White County Fairgrounds, Sparta, TN
Barony of Glaedenfeld and Shire of Easaraigh
19-21 May 2017
Greetings travelers!
Please pardon my absence. I have been to other events, but alas procrastination got the better of me. Good news, Im back on the blogger wagon and home to regale you with stories of my journeys for the rest of they year.
So Border Raids...
Border Raids was my first war event..ever.. way back in 1988 at Land Between the Lakes. I was young and dumb as most of us were in our yesteryear. For me, more memorable because my jaw was wired shut from a car accident I had that spring. That a story for another day and I digress.
For this years Border Raids, I found myself named Marshal in Charge for Heavy. Baron Griffin had suggested the role to me way back at Menhir, but it would be assumed that I would be helping newer, less experienced staff from the Barony. As the event approached, real life pulled away the Baronial marshals that would have be helping and I found myself in sole ownership of the responsibility.
Border Raids was my first time in the role as MiC for a war. This caused me much anxiety over the weeks leading up to the event. This is personal issue that I deal with a lot these days. I was almost sick to my stomach over it on a few occasions. Fortunately, I had some top notch support in my corner and managed to swallow my stress (i.e. hank Hill) and muscle through.
The big idea portrayed to me early on was to repeat the success of the 2016 Border Raids event. The 2016 event was themed on the 1066 invasions of England. The fights were organized in a scenario format with a briefing at the start of each fight to give the participants a little background into the history behind the scenario that was being fought. Additionally, each combatant was allowed to choose the side they wanted to fight for instead of the traditional 'kingdom' organization.
My main dilemma was that I did not attend the 2016 war. For this reason, I did some research and found some notes posted by Sir Gunnar Redboar concerning the 2016 event (found on Facebook here and here). I also reached out to Sir Gunnar to discuss the concept and was rewarded with a few bits of wisdom to guide my research.
This years Border Raids was themed on the 3rd Crusade. In my research I came up with 4 major battles for the 3rd Crusade to base my scenarios on. They were Acre, Arsuf, Iconium, and Jaffa. I had originally sought someone better versed in the 3rd Crusade lore than I to be our speaker between the scenarios, but when they were not able to attend, I ended up fulfilling that role myself.
Additionally, we had put out a request to see if anyone wanted to run a torchlight tournament on Friday night. When there were no takers, I took it upon myself to organize that task as well.
So, over several weeks I did gathered my info and research into a playbook for the event (if anyone would like a copy, let me know, Id be happy to share). I called upon my knight, Earl Sir Benen, and we reviewed my plan and tweaked a few things.
A good plan was put together.
The event started.
The plan, like all good plans, met its enemy (the event) and was immediately put in jeopardy.
We started out with land appropriation issues at the site first thing on Friday. The autocrat, Sir Valdryk consulted with the department heads. The end result was a relocation of the fighting field and the new location for the fighting field was not suitable for combat archery. So, I had to announce that we would not be supporting combat archery. But, the plan was still functional, albeit needing modification.
Later Friday I opened up inspections and prepared to hold a torchlight tournament. As the night grew darker, there was hardly any traffic at marshals point. Attendance looked to be fair, but by the time dark and truly settled in, I had only inspected 2 fighters. To this end, the torchlight tournament was not held. I was slightly disappointed, but a little relieved as well.
If the tournament would have been held, it was going to be a modified bear pit style using bridges that I had labeled a 'none shall pass' tournament. With the use of bridges, I added an additional victory condition where a fighter could win by crossing his opponents end of the bridge. So a kill or crossing the bridge could net victory. No wounds would be retained (merely a flesh wound rule). Sounded like it would be fun. I have to save it for another day.
Saturday opened with humidity and then leveled into a somewhat pleasant day until the heat set in late in the afternoon.
I conducted one authorization and my inspection team (consisting of myself, Earl Sir Benen, Styrbjorn and John) processed 42 fighters from Meridies and Middle kingdoms. We also had some guest inspecting by our Meridian Earl Marshal, Sir Gnaeus. We divided the fighters into red and blue armies at inspection, allowing them to choose and kept a count as they did so. In the end, we had nearly even sides without having to manipulate numbers. This was fairly surprising to me.
