New Scenarios Page: Medievals

I have finally managed to finish off a full description of the Callinicum scenario we ran last year for the Scottish Society of Ancients Battle Day. I've been doing parts of this every so often, and it is good to see it in completed form. I decided to make this one the first on a new medieval scenarios page, "medieval" being understood as anything that comes after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. I don't know how often I'll be able to add to this page; most of our games at the club are in the classical period because of availability of figures.

Empire: Carthage prevails

This post shows the second half of the battle for Sicily. It is stalemate all across the front, except on our (Sicilians, in blue) right flank. Here the Numidians are beginning to press in on the flank of our Peltasts. In the left centre, our general has joined our leftmost unit of Hoplites, anticipating the demise of the Italians to their right, in the hopes of shoring up the Hoplites' morale.

The second image shows various units being destroyed on both sides. Our commander-in-chief has failed to stop the rot as the leftmost Hoplites go disordered due to a failed morale test on seeing a unit of Italians break. This means that the Hoplites will be unable to exploit the demise of the enemy to their front, leaving it up to the leftmost Italians to try to come round on the flank of the Gauls and Carthaginian heavy infantry. On our extreme left wing, the Carthaginan heavy cavalry have finally managed to struggle through our first wave of units, partly exhausted.

The third map shows the Carthaginian cavalry in trouble against our left wing supporting trooops, and the Italians moving into position to threaten the flank of the Gauls. On our right wing, the Peltasts finally disintegrate. It's going to be very close; the large unit of Spanish is itself starting to degrade as a result of continuous pressure in combat.

Now the Gauls break, and the rest of the enemy cavalry are in trouble. Both units of Gallic heavies failed on two occasions to retire in front of our advancing second wave, and are about to pay for not obeying the order. On our far right, John's skirmishers continue to enact a toll on the Numidians. He even manages to start hurting one of the elephant units.
On our left, we destroy both Gallic cavalry units, while losing our second unit of light cavalry. The Italians just don't quite reach the flank of the Carthaginian heavy infantry, and the rest of our centre collapses. John's heroic Rhodians and Cretans destroy more Numidians and a unit of elephants but it's game over, as Carthage wins by four figures.

There were three moments of crisis in this battle. The first came on our side, when our Italians were severely damaged by the initial onrush of wild Celts. The second came when the opposition failed to capitalise, rolling really badly in multiple melees for several turns in a row. They missed destroying four of our units each by a single figure. The third crisis was when our general failed to shore up the Hoplites' morale. They were in a better position to flank the enemy heavy infantry, but could not do so. The leftmost Italians were just too far away to win the game for us.

So Carthage has finally taken Sicily at the fourth attempt. Their scouts are now eyeballing Romans across the straits of Messana. Next game: the Macedonians press on into Mesopotamia, hopefully in a couple of week's time. That will end the turn; we have no idea what will happen after that. The big question is whether or not Rome and Carthage will immediately come to blows.

Empire Campaign: Carthage lands in Sicily

This is the first of a pair of posts describing the Carthaginian invasion of Sicily. Simon constructed and deployed the Carthaginian army (in red above). Their right wing was composed of:

• Two units of 12 Elite Noble Heavy Cavalry
• Two units of 12 Veteran Gallic Cavalry
• Two units of 8 Veteran Numidian Light Cavalry

In the centre was massed their heavy infantry:

• 48 Gauls deployed in four ranks
• Two units of 48 Heavy Infantry deployed in four ranks
• 48 Spanish deployed in four ranks
• 10 skirmish slingers

Their left was composed of:

• Two units of 8 Veteran Numidian Light Cavalry
• Two units of 2 African Elephants
• Two units of 8 Veteran Numidian Light Cavalry
• Two units of 10 skirmish javelins

Simon played their right wing and Mark the left; they shared command of the centre. I constructed and set up the Syracusan army. Our left (me in charge):

• Two units of 8 Veteran Light Cavalry
• 12 Veteran Greek Medium Cavalry
• 12 Veteran Peltasts
• A large unit of 18 Veteran Peltasts in three ranks
• The Tyrant's Guard: 24 Elite Hoplites in three ranks. These set up behind the first of the centre command's units, intending to move wide against the expected heavy Carthaginian cavalry presence.

Our centre (Billy in command):

• Three units of 36 Veteran Hoplites in three ranks, interspersed with:
• Three units of 32 Veteran Italian medium foot in four ranks
• and 14 skirmish javelinmen out front

Our right (John):

• 18 Veteran Peltasts deployed wide in two ranks
• 12 Veteran Greek Medium Cavalry
• 8 Veteran Rhodian Slingers
• 8 Veteran Cretan Archers

The battle began as follows:

This was John's first visit to the club, and his first taste of the rules. Rather than mess him around with too much information, we thought it would be a good idea if he were to take the Sicilian skirmishing right wing. This would give him a good view of the whole battle as well as introducing him to the game. He immediately started to use his skirmishers to devastating effect, keeping them out of range of the enemy javelinmen and shooting them up quite happily. In our centre, we wheeled our infantry and started to advance them; on the left, we began to push forward with our mixed bag of light troops and medium cavalry. The Carthaginians advanced their infantry centre as well.

The third image, above, shows the advance of the entire Carthaginian army, with some of their heavy cavalry peeling off to face our potential flanking movement.

The fourth map shows the initial contacts. The Carthaginians were planning to use their large central infantry units to win through, while masking them with a large number of small cavalry units and elephants. On our left, the performance of the Carthaginian heavy cavalry was miserable, much to our relief. Unfortunately, however, one of our Italian columns was caught by a ferocious Gallic warband charge, rendering our centre immediately vulnerable. To our right, John sent in the medium horse at an angle to inflict as much damage as possible on the Spanish Infantry before being crushed themselves. His skirmishers were meanwhile continuing to enjoy themselves immensely.

The final image shows stalemate across the entire front as most of the Carthaginian army ground to a halt, inflicting very little damage at all. Our left and centre continued to hold firm as a result. The only real movement was the large mass of Carthaginian troops on their left, although half of their skirmishers were by now defunct.