Marian Romans vs Later Carthaginians - posted by Andrew Bennetts, 19 November 2022

 Al Fresco DBMM!!

John Calnan paid a visit on Wednesday and, as the Auckland spring weather had delivered us a particularly fine day, we set up the table on the patio rather than in the gloom of the garage. John had brought with him a delicious lunch from his local french bakery so all we lacked was a bottle of something cooling in an ice bucket - something to address for next time!

For the game itself, we had both agreed to use armies that had not been on the table much recently, leading to John's lovely Later Carthaginians being invaded by my Marian Romans with Armenian ally.

John had a strong right wing of Spanish scutariii and psiloi aimed at the wood that I'd anchored my line on, defending it with a small command of auxilia and psiloi. John's centre was a large command of Gauls reinforced by elephants and with Libyan spears in support, facing my centre of mainly legionaries, with a few additional auxilia and psiloi. Deploying second allowed me to weight the legionaries to the right of the line, avoiding most of the Gauls and providing support to my attacking wing of cavalry, light horse and the Armenians which I hoped would overwhelm John's smaller command of cavalry and Numidians.

Of course, the Armenians initially proved unreliable which slowed my advance somewhat, but excellent early pips meant there were enough spare to eventually coerce the Armenians to joining in. This delay however had allowed John's cavalry to seize a convenient gentle hill that should have equalised the cavalry battle. Despite this, my Spanish Light Horse demonstrated a convincing superiority over John's Numdians (i.e. they threw ridiculously good combat dice!) and with the Armenian cataphracts providing the coup de grace, John's cavalry wing was shattered and fled the field.

In the centre, the Gauls and elephants eventually ventured into charge range of the first rank of legions, who advanced and managed a clean sweep along the line, 4 Gauls and an El in one bound (my combat dice really were embarrassingly good all game!). Nevertheless, the Gauls recovered from this, pressed forward and the began to inflict losses on the legions. Meanwhile, John's right manouvered aggressively to put pressure on my weak left and threaten to roll up the Roman line.

However, the relatively sudden collapse of the Carthaginian cavalry meant their own left flank was exposed and the initial losses the Gauls had taken meant that it was not long before the Carthaginian centre became disheartened and then broken.

Poor John was not well served by either his pips nor his combat dice but took it all in his stride and we both enjoyed the outdoor air

https://www.facebook.com/groups/824840264342234/posts/2219995141493399/

The Carthaginian deployment: Refused mounted command nearest, Gauls and Elephants in the centre and masses of Spanish on the far right

The Roman deployment: Mounted command and Armenians in the foreground, Legions in the centre and a thin screen of Ax and Ps in the distance.

The view from the fragile Roman left as the Spaniards bear down.

With the Armenians slowly catching up, the cavalry fight approaches

I'm not sure what the Thracian is for "farsands of 'em sah!"

Numidians being comprehensively out-diced by Spanish LH

The clash in the centre approaches

Compare to the previous image to see where the Gauls and elephant no longer are!

The Thracians are being steadily overwhelmed by the masses of Spanish. However the Carthaginian 'dead pile' in the distance tells its own story.

Not long to go now, as the victorious Roman cavalry reform to roll up the Carthaginian line

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  Bruce Ferguson

  Try that in Wellington with plastics and expect it to all blow away

  

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  • Potbelly Miniatures

    Bruce Ferguson -1 to all bowfire

    

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• Peter Heron

  Jealous, looks awesome, unfortunately no gamers in Ruatoria!

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• Herbert Wong

  nice painted models, nice battle report!!

  

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  • Andrew Bennetts

    Author

    Herbert Wong Thanks - although nothing in the same league as your awesome collection 

    

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  • Herbert Wong

    you are too humble to say so, your guys 28 DBMM models looks good enough in table top. And your group should be the best 28 DBMM playing group in this planet.

    

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  Vincent Cholewa

  Admin

  Group expert

  Many thanks for the report, I enjoyed reading it. Nice figures and good weather dice, summer in warm Auckland