A Warhammer Ancient Battles Site

Richard invited me to come try out WAB at the regular haunt of Militia Brabantia. Richard owns a stack of armies, so I didn't have to worry about bringing my own, but having just finished my first slingers and skirmishers, of course I wanted to 'bloody' them. Richard had selected one of the interminable battles between Carthage and the Sicilian/Greek cities of the late 5th century as his source of inspiration: the battle of Acragas (406BC), in which the outnumbered Syracusan army defeated the Carthaginians. Richard translated the (very vague) source material into two 2,000 point WAB armies, with a numerically superior Carthaginian army (in the photo above) under his command, while I would attempt to lead the Greeks. The Carthaginians deployed in line across from the Greeks, whose army was divided into two parts by a rock formation (impassable terrain) just outside their deployment area. On the left of the Greek flank was the town of Acragas without walls (and therefore passable).

I deployed my army in two lines: peltasts on the left flank, slingers and javelinmen behind the rocks, Cretan archers and more peltasts. In the second line on the left flank light cavalry, then two hoplite formations (left-hand one with the army general), two more hoplite formations to the right of the rocks and heavy cavalry on the right flank. With hindsight I should have deployed my right-hand hoplite units further right, cause they ended up getting stuck behind the (very effective) javelinmen and Cretans.

I won the dice roll and let Richard take the first turn, who moved forward with his masses of infantry (including a Gallic mercenary warband) and cavalry. In my turn, I only moved my left flank forward far enough to put it squarely between the town and the rocks, while the right flank stayed back, though the javelinmen moved from behind the rocks to their right to line up with the Cretans. Missile fire from the slingers and Cretans immediately took its toll.

Richard feared my solid hoplite formations and seemed happy to let the skirmishers duke it out, while his cavalry moved on both flanks to try and get behind my formations. On the right, his heavy cavalry and mine got into a fight where they slowly ground eachother down, alternately losing combat, but due to some lucky dice, neither side broke for four or five turns. On the left, his light cavalry went into skirmisher formation and slid through the town, while my light cavalry slept. By the time I turned them, he'd slipped past.

This is when, for me, the interesting event of the battle occurred on the left flank. My slingers had broken - as seen above, Richard's cavalry got alongside my snoring equestrian unit and he threatened to attack me with two units of skirmishers, the warband and two units of levy infantry. Hoping to lure the Gauls onto my strongest hoplite unit (containing the general, on the left) and worried that it'd be attacked by cavalry in the rear and several units in front, I charged his warband with my peltasts (top left), who of course broke and ran behind the hoplites.

The Gauls pursued, but did not catch them and ended up right in front of my hoplites. Richard could now do nothing but charge the phalanx to its front. He lost the ensuing combat, broke and was overrun and destroyed by the pursuant hoplites.

(above: after the destruction of the Gauls, the hoplites have run forward and crashed into the Carthaginian slingers).

The situation on the left now turned topsy-turvy. Richard's cavalry was about to crash into the flank of my other phalanx, which was saved by the peltasts who rallied just in time to stand in the way of his cavalry, while I decided to turn my unit forward and help my general clean up. (below: Carthaginian infantry and cavalry in the Greek deployment area, with my phalanx and cavalry closing on the Carthaginian one)

On the right flank, the heavy cavalry squadrons were still grinding eachother down and after some more skirmishing, one hoplite unit had finally come to grips with a Carthaginian levy spear unit.

The latter stood up to severe punishment for two turns, until my phalanx ran away, off the board in two turns: the reason, my heavy cavalry finally broke and ran, taking that phalanx and the right-hand peltast unit with it. With a single phalanx and Cretans - about to be charged by heavy infantry - left on my right, we decided the battle was over. An inexperienced general turned history upside down...

Despite my loss, it was totally awesome and I will definitely play again. Thanks for the great afternoon Richard!

