Punic Wars - To The Strongest

On Tuesday evening Martin and I had another great game of To The Strongest.

Martin has already written up an excellent report on Tabletop Mog so I will just add a little of my perspective.

Unaware that Simon had already done a list for the Carthaginians I picked something of my own, 

• Carthaginian command: General (Mounted, Detached, Senior, Brilliant), Stratagem, Spearmen  (Veteran), two Spearmen
• Gallic command: General (Heroic), two Warriors (Hero), two Cavalry, Light Infantry (Slings)
• Spanish command: General, two Javelinmen , Light Infantry (Javelins)
• Numidian command: General (Mounted), three Light Cavalry (Javelins)

Taking a look at Simons actual list, I was not too far off the mark apart from he classes the African Spearmen as a Hoplite type rather than Spearmen.

Martin used a force of two Alae of Romans plus an Alae of Roman allies. Having small units and only three commanders he has far more troops on the table than me.

We initially set up the terrain and this is how it looked before we applied any random effects.

We then randomised the terrain and deployed the armies. On my right the Numidian and Gallic cavalry faced off against one Alae, in the foot from right to left I deployed the Gallic foot, African foot and then the Spanish. I was certainly looking outnumbered.

With just a screen of cavalry I was concerned that my right flank would soon be rolled up. However, the Numidians performed far better than expected. Soon, three units of Italian allies had succumbed to the javelins of the Numidians, although the Gallic cavalry were suffering to the return missle fire and spent most of the game in a state of disorder.

Things were not going so well in the centre though. The Velites were stubborn buggers, not only were they refusing to flee the charges of my Gallic foot, my own poor attacks combined with Martins excellent saves meant they stayed in the game far longer than I had hoped.

The Spanish on my left fared well, ranged against an entire Alae they held there own and polished off a couple of units of Hastatii with help from the African Spearmen.

Things were looking up, I had lost only a couple of Victory Medals and Martin was left with only a pair of his own. Then the Romans decided that they knew how to fight after all. A unit of African Spearmen were polished off and Hannibal fell dead!, a unit of Gallic Warriors were wiped out and then a unit of Spanish. My African foot command was also demoralised!

I had three Victory Medals left and Martin had two, also, having brushed aside the Spanish my left flank was now in danger of being turned.

However, my Gallic slingers, who had been ineffective so far, shot at the Italian allied cavalry. They made their save, but the accompanying General did not, Martin lost his final two Victory Medals and the game was mine.

Another great game that despite my dominance in the early stages of the battle went right down to the wire in the end.

All the figures are from the collections of Martin and myself and were painted by their respective owners.

Manufacturers are mainly; Gripping Beast, Warlord Games, Aventine, Victrix and Agema, with maybe a few other oddments thrown in.