There's Hold (ing) In Them Thar Hills!

The next game saw the Greco-Bactrians pushing forward in pursuit of the Chinese "bandits".

POP! Oh, there they are! Are those crossbows? Thunk Thunk thunk! yup. 

 The game was Holding Action (1) from Scenarios for Wargames.  My troops diced for which of 2 roads  they would enter on. I had 3 heavy cavalry units (1 cataphract), 2 horse archers, 3 units of pike  phalanx, 2 of peltasts, an elephant and 1 each of archers and javelin men. Breakpoint of 13 with heavy cavalry and pikes each worth 3 pts and the others each worth 1. As an experiment in simplification I fielded my pikes as single VBU 6 units rather than as double units made up of 2 VBU 4 units. Same dice in combat vs infantry and about the right effect as far as I can tell and simpler to follow.

The Chinese had, well, no army at all as far as I could see. But eventually the hills turned out to be hiding 2 units of massed crossbowmen mixed with spears, 4 units of shock light infantry swordsmen, a light cavalry lancer and a skirmish crossbow unit.

The scenario calls for the attacker to advance quickly to clear the pass. It doesn't actually say that you can't break column until you spot the enemy but that seemed like the spirit. And so it was then, that my horse archers were the first into the pass and the first to spot some crossbowmen. I had of course won the initiative that turn so the crossbows were able to advance and shoot. Ron then deftly flipped the initiative on the next turn getting to shoot again, and bringing forward another crossbow unit from his left which shot up my  horse archers.

As I tried desperately to deploy, peltasts and cavalry on the flanks, pikes in the center screened by skirmishers, Ron's crossbows took out my archers and helped by his light cavalry broke my Companions.
At this point 2 units of swordsmen showed up and charged into my peltasts before they could escape.  Suddenly I was down 5 army morale points, and was 1 hit away from losing my horse archers, my column was just deploying and there was nothing to screen them but a single unit of elite Euzoni javelin skirmishers. Ron had a slight scratch on his light cavalry. It didn't look good, especially as the rest of his army emerged on my open right flank.

The ambush is sprung! Chinese crossbows shooting from behind a wall of spears.  

The lack of pictures beyond this point does not reflect reluctance on my part but worried concentration on the excitement in hand!  

No point in going home early (although given the ice pellets and slush I met when I did go, I probably should have), so I brought up the pikes, elephants and remaining cavalry for an assault uphill against crossbows and tough infantry. But as my javelinmen nimbly flanked his crossbows, I suddenly got a break, a hit by the javelins (needing a 6)  followed by a catastrophic cohesion failure on his part, (also a 6) resulting in the crossbowmen routing. OK I was on the board! and the pressure was off, I had room to deploy. As his infantry came up, we proceeded to repeat the skirmish attack 6 to hit, 6 to fail cohesion, not once but TWICE!  These infantry were tougher and didn't rout but they had lost their shock value. I tried hard to catch them with my cataphracts but while they chewed up my 2nd peltast unit, I held on and javelins eventually cleared that flank.  
 
In the center, my pikes charged up hill, driving back the crossbows but shock infantry caught them in the flank and they crumbled. I was now only 2 units away from breaking, but so was Ron! There was nothing to do but push forward and hope. Forward the pikes! Ready the Heffalump! Charge with the cavalry! As Ron's army morale crumbled he launched a last desperate gamble.

 

The Chinese cavalry make a last desperate attempt to break the pikes but these guys don't carry long pointy sticks for nothing. 

Army morale is assessed at the end of  a turn and Ron was moving 2nd, he knew he was going down but it was close enough that it was just possible that a suicide attack could work, I'd have to miss with all dice, he'd have to hit with a couple then I'd need to roll one of those 6's on a cohesion test, get caught by the pursuit and do it again. A long shot but possible and it would change the game to a draw. Well, my pikes missed on all 6 dice but his cavalry also missed on their 4. A drawn melee! I WON!!  (By a nose)

You'll just have to imagine the extra 7 Chinese units which crowned the hills in a ring around my army a turn earlier. The troops in the center right background, crowning the hill, are my proud javelinmen who practically won the battle single handedly, with a little help.

  

Rolling, rolling, rolling

Corvus Thracian Mercenary Thureophorai escort a motley supply train.
(Trivia, the horse pulling the supply cart is  a hard plastic Marx horse whose 1st job was pulling a WWI artillery piece in the Over The Top playset.)

