Hoplite revisited

 I was planning on attending the Society of Ancients Conference this year and I usually like to put a session on at conferences I go to. Unfortunately I've not done much Ancient gaming recently after doing Alexander the Brief a couple of years ago. It is one of those periods I have lots of stuff for but my enthusiasm waxes and wanes, mainly as I have yet to come up with a system I'm happy with which would work remotely.

Anyway, I had a moment of inspiration when I remembered Mark Cordones 'Hoplite', a simple campaign system to fight the Peloponnesian Wars. I played it a few times when it was published on the Portable Wargames Facebook Group, and I had wondered how it would work with using Dominion of the Spear for combat resolution.

Once more unto the breach dear friends. The contents of the Hoplite 'box' (actually an A4 box file).

We have here a simplified map of Greece with six key cities, Sparta, Corinth, Thebes, Chalkis, Delos and Athens. The three little grey blocks are Spartan armies while the brown ones are Athenian. Each side has a fleet block too. As long as the Athenian fleet is in play, Athens cant be directly attacked. Armies move along the marked lanes. Each turn is two years starting in 431. Players win by capturing Sparta/Athens or destroying all the enemy armies. 

Any battles are resolved in a battle board. I'm going to use Dominion of the Spear. The armies are randomly generated but consist of six units, ranging from one cavalry, two peltasts and three hoplites up to five hoplites and one peltast. To reflect Spartan military superiority, they can re-roll their army.

If an army loses a battle it is removed from play (they can be replaced on the game map under certain circumstances).

Each turn players roll for initiative and may take one action. Athens wins and attacks Corinth from Delos. 

Battle time! Spartans nearest the camera, Athenians furthest. The Athenians have got five hoplites and one peltast, Sparta has two peltasts and four hoplites. I'm just going to use standard Dominion of the Spear ratings for these  - so peltasts are unarmoured missile infantry, while hoplites are armoured melee infantry.

Things don't go too well for Sparta. I'm using automatic combat resolution in all three sectors from right to left to keep things fast. Turns out peltasts needing a 6 to hit aren't very good against hoplites needing 3+! Whereas peltasts vs peltast needs 5+ each and may go on for some time.

The writing is on the wall pretty soon. Those peltasts are still going for it, but Athens has turned the Spartan right and still has a unit in reserve. In the final round of combat Sparta was reduced to 1 unit and lost. Corinth falls to Athens.

The Spartans immediately counter attacked from Thebes. It would be a high risk strategy to attack from Sparta, as if they lost the Athenians could just march in next turn! Assuming they won the initiative and Sparta didn't manage to raise a replacement army.

2nd Battle of Corinth. Athens rolled badly and ended up with three hoplites, two peltasts and a cavalry unit. Sparta got four hoplites and two peltasts. Sparta puts a hoplite phalanx up front while, while Athens tries skirmishing with the peltasts. 

And we can see how well that went. Two dead peltasts and no Spartan losses.

The Athenian centre and left collapse and they only have their cavalry left, still no Spartan losses. 

The Athenian cavalry do manage to ride down one unit of hoplites, but it is game over. Sparta retakes Corinth! What a bloody year 431 was.

After the bloodbath in 431, both sides are more circumspect in 429. Athens takes Thebes, and Sparta takes Delos. Neither side rolled high enough to replace a lost army (needs a 6 on the initiative).

427 saw a tied initiative roll, and an event.

Revolt in Ionia! The normal turn is replaced and Athens is forced to send an expedition to suppress the Ionian Revolt. If Athens loses, they will permanently lose one army, so this a high stakes operation. 

The rebels automatically get an army with three hoplites, two peltasts and one cavalry (a modification to the original). Athens rolls up four hoplites, one peltast and one cavalry.

A fairly bloody opening as Athens loses two units to one rebel.

Things got worse. Athens was reduced to one cavalry and one hoplite, while the rebels maintain a rather ragged line and their cavalry outflanked the Athenian left.

Suddenly the battle became symmetrical.... both sides cavalry flowed around the remaining hoplites in the centre.

But Athens managed to pull it off by routing the rebel centre as its own hoplites held off the rebel cavalry. Athens manages to hold Ionia!

