Classical & Roman Era at Brixham 2021
Sertorian Spanish vs Seleucid
Game 1 Sertorian Spanish vs Early Arab
Game 2 Sertorian Spanish vs Seleucid
Game 3 Sertorian Spanish vs Hurri-Mitanni
Game 4 Sertorian Spanish vs Middle Imperial Roman
Game 5 Sertorian Spanish vs Early Successor
Second game up, after a healthy mid morning breakfast burrito from The Curious Kitchen, saw the Iberian Rebellion attempting to be suppressed by the mighty empire of pre-Biblical Syria, the Seleukids in a nigh-on bottom of the table clash of the titans!.
The lists for the Sertorian Spanish and Seleucid from this game, as well as all the other lists from the games at Brixham can be seen here in the L'Art de la Guerre Wiki.
As the sound of Piratical boom-boxes echoed round the hall, the battlefield emerged from a bag of dice, dominated by an impassable volcano, spewing smoke and helpfully guarded by a very neat wire fence around the bottom of it - presumably to stop the Jurassic park monsters from down the coast in Lyme Regis from interfering with the pirate-based activity which dominated the cultural landscape in Brixham.
The volcano had rendered the table split asunder, giving one obvious place in which the battle would be decided and yet again leaving pretty much nowhere at all in which the Spanish could execute their one-trick-pony trick of ambushing huge scads of their forces.
The stage was set for a straight up battle, with rebel legions against the Phalanx, and hard-charging Iberian warriors against, erm also The Phalanx probably.
With so little table to play with, and such an obvious starting position for the Seleukid army the Spanish had detached their small mounted command and sent it on a flank march on their left, hoping and planning to arrive and cause instant havoc and fear in the Successors rear areas - or at the very least keep their elephants at least 4MU away from the right hand table edge allowing the Spanish army to use a bit of extra width.
Sertorius
The Spanish Legions expanded faster than a wargamers waistline in a town where the two main food groups come encased in pastry or batter, almost reaching the edge of the board and daring the advancing Seleucid Elephant Corps to follow them into the possible arrival zone of the impending Spanish cavalry flank march.
The proper Spanish Spanish infantry were doing likewise on the opposite side too, butting themselves up to the volcano as the Seleucids started to realise that they were narrower than a freshly shaved stick stuck in a vice.
What's Going on Here Then?
The Seleukids are attempting to keep the battle line tight, but they are also advancing past a steep hill in the centre of the table which is creating a gaping flank on their right as they push on. The possible arrival of the Spanish flank march is also preventing the Seleukid elephant corps from expanding out towards the table edge, giving their army flank problems on both sides.
So far, the Spanish are lining up and waiting having aligned ther best (elite) troops ready to recieve this attack, and although the elephants may cause somewhat of a problem for the Iberian Legions, at least they have the 4-hit HI resilience to try and absorb the pachyderm attacks rather better than the 3-hit Spanish foot
With the javelinman contingent lurking ominously in a second rank, the Imitation Legions continued to push up, ready to sidestep and catch the Phalanx and do the classic curtain-opening trick to expose the elephants to a javelineer charge.
The Seleucids clearly had the upper hand in skirmish screening Light Infantry, but for the rest of the matchup things were better balanced than a Brixham seagull perched on an empty chip box impaled on the harbourside railings by an overly passive-aggressive wannabe litter lout.
With Elite Ligurians linking up with a line of full-fat legionaries the Spanish sensed that they may not need to wait for the arrival of the still-lost flank march to force the pace in this battle.
A fully tee'd up charge all along the line had the potential to furiously charge and sweep away the pokey lines of Successor resistance at a stroke of dicemanship, and if there was a way to win without recourse to tactics or skill, the Sertorian army was all for giving it a go.
With the volcano gently steaming the countless hordes of Spanish warriors continued to flood forward, overrunning the mountainous terrain in their rush to try and engage some of the flotsam and jetsom of the Seleucid army that had somehow escaped from being added to the ends of their line of Pikes and Elephants.
The mountain was steep and the nimble-footed Spanish hillmen had their work cut out to advance up it's near-sheer sides, all the while grumbling to one another that the very same hill was usually declared as gentle in previous games they had participated in.
They knew however that great success and plaudits may lay beyond their climb. Running down crappy bowmen is an unrewarding job, but someone from the Iberian peninsula has to do it I suppose..
And, in a flash of chorizo, red wine and shattered pasty crust shavings, battle was joined!
