Lion Rampant Practice

Next week I'm playing in a Lion Rampant tournament - my first time playing in a wargames tournament in five years or so. So on Thursday a group of us who are playing had a practice game to get used to the rules. It's always I good idea to be familiar with the rules, I find.

We mostly used reduced figure units, because Caesar didn't have enough figures to accomodate three of us. Theo used his own figures but they were mostly either just undercoated or not even assembled (his light cavalry unit consisted of a single horse and five empty bases). Theo has promised that the army will be painted by next Sunday.

Anyway, we just had a free-for-all to get used to mechanisms, but I did at least use a force that's basically what I plan to use.

I'm borrowing figures for a Sub-Roman British warband, but I used various figures from Caesar's collection to replicate the troops I plan to use.

I didn't take photos or keep a record of what happened in most of the game. It was all a bit of a wild free-for-all. The tournament will consist of preset terrain and scenarios, so it will be interesting to see what forces people come up with given that they will have no idea what they will be required to do.

One thing we had in our game were a lot of leader challenges. Stuart's leader challenged mine, only to discover that I had a skill that made my leader harder to kill. The duel was a draw.

Caesar wasn't so lucky - his leader was slain by Theo's undercoated commander.

Theo's commander was part of a group of warband infantry lurking in some woods in the centre. I avenged Caesar when Theo's unit strayed too close to the edge and one of my skirmishing archers picked off his leader with a well-aimed arrow.

I then demanded a rematch with Stuart's leader, and this time killed him. This meant that I was now the only player with a leader on the table.

There were numerous wild swings of fortune but in the end Caesar and I came out on top. I think we have the rules sorted now though, and should be good to go for next Sunday.