The Battle of Thapsus 46BC - To The Strongest Rules

10mm Numidian elephants escorted by Numidian light infantry javelinmen

Still obsessed with my current reading and painting period of the Roman Civil Wars, this month's game was the Battle of Thapsus.  If I was more organised I would have done these battles in chronological order but I have only just painted the elephants and I still don't have enough troops for Pharsalus yet!

To summarise the history of this battle just very briefly: After defeating Pompey at Pharsalus and defeating the Senatorial Optimates further in the Eastern Provinces, Caesar pursued into North Africa.  Stalemate battles ensued.  Caesar settled down to await reinforcements from Sicily and besieged Thapsus.  The Optimates were forced to accept battle and ventured out to attack Caesar from behind.  Caesar left the siegeworks and formed his army for battle:

According to Wiki (yes I know it's not the best but it was one of the most convenient sources in this case):

Optimates:

Commanders:  Scipio, Petreius, King Juba I
Legions: 12+ (72,000 men)
Cavalry: 14,500
Allies: King Juba's (numbers not known) including 60 elephants

Populares:

Commanders:  Caesar and one other
Legions:8+ (50,000)
Cavalry: 5000

 Optimates on the left and Populares on the right

Historical Outcome:  Caesar's men impatient and keen for another victory surged forward.  The elephants (presumably on the right) were defeated and trampled their own men, whilst the left wing elephants made their attack on the Populares centre.  This attack was held and then pushed back.  Caesar's own cavalry then outflanked the Optimates and took their camp. Juba's men deserted and the victory was complete.  A massacre then followed and prisoners were not spared (due to Caesar having had an epileptic fit apparently and thus unable to intervene).

Wargaming the battle:  Well on first glance it looks like Caesar is really up against it!  He is seriously outnumbered and his generalship is going to be stretched with 2 known generals (the name of his other commander does not seem to be recorded) compared with 3 generals on the optimates side.

In my playtest to remind myself of the rules, just prior to the game - I played one wing vs one wing.  In this the elephants on their first ever outing smashed straight through all who stood before them...so it seemed far worse for Caesar than I could balance up.  So what could I do?

I decided not to do too much other than improve morale and command quality for Caesar.  This seemed to be historically the right thing to do.  His men had known victory after victory.  Two legions had just deserted from the Optimates. Surely total victory was in the grasp of the Populares.  Caesar had proved himself to be both lucky and brilliant and so I made the following adaptations for the battle:

Caesar:  Classed as 'Brilliant' - all other generals as normal

Optimate Legions: downgraded by one morale save to 7+ instead of 6+ (but all allies remain as their standard settings).

One Populares Legion: Upgrade to Veteran 5+ morale but this is stuck on a label beneath the base and not revealed until combat is joined for this unit (to prevent it being unrealistically avoided on purpose).

No other changes to basic rules (other than using TTS 'Even Stronger' Version 5 amendments).

 Numidian's on the Optimates right flank - King Juba I commanding

Terrain was classed as flat with one area of marshland and beyond both flanks were major impassable water features

Caesar's camp was placed on the table though historically was much further back.

 View from behind the Optimates' centre

Ian took command of the Optimates (I thought it would be more fun for him to use the elephants and greater numbers of troops).  He got the highest chit (we use the chits instead of cards so as not to obscure the table), and ordered his army to do a general advance.  They obeyed (except for his left flank which was sluggish in obeying orders).

It did feel a bit odd in the pre-game brief to describe your own general as being brilliant i.e. 'I am Caesar therefore I am brilliant!'.  Sounds a bit egotistic but we know what we mean when we take these parts when playing at commanders!

I (as Caesar) could not allow my men to hold back so I ordered them into a general attack too.

These photos show these opening stages well.

..and then the lines collided!  Disorder struck some units very early on (much earlier than the last game we had - which seemed to have a lot of freak high saves constantly).  This time Ian (as Scipio) suffered some of the worst luck with saving throws (or chit pulling) that either of us have ever seen.

You can see the puffs of cotton wool (not smoke markers but obviously dust clouds!) representing disordered units.  Scipio has a whole flank of elephant units and his centre and his left becoming disordered and with just one on the Populare's side (I can't recall it but they must have been hit by archery), or it was misplaced cotton wool.

My reserve units are preparing to meet the elephants and Numidian Light Cavalry should they break through.

Disorder started to affect most units in the Optmates forces and then units started to break.  I forgot to apply the Even Stronger Version 5 rout tests in the first instance, but from then on I remembered.

Unfortunately I got this bit slightly wrong which probably wound the game up a little bit quicker than it otherwise would have done (sorry Ian).  There are two attempts to pass a rout test. If a unit fails then they become disordered - they do not immediately rout! (yes I read 'rout test' and clearly didn't take in the paragraph in full) - UNLESS they are already disordered when they do indeed rout.  So as one unit broke and their neighbouring unit took a rout test - they should have just been disordered when they failed and not routed. Of course as another unit ran I applied the test to the next unit and so on.  We saw a proper 'England cricket style' batting collapse - as unit after unit broke.

Don't get me wrong - I think the TTS 'Even Stronger' V5 changes are much better and I really like them - far better than the old demoralised command rules and I think it is quite right that neighbouring units are affected by what happens nearby (the lack of such effects to friendly units was what I found to be the worst thing in the ACW 'Fire and Fury' rules).  It is just my own misreading which caused the Optimates army collapse to appear much worse than it actually was.  In all respects the game was absolutely brilliant and very enjoyable indeed.  TTS is an outstanding set of rules and I very highly recommend them.

