The Weekly Warfare   Musings martial from across the SCA

The objective in the town battle was to hold 3 flags that formed a line across the middle of a symmetric field between the two armies. The flag on our left was placed on a bridge extending from the castle entranceway with a path towards it on either side. The flag in the middle was located in a large rectangular building and the flag on the right was located in “the ravine” which was a narrow path with a broken wall separating it from the rest of the field.

Atlantia was charged with taking the flag on the right (in the ravine) leaving us with a limited front battle (with no DFB (Poor Giacomo)). The East and other allies were in the middle, and Gardner’s Company was assigned to take the flag on the bridge (far left).

At lay on, the mid quickly ran up and took the ravine and center flags, but I’m not sure what was going on at the bridge (it was the other side of the field from me). Atlantia advanced through the ravine 3 or 4 fighters deep and formed up in front of the army of Aethelmarc. The Mid was holding the middle, and from others’ accounts, Northshield was squaring off against Gardner’s.

As soon as we formed up, we were given orders to step (repeatedly) until we had pushed them all back/killed them and we took the flag. We advanced a bit further forward until we were about 15-20 feet in front of the flag and then we held that position most of the battle. I stayed alive for quite a while (partially because I was in the second rank initially), but eventually had to go rez.

As I returned from rez, I noticed a significant hole forming in the East’s line near our forward rally point and I ran up to fill a 6 person wide gap. I did a bit of arm waving to shock them into stopping their advance (which worked), but I think it also left them a bit dumbfounded as I quickly killed 6 or 7 of them in rapid succession. Reinforcements arrived during this process and also killed a lot of them, allowing the East’s line to push forward to the doorway for the middle building.

I died at some point during that advance, went back to rez and figured I’d rejoin Atlantia so I stopped to visit Dominyk who instructed me to “Go show them how an Atlantian takes a doorway!” So, I went over to that doorway, saw the Mid had a killing cup inside and that the East had one on the outside. Initially I just shouted that it was a rez battle and that they should charge the doorway. Two of them did and I followed, but then we died.

I returned from rez, and shouted the same instructions. Nobody really moved, so I kinda pushed 3 or 4 fighters into the doorway and followed them in. I think they got the picture because several people followed me into the doorway. I think I got 4 or 5 kills as I walked into the doorway (their blades were busy stabbing the guys who went first) and the rest of the group swarmed in and took the flag.

We then set about pushing them out of the building. I died being over-ambitious about clearing the other doorway too, so the line outside could form in front of that entrance and the entrance to the bridge, protecting them both.

I engaged in some line fighting and reinforcing the middle line before returning to Atlantian lines in the ravine where I again managed to be returning from rez as a giant hole was opened. Once again, I ran up, looked scary, they all stopped advancing and let me poke holes in them and I got a bunch of kills. I fought in that point in the line most of the rest of the battle.

At one point I managed to kill a Midrealm Bronze Ring who was organizing a pulse charge just before he called charge. That left the group who was about to charge pretty dumbfounded and we quickly swarmed them and wiped out the entire Aethelmarc line. I got within 15 feet of their forward rally point and wanted to go kill their commander, but Letia yelled at me to get back in line.

The rest of the battle was pretty uneventful. I ended up on the other side of the ravine line after a rez and then they decided to change the rules and suddenly there was no more rez. Aethelmarc launched another pulse charge with similar efficacy, but I was killed in the process. I walked off the field and watched as the rest of the army basically killed them all in short order.

Remember, if you can’t take the flag, change the rules

Overall, there were a lot of holds and I think several of them were due to dehydration/heat exhaustion. I think we even had one from someone collapsing before I even made it to the front rank (like in the first 5 min). In one case, a guy who was dehydrated/tired took a mask shot and blacked out. I heard he got a concussion from when he hit the ground. On the flip side, Atlantia didn’t lose a single fighter to dehydration/heat exhaustion in this battle, so perhaps the first step to fighting like Atlantians is hydration.