The players were Rob Cameron (Caesar & Publius Sixtus), Greg Jennings (Titus Labienus & the Reserve commander), Richard Woolford (Boduognatus & Galba) & Craig Byron (Ambionix)

Special rules:

•  Caesar must fight on foot, depicted as Bd(O)

• No pip-swapping for the Romans

• Romans do not get pips until Gauls enter the Sambre

•  Roman vanguard gets 1 pip per bound only

•  Sambre classed as paltry river

• Roman reserves come on as a flank march entering from the Roman rear edge

• Roman camp counts as 2 EEs lost if it is passed through by the Gauls

The 2 Roman commands were deployed on a large hill, with 3 cohorts formed but the rest of the legions in column to the rear.  The partially completed Roman camp was unprotected.

The battle began with the Gauls moving out of the forest and threatening the vanguard.  The Romans used their single pip to begin pulling back some cavalry.  The Gauls then contacted the vanguard, with all of the auxilia getting killed within 2 bounds, breaking that command.  However, the 1 pip per bound allowed the Romans to keep 1 Cv element within 200 paces of the Gauls, which prevented them from making march moves.  This was critical in allowing Caesar’s command enough time to reform.  The Cv also ended up killing 4 Warband (Wb) through a flank attack, but this was less important than the movement restriction.

The Atrebates got good pip dice, allowing them to put the Cv into column and marching across the river, thus activating the Romans.  Unfortunately the pips then dried up, leaving the Cv column nicely positioned on the flank of the Romans but unable to exploit the chance before the Romans could react. Labienus was able to get his element of Boltshooters (ArtO) into position to take potshots at the stalled column. No Chariots were lost but recoils helped soak up a number of the Atebrates scarce PiP’s.

The Roman “flank march” came on in the 7^th bound from the centre of the Roman rear table edge.  It was diverted to the Roman left flank to reinforce Labienus’ command.

The Atrebates and Nervii had made it onto the base of the hill and began working their way up, quickly routing the skirmishing Roman archers covering the legions front.  The Gauls’ success and impetuosity had broken their formation up somewhat and the Romans took advantage of it to move their cohorts down the hill in a counter-attack.  The Atebrates had some initial success with Ambionix and one of his other warbands breaking through the Roman line but factors of 6 v 4, and 6 v 3/2 when overlapped quickly began to tell against the Gallic host.

A decisive moment occurred when the Gallic light horse was killed by archers (PsO) defending the crest of the hill.  This allowed the archers to move down and into the rear of the Gauls, thus preventing them from recoiling.  And when the Gauls are already down 6 v 4 (at best) it doesn’t take them long to be smashed.  Just as the Atebrates broke the chariots of their nobles had finally worked their way to the rear of the Roman position and launched a desperate last charge uphill but were beaten back by the now supremely confident legionaries (with the lost of one chariot element).

By this stage the Viromandui in the centre had managed to contact Caesar’s command, but did not win a single combat as Caesar always managed to at least match the Gallic die roll.  As the Atebrates broke and fled Labienus’ command started to swing onto the flank and rear of the Viromandui. Eventually they too were destroyed, handing the game to the Romans.  Although it should be noted that in the last bound a few Gauls made it into the camp and even managed to contact Caesar with the Gallic general Galba.  However Gallic hopes of causing some damage were quickly dashed as Caesar’s luck held and he threw a 6, continuing his great run of combat dice.

Overall it was a fun game, and a great change of pace.  We made the following observations:

• It was great fun playing a game where Kn and LH did not dominate

• We allowed the Romans too much time to form themselves against the Gauls.  By the time they arrived the Romans were largely intact, and even having a reserve line in a couple of places.

• We should have made the Romans more spread out and left the camp more vulnerable

• The reserve should probably have been required to head for the camp first before being allowed to deploy elsewhere.

• As happened historically, the Atrebates made the early running but were then pressed back the Romans who then moved into the rear of the remaining Gauls to finish them off

• Being uphill gave the Romans the edge they needed.  Once the Gauls become overlapped they start dying in droves
• Having Caesar at risk in the last bound certainly made it exciting, but we thought that it should have been compulsory for him to be in the front lines as happened historically
• We thought it would be fun to have a non-playing umpire.  That way the umpire could make changes through out the game or implement rules without anyone being aware of them in advance.

• Damn Caesar and his good combat dice!

For us, the game underlined how well DBM works for historically matched opponents.  The game pretty much unfolded the way that it happened historically, so we can’t complain about that!

We are planning to replay the game at the end of the year with a few modifications.  But next is Adrianople!

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