The Berbers invade Spain: Madaxeman ADLG (& travel!) reports

[madaxeman]

In the dark and cold month of January an intrepid band of Central Londoners set off very early one morning to head to Heathrow, and then onto the sunshine of Southern Spain to take part in the annual Akra Leuka ADLG tournament in Alicante.



Of course, going all that way just to play toy soldiers would have been daft, so the trip had long since developed a frightening degree of mission-creep by adding in a couple of nights in Valencia, a military museum trip, a visit to a mountaintop castle, much Iberian gastronomy and quite a few different types of alcoholic refreshment.



But, at the heart of it remained one of the biggest ADLG gatherings of the year, with 68 players drawn from all over Europe coming together for a marathon 6-game competition themed where every army list had to be led by one of its greatest historical generals ("Strategists" in L'Art de la Guerre terminology).



After much consideration I had ended up plumping for the Berbers, mainly as they had successfully invaded Spain (and most definitely not because I thought they were a "good" army under ADLG).
The event itself then saw this somewhat scratch Berber host taking on the Ghaznavids, Timurids (twice), Byzantines, Feudal English and also the Ottoman Empire, and all of us taking on some extra pounds no doubt in the tapas bars and restaurants of Southern Spain too.



With 6 games, a lot of tourism, a range of opponents from across the continent and an account on ChatGPT I've ended up absolutely throwing the kitchen sink at the whole "writing up the match reports" thing this time around, including video analysis, stats and odds charts, randomly generated Berber oaths, somewhat spurious pen-pictures of the Great Generals involved in the fighting, AI-generated poetry and army list analysis as well as the usual terrible jokes, irrelevant captions and other badly written nonsense you are probably already well used to.



So, put the kettle on and brew yourself up a Sangria as now is your chance (as long as you are sitting comfortably..) to share that epic experience in the Battle & Tourism Reports from Alicante 2023.

(Link to reports : https://www.madaxeman.com/reports/Alicante_2023_A.php )

[Graham C]

What an excellent report almost makes me feel like taking up ADLG just to go to the tournament and congratulations on your win

[davidb]

Great report as usual. Congratulations on your win!

[madaxeman]

What an excellent report almost makes me feel like taking up ADLG just to go to the tournament and congratulations on your win

There's a lot more to going to tournaments over and above the actual "playing a game or two" thing :-)

[Jon Freitag]

Great report!  I enjoyed this very much.

[Chris]

Echo the previous remarks and sentiments.

One wonders (and perhaps worries a little) about the time and resources required to assembled such multi-media and sensory stimulating reports.

Somewhat related: Adds another layer of regret for not having made a point of visiting Spain when I backpacked around Europe when I was much younger and foolish. (Older and still foolish now  )

Cheers,
Chris

[madaxeman]

Echo the previous remarks and sentiments.

One wonders (and perhaps worries a little) about the time and resources required to assembled such multi-media and sensory stimulating reports.

Somewhat related: Adds another layer of regret for not having made a point of visiting Spain when I backpacked around Europe when I was much younger and foolish. (Older and still foolish now  )

Cheers,
Chris

Well, on the first point, I used to have a job that involved a lot of time sitting on long-haul flights... and now I don't have all that much work at all !  However, this was a bit of a special one, so I did throw El Kitchen Sink at it a little... and of of late I have been doing more straight to YouTube  https://www.youtube.com/@Madaxeman

On the latter, I'm sure there is plenty of time - visiting places when you are older is still a lot of fun

[gavindbm]

Another fun report.  I enjoy the video reports..though they can distract me when I try to concentrate on painting.