THE BATTLE OF BARNET, 1471 IN THE WAR OF THE ROSES
GIANT DBA 3 GAME
Introduction
Our local group has been working its way through the War of the Roses. One of the games was the Battle of Barnet. This was an attempt by Edward IV to reclaim his throne after being ousted by King Maker -- Earl of Warwick. The story of the battle can be found here
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Barnet
I wanted this game to be a large one, involving 8 players on a 4" by 8" foot table and using most of my Wars of the Roses figure collection. This collection represents 6 DBA 3 "armies" worth for each side.
IV/83a Wars of the Roses Armies 1455-1485 AD or Tudor Army 1486-1515
AD: 1 x General
(4Bd or 3Kn), 1 x currours (Cv) or border staves (LH) or unreliable levies (7Hd), 4 x
stiffened billmen (4Bd), 4 x
archers (4Lb), 1 x guns (Art), 1 x
Welsh (3Pk) or Irish (3Ax) or men-at-arms (4Bd/3Kn) or mercenary
handgunners (Ps).
I made a pool of elements from which each commander could draw. The pool was 80 elements, 5 x 16 different element options. I did not include the Horde as no one wanted it. Below is the Yorkist roster
The Lancaster command wrote this
"
I lost my notes , but I mainly had bows and blades in the center, a mix of horse, bows and blades on each flank, and most of the horse and light in reserve." He also placed artillery in center and left flank.
This battle had a number of interesting aspects that made it a bit difficult to model. First the right, center and left battles of each army were not aligned as they deployed at night, see attached map
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/35/Battle_of_Barnet%2C_early-battle.svg/1178px-Battle_of_Barnet%2C_early-battle.svg.png
Secondly, at dawn there was a dense fog that prevented troops from seeing enemy. As they advanced, Gloucester on the York right and Oxford on the Lancaster right noticed that they were overlapping the enemy line and turned to attack that enemy in the flank.
How to recreate the situations on the table top. There were many good suggestion on the DBA Chat board
http://fanaticus.org/discussion/showthread.php?t=18168
Part 1 -- First day of game
I decided to keep things simple. Each side deployed not knowing the others deployment. First set on was covered with boxes. Then second side deployed, also covered. Each side then moved with opponent covered until they got within cannon range -- 5 Base Widths (BW = 60mm). I had told the two right flank battles of the overlapped lines and allowed them to wheel towards the enemy flank. Each side took a cannon shot straight ahead without seeing enemy. They rolled for results, but only a couple of recoils.
Here is the table with boxes, showing Hastings vs Oxford
Then I removed the boxes and we started almost normal rules. For a few bounds, all shooting had to be straight ahead, no support shoots. All moves were only forward, or not at all. Most important was that players could not talk to each other unless elements in contact. Each CinC was given two couriers that they could send to wing commanders with new orders.
The two players whose flank was turned were not happy to see the enemy coming at them from the side. Here is a close up of Hastings and Oxford
Exeter lost his artillery and a few bows who were shot at but not able to shoot back. He charged a line of bows with his cavalry and light horse but was badly shot up. One LH remained.
At the end of the first day, here is the overall picture.
Because of hostile cats at the house, we always put "Cat Baffles" on the table, if we leave the table set up for continued game. Thin ply wood on legs.
A reader asked me what are Hostile Cats. They are cats that are hostile to the terrain, and any figures on the terrain. Here is some damage they did to Napoleonic battle terrain. Before the baffles, we might well find figures around the table, displaced by cats.
Here is one of the culprits
