Rome v. Carthage Round 4

Mike & Jim's Carthargian & Gallic Army
v.
SteveJ's Romans

Both sides deployed with their right on the edge of the table and their left held back.  The Romans had their Auxilia division on their right and their two legions left and centre.  The Carthaginians had their Gallic cavalry on the right, Carthaginian cavalry & elephants on their left. In their centre they put the Gallic warbands in front followed by skirmishers and their spearmen in rear.  (The pics are all taken from behind Carthaginian right).

The Romans began to move their right across to behind the legions, advanced their centre legion and formed a line with the legion on their left.  The Gauls were charging forward with cavalry on their flanks when suddenly disaster struck when their Spearmen threw blunder dice and suddenly turned around and ran for the rear.

Cavalry and elephants were pushed forward to support the Warbands' flanks as they gallantly charged the RH legion.  The 2 warbands on the right were faced with just 1 cohort each & with cavalry support they pushed their opponents back.  The other two faced 2 cohorts each, one was quickly beaten while other was pushed back.

While the 2nd legion and the auxilia were still being redeployed, the 1st legion was being hammered by warbands, cavalry and elephants.  After some initial success it became fragmented and was swamped by elephants, warbands and cavalry.

There was a bit of a lull in the fighting as both sides sorted themselves out facing at right angles to their initial front.

The Romans had some sucesses as the Carthaginians renewed the attack.  On their right, the Carthaginian cavalry was well held and two cohorts broke a spear unit.  On their left, a counterattack by the Auxillia finally broke the Gallic foot.  But their centre was hard pressed by the spearmen, and the Auxillia couldn't stop the massed cavalry charge on their left. 

So the Carthaginians finally won one after 3 defeats.  And that was despite 2 blunders.  They seemed to be a problem at the time, but in fact didn't really hurt.  The infantry got good dice later to catch up & the cavalry blundered forward, more or less in the right direction anyway.  The elephants were a great success - taking out 2 cohorts & hurting 2 more before they were stopped - take note SteveP.