Hitting back

Last year the Hebrews raided into Palestine and got away with a decent amount of plunder, having defeated the defending Philistine force. After spending all of this time regrouping, the Philistines decided to embark upon a punitive expedition into Israel. They arrived outside Beth-Bephor and laid siege. A Hebrew relief army made it's way through the hills and battle was joined.

The sides deployed on tricky terrain. I wanted to see how tough a nut BUAs are in DBA 3.0.

The two sides charge into each other in the north, but in the south they just sit there, looking at each other. PIP dice were generally not high throughout this game. Note the piece of polystyrene packaging that the Hebrew auxilia are standing on so that they can stay in formation. No, they are not laying an egg...

The Philistine spear reserve moves up to aid the northern-most chariot and The Philistine auxilia take out their opposites on the hill. First blood Philistia! Feeling cocky, the southern-most Psiloi are sent forward to try to lure out the Hebrew auxilia. These will duly be destroyed.

The spear get into the battle-line in the north while the Hebrew reserves come through and join their brethren in the woods.

The Philistine Psiloi see off the auxilia that had been opposite them...

But the victory is short lived as the Hebrew line advances from the woods and goes onto the attack. The Psiloi are swept away in this counterattack.

A close up of the hill as the bitter fighting continues.

The Hebrew auxilia that took out the Psiloi forces the Philistine auxilia to turn, recoils them into the other Hebrews and puts the Israelites into a winning position, having eliminated 3 elements to 2. But in the north the Philistine spear force the Hebrew general to flee.

The Hebrew general returns, but not before the epic chariot battle on the far northern flank...

Ends with a Philistine victory!

Buoyed by their success the last remaining Philistines on the hill charge into their opponents...

And destroy them! Victory to the Philistine army! 

A great deal of plunder would be taken from this punitive raid - the score stands at 1-1 in the promised land, but I'm sure neither side will want to leave it that way.
It turned out that taking a BUA is damn hard work. The Philistine spear spent the game charging and bouncing off the walls, as I guess they should.The PIP dice and the nature of the terrain meant that the crux of the battle revolved around the combats in the northern part of the battlefield, and as can be plainly seen, half of both armies spent the day staring at each other and moving forward warily.
The biggest takeaway for me is the need to construct some new - lower - difficult hills. These certainly look the part, but they are very awkward to use. Figures can't balance and the battlelines lose their symmetry. I've begun constructing some new hills from foamcore which won't be quite as dominating but should be much more user friendly. I've also found that the grass mat on the tiles has a grain to it that makes it very hard to keep lines in contact properly, so I'll probably move to a base cloth.
Hopefully I'll get another game in next Friday - not sure if it will be a Punic Wars clash or a Biblical rematch, or maybe a Crimean War hit-out using OHW. We'll have to see what I'm in the mood for.

Nate