A.John uses an MI to push away one squadron of Immortals, then another to attack another squadron which, hemmed in as it is, cannot retreat. He then moves up a Cataphract to aid the MI in the attack, and another Cataphract to chase away the Saracens and surround the unlucky enemy HC.
With his final order, he recovers the HC on the hill, which given the Dara missile rules and the Saracen withdrawal are just out of arrow range.
Melee kills the HC as expected -- seven more RPs -- but lands three hits on the attackers as well. That means that either the CAT or the MI would rout. I more or less arbitrarily decided that the MI should rout, and then eliminated them for routing across the ditch. Technically they have an "escape route" northward, but it made no sense to me to allow that since their ultimate goal is the Dara gate and the can't go across the ditch. If you had this impenetrable barrier between you and your destination, would you go 8 hexes through the ditch even though your commander would prefer that you not, or would you rout towards the enemy center in the eventual hope of passing behind their front lines and running something like 50 hexes?
The answer seemed pretty clear to me. And this does have the nice effect of preserving the higher-TQ CAT, at least.
Current Rout Point totals:
| Side | Current | Limit | Pct |
|---|---|---|---|
| Persians | 118 | 109 | 108% |
| Byzantines | 87 | 102 | 85% |
Over to Perozes to wrap up the Persian moves for this game!
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