Venetian sortie with Lion Rampant

At Model Expo Italy, a convention held annually in Verona, Luca and I had a demonstrative game of Lion Rampant.

Northern Italy, 15th century. 

A Venetian castle is about to be encircled by a Milanese force. The stronghold commander decide to lead a sortie to prevent Visconti's army to mount a proper siege.

Thus said, it's a classical Bloodbath scenario from Lion Rampant rulebook, with an asymmetrical deployment (Venetian retinue must first exit through the main castle door). 

Walls do no provide any help, since all the garrison is rushed against the enemy.

The crowd gathers to cheer its heroes

Some food is also provided to the Men at Arms

Forward! Stradiotti led the sortie!

Milanese forces approaching the castle

Stradiotti are quickly routed by a terrible crossbows shooting, leaving the Venetian force without light cavalry. Luckily enough, Venetian archers soon do the same to Milanese mounted crossbowmen.

Battered mounted crossbowmen on the right

Mounted Men at Arms clashes but the Venetian leader is forced to retreat 

The Venetian leader demonstrates that courage isn't enough. "Maybe a sortie wasn't a good idea", he thought, while his unit is decimated.

Visconti are now charging against Venice infantry, which resists

Ineffective, the most I can say of these arquebusier (bidowers)

Some modern firearms aren't enough to stop foot knight advance and the poor skirmishers are forced to make way.

Venetian Fanti da Mar tries to arrest Milanese foot knight

Fanti da Mar (Marine Infantry), were a Venetian troop usually embarked on the galleys of Serenissima. They often were dismounted in raids or used (in the Colonies) as garrison troops. Usually they were partly armoured and armed with a warhammer of other short weapons (better suited to naval combat). In this game, I tried to represent them as Foot Men at arms, but I feel that Foot Sergeants with switched values of attack and defense (as suggested here), could be a better representation, after all.

The survivors take shelter behind the castle walls.

Doors are closed and Venetian now prepare for a siege.

Milano Wargames and Model Expo

This year I already joined two different conventions: on 17th February I was in Novegro for MilanoWargames, organised by Dadi e Piombo, the only wargame magazine currently published in Italy. http://milanowargames.blogspot.it/

Few days ago (11-12th March), I was in Verona for Model Expo, a modelism (+cosplayer+games) convention in my city. http://www.modelexpoitaly.it/

In both convention I held a Lion Rampant demo game together with Luca. The scenario was set during the Wars in Lombardy (1423–1454 AD), a series of semi-continuous wars between the Duchy of Milan and the Most Serene Republic of Venice and the respective (and incostant) allies, for the control of the Northern Italy. Many of the most famous Condottiere fought in some moment in this conflict, some as young officers and other as hardened veterans. Between them Da Montone, Piccinini, Da Carmagnola and Sforza.

It was the perfect occasion to use our Condottiere's armies, made up mainly of Perry Miniatures. Luca's army (Muzio Attendolo's troops serving Sforza for Milan) was entirely plastic, while mine was a mix of plastic and lead Venetian army, serving under Colleoni's family.

The table actracted a lot of attention, and many visitors stopped to ask informations about the game or the miniature. In Milan, the guest stars were the table cloth (hand made) and the houses, from Tabletop Miniatures, awesomely painted by Luca.

Luca's light cavalry and Tabletop inn (Milano Wargames)

My Stradiots fighting at Model Expo

Both the convention were, by my personal point of view, a great success. Lion Rampant has a nice look on the table (we played with 28mm miniatures of course) and catch the visitors' eyes, and it's simple enough to be explained to new players in five minutes and mastered in ten. I can state that after 15 minutes they were fully able to play by themselves. Of course the summary cards designed by Tim Charzinski, were of great help, bringing the only information one player needs to remember directly under his eyes. And thery're pretty pleasant to see on the table. I cannot recomend them more! (https://charzinski.wordpress.com/2016/05/31/unit-cards-and-retinuecreator-for-lion-rampant/)

Of course it's not a deeply strategic game, but, as introductory ruleset to help not historical or even not miniature gamers to join the hobby it's a wonderful starting point. Of course it's also a perfect ruleset for a relaxing evening game. I hope I wil be able to publish a proper review for Italian gamers in the next issue of Dadi and Piombo, stay tuned!

I will dedicate a separate post to my shopping at the conventions!

~ Riccardo