Levy Getting a Rep

Off to my son's this morning, early, with a car load of troops both Roman and Seleucid for a Classical show down, I dropped the missus off and then we headed for Stewart's posh offices on the Zetland Estate where we use the conference room table with a little help from a piece of plywood. Stewart chose the Romans so naturally I had the Seleucids.

I took three phalanxes, two regular and one Levy, with Thorakitai and Peltasts to protect the wings, I had Cretan archers and Scythians to provide excellent firepower along with some levy archers to make the numbers up and of course I took an elephant. The Romans had three cohorts, two regular and one recruit along with an Auxiliary cohort, supporting these were Contarii cavalry in heavy armour, horse archers, skirmishers and two bolt shooters.

Once deployed I thought I would attack the Roman right with the elephant supported by the Scythians and Cretans backed up with the Mercenary peltasts, my right I thought could handle the enemy horse archers and skirmishers and I decided to advance two phalanxes and hit the Roman right centre with them, the third phalanx would wait and see. The Romans were a bit cautious which was to be expected with Stewart not having played them before and like most of us suffered perhaps a little from 'elephant fear' hence the two bolt shooters.

Seleucids on the left, Romans on the right.

My right attacks.

I won the initiative for the first move and foolishly gave it away, bolts headed for the elephant and I only just managed to dodge them, during my move I moved Nellie into the small copse and shelter, getting away with my blunder. Unlike most of my games my archers now rained missiles down on my enemies and caused great slaughter, I seemed to have recovered. I carried on with my plan of attack on the enemy left and suddenly thought the phalanx I was pushing to the front were the Levy but thankfully in front of them were the Auxilia rather than a Legionary cohort, but even this could cause me trouble. I needn't have worried the Levy crashed in to the Auxiliaries and quickly routed and dispersed them, my second phalanx on their flank however was in trouble as it failed to beat Cohort I.

Scythians, what Scythians?

 

Over on my left I was making headway and had chased away the enemy skirmishers on that flank and had the elephant in a good position to either go after the Contarii or swing in to hit the cohort of recruits. I got my horse archers too close to the beast and it spooked them, so much that they left the battlefield never to return, the enemy cavalry meanwhile took no notice at all of the elephant. Luckily for me I had brought the Cretans around to face the Contarii and they dropped enough horsemen to make the Romans also flee from the field, I sighed with relief. My third phalanx led by the King had now come into contact with another cohort and although not running also did not fight well and it took a lot of effort to simply keep it in the fight. I had a dilemma, I could throw my peltasts into the fight with the King or turn them to take on the Recruits and hope to beat them with the help of the elephant, I decided to leave the King to his own devices and went for the almost sure thing. It would seem I made the right choice as the Mercenaries smashed the recruits without the aid of the elephant and sent them packing.

Just before the King routs and the Thorakitai charge.

Beware Greeks in the rear!

As we surveyed the battlefield the Romans had at last routed two of my phalanxes but one of the victors had been caught in the flank by the Thorakitai while the returning Levy moved to charge its rear, the second cohort had an elephant bearing down on their flank and the hard fighting Mercenaries to their rear, Stewart called a halt to the slaughter.

A good game and a learning curve for Stewart and myself, I think my sixteen man units need beefed up to at least 18 or maybe 20 as the Thorakitai suffered quite a bit from missile fire although they still managed to do their job, the Mercenaries wiped away the shame of running from Kevin's Numidians while the Levy phalanx once again defeated their opponents. I still have to get the hang of these damn elephants.