In 425 Sparta managed to roll a 6 for initiative and raised a replacement army in Corinth. Athens rolled a 5.

A '5' lets you fight a naval battle, so the Athenian fleet attacked the Spartan one. Now, you could fight a battle with your favourite galley rules, but I just ran a dice off. Higher wins, draw is no result. However I gave Athens +1 as their fleet was generally better than their opponents. Athens defeated the Spartan fleet which was removed.

Having destroyed the enemy fleet, Athens is virtually immune from attack. The Spartans need to raise a new fleet AND beat the Athenian fleet to be able to attack Athens.

Sadly for the Athenians, their victory at sea was short lived. 423 saw a truce rolled, both sides could replace a unit. Athens built an army at Chalkis, but Sparta rebuilt its fleet.

Hostilities resumed in 421 and the Athenians occupying Thebes attacked Corinth (again).

3rd Battle of Corinth. Both sides have four hoplites, but Athens has two peltasts while Sparta has one peltast and a cavalry. Both sides opt to just put a line of hoplites up front and keep their lighter troops in reserve.

Hard pounding for a few turns sees both armies reduced to half strength!

But eventually the Spartans turn the Athenian right and it is all over. Sparta holds Corinth. They pursue the beaten remnants north and occupy Thebes.

In 419 the Spartans get the initiative and their army on Delos attacks Chalkis.

1st Battle of Chalkis. Athens rolled a 1, so just three hoplites and a bunch of light troops. Sparta has four hoplites and two peltasts. Again, both sides went for a hoplite phalanx up front.

And you can see how well that went for Sparta....

Oh dear! The Athenians hold Chalkis. Having defeated the Spartans, the Athenians just sailed from Chalkis and retook Delos.

The strategic situation going into 417. Corinth is wide open, and having won the initiative, the Athenians on Delos simply sailed across the Aegean and took the city.

The Spartan Army in Thebes was hastily recalled and attacked the Athenians in Corinth. 

4th Battle of Corinth. Both sides have identical armies, four hoplites, one peltast and one cavalry.

Athens sooned gained the upper hand, and shortly after, defeated the Spartans. Corinth fell to Athens.

In 415 Athens gained the initiative with a mighty 6. The safe option would have been to raise another army, but Athens was garrisoned and this was as close to Sparta as the Athenians had got so far, so they attacked Sparta directly.

The Battle of Sparta. The Athens rolled up five hoplites and a peltast. Sparta could muster four hoplites, a peltast and cavalry.

The Gods favoured Sparta and the Athenians took heavy losses.

And pretty soon it was all over, the Athenian attack was repulsed.

To add insult to injury the Spartans used their 5 to initiate a naval battle and attack the Athenian fleet.

Which they promptly won. What a reversal of fortune! Both sides now looked utterly exhausted after 16 years of warfare.

In 413 Sparta moved its last army to Corinth, while Athens occupied Chalkis.

In 411 Sparta rolled a 6 and raised a new army in Thebes. Athens withdrew from Chalkis back to Athens.

In 409 The Spartans in Thebes occupied Chalkis. All the Athenians could do was hold in the city.

407 and the Gods smiled on Athens, They rolled a 6 and raised a new fleet and the city was safe. Sparta moved its army from Corinth to Delos. Athens was now thoroughly besieged.

405, stalemate. Athens couldn't risk attacking Chalkis and Sparta couldn't attack Athens in the face of the fleet.  

403. Sparta initiates a naval battle against the Athenians. Athens wins and the Spartan fleet is destroyed.

401. The Spartans get lucky and raise another fleet. The Athenians immediately attack it, but are defeated by the Spartans.

399. With the way clear, the Spartans on Chalkis attack Athens directly.

The battle of Athens, 399. Athens gets four hoplites, a peltast and a cavalry. Sparta four hoplites and two peltasts. Both sides line up in the inevitable hoplite phalanx.

After a few turns of pushijng and shoving, it all goes horribly wrong for Sparta. Athens repels the attack and defeats the Spartan army. Rather than wait to be bottled up again, Athens advances out of the city and takes Chalkis.

397 sees the Spartans sieze the initiative and their last army faces the last Athenian army at Chalkis.

