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Cutter of Heads |
Blood Shedder |
Dweller in the Black House of the War God |
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1 Reg CinC Bd(I) |
1 Reg Gen Bd(I) |
1 Reg Gen Bd(I) |
1 Reg Gen Bd(I) |
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10/29 |
9/26 |
8.5/24.5 |
5.0/14.0 |
Obsidian Serpent & Cutter of Heads lead the main combat commands. In particular, Obsidian Serpent has the Quachic (Wb) who provide the main punch of the army. These two commands should be aimed at enemy who can be crushed by their heavy infantry. Thus, in general, they deploy in the centre of the army and aim for the enemy infantry centre.
Blood Shedder has the main supporting or delaying command. His primary mission is to occupy enemy mounted troops and protect the flank of the two main combat commands. The size of his command means he can happily contest an open flank.
Dweller has the weakest command. His command is ideal for sending on a flank march or for covering the other flank of the two main combat commands. The fragility of his command means that it is better if he has some terrain to work with. Also he is the ideal dumping ground for low PiP scores.
The large size of the army & large number of impetuous troops means complex manoeuvres don’t work and it is best to roll straight forward. The impetuous troops also mean it is best to attack vigorously and (hope) to use numbers to soak up losses. The regular generals mean it is possible to focus PiPs where most needed (generally with the two battle winning combat commands). Thus keeping the Clan Warriors (Hd) under control, so not requiring too many PiPs is a good idea.
The Quachic (Wb) should deploy in 2 ranks (sometimes with Clan Warriors as a third rank). They are the primary strike troops for use against enemy heavy infantry so must be given most support & attention in their use.
The Suit Wearers (Reg Bd) should deploy in 2 ranks but be ready to separate the ranks as they close with the enemy. They are intended to attack enemy foot, and either defeat them or delay them while the Quachic punch a hole. Consider deploying them in ambush if defender.
The Priests (Irr Bd) deploy close to the baggage to protect it from attack.
The Mercenaries (Reg Bw) deploy on the open end of the line (probably in column) or as a reserve. Their primary role is as a counter or threat to mounted enemy. They are certainly the best troops to fight enemy knights with.
The Clan Warriors (Hd) are tough, as superior, and happy fighting in rough or difficult going, so are ideal for contesting terrain with enemy light troops. However, they are unable to destroy enemy skirmishers except by flank attacks and are vulnerable to knights & warband (as is the entire army!). Enemy cavalry (& often light horse) will defeat them but only slowly (as they are not as easily destroyed as Psiloi by mounted in the open) and the Clan Warriors may be able to take enemy in the flank due to superior numbers.
The Canoes (Bts(I)) can be used to paddle along rivers or waterways. They present a threat to the enemy and may be able to launch a useful attack on the flank of the enemy battle line, poor quality troops in the enemy rear or baggage. Also once the Clan Warriors are out of their canoes then they are impetuous so need few PiPs!
The skirmishers (Ps) are the fastest and most manoeuvrable troops in the army. They can be rushed forward to take terrain or pin/delay enemy troops. Also they are useful for attacking enemy flanks or for covering the flank of the large mass of Clan Warriors.
All the troops (except Psiloi & Canoes) move at the same speed (and are not slowed by rough going), so each command can deploy and move as a single block.
Generals should not be deployed in the front line, but well to the rear of their commands. The only exception is Cutter of Heads who may provide sufficient extra punch that it is worth him leading from the front. He will rarely be stuck in combat as Inferior.
Blood Shedder commands the same number of elements as Obsidian Serpent so either of them can be deployed first. In general, it will be better to deploy Blood Shedder first as this gives Obsidian Serpent the best chance of deploying the Quachic (Wb) opposite a suitable target.
As noted above, Blood Shedder deploys on the open flank. Dweller deploys on the closed flank or flank marches. Obsidian Serpent & Cutter of Heads deploy next to each other in the centre. If it is expected that the enemy will deploy with mounted in the centre then consider deploying either Blood Shedder or Dweller in the centre, with Obsidian Serpent & Cutter of Heads on the wings - they will aim to get round the enemy mounted and into any supporting infantry. If the terrain is very cluttered then consider flank marching Blood Shedder.
Obsidian Serpent has the boats (& clan warriors) so he is most likely to deploy next to any river or waterway. Alternatively his clan warriors deploy attached to the back of the Quachic (for ease of control) or are used to contest bad going (on auto-pilot). Cutter of Heads has the Mercenaries (Bw) who can be used to guard his open flank or as a threat to small groups of Knights (e.g. Macedonian Companions or Roman Lancers). Blood Shedder has so many Clan Warriors (Hd) that they are best deployed in multiple lines with gaps between the lines.
