Iazyges AAR

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

The Lazy Gs AAR

(I know it’s not the right spelling - it’s my innate Roman mockery of barbarians . . .)

This is a rough field-test AAR for IJ2. I thought that as I was testing the Iazyges, I might as well run a quick, not-so-serious, AAR in the process as a bit of light relief from ‘At The Limes’. I’ve yet to do an AAR from the barbarian (scum - oops, sorry) side, and it might be fun to pen an irreverent AAR, for a change.







So. This is me north of the lovely blue Danube. It looks like a nice spot to settle in. I have two what might be called budget towns and a lot of rowdy lads eager for some holiday fun. Way too many, in fact. My budget is going to bottom out next turn big time. So my rex, a lovely chap called Rando - where do they get these uncouth names from? - decides to do what all barbarians do and sally forth to sack and plunder. This is the classic case of a circular argument: we raid to get money to allow us to raid. Hmmmm. I am not convinced by Rando’s logic but he has some interesting traits - apparently he’s a grower and must, I presume, like gardening.





War, it is then. As the mighty (how we love you) Roman empire has been united by the mighty Julian - I’ll apostatise from anything, baby! - I decide to strike quickly while the empire is perhaps in the post-unification blues. I move one army east across the river to protect/secure that flank - hey, it’s a jungle out there, don’t trust no-one - while throwing the western army across the Danube to besiege the lightly defended Roman fort. Those poor Romans (I’ll write you all up in an AAR, promise!).





I then send two armies - one led by Rando directly south across the Danube to assault the large fortress town of Sirmium. This is not my main strategic thrust but a feint to draw in the Roman forces in the area. I notice that the Roman fort further west cannot hold out for longer than 2/3 turns and will fall. I will then cross with that army and strike south and east behind Sirmium and so pin the Romans. That’s my plan!





OK - next turn. As ever with RTW nothing proceeds as one plans. A snotty force of freebooting raiders has appeared without passports in between my two budget towns smashed on cheap fermented cow’s urine. There goes the neighbourhood. Just to make sure - I pull back the flanking east army to engage but these Iazyges lack the long marching power of true Romans (Roma Victa!) and cannot make contact. I then send Rando’s son Burkhard (I mean, honestly, has no one here heard of Latin?) with the bulk of his retinue south to catch these drunken barbarians (err, ethnically disparate peoples). I’m not worried as their numbers are slight but the experience might be worth it (who am I kidding).









I hit the end of turn button and then it hits the fan! A relieving Roman task-force arrives from the south and assaults my two armies at Sirmium even as the besiegers sally forth to support them. The Roman fort to the west is still 2 turns away from falling so my third army cannot bring pressure to bear yet. Oh well, I need a decisive victory quickly to build up my plunder so if I can win this huge battle I can keep my tribes happy! I note that the support forces are led by Verenianus Coruncanius - who some of you might remember from an earlier AAR and feel a misty nostalgic tear in my eye - and that if they fail to turn up in time for the battle and I win, they will be wiped as a consequence. Nice.



Battle is joined. Tune in soon for a hopefully CTD free slaughter!

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

The First Battle of Sirmium - 361AD


Forgive the uncropped screenshots but I’m going for speed here - OK, first bug, I couldn’t reload the campaign saved game from saved game options in the loading screen. I could however load from the continue option, so I have to remember that. This may be because I have installed IJ2 over a previously modded version of RTW/BI - RTR Platinum. Or not. I don’t know.

Anyway, here I am on a nice little hill overlooking the main Roman road south and east out of Sirmium. It’s great up here. Lovely views and the grass is all soft and scrunchy - just right for picnics if unexpected guests arrive, and, oh, look, here come some Romans toiling along in the distance in this heat in full armour. They must be very thirsty.





Well, this hill will do just fine so I arrange my lines as follows: I place the armoured horse archers out front in a long line to screen my infantry and act as skirmishers. I place two mobs (sorry, err, globes) of light angon men on the flanks, again to act as skirmishers and shields. The core of my battle-lines are the ranks of spear infantry in long lines, two in fact, and behind them rides Rando (Rando Rides Again! - I can see the serial panegyric rights already . . . ) with his mounted bodyguard. Now last night, I made sure that all these bodyguards sacrificed to the great god Kraashtudesqtuup and can only hope their prayers were received with piety . . .

