The following post details two games of ADLG.
The first was my Pyrrhic army against Ian's Gauls. His choice was quite surprising as he'd long talked about Gauls but for 2 or more years had only ever taken an all elite German army.
His Gallic army had 6 bases of cavalry and 2 of light horse giving him a strong mounted arm. Otherwise he took the maximum amount of light infantry (slingers and javelins) then the remainder in heavy sword impetuous ord.
My army consisted of 8 pike - 4 ord + 4 mediocre - and this was the backbone of my force. I had never used mediocre pike and wanted to try this out. Elsewhere my cavalry and light infantry forces were outnumbered but my elite xystophoroi had the edge on his cav.
Ian oddly deployed his cavalry in a terrain restricted area in three lines. This completely reduced their effect for the game. My lower numbers of cavalry could fend them off in limited space.
Meanwhile on the open flank, a largely unsupported block of Gallic sword were monstered by a wall of pikes who bore the initial charge then began to grind them to pieces. No Gauls would escape annihilation on this flank.
My ace was my third command containing light horse, light foot and Samnite medium sword. The light cav with javelin drove away his light troops then the 3 bases of Samnites drove straight up the middle with only 1 peeling off the support my cavalry.
Three bases of Gallic MC were kept completely at bay by a single base of xystophoroi blocking a gap.
My cavalry would hold the line (my elite heavy spear died in two rounds to cavalry in a show of lucky dice rolling) allowing the Samnites and pikes to do their job. The cavalry would strike back after early losses to take a Gallic general and a couple of HC bases. Ian never managed to untangle the long conga line of forces he has wedged between marsh and two woods.
And what was the Samnite job? They run up the guts, killed all the light foot, flanked some Gallic heavy sword then sacked the camp. Game over ... Pyrrhus wins.
The second game saw my flowering of my new love affair with mediocre pike. I played Ptolemaic against the Gauls once more. This time I had 6 bases of mediocre pike and 2 ords. My cavalry was about the same but I employed a death star of an elephant and thracians.
Tonight was also a game of bluff. My use of terrain and medium troops had led my opponent to believe he knew my army composition. Ian had learnt than medium foot are just wonderful so employed a command of mediums. I just stacked heavy foot, decent cavalry, some 2 bases of light cav + 2 LI then a death star and a single base of peltast medium spear (to engage in light terrain or stab cavalry.) We then fought on a plain with limited terrain giving my heavies decent operating space.
My far right command looked like it had bitten off more Gallic medium sword bases than it could handle but I managed to move some of my CinC's command over to threaten. The elite impact HC were imposing enough to convince both the light foot and medium sword than emerging from the rough ground to support the combats was a bad idea.
With my 8 strong pike command spread across open ground - against a smaller group of elite heavy sword - I had some imitation legionary foot left often and a base of medium spear peltasts. These gladly advanced onto the medium cav ord in the centre.
Note, this could never had happened if the Gauls had not chosen to retreat their cavalry when confronted with an earlier Ptolemaic charge. The extra turn allowed me to funnel solid heavy infantry into the fray with cavalry and to bolster my smaller elephant command with flanking cavalry support.
My pike block took a beating in the initial phases of combat - Ian's dice always run hot, its not speculation just fact - before my overlaps began to count and 2 timely rallies held the line. From this point, despite losing 2 bases of pike, I ground through the Gallic line.
One base of pike ordinary even broke away slamming into the heavy cavalry. This did not end well for the Gallic nobility.
Threatened by xystophoroi in the open, the medium Gallic foot did not emerge together rather were slowly fed into the death star. I've never really seen elephants do anything good but tonight my jumbo stomped two Gallic bases into powder. Again, early hot rolls by the Gauls were eventually counteracted by overlaps and positioning of the general.
The game was really over with the Gauls faced with a continuous line of strong melee troops. My light cav with javelins had again done a sterling job of driving away light troops, the pike had simply worn down then crushed their opponents over time and a smattering of other infantry had started to kill Gallic cavalry.
With the elephant stomping on heads and thracians cutting into medium Gauls the damage was done. Keeping Gallic troops at bay with unfavourable match ups and draining their command points with 'hail Mary' rally rolls put the nail in the coffin.
This time ... big Ptolemaic win.
No comments:
Post a Comment