We started at around 10:30 with the Acre scenario. I reviewed my notes and called all the fighters to the field.
King Bryce provided a few words to the fighters. When he finished, I led a safety briefing and then went into the scenario history and how we were going to fight it out. Additionally, I had each army elect a commander. Via the elected commander, I would give guidance as to what was going on and where they need to stage their units. This worked very well and limited the amount of down time due to 'fighter wrangling' that can sometimes happen.
On a personal note, I erred in not asking His Excellency, Sir Jaime to speak. As representative of the Middle, I should have done this. Major protocol violation on my part I think. Nothing was said, but I know that should have been done.
With our small number of fighters, I opted to do a simple fortification fight for Acre with the Red army controlling the fort and the Blue army attacking.
Some volunteers and I setup the fort while inspections were happening. The fort itself was made of crenelated hay bales stacked up to 3 high with 2 gate openings. The whole wall was around 50' long. The end of the walls represented a solid boundary and the entire area was treated as a building for maneuver concerns. So persons could only enter/exit via the two openings during the fight. The fort stay static throughout the day and was used with the same rules throughout.
So we fought the Acre fight. It went fairly quickly so we reset with the armies switching sides and ran it again.
I sent them off for a water break and prepped for the next fight, Arsuf.
After about 15min, I called them back out and briefed them on the history of Arsuf and had the commanders line them up.
For Arsuf, the Blue army started on the south end of the field in a column formation with the Red army lined up in skirmish line along the west side of the field. The Blue armies goal was to make it with a majority of their forces to a control point at the north end of the field. Since we only had 42 +/- fighters on the field, the engagement quickly turned into a standard field fight at the start. The Blue army won the engagement. Since the scenario went fairly quick, we reset and switched sides. In the second engagement, the Red army charged and ended up getting most of their fighters to the objective.
I repeated the water break after and prepped for the next scenario. The process was working well and things moved along with great fluidity (much to my surprise).
We opted to forego a lunch break in favor of continuing the scenarios so that we would not lose too many fighters to idleness.
Fighters briefed, we started the third scenario, Iconium. Iconium was a 2 phase fight were Red and Blue fought a standard field fight for the right to defend the fort in phase 1. In phase 2, we moved them directly into the fort with no break and fought the fort engagement. once again, we reset and fought again.
In the 4th break, fatigue was setting in. I let things idle for about 20 or 25 minutes before calling everyone back to the field after checking on everyone's hydration efforts.
The 4th scenario, Jaffa, can be a very complex fight if you have enough fighters. With our smaller numbers I opted to fight the fight across the face of the fort with a 3rd of each army occupying half of the fortification. This created some interesting angles and tactics for the fighters in the last melee of the day.
So, I briefed the armies for the last time and layed on. We reset and fought one last time switching sides.
At the end of the 4th fight it was early afternoon (almost 2pm ish I think). I opened the field up for pickups and commenced cleanup of the field.
A big thanks to my volunteer marshals - Sir Conrad, Sir Hrothgar, Isaac - and to my marshal team - Earl Sir Benen, John and Styrbjorn.
All in all, my first MiC experience was pretty fun once it got going. I did stress out a lot leading up to it though. I think the fighters had fun and we kept their interest the whole day.
The rest of the day was spent cleaning up, fighting the heat and waiting for court.
I was surprised at court with an award. Most unexpectedly, I was awarded the Order of the Argent Shield. It was an awesome end to a day that I was personally dreading..lol. Thanks to Mistress Moreg and Lady Satara for the work on my scroll.
Thanks to our brothers and sisters in our neighbor Barony for hosting Border Raids with Easaraigh. We had some bumps in the road and some site issues, but all in all it worked out to be a friendly, if a little undersized, war that I think people enjoyed.
