SPRING BIG GAME 2017 - THE COUNTY CUP (PART 7)

Not to be outdone, the Lower Course descended into a more measured, if equally desperate, bout of chaos : the first three sided melee in recorded Hereford VBCW history. Determined to capture a vital "red flag" from the upper green (or at least deny it to the enemy), the forces of the Blessed Lady Rita, the Rorke's Drift Re-Enactment Society and THE Rural LDV fought a long-running, bloody and somewhat indecisive engagement through and over the bunkers: 

"The trouble with the Bishop - and the Captain - is that they do things on such a small scale, m'dear." -
Lady Rita Talbot-Ponsonby in the course of the vast three way melee on the Lower Course.

An aerial shot of the Lower Course. The three sided melee continues in the
foreground. In the centre, two Special Objectives remains to be
captured - a "Hero's Grave" and a "Chemical Works".
In the background, Spode's black tank can be seen idling,
anxious not to enter another Minefield.

The one recipient of vast fortune - and an equally vast number of re-inforcements - via capturing "Special Objectives" (which varied from Minefields through Mommet Groves and Mommet Tunnels, to an abandoned Champagne Smuggler's Cart, the Herefordshire Cider Makers' Secret Stash and a herd of a Herefordshire's famous cattle) was none other than the Captain Percy Fitzneatly and the North Herefordshire Parishioners Milita. It seemed that Captain Percy (Craig) could not help but throw his D6 for the "more men/double more men" options every time he encountered a Special Objective, and soon the plucky Milita had grown to Divisional size, and the "Spare Units" table was looking denuded:

The patriotically covered "Special Units" table, originally filled with units, is quickly reduced to
a random smatter by the re-animating good fortune of Craig the Lichemaster. The units shown
here will soon be on their way to join the Burghill & Tillington Infantry Corps

While rendering Captain Fitzneatly's force even more formidable than anticipated, such was the vast scale of the re-inforcement that it seems to have slowed down his advance to a crawl. With the Bishop and the Captain still engaged in their never ending bitch - fight in the southern corner of the Upper Course ("I take this pen-knife...I see your pen-knife and raise you a rusty fork - take that, you bounder!), the remaining players (Captain Shang's Christians, the Lew Wallace Memorial Assault Group, and J's Spanish-Monarchist-Nationalist-Catholic Militia) would have to rely upon speed to claim their victory.