Sundiata And The Mother Of Dragons

I've been enjoying giving my Daenerys Targaryen army a good outing over the past couple of weeks, and looking at its strengths and weaknesses. The latest game saw them paired off against the army they share a box with - Sundiata's legendary Malians.

Sundiata defended. I used a few die-rolls to determine the makeup of the Targaryen army - the dragons were fielded as a pair of fliers, whilst the two heroes were the general. The rest of the army was the usual mix of riders, spears and hordes.

Daenerys found her army deployed between two woods, so would have to move it out quickly to give it some frontage.

Some of the hordes were deployed partially in a wood, and fell foul of Sundiata's hunter lurkers. Still, a lost horde this early in the battle is hardly devastating.

The two armies closed. 

A large cavalry fight shaped up on the far flank. Both sides shuffled their lines to bring their best troop to bear and to cover flanks.

Sundiata's army charged with riders facing riders and teh African king having an overlap.

They lost - one element destroyed and one recoiled.

The infantry met in the centre.

A disaster for Sundiata as he lost an element of spears and also his griot cleric. There was now a huge hole in the Malian line. The Dothraki and a supporting dragon finished off the Malian riders.

Sundiata was now in trouble; 8AP down and badly out of position. However a hero never gives up and he swiftly dispatched one of the dragons.

He was surrounded by Dothraki and the other dragons ...

... but saw them off. One of the Dothraki recoiled off the board and was lost.

There now commenced a period where both sides only rolled 1 or 2 PIPs each bound, so big moves stopped. This favoured Sundiata's archers on the other flank that could pepper the hordes and Unsullied there with arrows and force them back.

On the other flank it was a series of moves by individual elements for a while and relatively inconclusive fights. But Sundiata was able to ignore dragons on his flank to attack some Dothraki that had no retreat.

And his heavy cavalry surrounded Daenerys's heroes and beat them. That was enough to defeat the Targaryen army.

From 1-8 down, Sundiata came back to win the battle 11g-8 - quite a turnaround!