Chalkis. The Athenians rolled a 6 for army selection, the Spartans rolled 1. Twice. So the Athenians end up with five hoplites and a peltast, while Sparta has a mere three hoplites, plus two peltasts and a cavalry. Obviously scraping the barrel.

The Athenians put up the usual hoplite phalanx, but the Spartans decide to gamble and lead with their peltasts on the left and centre. The cavalry and two hoplites are in reserve.

Amazingly it pays off. After a couple of turns battle the Athenians have lost two hoplites but the Spartans are down just one hoplite.

More pounding ensues, leaving the Spartans having to commit their cavalry, but now the Athenian centre is wide open.

The Spartan cavalry succumb to the Athenian hoplites, but the Spartans on the right easily overwhelm the isolated hoplites. Athens is defeated and loses its last army.

And with Sparta having completely destroyed the Athenian forces and poised to occupy Athens, it is a Spartan victory!

Well that actually went very well. The war lasted a couple of years longer than the real one, but it did actually feel like I was making strategic decisions. I've played this four times now and I think Athens best hope is an early game blitzkrieg, longer term, geography is against them. Plugging in Dominion of the Spear worked very well and my few other tweaks were OK. It was just a shame we only had two random events, I'm minded to change the probability to whenever either side rolls a '1', which would make it more likely.

I think that is good enough to take to the SOA conference though, although it might be a bit ambitious to try with six players, I will give it a go.

 

Chancellorsville with Dominion of Blue and Grey

 As I seem to be on a bit of an ACW kick at the moment I thought I'd have a look at Dominion of the Blue and Grey. I've got a ton of Dominion sets of rules which I haven't even looked at yet, but you have to start somewhere. Having read through the rules I picked the Chancellorsville scenario as it didn't have any cavalry (to keep things simple) and we'd played it fairly recently with Neil Thomas ACW.  

Battlefield from the north. This scenario focusses on Lees attack in the north rather than including Fredericksberg too. So we have the Rapahannoc on the left (east), Chancellorsville itself nearest the camera (north) and around it The Wilderness.

Hookers Union army is nearest the camera and defending. They have three infantry units in the front line, the two on the left are 'elite' which gives a combat bonus, presumably to reflect their vastly superior numbers and the one on the right is a normal one. There are two more in reserve. I added a skirmisher base to the Elite units to remind me. irl Hooker outnumbered Lee about 2:1 so I should probably have put more bases out for the Union units. In later games I put the CSA on a shorter frontage instead.

Lee's army has two ordinary infantry units, then Stonewall Jacksons flanking force which is both Elite and Disciplined (Jacksons outflanking manouvre caught Hooker off guard). I added both a skirmisher base and a leader figure to remind me. In reserve are another infantry unit and some artillery. Guns are treated very differently in this set to the others and I'll cover that later.

Both armies also have a pair of leaders - in this set each side can have a General intervene twice during the game to modify a a dice roll by plus or minus one. I'll use the leader figures to remind me and take them off when they are used up. They also have a pair of wagons as each side can attempt to rally two units during the game. Unlike the other sets, rally succeeds on a 4+ but any special attributes are removed. You can only attempt to rally a unit once and units which failed their reliability roll cant be rallied. I rather like that, and I'll use to wagons to keep track of rally attempts and which units have been rallied.

Finally, unlike the other sets, armies are defeated if they only have TWO units remaining and the enemy has more, so they will break faster. Steven argues that in the ACW armies seemed very willing to break off the action to reorganise and fight again another day, possibly due to the space involved. 

There is no preliminary bombardment in these rules, and it uses a dice driven sector activation like the  Blitzkrieg set. 1-3 is left, centre, right and 4+ is attacker choose. The restriction here is that you cant choose a sector in which a battle has already been fought (to represent some of the C2 difficulties in the conflict). Lee rolls a 4 and chooses Jackson to attack as it is the only sector with a CSA advantage.

Like many of the other sets, units fight in sequence, artillery, the infantry etc. Infantry hit on 5+ but Jackson gets +1 for being elite and the Union are on -1 for Jackson being disciplined. So a 3:1 advantage to Jackson. Jackson duly routs the Union right, and unit moves up from reserve immediately. This happens at once before any rally attempts.

