Dan Raspler  - Dec 8, 2004 6:01 pm (#388 Total: 396)  
"Tempus edendum est tempus non lusendum." 
	 
Well, I finally returned to the Ancient Wars series last night with the
first of the Trajan scenarios, the Armenian War. It was a lot of fun and
as usual, it had a great narrative flow. 

Our session featured Trajan and Hadrian marching north to Armenia in two
separate columns, while the remainder of the Roman army under Quietus
picked its way east from the Syrian coast. 90% of the tiny starting
Parthain army was near Ctesiphon, with only a couple units in Armenia. 

In the north, rather than allow Hadrian's force to get to the same hex
as the Armenian king, I had the Parthian general there intercept the
Romans in the mountains in order to force a fight. It seemed preferable
than allowing him to snatch all of Armenia away with a single political
strategem and 4 out of 6 chance on the tribute table. 

The battle itself was very cool. Of course, we used the battle board,
and as we were in a mountain hex, the outnumbered Parthian/Armenian
force was able to hold off the Romans admirably in the narrow pass. In
fact, a few lucky die rolls resulted in the disrupted Romans panicking
quite quickly... and if it wasn't for a couple of turns of bad command &
control dice the Partians might have won the battle. But as it was, the
Roman lines stabilized and the battle was fought to a draw. 

Meanwhile, near the westernmost Parthian capital of Ctesiphon, Chosroes
and his generals had been recruiting satrapy units desperately. With the
handy use of the "trade concession" strategem marker, the Parthians
managed to assemble a very impressive host of heavy horse, horse archers
and infantry levies before the Romans had taken more than a couple of
their frontier cities. But just when the Parthians were poised to launch
a surprise attack on Quietus' southern army group, the random event
table dictated Favorable Roman Omens, which increased the already
impressive Roman morale... so Chosroes chose to bide his time. 

The following turn, back in Armenia, Trajan's force linked up with
Hadrian's and together they first besieged the Armenian king and then
tributed him into their camp. But seeing that the bulk of the Roman
heavy units were in Armenia along with the best Roman leaders, the
Parthians chose that moment to strike. The problem for the Parthians was
that Quietus knew there was trouble brewing, and so pulled back to the
relative protection of the frontier. With a number of rivers between the
two opposing armies, it seemed that the Romans were safe from the
eastern horde. But unfortunately for Quietus, the Parthians recruited an
engineer unit... and used two military strategem markers to first
guarantee a successful march across the rivers, and then to take a
chance with the Forced March table in order to attack Quietus before he
could button up in a city and wait for relief in the form of Trajan's
massive army. 

The battle that ensued was awesome. A massive host of Parthian horse
archers plagued the Roman flanks, while their heavy cavalry kept the
legions busy. After a few rounds, with most of their light units cut up
by enemy cavalry, the Romans were once again in panic. But unfortunately
for the over-confident Parthians, Roman legions with "Imperator" class
leaders don't care if they're panicked! Those tough legionaires held
their ground and, in testudo formation, counter-attacked and mauled
loads of Parthian light units... until the Parthians panicked as well.
Since Parthian morale generally isn't as good as the Romans', Chosroes'
army started to rout away. 

Suddenly, things looked bad for the Parthians. Unfortunately for
Quietus, his crack Legions just couldn't break the heavy Parthian
cataphract at a key moment, and the freshly rallied horse archers
returned to shower the Romans with arrows, disrupting their formations
and over-running them. As the sun set, it was clear that this was going
to be a huge victory for Chosroes... with the outnumbered but valient
Romans suffering 100% casualties to the Parthians 50% casualties. 

Awesome stuff... but that's when we had to call it, with Trajan's fresh
army poised northeast of Chosroes', ready to quick-march down into the
heart of the Parthian empire.