Zama..How unlucky we were.

As I said in a previous post, I spent the last weekend in London , having left home in a taxi at 9.30 on Friday morning for a train to Glasgow where I boarded a coach to take me south, arriving in the capital at 8.15pm that night. My botty has never been so numb from sitting for so long in one place, and I thought that I had developed something akin to bed sores, and not a nurse in sight to help relieve my suffering, so when it came to catching the tube to Muswell Hill, I thought it best to stand all the way.

Simon AKA Bigredbat, picked me up at the other end and took me to his home where I was to be billetted for the duration of my stay, and the plan was that we would get to bed early as we had to be up at 6am the next day, to pack all the terrain and figures and toddle off to Bletchley. Craig had already arrived from Leeds and it wasn`t until much later that Keith and Adam from Ireland turned up. They had painted a load of figures for the game and we spent some time admiring their brushmanship, and drinking wine, so it was 1.45 in the morning before we got our heads down.

It was a very tired bunch who surfaced at that early hour and hit the 7.30 deadline for the off.

Now to the game. It was impressive in both size and the number of figures on the terrain, the largest, I do believe, in both respects, and throughout the day I think that everyone in the hall had come up to take photos. Now it has been many a long year since I took part in a wargame, in fact, it was back when I had hair, and what I had read of the rules, had gone into what used to be a sponge, and leaked out of what is now a collander, but I was told not to worry, Simon would keep me right.

The sides were allocated and I was given the Carthaginian left flank, a mixed bunch of cavalry and foot from light to heavy...........AND TWO ELEPHANTS....which were definitely heavy! Anyway, blethering on, it was all happening in the centre and on the right flank, and at one point I thought that we were destined to break through in the centre.....that was until the luck of the Irish kicked in, and Adam who commanded the Roman centre, started to take out two or three of our units at a throw with incredible ease. No matter that he was pushing us back, but most of the unit counters he took from us seemed to count towards their total of 18 to win the game which they did by about quarter to four.

Now I know that this is not a blow by blow account of the battle, and was never intended to be, and I musn`t forget Scipio`s (Ian) generalship which was obviously a huge factor by his use of the command cards he drew, but if you want a bit of luck thrown into a game, get an Irishman on your side.

Let`s wait and see what happens at Salute - The Rematch. My money is on Hannibal!