HAIL CAESAR! GAME 1 - The Battle over Gold and Pork
Hey everyone! I met up with Graham today who spent a whole three hours to drive out to play this game with me! That's dedication! We also used all of his own models as I have nothing painted up in the way of Celtic or roman warriors. It was my first game and Graham hadn't played for awhile so we had our noses in the rule book for half the game! Took over 7 hours to play! But we both had a lot of fun, and this is the battle report that I am replaying based on the photos.
The above photo represent my battle lions of 309 points of Britons and 309 of Romans. I had three divisions. The Romans had two.
This battle report was written on my view of the game as the Britons and some details may be obscured or left out as I'll try to remember what I can based on the game play and the photos. I hope you enjoy this battle report.
I'd also like to point out that we did not follow the minimum requirements of the usual 4+ unit in a division (excluding skirmishers) and for deciding if units were broken that if more than half of the main bodies of medium or heavy infantry were shattered or broken then the division was considered broken.
On the far left was Chief Bagotrix (commander) Who fielded a unit of Light Cavalry, Two Warbands and a unit of slinger skirmishers.
In the middle was Chief Getafix (General) who fielded Two Warbands , a unit of slinger skirmishers, and a unit of light briton chariots.
And finally, on the far right was Chief Ludocus with A Fanatic Warband, skirmishing archers, a regular Warband and another chariot.
The Romans were only divided into two divisions. Their division with the general included a Scorpion battery, a medium artillery ballistae battery, Two Veteran Legionnaire units and I think some Auxiliary troops and armored archers.. The other lead by his commander had three Legionnaire units, a unit of medium cavalry and archer skirmishers. I may have messed up the units for divisions here. Hope you can see through my bad quality cellphone photos.
The forest on the left side of the board was impassible terrain, while the ruins on the right were also impassible. Every other piece save our strips of road running through the middle of the board were rough ground.
The Romans chose the deployment side, I deployed first as the Britons, but the Romans had the first turn.
The roman moves were fairly simple on the first turn as they moved their veterans and regulars up , keeping their cohesion as a battle line. The auxiliary and cavalry stayed in a similar position to guard their right flank on the hill.
You can see here on my turn I moved the middle fellows up with little problem, but Lodocus had a lot of issues with command and all his division sort of hung out in the corner. Bagotrix could only move a few units
The Romans on their next turn moved up and their Veterans spread out a bit. From the hill the Romans shot a few ballista shots into one unit of Briton's chariots, damaging it.
In angry response, Getafix ordered his Chariot to make a massive charge across the field which turned out perfectly, and had it madly head towards the armored Roman archers. They wisely evaded behind enemy lines though and the Legionnaires took the full brunt of the assault. Unfortunately the damage sustained from the earlier rounds ballistic attacks and the combined assaults from both charged unit and support units broke the charioteers and they were pummeled into oblivion causing very few roman casualties.
The above photos are at the end of round 3. Getafix was doing nicely with his light cavalry getting up closer to the enemy around the impassible forest, but Lodocus was struggling moving folks through the rough farmland terrain.
The roman line (above) stands strong as the Briton's continue their advance forward.
By the end of turn four, the Romans had more or less resumed their battle line while causing very minimal casualties with all their shooting paraphernalia. General Getafix orders his men to line up and get ready to madly dash towards the Roman veterans while his skirmishers move forward to support in anyway possible.. Both Lodcus and Bagotrix suffer trying to get their men to do anything and they simply lag behind. It seems all the glory for the Briton charge would go to the General Getafix.
Turn 5 resulted in another Roman standstill. The armored archers returned to the front and Roman shooting started to fire at various targets but seemed of little effect once more!
Getafix orders in his massive horde to madly charge and they do so successfully , straight into both units of Roman Veterans. A great melee ensues. The Romans and the Briton's on the right manage to harm each other in equal fashion and both remain fighting, but the Briton's on the left are beaten in combat and they give ground in good order and lose some disorder. They are pursued by the unit of veterans.
The rest of the Briton army struggles and really does nothing at all. Off screen some of Bagotrix skirmishers and one warband manage to move a bit, but end up being quite separated from their commander. This separation proves to be a massive mistakes on the part of Bagotrix! 
The following turns I think are missing some photo, but basically what happened above was that
the Romans fought on in turn six and ended up breaking the Warband that gave ground last turn. Meanwhile, the other Warband that charged managed to tie the combat and continue fighting.
Lodocus was finally able to get his light cavalry out of tough ground and move his warbands up a little bit. His skirmishes dwindled in the back remaining useless.
In turn 7 the Romans drive the Briton Warband back but decide to hold their line instead of pursuing while the victorious Veterans turned back to join their battle line. Many archers, bolt throwers, and ballista managed to pummel the light cavalry, causing many break tests to ensue, but somehow the light cavalry bravely held fast.
Getafix's forces were mainly wiped out and there was no point of the wounded and now shaken warband to remain. In the following turns Getafix, the entire general of the force and the remainder of his division retired the field in great speed.
