Bannockburn is an interesting battle. Many historians have argued that it was a turning point in medieval warfare, the division between the High and Late Middle Ages, but you could just as easily argue that it was a symptom of broader trends, just one event of many in a slow process of change. It’s narratively fascinating and historiographically intriguing, and that’s before we get to the nationalism. It’s not very surprising that it has an enduring legacy in popular culture and in historical writing – it’s too good a story to ignore and many historians have tried to fit it into their pet theories about how the fourteenth century forever changed medieval warfare. And lest you think I am without sin I have done this very thing in the past, even as I have since become significantly more sceptical of such arguments in recent years.
Before the armies clash - the Scots have a well ordered battle line while the English are scattered across the marshy terrain. Who goes first is actually determined by a random role, to reflect a lack of certainty about who really took the offensive back in 1314.
The first essay I wrote as an undergraduate that was on a topic of my own choosing (i.e. not from a list provided by the lecturer), I remember putting forward the argument (which was not very original in a historiographical sense, but it was new to me at the time) that the English victories of Crécy and Agincourt could trace their roots back to the Scottish wars and in particular the English defeat at Bannockburn. My argument was rooted in the broader historiographical tradition of the infantry revolution of the fourteenth century. This was essentially an attempt by historians to explain the fact that fourteenth and fifteenth century Western European armies mostly fought on foot, with mounted troops dismounting before combat. The arguments around the infantry revolution come in various extremes, with some arguing that cavalry essentially disappeared while more moderate voices point to the evidence that they still contributed to conflicts throughout the period albeit in a differnt role than before, but that’s a discussion for another time. What we know is that at battles like Crécy, Poitiers, and Agincourt the English and (from at least 1356) the French mostly fought on foot. The question was: why did Europe’s military elite who had previously preferred to fight on horseback decide suddenly to get off their horses and join the lower classes in fighting on foot?
Edward’s Battle begins to reform and reinforcements are brought from the camp while the Scottish axe men break rank and advance to attack and disrupt some of the English knights.
One popular theory looks to the Scots as the originators – except for them it wasn’t really a new tactic but rather how things had pretty much always been done. Scotland didn’t have as many of the large horses that were required to carry a fully armoured man-at-arms into battle and so they had a more established tradition of the nobility fighting on foot with the other soldiers. This really came to the fore at Bannockburn where an army of dismounted Scots, led by Robert the Bruce, delivered a resounding defeat to King Edward II’s mounted knights.
The theory goes that the English, so utterly shamed by their defeat learned to copy those Scottish tactics and deployed them to great effect on the fields of France - the French seemingly entirely unaware of these tactics despite being the Scots closest allies. To add insult to injury the English would defeat the Scots at Neville’s Cross in 1346 with the tactic and some historians even refer to it as the “English way of fighting” ignoring its supposed roots in Scotland.
We don’t have time for me to unpack that entire argument, but here’s the thing – Bannockburn is fascinating but it’s not unique. At Courtrai in 1302 the Flemings, without cavalry, crushed the flower of French Chivalry. Even then that alone wasn’t enough to win them their independence and within 4 years they were back under French control. One battle is not decisive, and a single victory does not a universal tactical shift make. Each battle is unique, its circumstances unlike any other battle in a myriad of ways, many of which we can never know. To my view, all these battles fall into broader patterns of changing tactics and methods of warfare that extend far beyond the individuals involved in them. There’s more to war than just the military. Population demographics, technological developments, and even shifts in political and religious structures all contribute to determining how war is waged.
The English charge into the Scottish line for remarkably underwhelming results while the aggressive position of the axe men blunts some of the charge potential.
Bannockburn was an important event. There’s no disputing its central role in changing Anglo-Scottish relations. It is not a military revolution on its own. However, that still doesn’t answer the most important question and the reason you all are here reading this, which is: what do I think of the Bannockburn scenario in Men of Iron? Honestly, I thought it was pretty rad!
One of my issues with the original Men of Iron box is how static one of the players often must be. Battles like Falkirk and Courtrai have one defending side sitting in formation waiting to be attacked by the other player. This is not entirely the fault of the game since it is really just representing how battles were fought at the time. Short of picking different battles (and there are a few I would maybe have preferred to be included) there’s not much to be done about that. In the end, though, I can’t dispute that Richard Berg had the right to pick what he wanted included in his game and the ones he chose often had this dynamic. At the same time, I don’t have to find that fun!
