Roman Civil Wars – Sept, 6 2017

A couple of weeks ago I tried to recreate in my club a battle between two Late Imperial Roman armies. Considering my fascination for Imperial Roman history I decided to prepare two armies: one with a left wing composed by Palmyran catafractatii and the second-one with regular legionary unit and barbarians allies.

All miniatures are 28mm, a mix of Gripping Beast, Armour & Aquila, Fireforge Foundry and they are all painted by me.

A detail of the army on the left of the previous photo. The army is composed by regular legionaries (Menapii and Petulantes Seniores) with a second line of auxiliary archers

The left wing of this army includes heavy cavalry with some Numidian cavalrymen to support them

The second army sees regular legionaries on the left with Goths on the center and Huns to support them

The battle starts with the cataphractarii assault. In the photos below the sequence of the attack with the knights in the typical cuneo formation

A group of Huns tries to stop the heavy cavalry attack without success ... so the knights destroy the line of Lanciarii Gallicani Honoriani

Also on the centre the battle begins

An image of the battle trend

A detail of the two HQ's 

On the left, the Roman-barbarian army suffers casualties but ...

... the heavy knights have created an hole into the enemy army that it is impossible to close so ...

... the false Imperator escape while a unit of Herculiani Seniores surrounds rebellious legionaries

Aurelian 26 Dec, 2016

I bought Aurelian wargame book a couple of months ago but only in these days I have had the possibility to play it with a set of full miniatures painted.

I think that Aurelain, the Sam Mustafa's wargame, is a very interesting wargame system with a right equilibrium between the time necessary to play a game and the different army tactics that a player can use.

Nonetheless, even if I don't like a game that use cards, this play system that permits to discard the higher card score during the struggle increases the tactic in the game.

It is possible to find in internet, as open sources, four tutorial videos created by Sir Tobi here to understand better the game. Here the link: 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E00VsoItWYc&feature=em-upload_owner

Below some pictures of a "solo battle" between two Roman armies.

The initial deployment. The table is my "training table" and so the scenario is not so rich as the ones of my club

Some images of the two armies waiting for orders

The Emperor and his command group

The strategy of the attacker was to outflank the enemy with the cavalry

In Aurelian shooting is a very expensive phase but sometimes it creates significant casualties 

The attack on the flanks is starting

Two times the outflank is repulsed. The struggle starts in the centre but it is too late for the attacker.

The final positions

Final score 2 vs 0: defeat for the attackers