The Union also get to choose a sector to fight and pick the centre, they also use of their Generals to take -1 off the the CSA dice. This then becomes a very one sided fight.

The CSA centre is routed and their guns move up from reserve. Artillery are most effective if deployed from reserve with another infantry unit in reserve (support), which they are in this case. Steven argues that they were far more effective defensively than offensively. You can deploy artillery in the front line if you wish, but they are less effective, and unsupported artillery can be overrun very easily by infantry or cavalry. It is these nuances which add flavour to each set but equally mean you need to read them very carefully when switching rules. 

Lee attacks on the right again. They have the biggest advantage here and just to make sure they send one of the Generals to help out.

And routs another Union infantry unit. Unless Hooker does something clever, the Union have lost at this point.

Hooker rallies one of his routed units (shown by the wagon) which moves up into the gap. Now I've just realised I should have done this at the end of the turn prior to victory determination. Oh well, put it down to learning the rules.

The dice decree another combat on the right (rolled a 3) and naturally Jackson is routed! irl he was killed in battle.

That isn't so great for Lee. He has to pull out his last reserve, which of course leaves the guns in the centre unsupported.

The Union also roll a 3 for activation so fighting continues on the right. but neither side gets a hit. They are both saving their Generals for last ditch rally attempts.

At the end of the turn, Lee tries to rebuild his infantry reserve by rallying both routed units. Both attempts fail, despite Lee's personal intervention (he rolled a 1!). These units are now permanently lost and no more rallies can be attempted.

On the next round the dice decree combat in the centre. This has the potential for catastrophe. The artillery needs a 5+ to hit and fires first, but if it misses, the Union infantry will destroy it on anything but a 1 (normally a 3+ but they were elite troops) as it is unsupported. If the guns were still supported they would need a 5 (plus 1) to destroy them. 

Fortunate smiles upon the Confederacy and cannister from the Napoleons sends the Union into confusion  and routs them. Is it game over?

No! Hooker manages to rally his other routed unit and it fills the gap in the centre. It must be those superior Union numbers. That is the last Union leader and wagon used up though.

The Union are forced to fight on the left, despite them having the advantage (being Elite troops), both sides miss.

Straight onto the next turn as there are no more rallies left. The CSA fight in the centre and both sides miss.

The Union roll a 2 and the fighting in the centre continues. This time the Confederate guns hit home and the Union infantry are routed. With no more reserves, Hooker packs up and heads for home. A very, very hard fought Confederate win and surprisingly close to real life.

That was a bit slow as I was getting used to it and I made one obvious mistake, but once again it is quite a different feel to the other period games. Having set it up I ran it for a few more iterations to get the hang of it more. It is difficult choosing when to commit your Generals, it adds a whole extra layer of decision making.

This run was a complete Confederate wipeout! Hooker has all his units left, although one did rally during the battle. Once again Lee failed to rally a single unit.

This one was more of a scrap. Jackson routed in the first exchange of fire and very rapidly the CSA were down to a single line with the Union completely unscathed.

Lee did actually manage to rally one of his units, which was able to support the guns on the right.

But it didn't last and the Confederate left collapsed.

And as the reserves moved up to plug the gap, the unsupported guns were overrun by the Union right. Another Union win.

This run was very bloody from the outset with the Confederate right and Union centre both being routed. Once again the CSA gunners ended up in the front line.

Lee managed to successfully use both rallies which kept the fight going, whereas the Union only managed one and soon the Union were outnumbered.

And finally the Union line collapsed.

In all I ran it half a dozen times with two Confederate and four Union wins, so pretty balanced, and I felt much more on top of it by the end. Like all these period specific sets, there are some very specific aspects to the unit characteristics and turn sequence which you need to get your head around, even if the basic mechanisms are similar. I found this one easier to get to grips with then the Blitzkrieg set, although I deliberately avoided cavalry as they have their own special rules depending on whether they are operating mounted or not. Helpfully the play example in the rules is Gettysburg, which uses both artillery and cavalry units, so gives an indication of how they are supposed to work.

That was good fun and I'm looking forward to fighting some more of these.