Dicing with Vikings!

Today we did a Dark ages skirmish, pitting an Anglo-Norman force against a Viking raider group.
Ian had his Saxons with my Normans, Phil and Lawrence used their Vikings.

The Vikings had landed on the banks of a river...

...But before they could raid, they needed to fight off the defending English. Phil (aka Olaf 'Treehugger') took the Viking right.

Lawrence (aka Trigg 'lotcaster') took the Viking left. Both Viking forces had rolled well in their force composition dicing, and fielded large numbers of Bowmen and armoured infantry. 

Ian deployed his force on our right, he was facing Lawrence. 

 My Normans deployed on the left, behind a wood.

 My men began by advancing into the woods facing Phil's force. 

 Ian advanced steadily, allowing the archers in his shield-wall to shoot.

 The Vikings waited, and returned the Saxon shooting.

The first volley lightly wounded and armoured Saxon in the front row. 

he must have ducked to pull out the arrow, as the next hit caused another light wound on the man behind him! 

 My Normans were progressing slowly through the trees, some more Saxon bowmen accompanying me.

My archers were on the left of the Saxon line, behind some Norman axemen.  

 My archers first volley killed a Viking spearman.

 My spearmen trudged on, but at least they were not fighting an arrow-storm! 

The Viking bowmen were having a good day, their arrows began to  cause casualties in the Saxon line. Amazingly, the first 2 hit were the 2 archers in the second line!

Lawrence's slingers now came in range and began shooting at my men. 

 The Norman arrows did not have the luck of the first volley, but still caused a few injuries.

Ian's archers had more luck... 

 ..they killed a man I had previously wounded.

The slingers were also hit by my archers. 

 ..though their return shots light-wounded a Norman archer and swordsman. Phil and Lawrence were focussing on Ian's Saxons though, apparently!

 More arrows were hitting the Saxon line, and slowly wounding more men. 

 Ian was not shooting the Viking archers, preferring to shoot their shield wall.

 The Saxon archers were taking a beating!

 The Viking slingers began an indecisive skirmish with my archers, neither side really managing to hit each other!

 Phil's archers now came into play, shooting from behind his spearmen on the hill.

Lawrence's battle line looked untouched, the Saxons opposite less so! 

 Even with the Saxon bowmen's help, those slingers stood their ground!

 Finally, my spearmen cleared the wood.

 ..but the 'Treehugger' held the high ground in force.

 The Saxons were losing the shooting match, so advanced on the Viking line. 

 My men moved forward to support their left.

 My spearmen were stuck facing Phil.

 At least the slingers were taking more losses at the shorter range.

 ..but the same worked the other way, as a Norman armoured axeman slumped to the ground..killed by a slingshot.

 Ian's line was counter-charged fiercely by the Viking line, and came off much worse in the melee. The Saxon shield-wall began to break up

 The loss of the brave Viking slingers, who FINALLY broke, could not recover the situation.

The Norman commander, seeing the Saxons failing, decided to retreat with his force still more or less intact. The Vikings survived to sail away and raid elsewhere down the coast!

This was, rather sadly, a game rather spoiled by the erratic results of the dice. It seemed Lawrence could only rarely roll a bad dice, and Ian's dicing was...appalling!

The result was a foregone conclusion....

Such is the nature of war!