Campaign Game: Salinus against the Cimbri

Our campaign is loosely based on a historical timeline, although events are beginning to deviate a little from history, and some of them are turning out a bit differently too. I like this, because it means that although we are playing purely historical match-ups on the tabletop, the campaign still has a bit of a life of its own. One such event occurred on Tuesday as we played the latest battle to be generated. It is 110 BC and Consul Salinus attacks the migrating Cimbri, fresh from beating up Illyrians, in the foothills of the Alps in Noricum.

The first photo shows the deployments, Salinus to the left and the Cimbri on the right. At the top left of the field are the Socii, ably commanded by Gordon, with me as Salinus running the (Roman) right half of the army. At the top right, Willie and Andrew ran a mercenary Gallic contingent tagging along with the Germans (in other words, Willie wanted to use his newly painted Gallic figures!). Graham ran the Cambric centre, and Simon their left. Terrain in the top half of the table as you look at it was a valley across which the Italians stared at the advancing Germanic host, a combination of steep and low hills, with a wood at the far end. Apart from some rough terrain near the German lines at the their centre left, the rest of the table was bare. A game of two halves, then. Photos taken mostly from the Roman perspective, because that's where I was.

A view of the extreme left of the field as the battle begins. Italian Equites have been deployed to protect the left flank of the legions, with some Balearic slingers out front. In the foreground is the first of the two Italian legions, sitting on a nice safe steep hill with the usual screen of Velites. Gordon is already moving some of the legionaries to his left. We have ruled that for this late transition period in the Republican Roman army, a legion consists of four groups of sixteen legionaries and two units of eight Velites. No Triarii this late, and no real difference between Hastati and Principes. Not coincidentally, this comes to a total of 80 figures, which is how many will be in a Marian legion after the reforms. The idea is that the legion composition is already moving towards the pure heavy infantry force associated with Marius. In the distance above you can see some Germans lurking in the hills.

 Moving to the right, you can see the second Italian legion, the first Roman legion, and the second (rightmost) Roman legion, which is beginning to peel off even more to the right. Many more Germans in the distance. The single piece of rough ground is already occupied by a large number of their slingers, so I am going to send the Velites forward to clear them out.

My extreme right at the same time: legionaries moving in this direction, because the flank is only held, as usual, by the Roman Equites, with some help from Cretan archers. Two German war bands are coming in this direction, as are two units of heavy cavalry deployed together with integral skirmisher support.

A side view of the whole game at this stage.

My right a little later, with both sides trying to run forward with some heavy infantry to support their cavalry. The Cretan archers have time-warped in from the future with machine guns. In fact, all of the Roman shooting is exceptional, right across the field. Although it is isn't reflected in the stats, this is actually a very experienced Roman army, having also done loads of damage to Illyrians in the past before being taken northwards by Salinus in a glory hunt against the Germans. Their experience is definitely being reflected in their missilery...

A third side view of the developing battle. The German centre is advancing, but for some reason their guys on the hill aren't. This is probably not a good idea against the Romans, because it will give us time to manoeuvre our more flexible units into positions of our choosing. The secret to killing Romans with war bands is to hit them hard and fast and try to break through before they do something sophisticated. I am hoping to do exactly that because the rough ground is effectively breaking up the German line, which means that my rightmost legion has freedom to manoeuvre any way it likes.

Back to our extreme left. Gordon is taking advantage of the lack of German (or, rather, Gallic) activity here to throw his Equites wide and continue to move leftwards with his Italians. As was seen in the previous battle against the Numidians in North Africa, doing this can weaken the Roman centre, but since the Germans aren't advancing in this part of the field, Gordon is obviously hoping that he will have the time to get into prime position for when they do come forward.

His innermost Italian legion pulls some fancy manoeuvres, because it can. Still the Germans wait on their hills.

The four units right in the foreground of the photo above show my leftmost Roman legion waiting for the inevitable German attack, as Graham leads them forward. Watch the lone Roman unit to the right of the photo as it waits to see what happens - this is part of my rightmost Roman legion.

My extreme right at the same point. I have two legionary units waiting for the war bands, plus another has gone wide to counter the perceived threat from the German horse, many of whom are actually on the ground, riddled with Cretan arrows.

The whole field.

A low level shot of how the Germans on the hills look to the Italian cavalry at our far left.

Another low shot, this time showing Graham's war bands advancing on the Roman legionaries.

A third atmospheric photo, this time of the Romans waiting for the Warbands at my right.

Crunching sounds as masses of pila strike home. These legionaries are even better shots than the Velites and skirmishers. At the right of the photo, you can see that I have taken advantage of Roman organisational flexibility to angle that lone unit from the second legion inwards. That war band's flank is very inviting...

More crunching at my far right.

I have been able to commit a unit of legionaries here while still keeping the Equites in reserve. The Cretans keep firing those infernal machines.

A low level shot of my other legion in action. In the distance you can see that the rest of the Germans (and Gauls) have finally come off their hills.

Nothing is going right for the Cimbri. My legionaries swiftly eliminate one unit of heavy horse, and the other immediately fails its morale and freezes in place. Not a good place to be. I haven't even had to use the Equites here.

Meanwhile, at our extreme left, the Italians Equites are coming entirely around the enemy army's flank, albeit carrying a couple of hits from javelins.

A view just at Gordon's left centre - a nice open space for Italian legionaries to exploit. That earlier manoeuvring seems to have paid off handsomely.

More to the right, the German centre is closing on the Socii.

Pila down hundreds of Germans and their much vaunted charge fizzles. Salinus is heard to mutter some disparaging remarks about senatorial colleagues who previously ended up relying on the Italians to do all the dirty work.

At my right, the Roma Equites wait patiently for the enemy cavalry to be destroyed so that they can then exploit.

What happens to war bands flanked by Legionaries. "Run away! Run away!".

One German unit manages to achieve the distinction of receiving a successful impetus marker, but it doesn't really do them any good.

The centre is now a giant melee. Note, however, the Italian legionaries about to flank the far end of the German war bands. It's beginning to look like Cannae, only the Romans are the ones crushing both flanks of the infantry lines.

My legionaries go into the flank of a second war band.

Even my Equites get into the act, although it is a bit too late to save the small legionary unit that has been holding the war bands here.

Another shot to what happens to flanked war bands, as two more of them disintegrate.

The Italians are doing the same at the other end of the line.

How it would look from an observation balloon - a classic double envelopment.

Game over for the Cimbri, and in spectacular style. The army of Salinus could do nothing wrong. Their missilery was superb, the pila were deadly, they stood firm against the German charges, and their gladius work was exemplary, not to mention their battlefield manoeuvres. Not much can stand against the Romans on top form!

Historically, Salinus made this attack about a year later and was defeated, so this is definitely one of those instances where things turn out rather differently. With the benefit of hindsight, if the Germans had ignored the open area to their left and instead concentrated entirely in the centre and on their right, they could have effectively anchored on the rough ground and come forward en masse to crush the opposition. But that didn't happen. Salinus is now off to a deserved triumph in Rome, and I'm off to Cheltenham. A good victory to make my last club game, although I will be back in December for a couple of battles, I should think. In the meantime, I'll continue to run the campaign remotely.