Mighty forces slammed together at high speed as both sides worked out that their first round factors might well be more than one, and then also spotted that the same was true for their opponents as well.
What's Going on Here Then?
With the Seleukids past the hill, the Spanish have launched an attack to try and break the Phalanx frontally with Impetuous charges as well as start to work troops past the enemy flanks before the rest of the Seleukid army can squeeze through and over the terrain to protect their pikemen. .
This is not ideal, but also not entirely bad for the Seleukids, as they have a wide frontage of potent troops but only 1 at-risk flank, with the Spanish flank march still missing in action their elephants having fanned out into the side zone to block the possible envelopment by the Legions and drilled Lusitanians
The pressure was on Seleukia as the Iberian warriors finally emerged from their mountaineering holiday chalets and rushed out onto the plains, bearing down on Seleucia's archery school outing with great speed and fury.
With such a threat to their flanks now in play, the Camel Guards decided that this was no longer the time to chance their arms in a risky fight against Spain's fabled, erm, Medium cavalry and themselves turned and fled, leaving the bowmen to whatever fate that the Fates had in store for them.
The lines of infantry were struggling manfully (hombre-fully in Spanish?) against one another, but as had been foretold in ancient prophecy and also by people who owned rulers and tape measures, the greater width of the Spanish line was allowing their Lusitanian drilled warriors to push past the end of the Phalanx and threaten to roll it up.
Mamaguebo! The Galatian mercenaries in the pay of Seleukos wanted to fix that problem, but they were struggling to get across the steep mountains, and with more men to spare the Spanish were delaying them with fanciful attempts at combat to boot.
OK, so maybe they weren't delaying them all that much
But, still, the Spanish infantry had by now crashed through the end of the Phalanx and widened the amount of excess width that their army was bringing to bear by another unit or so in the process.
The Seleukids ability to hold up their flanks was surely fast running out, and a collapse was feeling more and more imminent by the moment
The Great Al Seleukos' elephant corps were now more fully committed to combat than a sliced and fried onion is to a Spanish tortilla, as they spread wide to counter the countless numbers of Iberians threatening to overrun their flanks.
Even so, javelineers were in combat against elephants which had to be a good thing for warriors more used to tilting at windmills than attainable vulnerable targets.
Seleukids
The line of Phalangites was starting to fracture, but so was the Spanish assault as it dashed, and then ebbed away against the stubborn resistance of the Argyaspides .
The Elite Pikemen stood firm next to the Seleukid elephant, forming a seemingly impenetrable choirzo-slicing machine into which the Iberians seemingly had little choice but to continue pushing their military sausage
In what by now seemed like an entirely separate sphere of combat the Spanish mountaineers had finally scaled the mighty peaks, and had succeeded in sneakily making their way towards the fast-firing Seleukid bowmen who had whittled their opponents away considerably as they advanced.
Culicagado! Crap Camelry were also now attempting to stand firm against fairly average Medium cavalry too, in a bottom-of-the-barrel volcano-side battle of "who is the least rubbish?"
In a puff of grey dusty smoke suddenly both Elephants evaporated, leaving behind a large gap and a vague smell of curried flatulence which both puzzled and repulsed the surviving infantrymen from both armies in equal measure.
A handful of Thracian peltasts were suddenly thrust into the limelight, and soon would surely be thrust into combat as they found themselves on the front lines of helping the Seleukids from being rolled up from both wings.
The Battle of the Barrel Bottom (hastily checks Wikipedia to see if this was in fact an actual American Civil war battle...) had also by now resolved in favour of the rather exhausted Iberians, who paused for breath only to realise that their hard won gains were practically impossible to exploit any further given the literal and metaphorical mountains now lying between them and the rest of the game.
The lone surviving Selecuid horse archer was already planning his retreat to safer climes.
By now the Galatian mercenaries had finally made their way down many tortuous mountain passes and tumbled out onto the level ground like chunks of swede tumbling out of a newly-opened Cornish pasty, appearing in the very nick of time to blot out the Spanish hopes of rolling up the Phalanx from its right hand end.
Inspired by their newfound safety the rest of the pike holding brigades redoubled their martial efforts, pushing long pointy sticks into the faces of the not quite so eager Iberians and striking some mighty blows for the Empire of Antioch in the still surprisingly close overall game balance.
The Seleucids also had metal clad Cataphracts to which the Spanish had even less answer than the Thracians had managed in a competition earlier this year.
