Successors Yet Again

Yet another Successors clash in the Empire Campaign as the Ptolemies attack the Macedonians.  The lights had been repaired at the club, so this time I was able to take some photos.  The two sides set up pretty much as standard: central phalanxes with mounted and/or light troops on the wings.  The Macedonians had a symmetrical deployment, while Ptolemy led with his right (a powerful cavalry force here) and relied on a load of nellies to hold his left, next to the foot guards.

The first photo is an angled shot of the Macedonian phalanx, bristling on a nice hill.

Next is a picture of the left of the Macedonian line (Gordon commanding), menaced by a large unit of elite lancers supported by light and medium cavalry (Simon as a Ptolemy).

I ran the right wing of the Macedonians.  I intended to use my superiority in light troops to remove the skirmish screen from the enemy elephants and then trash them with missile power.

My lot ganged up on the hapless enemy archers.

The archers having been disposed of, my light troops showered the elephants with javelins and slingshot.  The elephants nearer the camera took loads of hits.

The remaining elephants charged my light troops, only for disaster to strike the Ptolemaics.  The badly damaged elephants were immediately destroyed.  They then routed directly into their friends, which routed in turn into the foot guards, disordering them in turn.  The entire flank guard collapsed ignominiously.

My guards then charged in, just to add insult to injury.  On the other wing, Gordon's forces cancelled out the enemy heavy cavalry, allowing him to pick off the end phalanx units, which turned out to be Egyptian conscripts.

A bit of a disaster for Ptolemy, then.  Afterwards, we counted the points and it turned out that I had overbuilt the Macedonian army by a phalanx's worth.  I used the same army as before, taking it from an earlier battle description in which I wrote by mistake that the Macedonians had six phalanxes when in fact they had five.  It wouldn't have mattered, though, because the morale collapse caused by the elephants was so spectacular.  My turn to be a numpty...

Next up in the campaign will be a Macedonian attempt to restore the shattered lines of communications in their territories by destroying a rebellion in Thrace.  They need to re-establish control of the Bosphorus.  Before that, though, we have Chalons...