Oh yes. A little surprise. I have stashed a group of berserker chappies in the woods on the far right flank. I want them to hit the Roman (you poor sods) left flank as it makes contact. These chaps are my tactical battlefield nukes. Bless ‘em.







Oh, here are the Romans, already deploying for battle and surging forward uphill. For the god’s sake, have you not read Tacitus, Polybius, Livy? What are you doing? I really must have words with whoever runs their staff college . . . I order the horse archers to form a Cantabrian circle and harass the advancing legion lines while advancing the flanking angon - well, I wouldn’t exactly call them soldiers - let’s say, men to threaten to Roman flanks. My berserkers begin to creep forward under the shelter of the trees. Some are gnashing their teeth on their shield rims - which cannot do their molars any good.







At this point, I spot several dead legionaries on the field of battle as their lines begin to shy away from the withering arrow fire, turning left and right from my centre. I stare for a moment at these valiant corpses and must admit to feeling a tad conflicted about it all. Dead Romans. By my hand. I mutter a brief paean to their valour and then move on. Now the Roman line is split asunder and one half is engaging the Iazyges on my left and the other is piling into the outer fringes of the wood to come to blows with the angon men and my spearmen who rushing down to hit them. This is going much better than I thought . . .







Well, would you believe it? The entire Roman right flank has just collapsed . . . No AARs for these chaps, that’s for sure. Yep, look, there it goes, all crumbling away. In shock, I order ‘riding’ Rando to charge forwards to pursue and harass - hold my breath - and sigh in relief as the ground trembles with the sound of hooves. Throwing all caution to the wind, I let the leash off those berserkers and watch in horror as they smash into the shaken Romans in the trees, all screams and upright hair and bleeding gums.





And that was that - before I had time to finish my glass of tawny Port, even. Fleeing Romans all over the battlefield and a dead commander cut down so quickly I didn’t even have time to commission a painting in his honour. A clear victory over a professional Roman army - mind you, to be fair, it did have a lot of, well, you know, those German fellows in with them. Couldn’t have helped morale or discipline, you see. Bloody barbarians, they’ll be the death of the Roman army, mark my words . . .





The bad news was that the survivors fled back to Sirmium and managed to hang onto the walls. Neither of our respective reinforcements arrived and in fact it all turned out rather well and according to my grand strategy. Mwahhh, Mwahhh . . .



Yet again, I was able to exit back to the main screen but once I clicked to exit the entire game - CTD. Wonder why?

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Rebels Without A Cause

I’m happy. Sirmium is being battered by stones and missiles and the odd dead cow (biological warfare eat your heart out). In a few months at most I will occupy a Roman fort on Roman soil. My happy Iazyges will be drinking amphorae of wine by the cartload. But first, a little matter of some rowdy tribesmen wandering shamelessly across Iazyges land. Time to teach them a lesson.

I pull Burkhard (what is this with his name? It sound like something out of a Roaring Tales omnibus ‘Captain Burkhard, I want you to secure that ridge with these fusilier chaps and hold off the fuzzies until I get reinforcements. Alright?’ ‘Absolutely, sir. Not a problem!’) back to the northen budget town as a rather large mass of (allied - sure, I believe them) Quadi are wandering dangerously close and then send in my remaining army to quash these rebels. It’s a walk in the park - well, more a stampede through a National Trust property given the amounts of trees, but you know what I mean. Here, look, let me show you . . .



Do you see the size disparity? These rebels are going to wish they had never been born. So here they are running around trying to find a good defensive position - good luck, boys, it won’t do you any good. See the chap in the red cloak? He’s their leader and about now thinking that a career move to the Roman army south of the Danube would probably have been a good idea. Why, O, why didn’t I follow my half-brother, Gaudich, and join up with the Roman caravan, he’s thinking, while desperately ordering his men to turn left and then right - oh, and he comes the Iazyges out of the woods - all angry and bristling with weapons. Thank the gods for that red cloak which really does a good job of hiding the colour brown when it appears through the old barbarian breeches.







What follows next is actually quite overwhelming and for a brief moment I feel sorry for these men and their plight - but, hey, that’s life before the Geneva Convention, well, before Geneva itself actually, but let’s not split hairs - oops, too late, the hair splitting has begin, along with the heads . . .









