Second re-fight of Battle of Daras 351AD

[CarlL]

This was my second re-fight of the battle of Daras in 531AD. Daras was deployed as a city gate (and in rule terms the Byzantine camp). I used the same 16 box long by 8 box wide gridded (boxes) tabletop, (and 25mm figures), as in my first re-fight.  However, this time, I limited the game by using just twelve units per side to represent each army, each deployed as one command with one mounted, detached general (per side), these are descriptive labels, from the TtS rule system; additionally I made Belisarius a brilliant general to see what impact this had. Besides the  smaller number of units I fielded for both armies (see below) I also limited the deployment zones (again ignoring rules per se) to 8 box length for Sassanids and 6 boxes long for Byzantines (This being the length of the given Byzantine defensive ditch). Each army allowed to deploy up to two boxes in from table edge.  The scenario called for Belisarius to deploy his army fully first (unlike how deployment works in the rules) and then the Sassanids deployed and moved first. See photo illustrating my solo game deployments.  (The dry ditch ran along the border between the second and third row of boxes, counting in from Daras. The Huns were again in hidden deployment on the Byzantine extreme left, half way across the tabletop, on a lightly wooded gentle hill.)

The Byzantine army had 7 veteran cavalry units, armed with lance and bow (and three ammo chits); 1 Hunnic light cavalry veteran unit, javelin and bow armed; 2 close order, raw units of Roman Legionaries, (with spear and light pre-melee javelins or darts); and 2 light infantry (ie skirmisher style) units, armed with bow. (Again this does not reflect any official list accompanying the rules but my 25mm figure armies DBA origins!!)  This choice of infantry types and cavalry arms was my interpretation (using the unit possibilities within the TtS rules) and different from my earlier choices in my first re-fight.

The Sassanid army had 4 veteran cavalry units, armed with lance and bow; and 4 ordinary cavalry units, armed with lance and bow; supported by 1 light cavalry unit, armed with javelins and bow; and 2 'shieldwall' units (large shield and spears) of close order infantry; 1  light infantry (skirmishers) with slings.  The use of shieldwall unit types for Sassanid close order infantry was an experiment. The Sassanid camp was depicted as a palisaded tented area on their rear edge (first row of boxes) midway along the tabletop.

I didn't deploy hero characters in either re-fight, nor army standards; nor designate either general as heroic; I was keeping it generally simple! After the game, I realised that I still made mistakes, like allowing LC horse archers to shoot off two ammo chits in one shooting round albeit the rules limit this to foot archers!! The Sassanid army had a points value of 129 points and would be defeated when it had surrendered 8 victory medals (eg lost four close order lancer cavalry units); the latter was also true for the Byantines, whose army cost  147 points. I think I got these 'costings' correct this time, but I did change the unit types in this game, eg different close order infantry types for both sides; and giving each sides lancer cavalry a bow armament too.

In this game I deployed the Byzantines quite defensively: every unit behind the ditch, and protected the exposed deep flank with a second cavalry line at the ends of the front line. I hoped to make good use of the cavalry and the light infantry archery. While I took advantage of the Sassanids deploying second and moving first to load their left flank with the veteran lancers and push them out quickly as a left flank group of 6 Sassanid lance & bow armed cavalry; to try and overwhelm the Byzantine right flank before they could react. It nearly worked with the Byzantines losing 6 victory medals of their 8 pool before any Sassanid losses. Then it went wrong.

The cards swung the other way, the surviving Byzantine Legion unit not only surviving a flank attack, but getting the cards, to allow it to turn to face the flank threat, and then to overwhelm and destroy the Sassanid general and his lancers who had ruthlessly run through two units of  Byzantines. 

Meanwhile Belisarius had two lucky escapes in this game: the first when he went forward  to direct the skirmisher archer shooting and  had to quickly evade a Sassanid cavalry lance attack; then he joined a Byzantine lancer cavalry unit to take it to relieve the exposed flanks of the Byzantine infantry. However they were in turn hit in flank and destroyed by another Sassanid flank attack on the Byzantine lancers under Belisarius's command. Belisarius was saved and escaped back to safety of his bucellarii whom he led in another counter attack this time ore successfully and turned a 6v0 score to a winning 6v8 score in Victory Medals.

I enjoy these rules, at times they don't feel 'ancients like' as they are so different to all I have played before, however they create the 'friction' of battle and make for a good representation of limitations of leadership in ancient battle, in terms of a commander in chief or his main aides, not being able to do everything they might think possible.

It was another fine game, played over 10 turns, with most of the work done by just half the Sassanid units and half the Byzantine units. Final losses: Sassanid general and 3 lancer cavalry units, (1 veteran) to 2 Byzantine lancer units (both veteran) and 1 Legion (raw) unit. 

The Byzantine shooting plan was ineffective: after activating a unit to shoot you need scores of 8+ to hit (on range 1 to 10), while the Sassanid lancer cavalry needed 7+ (or 6+ if veteran) to save and negate any hit. In my two re-fights of Daras only one close order unit has been shot down in one turn of shooting. Remembering that a turn is of variable length, on some occasions, I might activate 6 units in one command and achieve two to three actions (like move, charge, shoot) for each unit; in another turn my first activation attempt might fail and that's it!  The light units are destroyed on taking a first (any) hit. The close order units usually take two hits, (you can have deep or extra deep phalanx units that can take 3 or 4 hits); on a standard close order unit  (sometimes misleadingly called regular size in the rules) the first hit not saved disorders and the second destroys the unit.

Although I realised that by withdrawing units after taking hits you can sometimes rally their disorder (so removing that first hit), this is a two stage process, first you have to successfully activate the unit (designated an easy activation surprisingly) and then you have to play a successful save card, so the poorer the unit the poorer its chances of rallying. This again varies with the luck of the turn of the cards: the Byzantine successfully rallied three times in this game and the Sassanids twice.

Now do I re-fight Daras for a third time or not?

CarlL

[CarlL]

More photo report, CarlL

[CarlL]

more of the story CarlL

[CarlL]

final moves, CarlL