A couple of games of Citadels. Was fun. Lost both times and was robbed and assassinated and pillaged a lot.
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Wednesday 15th November Leave a comment
Friday 10 November, To the Strongest Leave a comment
We played the big battle of Edessa as mentioned in the earlier blog post below. Here is how it went. Click on the gallery to read the captions and the battle report.
The Roman Army march out of camp and deploy for battle. DARRYL takes the right wing with Succesianus and the Legions whilst Phil takes the left and centre with Valerian and the Auxiliaries
The armies close as battle commences
Valerian and his guard
Succesianus and the Legionnaires
The Persian cavalry close with the Roman left wing having driven away the camel light troopers
Mike is in charge of the Persian left wing whilst Alex takes the right
The Roman Army
The Auxilia are disordered in their advance by punishing archery from the Persian infantry
The Persians and their fearsome Elephants
The Persians and the Romans
Persians
View on the Persian right flank.
Roman light cavalry advance to skirmish against the Persian cataphracts but are ridden down when failing to evade
Clash of cavalry on Roman left flank led by the heroic Roman contari extra heavy cavalry general
Persians
The Roman centre advances rapidly towards the Persian elephant and infantry supported by the commander in chief Valerian in reserve
The lines are closing but the Roman right flank is held slightly back in the face of the elephant advance
The cataphracts play the tonight we dine in hell card and become heroic in their refusal to be beaten by the Roman cavalry
The Persian reserve advance only to realise a lost Roman cavalry unit has arrived to their rear , the Roman strategy card randomly placed a unit from the right flank here
The auxiliaries fair badly. A unit including the general is lost facing the levy and the unit facing the elephants falls into disorder
The Roman cavalry falls back in disorder. Valerian attempts to halt the Persian advance by Interposing if his own heavy cavalry
Disaster as the guard cavalry rout and Valerian is captured. At this point all seems lost for the Romans but they stubbornly detained to fight on after a brief lunch break.
Things look bad now on the left flank but the cavalry with the general manage to rally
The Roman cavalry on the far left though have driven back the light horse and can see the arrival of their comrades to the Persian rear.
The Roman auxilia attempt to retreat and then rally but the elephants just keep advancing
Not forgetting the action on the right flank. The elephant proves resistant to all archery, ballista bolts and pila . The Persian cavalry manoeuvre to their left hoping to encircle the legionnaires
Aft many hours and multiple attempts the elephants finally are beaten
The Roman cataphracts are destroyed but the heavy cavalry push back!
View from the Roman camp
The Persian cavalry turn to face attacks from all directions now.
Persian cataphracts
The Roman legions begin to close and push back the Persians, turning to defend the flanks.
The view from the Persian left flank as the reserve closes with the lost Roman unit to halt their slow advance and protect their comrades
Roman heavy cavalry halt the Persian cataphracts whilst the auxilia retreat in disorder towards the camp fortifications and safety
The Roman light horse attack the flank of the. Persian reserve cavalry multiple times whilst the Roman heavy cavalry attack. From the front.
Finally it comes down to the last victory point. The romans manage to hold onto their last two on the. Persian turn whilst on their turn they are able to inflict the final victory point losses onto the Persians bringing them to zero and claiming an unexpected victory.
So in the end things turned round for the Romans after Valerians’s capture and the loss of the centre general. Darryl’s cautious preservation of the Praetorian Legion and its commander Successianus plus the heroic left flank Roman cavalry managed to turn things round and seize an unlikely but close victory.
Perhaps Succesianus was able to sack Edessa and negotiate the release of Valerian? Or maybe simply being able to retreat back into Roman territory was enough now for the Romans, leaving their hapless Emperor in the Persian clutches for ever more?
Was certainly a fun battle. The new rout rules prevented the Roman guard cavalry from becoming demoralised and the new no rally in zone of control had an effect too. It stops the romans using detached generals to continuously rally in the face of the enemy but it also meant that disordered forces fought on for ages with very little effect on each other.
A good game and thanks to Mike and Alex with their Persians and to Darryl for stabilising the Romans for Phil when all seemed lost.
Friday and Saturday 10 and 11 November, Gloomhaven Leave a comment
Played our first two games of Gloomhaven. Went well so have now painted the six starting character figures. So far Phil has played as the Spellweaver, Mike the Cragheart, Alex the Tinkerer and Darryl the Mindthief.
The King’s Life (4) Leave a comment
Iron Hills War Chariot Leave a comment
Thranduil King of Mirkwood on Elk Leave a comment
I have tried some snow on Thranduil’s Base…
Monday 6th November: Preparing for To the Strongest: Imperial Romans versus Sassanid Persia Leave a comment
By User:Fabienkhan – Own work, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=588632
Battle of Edessa 260 AD
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Edessa
Table is all set up ready for the arrival of Shapur and his Persians (Mike and Alex) to take on Emperor Valerian (Phil and Darryl) and the Romans. This was ultimately an ill fated campaign for the Romans historically but perhaps our representation of the first few days of the campaigning around Edessa might yield a different result.
Two sides of 250 points each.
Our scenario represents the first day’s engagement. The Romans have deployed for battle outside their camp whilst an advance force of Persians have arrived at the outskirts of Edessa ready to fight and block the Roman advance. If the romans can defeat the Persians on this day then they will be able to resupply from the city but if they cannot then they will soon be out of water and fodder and the Emperor will be forced to negotiate terms when the bulk of Persian Army arrives over the next few days. During the negotiations the Romans will be betrayed and Valerian will be captured, leading to the eventual surrender of the Roman Army trapped in the camp thus suffering the worst defeat in Roman history. So our scenario is the only hope the Romans have to avoid the terrible true historical outcome.
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