The high Aztec aggression (3) means the army will often be the attacker. This is probably a good thing as it allows the army to deploy second and to move first (so avoiding being pinned on the baseline by enemy LH).
The size of the army and its impetuous nature means having a lot of terrain is probably a bad thing as it means the enemy can fight on a restricted front with their good troops, rather than being stretched by the size of the Aztec army. Thus, it will generally be best when attacking not to use the steep hill option, but to consider the use of a river or waterway. Also, when defending use the minimum amount of terrain, use large pieces of terrain and consider using roads. The exception is against warband (and possibly knights) when need to break up the enemy to have a chance, so use lots of small pieces of difficult or rough terrain. If the terrain is very cluttered then consider flank marching Blood Shedder.
Night battles are probably a good thing for the Aztecs (the loss of PiP swapping is more than balanced by loss of speed for enemy mounted troops), so invade during winter. If want to use canoes on a river, avoid summer - also may want to avoid winter in cold due to freezing - best chance of using rivers is during flooding (i.e. spring/autumn in cold, winter in warm/dry & spring in tropical), but also likely to rain (which will affect archers).
Aztecs invaded. I chose the winter season, so it should have been a night battle (for 1 hour) with mist but my opponents preferred a daylight battle, so we ignored time of day (as "optional" at Berkeley). I placed a large (200 paces wide) river. The Romans placed four entirely steep hills (and a compulsory road).
The river was paltry so no boats. First mistake: I forgot you cannot place ambushes in the central zone under 2.1 so wasted a lot of time worrying about such an ambush and how to deal with it (so spent my first move checking out the hill).
The Armenians were unreliable - this was a BIG help – they decided to send out a column of LH(F) along the far side of the river, but this came to nothing.
Roman 1 advanced to contest the hill with Aztec slingers (before the Aztecs could get round it) and this resulted in the only real fight in game. To left of hill (i.e. between river & hill) the Quachic engaged a small number (5?) of Roman legionaries and began to kill them slowly (Quachic had a clear overlap). On the hill Roman Ax(S) slowly beat the Aztec slingers. To the right of the hill a small fight developed between more legionaries from Roman 1 and Cutter of Heads’ suitwearers (with losses even).
Roman 2 was happy to stop within artillery range and shoot. Unfortunately they got to shoot at some Mercenaries (Bw(I)) so killed a couple of elements. Second mistake: the Mercenaries had nothing to do in this battle and I should not have put them in the front line.
Roman cavalry left a couple of LH to face Blood Shedder and the rest set off to aid Roman 1, but didn’t arrive by the end. Blood Shedder moved forward slowly and eventually engaged the end of the line of Roman 2.
Dweller eventually arrived and moved quickly to the river (which was easily fordable), so he began to cross. Third mistake: I almost attacked the Armenians! If I did they would become reliable, while if I had hung back they would change sides when Roman 1 collapsed!!
Final result was a draw (5-5). However, with slightly better dice the Quachic would have killed the 2-3 extra Legionaries needed to break Roman 1 (and bring the Armenians in on the Aztec side): 8-2 win?
Lessons: River was more trouble than help. Without it would have had more space to manoeuvre round the hill in the centre. And would have had all commands on table. So only use river if will be in flood.
The following is a brief account (from a fading memory) of the games we played at Shieldwall 99.
We arrived at the competition with an army that my Roger, my partner, had never used before and which definitely does not fall within the "killer" or "tournament tiger" category: instead, it is firmly in the "romantic" category.
Game 1 against Aztecs
Keith McGlyn who runs & umpires the various Shieldwall competitions had taken pity on us, so our first game was against Keith’s own Aztec army. We began playing against Keith and then switched to playing against a team whose opponents had not turned up.
Keith’s army organisation was radically different from ours/mine. He had one command with only a sub general as a PiP dump, a second command which was entirely of slingers (Ps(O)), and two main commands which both included clan warriors (a.k.a. peasants, Hd(S)). His main strike command contained a VERY nasty surprise: Keith had double based the Otomi (Wb(F)), with the Quachic (Wb(S)) to give himself a 10 element frontage of, effectively, double based Wb(S). We only had 10 Wb(S), so a 5 element frontage – and Wb(S) is instant death to Bd(I) or Hd(S).
Keith’s trick is not prevented by the lists, but it was one I had never considered as it goes against the likely actual organisation of the real (i.e. historical) Aztec army. Having seen this trick and knowing how it would boost the effectiveness on the wargames table of my Aztecs, I still will not use it. Does this put me firmly in the "romantic" camp? On with the game.
