Summer Crusaders: Teutonic Knights and More: Summer 1240

Started by MengJiao, February 18, 2022, 10:22:22 AM

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MengJiao

  It was one of those aristocratic options:  You could go on a quick crusade with the Teutonic Knights and/or their grim, brotherly allies, the surviving Sword Brothers or even with the Swedes and Danes, or even with some renegade Pagans and Slavs from Pskov.  You got to get home right after Christmas after contending with some Lets, or Sorbs or Wends or Russians or Suzdalians.  What's the worst that could happen?  Well...the Mongols were sometimes in town and checking up on things, but if you kept your nose clean, even a brush with the Mongols might do no more than add some zing to your crusading experience.

  The summer crusaders are just one of the many features designer Volko Ruhnke has included in this action-packed look at what Alexander Nevsky had to deal with.
For me, this game Nevsky (first in the Levy and Campaign series), is a kind of
natural continuation of Pendragon, an early medieval-focused game in the COIN series (a series also designed by Ruhnke).
Nevsky is a lot more focused than Pendragon  and it covers some seasons of 1240 to 1242 in 40-day increments rather than around a century in raiding cycle increments.
It's kind of hard to summarize the game and...visually its all over the place, but here is a glimpse of the beginning of the campaign game:

MengJiao

#1
Quote from: MengJiao on February 18, 2022, 10:22:22 AM
  It was one of those aristocratic options:  You could go on a quick crusade with the Teutonic Knights and/or their grim, brotherly allies, the surviving Sword Brothers or even with the Swedes and Danes, or even with some renegade Pagans and Slavs from Pskov.  You got to get home right after Christmas after contending with some Lets, or Sorbs or Wends or Russians or Suzdalians.  What's the worst that could happen?  Well...the Mongols were sometimes in town and checking up on things, but if you kept your nose clean, even a brush with the Mongols might do no more than add some zing to your crusading experience.

  The summer crusaders are just one of the many features designer Volko Ruhnke has included in this action-packed look at what Alexander Nevsky had to deal with.
For me, this game Nevsky (first in the Levy and Campaign series), is a kind of
natural continuation of Pendragon, an early medieval-focused game in the COIN series (a series also designed by Ruhnke).
Nevsky is a lot more focused than Pendragon  and it covers some seasons of 1240 to 1242 in 40-day increments rather than around a century in raiding cycle increments.
It's kind of hard to summarize the game and...visually its all over the place, but here is a glimpse of the beginning of the campaign game:

  You can't quite see it, but each Lord has a mat full of household troops, vassals, provisions, money, boats, sleds, loot and so on.  Maybe I'll get some pictures of those...though to my mind the word
"Mat" suggests some kind of time out in an Aztec preschool for trickster god impersonators on halucinagenic drugs and pulque.  I hope that's just me.

  Some mats:

 

Gusington



слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

MengJiao

#3
Quote from: Gusington on February 18, 2022, 11:03:40 AM
Sweet! Right in my wheelhouse.

  In a weird, round-about way, I think Alexander Nevsky (the 1938 movie more than the historical dude himself), is in everybody's wheelhouse even if they would rather it weren't.
see this blog for the star-wars linkages and Sergei Einsenstein hobnobbing with Walt Disney: http://criterioncollection.blogspot.com/2008/09/87-alexander-nevsky.html

Gusington

^I have actually seen that! Back when I still purchased physical media, I bought the Criterion version of Alexander Nevsky.


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

MengJiao

Quote from: Gusington on February 18, 2022, 11:31:14 AM
^I have actually seen that! Back when I still purchased physical media, I bought the Criterion version of Alexander Nevsky.

  Aha!  So things get rolling which will force the city council of Novgorod to summon Alexander probably.  The Teutonic Forces pull a command card first (they do everything first in this here game) and
the Danes mobilize Rudulf who issues his levy command and a very handy ambush event card is brought into play...no summer crusaders yet since Rudolf has to muster when his own card comes up and yes
I put it in the summer deck so he will eventually.  Not very visible but quite ominous since Gavrilo needs to get raiding and the ambush might catch him at a bad moment.

Gusington

Looking at your images, everything about that game is quite beautiful. It must have been pretty pricey, eh?


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

MengJiao

Quote from: Gusington on February 18, 2022, 11:57:30 AM
Looking at your images, everything about that game is quite beautiful. It must have been pretty pricey, eh?