The Successors were still at risk of being overwhelmed, but their tight formation and high quality was starting to exert an ever increasing toll on the Bilbao to Alicante forces, especially as their flank march was still yet to arrive, knocking a significant amount off of the viability of the on-table army in the process.
What's Going on Here Then?
Culicagado! The Spanish have still been unable to force their troops into the flank of the Phalanx, with the Seleukids succesfully throwing fresh troops into the gap near the hill, and the Spanish struggling to exploit the evaporation of the elephants due to the milling clouds of enemy Thracians who were jammed up behind the pachyderms.
The Phalanx has pretty much won the battle with the Spanish, the Iberians wild charge petering out against a wall of well drilled and high quality pikemen who have stuck together to create a solid line of pikes to face down any enemy. The Spanish need to start making more dents in the enemy lines, and more importantly, exploiting them with deadly flank attacks.
The Rebel Legions and Ligurians were driving forward to try and catch the handful of Thracians and chop a few more holes in the Seleukid defence, as well as teeing themselves up for some stunning flank attacks on the Argyaspides in barely a turn or so's time.
Doing both at the same time of course would have been far preferable, but with a distracted general barely contributing much in the way of command, and what felt like loads of time left there seemed no real hurry to land a hastily constructed but vaguely ineffective attack right now.
Suddenly quality started to come into its own across the table - not a great time to be a Spaniard relying on quantity to be honest, but great if you were a naked Galatian lunatic wishing to both be able to return home with tales of your immense heroism and fighting prowess, and of course, a pay packet which matched your own very public packet in size and impressiveness.
The Argyaspides had been quietly and efficiently shredding everything the Spanish army was able to throw at them for quite some time, repulsing and removing from play wave after wave of impetuous warriors and drilled semi-Romanized Ligurian pseudo-auxilia with equal disdain.
But lo, the Spanish suddenly realised that they had run out of units to continue to throw into the chorizo slicer, as the Argyaspide Elite Pikemen took a breath, twiddled with their facial hair and basked briefly in their glory and success.
The non arrival of the flank march reducing the Spanish break point from 25 down to 21 had been brutal for Spain, and despite also losing 21 units themselves the quiet lethality of the 23-strong Seleucid army's narrow but high quality army had finally told and the battle was lost for Spain
L'Art de la Guerre hint - an off-table flank march reduces the army's break point by the amount of units in it, until it physically arrives on table.
Click here for the report of the next game in this competition, or read on for the post match summaries from the Generals involved, as well as another episode of legendary expert analysis from Hannibal
Post Match Summary from the Sertorian Spanish Commander
Oh dear! My fantabulosa strategy seemed to be working just bona here, until the fambles of my opponent got amongst the dice and then the pricklypikemen managed to put pricks in the ears, and all over the rest of my soldiery as well
Quite why my army didn't manage to defeat a wall of pikemen frontally with a hair arsed charge is beyond me, because that strategy does sometimes work perfectly. And those flanks, what an open dish they were, yet my men failed to feast on them from all sides it seemed
The silly sausages of the flank march failing to arrive in the nick of time clearly hadn't read the script, so if they had nly turned up a moment sooner the play would have been perfect in every way
TAt least now I am staring from the bottom of the table upwards, which is a not entirely unusual situation to find myself in it is true - so onwards and upwards !
Hannibal's Post Match Analysis
Thou overwheening doghearted malt-worm! What gems of success did you wantonly throw away here by incompetence and hubris in equal measure?
All you had to do you sanctimonious crook-pated haggard was to sit back and wait while the enemy struggled through the gap in terrain you had created, and then to actually do something about getting into their flanks. Youdid neither, attacking rashly and then failing to get round the sides or back - a failure even John Barnes would have been embarassed to rap about!
Instead you frothy toad-spotted harpy, you just fed man after man into the mincing machine that the enemy had assembled, and played the game right into their hands by attaking frontally on a narrow frontage.
There is a reason the Iberian Empire didn't conquer the Mediterranean, and that is because a charge by heroic medium foot swordsmen is not actually that good. Your attempts to disprove history are rendering you into a crusty folly-fallen ingested-lump, and I am sure they will continue in the next game where surely your sheep-biting face will be hanged an hour!
Click here for the report of the next game in this competition
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Game 1 Sertorian Spanish vs Early Arab
Game 2 Sertorian Spanish vs Seleucid
Game 3 Sertorian Spanish vs Hurri-Mitanni
Game 4 Sertorian Spanish vs Middle Imperial Roman
Game 5 Sertorian Spanish vs Early Successor
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