We defended and put down a number of gentle hills covered in rocks (i.e. rough going). The two very large ones were significant – I can not remember where the other went. (Writing this has just made me realise that this was probably illegal as the Aztecs aren’t allowed Rocky areas etc., so the hills should have been steep sloped or tree covered – terrain on the Aztec list is WW, Rv, H(S), Wd, M, Rd, BUA – oops!).
We ambushed Horde(S) on both hills. Indeed, we put a whole command on the left hand hill and hid slingers (Ps(O)) amongst the rocks on the forward slopes. The rest is shown on the diagram below.
Having seen Keith place his strike command in the centre with all those shock troops (Warband!), we planned on holding his strike command, demonstrating on our left and aiming our main thrust at breaking Keith’s CinC’s command.
The game went much as planned from our point of view. Our ambush on the right meant our Horde(S) had the advantage of being uphill to Keith’s Horde(S). Also we managed to get some of our Quachic (Wb(S)) into the Suitwearers (Bd(I)) of Keith’s CinC’s command. Eventually the grinding broke it, but not long before time was called. We managed to hold elsewhere, so ended up with a nice 7-3 win.
The problem with a good win in the first round, is we had to fight a decent army in the second round. Anything, with Knights is bad news and the massed Chariots (Kn(S)) were a nasty prospect.
We invaded, put down no terrain and the Assyrians put down a number of gentle hills. These were neatly sloped hills (like ours), but they had neatly (and cunningly) used lengths of string to denote exactly where the ridgelines ran. This was neat as it avoided any potential argument and cunning as they were shaped to provide large pockets to hide in on one side only. (The map shows the hills which had an impact.)
The clear area on our left looked like the most likely place for the massed Assyrian chariots, so we placed Blood Shedder there: the theory being he could absorb a lot of losses before breaking. Dweller flank marched on the left in the hope of possibly sandwiching the Assyrian mounted. Cutter of Heads had the centre, with his archers next to Blood Shedder: we were hoping to upset some cavalry with them – ideally advancing Cutter of Heads and holding back with Blood Shedder would mean the archers to fire into the flank of a mounted attack on Blood Shedder.
The Assyrians attacked our left strongly. Some cavalry also ended up fighting Cutter of Heads (I’m not sure if they were from the CinC’s command or one of the others – memory failure), while the Assyrian spearmen (inc. lost of Sp(S)) moved to threaten the archers and to engage Cutter of Heads. Obsidian Serpent moved as fast as possible (delayed by LH skirmishers) to attack the Auxilia command.
Both flank marches arrived late in the game. The Assyrian flank march consisted entirely of camels (Cm(O) & LH(I)). On arrival it headed for our baggage and slowing it down was tricky as Obsidian Serpent was on the far side of a hill (i.e. extra PiPs), but we managed to get a few Ps(O) back to delay it.
Our flank march was late, came on with a PiP score of 1 (which is very bad news as it makes it hard to get the command on at all!) and was delayed by small numbers of Assyrian troops.
On our right, Obsidian Serpent broke the Auxilia command after a long fight.
Meanwhile, the Assyrian Chariots, with cavalry support, had smashed Blood Shedder. The archers had killed a few cavalry, and Cutter of Heads had killed more cavalry (fortunately it was Cv(O) – also, though we had Bd(I) fighting Cv(O), we had reserves to plug gaps and the Cv(O) fighting Cutter of Heads was only a single line): so the cavalry started to disengage from the front, as the Chariots turned to come into Cutter of Heads’ flank.
The final stage of the game was interesting. Cutter of Heads was attempting to disengage from the Assyrian spearmen and Chariots (to his left front and left flank), while also trying to catch the cavalry retreating from his right front (and trying to lap round the flank of the Assyrian spearmen). Unfortunately, our losses mounted faster than the Assyrian losses and our army broke.
Overall result a 9-1 defeat. However, the battle was a lot closer than the score line suggests, as if during the last couple of moves we had killed 3 elements in the Assyrian CinC’s then the Assyrian army would have broken – but they worked hard to deny us that chance (and Cv(O) moves faster than Bd(I)).
Well having lost badly, we expected an easier match next time but got yet another Neo Assyrian Later Sargonid army! More unstoppable Chariots (Kn(S)) – gulp!
We defended and put down our rocky hills again. (I can not remember where the other big one ended up so it was probably on the Assyrian base line). The best chariot country looked to be in the centre so Blood Shedder went there. Our success against the last Assyrian armies cavalry, encouraged us to place Cutter of Heads on the right -his all regular command meant it could march quickly, so we want to use it to try and turn the Assyrian line. Obsidian Serpent went next to the big hill and Dweller was ambushed on it.