Theudegisel - no, really, I kid you not, that’s his name - is cut down in moments as his men flee. But let’s be honest, no one called Theudegisel was ever going to carve out an empire anyway, now was he? How he got those poor chaps to follow him, I’ll never fathom. There he is face down in the grass, his red cloak protecting his dignity. Somewhere, many leagues south, in a Roman legion, a humble soldier named Constans - well, he had to change his name, who wouldn’t?- lifts his head and lets loose a tear in the feeling that his half-brother has gone to the great drinking hall in the sky.







Let’s be blunt: it’s a massacre.



But life goes on - oops, sorry, that was a bit crass of me but you know what I mean. On to the next round! Finally, I train up a spy. I will send him south to Sirmium next round to sus out their defenders. Hurrah! I see that the Roman fort has been abandoned by its defenders secretly in the night and so I slip my men and occupy my first piece of Roman real estate . And very nice it is, too. The bad news is that the defenders have marched south and east towards Sirmium and are commanded by a member of the Imperial family - Nepos Chaerea. Finally, a civilised name! This is very tempting - a target which will prove very hard to resist. What will I do, I wonder?

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Let’s All Do The Cantabrian Dance

What I do next is simply stunning. But let’s recap a moment. All this Sirmium stuff is a rouse, remember that. This great big town is a magnet around which I have thrown two massive armies and old Rando. Nothing more. I don’t actually want the bloody town (well, that’s a lie, of course, but it’s not my main objective). All this siege nonsense is just to draw the bees to the honey so that my MAIN army out west in the Roman fort can cut round behind and strike deep at any undefended towns - it’s all about the pillaging, nothing more. My economy is flat-lining like the Great Depression but this time instead of company directors in the Empire State taking a one-way ticket to the concrete pancake, it’s smelly barbarians throwing themselves out of high-rise tree yurts or whatever . . .

And here is old wonderful Nepos Chaerea storming down from a hastily abandoned Roman castra to relieve Sirmium. Nepos - a relative of Julian himself. What a coup. So I send the real striking force out of the Roman castra south and east on the heels of Nepos to put the fear of god in him, and guess what? The man retreats right up the walls of Sirmium itself in panic. So much for Roman discipline and intelligence. Well, it’s time to give Etreleus, the commander of the second Iazyges army, a crack at the whip, as it were - and, to be honest, I quite like his name; it has a vaguely Hellenic ring to it (I might just marry him into the ruling dynasty and who knows what might happen then?). So off they go around the walls of the battered town and out onto the snowy plains south of it to confront the tired and demoralised troops of Julian’s second cousin, twice-removed (well, he would have to be, to have survived all that Constaninian blood-letting, the insane oedipal family that they are), or something.

It’s early Winter and snow lies all around and distant crows spot the bitter skies above. Nepos is moving hesitantly towards the town walls but the garrison commander is staying put and my other reinforcing army can’t quite be bothered to turn up, either. It does take some effort to keep the milk churning and they are all a little tired as a result. Bless ‘em.







Now I have a lot of men - more than that: I have a lot of mounted archers and kontos (that’s a fancy word for lance) wielding troops so I intend to fight this as a classic cavalry skirmishing battle a la steppe warfare. What fun, it’ll be! But then I see the Roman standards rising over the brittle, crumpy, snow and realise just how few they are - and that the elite guards cavalry attending Nepos are the only cavalry he possesses. So once the nomadic barbarians have finished throwing snowballs, all the while pretending it’s all good military exercise and warms up the muscles, my archers advance in mass at the gallop to begin the slaughter.





Nepos halts at once and remains stationary. He’s probably wondering on that decision he made to abandon the castra and storm to the rescue of Sirmium with only some SIX HUNDRED men - and most of them infantry. I’ve got over three thousand in front of him and all mostly on horseback - not the small Gallic horses neither but these big boned Hunnish mounts built for stamina and speed - the Volvos of the late Roman world. Sirmium looms close by but it might as well be fabled Atlantis for all the good it’s going to do him. Horns blare forth, ox-tail standards dip, shrieks cut the air and then all my wonderful horse-archers wheel about into pretty circles before the Roman lines and begin the Cantabrian Dance . . .







