4/11/2022

Orc country

After repelling the incursion of the Orcs, king Einar hastily musters all reachable men and trespasses Orc country to retaliate. Thinking speed and surprise would be more decisive than numbers he didn't rally all his forces, but to his despair he faces a second invading Orc army, and this time he sees something he hasn't met before, cavalry!

The Orcs with their general in the big mob in the centre go down the hills towards king Einar's forces but their Warg Riders decide to stay and wait. Puzzled by their cavalry not supporting them, the Orcs lose their initiative and then Eilif and the Rangers on the left side loose their arrows and kill three Orcs whereas on the opposite side another group of archers kills two more.

Immediately after that, Einar orders general charge.

The Death Dealers (berserkers) and the Rangers make a short work of the Orcs and the four only survivors of two Orc units fall back in panic.

Then Einar with his Huscarls armed with two hand axes,  together with the right wing of his army, charges against the general of the Orcs causing as well too much pain and death. Only one of his units falls back after loosing its leader (the yellow dot).

The archers on the right have now in range the Orc's cavalry and almost exterminate a light unit in one go!

Things are going really good for king Einar and crows will feast on Orcs' flesh this day.

Severely mauled, the Orc general also falls back and the battle is won; but I wanted to try my newly painted cavalry so I decided to play one more turn.

In the next turn, a flanking reinforcement of medium cavalry arrived on the left flank and could charge the rear of a Fyrd that had already suffered several loses, destroying it completely!

Then, the four surviving Orcs reformed into the general's Orc unit that became strong once again.

Moreover, the other unit of medium cavalry finally charged down and killed all the archers on the right flank whereas the only surviving Orc mounted skirmish rallied and started to kill Mirholme warriors from the leaderless unit that had also rallied.

The tide of the battle dramatically changed in one turn and now it was Mirholme who was in peril, but as the forces were still more or less equal and both had taken too many casualties, I decided to end the battle and let both forces retire, calling it a Phyrric victory for Mirholme.

AFter the battle, king Einar realized about the importance of having cavalry, and he decided to send his loyal Ranger to Treyine with a letter asking for help. He needed knights who could help fighting the Orcs as well as train his men to fight mounted. In the meantime, he would retire to his castle to build up a new army to fight and conquer the Orcs.