OHW - A tayste of Medieval Adventure.

In between the ACW campaign in One Hour Wargames, I thought I would try out the Medieval version of the rules. On this occasion I shall be using 28 mm figures, so my 36 cm square cushion of 6 mm fame has had to be replaced by the small table I have access to. It is still not quite the recommended size of 36 inches by 36 inches. It is too narrow from front to back, so I have created a 30 inch square. This simply means reducing range and movement by one sixth for all units.

The playing area has been kept simple, being totally flat, with just a few trees to break up the ranks.

I rolled on the chart for the composition of each force, the claret and blues have three units of knights, two of archers and a single unit of men at arms. The eagle eyed will spot that the knights have some light cavalry mixed in the ranks. This is due to them originally being painted up for Lion Rampant in sixes, but the lights are in the same livery and will have the same stats as their better armoured colleagues.

The green and whites army consists of four units of knights, plus one each of men at arms and levy.

Deployment saw the green and whites place two units of knights on each flank. The left flank also has the men at arms.

The right flank with the knights and levy.

For the claret and blues, they placed two units of knights on their right flank as well as a unit of archers.

On the left flank stand one unit each of knights, archers and men at arms.

Looking across the battlefield from East to West.

And from West to East.

I was going to delete this photograph, but even though washed out, seems quite evocative.

Turn One, the green and whites waste no time in surging forward.

Turn Two. The claret and blues, accept the challenge and they too surge forward.

Knights are about to clash. Archers still out of range.

A soldiers eye view.

Turn Three. Green and white cavalry smash into their opposite number, one has to settle for the men at arms, well the archers are beneath them after all.

Not quite making contact with the enemy men at arms.

A full blown duel of knights in the West.

No quarter asked, no quarter given!

Claret and blue knights on the East flank, take some casualties.

Some brutal fighting also sees lots of carnage on the opposite flank as the knights slam into each other.

Turn Four. Claret and blue men at arms slam into the oncoming knights.

Finally in range, the archers let loose a volley at the advancing spear armed levy.

Steady...steady...LOOSE!

Arrows strike home.

The knightly battles continue to rage, and noblemen fall.

Turn Five. Melees continue across the battlefield as the levy move in on their tormentors.

Brace yourselves archers, personally my bottom would be going like a rabbit's top lip at this point.

More knightly combat, and more knightly deaths.

One unit of claret and blue knights is destroyed.

Turn Six. Give them another helping boys!

Make every shot count.

Oh dear! not nearly enough, pass me some of that paper will you?

Knights and men at arms, fighting for their lives.

Looking along the battle lines

Turn Seven. The levy say hello to the archers.

As do the men at arms.

The victorious knights break through and look for another victim.

Disaster on the Eastern flank, as another claret and blue unit of knights are decimated.

The archers now embraced in melee, begin to suffer.

The men at arms seem to be gaining the upper hand in this duel.

More archers caught in melee bite the dust.

A bad day for the claret and blues, as their final knight unit is destroyed.

Turn Eight. Seemingly undaunted by the loss of all their mounted colleagues, the archers fight back and do pretty well too.

Next door the claret and blue men at arms, hack down the opposing knights.

More brave archers stand their ground.

Turn Nine. Badly battered but victorious, the knights attempt to turn into the embattled enemy archers.

For the claret and blue men at arms, they too swing round onto the flank of the levy, expecting the archers to shortly break, they will be able to slam into the enemy.

Two units of green and white cavalry are now on the hunt for more prey.

Only archers left over here, but they will do for now.

Turn Ten. Still the archers hold their ground, and hit back.

Turn Eleven. Now assailed in front and on the flank, things look grim.

The other unit of archers are also hit in the flank by enemy knights.

All with inevitable results, the archers are destroyed in quick succession of each other.

At this point with only one unit of men at arms still on the field for the claret and blues, and five enemy units on the loose, I called time on the battle.

A very enjoyable game, took much less than an hour, even with me taking photographs. The ability to get into melee is certainly brutal, and really speeds up the end of the battle. It of course was not allowed in the ACW variant of the rules.

Next up will be a Pike and Shot battle using the OHW rules, with 28 mm English Civil War troops.