Rome vs Hawkshold 2000 points rules test game 1
This past Friday the Jersey group got together and I figured that I’d take some of the new rule proposals for a test drive. We had 4 players in Chris, Brook, Rob, and myself so we decided to do a pair of 1-on-1 games first, then a big game. We rolled for opponents and I got Brook. This first game was over quickly, so we where able to play a second game while Chris and Rob where still grinding it out in a Dwarf vs. Undead match. This is the first of those 2 games.
One of the rules we tested was voting thread 5D
http://yourmovegames.com/forum/index.php/topic,4615.0.htmlwhere the wording for the Pila rule goes from
When a non-cavalry non-skirmisher unit throws javelins (or pila) while on Close, mark off the range indicator. A unit does not make a range attack while the range indicator is marked. The mark is erased when one of the following happens:
--the unit's Standing Order is changed from Close.
--the unit becomes unengaged after being engaged.
--you spend a Command Action in the Movement & Command phase to erase the mark.
To
“When a non-cavalry non-skirmisher unit throws javelins (or pila), mark off the range indicator. A unit does not make a range attack while the range indicator is marked. The mark is erased when one of the following happens:
--the unit becomes unengaged after being engaged.
--you spend a Command Action in the Movement & Command phase to erase the mark.”
The other rules is voting thread 5E
http://yourmovegames.com/forum/index.php/topic,4616.0.htmlWhich essentially says that Pila should lose attack dice when units go into the yellow or red just like all other ranged attacks.
Set Up
Hawkshold played by BrookTop to bottom:
Militia
Greatswordsmen backed by Bowmen
Heavy Infantry backed by Bowmen
Heavy Infantry backed by Bowmen
Greatswordsmen backed by Bowmen
Militia
I will hereby dub this build “Crawl and Shoot”
Rome played by yours trulyTop to bottom:
Velites backed by Italian Swordsmen
Veteran Principes backed by Triarii
Veteran Principes
Italian Swordsmen
Italian Swordsmen
Italian Swordsmen backed by Triarii
Velites backed by Hastati and Italian Cavalry
Bohan made me believer in Libyan Foot over Hannibal’s Elite as breakthrough units (same offensive stats for less points) so I figured I’d field some Veteran Principes instead of Extraordinarii.
Early Turns
Brook had his line capped at 2.5. He targeted each of my Skirmishers with the 2 Bowmen on their respective sides. His Bowmen also had the SM standing order so they wouldn’t lose any attack dice as they closed. My non-skirmisher troops where set to close objectives about 1.75 inches to their right since Brook had a 6-unit wide front that would cause me alignment issues later on if I didn’t offset our lines somehow. The Skirmishers where told to just go off on their own and do their Skirmisher thing.
The Hawk line started its slow crawl forward while Rome did it’s sidestep dance. The Hawk archery wasn’t effective early on, but they needed 1s to hit their skirmisher targets so not surprising. Brook placed Bravery on both of his Militia and I drew lots of cards. My Pila throw before engagement produced expected damage across the board. The Militia at the bottom of the pic above failed their courage check despite the bravery from the combined attack of the Italian Swordsmen Pilas and Velites Javelins. Most embarrassing for the Hawk general.
Late Turns
Note that at this point I realized the photo quality would be much nicer from the other side of the table, so the above image depicts a view from the opposite side of the table from which the first 2 photos where taken. You may notice little “Ps” on my line units just above the standing order circle. I put those there to indicate that Pilas had been thrown by those units and it would take me a command action to remove the P.
Brook switched the targeting of his archers to some of my line units and frankly I can’t remember which ones. I direct controlled my Velites at the left of my line to create space for my Italian Swordsmen to engage the Milita unit there and Brook had another severe courage meltdown as this Militia unit (also with Bravery!) blew its courage check as well and died in the return attack. The following turn I was able to get the pinches on both sides of the Hawk line and Brook surrendered at that point so we could get another game in before Rob and Chris finished playing.
Final Thoughts I think the Hawks still had some fight in them as the Bowmen could pinch the Italian Swordsmen that where about to roll the line and the Italian Swordsmen are not exactly the toughest units in the land. However, the Hastati and Italian Cavalry where going to be a problem in a few turns. I was able to draw and play both of my For the Glory of Rome cards. Or whatever card it is that gives you (+1) +1/+1 if your unit is backed up. That is just a vicious card! Sadly, none of the rules we where play testing went into effect except for the Italian Swordsmen at the very top of the last photo and I didn’t bother burning the command action to allow for another throw before they pinched the Greatswordsmen up there. They never actually engaged the Militia unit, so where not eligible to throw again until I had burned the CA. This brings up an interesting question concerning this rule. If a pila using unit expends it's throw on target #1, engages with a different unit (other than the one that it threw at, so target #2), then is victorious from THAT combat, does it get another pila throw at its next target (target #3)?
We had a better result from a play testing standpoint in the next game and an even better amount of information from the big game that took place after that.
