Friends Mark and Si have been collecting Polish-Lithuanian and Ottoman armies in 28mm to use with my “eastern front” variant of For King & Parliament.

As I currently have neither army in my collection finished, and play in 15mm, I was keen to have go. I would play the Polish-Lithuanians (hereafter known as ‘the Poles’) and John and Si would play the Ottomans (hereafter known as the Ottomans or the Turks!).

The Poles won the scouting, so I deployed my Winged Hussars and veteran Pancerni cavalry on the left, my guns in the centre, and some German foot supported by Reiters and Turkoman light cavalry on the right.

The Ottomans had their Janissery infantry and artillery on my right, their Azab levy foot in the middle, and their Sipahi cavalry (including some guard) on my left.

The game opened with each side moving their cavalry forward as rapidly as possible, and soon a collosal melee broke out, horse swirling back and forth amongst the confusion of the battle.

Meanwhile, my plan on the right had been to use my ‘German’ horse and accompanying lights to disperse the enemy horse in front of me, then advance to threaten the flank of the enemy infantry and guns as my ‘German’ foot advanced to contact from the front. Unfortunately the cards had other ideas, and my men refused to move more than a token distance towards the enemy.

The Ottoman cavalry command opposite my ‘Germans’ had exactly the same plan, and did manage to advance forward into bow range.

Fortunately their attempts to do unto me what I had intended to do unto them failed miserably and, with a new turn beginning, I was able to clear the enemt horse away and start my ‘Germans’ forward.

This left the game progressing nicely: I reckoned my four units of foot with cavalry support hitting the enemy flank could take care of the Janiserries, and my cavalry on the left were all veteran versus merely a mixed bag of Turks, so provided Si couldn’t get the Azabs in on my guns and more ‘German’ foot in the centre, I should be okay.

And so it came to pass: my cavalry on the right proved unstoppable, and soon Ottoman horse were fleeing the table in great numbers.

In fact, the battle was won on the left by the cavalry before my poor infantry and flanking cavalry had time to get stuck in at all:

So a solid win for the Poles…doubtless helped by my secret weapon lurking in her crate under the table: a fierce Pomeranian* mascot to inspire my troops to the heights they achieved!

*Pomerania being part of Polish Lithuania at the time!