The next game in the Sino-Bactrian Border War Mini-Campaign has been fought. Thanks to a split decision double feature game last time,   a draw was declared and Wagon Train selected as the next game.

A familiar site to Scenarios for Wargames fans.

We tossed for sides with the result tasking the troops of the King of Bactria with safely escorting a convoy through hills filled with Chinese bandits, sorry, I mean  the advance guard of an Imperial Chinese expedition.  My force was composed of 2 units of mercenary Thureophorai, a unit each of javelin men and archers, a unit of horse archers and a unit of Macedonian style Heavy Cavalry Lancers. In the fort was a bolt thrower, some pikemen and a the important part, a unit of heavy cavalry and one of light javelin cavalry.

Ral Partha Chinese.

The Chinese eventually fielded 1 medium cavalry, 1 light shock cavalry, 2 crossbow & spear units, 3 swordsmen units and a unit of crossbow skirmishers.

Now that the crisis is nearly past, the war artist comes out.

There were some sticky moments early on as Ron's cavalry arrived on either flank and rode over the skirmishers that I had deployed to guard the flanks of the train. They did their job though  and held up the Chinese cavalry long enough for the Thureophorai to earn their pay. By turn 8, after some nervous fighting, Ron and I were both down 2 units (2 skirmisher for me, a light cavalry and crosswbow unit for Ron with a hurting medium cavalry unit facing off with a damaged Thureophorai ) but the wagons were in sight of the fort with no enemy in between.

Alexander the Minifig orders the Companions  to wheel and ride down a unit of spear and crossbow armed Chinese infantry. Yee Haw!

At this point, fortune favoured me. The bulk of the Chinese infantry now came on behind the convoy. Unless someone could get in front of the convoy and stop it, they would not be able to intervene before it reached the fort. Unbeknownst to me, another light infantry sword unit arrived late through the big wood near the fort. By the time they found their way to the open, the convoy was past. A unit of skirmishers did manage to  almost get close enough for a shot but they couldn't get past the cavalry that had sortied out. 

    "Honey, I'm home!"

Minifig Ox Cart with prince August driver.

This is a scenario where the arrival times and places can make a huge difference. Would it had made a difference if Ron had moved his crossbows to an intervening position instead of moving up to support the cavalry? Who knows? What is sure is that I would have been in a world of hurt had the mercenaries not won their fights with the Chinese cavalry! A fun little game. Took about 2 hours of actual plying time to make it through to a conclusion in 11 or 12 turns.

CRACK!! "Move your Ass into that fort!.....and your Camel"

RAFM cavalry, garrison chariot driver come wagoneer, Ral Partha fantasy baggage animals.

Basic Ambush

Victorious charge of the Greek cavalry.

My newly organized, refurbished and rebased Greco-Bactrians took the field today. A routine convoy near the border being suddenly being ambushed (Sfor W #30) by an enemy originally classed as bandits but which turned out to be part of the Han expedition which has been probing the borders of Bactria.

The escort was composed of the following: 1 horse archer, 1 lancer, 1 large pike and 2 peltast units led by my sub-commander Alexander The Minifig. The ambush force consisted of 1 horse archer unit, 2 crossbow and spear units and 2 light infantry assault troops with halberds.  A clash of light cavalry units eventually saw the Chinese routed but my peltasts and horse archers were no match for the massed crossbows. I managed to get the wagons past the Chinese and there was nothing air in between them and the bridge but one last long range volley of crossbow bolts wiped out one of the wagons. A draw was still possible but my heavy cavalry was in trouble. They had been moving to protect the wagons on the only turn in the game in which I won the initiative. Ron's shock troops had been bypassed by my rapid advance and rushed to catch up. A flip of the initiative and a lucky charge bonus roll brought them into contact with my flank before I could react. After 2 turns of melee I finally pushed his unit back, pursued but was repulsed. The 2nd shock unit now caught me before I could rally and after 2 more turns of melee, my unit finally broke taking my army with it. Final tally, Chinese losses 1 light cavalry unit, Bactrian losses, General + Heavy Cavalry, Horse Archers, 2 peltast units. 

