Second Civil War: Fictitious Battle of (Nearly) Thapsus

It is around the year 46 BCE. The soon-to-be divine Julius, having roused himself from his 'sojourn' in Alexandria with the intoxicating Cleo' (following his defeat of his old colleague, son-in-law and sometime rival Pompey the Great) has transported his army to Afrique. Initially under-manned, Caesar had to await the arrival of the remainder of his troops before he and Marcus Antonius confronted the Optimates forces commanded by Metellus Scipio and Juba I of Numidia, along with Caesar's former subordinate from Gaul, Titus Labienus. Still facing odds of 3:2, Caesar, ever the gambler and having confidence in destiny, advanced to face his rivals...

The Optimates formed up with an oasis and gentle hill strengthening their left (Biko's photo)

This was our first game for 2016. We do not yet have all of the forces for a 'proper' re-fight of the Battle of Thapsus, so we settled for a fictitious game based loosely on that battle. The aims were simple, to have a bash with some ancients so as to blow the cobwebs off the Impetus rules and to deploy as many units of various troops as possible that are appropriate for the Second Civil War campaign in Tunisia.

We were joined by Mark 'Sun of York', Mark 'Biko' and Stephen our honorary ANF members from the NWS. You may already have read Mark's excellent report of the game (I recommend it to you if you have not).

As so often happens, the civilians were out in force early, taking photos of the deployed armies from various vantage points

 With Caesar's command of 'good luck', the Populares forces advanced

First 'blood' to the Optimates: Juba's pesky Numidian cavalry scratching one unit of Balearic slingers.

The Caesarean right was confronted by Labienus' elephants...

 who foolishly charged against one of their nemesis units, skirmishing javelinmen.

 Trouble is that no-one had told these elephants about the nemesis!

Joining their Elephantidae companions, the Optimates' levy cavalry charged the Caesarean Germanic cavalry, suffering the expected result, but greatly weakening the former's precious mounted force.

It was easy for Cretan archers to see off the second unit of Thracian peltasts having seen their comrades turned into elephant tusk-picks.

Caesar's Gallic cavalry defeated the previously victorious elephants, the latter being still disorganised ('disordered') and a little weakened from their Thracian appetiser.

On the Caesarean left, the Numidian cavalry were proving a headache for Marcus Antonius, shooting the s... out of one of his units of Gallic cavalry...

but his other unit of Gauls managed to catch the elusive horsemen and fight them to a 'nil all' stalemate.

The wings having seen most of the action to date, but the time of the clash of the centres was fast approaching.

Below are two photos from Biko showing the overview of the table at this stage.

Labienus sent his veteran cavalry to attack Caesar's elephant-crushing Gauls, but they too met with defeat.

The second, flanking unit now moving to attack finally overcame the brave Celts. There's that six that I was after, pity that it was for the cohesion test. We were to see a bit of this flawed strategy from most players throughout the afternoon.

In the centre-right, Caesar's auxiliary spearmen charged and broke Scipio's unsuspecting Hispanics.

 The next unit of Optimates charged the victorious Caesareans, the mêlée continuing.

Over on the Caesarean left, Marcus Antonius was getting some revenge against the Numidians as first one...

 and then another unit was broken.

More of the African horsemen counter-attacked the previously victorious spearmen, resulting in an inconclusive mêlée.

The final unit of Numidians rained spears on one of Antonius' antesignani, who were unable to return the compliment.

Back on the Caesarean right, Labienus' remaining unit of elephants charged the veteran legions, neither side prevailing.

Further down the line, the sides continued to exchange skirmish fire, in preparation for the attack of the legions.

Below are Biko's overview photos at this juncture.

Scratch one elephant. It was Labienus' turn to try rolling a six in a cohesion test, a sure-fire losing strategy!

 Things went from bad to worse for the Optimates on their left flank.

In the centre two units of levy Spanish spearmen combined to break the Caesarean veterans.

 Further to the left, the sides traded skirmish blows, and losses.

In went the legions in the centre, neither side gaining the upper hand as pila went sailing through the air and a cacophony of steel on steel and shied resulted.

The Optimates began to get the upper hand...

Here's the Biko-cam view of the battlefield!

Had lady luck deserted the Populares? First Marcus Antonius and then Caesar himself rolling double-one, resulting in a downgrade of their command status.

Time to for action! Caesar sent his veteran legions to take the hill.

One unit of levy pseudo-legionnaires defeated.

Two units of Cretan archers attempted to stop the legions with bowfire. They too went to valhalla.

On the far Caesarean left, the Optimates' veteran cavalry and Caesarean Germanic horsemen decided to wage their own private war.

Building on their initial success, Caesar's veteran legions pressed on, breaking a second unit of pseudo-legionnaires and taking control of the central hill.

Below are the last two of Biko's overview photos of the table.

One of Caesar's victorious legionary units joined the fight in the centre, breaking the Spanish spearmen, but failing to repeat the dose against one of the Optimates' legions.

 Labienus' veteran cavalry finally got the better of the Germans.

Those losses took the Caesarean army past its demoralisation level. Could the legions break sufficient Optimates to also break them before the adding up at the end of the turn?

They tried to repeat the success of the previous two turns, but, fatigued by their exertions (wargamer's story telling), they fell short 

It had been another excellent game using these fine rules. The result attests to the closeness.

Caesareans VDT at the end of the game 24 points (army break point 22 points)Optimises VDT at the end of the game 28 points (army break point 29 points).