Well, it’s an utter slaughter. The Romans crack and start breaking their lines in an attempt to come to blows - thus avoiding the feathered death falling around them; but it’s futile. Look, here’s the main legion detachment, an ordo of men, working forward as per standard protocol on facing steppe archers but no-one told them that it’s all a numbers game at the end of the day. One by one, they drop in the snow, stuck like pin cushions, as my archers fall back firing over their shoulders. It’s like Carrae all over again. They didn’t even get within verutum or spiculum range, the poor saps.







I switch targets and mow down the light rear lines of the detachment. This is even worse. With only the large oval scutum to protect themselves, these legionaries are lambs to the slaughter as my steppe archers work themselves around the flanks and pepper them from every angle. They try to retire over the brow of the hill but the deep snow impedes them - well, let’s draw a veil over that slaughter, shall we . . .





I can see the stunned look on Nepos’ face even through the ‘Deurne’ style ridge helmet. It’s over and he realises it so in sympathy I send in the lancers to finish him and his guards cavalry face to face. Of course, I could just keep mowing them down but he at least deserves an honourable death on the field of battle. So, in they go, all long lances and flying tassels and brightly painted pennants - I really must educate them all on the finer arts of battlefield camouflage sometime soon - and the shock of their impact sends the snow flying in all directions.





The Roman escort cavalry really fail to stand up to the shock of the charge as my main lancers pile in, yelling famous Iazyges war-cries like ‘Your mother looks like my cow’ or ‘Your cow looks like my mother’ - well, they’re not a sophisticated culture after all. Then its old Nepos all surrounded and fighting on his own. That’s him, there, right in the middle. You can’t really see it from that angle but by all the gods he slashing away like a daimon from Plato, his spatha rising and falling with a precision which surprises even me. Sweat glistens on his brow and his eyes dart here and there, marking targets with a cool precision which is effortless, and quite breath-taking to watch. My lancers close in on his solitary form but he remains resolute and tall in the saddle, like a god on earth. The kontos lances splinter his oval scutum but he simply hunches closer to the crop of his horses’ neck, whisper a name ‘Athena’, and then launches both of them high into the air, his sword flailing and his horses’ hooves crashing down around them both. Scarlet splashes stain the mushed up snow all around them - and then I hear this Nepos start speaking in Greek, softly at first but then louder, like a paean, and the bloody fool is mouthing his death-speech, all reverence for the stream of divine oneness and the all-flowing cosmic unity which is the universe - very late decadent Hellene - and then I realise that this man is cut from the same cloth as Julian and holds to the old ways and is now making peace with his soul and the universe which is also an extension of that soul. It’s actually quite beautiful as he mouths his soft words and feels the winds of the cosmos ripple through him, all the while swinging the spatha with an economy which is almost poetic. Then he is gone - lost in the carnage of the slaying. His body and the wondrous horse named Athena all unravelled into the tapestry of lances, helmets, armour and sweating bodies.





It’s a fantastic victory and not only does the Roman army melt away as if it had never been but old Etreleus recovers a Legionary Eagle from the wreckage of the battlefield and has it sent to our main (budget) town, Campus Iazyges, in honour of the victory. You beauty! Several Roman survivors cower at his feet and so this young Hellenic sounding chieftain has them enroll as slaves in his entourage and will use their knowledge of Roman military tactics to help him in the future. Nicely done.









I then move my newly acquired spy, a lovely shifty chap called Fragiledus (I really hope he doesn’t live up to his name - who becomes a spy with a name like ‘fragile’?), south of the Danube so that he can give me advance warning of the next wave of Roman assaults, and then reach the end of that turn - and a very nice turn, it was too!

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

It’s a Numbers Game, Baby



I’m smug, I’m replete, I’m over-bloody ecstatic. A couple of turns in and already I own a Legionary Eagle! Two Roman armies trashed and a fort taken on Roman soil and the great big town of Sirmium slowly approaching its doom as my Iazyges tighten their noose about its neck. But then a big splash of cold water hits my face - and it’s all to do with the economy. My debts are rising faster than a vicar's pants in a brothel when the police raid - and until I can plunder and pillage everything Roman, it’s not going to change soon. I figure that I can either wait until Sirmium falls - that’s got to have some serious gold in it - or push on south to scope out Singidum and maybe rush it. What to do?