Since we had time in hand, I switched out my troops and we reset, Ron swapping his horse archers for a unit of shock light cavalry, me swapping the pikes and 1 peltast units for a unit of cataphracts and 2 skirmisher units; 1 bow, 2 javelin.  This time my skirmishers, horse archer and peltasts ganged up on his 1st massed crossbow unit and eventually routed it (rolling 18 dice in one turn without a single 5 or 6). The rest of his army was hidden near the bridge. I was a bit too hasty pushing my wagons forward, covered only by the cataphracts and a unit of skirmishers and found myself in a tight spot. The cataphracts charged up the hill in disorder but managed just 1 hit out of 9 dice. The melee continued next turn and my cavalry were repulsed, retreating until their backs were against the wagons.  The Shock Light Cavalry now took a crack at them and came within a hair of pushing the cataphracts back into the wagons routing them but led by my general in person, they held on. On the next turn my light troops showered one of the enemy light infantry with arrows and javelins, routing it and my heavy cavalry crashed uphill into the already battered unit crushing it. The enemy broke. A close call! 

2 fun games. The hex adaptation o basic Impetus continues to please. 

The Dividing of Hosts

East meets West

(and no it doesn't look like they're about to play for Lord Grey's Cup even if their are lines painted on a flat green field)

When I resurrected my 25mm ancients after their long slumber, the plan was to reduce every thing to 2 armies of around 20 units totaling around 500 figures each. When I reduced that in 1/2, I added a 3rd army and was contemplating a 4th. Now that I have reduced the forces again to double Basic Impetus armies, or around 100 figures each. I just split the 3rd army into 2 and am adding a few more units to bring it up to scratch. Naturally, since I have all these figures kicking around, I started planning  more armies. Four became six then eight, then........laying out some figures and focusing helped. I'm back on track to finish converting 200 or so miscellaneous figures into opposing Bactrian armies, one Hellenistic in nature, raised primarily from Greek colonists (from RAFM) and formed around a phalanx, the other Iranian based on cavalry backed by mercenary and levied light infantry, (largely from Garrison). 

Antirossus rouses his men.

 The native Bactrian rebels, looking suspiciously Sassinid-ish. I don't have my peasants done yet so some Achamenid Persians are standing in for now.

There's only a half dozen new figures to paint, a dozen or so to fix up and a dozen or so more bases to cut and populate. Then I can start the campaign and also start planning the next pair!

Back Tryin' (Bactrian) Again

Today my Greco-Bactrians regrouped and took the field again as the Chinese pushed farther West. The scenario this week was Reinforcements Off Table  from Scenarios for Wargames. Ron has loaded a list of scenarios into his PC with a random selector and as so often happens. the scenario rolled up seemed to carry on from the last one with the Bactrians trying to gather their forces to hold back the invader.

The  rules were once again a hex based adaptation of Basic Impetus. These are starting to come together nicely. After the last game, we decided to let go of the partial discipline rule which we had lifted from full impetus. The added complexity seemed to have slowed the game without really adding anything, actually for me, it detracted from it, making the more powerful units even more powerful. The game today using BI straight up, (apart from the hexes) seems to have confirmed this as a smart move.

We have also refined out "U"s (measurement units) to hexes conversion. In essence each hex is 5 "units". After some trial and error we have ended up rounding movement so that heavy infantry and missile troops move 1 hex and pretty well all others move 2 hexes with the skirmishers and light cavalry being much more mobile due to their ability to move in any direction. Javelins and slings have a 1 hex range, 2 hexes is close bow range and 4 hexes long bow range.

Units must face the corner of a hex and a straight move can be into either of the hexes to the front (these also being the ZOC) with the 2nd move bringing the unit into line (that is left then right or right then left). Two moves to the left would be considered an incline with requisite penalties. A wheel is one 60 degree rotation.

The variable moves have been a bug bear but we finally got them sorted out today. Taking the principle of needing to move more than 2.5 units to cross into the next hex and applying it to the charge bonus and retreat/pursuit moves, we calculated that infantry needed to roll 5 or 6 (halved to 2.5 or 3 as per the rules)  to move an extra hex while cavalry only needed to roll 3. However, for retreats after melee, we needed to know not only where the units end up but whether or not the retreater had broken contact. This meant comparing the the infantry 1/2 die to the cavalry full one. This is not difficult math but we found it bothersome, not to mention we kept forgetting the 1/2 so we ended up allowing the infantry a full die and cavalry 2 dice with both looking for a 5 or better to move an extra hex. This is not an accurate translation of the odds but its close enough, easy and intuitive.

