TTS AAR: Khurasanians versus Marian Romans
/More practice for To The Smallest: this time my Khurasanians would take on Si’s Marian Romans
Unsurprisingly, the Khurasanians won the scouting, so I deployed in order to hold the Roman legionaries in the centre of the field whilst my much superior cavalry smashed their hodge podge of Gallic, Roman and Persian cavalry from the field on the right, and swept round to outflank them on the left.
As the battle began, my horsemen swept forward as planned, and soon the game was split into three distinct sectors: the left, the centre and the right.
On the left hand side, my cavalry shot past the Roman right flank and then turned to do battle. Unfortunately, the Marians have very manoeuvrable infantry, and rather than face the rear of the Roman line, they faced some fierce-looking legionaries determined to protect their comrades’ open side.
Si then conducted a textbook demonstration of how to counter cavalry with infantry as, for the rest of the battle, the forces on my left fought each other to a standstill, with neither side gaining the upper hand. My only consolation was that this action tied up half the Roman legionaries (the bits of his army I was afraid of) for half of my cavalry, leaving all my infantry and half my cavalry to deal with half his infantry (the veteran half, unfortunately) and his hodge-podge cavalry.
On the right flank, my cavalry swept forward confident of victory.
This, of course, proved to mean “over-confident of victory” and, for a moment, it looked as if I was going to be beaten back on this flank.
Fortunately my Ghilman lancers proved why I pay so many points for them, and although I was definitely losing this flank, the position at the end of the battle was an 'honours-even draw.
That left the centre to decide things, where five units of veteran Roman legionaries faced six units of Arab spearmen, half of them with extra bows.
Fortunately for me, the initial Roman attack was piecemeal, as some of his infantry had turned to help his cavalry out in their battle on the right flank against my horsemen. This allowed me to pepper his line with arrows, killing two enemy cohorts (one base’s worth) and increasing my advantage from 6:5 to 6:4.
This numerical advantage allowed me to get some of my infantry onto the flank of the Roman line, and from there it was just a matter of time before the legionaries gave way. I was helped by the cards a little bit, especially when the Roman eagle-bearer was killed, and victory was mine with the demise of three of the five veteran legionary units.
Somewhat wierdly, the infantry fight in the centre of the table that would eventually decide the game seemed very much as sideshow, as both Si and I spent most of our time concentrating on the action on the flanks. It took a bit of time for the veteran legionaries to get moving in the centre: something that definitely played out to my foot-archers’ advantage.
A great game of TTS.