  Not really.  It doesn't seem to be selling all that well.  I got a relatively sat-upon used copy for 50 bucks.  It looks like GMT
games are really coming to the point
that graphically and in terms of production values in general -- they look fantastic but aren't terribly expensive.  Plus they are packed with
useful aides and play-throughs. Valley of Death is exquisite, Pendragon was stunning,
Gallipoli was beautiful and so it goes -- all not too pricey and really well done.  And not selling well!  So you can get them for even less!

Gusington

Where'd you get your copy? And your copy of Pendragon?


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

MengJiao

#9
Quote from: Gusington on February 18, 2022, 12:10:00 PM
Where'd you get your copy? And your copy of Pendragon?

  On ebay.  Sort of anticlimatic, but if you poke around there you can find some okay used versions of many games.  Meanwhile, having learned that Gavrilo really can't defend Pskov once the Teutons assemble, and having the raider option, Gavrilo went ravaging and sort of escaped and the Teutons mobilized as never before.  Even the Grand Master (Landmeister in Livonia) is coming out -- well he is levied and mustered and running Rudolf's force as a "Lieutenant" (a confusing usage, but hey, it's Ruhnke's game).  Up north, the more workmanlike crew from the trade-routes around Ladoga -- feeling confident in their sergeants and men-at-arms with crossbows, have advanced into Estonia.  So that's not too bad for the first 40 days -- Plus the council of Novgorod mobilised Domash.  So both sides have fielded pretty big forces.

MengJiao

#10
Quote from: MengJiao on February 18, 2022, 12:11:59 PM
Plus the council of Novgorod mobilised Domash.  So both sides have fielded pretty big forces.

  Domash wasn't much help, but the score is tied at 2.5 VP's each or so I thought. After a recount,  Gavrilo's ravaging scores well 3 (so that puts Novgorod and co ahead), but it leaves him out in enemy territory while the main Teuton force has taken and plundered Pskov
and there's not much to stop them except maybe the winter which is arriving (PS -- can Gavrilo's forces survive the winter? possibly, by using some of their loot and coin and moving as little as possible -- in fact Gavrilo's force might be slightly better off -- due to loot and coin -- than his local renegade Slav and bishoprical opponents -- guess we will see -- PPS -- a weird beginning to the winter -- The Grand Master moved first and "ambushed" Domash's force, forcing it to fight rather than run -- Domash played a winter defense card, emplacing a fortress-like barrier, battles have to go through one round and the main attacker has to go first in the case of a "Wall"/fortress/barrier -- The Grand Master's army is a mounted, knight-heavy force and without many archers or crossbows so they had to dismount and endure a round of archery and melee and they were wiped out or routed with one out of six recovering...The Grand Master had to retreat and now Domash is sitting on more food than he can move even with a pile of captured sleds, but, back at Pskov, the nightmare continues:  the Grand Master's spoils from Pskov were the provisions and he lost those so his one surviving Man-at-arms came back and ate half of Rudolf's private food supply.  Demobilizing/paying off some Teutonic troops and such might be the best plan at this point...the force can rebuild when it remusters next summer -- meanwhile Bishop Herman  pulls back to Dorpat to tax his own estates, this will provide money to keep at least some troops in the field):


MengJiao

#11
Quote from: MengJiao on February 18, 2022, 01:34:54 PM
Demobilizing/paying off some Teutonic troops and such might be the best plan at this point...the force can rebuild when it remusters next summer -- meanwhile Bishop Herman  pulls back to Dorpat to tax his own estates, this will provide money to keep at least some troops in the field):

  A very busy mid-winter levy and muster yields some game-changers: the Danes have a crisis back in Denmark and leave the field; the Mongols want to know what's going on and this puts
off any fielding of Alexander or his brother off for a season.  They might be available in the muddy springtime.  Meanwhile, Gavrilo starts accumulating ships to make his escape and things are at
sixes and sevens on all the other fronts...though Vladislav and Domash are encamped with lots of food and transport.  Vladislav might be able to move through Estonia to help Gavrilo with his
nautical project by distracting his enemies...we will see:

MengJiao

#12
Quote from: MengJiao on February 18, 2022, 03:19:23 PM
Quote from: MengJiao on February 18, 2022, 01:34:54 PM
Demobilizing/paying off some Teutonic troops and such might be the best plan at this point...the force can rebuild when it remusters next summer -- meanwhile Bishop Herman  pulls back to Dorpat to tax his own estates, this will provide money to keep at least some troops in the field):

