Club Night 31st July

Friday night saw myself, Luke and Ian, joined by Mark, to try out our first full game with the Impetus rules. Using the 10mm figures we have for POW/Vis Bellica, based on 60mm wide bases, we pitted Sarmatians against Romans. We mostly followed the army lists but freely ignored them to fit the figures we currently have.

Luke and Mark set up as the defenders with the Romans, securing their left flank with a river, and their large Cavalry command, consisting of a number of units of Cataphractii, no doubt manned by renegade Sarmatians. In in the centre there was an allied Warband command, and then two commands of legionaries with auxilla and artillery support. Against them Ian and I deployed the Sarmatians with our infantry levy on the centre, the young nobles and some nobles on our right, the majority of the nobles under our charismatic C-in-C on the left, with some light cavalry and skirmishers on the far left.

The game began by a general advance by both sides as we go to grips with the intricacies of movement, disorder and discipline, especially with the impetuous Sarmatian noble cavalry.

On our right Ian's Cavalry careered across the dry river bed in various degrees of order and swept away the first lines of Roman light cavalry, but the the rogue heavy cavalry began to get into action and it became a lot tighter. With both the opposing centre commands rolling double 1's for initiative they lost a level of ability and two poor commanders uncertainly glared at each other but did little else.

On the left flank I manoeuvred the light cavalry and skirmishers through the woods to try and turn the Roman line, while my Impetuous nobles headed off for the Roman legionaries. Coming under bow and artillery did not deter me and I crashed into the lines, destroying the artillery and chasing off the archers. Unfortunately this bought me into contact with the second line of the Roman commands, which was the legionaries proper. With the heavy darts (treated like Pilums) and their long spears negating my charge bonuses, I bounced, rather unsurprisingly, and was swept away as the famed legion advanced.

Meanwhile on the left, despite some jammy dice rolling from Luke, Ian was beginning to swing it back in the Sarmatian favour again, after having looked a lost cause. Getting round the flanks of some of the Roman heavy cavalry with the nobles from the infantry command was proving to be decisive.

Meanwhile in the centre the Warband finally burst into life against the Sarmatian centre. Although they creaked, they did not break, while one of the large war band units fell under hails of Javelin as they charged and then some sturdy dice rolling. This bought the turn to an end and time to tot up some loses. The Sarmatian general had fallen, braking his command, as was the other cavalry command on the right. In addition all out units took 1 loss to represent the impact of the loss of our dynamic commander. However Ian had done enough (all I had done was lose our C-in-C), by breaking the Roman Cavalry and Warband. All these losses and subsequent routs of command, meant that both armies had broken at the same time. The Sarmatian invasion of the Roman provinces falling back, while the battered force sent out to block them retreated to its forts.

We all really enjoyed this game. Although we found as we played we missed little nuances fo the rules, this is not unusual on a first run through, but the basics where quickly grasped, and above all were fun.

This will be my last blog for a bit as I am off to a wedding which will interfere with gaming!! However I am working on a Bf-110 for the Skirmish Wargames game at colours and once it is more than an indistinguishable pile of green plastic I wil post some photos.