Well, the next turn cycles through and guess what? Adelhaide graduates from the top secret Iazyges black op centre located deep underground beneath Campus Iazyges. He’s a shifty fellow, all in white trash tattoos and sporting steppe-coloured Oakleys. I take to him immediately and plan great things from him. As a first mission, I send him west via the captured Roman fort to infiltrate and possibly assassinate the commanding officer of the advancing Roman troops. What fun. However the gloss wears off rather quickly when I realise that my men are dripping away and forming rebel bands all because I can’t keep up the flow of trinkets and gold. Peasants! And yet another such band is roaming around the steppe between my two budget towns again!







So I decide to send old Burkhard - I really must think about changing his name by deed poll - with half of the men at Campus Carpi (a renowned spot for fishing, by the way) south to intercept and destroy these pesky deserters but of course it will take them two turns to get there. Meanwhile, I send my little Frigid chap eastwards to scout out the Romans so I can work out how best to deal with them - I mean, defeating Nepos was a high but I mustn’t get complacent, right? The gods blessed me once but they can take it away just as easily!

Well, what happens next shows you why chaps like little chilly here are really useful. As Frigid glides eastwards what does he find but ANOTHER Roman army slightly further south and lurking behind a river crossing. And it’s a big one, too. Well spotted, old boy. Fridggy gains in attributes, also, which is nice and makes me go all misty-eyed over the chap.





The turn ends and I have to make some hard decisions. I gain a diplomat named Vannius (respect!) who I send east and north hoping to get him into Quadi country to figure out what’s going on with that rather large force of barbarians oh so close to my northern border. I now have two Roman armies within striking distance of Sirmium, one of which, commanded by the Comes rei Militaris Asterius (who is about to make an appearance in ‘At The Limes’ soon - I know, shameless plug, so sue me . . .), is composed of front-line legionaries and auxillia. The other army is an unknown quantity so I must assume for the moment that it is an equally first-rate one. Well, the turn spins and I’m not overly surprised to see old Asterius shot east and take over the larger army. It’s not good news, to be honest. I now have a single Roman force, and it’s a large one, poised to relieve Sirmium. I have to act decisively and so I send Rando and the second army from the Roman fort to head them off on the other side of the bridge. Asterius is trapped into making a forced assault over a bridge if he wishes to advance onto the border town. It’s a perfect position for ma as my horse archers can cut his men to ribbons while bottlenecked on the bridge - bring it on, Asterius!





That smugness rapidly dissolves when Fridggy brings me back a unit breakdown of the Comitatus - armoured horse, ouch, palatine legionaries, and palatine auxiliaries. This intel also promotes his abilities again - nice one! This is a massive regional army intent on my destruction and against which my Iazyges have little to no hope if caught in an infantry battle. My mobility is my only defence here. Time to make a harsh decision. I hold the east bank of the river - Asterius the west. One of us will have to cross. If he crosses and makes a bridgehead, it’s over for me. His armoured shield-walls will just advance and be reinforced. If I cross, on the other hand, I run the risk of being trapped on the bridge - suicide - against the option of getting across and spreading out around his flanks.







I look at the two armies - Rando’s already bloodied one and the guys from the Roman fort lead by a certain Hanhavaldi - well, they would be, wouldn’t they? - and it occurs to me that it would be worth losing an army because a) I might be able to eliminate Asterius’ elite units in the field and b) it would drive down some of my expenditure. The more I think about it the more it becomes attractive - I mean, who’s Hanhavaldi to me, right, but a barbaric collection of misplaced vowels and consonants? So in an impulsive fit, I send the chap surging across the bridge right into the maw of the Roman lines. Old wily Asterius then does the unpredictable and falls back from the bridge (?) and into the low hills to the east - and all impulsive now I send Hanhavaldi straight after him - and battle is joined!

[Atterdag]

Very nice!

Please keep on writing!