Doing away with the Discipline value meant that the points values of the Beta and published lists became irrelevant. The full lists have more options than the Basic ones so we are using the guide lines to convert the Beta lists to Multi-Basic Impetus lists. The guidelines are for a single BI army but we are now playing  Multi Basic Impetus  so we need double sized armies. What we are now doing is drawing up double armies from the lists including just the options and troops that we have the troops for (or intended to paint shortly) this  will be our "campaign" roster. From this we will draw scenarios/TT Teasers at 1 unit per scenario unit or gun. If we don't have enough of an appropriate troop type in our list then we may substitute something we do have (eg if a scenario calls for 3 heavy infantry units Parthians may field horse archers or cataphracts or skirmishers ).  Not perfect but easy and it seems to give about the right size of game for us, usually in between 8 to 16 units.

I wish I had remembered  to take pictures today, other than the quick cell snap above. It was an interesting game with some gallant charges, some devastating shooting (not by me), some clever generalship and some solid generalship. There were also an amazing number of 5's rolled for reinforcements. (For those not familiar with the scenario, and unit rolling 5 or 6 is lost). Ron was nice enough to let the lost units roll again after a delay. 1/2 of the defaulters including my King rolled 5 again!  I smell a revolt in the air.

If you refer to the picture at the top of the page you will see my army hiding out on the open steppe, tucked down behind a low rise. Ron's army laid out with 6 units of infantry flanked by light cavalry and supported by 2 heavy chariots which were able to pass through. Four of these units are double units with crossbows in the rear and halbardiers in front. I had hoped that Ron would advance on a broad front, straight up the road with light cavalry on the flanks, and had deployed light troops on my far left and an elephant, pike block and cataphracts on my far right. I left the middle unoccupied, relying on reserves or on flanking and breaking his army. It almost worked, I came close to breaking his right hand cavalry but the dice refused to do me any special favours and eventually it was my light infantry that had the worst of it. Late in the game some of my heavy and light cavalry showed up here and finally broke his cavalry but took damage and were then shot to pieces  by massed crossbows before they could exploit.

On the far side, an early arrival of heavy cavalry drove back his lights and began to turn his flank. As his infantry topped the rise I sprang my trap and came forward with elephant, pikes and cataphract. I didn't have the speed to hit him in 1 move from hiding but I did manage to move last. If I had won the toss and moved first on the next move I might well have been able to catch him but the gamble didn't pay and he had just time to readjust his line. The ensuing fight was close and could have gone either way. If his chariots had broken, my heavy cavalry and elephant would have been let loose behind his line and I might well have carried the day but it was not to be and a hail of fire from the chariots broke up my attacks and then routed my infantry and elephant. At least my heavy cavalry survived to retreat off the table and fight again!

Call up more levies! We need to rebuild!

The Other Side of the Pass

The Ron Emperor sent this picture of his army occupying the pass after the Bactrians had collected their dead and wounded and gone home and an account of the battle from the other side. He had actually had his camera to hand but the game we were both too "into" the game to think about pausing for pictures. 

  Overview

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The clever Graeco-Bactrians had laid out their position hiding most of their troops behind the crest line of the pass and in difficult ground. It was going to be up to the Chinese -Light Horse archers and the spear armed Light Cavalry to penetrate the Scythian Light Cavalry screen. The Chinese marched bravely down the road lead by the Light Horse archers (2 stands) and spear armed  Light Cavalry (2 stands). The order of march then had the Medium Cavalry (2 stands) and War Chariots (2 stands) behind them. This was the first command. The second command consisted of the infantry. Two stands of Spear & Sword armed light infantry, followed by two composite stands of spear and crossbow light infantry. These were followed by two stands of spear armed Heavy Infantry, then 2 more stands of spear & sword armed light infantry in the rear.

Unfortunately for the Chinese the units arrived on table and could not deploy off road until their second turn on the table. It would take about 6 turns before the Chinese had completely deployed into some semblance of order, in fact the Heavy Infantry were never to make it into contact with the enemy. On turn one only the Light Cavalry and the light Horse made it on table. In the following turns the rest of the troops arrived at 3 or 4 stands per turn on the road.

The Chinese managed to cover the deployment with the light cavalry to the fore. As they approached the Scythian scouts, the Scythians fell back tempting the Chinese to blindly go where no Chinese had gone before. But the Chinese maintained their discipline as they moved forward. The Chinese commander had studied the enemy Commander over many months and was well aware of his penchant for ambuscades, taking advantage of the terrain and sudden charges especially when faced with a larger enemy force.

