In the ongoing search for an army to take to Cancon, I thought I'd try out Seleucids (190BC), against Michael's Middle Imperial Romans.
I was the invader, in autumn.
We both chose a fair bit of terrain. On my side of the table was a wood in the centre of my deployment zone and a difficult hill on the left of my deployment zone. On Michael's side of the table there was a vineyard on his right and a difficult hill and a rough hill on his left.
The deployment dice determined that I should deploy first, and the weather was a strong wind, coming from Michael's right. Although I'd been hoping for rain, strong wind suited me fine, as it turned out it provides a combat disadvantage to artillery. The battle started at 9am.
On my left I deployed a command with Kn (F) SBWs, along with some LH (O), Ax (S) and Ps (O) (21 ME). Just to the left of the wood was the phalanx command with Pk (S) and (O) and 1 Ps (O) (25.5 ME). From the front of the wood and off to the right was a command with Ele (O), Kn (X), Ax (S), Ps (O) and LH (F) (24 ME); the elephants were in ambush in the woods. Flank marching on the right flank was an allied command of Aetolian Greeks with LH (O) and Ps (S) and (O) (8 ME).
Michael then deployed a massive command under a sub-general - something like 28 Bd (O), 4 Bd (X), 4 Art (F) and a heap of Ps (O) (51 ME). On his right was a small command with Ax (O) and Ps (O) holding the vineyard (12 ME). On his left was a slightly larger command under the C-in-C with Cv (O), Ax (O) and Ps (O) (16.5 ME).
I didn't bother to scout as I knew Michael's army was led by an Inert C-in-C and thus couldn't run ambushes. I was willing to take the chance on being attacked at night. I thus removed the chance of losing elements to bad scouting dice rolls.
My plan was to hold back in the centre and right, and attack vigorously on the left. The sub would lead the Kn and LH on an end run around the vineyard while the infantry attacked it frontally. Once the left was secured I'd advance in the centre with the Pk and Ele against the Bd. The Kn would remain with the C-in-C as a reserve to support the rest of the right. The flank march would either run for the baggage or for the flank and rear of the Roman left flank.
Yeah, well...
The Kn and LH were soon around to the rear of the vineyard and deployed to attack the Ax sitting between it and the table edge. Only Michael used PIPs to keep pulling the Ax back, while the Ps sat at the back of the vineyard where it would take a few PIPs for my infantry to reach them. He also pulled his Bd (X) out of the centre command, and when PIPs allowed it moved them back to support the Ax. In the centre Michael advanced his Bd/Art behemoth command until his Art were in range of the phalanx. Before long, despite the strong wind, I soon lost an element and the whole phalanx got recoiled out of shape.
Nothing for it but to advance the phalanx. This at least had the advantage of supporting the Ax on the left, who'd been sidetracked by a Bd element Michael moved into their path. After a few rounds of combat I eventually destroyed that flanked element. Meanwhile, to cover the right flank of the phalanx I had to move the elephants out of ambush. The left-most elephant was in arc of the artillery. Boom! One dead elephant.
Out on the right Michael moved the Bd off the rough hill and into contact with the Ax, Ps and LH of my right flank. The combat was fairly indecisive, with only one element lost - a Seleucid Ax. Even the Kn (X) achieved little. Only when the elephants joined in did I manage to destroy another Bd element. I shifted the victorious elephant over to support the phalanx, where it promptly died in combat against more Bd.
In the centre the phalanx and the legion finally reached each other. By this time I'd lost two more Pk elements to shooting, so the phalanx was a bit less potent than I'd hoped. Only on the left of the line did it achieve much. On the right of the phalanx the Argyraspids shoved their way forward but couldn't kill anything. The only ray of sunshine for me was that an Ax element was able to hit the flank of an Art (F) and destroy it, opening the path into the rear of the Roman centre.
On my left, however, things were turning into a mess. A couple of Kn wedges finally reached the Ax, killing one element. Another wedge charged a Bd (X) element, with the sub-general as an overlap. However the Bd won the combat, leaving the sub-general dangerously exposed.
At this point we had to call time, for which I was fairly grateful. The left wing sub-general was in mortal danger, the loss of whom would dishearten the command and leave it close to breaking. The right wing was also on the edge of becoming disheartened, with Ax slowly massing on their edge. And the centre was slowly chewing up legionaries, but it was also taking casualties. I could easily see both wings collapsing in a couple of bounds, while none of Michael's commands had taken any serious losses.
The flank march? Oh, it didn't arrive (allies - harrumph!).
