SBVT3 Genpei Wars tournament match results

Semi-Final 1: GP07. Yahigagawa, August 1181

g1ul10: Banners 3 ( Blocks lost 18)
Mark McG: Banners 4 ( Blocks lost 16)

Tough match, with the Taira having to cross a fordable river against defenders in palisades. Initially I tried to flank the palisades with cavalry, which ended in 1 dead cavalry, and a cavalry leader picked off by an arrow! 0-2 down, the infantry rush the right flank, and manage to break a palisade, and push into the defences. The bite and hold strategy starts to pay off as the Minamoto left flank crumbles, drawing back to 2-2. Spirit of Haya-Ji gets the Taira cavalry across river in the centre, and a Personal challenge puts Yukiie down. More whittling down, and a First Strike opportunity for the cavalry sees Taira draw ahead 3-2 for a brief instance, before the cavalry dies. 3-3, but a vulnerable Yari unit goes down next card for 4-3 Taira win.

Took about an hour to play, which is longer than I expected for a 4 banner match.
[strike]2nd Semi-Final 1000 GMT tomorrow (Jan 2)[/strike]

Semi-Final 1: GP07. Yahigagawa, August 1181

Mark McG: Banners 2 ( Blocks lost 21)
g1ul10: Banners 4 ( Blocks lost 13)

Again a tough game, with the match decided in the very last turn. After a mostly ineffective arrows exchange between the two camps, the Taira (red) begin an infantry attack in the left and center sections. The Minamoto (yellow) adopt an aggressive defense strategy. For a couple of turns infantry units battle across the river and finally the Taira manage to gain a foothold on the Minamoto side. During their couter-offensive the Minamoto have a 2 figure spearmen units eliminated with its leader by a battle back. Its 2-0 for the red. This single roll seems to tilt the balance toward the Taira. The next turn its 3-0 for the Taira when they eliminate a weakened Samurai unit. But the resistance of the Minamoto is strong and after a couple of turns it is 3-2 for the red with several weakened units scattered on the battlefield. The last Ashigaru charge by the Minamoto fails and a battle back is responsible for the final Taira medal.

Congrats to Giulio, 2 close matches and I felt this was one of the best scenarios of the Genpei war I've played. Still have mixed feelings about attackers chopping down palisades while the defenders do nothing. For me, the Rampart rules would be enough.

Missile fire incredibly ineffective. On the approach, the Taira suffered 32 dice of missile fire, for 2 hits. Over the course of the match, the Taira Yari cavalry took 12d of missile attacks, and were unscathed. One of those matches were I couldn't hit a thing. So I did feel the Minamoto had a good chance for victory, but blew it.

Interestingly, both scenarios had a similar feature in that it was an Infantry Onslaught onto the Minamoto Left/Centre that broke the defences.

Mark McG wrote: Congrats to Giulio, 2 close matches and I felt this was one of the best scenarios of the Genpei war I've played. Still have mixed feelings about attackers chopping down palisades while the defenders do nothing. For me, the Rampart rules would be enough.

Thanks for the match reports. Sound like great games. I'm looking forward to viewing the logs.

This is an awkward tactical situation for the Taira. The combination of the river and the shield wall makes for a tricky assault, particularly as their dice in the river are reduced for Palisade destruction.

Destruction of palisades (pulling down shields, filling in moats, burning abatis) was a described feature of almost every battle involving them. The historical aspect is still very important to me in differentiating these scenarios (therefore making these distinct from Ramparts in Ancients or Redoubts in Napoleonics) so I'm very much inclined to keep this in the rules. I have considered battle back on attempts at Palisade destruction and would like to playtest it before finalising the rules.

Brent.

Guys I'd love to play the final. Any news about the other semi-final?

g1ul10 wrote: Guys I'd love to play the final. Any news about the other semi-final?

Sorry about the delay, Giulio. I think Todd has been away and we've only just been able to make contact this week.......and my heavy work schedule is now a problem for getting this completed in the next week (which is also why I haven't been able to make progress on the Genpei War material ). We'll let you know as soon as we're done.

Mark is planning to start another tournament and I'll suggest that he does so while we're waiting.......no rush to finish this one before the next.

Brent.

To an extent part of the problem is too many tournaments, or rather particular players being in so many tournaments they can't play matches quick enough. Ancients and Napoleonics are the main 2, but Samurai Battle and The Great War as well.

I'm happy to start a new tournament for Samurai Battles if others are ready, but that doesn't solve the semi-final problem, and likely reduces the number of players that can commit to a tournament because of their outstanding matches.

I had planned on SBVT4 being some of the Ninja Attack Expansion scenarios, which seem more meaty and higher unit counts than the original game.

Mark McG wrote: I had planned on SBVT4 being some of the Ninja Attack Expansion scenarios, which seem more meaty and higher unit counts than the original game.

It sounds great. I'm in. BTW Just received Ancients for Christmas (by Santa... aka me) and I hope to join you on the tournament there too. But not before having played all the scenarios in the base box at least once.

with toddrew's prelonged absence, I am awarding the Semi-Final victory to BrentS, so we can move along to the Finals/

g1ul10 vs BrentS
Scenario: GP08. Yokotagawa - July, 1182

Good luck to you both

Is Todd away? I haven't heard back from him in the last fortnight but the delay last month was my fault because of my hectic work schedule. Happy to proceed to get it done so we can move along but I'll try Todd again.

Brent.