As it turned a unit of skirmishing arches appeared at the northern edge of a wood that stretched half way across the battle field and opened fire. A second unit made an abortive attempt to leave the wood to get into archery range and revealed its position for little gain.

The Chinese troops continued to arrive, then deploy into multiple lines of infantry. Two units of Light spear & sword armed infantry headed towards the enemy archers in the aforesaid wood, supported by two composite units of spear & crossbow armed troops. The remainder infantry deployed as soon as possible off the road and advanced towards the pass.

Meanwhile the cavalry command had forced the enemy light horse back towards the crest line, actually the enemy light horse were feigning retreat yet again. The light cavalry finally crested the pass and got a clear view of the enemy line waiting patiently behind the crest. The cavalry was in contact with the enemy elephant and long bow men before they could react. The chariots plodded steadily forward followed by the medium cavalry. The cavalry and chariots managed to impede each other and get to close to the light horse screen to their front. But their was nothing for it but to go ahead, expecially as war chariots once moving have to move at least half a move a turn, even before declaring a stop.

As the southern wood was being cleared of the enemy skirmishing archers, the remaining infantry deployed in line behind the cavalry screen. The cavalry screen became embroiled in a bitter struggle for mastery of the crest line in the centre of the pass.

Finally the Chinese infantry on the broke into the long wood decimating the enemy skirmishing troops. But the Bactrian Cataphracts and cavalry then moved up to face them off. Meanwhile the massive fighting in the centre continued the elephant continuing to charge while the war chariots attempted to contact the elephants. The cavalry was in front, and even though not the best troops to face elephants (especially when the elephants are supported by long bow fire, they had no choice with the war chariots pressing continuously forward behind them.

Eventually the chariots managed to contact the elephant, and after a multi turn melee, defeat it. The end was finally approaching as the Chinese now moved forward in a steady line of infantry that stretched from north to south across the battlefield. But the cost to the cavalry had been high. The cavalry command was within one point of breaking. The infantry forces were desperately trying to cross the open ground of the pass and contact the enemy line which was holding the gap.

In the end the Chinese luck held while that of the enemy took a quick and downward spiral. The results the Chinese lost 2 stands of Light Horse archers, 2 stands of Light cavalry spears, and one stand of medium cavalry (7 out of the 16 morale points in the command), while the infantry command managed to retain all its stands they were highly damaged at the end of the battle. The Chinese were had lost 7 out of  the 17 morale break point.

The Chinese had cleared the pass, but lost the element of surprise  As the Chinese continue their push to control the trade routes across the middle of Asia the Graeco-Bactrians are preparing for another encounter as well, this time with full knowledge of the new enemy they face.

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Preparing? Indeed!

And a closer view. Infantry and cavalry by Ral Partha. Chariots by Hincliffe if I'm not mistaken.

They shall not pass, or well, ok, maybe this time.

Well, my Bactrian army has been bloodied, very bloodied as it turned out.   My cell phone battery gave out so no pictures I'm afraid.

The scenario was Pass Clearance from CS Grant's Programmed Wargame Scenarios. The rules were modified Basic Impetus on a hex grid. The enemy was Ron Dynasty Chinese (That's Han to you). I had a rough idea of what sorts of troops I might face since I'd seen them on the shelf over the last 20 years but I avoided looking at the army lists since I figured that a new arrival on the scene, an army they had never fought before, might have been a surprise to the Greeks, Bactrians and various others who made up my army. It turned out to be a bit more of a shock than a surprise!

Whoever wrote up the Beta Han List was very generous with VBU and Impetus factors and the superior firepower of their crossbows was staggering. To overcome this army I was going to need the get the best out of my motley crew. Unfortunately, since it was my first time fielding it, I really didn't have a good handle on its strengths and weaknesses.

The position I was defending had steep hills on either sides with several patches of woods. I deployed my upgraded skirmishers, from whom I expected much given how well their plain Jane cousins did for me in the last game, in an advanced wood on the left hand slopes with light cavalry filling the plain. My main battle line was posted just behind the crest of the pass, archers in the woods to the right, then elephant, pikes, Thracians and lastly cataphracts.  Initially the Thracians were supposed to accompany the elephant but I switched and decided to have them provide a link between the phalanx and the cataphracts.  Despite finding my javelin armed peltasts most useful in previous games,  I decided that I needed more high VBU troops so upgraded the Thracians from VBU 4 to 5 which seems to remove their javelins, presumably indicating Rhomphai armament. They are useful troops but not strong enough for 1 unit to launch attacks and to make matters, worse, I kept maneuvering them into positions where they could launch javelin assaults, only to remember that they didn't have any! ARGGHHH! Luckily Ron was generous enough to allow me to take back such moves several times. General, Know thy troops! Next time I'll field proper peltasts and  leave the shock charges to the big boys.