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

The Battle of Mons Backside

It’s a lazy hot day and despite a gruelling push across the bridge and a pursuit up rough ground hard on the heels of the retreating Romans under Asterius, my Lazy Gs are in fine spirits (mostly fermented cow’s urine, it must be said) and spoiling for a fight. The Roman infantry has regrouped on high ground to the right of the old paved road with their backs against a low range of hills known locally as the Mother’s Shrivelled Dugs (honestly, that’s a literal translation, I kid you not). Their intent is immediately obvious and worries me at the outset. By backing up against the hills, the Roman Comes is attempting to protect his flanks and avoid envelopment by my horse archers and lancers. Now I know why they fell back from the bridge. This is one wily commander and one I need to take seriously especially as his men both outnumber mine and consist of crack frontline units (and given I am paying on H/H, I can’t be too cavalier here . . .).

I am going to have to fight this with all my wits and use the Iazyges as a proper steppe fighting force. Desperately dashing cold water onto my face (metaphorically speaking), I assemble the army into two broad divisions - on the right I mass the horse archers and mixed archers and kontos wielding horsemen while on the left I mass the heavy cavalry into a number of wedge formations. It’s not subtle but then steppe warfare isn’t built out of precise tactical manoeuvres - it’s a shifting pattern, like the flight of startled birds in the evening sky. Oh god, I am coming across like a poet now . . .







For some reason beyond my limited understanding of Iazyges’ mentality, Hanhavhavalalalaa, or whatever, ensconces himself in the small spearmen I arrange as a rearguard force in case of a Roman break-through. Whatever. If he wants to cower amongst the shields of these men, so be it. So here we all are - the Romans digging in up the hill of the shrivelled mum’s paps and all these archers and lancers on their snorting horses below. Tentatively, and with no small amount of focus, I move the lead elements forward . . .

My tactics are simple but hopefully effective - I am going to send every damn archer I have against his cataphracts and guard cavalry in the hope of eliminating them and leaving his infantry exposed. It’s a risky tactic as once those Roman cavalry get in amongst my steppe horse they will make the proverbial mincemeat out of them so I need to be quick and decisive. With wild ululating cries, the mass of archers surge forward uphill and begin the rain of volley after volley into the shining ranks of the Roman armoured horse. Carefully, I also edge the armoured wedges forward to begin to put pressure on the Roman right flank. It’s working. The cataphracts advance to make contact with the remaining guard cavalry (except Asterius’, of course, he’s staying put behind the lines of the infantry). Behind them, move the other Roman horse so that gradually they all drift further away from the protection of the infantry lines. A rain of arrows falls continuously upon the cataphracts like hail and slowly they start dropping.







Then the unbelievable happens and I almost whoop for joy. Asterius’s heavy cavalry and the two ordines of regular cavalry have edged far enough forward from the infantry in an attempt to counter the horse archers that in a flash I charge my heavy lancers across the field into their flanks. The thunder of hooves, the dust rising up in clouds, the jangling of bits and harnesses, the neighs of the galloping horses - all combine into a tide of bloody destruction and the Roman cavalry - already weakened by the constant rain of arrows - is reduced to a crimson ruin.









It’s a tough struggle but in the end my Iazyges remain triumphant upon the field and the Roman cavalry have been massacred almost to a man (and horse). In alarm, the Comes Asterius, sensing that a watershed has been passed, orders his main infantry lines to retreat further up the slope of the hill. I can understand his reasoning: he needs to maintain a strong defensive position against my heavy cavalry and is hoping that the slope of the hillside will make it difficult for them to charge his lines. He’s not wrong, this Asterius, but my plans are moving in a different direction.





Little by little, I re-group the Iazyges back into their original positions and maintain missile pressure on the Roman left flank where his Palatine Auxiliaries are presenting a solid shield line. On my left, I edge the heavy cavalry forward and over to their flank so that in effect I have the Roman lines in a vice. If Asterius decides to charge my horse archers and halt the withering arrow fire, my lancers will run him down from the rear. Similarly, if the Comes turns to face the threatening lancers, my horse archers will riddle his backs with wave after wave of arrows. I’ve put him in a right conundrum. Time passes a I sit back and wait for his next move - I don’t need to do a thing now as the only issue at stake now is how long I can maintain my supplies of arrows.