So there were but three points in it and, just one inch of charge move on the die. Meaning? The unit of pseudo-legions just visible at the bottom left-hand corner of the second last photo above was one inch too far for the fresh unit of Caesarean legions, who were bearing down on its rear...!

Not the only what-if, of course, and mistakes on both sides did not help one's own cause. Top stuff!

Cornwallis' Retreat 17 June 1795

This is a very late battle review, for which I apologise. Mark of One-Sided Wargames fame has already posted a very fair review here so this is by way of addition and comment. I should also very much like to thank all my comrades in the ANF for once again agreeing to indulge my fantasy and participate in a Napoleonic Naval action. I was again allowed to choose the scenario: with the increasing size of my Sails of Glory fleet, the assistance of additional ships from ANF comrades, and a little confidence gleaned from our last action San Domingo that we could accomplish a full battle in a day, I now felt inclined to try out a medium-sized action to test the next set of rules, Form Line of Battle by David Manley, a very popular set of Napoleonic Naval Rules which has gone through several editions and is used by many wargames clubs, but of which more later. The action I chose was Cornwallis' Retreat, which, was, as Wiki tells us, 'a naval engagement during the French Revolutionary Wars in which a British Royal Navy battle squadron of five ships of the line and two frigates was attacked by a French Navy battlefleet of 12 ships of the line and 11 frigates in the waters off the west coast of Brittany on 16–17 June 1795'. A full account can be found here.

The main issue for me as the scenario designer was to ensure that an action took place at all, that the British were not allowed to escape easily, but equally, to ensure that the French did not position themselves perfectly, and catch the British between two fires. It was therefore absolutely fascinating to me that the French Vice-Admiral Villaret de Joyeuse, ably played by James, followed the historical deployment extremely closely. His subordinate, Rear-Admiral Kerguelen, took as critical a view of the deployment as his historical counterpart, which was also immensely pleasing from a scenario point of view.

Here's how we had it:

 

Three lines of ships with the frigates deployed around them. Apologies for the blocks in the pictures: my efforts to re-design our sea foundered rather with incorrect use of paints causing undue flex (as well as some quite spectacular wave formations, and drastic measures were required to hold the sea in place). At least we had some realistically grey, rough and miserable looking Atlantic weather as a result.

The French fleet came on in not a little confusion, as randomisation under full sail cut in.

On the British side, determination was the order of the day, as Admiral Cornwallis decided to turn and fight, a resolution which was much aided, I am sure, by the slow sailing of two of his ships, with which the rules coped admirably. We had sufficient players to allow Stephen to take over two ships of the line as Captain Charles FitzGerald whilst I played the commander of the British frigates, intent on replicating their actual deception, if I could.

Here is an initial view down the British line

No doubt, then, that there would be an action. I may have got the wind direction slightly wrong, but my decision was to keep it as it was. On reflection I should certainly have allowed ships to lower their sails, which would have made a huge difference - mea culpa.

The British line was challenging to maintain, given the different sailing capabilities of the ships.

There was almost a collision at one point:

Early shots at long range from the British line of battle had a devastating effect, with the 'Alexandre' forced out of line, on fire and eventually sinking. It was a huge initial blow to the French force and from a morale point of view, I do not think they entirely recovered. In fairness, the rules were new to everyone and the extreme unlikelihood of this event being repeated was not initially clear - I too was fairly astounded.

As the line closed, frigates took centre stage. As a result of their bold handling, the British commander ordered fire on frigates from his line, with the inevitable result that the French retailiated, the British ending up the losers as a result of this exchange.

One bold French frigate even ended up raking - somewhat ineffectually - the British line, ending up heavily damaged but escaping.

A confused melee ensued, with the British succeeding in making off to the North. A view from the French side:

The French commander continued to be rightly worried about the Channel Fleet making an appearance - that will have to wait, however - although in practice it was the wind direction that in his view prevented him from pressing the action.

And here is the historical action, or one view of it, at least:

Not too dissimilar a view, in fact, given the difference in perspective.

It was exceptionally depressing that other commitments forced me to leave at this point: never again! Quite understandably my comrades continued for another move and then called it a day. The net result though - one French ship of the line lost, one British frigate also lost, and some moderate damage all round otherwise - was highly realistic, and more than answered the niggling doubt I had harboured that Napoleonic naval rules would lead to mutual devastation. The action had indeed proved possible to fight within a day, as I had hoped.

There were however some very conflicting impressions regarding the rules. General sentiment appeared to lie in favour of Signal Close Action by comparison to Form Line of Battle, with the view being expressed that the element of chance was simply too great, the loss of the 'Alexandre' being cited to that effect, and the wind rules were too inflexible. The former was down to chance - such a thing could conceivably happen, although the chance was very slight - the latter I believe was my misinterpretation of certain aspects of the rules, especially the ability to down sails (detachable masts replaceable with downed sails would indeed have been a bonus for Sails of Glory ships). By contrast I was myself left with a warm and fuzzy feeling towards Form Line of Battle which I did not feel for Signal Close Action, similar to this reviewer from many years ago link, but this may just have been the experience of fighting a second battle or a personal sympathy with the kind of game mechanics David Manley designs. More experience evidently required, and I still have lots of work to do in scenario design. There are also a  few more rule sets to try out yet, however: we are deliberating between Heart of Oak, Blood, Bilge and Iron Balls, or Close Action. This action was ambitious enough: next time though I am dreaming of something even bigger. Come on Ares, let's have a few more ship types to help us!