The game began with some harmless insults being traded between my light cavalry  and the Chinese. The game is unfriendly to missile fire at light cavalry and a close look at his shock light cavalry indicated that they had twice the combat value of my Arachosians so basically, after a few maneuvers to try to disrupt Rons's march and deployment and to draw him into my ambush, I started to fall back at full speed to get my light cavalry safely out of the way. The first shot of the game came from my foot archers, disrupting a chariot but neither harming it nor slowing it down (we had drafted the discipline rule in from Impetus and Ron's well disciplined troops only occasionally failed their rally).  Ron deployed a mass of light infantry to flush me out at which point I was close enough to have a look and discover that these were a combination of elite shock troops that made my Thracians look puny, and massed crossbows with devastating firepower. I made a new plan. Skeddadle all my out classed light troops to safety and launch an assault with elephant, pikes and cataphracts, once he was through the gap.

Unfortunately there was a wrinkle. Basic Impetus is a game  which calls for an initiative roll each turn to see who would move first. I had successfully rolled low and moved second so far, being able to react to enemy moves and scoot out of the way. On the turn of the ambush, that flipped, allowing me to get my shot in  but on the next turn it flipped again giving Ron a double move at just the wrong moment for me and allowing his aggressive light infantry to reach my skirmish line before it could pull back. At the same time his light shock cavalry was able to also sweep forward to catch my skirmishing ones.  This was unfortunate but not necessarily a disaster, protected by the woods, odds were that my skirmishers would take some damage but stood a good chance of escaping and might even get lucky and win some of the combats. By the end of the turn my skirmish line was wiped out and my light cavalry reduced to a single stand. Five units destroyed in the blink of an eye. Nearly 1/2 way to my break point and I hadn't put a single hit on him. It looked bleak.

 There was an awful jumble in the middle of the table as the war chariots rolled up the road and deployed flanked by cavalry. The supporting infantry was somewhat held up by the woods but they would be up soon with those deadly crossbows and  hard charging halbardiers. One of Ron's horse archers topped the crest and sounded the alarm. There before him was the main Bactrian army, bronze helmets and shields and iron horse armour gleaming in the sun. From the woods my Saka bowmen (using the mountain Indian stats) strode forward from ambush and opened a frightful barrage (who knew so many dice had 1 or 2 marked on them?).  The elephant, a 40 year veteran, trumpeted wildly and rushed forward, trampling panicking horses beneath her feet.  Charge followed counter charge as the chariots, unable to stop and without room to maneuver, rolled forward. On the left, my Cataphracts maneuvered for a clear charge at the Chinese infantry as they cleared the wood. Then the crossbows twanged and my nobles back peddled desperately while I searched for a new plan. The score now stood at 7 army morale points lost per side. (Ron could lose 17, I could lose 13)

With unlimited time and an array of machine guns, crossbows, facing me, it was just a matter of time before he shot me to pieces. At this point, the question arose of how long I needed to hold the pass in order to claim a victory. Initially Ron had said 11 turns, and 11 turns were done, but the table was 24 hexes across and even if I had retreated off table on turn 1, he couldn't have made it. I suggested we roll 2d6 to see how many additional turns he could have but with two "new" armies on the table (most figures on both sides were 20 to 40 years old), we decided to just play it through.  There was only way, to avoid destruction, rally my shot up phalanx and cavalry and charge! If the charge worked, there was a good chance I could blast a hole in his army but if the attack was repulsed, then it would be all up. Do or die!

Even having to make piecemeal attacks, my shock troops proved their potential, inflicting buckets full of hits on the enemy. Ron's troops proved that their morale was good. (Now he rolls a 1!)
His line was battered and within a pip or 2 of having broken but it had held and now the counter attack was coming through. Shock infantry charging into the phalanx, crossbow bolts following up my cavalry as they rallied back for another charge. Then the battered chariots whipped their  horses up to speed and rolled forward into my Thracians and a battered phalanx and both crumbled, bringing me to my break point.

A hard fought game and one which reinforced my choice of army. As Phil Barker once wrote, pick an army that you can love, even when it loses.