ENFILADE 2011 TACTICA II Game Eastern Romans vs Western Romans

The following is from a TACTICA game presented at the NHMGS ENFILADE Convention on May 27, 2011 in Olympia Washington. This was a fictional Roman Civil war battle with an Eastern Roman Army versus a Western Roman Army. Each Army consisted of two Legions with support troops and an Allied contingent. The Western Romans had three warbands of Gauls while the Eastern Romans had some Sarmation Cataphracts and infantry. This was a large battle with about 3000 points per side.



This picture shows the Western Roman (WR) setup with Legions in the middle and light troops and cavalry on the flanks. The Gaulic Warbands can be seen on the far end lined up one behind the other.

Here are the Eastern Romans (ER) with a similar setup, Legions in the middle, lights and cavalry on flanks. The Sarmation Cataphracts and Bastarnae are on the far end with some Paeonian Lt Cav and Skythian Horse Archers outboard of them.

Here are the WR players. I'm terrible with names so don't recall who is who, but maybe someone will recognize them and help me identify them properly.

Here are the ER players. the guys picked up the rules pretty quickly and all had a good time. As it ended up it was a very close match.

Here are the opening moves. Both sides have moved forward and skirmishers are doing their thing out front. The ER on left flank(far side) are doing some maneuvering as opposed to all the other legionnaires who moved straight ahead. Not sure what they were trying to do, but it didn't do them much good as you will see. Rule No.1 KEEP IT SIMPLE.

Here is a view of the WR right flank. Heavy Cav from each side are engaged in a melee. The lead Gaulic Warband (WB) is moving up to engage some cohorts, but notice how the other two WBs are pretty much useless. They would have done better to spread out or run in ahead of their own legion to inflict some casualties. As it was the back two WBs did little or no fighting the whole game.

The opposing Legions engaged in the middle. It was pretty much a slug fest.

The ER right flank. The WR light infantry and cavalry was no match for the Sarmatians who rode their opponents down pretty quickly.

The far left ER flank. Everyone is pretty much engaged. The ER light infantry will move up to help the cohorts fight the Gauls.

The left side of the ER line is in trouble A few cohorts have broken and one is disorganized. The left ER Legion will soon break and route off the field.

Unfortunately for the WR's, their left Legion also fared badly and it has routed off also. Both sides now have a big hole in their Battle Lines. Neither side has reached Break Point however so the conflict continues.

Another view of the battle field just before the left flank ER Legion breaks. Thew Cataphracts will make short work of the WR Heavy Cav and the Bastarnae will demolish the Light Infantry.

Both side near Break Point now and they are maneuvering to attack their remaining enemies.  Not shown is one of the Gaulic WBs has broken, but the entire left flank of each side is totally gone.

One of the remaining WR cohorts has taken its last casualty and can be seen routing off the table.  When we added up the points its was ER 210 points lost with BreakPoint of 206. Percentage = 102%.
WR lost 270 with BreakPoint of 219. Percentage = 123%.
Since ER had lower percentage, they were deemed the Winner. A very close game indeed.