Thanks to My wife Ellen, Tristan, Sean and Racaire for the photos.
Please pardon my absence. I have been to other events, but alas procrastination got the better of me. Good news, Im back on the blogger wagon and home to regale you with stories of my journeys for the rest of they year.
So Border Raids...
Border Raids was my first war event..ever.. way back in 1988 at Land Between the Lakes. I was young and dumb as most of us were in our yesteryear. For me, more memorable because my jaw was wired shut from a car accident I had that spring. That a story for another day and I digress.
For this years Border Raids, I found myself named Marshal in Charge for Heavy. Baron Griffin had suggested the role to me way back at Menhir, but it would be assumed that I would be helping newer, less experienced staff from the Barony. As the event approached, real life pulled away the Baronial marshals that would have be helping and I found myself in sole ownership of the responsibility.
Border Raids was my first time in the role as MiC for a war. This caused me much anxiety over the weeks leading up to the event. This is personal issue that I deal with a lot these days. I was almost sick to my stomach over it on a few occasions. Fortunately, I had some top notch support in my corner and managed to swallow my stress (i.e. hank Hill) and muscle through.
The big idea portrayed to me early on was to repeat the success of the 2016 Border Raids event. The 2016 event was themed on the 1066 invasions of England. The fights were organized in a scenario format with a briefing at the start of each fight to give the participants a little background into the history behind the scenario that was being fought. Additionally, each combatant was allowed to choose the side they wanted to fight for instead of the traditional 'kingdom' organization.
My main dilemma was that I did not attend the 2016 war. For this reason, I did some research and found some notes posted by Sir Gunnar Redboar concerning the 2016 event (found on Facebook here and here). I also reached out to Sir Gunnar to discuss the concept and was rewarded with a few bits of wisdom to guide my research.
This years Border Raids was themed on the 3rd Crusade. In my research I came up with 4 major battles for the 3rd Crusade to base my scenarios on. They were Acre, Arsuf, Iconium, and Jaffa. I had originally sought someone better versed in the 3rd Crusade lore than I to be our speaker between the scenarios, but when they were not able to attend, I ended up fulfilling that role myself.
Additionally, we had put out a request to see if anyone wanted to run a torchlight tournament on Friday night. When there were no takers, I took it upon myself to organize that task as well.
So, over several weeks I did gathered my info and research into a playbook for the event (if anyone would like a copy, let me know, Id be happy to share). I called upon my knight, Earl Sir Benen, and we reviewed my plan and tweaked a few things.
A good plan was put together.
The event started.
The plan, like all good plans, met its enemy (the event) and was immediately put in jeopardy.
We started out with land appropriation issues at the site first thing on Friday. The autocrat, Sir Valdryk consulted with the department heads. The end result was a relocation of the fighting field and the new location for the fighting field was not suitable for combat archery. So, I had to announce that we would not be supporting combat archery. But, the plan was still functional, albeit needing modification.
Later Friday I opened up inspections and prepared to hold a torchlight tournament. As the night grew darker, there was hardly any traffic at marshals point. Attendance looked to be fair, but by the time dark and truly settled in, I had only inspected 2 fighters. To this end, the torchlight tournament was not held. I was slightly disappointed, but a little relieved as well.
If the tournament would have been held, it was going to be a modified bear pit style using bridges that I had labeled a 'none shall pass' tournament. With the use of bridges, I added an additional victory condition where a fighter could win by crossing his opponents end of the bridge. So a kill or crossing the bridge could net victory. No wounds would be retained (merely a flesh wound rule). Sounded like it would be fun. I have to save it for another day.
Saturday opened with humidity and then leveled into a somewhat pleasant day until the heat set in late in the afternoon.
I conducted one authorization and my inspection team (consisting of myself, Earl Sir Benen, Styrbjorn and John) processed 42 fighters from Meridies and Middle kingdoms. We also had some guest inspecting by our Meridian Earl Marshal, Sir Gnaeus. We divided the fighters into red and blue armies at inspection, allowing them to choose and kept a count as they did so. In the end, we had nearly even sides without having to manipulate numbers. This was fairly surprising to me.