I’m not sure where the Assyrian auxiliary command started, but it tended to stay back and it ended up in the middle of the main Chariot & Cavalry command. The Arab ally command was large, with lots of Auxilia(O) and Psiloi.
Dweller fought an intense, long and not very bloody battle with the Arab auxilia/psiloi on the big hill. Dweller had the up slope advantage so was slowly pushing the Arabs back.
Obsidian Serpent advanced to stare at the Assyrian spear command (which stared back). Both commands were anchored on the hill, so I was waiting for Dweller to push the Arabs back far enough to enable Obsidian Serpent to attack with flank support. If I attacked before exposing one of other flank then it would be a very even fight: opening one flank would give me the edge (I hoped).
The Assyrian chariots moved up towards Blood Shedder but then stopped. The Assyrian CinC’s attention was on trying to stop/delay Cutter of Heads without losing too many cavalry (again Cv(O)). Roger was pushing hard with Cutter of Heads, but finding it hard to chase fast moving Cv(O) & LH. As the end of the game approached, we launched Blood Shedder into the Assyrians in an attempt to get a result but ran out of time.
Overall a 5-5 draw, with very few loses. This was disappointing as we had been the ones dictating the action.
Heading into our last game, we were hoping for something without Kn(S) and without more Warband than we had – but we got Malay (i.e. massed Wb(S)). Also we were the invader, so no scope for interesting ambushes.
They placed a number of woods (or jungle) and (I think) a village (which I think was on their base line) – only relevant terrain is on the map.
We needed a radical plan if we were to have a hope against massed Wb(S). (Two ranks of Wb(S) are factor 4(S) versus either 5(I) for our Blades or 2(S) for the Hordes, and the Wb kill both of them on more!) Therefore, we flank marched both Dweller and Blood Shedder. We planned to spread Obsidian Serpent’s command out in a long line with our Quachic (Wb(S)) only 1 rank deep – this was to delay the enemy as long as possible, while Cutter of Heads again tried to use his manoeuvrability to turn the end of the Malay line.
The Malay’s deployed two big commands of Wb(S) and El(O) (& a few Psiloi), a small command of El(O) & LH(O), and an Sinhalese ally with El(O), Bd(F), Bw and Hd..
Our plan worked well, but not well enough. Cutter of Heads attacked the small Light Horse & Elephant command – I was lucky and broke it almost immediately: the luck was in fleeing some enemy LH, while being pushed back by others (at first contact) so being able to flank attack some LH (and kill it); meanwhile, my slingers (Ps(O)) and archers (Bw(I)) killed an Elephant or two.
The problem was exploiting this success. The demoralised enemy led bits of Cutter of Head’s command on a merry dance. I used some to attack the exposed flank of the main Malay command – right on this flank was the enemy CinC (on his Elephant), but he refused to die despite many attacks by Ps(O) and Bw(I). The rest of Cutter of Head’s command was trying to avoid contact with massed Wb(S), which we managed for a while.
Meanwhile, Roger used Obsidian Serpent to fight a nice delaying action against most of the enemy army. But he could not delay the inevitable and Obsidian Serpent broke.
This increased the pressure on Cutter of Heads and he eventually broke as well- which broke our army. (Dweller had arrived but only to chase demoralised enemy, while Blood Shedder was still trying to find the battlefield).
Another 9-1 defeat. But if we had managed to kill the enemy CinC, then it is likely his command would have broken and with it the whole enemy army.
With hindsight, the plan was too radical (or not radical enough). We should have kept Dweller on table to do the job Obsidian Serpent did (as the loss of Dweller would have been a smaller step towards loss of the army), and Obsidian Serpent and Cutter of Heads to attack opposite ends of the Malay line. See below.
Overall we scored 14 out of a possible 40, but it could so easily have been more. Also our opponents had to work at it: none of them had easy wins – the Malay’s probably had the easiest win but that was because their CinC was very lucky.
So why play with Aztec? Clearly, on the wargames table (in DBM) the Aztec's worst nightmare is a warband army (such as the Editor's beloved Sea Peoples - Slingshot 205), and knights are bad news. However, it is an enjoyable army to use (though it can be frustrating trying to exploit success or push the pace with such a slow moving army), has an interesting history (which is what gets me interested in an army), is different (so gives you and your opponent unusual tactical problems) and will impress people with its size and colour.
Now to get back to painting 25mm Aztecs - a very pretty sight!
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Last revised: August 26, 1999. |
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