  A very busy mid-winter levy and muster yields some game-changers: the Danes have a crisis back in Denmark and leave the field; the Mongols want to know what's going on and this puts
off any fielding of Alexander or his brother off for a season.  They might be available in the muddy springtime.  Meanwhile, Gavrilo starts accumulating ships to make his escape and things are at
sixes and sevens on all the other fronts...though Vladislav and Domash are encamped with lots of food and transport.  Vladislav might be able to move through Estonia to help Gavrilo with his
nautical project by distracting his enemies...we will see:

  Well...Gavrilo sailed away when spring came and the ice melted.  Most of the Teutons demobilized despite lots of desperate fealty rolls.  The council of Novgorod fielded Alexander and Rudolf kept himself from demobilizing by saying home and collecting taxes.  When the summer of 1241 began, the Papal Legate arrived and summoned the Grand Master and the Summer Crusaders.  The Papal legate is represented by the purple pawn and after he gets the Grand Master Mustered he will go back to his "card" (as an ostensibly abstentious and parsimonious person he doesn't get a "mat" apparently).  Meanwhile, if Alexander can get his transport and supplies together, he has a shot at storming Pskov, I think:


MengJiao

Quote from: MengJiao on February 18, 2022, 05:51:25 PM

  Well...Gavrilo sailed away when spring came and the ice melted.  Most of the Teutons demobilized despite lots of desperate fealty rolls.  The council of Novgorod fielded Alexander and Rudolf kept himself from demobilizing by saying home and collecting taxes.  When the summer of 1241 began, the Papal Legate arrived and summoned the Grand Master and the Summer Crusaders.  The Papal legate is represented by the purple pawn and after he gets the Grand Master Mustered he will go back to his "card" (as an ostensibly abstentious and parsimonious person he doesn't get a "mat" apparently).  Meanwhile, if Alexander can get his transport and supplies together, he has a shot at storming Pskov, I think:

  Alexander stormed Pskov in early summer.  Two things helped him manage this -- one, his personal retinue (like huscarls) or druzhina, gives him a +1 command, since he already has 3,
this can give him a total of 12 commands in one season if he is given the max of 3 command cards in the command sequence deck -- more than enough to have a chance at storming even
a large city if it has only its intrinsic garrison.  It probably also helped that I was too optimistic with the cards for the Teutonic mobilization.  I should have given the Grand Master all three of his cards,
but I had hopes that he would triggers some other mobilizations but no...the Papal Legate is not quite the moral equivalent of an experienced gang of armored horsemen respected even by the
Mongols on tour when they leave the steppes and visit the forests.  At best the Legate can trigger either one mobilization or one command and this summer even the Summer Crusaders
were not up to their full fealty feelings it seems.  This points out several interesting aspects of the game -- the shifting political currents that it portrays with event cards, the different force structures
that it allows with the capability cards and the varying plans and expectations reflected in the command sequence cards:


MengJiao

#14
Quote from: MengJiao on February 19, 2022, 08:26:25 AM


  Late summer was  busy, though not much changed on the map.  The Crusade was finally underway again, but the Pope died and the legate left.  The Grand Master pulled back into friendly territory to levy and muster his summer Crusaders.  The Russians built sleds and waited for the snow.  Not much to see yet.

   Winter is rough so far for both sides.  The Teutons have pulled back into their own territory to raise money to keep some forces in the field.  The forces of Novgorod may try to recapture Izborsk, but dare not move their main forces from Pskov.  But they too may have to resort to taxation to keep some forces fielded.

   Into the second 40 days of winter (just 80 or so more to go), the nightmare continues:  Prussia revolts and the Grand Master has to start his campaign in Riga.  BUT the Teutonic Knights do field a portable organ and this drives them temporarily into a sort of +1 melee frenzy...if they can get the sleds and provisions to leave Riga.  Meanwhile, the Russians are raising taxes and maybe Gavrilo will get Izborsk to return to Novgorodian alliegance.

  The turn of the year to 1242 -- I'm declaring a victory for Novgorod and co.   The so many things went against the Teutons (defeat of the Grand Master, problems in Denmark, death of the Pope...even the timing of the Mongol supervision probably help Novgorod and co.):