Sunday 14 April 2013

Thapsus- part the second

Returning to The Thapsus in Dug's shed last Wednesday, from where we left the action, with the Optimates' elephants plunging into V Alaudae (the veteran "larks").  


The elephants were quickly slain, but inflicted losses upon the veterans, who were immediately set upon by a unit of Numidian militia.  Alaudae were the best unit on the battlefield, and the militia, probably the worst, but some phenomenal dice-rolling by Boot, saw the veterans broken, and the militia through the line into open fields beyond (below)!



Unfortunately, for them, the Caesarians were able to contain the breakthrough by bringing up reserves. 

Both sides committed their second line of cohorts, as the fighting became general (below).


By this stage, most cohorts on either side had run out of pila, and were badly bruised.  However, the superior elan of the Caesarian legionaries gave them an edge in every melee.  Below, Scipio is getting a bit nervous...


...and the Caesarians more confident.


Eventually one of the Pompeian militia units broke, and a cascade of morale test failures swept away half of their cohorts: the battle was lost.  

Interestingly, the paper copies of the rules I had brought along weren't used (except for the charts), as four  of us had iPads (below) with the PDF version on them, hyperlinks and all.


Finally, here are the gamers, all together in front of the shed (now officially renamed the "Dug-out")  Nigel, Daz, Dave, Boot, and Fletch (back), and Carlo, Mark and Dug (front).  Thanks for the play test, chaps!


11 comments:

Handgrenadealien said...

Now I'm not usually a fan of anything Roman, but that does look like a fantastic game. Great miniatures & terrain.
Regards HGA

Stig of the Dump said...

Looks like it was a great game!

Steve

Christopher(aka Axebreaker) said...

Yet again a fantastic game!

Christopher

DeanM said...

Amazing looking game and figures. Truly spectacular and grand. Best, Dean

Tarty said...

Great event by the looks of it Simon, inspirational.
Richard

Prufrock said...

Great work, BRB! A fine looking game, and your rules appear to be doing their job.

Great to see!

Cheers,
Aaron

BigRedBat said...

Thanks chaps! It was a great day.

Aaron, I'm doing some editing at the moment, but I should be able to send you a set to have a look at, within the month.

Cheers, Simon

DadExtraordinaire said...

Great looking game Simon and with some beautifully

legatus hedlius said...

Maybe iPads do have some use after all!

Beautiful looking game. It has kept me feeling all Caesarian!

Cyrus said...

Fantastic looking game Simon!

AHunt said...

That's a great looking game. It makes me want to get my table built, even more.