"Skill is imbalanced"
-Whoop
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| Historical BR: Agincourt! | | | Author: | | | IP: | pega.gloXXXX | | Date: | 01/13/00 02:01 | | Game Type: | Other | | Labels: | Old Classic(1), Funny(1), Text Only(1), Fan Fiction(1) | | Report Rating: , # of Ratings: 1, Max: 8, Min: 8
Lifetime Rating for [MrFurious]: 7.0000 |  | Historical battle reports: Agincourt
For fun, I have decided to write little reports on historical battles since I assume our collective addiction to SC also creates in most of us an interest in all things strategic. Keep in mind that I am NOT a military expert by any means I am just a guy who has read a few books. If my facts are not straight please don’t flame me, but feel free to use the comment section to correct and promote further historical discussion.
Without further ado here is my report:
Players:
King Henry V: inherits the red English forces from his father (Henry IV of course)
Charles d'Albret, constable of France: Appointed commander of the blue French forces
Map: Various parts of France
(It is interesting to note that even though these two countries have been at war several times in their history, battles are rarely fought at the same place because as the old commanders put it: “Thou shalt not play on the same gay ass map else thou losest thy skill”).
Pre-Game Chat
Back in 1414 ,way before the internet, Generals and Kings would converse through another device that could be construed as the ancestor of battle.net namely: The Heralds.
These brave souls would travel back and forth throughout the lands faithfully carrying the words of their masters into enemy territory. To be sure, they were protected from harm by royal letters and the laws of diplomatic immunity. However uneducated brigands can’t read and some Heads of state take a dim view towards bad news. There were also wolves and accidents at sea.
So it was that the Herald of the French came to see King Henry V. The king had advanced the idea that some French territories should be his by birthright and that if he couldn’t get them through diplomacy he could get them by force of arms. Thus the herald came with the French reply from the Dauphin (or prince) of France. The two countries had already tense present relations (Historians would later say this episode is a small part of a 100 years war between them) so the Dauphin sent Henry some tennis balls and told him to play with himself. The King is reported to have said that the Dauphin’s joke will be wept at by thousands French of mothers and wives. Basically in B.net talk this boiled down to:
< King Henry V > Here is a list of the channels I think I should be ops on
< Dauphin > F you! My man Chuck here ownz you and your mom! Go back to BGH!
< Charles d'Albret > Dauph man, why you put me in these spots?
< Dauphin > Kick his ass man!
< King Henry V > Ok
< Dauphin > Allright newbie killin’ time!
< Charles d'Albret > Take a look at his rec
< Dauphin > Rec means nothing man he’s a newb
< King Henry V > Hank//Hank
< King Henry V > gone
< Charles d'Albret > ….
As you can see, The constable of France didn’t share the Dauphin’s underestimation of the English King. The young King had had a good record over at home of having defended his title of Prince of Wales from a few pretenders. Nevertheless, Chuck was duty bound to obey his Prince and fight Henry. Besides he was still confident enough in his skill to take him on.
Opening moves
Both sides started pumping mass troops in anticipation of the coming conflict. Chuck was going mass Knights, which were the medieval equivalent of Goons, whereas Hank went for a mixed force of men-at-arms, archers and Pikemen. Chuck tried to go for a quick kill by doing the equivalent of the Dark Templar drop in those days. He paid three of the king’s lords, Richard, earl of Cambridge, Sir Thomas Grey of Heton, or Northumberland, and Henry, Lord Scrope of Masham to betray and kill the King. However, Henry had detection and the traitors were found out and sentenced to die. This in B.net talk adds up to:
< Charles d'Albret > didn’t see your turret
< King Henry V > hehe
Henry loaded up his troops aboard his transports and executed a perfect drop on the town of Harfleur. He laid siege to it and took it in just over a month. The Constable had been too confident in his betrayal tactic and did what a lot of B.netters do; he didn’t protect his expansion enough. He knew he his knights couldn’t reach the town before it fell so he abandoned it, massing more forces and sending them where they can better respond to further attacks.
Agincourt
Henry takes Harfleur as his own and in two weeks, English merchants are already doing business there. He leaves a small garrison and heads deeper into French territory. That is when is infantry is hit by the medieval equivalent of Psionic-Storm; Disease. The French roads were muddy and filthy, Morale was at an all-time low. Henry’s goal was to take the town of Calais and from there he could call it quits for awhile and profit from the newly acquired towns.
Chuck meanwhile, had no intention of letting Henry get anywhere near Calais and intercepted his forces at a place called Agincourt. It was clear Chuck had macroed the hell out of his resources because his goons er… Knights outnumbered the English five to one with all of his troops being fresh. Seeing the weak English, Chuck announces:
< Charles d'Albret > Is that all you got??? You suck!!!!
After delivering a rousing speech to his men, Henry proceeded to micro his troops around two woods that formed a wedge in the terrain. He protected his archers from the knights with Spikes on the ground (equivalent of mines =]) and placed his men-at-arms at the base of the wedge to await the French. Charles d'Albret just attacked moved his troops in, his knights not caring about the puny archers. Much to his surprise, these archers had incredible range sufficient power to penetrate his knight’s armour! As the knights pass through the wedge, the raining arrows (10 per minute per archer) slaughter them. The men-at-arms easily take care of the few knights who trickle in to the base of the wedge. Chuck tries to pull back his knights but their clunky way of walking only caused more of them to die by archer fire. The constable is forced to conceded though he is pissed off.
< Charles d'Albret > fucking longbows!
< King Henry V > Upgrades rock =]
< Charles d'Albret > gg
< King Henry V > gg
Winner: King Henry V!
Lessons learned:
1) Get early detection, the traitors could have been the end of Henry.
2) Upgrade your troops! Historians all agree that henry couldn’t have won this war with normal archers as they would have just bounced over the knight’s armor.
3) Combined troops own!
If you want more information on King Henry I suggest you visit your local library.
A cool little last fact:
In this battle, the English threatened to cut off the middle finger of English troops, without which it is impossible to draw the renowned English longbow. This famous weapon was made of the native English yew tree, and so the act of drawing the longbow was known as "plucking yew." Thus, when the victorious English waved their middle fingers at the defeated French, they said "See, we can still pluck yew! PLUCK YEW!"
Over the years some "folk etymologies" have grown up around this symbolic gesture. Since "pluck yew" is rather difficult to say (like "pleasant mother pheasant plucker," which is who you had to go to for the feathers used on the arrows), the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labio-dental fricative "f". Thus the words often used in conjunction with one-finger-salute are mistakenly thought to have something to do with the intimate encounter.
It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows that the symbolic gesture is known as "giving the bird"
Cheers,
MrFurious
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