The it happens. The Palatine troops rush forwards out of frustration, led by a desperate Ducenarius. I can almost hear Asterius curse in disgust but by the time he realises this man’s folly, there is nothing he can do. Look, there they go, all Roman manly courage and martial vigour - straight into their doom, stung by the missile fire into sheer folly. In a flash, I order the archers to envelop these poor Romans and watch on in fascination as they slowly dissolve in what seems to be a black whirlpool of horses. Not a single soldier emerges alive from that deadly swarm.









I’m expecting Asterius to realise now that if he stays here on the hillside, I will eventually just whittle away at his men. His most sensible course of action is to retire in formation to a more defensible area - nearby woods, perhaps. I watch tentatively as I reform the archers and note with some alarm that two of my units are now out of arrows. I reform them into a different formation so that I won’t send them unexpectedly into a bristling spear wall. Still no sign of movement from the Comes, though. Is he waiting out my missile capacity, I wonder? That is my weakness, I admit, but few troops have the patience to sit still behind their scutum even as the arrows rain down, peppering any gaps. - Ah, here we go again! Another ordo of heavy infantry attempt to rush the archers - and again my steppe nomads envelope them without mercy all the while with the lancers watching on by the other flank pinning Asterius in. I watch calmly on as these Romans are butchered, too, keeping my eyes resolutely fixed upon Asterius and his remaining guard cavalry stationed behind the Roman lines.









It’s over quickly and I realise that the Roman Comitatus is now decimated with over half of its men slain on the slopes of the hill. I realise then that the essence of steppe warfare isn’t just ever-circling Cantabrians or the thundering charge of lancers into disorganised infantry lines or retreating ordines - it is also those moments where you just remain waiting on the flanks of the enemy. A mass of horse looming like a threatening cloud or storm-front - and that in that threat lies the erosion of the enemies morale. I edge the lancers closer in as I re-assign another archer unit into lancer status due to lack of arrows. It’s wolf-pack tactics - and Asterius obliges me by moving slightly to his left with his cavalry. This is a gap I cannot risk missing and so I order all my lancers in like a flood. What happens next is as inevitable as the dawn. He and his guards are overwhelmed and slaughtered to a man while I put harassing fire on the remaining infantry units to force them to remain where they are.









Now most of my archers are galloping with empty quivers and although the battle is no longer in doubt and I have sustained relatively minor casualties - from here on in, it’s close in work and I know my men will suffer. I have no choice, however, so I signal a general charge to all standards and we close in on the remaining Roman units now scattered across the slopes. It’s long gruelling work and I even have time to bring up Hanavavavavwhatisname with the spearmen to break the last of the Roman lines - but in the end, my Iazyges remain victorious among the shattered remains of the elite Roman army. The corpse of Asterius is discovered lying beneath a dozen of my lancers and to honour his name I erect a small tumulus of shield and broken weapons over his body.









But the cost was high. However, given that I had intended this to be a suicide charge in order merely to wear down his elite units so that Rand could move across and finish the job, I am amazed that I am here at all.

Can nothing stop my crazy lazy gees???

[bomberboy]

Good AAR.

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Tickling The Soft Underbelly

I’m in a post-sherry drinking haze when I remember to rouse myself from the euphoria of the latest Roman defeat. My Iazyges are unstoppable and on a roll and I love the little tykes with all my (jaded) heart - bless ‘em! But the fumes wear off and despite my unstoppable steppe horde of distantly related Iranian nomads rolling effortlessly through Roman lands, there is that little matter of the pesky unwashed passport-free intruders to the north - near my world-renowned fishing spot. Burkhard is hard on their heels and now that the Romans are no more than dusty corpses laid out west of the river, I send him after these little upstarts. Typically, they retreat eastwards across the river - the name of which escapes me and I can’t be bothered to google it - and almost ride down my newly appointed diplomat who his riding north with his entourage to engage in dialogue with the Quadi and that large army ever so dangerously close to my nebulous frontier (well, we are a steppe people, after all, and animals must pasture where animals must pasture). For a moment, there is some little jiggling as these poor outlaws, Burkhard and Vannius all dance around each other in small tactical moves and then suddenly - I have him!







Well, this is Burkhard’s first outing as a leader of steppe nomads and I am going to allow him to engage in all the bloodletting he likes - well, with a name that has the word ‘burk’ and ‘hard’ in it, he needs all the prestige he can get, right? Battle is joined and the fun begins!