Now for the actual real-life battle this collapse was probably pretty realistic, and it would have been difficult in the game for the Optimates to have held on much longer as my troops were disordering units all over the place (causing some quite legitimate routs when they were 'Rout Tested') - however the medal tally would have been different had I not misinterpreted the rules.  I would have lost some units to the elephants on my right I am sure, as the game went on for probably a couple more turns.  So the medal tally of 13-0 should not be taken as being the proper result.  Scipio would have lost for sure but Caesar should perhaps have worn his reading glasses and read the important paragraph properly.  I will next time!

PS - If you don't have much time to complete a game then I recommend misreading the rout test rule as I did - a broken army will collapse very quickly!

The Battle of Philippi 42BC - To The Strongest Rules

Well, it's been a funny old year so far.  Not least in my wargaming activities.  This has manifested in the form of incompleted units, stops and starts on projects and now redundancy putting the sudden brakes on my (sometimes excessive!) wargaming spending. 

I tend to like to put photos of finished units up on here, but finished units have been scant few so far this year. 

One of my greatest successes this year to date, however, has been finally getting a decent game in using Simon Miller's 'To The Strongest' Rules.  I have only just finished putting the figures away (it's now 0210hrs!) and i'm still buzzing from playing such an enjoyable game.

I have looked at the rules on and off over the last 3 years and tried play testing them but I clearly was doing things wrong.  A quick email to Simon and he very helpfully clarified what I should be doing!  Suddenly it all clicked into place. This was in 2016 and to my great shame, I never got around to playing again until last week when I play tested the rules correctly this time.  With this growing confidence I painted up a couple more units!

This evening the rules got a more thorough testing as I played my regular wargaming opponent, Ian.  We are both big fans of 'Hail Caesar' and are used to using ruler and dice and I was most interested to know what he thought of the rules.

I loosely based the game around the Battle of Philippi (42BC), the first of the two battles of that year.  I made a lot of guesses for the units and allies and introduced special rules and modifiers to reflect Cassius's likelihood of suicide if his camp is captured and also Octavian's poor performance as a General during this battle.

The marsh and hills were rough terrain and so favoured light troops.

I have to say I do mostly game with 28mm figures but playing the game with 10mm figures was an absolute joy for the 'Grand Battle' experience.  I have been painting these figures on and off for a few years now and did some serious basing work last night to get the troops ready for today.

I won't give a full battle report of the game - the main reason is that it is so much work to do that and it would just put me off making any kind of blog post at all - and I have struggled of late to get any posts done at all.

It reflects well on the rules in that, as Ian's army started to collapse (and mine somehow clung on despite the disorder affecting my centre) he still really enjoyed the game.  There are so many subtle and cleverly thought out rules that it really was a joy to play.

Please excuse the cotton wool balls being used as disorder markers - its just something that we have always used. Traditionally to represent smoke but I guess it could represent dust clouds being kicked up!

It was a hard fought game and the legionaries on both sides really slogged away.  Ian's Spanish Scutarii bravely prevented my cavalry from executing a dangerous turning motion and one of my light infanty units gave ground slowly against one of Brutus's Legions.  This held my line long enough to recover and ease rallying for my weakening troops.

 In summary I have to say that the rules are superb!  They really are so much fun!  There is much built into it which isn't perhaps apparent on first reading.  Initially I was surprised by the lack of supporting units rules - but they are there - they just work in a really great way.  Supporting units enable you to rally much more easily by preventing the enemy from having units threatening which could cause your testing unit deduction penalties.    The rules were great and we can't wait to try them again.  I have another couple of units of Spanish pushing their way to the front of the painting queue!

In case you wondered, the rules, gold Roman coin medals, marker chits and mat are available from Simon Miller's website https://bigredbatshop.co.uk/

The 10mm figures used here are available from Old Glory UK and are the 'Grandscale 10mm' figures.

I really do need to get some decent camps/field fortifications though - my card ones are a bit of a let down!

Roman Command Stand

The Roman General was painted up about 15 years ago and  I thought he was well over due being put onto a decent base.

Having been attached by himself to a single piece of card all those years ago, I decided to add a mounted Legate to the stand to lend an extra sense of authority.   So there is something like 15 years painting time between these two.  Some areas have been freshened up on the General in more recent years.  If I remember, I originally painted the cloak with an enamel but it looked decidedly faded so was later painted in a richer acrylic.

Both figures are from the 28mm Foundry Imperial Roman range

I seem to be painting two scales of Romans at the moment.  Having just read Julius Caesar's 'Gallic Wars' I'm now reading his 'Civil War'.  This has (as probably expected!) enthused me with the Caesarian Roman period.  I've started this range in 10mm while I carry on with the Imperial Romans in 28mm.  My plan is to use Simon Miller's 'To the Strongest' rules with huge 10mm armies so that I can play massive battles in a sensible amount of time.

Of course this plan is likely to go awry as my regular wargaming opponent, Ian, has several painted cohorts of 28mm Foundry Caesarian Romans freshly painted and they look stunning.  There must be a latin-named medical condition for anyone painting up 3 x Roman armies at the same time!  I shall hold off doing so for as long as possible!