IWf World Championships
Sunny Epsom
Sunny 2001
The big question - can I improve on my fairly lacklustre 2000 performance, where the Mighty Lithuanians had started to let me down for the first time?
Yet again I had managed to coincide an intense weekend of wargaming with an intense week of exhibition attendance, late nights and heavy drinking the week before.
So, tired, and trepidatious (because of the non-scientific way I had chosen my Sicilian Norman army - i.e. "I want to use my new Bw (I) and my 2 Dragons Norman Knights in a competition - what can I choose that will let me do both?") we arrived at Epsom very early in the morning.
So, that brings us to The Sicilians"........
My First Game was vs an almost-late Bob Medcraft and his "I'm glad I bought this army just before 2.1 came out - NOT - but I'm buggered if I'm going to never use them" Dailami.
Apologies for the poor photos here, but we were playing in the stygian gloom of the DBR hall.....
Suspecting the key to the game would be killing foot quickly, The Sicilian mafiosi had brought their "anti-spear" list out to play. The dailami, smelling a knight or two a mile off, wisely tried to keep the bulk of their auxilia safely tucked up in front of a rough hill, extending their line with some more auxilia, who (knowing the Sicilian mentality) had brought along a friend of theirs - the Sicilians looked on and saw the loose formation foot equivalent of a 4-legged Mafia protection racket, Tony "The Elephant", Jumborini, who sat in the center of their line, slurping up pasta in a very strange way indeed.......
The game quickly developed into a game of cat and mouse - or elephant and LH to be more precise. On the Sicilian left, the game plan was simple - the Kn (led by Al Pacino) and the Arab Cv would fight it out, and whoever was luckiest would win. But in the center the big question was could the Germans get into the auxilia and make "Vorsprung Durch Dead Dailami Roadkill" or would Dancing Tony The Elephant get in the way and spoil the party?
Are you trumpeting at me?
You ask me to run into these Dailami? But you don't ask with respect. You don't offer friendship. Instead, you come into my house on the day my daughter is to be married, and you, uh, ask me to run over these crazy elephants instead....?
That is
not justice"
In a close shave, the Kn (I) manage to just brush past the end of the Dailami line.
Michael:"Well,
when Johnny The German was first starting out, he was all set to charge
into the elephant, a big bad elephant. And as he got nearer and nearer, he
wanted to get round it. Now, Johnny is my father's godson. And my father
went to see this elephant's General, and he offered him $10,000 to let
Johnny go into the Cv (S) instead. But the General said no. So the next
bound, my father went to see him, only this time with Luca Brasi. And
within a couple of minutes, he rolled such poor dice that Johnny could get
into the Cv (S), for a certified check for $1,000.
Kay: How'd he do that?
Michael: My
father made him an offer he couldn't refuse.
Kay: What was that?
Michael: Luca Brasi held a gun to his head,
and my father assured him that either his brains - or his dice, showing
"ones" - would be on the tabletop...That's a true story...That's
my family.
German DBE'd Kn (I) make the Dailami general an offer he cannot refuse.....
Very soon, the Kn (I) were where they were supposed to be, the Sicilians were ably supporting their flanks, and it was time for the Don himself to step up to the plate and take a swing at the remaining auxilia
With the elephant otherwise occupied, the Don himself (Marlon Brando) delivers the coup-de-grace, ploughing the last couple of auxilia under the tablecloth. 10-0 to the boys from the land of Olive Oil (that's how they make their money, honest....)
