Lion Rampant - First Game

Several of us met at the Game Matrix in Tacoma today for some Lion Rampant games. It was the first time for most of us, but we all seemed to enjoy the rules even though we may have not gotten everything exactly right. For one thing, in the game I played we initially had not correctly done the Courage tests. We didn't count the casualties cumulatively when figuring out the tests - that is, we only subtracted casualties caused in each turn when working out the Courage test result. At first this seemed very harsh and made for units to be destroyed quite quickly, but it does seem correct for the overall flavor of fast-paced game.

My buddy Adrian and I used the Bloodbath scenario as it is the most straight forward. I only got off a few pictures as I was referring to the rule book throughout the game to ensure we were on track.

My Early-HRE foot serjeants receiving an attack by English MAA. The foot serjeants are good at defense - although in this case they'd have been even better off in Schiltron, but they had just moved out off the woods in their previous turn.

The same unit of HRE foot serjeants in the previous turn  in cover from English archers.

The HRE crossbowmen only got to take out a few of the English before they failed their Courage test after receiving casualties from English bow fire.

One of two HRE mounted MAA units - with the Archbishop of Cologne as the retinue leader. Both mounted MAA units failed multiple movement activations early in the game. After eventually passing their movement activation this unit put the English right to flight.

The mounted MAA unit on the HRE right eventually passed movement activation to move up and attack an English foot MAA unit. They did very well in their attack and practically destroyed the English foot MAA unit. However, due to consecutive bad Courage tests, enough HRE units left the table to give the English an edge for victory.

Pat's Byzantinnes facing Old Bob's French

Wes' knights taking fire from Scott's bidowers.

For the most part I have no trouble with the rules as they are. Some of the players did have issues with the 3" between units rule though. I believe they are in the spirit of the rules being kept to small unit actions. It appears that no more than two units (one per side) can be in a close combat at any given time. Although there is the possibility of a unit being attacked by two different units in a given turn - separately of course. I like the size of units and the assignment of hits to casualty per type of unit. I'm looking forward to playing out the other scenarios - as well as adding more terrain. We did use the minimum suggested - one piece per quarter. Overall I like these rules and I think they should appeal to a lot of the community for various reasons - not the least of which is the price of the rules (clearly written and nicely illustrated at that), as well as the relatively modest amount of figures required. Unless of course you want to run 4 units of Serfs!