Sunday 14 August 2022

Darius remains undefeated! Early Achaemenid Persians vs Middle Imperial Romans - posted by Dirk Heinsius, 14 August 2022

Darius Remains Undefeated
(by the skin of half an element)
Saturday 13th August, Darius took on Michael Stonyer's Middle Imperial Romans at the Hutt Club.
Romans are a tough match for the Persians, Artillery,Blade and Superior Auxiliaries, all tend to go through Persians like the proverbial hot knife through butter. Darius of course had a plan, which was to hold back the Persian foot as much as possible, pester the Roman advance with Skirmishers, and then counterattack with the Cavalry. Of course the Romans can field quite a lot of cavalry themselves, so if this was the case then plan B, was to concentrate the Persian Cavalry against the Roman Cavalry, with the Immortals in support and win that way.
Alas neither plan really survived the terrain.
Darius invaded, and was met with a cluttered field, featuring two woods, and a large Oasis, along with other areas of rough. This severely limited Persian Cavalry operations, and reduced the battlefield to a narrow front, ideally suited to Roman operations. To add insult to injury, Darius also was required to deploy first.
The only option was now to hold back the foot as much as possible, to try to hold the wood on the left with the superior Psiloi, and to force the Roman centre to come forward if they wanted victory, thus hopefully exposing their flanks to the Persian Cavalry.
Persian PIPs for most of the game were low, so whilst the Ps(S) were able to take the left hand wood, they were unable to deploy to take advantage of their superior mobility in difficult terrain. Correspondingly the Roman PIPs were good, and the Ps(S) were hit by 5 columns of Superior Auxilia in the wood. The Persian combat dice were almost as good as their PIP dice, and in short order the Persian Psiloi were no more.
Meanwhile on the left, the Persian Cavalry were blocked at the Oasis, and dispite launching a few probes, the Roman Psiloi managed to counter these at every turn. The only success was that the Chaladean Archers, managed to advance into the Oasis, and their bow fire was slowly forcing the Roman skirmishers back.
With things crumbling on the Persian left, Darius decided on a bit of a "Hail Mary" plan, and advanced the Immortals, supported by the Lydian Cavalry and the Babylonian Chariots in the centre. Early Artillery fire managed to reduce the Immortal numbers by 50%, but their sacrifice did allow the Cavalry and Chariots to close with the Legionaries in front of the Artillery. At this juncture Ahura Mazda took pity and the Persian dice suddenly became hot, and the attack in the course of a couple of bounds, managed to take out 4 elements of Legionaries, 2 of Psiloi and an artillery piece.
At this point after about 5 hours of play, time was called. Both sides had lost 10%, so 13-12 to Darius! It must be mentioned that one Persian command was half an ME off disheartening, which would have tipped the score the other way.
The Romans executed their plan perfectly, they only failed top gain complete victory, by not following up their initial successes fast enough. By the end of the game the Roman centre had still not advanced, and the bulk of the Praetorians, never even saw a Persian.

Man of the Match, has to go to the lone Bactrian Archer, who despite being overlapped, held off three separate charges by the Roman Auxilia. His loss would have dishearten the Persian Centre. 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/824840264342234/posts/2137110189781895/

The Roman Psiloi in the Oasis, having redeployed to stop any cunning Persian tricks

The Persian Sparabara, face off against the Gothic warband. I don't thhink either of them moved for the entire game.

The Chaladean Archers, with their new battle trophy captured from the Samurai.

The Roman Auxiliaries have completely cleared the left hand wood, whilst the supporting Persian Auxillaries, sit and watch due to lack of PIPs

The Praetorians at the end of the game, after having done nothing.


The initial Persian deployment

The Chaladean Archers advance into the Oasis, whilst the Persian horse ready for a flank attack on the Roman Psiloi.

        • Dirk Heinsius
          Author
          Man of the match, the Bactrian archers holding off the Auxilia, whilst the Hordes just stand and watch.
          No photo description available.
          2
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          • 15h
        • Potbelly Miniatures
          next month you want pit darius against the mighty, mighty* estrucans?
          *not actually so mighty
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          • 15h
          • Edited
        • John Edmundson
          Ah yes,the world famous Oasis of Ceres, right in the heart of Roman Italy.
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          • 12h
        • Vincent Cholewa
          Admin
          Group expert
          Many thanks for the report, oh King of Kings. I always enjoy reading about games and seeing pics of the action. One point, I think you are wrong that Darius remains undefeated by the skin of half an element. If you had lost that element and the command been disheartened, it would have still been a draw, though with an edge to Mike.
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          • 11h
        • Jose Garcia
          Hello, really mega pictures, wanted to ask how deep the bases are with the Romans, when I look at the pictures come me deeper than 2cm for the BD and deeper than 4cm for the CAV, I would be looking forward to answer. Greeting
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          • 10h
          • Vincent Cholewa
            Admin
            Group expert
            Jose Garcia Mike isn’t on FB much. I have sent him a text and asked him your questions. I will let you know what he says ðŸ˜Š
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            • 10h
          • Vincent Cholewa
            Admin
            Group expert
            Jose Garcia Mike replied:
            “My bases are slightly deeper then the standard DBMM bases. Blade are 6cm wide by 25mm deep. Cavalry are 6cm wide by 5cm deep.… 
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            • 9h


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