The Byzantines claimed a moral advantage on the grounds that they had God on a stick.
There were ploughed fields on each flank, which turned out to be muddy. This left the cavalry on both flanks a little hindered. However both armies still plodded through the mud on the Byzantine left to try and gain an advantage.
On the Byzantine right things were a little more cautious.
The Byzantines got the upper hand on the left.
But things were still cautious on the right.
Meanwhile the Franks advanced slowly, with a pile of blades in the centre and a load of knights on their left. The Byzantines were content to wait it out, peppering the advancing Franks with archery that did little more than slow them.
A charge right down the line - the fight was on!
The Byzantines fell back, losing some of their cavalry and giving the Franks a breakthrough.
The Byzantine cavalry was somewhat disadvantaged against the Frankish knights.
In the centre, and on the other flank, the Byzantines gave ground slowly, but without losses. Their double-depth bow elements proved surprisingly resilient, give that they were up against blades.
The Byzantine left was actually scoring plenty of kills, and the Franks were a single element away from breaking, whilst the Byzantines were still only just about halfway there. That changed in a single bound when the Franks got their act together, destroying two double-depth elements and one of the Byzantine commanders to claim the victory. And he captured God on a Stick.
In fact this was a surprisingly close game, although it was mostly down to Geoff commanding the Byzantine left flank. I had the right and failed to inflict much damage on the Franks, before losing a pile of stuff in one bound. I did forget that psiloi move three base-widths, not two for most of the game, which slowed down my cunning flanking move by a turn or so. That's what I'm going to blame it on. Peter commanded the Franks single-handed, and just kept driving forwards, which seemed the best tactic under the circumstances.
Looks like it was a great game. The miniatures looked splendid too. Going to have to have another go at DBA one of these days. I've always been a bit put off by the strange jargon its written in. Maybe the new versions a bit better.
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