Diodorus, Book 13.86-87

The Carthaginians, after transporting their armaments to Sicily, marched against the city of the Acragantini and made two encampments, one on certain hills where they stationed the Iberians and some Libyans to the number of about forty thousand, and the other they pitched not far from the city and surrounded it with deep trench and a palisade. And first they dispatched ambassadors to the Acragantini, asking them, preferably, to become their allies, but otherwise to stay neutral and be friends with the Carthaginians, thereby remaining in peace; and when the inhabitants of the city would not entertain these terms, the siege was begun at once. The Acragantini thereupon armed all those of military age, and forming them in battle order they stationed one group upon the walls and the other as a reserve to replace the soldiers as they became worn out. Fighting with them was also Dexippus the Lacedaemonian, who had lately arrived there from Gela with fifteen hundred mercenaries; for at that time, at Timaeus says, Dexippus was tarrying in Gela, enjoying high regard by reason of the city of his birth. Consequently the Acragantini invited him to recruit as many mercenaries as he could and come to Acragas; and together with them the Campanians who had formerly fought with Hannibal, some eight hundred, were also hired. These mercenaries held the height above the city which is called the Hill of Athena and strategically situated overhanging the city. Himilcar and Hannibal, the Carthaginian generals, noting, after they had surveyed the walls, that in one place the city was easily assailable, advanced two enormous towers against the walls. During the first day they pressed the siege from these towers, and after inflicting many casualties then sounded the recall for their soldiers; but when night had fallen the defenders of the city launched a correct-attack and burned the siege-engines.

Hannibal, being eager to launch assaults in an increasing number of places, ordered the soldiers to tear down the monuments and tombs and to build mounds extending to the walls. But when these works had been quickly completed because of the united labour of many hands, a deep superstitious fear fell upon the army. For it happened that the tomb of Theron, which was exceedingly large, was shaken by a stroke of lightning; consequently, when it was being torn down, certain soothsayers, presaging what might happen, forbade it, and at once a plague broke out in the army, and many died of it while not a few suffered tortures and grievous distress. Among the dead was also Hannibal the general, and among the watch-guards who were sent out there were some who reported that in the night spirits of the dead were to be seen. Himilcar, on seeing how the throng was beset with superstitious fear, first of all put a stop to the destruction of the monuments, and then he supplicated the gods after the custom of his people by sacrificing a young boy to Cronus and a multitude of cattle to Poseidon by drowning them in the sea. He did not, however, neglect the siege works, but filling up the river which ran beside the city as far as the walls, he advanced all his siege-engines against them and launched daily assaults.

The Syracusans, seeing that Acragas was under siege and fearing lest the besieged might suffer the same fate as befell the Selinuntians and Himeraeans, had long been eager to send them their aid, and when at this juncture allied troops arrived from Italy and Messen� they elected Daphnaeus general. Collecting their forces they added along the way soldiers from Camarina and Gela, and summoning additional troops from the peoples of the interior they made their way towards Acragas, while thirty of their ships sailed along beside them. The forces which they had numbered in all more than thirty thousand infantry and not less than five thousand cavalry.

When Himilcon learned of the approach of the enemy, he dispatched to meet them both his Iberians and his Campanians and more than forty thousand other troops. The Syracusans had already crossed the Himera River when the barbarians met them, and in the long battle which ensued the Syracusans were victorious and slew more than six thousand men. They would have crushed the whole army completely and pursued it all the way to the city, but since the soldiers were pressing the pursuit without order, the general was concerned lest Himilcar should appear with the rest of his army and retrieve the defeat. For he remembered also how the Himeraeans had been utterly destroyed for the same reason. However, when the barbarians were in flight to their camp before Acragas, the soldiers in the city, seeing the defeat of the Carthaginians, begged their generals to lead them out, saying that the opportunity had come to destroy the host of the enemy. But the generals, whether they had been bribed, as the report ran, or feared that Himilcon would seize the city if it were stripped of defenders, checked the ardour of the men. So the fleeing men quite safely made good their escape to the camp before the city. When Daphnaeus with his army arrived at the encampment which the barbarians had deserted, he took up his quarters there. At once both the soldiers from the city mingled with his troops and Dexippus accompanied his men, and the multitude gathered in a tumultuous throng in an assembly, everyone being vexed that the opportunity had been let slip and that although they had the barbarians in their power, they had not inflicted on them the punishment they deserved, but that the generals in the city, although able to lead them forth to attack and destroy the host of the enemy, had let so many myriads of men off scot-free. While great uproar and tumult prevailed in the assembly, Menes of Camarina, who had been put in command, came forward and lodged an accusation against the Acragantine generals and so incited all who were present that, when the accused tried to offer a defence, and one would let them speak and the multitude began to throw stones and killed four of them, but the fifth, Argeius by name, who was very much younger, they spared. Dexippus the Lacedaemonian, we are told, also was the object of abuse on the ground that, although he held a position of command and was reputed to be not inexperienced in warfare, he had acted as he did treacherously.