Moesgaard 2010

Now, a week after our return from Moesgaard, after confirming memories with pictures and videos, it is time for a preliminary analysis of the battles.

As I am no longer a commander, I have limited view of the entire battlefield and will thus by necessity focus on Ask. I will try to include what I can of the rest of the battles, and will gladly hear the comments of Robert, et al, who had a better view and idea of what was supposedly happening.

You should also all beware that I try to be an objective observer and analyst, so that any criticism or suggestions for improvements are not meant as degrading, but as a possible help; right or wrong, for I also am not infallible.

The sides:
“Scanlines” under Robert Dahlström, calling themselves “Tyr” for easy identification. After many years absence and longing, Scanlines were back in busines. With support from a few Poles and ?? all the Scandinavian groups were pitted on one side against the rest of the world on the other. Main groupings were Danes (including Ulfhednir, Odd, Atgeir, Loke's Frimænd, Danehirden and my own beloved Ask, sorry if I forgot anyone, I have a hard time following the mercurial developments of any groups save my own and the wolves- I know most of you in person and like you, I just find it hard to follow which groups you are in), Spydkysten/Spear Coast (an alliance of the Swedish and Norwegian groups putting much emphasis on one-handed spears, includes Ranerne, Hälsingarne, Elvegrimarne and others (Bifrost?)- again I am not current with all groups, I just like their members). I apologise for anyone not mentioned and/or forgotten, there are simply too many groups for my old brain to keep track off any longer. Total supposedly 223 fighters.

Traditionally Scanlines has been seen and proved to be too strong, but the past two- three years other groups have proven themselves while certain unnamed Scandinavian groups has proven not to be as elite as they once were. Thus, I suspect, Peter and Zuk started their tenure as “Combat-executives” thinking that Scanlines vs the rest would be even.


The rest under Swart of Einvic, calling themselves “Fenris” (or possibly “Viking”, I am not certain, I just know anything not shouting “Tyr” was a target”). Groups from as far away as Australia had joined to oppose the Scandinavians, The main groupings were the Germans (Einvic, Bernstein Ring, others?), Army of Jomsborg Elag (a large conglomerate of groups from all over, including Australia), Valhalla (a very old group that hosts wonderful parties in their camp) and the Dutch of Trek. Valhalla often serves and served as a reserve, and Trek as a small reserve, skirmishers and runners to insert through holes in the enemy line and spread havoc behind it. Total supposedly 220 fighters.

I am uncertain of the numbers for each side (220 + 223 does not add up to the 435 Peter said we were), except that Ask was the largest non-alliance single group, fielding 45 fighters and that a total of 435 fighters were on the field.



The Battles:

General introduction and points.
-Attackers come on from the beach side, Defenders from the Forests.
For safety reasons, stepping on the path in front of the audience (being kept 2 M back from it by the local Home Guard) means that you die.

-Until last year's inclusion of the small burial house in the battle (as an obstacle, its inside is off-limits as this is where medics, water-girls, etc. hides), the Attackers were generally held to have had the easiest task as the field slopes downhill and widens, especially on the line from the white stone to the house, then draws in a bit before widening slightly again after the exit to the woods in that part of the field. But these days some believe that the Defenders' side has the easiest task as they can employ the house to create a bottleneck, divide the attacking army, etc.. I am undecided on that, but more of that later.

-Since the “Inverted W” of 2007, the “Cock and Bollocks” tactic of 2008 and the “Stairway to Heaven” of 2009, everybody now uses self-supporting, self-protecting “Phalanx” formations. Squares, often made up of individual subgroups, protecting their own backs and flanks, and with their own internal small reserve to support itself. These are employed not unlike the Roman manipular tactics, but with less space in between as we do not (yet) have enough groups on the field to build a second line of overlapping groups behind the first one. This deployment is much more flexible than our traditional line, but only in the last couple of years have we had enough men on the field to deploy as such.

-For many years, metal armour and helmet has granted the wearer two lives as the Museum wished for more armour on the field. But this year the rules were revised so that everybody had only one life no matter their protection. I suspect to avoid the perpetual problems of people not being able to count well and sometimes needing seven or eight hits to acknowledge their demise. Personally I suspect cheaters will cheat in any case and that they are a minority, but it did change the strengths of the individual groups. But we will be back to that.

-When the lines engage, no orders from the overall commander can be heard. All he can do is to put the plan in motion, commit reserves and hope. The actual performance in battle is up to the initiative of subcommanders/group commanders knowing the plan and being able to improvise.