The English knights are quickly pushed back by the Scottish pikemen and the Scots begin to advance. Robert the Bruce is getting his hands dirty and pushing forward himself.
I bring this up because Bannockburn could have been another battle with one static side facing off against an attack from the other side, but I found it to be a lot more dynamic than other scenarios. I think the scattered nature of the English deployment helps with this a lot. The Scots have a strong defensive position and could choose to just hold that – forcing the English to attack them or risk the clock running out. However, since the English line isn’t fully formed, they are potentially vulnerable to attack at the start of the battle. As the Scots is it really the best plan to wait, or should you push the offensive now and never give the English a chance to properly organise themselves? It’s a viable option for the Scots to break ranks and attack – or even to reposition and set up a new line somewhere else. It made for a much more dynamic and exciting experience than I’ve had in many other Men of Iron battles.
The English lines have begun consolidating and the Scots are looking a bit stretched, but the momentum is still with them. Will the English be able to counter attack successfully?
This was also the first time that I really felt like I was missing something by not bothering with the Seizure Counters. I’ve been playing these all solitaire, I haven’t been using them because it didn’t feel like they would add very much to my experience. For the most part I haven’t seen many situations where I’d want to add an extra thing to keep track of during my games. However, during Bannockburn there were several moments where I thought “I would have used a Seizure Counter there”. I think a big part of this is that there are more options of commanders with good command ratings. Most obviously, the Scots have two commanders at 4 and Bruce is at 5 and gives -1 to the other commander’s rolls. A roughly 50% chance to activate a second Battle is very strong, and a 40% on the third is amazing. Interrupting that momentum at a crucial moment could pivot the game in a big way. This means using a Seizure counter to attempt to interrupt the Scots’ activation is very tempting, much more so than in scenarios where the chances of your opponent making their Continuation Roll seems lower than my chances of succeeding with a Seizure Counter.
Scottish momentum continues but the English have rallied their Routed troops and are forming a defensive line. Still, casualties have been high and chances aren’t looking good for them. (This photo is from the next day, hence the return of daylight)
The English are less good, but you have an interesting balance where Edward II is terrible but he has a huge Battle so you kind of want to activate him first and then try and get another commander with a Continuity Roll. The two cavalry Battles each have command ratings of 4 which isn’t bad odds of getting them to do something, and the archers are on 3s. There are options, and you should be able to activate two Battles reasonably often. However, this also runs the risk of you leaving yourself exposed as it takes several turns to reassemble Edward’s Battle into fighting order. If you’re relying on Continuity Roles to activate other Battles nearer the Scottish lines you run the risk of the Scots seizing initiative again and as we’ve seen, they can get a lot done in one turn.
I really felt this push pull and I can see how the battle could develop very differently with Seizure counters in play. Similarly, I never felt like Bannockburn fell into the trap that annoys me in Men of Iron where you just keep activating one Battle repeatedly to try and push its advantage as much as possible. I activated every Battle on both sides and often in different orders each turn. This gave it an extra layer of decisions that I thought was missing in some of the other scenarios.
The Scots went berserk for a dramatic finale - Robert Bruce and two others going on a rampage of Continuous Attacks. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them go this well in any of my games so far! Final game state is a solid Scottish victory.
In terms of the history, I really liked that it felt different from Poitiers, Crécy, and Courtrai. As I said at the start I feel like when historians take a big picture view of these battles, they can fall into a trap of assuming that they were all pretty much the same and a clear through line can be drawn between the tactics at each of them. While Men of Iron does show their similarities, they are also distinct, and it helps to show that just because two events share some similarities it does not make them the same event. Bannockburn is a distinct battle and an important one, but it is not a turning point in military history. It is also more than just a single data point in a longer series of battles. It is a distinct event worthy of its own study in addition to considering its place in greater history, and I think Men of Iron does a decent job of capturing that. Also, respect to Berg for giving the Scots longbowmen that are as good as the English, you love to see it.