Almost a month ago (yes, I am seriously behind on blogging, sorry), I took a trip up to a paragam of Wargames, Boards and Swords in Derby.
The theme was 30 Years War or ECW, which led to me using my great and glorious Eastern Association Parlimentarian forces, who have had four games, two wins and two loses. Could I keep my 50% record?
Doubtful...
I was up against a lot of VERY experienced players, whereas I haven't played competitively since before the great beta rewrite prior to Lockdown One.
My list:
Two units of decent cavalry, two great foot, two units of rough horse, and lots of very average foot. Two dragoons, some guns, decent pack of generals including my 18x Great Uncle Edward Whalley.
Game 1 vs Later Oxford Royalist run by the living legend Steve Stead
I have played Steve on many occasions, very occasionally I get a win against him. In ReG, where he was one of the best player around, and with him using Wupert, the odds of a win had just dramatically dropped. He only had two pike and shot units, six units of WAY better cavalry than me, lots of shooty foot that don't care if I have pikes and a good set of generals. Deployment saw the inevitable cavalry mass, which I tried to counter by putting mine into a large set of rocky ground to slow down the inevitable rout, while my better and more numerous foot attempted to tackle his foot. My guns were badly misdeployed and where they were placed, would effectively take no further part in the battle.
Steve's cavalry start to circle like vultures, four units of vastly superior troops vs three really rather okay troops. His foot try to keep mine busy while I try and work out the chequerboard and push back rules from shooting (Dik, artillery aren't ignored) while trying to close efficently.
To the right, my yellow unit of foot advance to threaten Roylist cavalry, who themselves team up with more cavalry to threatened my dragoons in the fields. Meanwhile, one of my not so good cavalry units advances, cautiously.
Working on the misapprehension that a legandary general and some decent cavalry might slightly delay the Royalist mugging, I sent forward Cromwell and some of his horse, only to be severly outnumbered and out-classed. It did stop the left-hand Royalist units turning in on my flank immediately, which was a bonus.
And on the charge, honours were even, mostly due to Cromwell himself. My second decent cavalry unit adavanced to guard the flank of my first, while my Parlimentarian horse hung back for safety.
In the centre, the firefight broke out in ernest, and I found out what troops with 'Elan' do now as Steve's shooty foot types caused a lot of ouch on my foot.
Over at the main event, my first unit holds up the inevitable, allowing Steve only piecemeal free access to the rest of my cavalry.
My foot is faring somewhat worse against the non-pike foot.
The only saving grace is Steve's complete lack of cards over at the fields, allowing me to snipe with my dragoons as his hoped for easy push through fails to happen.
With my centre cavalry's collapse almost imminent, I decide that I would rather let my units decide to die at a time and place of my own choosing, and charge.
Why?
No clue.
On the right, my cavalry decide that actually, they might have found a unit of Royalist cavalry that is only slightly better than they, and launch in too.
In the centre, some sub-Gaukroger-esq shooting rather cheers me up. That's three wounds strainght away, which in ReG is a base killed.
Not to be out-done, my dragoons show Parliment has the better powder supply to the Royalist horses.
To which the Royalist expend a great deal of their powder supplies to liberally pepper my forces, but you can see how far back I have driven the Royalist foot as it approaches its own baseline.
With an almost crushing inevitability, my heavier armed troops fail to deliver against the Royalist loose foot and break.
Instantly joined by my first cavalry unit, which causes KaB rolls (plus an instant wound) on the neighbouring units. 
On the right, my yellow foot senses an opportunity and charge in on Steven's engaged horse, much to everyone's shock.
Steve breaks through my foot, and my neighbouring unit attempts a charge.
As do their neighbours while my superior red coated foot take a battering from shot.
The yellows' flank charge does rather well, pity the rest of the army was falling apart behind them! 
And when I say rather well...
And rather badly (knew I should have claimed the +1 for better painted troops)...
The Eastern Association crumbles to a 2-15 defeat to the Later Oxford Royalists, but its alright, as we will go on to win the war (and we control the Navy, so powder supplies are short for the king, but not as short as he will be after his final visit to London)! Very enjoyable game, and despite being rooted firmly to the bottom of the table, I still had faith. Steve would go on to come second, can't begrudge that at all.
Game 2: vs Dene Green and his early Gustavian Swedish
Ah, the other ReG army I had already met, in the guise of Neil's Swedes, which had gone through me like a dose of the clap when I first play tested this army. I knew I was doomed, but this early?
It's a strong army, lots of shoot and charge salvoing foot, and generally better cavalry than mine. A tough ask.
Table fell rather well for me, a funnel of interesting going to push through, and a nice open left with a securing waterway. My dragoons massed on the right to hold the town against Swedish horse, in the centre my foot braced for the inevitable smash of the Swedish Ga Pla, while on the left my superior foot and yellow coats prepared to go wide around the hedged fields to assist the cavalry. 