In turn eight the Romans wisely have their skirmishing archers get behind the legionaries. The artillery weaponry of the Romans fire at the fleeing Briton unit causing as many casualties to them as possible before they can disgracefully head home. Oh the shame!
The Briton's are not quite able to charge and as their light cavalry are still stuck up in some terrain, though Lodocus gets his chariots further into a striking position.
Turn nine and a unit of Roman legionaries hurl themselves at the injured light cavalry and end up wiping them from the face of the earth. Romans distribute some of their shooting between both fleeing foes, continuing to taunt them, and oncoming enemies. They cause very little useful damage.
The Briton's continue to try to move their forces into position from Lodocus' side but do very little in the way of movement. . . And Bagotrix is struggling to move the units he's left behind. He gets very little headway with his nearby unit of Light cavalry and warband as they keep trying to creep behind the impassible woods...
The roman lines after turn 9. It's looking pretty good for them!
On Turn 10 the Romans remain where they are, and decide to fire missiles at their foes. Not a single shot hit that round.
Many of the Briton's are retiring from the field and leaving. The chariots are able to get into position and are close enough to make decisions on their own without their Commander's leadership. One warband continues its trek through rough ground while Lodocus moves his Fanatical warriors out of the rough terrain. The skirmishers follow suit from the rear!
During Turn 11 the Romans on their left flank move forward into rough Terrain and only manage to get one casualty from all their shooting this turn! They scored a break test shot but the Briton's took it like champions.
The Briton's under Lodocus' control surged forward. The one warband clashed with the other Romans in rough terrain and managed to beat them and all their supports right off, causing them to give ground backwards as they became disordered. The shocked Roman commander watched in horror as the Fanatics also charged another unit of legionaries , completely cut them all down with the support of Briton bowmen , and then swept right up into the armored archer unit that was standing behind them and cut them down as well despite firing some successful shots into them before they were removed from this world.
On turn 12, the Romans are now somewhat worried about these Fanatics and the Warband on their left flank. Deciding to risk the non-veterans, the Veteran forces move back and form a defensive perimeter surrounding their artillery. The Auxiliary on the hill had long taken a defensive position. Worried about his Medium cavalry being caught up int he wave of Fanatics, the Roman Commander had ordered them to march out of charge view.. but they blundered and moved forward one movement instead! Some skirmishers start to support the Roman Legionaires caught fighting the Briton warband since the original supporting unit was disordered and could offer no help that turn.
Getafix finally gets half his division in gear and has them move into positions that are suitable to threaten the enemy. The remainder of his division continues to ignore orders as they're simply too far off to properly receive them. The chariots end up being able to charge the Romans but are beaten back by the veterans, but cause them to at least become shaken for the remainder of the game. This is the last of the chariots use.
In turn 13 the Roman skirmishers are now fighting this unit, and have the support of the now orderly legionnaires. They are however, no match for the Romans and are driven back once again as the skirmishers are cut down!
It's here that the action got intense and a lot of photos stopped showing up. In summary, the fanatics basically turn to try and get into a good charge position to fight the Romans, but are unable to do so for being an inch off from a successful charge. The Briton bowmen fire some shots into the veteran legions but do nothing. The artillery continue to pummel the fanatics but thanks to amazing rolls of 6's and Fantical warpaint, they all hold until finally, the Roman Legionaires are able to defeat the wounded far right warband , causing all the fanatics and the rest of the division to quit the field. Actually, since the unit did not lose more than half of its divisions (The fanatics and the chariot were still alive) they should have remained and kept on fighting, but with so many wounds inflicted, and we having reached roughly the 6 1/2 hour point, making little mistakes could have popped up.
Although not pictured since the game was technically over, in the next following turns, Bagotrix gets his Warband up into the Auxiliaries faces and ends up driving them back. Another danger for the Romans as now they have the threat of behind charged by a returning chariot as well as some of Bagotrix Briton's who fail to follow orders. However, thanks to the support of the now nearby Medium cavalry (a blunder that ended up helping the Romans), the support and the auxiliary managed to break the warband. The Briton nearby Light Cavalry failed to get in and close their charge... We ended the game here.
All in all, it was a great game and a Roman victory, though the Briton's had a great comeback in the end.
What I have learnt from this game is that rough terrain is not anyone's friend! Especially if your commanders only have 8 leadership. Moving the Briton's through it was slow and caused a big chunk of my army to not be able to join their brothers in the middle whatsoever.
Another big mistake was trying to separate Bagotrix units up. This caused the general to follow the successful light cavalry and warband around the wounds but left his slingers and warband to slowly make their way around the otherside. It is quite important to keep the commanders near each and every unit of the division! The terrain definitely favored the Romans though.
This battle I called The Battle over Gold and Pork was dubbed thus since Graham's Romans had a decorative baggage train full of a chest of gold, while my baggage cart had a pig roast slowly cooking over the fire. I guess the Roman's get to eat some fine Briton' swine tonight while the Briton's go home to lick their wounds!
Next game I believe we will use minimal division rules and I will also better place my units!
I hope you all enjoyed reading this battle report.
EDIT: Just wanted to add more photos from my opponent's side of the table!
Thanks again for reading.
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