Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Hail Caesar !

Jim's Britons v. Steve's Romans

Both sides deployed their mobile troops - cavalry, chariots & auxilia - on the British right with two long infantry lines covering the rest of the front.

The Brits advanced their infantry through the wood right of centre, held back their left and advanced their light cavalry on the right.  The Romans held back their right but advanced on their left to meet the British left.  This lead to a quick and wild melee on that flank.  The British had the better of it destroying all the Roman horse & an auxila at the cost of 1 chariot unit.

The Brits in the wood got lost for a while but eventually blundered through & deployed in front of it only to be threatened in flank by the auxilia that by-passed the flank melee.  But with some light cavalry support it saw off the auxila leaving the Brits in control on that flank.

Meanwhile on the other flank, the Romans realised they had to get moving before they were outflanked from the left.  The British advanced to meet them.  On the Roman right, that division had success pushing back and then routing the British left.  But in the centre their formation was disrupted by the the need to face a flank threat and things started going badly.  It soon got even worse when the chariots and light cavalry arrived in their rear. 

Soon the Romans were reduced to just the 3 units of their right flank division (the Roman army morale was not affected by the loss of the auxilary troops - only legionaries count).  The British calmly reorganised while sending their light troops to soften up the remaining Romans.  

In the 3rd pic the last 3 Roman units are the 2 in the far left with slingers in front & one surrounded on the far right.  The surrounded one routed next turn & the other were reduced to shaken status by the slingers causing the division & the army to break before the rest of Brits got reorganised.

We have fought 3 Roman v. Britain battles.  They have all been decisive, but the winner has alternated - Brit, Romans, then Brits again.  The Brit's plan was to first outflank the Roman right then attack their front.  When the Brit advance on their right succeded, the Romans were in big trouble.  On their far right where their line was intact they repeated last week's steamroller, but where the Brits were able to disrupt their formation it was  different story.  Familiarity with Hail Caesar does open up tactical opportunities - it isn't all luck (at least it isn't if you win).  

1 comment:

John Lambshead said...

I played my first Hail Caeser game at the weekend. What fun!