I forlorn hoped my superiors (free march move down table) and scouted my dragoons forwards. Cromwell brought all four cavalry units up too. My Green unit was instantly pushed back through my Black superior unit, taking all sorts of hits and losing a base! Stupid mistake on my part.
Not really the counters I wanted for Essex in the middle, leaves my main infantry bulk spread out rather...
On the left, my cavalry fan out to assist as the Red infantry ping away at the Swedish horse. 
In the centre and on the right, two English complete and one beaten up foot face down three Swedish foot and loads of cavalry. My artillery, guarded by the blues, wanders what it has let itself in for?
Aggressive cavalry gets, well, aggressive and charges the Swedes before they do too much to us.
Will the extra points to make Cromwell a legend pay off?
In the centre and on the right, the Swedes of Dene (ooh good name for a band) close rapidly. My artillery thus far has been ineffective, while his snipes superbly. My dragoons in the town are shooting well, but there are ten shooting bases out there compared to my 8.
On the left, my red superiors square up to the Swedish advance, while my Parliamentarian horse cavalry forms up into extended line to face the better Swedes.
Swedish salvo goes off, yellow dice, yuck! This is followed by their charge.
Think I got away with it lightly this time, as I reply on green dice, except where I've lost a base.
Stopped 'em in their tracks sir! The cavalry brawl is going rather the way of the Swedes, my ordinary averages expand to meet the threat, but lose a base to the Swedish charge. Cromwell's horse on the left has also lost a base, but so have the Swedes, while the horse of Cromwell himself also lose a base, but the Swedes lose two! My yellow foot unit, assisted by their general, has made good time up table and has moved to support the reds.
The Swedish foot salvo again and crash in, causing untold damage (two bases and a wound), but our return of fire and combat causes three bases on him, leaving it all in the balance. My left hand Parlimentatian horse fails to hold and scatters, but the Cromwellian horse surpass themselves and see off two units of the Swedish horse, which in turn does in the third unit, allowing my unmolested Parliamentary horse unit to turn 180 and speed to help the reds and yellows, who themselves are doing a fine job beating up Swedes.
In the centre, Swedish foot do what Swedish foot do so well, and chew lumps out of my front line! My blues and black superiors are somewhat absent from this photo having hightailed it. However, my shattered Green unit pull it out the bag and break an already damaged unit of superior Swedish foot, redemption? 
The red superiors were teetering themselves at this point, but again the yellows, (nobly aided by cavalry) catch and break the final unit of Swedish foot, giving me a rather unexpected win! The yellows are starting to become my favourite unit. 
Quite how I ended up smashing up a massively better army frontally is beyond me. A great game and Dene was very gracious of my rookie mistakes. 15-6, and 17 points overall. I had achieved my overall objective and won a game over the weekend. What would Sunday bring?
The table, for those at all interested in this type of thing. I had gone from very low to okay....jpg)
Game 3: vs David 'The War Doctor' Parish and Montrose Scots Royalists
Bugger!
This is an army I fought many times before in the days of FogR, and I never did well against it then. It is the perfect storm of anti-infantry and bad terrain troops, led by a legend (Montrose) and stoked by a viscous highland charge. I had lost before I began, if I could get into his Irish Brigade, or his weaker rear troops I would be fine, as long as the terrain did not go against me...
Oh, three forests across the secure flank, and a wood on the abutted onto each forest flank (if you fight in forest, your woods and forest can touch, without being rolled for, nasty), a village, two rocky grounds and a set of fields. This is NOT good!
Before we go any further with this report, I will say that the War Doctor is one of the nicest guys youi could ever possibly meet, he is a brilliant player and such a laugh. But this army! Gah!
In the great scissors-paper-stone-lizard-spock of the ReG world, I was about to get beaten by all four options!
Honestly, The War Doctor did not need the rest of his army, these two units would have done it!
The juggernaut closes through the wood, as with some cheesy luck, I force one of David's Irish units back through another causing KaBs and wounds to the left of the wood with my artillery, and a traffic jam.
My foot had beat a steady retreat against the Scots Highlanders, but that is a BIG wall of figures coming my way. 
The Highlanders clear the wood into my beaten ground, but his charges aren't slowed by my shooting at the superiors in the centre.
In they come! Not enough hits, this will be devastating!
The left-hand unit stalled, but his superiors crash in, and the result with shoot and charge is devastating, I kill 1/9, he kills 2/6, that's not a successful ratio if your army wants to survive? 
My black superior unit crumbles faster than an apple crumble dropped on the fastlane of the motorway. One kill and a wound was good, but the resulting KaBs would cripple my surrounding units. 
It was at this point, or shortly before, I realised that I needed to get my cavalry across to deal with the Highlanders and sharpish! Note to self, do your research on the armies and read the playsheet! Cavalry vs Highlanders are utterly lethal. You can see the traffic jam in front on my Yellow unit though.
