HYW English and a complete newbie

[Wes1969]

Hi all,

had my first ever game of FoG a couple of weeks ago, was soundly beaten but enjoyed every second of it.

I was playing with a HYW English Continental army vs Free Company.

My current set up comes in at 894 points, with

9 BGS of longbows (6 bases each) and 4 BGS of HF one of which is HA, the rest Armoured.

1 IC, and 3 TC.

My Longbows don't use stakes.

The whole game was more about learning the mechanics of FoG so not much went into the way of tactics so I would love to have any input on how any of you guys would play the above army.

As it stood my LBs where in 2 battle lines with the HF just behind to support at intervals.

Admittedly my shooting was lacklustre to say the least and as soon as my opponents HF hit my line I took quite a battering.

I know my HF can interpenetrate through the LBs but should I have pushed them forward before the enemy HF made contact or was I correct to keep shooting up to the last second.

As I say any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

[petedalby]

Your composition looks pretty good. One of the strengths of the HYW English is its ability to manouevre. The LBs can't really stand and fight HF.

So almost from deployment you need to have a contingency plan to get your MF out of trouble - either by moving into terrain or just away from danger. Yes, get your own HF in the way if you can but terrain is your friend. Rough or Uneven slows HF to 2MU, increasing the umber of shots they must take before they contact you.

And with an IC, you have every opportunity to turn and just move away - the HF wil never catch you.

Hope that helps

[Wes1969]

Will definitely look to being more active with their movement next time.

Was very unlucky with terrain placement but there was some terrain that I should have probably made a hasty retreat into.

All taken onboard, thanks Pete

[hazelbark]

The other piece is to consider having 1-2 8s of Longbow. You will genrally find them much more resistant to bow fire because they suffer fewer tests and fewer times the HPB -1 CT.