-This year, the losers of each battle was allowed to choose the role as either attacker or defender, positions in the first battle decided in a Tug-of-War Friday (amazingly with no injuries).
Often when 2 – 2 id achieved those ahead start to relax, some even give a battle to their enemies by trying very experimental tactics, etc., and generally relaxing; resting on their laurels.

-Peter and Zuk had announced during winter that as an experiment, the fight would start as soon as the first combatants entered the field. The group phalanxes/blocks would thus be important for moving around safely and effectively, as would skirmishers. This idea was dropped though, and it would probably have been boring for the audience.

Saturday Morning.
Being competitive fights, this first one would gauge the strengths of the combatants and give hints of the tactics employed by each side. The defenders were thus reluctant to leave their strong position behind the house, while the attackers were reluctant to deploy into a bottleneck. This resulted in a stand-off for some minutes while the attackers tried to lure the defenders out with obscenities, insults and a feigned attack by Ask on the right flank where they were deployed. Of note in these first minutes were Trek's skirmishing until chased off by Loke's Frimænd with support. I know they do not read Danish, but they tried to do what I describe in the post below. With little success tactically, but much morally, especially as Jaap succeeded in killing Jakob “Grimulf” of Ask, drawing first blood to much cheering from one side and much chagrin from the other. They would repeat their skirmishing and Jaap would draw first blood in all battles. But more on the skirmishers later.
The attackers' plan was to employ the “Stairway to Heaven” tactic, engaging the defenders from the right flank to the left with one phalanx after the other, the right and centre ones wearing the defenders down enough that either the right ones or Ulfhednir in reserve would break through at the left (basically an Oblique Order/Refused Flank). This plan was thwarted by the defenders' refusal to come out from behind the house and play, as we had feared.
Eventually we threw the plan to the wind; Ask on the right being hungry for blood and Robert tiring of the stand-off. Ask engaged their immediate opponents; Einvic despite their apparent strong position and a long fight ensued. Meanwhile the rest of the attackers went in slowly group-phalanx after group phalanx and as Ask started pushing Einvic back the entire lines were engaged.
On the right the Ask Bannerman noticed that the field widened slightly two metres behind Einvic and, remembering the old days where the attackers' pushing the defenders back as the field widened to go round in the resultant hole, spurred the Ask-fighters on to push their opponents back. It took a while as the large shields and defensive skills of Einvic stood up to the onslaught for a while (though not nearly as long as said Bannerman feared, more on that later). After a while the Germans were pushed back into the slightly widening part of the field, and with the losses suffered, a hole was opened for Ask to go round the flank, which decided the battle.
No reserves as such were committed against us, I seem to recall they had been used earlier to try and break through Spydkysten in the centre who, with support from Ulfhednir, contained them, pulled back and themselves broke into the enemy formation. The largest difficulty for Ask as we folded the enemy line back upon itself on its right flank was to hunt down Trek and a few other skirmishers/runners. Meanwhile the enemy commander, noticing his collapsing left flank had put a lot of pressure on our left, where the Icelanders and Poles pulled back a bit to blunt the attack, then stood their ground faithfully till the rest of us arrived; parts of Ask and Spydkysten pulling out of their advance to reinforce and the rest coming up from behind. The battle was a decisive victory for the attackers and we did not at any moment feel that it could have gone the other way.

Saturday afternoon.
Was almost a repeat of the morning battle, except that for a few moments it teetered on the brink of a defeat/more costly victory. On the right flank Ask was facing Bernstein Ring while Einvic and Valhalla were kept in reserve. As Ask pushed forwards First Einvic, then Valhalla in succession was thrown into the gap between us and our neighbours to try and isolate us from the rest of the attackers in a repeat of Napoleon's tactic at Austerlitz and the “Sickleschnitt” of 1940. For a moment Einvic almost broke through, but Ask's rearguard and our neighbours (who?), supported by Loke's Frimænd contained the attack, then Valhalla thundered in. With the line buckling, almost breaking and no reserves at hand, the battle was swinging in the defenders' direction. Then, just as everything looked lost, Christoffer led a pack of hungry Wolves in an epic charge downhill and into the flank of Valhalla. Very few things can withstand an Ulfhednir charge even from the front, and one in the flank while committed forwards is certain doom for any group, it was mass slaughter. Suddenly the hammer- anvil was turned against the defenders and their left flank melted away. With no reserves left except a few Trek runners, the battle was decided in a repeat of the morning fight and Tyr could now relax a bit Saturday evening as they could no longer loose the weekend; the worst that could happen was 2 – 2.

