Pyrrhic V's Republican Roman (Polybian)
I ordered a couple of gaming mats from Simon (aka BigRedBat) the other month and decided to have a crack using his "To the Strongest" rules utilising 28mm figures. I have tried with 15mm quite a while ago but I wasn't quite convinced as I had predominately used these for DBM.
I had all good intentions of taking a series of photographs showing the battle as it unfolded, BUT....... more people turned up than expected. So between the wargame, World of Tanks in the background, beer drinking and watching the footy match between West Coast and The Hawks I did manage to take a couple of photographs. And believe it or not we did reach a conclusion, which goes to show that the rules are very good for undisciplined and slightly intoxicated crowds. Definitely a major plus in my books as I see wargaming as very much a social event.
Anyway........the game.
As mentioned earlier, the armies have been set out on two
marked (20mm square) 6’ x 4’ gaming mats from Simon which look fantastic. The marked
squares are quite unobtrusive so maybe the mats could also be used for a
general board cover, WW2 for example.
Simon also sent me a couple of his ragged
edged bases, thanks Simon. The bases look great, although my ancients are
pretty much based, I do have a few ‘War of the Roses’ figures that need basing
so I am already formulating yet another army. (Looking a finishing it by 2020
if I’m lucky). Sorry, I digress.
Pyrrhic army. Army list used was provided free from Simon's site. bigredbatshop.co.uk
Roman army.
I pretty much used all the figures I had which gave 147points to each army. We didn't use heroic general, heros or camps in this game as we were still learning the flow of the rules.
It was easy to get carried away with advancing which is all well and good until the other commands fail to follow orders. In the game both center commands were reluctant to advance (through failed orders).
The Roman left wing was soon crushed but they caused enough casualties that their opposition would later break.
The Pyrrhic center consisted of veteran pike so the small units of Romans kept their distance for as long as possible. The pike units can take 3 hits before they break where as the Romans can only take 1 as they are listed as small units in this army.
The Romans crushed the right flank swinging around behind the Pyrrhic centre and the rest was history. Unfortunately this was where the photos stopped.
The game flowed well, although we made a couple of stuff ups with the rules. After the game we checked the forum tothestrongest.yuku.com. and soon sorted them out.
Great set of rules Simon.
