Italy 0 – Rest of the World 7

Last night saw the latest chapters in the continuing Commands & Colors: Ancients Punic War campaign. I fought 2 battles against the mighty forces of Hannibal.

As you might have guessed from the entry title, things didn’t go to plan (my plan, anyway) and I ended up on the losing side twice more. The first game (above) was actually really close – I lost 6-5 – and had a chance to win the game…my inability to roll a single close combat hit on 4-dice meant that the unit survived the combat, and my Cavalry were destroyed the following turn.

The second game (below) was a much more one-sided affair.

Despite drawing first blood by destroying the Carthaginian Elephants, my army quickly succumbed to a concerted attack by warband and heavy infantry, and I lost 6-3.

Afterwards the general consensus was that the only reason my legions hadn’t been recalled to Rome to be decimated in punishment for so many poor results so far was that I was doing a much better job of it in the field!

So, 7 games, 7 losses. What have I learned?

Well, I think more than anything, these two games against a Carthaginian Army has shown me just how powerful a Heavy Infantry unit commanded by a General is. And this brings into question all of my deployments up until now.

I have been deploying in ‘classic’ Roman style, with my Triari behind units of Princeps and Hastati. However, this means that my heavy troops very rarely get into battle until late in the game – possibly when the game is already lost – and in several of my games they have done nothing at all. I need to change my deployment to take advantage of these units – they are the most powerful units in my army, and I should use them accordingly.

So, yet more lessons learned, but not very many battles left to see if the changes make any difference.

I will post complete photo-battle reports of these two games in the next week or so…