Sunday morning.
Sunday the Fenris/Viking side elected to now be attackers, while the confident Tyr side decided to not defend behind the house, but instead having fun and take the fight to the attackers with the right flank (still consisting of Ask) setting up far forwards and pushing hard when the battle was joined. The flanks near the audience thus met where lines did back in the days when we could barely make a full line across the field and before when we could not (we only began to be able to cover the hole field in the late 90-ties) while the flanks away from the audience met at the widest point of the field. Setting up so far forwards also gained Ask the advantage of being on level ground on a small knee of the hill, which proved an advantage later.
Ask was supposed to charge and push hard, but both in this and the subsequent afternoon fight, we did not do so. Instead we fell back in the old habit of stopping at contact, instead of merely pushing on as we did some years ago. Fortunately Bernstein Ring proved no hard opponent this time either. But as we slowed down, it allowed their two neighbouring groups to attack Ask's rear echelon to again try and isolate us from the rest, annihilate us and then flank the rest of our line, we had to hold the entire enemy flank for a while there. Only skill, cohesion, skill-full use of the house to create a killing zone between us and it and the intervention of our friends to bottle the attackers up and kill them (according to Oleg, Ulfhednir again slaughtered anything in their path), allowed us to push on slowly and grind down our enemies.
Once more our opponents kept a close order, seeking safety in a tight unit. However, as we whittled them down their bunching together opened a hole between their flank and the path, allowing Ask to send their entire mobile reserve group (which had been engaged in the containment, but could now be pulled out) of 8- 10 men all the way round that flank fast downhill to attack the main enemy line from the back and hunt down the pesky Trek runners. Meanwhile still pushing the flank back and flanking it with the main Ask line picking up speed downhill as they turned back upon themselves. Our opposition melted away and again the battle was decided by a flanking manoeuvre on the strong right flank.

Sunday afternoon.
Was almost a repeat of the morning battle, except the Fenris/Viking reserve was futilely committed against Spydkysten in the centre to break through there. Which made Ask's slowness in folding the enemy flank the worse! I believe this is a video of it just as we start.

All four battles were decisive or even overwhelming victories for Scanlines despite some hard fighting. This had several reasons.

1.Removal of the Armour Points had taken away a significant part of the non-Scandinavian side's strength. Especially from the German groups, much of their training (correct me if I am wrong) and thus apparent strength in the past two years, was based on and around moving slowly in very close formation with large shields and having two lives from armour. Some of them even refuse to train without armour with the rest of us for safety reasons (with only about 15 minor injuries in need of attention from the medic- none serious enough to stop participation in the next fight, they should not worry; this was one of the most safe Moesgaard I can recall in my 18 times there). However, the consequence of this is a static and defensive fighting style. Heavy equipment takes away much of your ability and motivation to attack vigorously. It also slows you down and tires you. Further, employing heavy armour in tight formations, instead of teaching the fighters to open up and hold the same area with fewer people in loose order when attrition sets in, allows entire groups to flank or even get around you. Which you do not want, it is much like we teach individuals on the flank to not back in a pivot in the guy next to them- effectively getting behind him- when under pressure, but instead to step to the side; catching whoever is doing the pressing in a Triangle.

2.Group Phalanxes gives added flexibility and mobility. It is easier to move as several blocks than as a large line. Both sides attempted the blocks, but the most successful ones were those of Scanlines. Ask, and I believe Spydkysten and Ulfhednir as well, has trained this tactic during winter, merely moving around in formation, protecting ourselves from runners and providing our own reserve. Drill works. However, it takes a significant number of participants and repeated training to train such with any effectiveness. Many of the non-Scandinavian groups do not have that; Army of Jomsborg is huge, but in effect an alliance made up of people from all over the world rarely meeting to train as a group whereas both Ask and Ulfhednir have most members located within 50 Km of Aarhus and Copenhagen respectively and meets twice a week to train (and Ask forces new members to train 50+ times a year). This makes a difference.

3.Trek skirmished well, but were far too few to make a difference. If Skirmishers are to perform their tasks, they need to be enough to form a credible threat and lure/channel the enemy where they want them.

4.Possession if the hill/knee of the hill proved significant in all the battles. Not so much to the melee (we are not allowed to hit heads, so height advantage is not as significant) as to deployment of reserves or mobility in the battle. It is much easier to move downhill in heat, slick grass against slick soles and full armour than it is to move uphill). This is as large an advantage as the Defenders' possession if the house.


Despite the result both sides were happy and on the non-Scandinavian side, new bonds were formed.

Points of note/conclusion for Ask: will be kept to ourselves until the powers that be in the group lets me divulge them ;-)


If others wants my comment on their performance, let me know.

Comment, clarifications, discussions and enlightenment is welcome.


Picture by Iduna Mariana Pertoft.