Lion Rampant League, Round 4 - Battle Report

Fierce Foot face Yeomen Schiltron. 

Friday was a sad day for my Islemen in Round 4 of our Lion Rampant League. They were tasked with stopping Henry's Welsh from escorting The Messenger (Scenario H) from the NE corner of the table, to the SE corner. It did not  go well for the Islemen.
The Lion Rampant rules were written by Daniel Mersey and published by Osprey.


The Islemen units were:
2 Foot Men-at-Arms
2 Fierce Foot
1 Archers

Henry's Welsh units:
1 Mounted Sergeants
3 Foot Yeomen (with Javelin upgrade)
4 Bidowers

The Welsh had to guide their Messenger from the NE corner (bottom right of the picture) to the SE corner. The Islemen started with one unit of Fierce Foot in the SE corner (bottom left) and the rest in the NW corner.

Layout and deployment of starting forces

Initially the Islemen Archers and Men-at-Arms move out from the NW (top left) to intercept the Welsh advance across the board, but a cloud of Welsh Bidowers start to form a screen. The Welsh Messenger is still sitting quietly in the deployment zone.

Islemen move out from the left to intercept the Welsh on the right

 The Islemen Archers reach some Rough Ground in the mistaken belief it will give cover from the arrows of the Bidowers. Islemen Men-at-Arms move forward to try to sweep away the Bidowers thinking their armour would be good enough to withstand the Bidower's fire.

Islemen Achers wait in Rough Ground while Welsh Bidowers gather behind the hedges

In the South, Islemen Fierce Foot move out from the SE (bottom right) corner to try to catch the Messenger as he passes with his Yeomen guard. However another Yeomen unit moves down to block this attack too.

Islemen Fierce Foot wait behind a hill for an opportunity

The Fierce Foot have no choice other than to break through the Yeomen blocking unit. However the Yeomen have already formed a Schiltron and the Fierce Foot bounce back.

Welsh Yeomen fend off the Fierce Foot

Having blocked the Fierce Foot attack the Yeomen then use their Javelins to keep them at bay, eventually routing the not-so-Fierce Foot.

The Yeomen old off the Fierce Foot with Javelins

The Islemen Archers in the Rough Ground did finish off one unit of Bidowers but then succumbed to the withering fire of more Bidower units.
Meanwhile the Islemen Men-at-Arms are finding their armour is not quite as good against Bidowers as they hoped and are being whittled down. Any attempt to contact them is evaded by the Bidowers.

Men-at-Arms can't get to grips with the Bidowers

Finally an all out attack by all remaining Islemen units was made to break through to the skulky Welsh Messenger still languishing with the unit in the top right. The last few Fierce Foot are surrounded and rout and the Messenger has a clear path across the field.

The last few Fierce Foot are surrounded and rout.

As I said at the start, a sad day for my Islemen. At least two Welsh units played no part in the battle. I had no real answer to the Welsh Bidowers who were able to keep out of the way of my Islemen while picking them off.
The League Table can be seen here.