Chuang Shyue Chou - Mar 20, 2005 9:01 pm (#9315 Total: 9390) On the Table: SPI's Great Medieval Battles. Battle played: Angorra or Ankara in 1402. It depicts a battle between Tamerlane or Tamburlaine against Sultan Bayazid and his Ottoman Turks including a large contingent of Serbs. A decisive battle? What does decisive really mean in the context of history? This is my second time attempting this system. This time, I played the Moghuls while my extremely skilful opponent took the Ottoman Turks. As the Moghuls, I had my right wing engage the Ottoman with mounted archers. To my dismay, despite many attacks, I was only able to eliminate one unit in this most crucial of beginnings. My attacks in the second and third turns were simply just as unsuccessful as I sent wave and wave of mounted archers against his line. I had hoped that I could inflict a few more casualties as well as cause disorder in the Ottoman line. My opponent created a masterly defence with a second line of melee units. My left wing stretched my opposite wing to the other edge of the map but did not engage. He was denying this wing. (Shades of an oblique order by the numerically weaker opponent. Well done!) I manage to inflict more casualties with a series of great die rolls but my opponent did manage to pass his morale checks and also rally route units. His line was holding well. My attacks were finally succeeding but I was inflicting way too few casualties. From turn 3, I could see that I would not be able to massacre the Ottomans. And my opponent charged my right wing! Both lines broke. And there was a free-for-all there with me managing to eliminate a janissaries unit in plate armour. However, he had four mounted units in mail left at that end. He would survive while I lack the necessary units and time to win (or lose). Meanwhile, my elephant unit hit his plate unit and his Serbian contingent became disordered but his line was still holding to a large extent. It was too close to call after 8 turns. It was likely to be a draw or marginal victory for either side though I led in VPs. My opponent offered a draw and I accepted it. In the other table, we have another game of the same battle, the Moghuls did manage to break the Ottoman Turks. It was a massacre. We played doubles. My team didn't win as I wasn't able to produce a massacre. All in all, it was a great session. Up next: Strategic & Tactics issue 96: 'Singapore' on Saturday. This one has a extremely distorted map of Singapore. However, they did depict the Jurong line.