We started at around 10:30 with the Acre scenario. I reviewed my notes and called all the fighters to the field.
King Bryce provided a few words to the fighters. When he finished, I led a safety briefing and then went into the scenario history and how we were going to fight it out. Additionally, I had each army elect a commander. Via the elected commander, I would give guidance as to what was going on and where they need to stage their units. This worked very well and limited the amount of down time due to 'fighter wrangling' that can sometimes happen.
On a personal note, I erred in not asking His Excellency, Sir Jaime to speak. As representative of the Middle, I should have done this. Major protocol violation on my part I think. Nothing was said, but I know that should have been done.
With our small number of fighters, I opted to do a simple fortification fight for Acre with the Red army controlling the fort and the Blue army attacking.
Some volunteers and I setup the fort while inspections were happening. The fort itself was made of crenelated hay bales stacked up to 3 high with 2 gate openings. The whole wall was around 50' long. The end of the walls represented a solid boundary and the entire area was treated as a building for maneuver concerns. So persons could only enter/exit via the two openings during the fight. The fort stay static throughout the day and was used with the same rules throughout.
So we fought the Acre fight. It went fairly quickly so we reset with the armies switching sides and ran it again.
I sent them off for a water break and prepped for the next fight, Arsuf.
After about 15min, I called them back out and briefed them on the history of Arsuf and had the commanders line them up.
I repeated the water break after and prepped for the next scenario. The process was working well and things moved along with great fluidity (much to my surprise).
We opted to forego a lunch break in favor of continuing the scenarios so that we would not lose too many fighters to idleness.
Fighters briefed, we started the third scenario, Iconium. Iconium was a 2 phase fight were Red and Blue fought a standard field fight for the right to defend the fort in phase 1. In phase 2, we moved them directly into the fort with no break and fought the fort engagement. once again, we reset and fought again.
In the 4th break, fatigue was setting in. I let things idle for about 20 or 25 minutes before calling everyone back to the field after checking on everyone's hydration efforts.
The 4th scenario, Jaffa, can be a very complex fight if you have enough fighters. With our smaller numbers I opted to fight the fight across the face of the fort with a 3rd of each army occupying half of the fortification. This created some interesting angles and tactics for the fighters in the last melee of the day.
So, I briefed the armies for the last time and layed on. We reset and fought one last time switching sides.
At the end of the 4th fight it was early afternoon (almost 2pm ish I think). I opened the field up for pickups and commenced cleanup of the field.
A big thanks to my volunteer marshals - Sir Conrad, Sir Hrothgar, Isaac - and to my marshal team - Earl Sir Benen, John and Styrbjorn.
All in all, my first MiC experience was pretty fun once it got going. I did stress out a lot leading up to it though. I think the fighters had fun and we kept their interest the whole day.
The rest of the day was spent cleaning up, fighting the heat and waiting for court.
I was surprised at court with an award. Most unexpectedly, I was awarded the Order of the Argent Shield. It was an awesome end to a day that I was personally dreading..lol. Thanks to Mistress Moreg and Lady Satara for the work on my scroll.
Thanks to our brothers and sisters in our neighbor Barony for hosting Border Raids with Easaraigh. We had some bumps in the road and some site issues, but all in all it worked out to be a friendly, if a little undersized, war that I think people enjoyed.
Thanks to My wife Ellen, Tristan, Sean and Racaire for the photos.
Well met friends. Safe journey to thee!
THL Eoin Mac Cana called 'Clyde', CACM, CKP, CAS
Warden of the Northern Plateau
Squire to Earl Benen Mac Tire, KSCA, OL, OP
Knight Marshal, Shire of Easaraigh
Kingdom of Meridies
Warden of the Northern Plateau
Squire to Earl Benen Mac Tire, KSCA, OL, OP
Knight Marshal, Shire of Easaraigh
Kingdom of Meridies
