Sunday, October 23, 2016

Romans versus Gauls in 6mm

At the NWS Games Day I took part in a 6mm Impetus game.  I was a Gallic commander using Graham's almost finished army.  Together we took on Mark Woods's new Roman army.  Micheal made up the fourth player on the Roman side.

The Romans as seen by the Guals on their shinny white bases.

And the Gauls as seen by the Romans. 

And the game gets off to a good start as the first activation roll by the Romans
 sees their commander down rated to poor.
(The is actually their second roll, the roll to see who had major control of the battlefield had been a double one as well)

Each side has four commands.  I had numbers 4 and 1 on the left flank.
We were unsure how to use our chariots.  I had mine out front, Graham had his out back.

The Parthians had lent us their fabulous camp.
Any enemy of the Romans is a friend of the Parthians I guess.

Oh dear.  The Gallic general of our third command turns out not to be an expert.

But it can not get any better for my general and CinC

In what seemed to be a developing theme of the game
another Roman general is down graded.

Skirmish time and my chariots wipeout a lot of Roman skirmishers with their first shots,
The Gallic command number three starts its advance across the broken ground.

The preliminary fighting on the left is basically my cavalry trying to keep out of trouble.

The Gauls are through the broken ground and ready to pounce.

I'm keeping my guys back, but now realise I need to move to the left a bit.

The fourth band of Gauls enters the woods.

Their commander is not feeling an expert today either.

The Roman camp

The view from the Roman side
The Romans have lost a lot of their skirmish screen

The fourth Gallic commander now considers himself to be an expert.
He commands the left wing cavalry and has mostly kept out of trouble.

The Romans are not amused.

The fourth Gallic command is through the forest.
The third Gallic command is just about worn out.
The Gallic CinC is looking at the sundial.

The main body of Gauls has now advanced.

And halted...
The third Gallic command has broken.

The Gallic cavalry on the left has lost a few units, but there are still plenty of them.
The chariots are now fighting and proving to be lucky.
The Gallic CinC wants them out of the way before he launches his main assault.
This also gives time for the Gallic fourth command to work round the Roman left flank.

Yet another Roman general is down graded.
Not surprising as his command is about to break

And we're in!

The final Roman general seizes the day and decides he's the expert round here.

The charismatic Gallic commander is fighting for his life.  
His unit has suffered heavy casualties, but he must keep fighting.

A second Roman command breaks and that's game over.
Phew, what a blood bath.

Time for the Romans to go home.

From the sheet recording breakpoints, the Roman army would be lost at 31 while the Gauls would hang on till 55 (and for the Gauls their chariots and cavalry were three points a loss).  If the Gauls had lost one more cavalry unit from their left flank (which easily could have happened) that command would have broke and the game gone to the Romans.

Excellent game and fabulous to play in 6mm.

Friday, October 21, 2016

Early Macedonian versus Late Samurai

This was my first game in the NWS Impetus League competition.  I was feeling confident having devised a new plan and army list based on having a smaller frontage protected by terrain and using the flexibility of Light Foot (my Peltasts and Thracians) to screen my main force before retiring to protect the flanks, which would also be protected by my cavalry.

My army as seen from the Japanese lines.  
As the supposed attacker the Japanese have adjust the terrain so two of the forests provide them with flank protection.

The game starts slowly as I decide to shuffle my skirmishers across to take on the enemy artillery.
Doh!  I should have looked at the factors before I started on this course of action.

The skirmishers on my right also shuffle to the centre.

The enemy artillery is protected by fortifications.
What are fortifications?

I do know the range and my skirmishers are keeping out of it until they are ready.

On my right I attempted to outflank, 
only to be surprised by the appearance of troops with shooting sticks.

Ready to advance now.

The omens are good.
My expert commander finds himself upgraded to charismatic

Hmmm, for the enemy as well...
They go from fair to expert.

The artillery first shot gets straight sixes!

My second in command decides he is having a bad day and gets rated down to poor.

I'm starting to learn about artillery.
Need to not advance in a column so must get the peltasts forward.

On the left, not such a surprise this time, but more enemy with shooting sticks.

The enemy artillery and men with shooting sticks take their toll.  
I discover the only chance I have against the artillery with my skirmishers 
is to get to point blank range.

I get impatient and charge the artillery with my peltasts. 
 There are samurai that are behind the guns that countercharge. 
 It doesn't end well for my guys.

On the right we are under fire.

Another enemy commander decides he is having a good day and gets uprated to Expert.

The previous turn I had tried to close quick and I'm now slowly coming out of the disorder.
At least the enemy artillery has been neutralised, 
however the samurai have now manned the fortifications.

Not to be out done the third enemy commander gets uprated.

I'm busy shifting troops to protect my right flank.

I've pulled what's left of my Thracians back, getting ready for the big push.

Left flank is also busy being protected.

Well, big push came to nought.

Time to concede.
My pike units, while they still have some fight in them, are uncoordinated with their flanks at risk.

The flank covering forces are also run down.

550 points gives a decent sized force but possibly a bit too much to handle with the time constraints of a club game.  From the time stamps on the photos we started at 7:19 and finished at 10:37.  It seemed longer.

I found I'd been doing javelin armed troops wrong.  If they make one move and fire there is no penalty, but if they make two moves and fire there is a -2 modifier the same as applies to any other troops.

I also found that attention needs to be paid placement of terrain pieces in the deployment areas as, with six pieces, only two can be so placed.