Lately I’ve developed a bit of an obsession about Macedonian bronze shields (chalkaspides). The Antigonids and Seleucids both had units named after these brazen shields and given the prevalence of artistic evidence, I suspect they were universal during the Hellenistic period. In this post I show 24 bronze shield designs, The Balagan Collection of Macedonian Bronze Shield Designs.
Rise of Rome
I divide the Rise of Rome into three sections: the Punic Wars, Macedonian Wars and Iberian Wars. There is quite a lot of overlap between these. From 264 Roman fought three bitter wars with Carthage over the western Mediterranean – the Punic Wars. Roman triumphed and as a side effect began its conquest of Iberia – modern Spain and Portugal. But Iberia was a tough nut to crack. It took 200 years for the Romans to conquer the peninsular. Meanwhile the Romans conquered the Mediterranean. In the east Roman defeated the Macedonians and the Successors during the Macedonian Wars.
Armed in the Macedonian fashion
I’ve been re-reading all my books and articles on the Macedonian Wars. These covers the campaigns of Alexander through the Wars of the Successors (Diadochi), and ultimately to the wars against Rome. Fuelled with all that historical goodness, I want to write a series of posts on the Hellenistic armies with troops fighting “armed in the Macedonian fashion”. I start with, what does “armed in the Macedonian fashion” actually mean?
Four Player Big Battle Big Base Triumph in the Punic Wars
We played Big Base Triumph in the Punic Wars – liked the Triumph rules but thought some of the troop types sucked. To really challenge ourselves and test out that impression, we played another, bigger, game with Iberians on the table in force. So “Light foot” for both Scutarii and Caetrati and “Javelin Cavalry” for Roman, Numidian, Carthaginian, big shield Iberians, and small shield Iberians. I felt, somehow, I was about to rub salt in the wounds. Of course this is Punic Wars.
Summary: Romans (Chris, Adam) beat Allied Carthaginian (Jamie) and Iberians (Steven)
DBA 3 – Improving the Simulation – Some Comments
Joe Collins has highlighted a number of problems with DBA 3.0 and suggested ways to address these problems. Collin’s was part of the group that developed DBA 3.0 so he is both a fan and on the inside team. I really like Collin’s attempt to tackle some big problems with DBA. It would be great if more people did this, starting with Phil Barker. Unfortunately, Collin’s particular suggestions mostly leave the problems unsolved. I do like his solution for Bow but even that needs more.
Big Base Triumph in the Punic Wars
Despite the fact I play DBA a lot, I’m always on the look out for a better game system for the Ancients period, including the Punic Wars. So when the guys said they’d be willing to try out Triumph I leapt at the chance.
Using Big Bases for DBA
Big Base DBA (also known as Big Base De Bellis Antiquitatis or BBDBA) allows fast games with a small number of playing pieces and lots of figures. Big Base DBA requires few modifications from the standard DBA rules.
Inspired by Philip Sabin’s Analysis of Ancient Warfare in Lost Battles I’ve drifted further away from normal DBA than you need to, but I’ll explain why as I go along. Mostly it affects basing.
Philip Sabin’s Analysis of Ancient Warfare in Lost Battles
I really like the analyse of Ancient Warfare in Lost Battles by Philip Sabin. So I’ve written up what captured my attention.
Wargaming the Battle of Zama
I’m interested in refighting the Battle of Zama. This is quite a popular focus for historical scenarios so I thought I’d have a look at what other people have done before collating my own thoughts. By chance, Zama was the theme of the Society of Ancients Battle Day in 2010. Not surprisingly the Battle Day, and Zama, got a lot of coverage in the Slingshot, the society journal, over the next few months. I’ve used those accounts to explore some key questions about how to refight the battle.
Romans versus Iberian – Two Big Base DBA Battle Reports
Chris Harrod and I played two games of Big Base DBA set in the Roman conquest of Iberia. So Polybian Roman with Spanish allies against an Iberian army with Celtiberian mercenaries. In the first game, as the Spanish defender, I fielded my newly painted Built-up-Area (BUA). Quite pretty it is too – but it does pose quite a lot of challenges for both sides. We liked the first game so much we played the game a second time but swapped sides.
Steven’s Ancient Spanish for Big Base DBA
I’ve been rebasing my Rise of Rome armies for Big Base DBA. The first off the re-flocking table are the Ancient Spanish. 14 big bases of Iberian glory.
Did the Carthaginians introduce the oval shield into Spain?
Conventional wargaming wisdom is that Ancient Spanish light infantry carried a small buckler (Caetrata) and heavy infantry carried a large oval shield (Scutum) (see for example Head, 1982). The implication is that this division was always true. There was a similar division in the cavalry although the change to large shields was about the time of Hannibal.
Duncan Head at the 2010 Society of Ancients Battle Day offered some evidence to suggest the Carthaginians introduced the oval shield into their part of Spain – the Iberian part. He suggest this was deliberate Barcid policy to increase the proportion of heavy troops in their armies.
Pity Those Ancient Spanish in DBA – The Army Points Say It All
I’ve always felt the 12 element army size of DBA doesn’t give balanced games. Some folks have come up with points systems to deal with this. I thought I’d tally the points total for a few armies to see how they compare under a couple of the points systems. I’ve focussed on the Macedonian and Punic Wars and not too surprisingly the Ancient Spanish are the poor relatives.
Roman versus Carthaginian Big Base DBA
Andrew Coleby and I had a go at Big Base DBA. Andrew took Carthaginians and I took Polybian Roman. Andrew won – those pesky Gauls cut through my Legionnaires (again). Aside from being a good game it also proved the concept of Big Base DBA, i.e. big bases with lots of figures, big table, but using standard DBA.
Revised Pyrrhic DBA Army List
The official DBA II/27 Pyrrhic 300BC-272BC army list for DBA is okay but: