Age of El Cid - Battle of Graus 1063 CE

[James Morris]

Yesterday I met up with old chums TWD and Scrivs for a large El Cid era battle, reuniting our 28mm collections of medieval Spanish.  After getting over the hernia caused by lugging metal cavalry armies around (thank god for plastics nowadays) we settled down to fight a scenario based on the Battle of Graus, fought on 8th May 1063 between Zaragoza and Castile and one side and Aragon on the other.  We tried out my own Midgard rules for this period and it worked pretty well, with the battle swinging from one side to the other and exciting single combats.

Here are some picture highlights - you can read a full battle report on the blog here: https://mogsymakes.net/2021/08/01/battle-of-graus-1063-ce-enter-el-cid/

[Atheling]

Wonderful stuff James, Tom and Scrivs 

One of my favourite theatres of war circa 11CE

[Tonhel]

I really like the full battle report.

What is the difference between the: 1 household caballeros hidalgos (knights), 3 units of caballeros and 1 Andalusian heavy cavalry? Are they all heavy knights with the same stats?

Same as for Aragaon: 2 household knights – caballeros hidalgos and 4 caballeros? Are those all heavy knights with the same stats?

"Although all my Midgard games to date have been played with units on a 12cm frontage, we mostly had pre-existing 16cm movement trays for our El Cid collections (based for WAB), so we used bigger units than usual. Midgard is measured in ‘Spear Throws’ (the width of a base) so that meant we also increased our basic measurement to 16cm for the game."

So a unit for Midgar is a base of 12 cm wide and how deep? And how many figures per base?

[James Morris]

I really like the full battle report.

What is the difference between the: 1 household caballeros hidalgos (knights), 3 units of caballeros and 1 Andalusian heavy cavalry? Are they all heavy knights with the same stats?

Same as for Aragaon: 2 household knights – caballeros hidalgos and 4 caballeros? Are those all heavy knights with the same stats?

"Although all my Midgard games to date have been played with units on a 12cm frontage, we mostly had pre-existing 16cm movement trays for our El Cid collections (based for WAB), so we used bigger units than usual. Midgard is measured in ‘Spear Throws’ (the width of a base) so that meant we also increased our basic measurement to 16cm for the game."

So a unit for Midgar is a base of 12 cm wide and how deep? And how many figures per base?

Glad you enjoyed the report!  To answer your questions...

The knights (caballeros) are fairly standard heavy-charging types with a shock cavalry bonus; the household knights (caballeros hidalgos) are the same but with a higher armour value - a minor difference, but one which saved Sancho's bacon on at least one occasion yesterday.  I'm working on the theory that the kings/ princes would have had the best-armed followers across the army.

The Andalusian heavy cavalry were slightly less fighty than the knights, but had good armour, javelins, and the ability to evade charges as well as a higher move rate - so they could potentially fight the knights toe-to-toe, but are better off shooting off javelins to weaken them before charging.

Every unit in Midgard has the same frontage.  Our standard games have involved 12cm frontages with warriors on 12 x 6 bases with 8-12 minis; skirmishers on 12 x 6 bases with 4-6 models; heavy riders on 12 x 10 bases with 6-8 models; and light riders on 12 x 10 bases with 4  models.  As long as you can easily tell what's what, number of models on a unit base isn't critical.  If you're interested in playtesting, stay in touch as I may be looking for some more playtesters soon.

[scotty]

Superb looking game

[valleyboy]

Lovely figures set off by wonderful terrain - inspirational

[Ragnar]

Great looking game, James.

[2010sunburst]

Fantastic looking game.  The blue on the figures is really eye popping.

[Ethelred the Almost Ready]

Another great looking game, James. 

[Norm]

What a lovely looking game / table. Really nice to see the bigger figures playing in this sort of space.

[joekano]

Beautiful looking figures and table!  Thanks for sharing!

Chris

[RedRowan]

That looks great. This is such an interesting period to game.

Steve

[pws]

NICE! 

[RichBliss]

Inspirational.  Well done.

[Tonhel]

Glad you enjoyed the report!  To answer your questions...

The knights (caballeros) are fairly standard heavy-charging types with a shock cavalry bonus; the household knights (caballeros hidalgos) are the same but with a higher armour value - a minor difference, but one which saved Sancho's bacon on at least one occasion yesterday.  I'm working on the theory that the kings/ princes would have had the best-armed followers across the army.

So the other knights could be i.e Caballeros Villanos or not?
Caballeros Hildagos are the best, than regular Caballeros and than Caballeros Villanos? Or couldn't Caballeros Villanos not be equiped with mail?

The Andalusian heavy cavalry were slightly less fighty than the knights, but had good armour, javelins, and the ability to evade charges as well as a higher move rate - so they could potentially fight the knights toe-to-toe, but are better off shooting off javelins to weaken them before charging.

So these could be exactly the same as regular Caballeros, mail and etc.., but could have the option to have javelins?

Every unit in Midgard has the same frontage.  Our standard games have involved 12cm frontages with warriors on 12 x 6 bases with 8-12 minis; skirmishers on 12 x 6 bases with 4-6 models; heavy riders on 12 x 10 bases with 6-8 models; and light riders on 12 x 10 bases with 4  models.  As long as you can easily tell what's what, number of models on a unit base isn't critical.  If you're interested in playtesting, stay in touch as I may be looking for some more playtesters soon.

That's interesting. I am working on a army using only Caballero Miniatures, but as I am slow painter and easly distracted it goes slowy and the fact that I am working on retinues for skirmish and also painting the same mini's for ranked bases makes it even slower. Although I am going to use your size requirements for bases. It lookz good :-D. But just to be certain it is 12x10cm?
About playtesting, while I would love it. I will probably manage to have a complete army when you are on version 2 of your ruleset.