Byzantine vs Crusader DBA

We played big-battle DBA last night, pitting Geoff's Byzantines against Peter's Early Crusaders. I have a bit of a soft-spot for Early Crusaders; their list in DBM always looked like a disaster waiting to happen, with so many impetuous troops of different types in it. However yesterday I was on Team Byzantine, running the infantry on the right flank.

Here's the lines closing, with the Byzantines nearest the camera.

Both sides had lots of cavalry and knights. At the rear of the picture are the light cavalry. We came unstuck there, as the Crusader's lights easily saw off our, who seemed very half-hearted in their will to fight.

It didn't take long for the lines to break up. Our left flank command broke early on, mostly due to our light cavalry's unwillingness to fight, and our centre wasn't looking too well either. But it was the Crusader centre command which broke first there, giving us a little bit of breathing space.

On my flank I had archers mixed with the Varangians holding off Crusader spears. Casualties were light; one Crusader archer element destroyed by skirmishing light infantry in the background of the picture. Otherwise it was a shoving match.

The battle was close, but the Crusaders went over the edge first, losing enough tropps in the centre for their army to break. Geoff had a run of bad luck in combats early on, but once his rolls picked up the Byzantines were just able to hold on for the victory.



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