Cromwell producing some duff cards did not help trying to chase down Dave's inferior foot and cavalry though. A double move would have sealed this flank nicely. My dragoons swung out of the field to engage the Royalist Scottish dragoons.
David managed to sort out his traffic jam a little.
David's next turn of charges, again, I stall the two left hand units. The superior Highlanders continue their reign of terror, and supported by their mates to the left, slam into my two next two units..
To their left, my cavalry has arrived to aid my red superior foot, but the Irish brigade beyond my left were about to cause me a whole world of hurt by charging the artillery (like the highlanders weren't hurting me)!
Beyond the fields, my Yellows advance with intent to cause harm. I do kill one of David's units and another is severely beaten up by the traffic issues, but he has successfully nullified my best cavalry across the board. 
On the right-hand edge of the centre, David blows through my foot and his average troops hit my camp with the glee only Scots Highlanders finding an army's rum supply could! In fact my camp is one of my better fighting units, doing a wound!
The Irish foot wander past to look at my artillery. My cavalry are slammed into by the Highlanders, causing the Highlanders to take a huge amount of losses, hitting me twice on the way. My red superiors deal some decent hits on the next Highlanders, but under the category of too little and too late. 
On the left, I fail to do much at all...
I mean, look at all those tasty points I failed to get near. 
With a supreme irony, I kill a unit of Highlanders as my camp falls, causing double KaB tests (even more lethal than Meg) which causes two foot and my artillery to desert.
Finally tally, 4-15 to the War Doctor, and my despair at fighting Highlanders is unabated. Apologies to all the Scots in the room who saw me lose, it was not pleasant. I learned a huge amount (we forgot I should have had shove, it would not have made much difference), and I could have moved my cavalry over to squash the highlanders or fallen back into the town, I might have had a bit of better result, but I deserved to lose this one.
During lunch, I drove the few miles to Duffield and found my Great-Great-Grandparent's grave, I never realised the family was this local. I knew the family had links to Long Eaton and Nottingham, but not this part of Derbyshire. Their daughter was a teacher at the local school for many years, and it appears that they retired their to be nearer to her.
It's an impressive tomb, it also contains a memorial to my Great-Granddad's brother who was killed in 1918.
My aunt and uncle had been to visit a few days previously and planted bulbs. I will return in the spring to admire.
Apparently, they kicked up a hell of a fuss to get this memorial to feature their tribute to their lost son. 
A decent view.
Game Four: vs Simon Clarke's Cornish Royalists.
Simon was the scratch player and organiser, taking zero points from each game. I must have been lurking somewhere nearest the lowest of the low while on 21 points.
Much like the Swedes, the Cornish come with elan, and shoot and charge, but at much lower firepower, so my stopping power might be okay.
A bowling green of table, with a village and a waterway, both our foot mass on the right, while my dragoons hold the settlement, cavalry look good on the left, but without much to deal with. 
The lines close quickly, and I open up firing.
It's a little Gaukroger in the result! One base killed and five drive backs (three minus superior and chequerboard)..jpg)
Where the firing happened was pretty central, driving back the white Cornish unit, but they are closing fast.
The cavalry arms clash, and for once, my cavalry is actually better than someone else's! Aided by the dragoons, one of my Parliamentarian horse suffers, but three Cornish horse are about to perish.
WIth the failure of one, the other two are unleashed into the Cornish backfield, and lined up for a flank charge on the remaining Cornish Cavalier horse. 
Cornish foot charges in, but is severely affected by the closing fire of the Parliamentary foot. My light blues shatter under their weight.
But during the melee phase, the Cornish decide that despite their successes, they are better off not being there and their two units flee.
The Yellows, so often the heroes, watch with relief as Cromwell leads his cavalry in on a flank charge. Yellow on Yellow action is short lived.
The yellow Cornish don't hang around long, and Cromwell can keep going, eyeing up the Cornish blues...
Cromwell's horse may only be two stands, needing only a wound to break, but a double red dice vs a single black die will always be beneficial! The Cornish blues go the way of their friends.
The Cornish Reds,who had successfully broken through previously, were turned to threaten my superiors engaged with the Cornish Greens, while my Greens were having a lovely time outshooting the unit with Wupert's flag.
It was all down to had the charge order, and the deck, which would be me! Cromwell crashes into the flank of the Blues, they break, and that's enough to break the brave Kernow rebels.
This gave me a final 15-4 win. A great game, and I maintained my 50% record. Overall I scored 36 points and came seventh out of 12, a respectable score really.
Thoughts on new the ReG and competitions
Do I enjoy it? I think so. Some of the armies are very scissors/paper/stone/lizard/spock, and I met at least two scissors to my paper. I was glad to meet and beat Swedes and Cornish, two armies I've been badly beaten by in FoGR, nice that a vanilla army can stand their ground.
Am I good enough player to survive? Probably not.
Will I play again competitively? Definitely, I'm booked for Badcon, whether it's Swedes or Samurai, I don't know.
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