I see that Gudila and his merry band of freebooting scum (sorry, primitive-monarchically-challenged people) have retreated to a low hill in an attempt to hold their ground before our onslaught. Oh god, I think, it’s Theudegisel all over again and, boy, am I not wrong. I arrange the Iazyges into three small divisions - the heavy lancers on the left, Burkhard with his (so far not cursed by the god Kraashtudesqtuup) in the centre and the mounted archers on the right near the woods. I am in the middle of contemplating complex tactics and whirlwind manoeuvres when it dawns on me that I am being far too careful and then just simply order a general charge . . .







Burkhard and all his men simply ride straight through them for the loss of only 3 poor men - one was pierced by a spear, one banged his head on his companion’s shield rim and fell to the ground stunned to be promptly ridden over by almost a thousand nomads, and the remaining chap had a sudden attack of conscience and committed suicide. No, honestly, I kid you not. Too much fermented yurt-milk, if you ask me. Gudila joins the merry band of honoured red-cloak wearing men who’s rear sides shall remain mercifully covered and I survey a battlefield with complete satisfaction. Job well done, boys! Needless to say, old Burk HARD - as he’s now taken to calling himself - enrols some of the cringing survivors into his entourage and gains new confidence in facing rebel bands.









Now the turn, well, turns, as it were, and a seasoned chap arrives at the main town and presents himself to the daughter of Rando - it seems these two have been sending flower-entwined missives sealed with little stamps of cow-dung (well, nobody reads Latin love poetry up here, it has to be said) for some time and are now hopelessly in lust, err, I mean love. I take a long had look at this new chap on the proverbial block and then decide that, yes, I like him a lot - ok, the name is the worst yet so far (Adelgund, for heaven’s sake!) but look at his traits. So much potential, there. The I sneakily invite Burkhard over for a drink and assess his traits one evening (ohh, err, matron) and you know what? Now that Adelgund is married into the Rando dynasty, I decide to make him the new faction heir over Burkhard and designate him as such. Burkhard takes it, well, HARD but what can he do? Adelgund is just so much the better man - and a Christian, to boot.



Now, with that all settled, I attend to the little things bubbling up around the epic siege of Sirmium (soon, men, soon, it will fall and all that gold will be ours!!). Lovely old Friggy is sent east to scope out the fortress town of Singidunum and see if I can surprise it with one of main Iazyges armies loitering around the siege area. First, Friggy sneaks himself into the town and then is able to report back that it is lightly garrisoned and commanded by a certain Valens. He also reports that should we assault the walls with a view to surprising the garrison (only 83 heavy cavalry), he has a 32% chance of opening the gates. First off, I am amazed that of all people Valens himself should be within my grasp and secondly that nomad barbarians can do complex percentages . . . But who am I to question higher learning in the steppes?





This is too good to miss, so I tentatively move him of the name with many hhhs and vvvs and whatnot (you know who I mean) east to make a surprise assault - remember, this is my entire strategy, after all, thinking that I have a chance to not only storm and plunder a MAJOR Roman city but also eliminate a powerful Roman general (and future emperor!) at the same time. Truly, I have plunged deep into the soft underbelly of the Roman empire and can only do great deeds!

That’s when, of course the proverbial hits the fan - or whatever is its equivalent here in the endlessly rolling plains . . . As Hannabarbera moves eastwards, what do his scouts reveal further south but a medium-sized Roman Comitatus led by a nine-star general - yep, Julian himself. And all geared up to avenge himself on me for the slaughter of his distant kin Nepos. In alarm, I order an about turn and send the Iazyges desperately back to the bridge at the river to block and surprise any assault by these elite (and I mean ELITE) Romans led by Julian (love ya, baby!). Oh, this is going to be messy all right. I evacuate most of the garrison nomads from the Roman fort further north and bring them south to support my little bridge detail but, of course, they won’t be able to cover the distance in time - and then hit the end of turn button with some trepidation . . .

[Gäiten]

Kill him!

[Agisilaos]

I am sure Julian will bring fear to your soldiers even though you are making good preparations for his arrival. long live the king Julian just joking here.

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

It's going to be messy whatever happens - that's for sure!

[Gäiten]

Well, he is not going to meet his destiny against the Iranian Sassanians, but against the Iranian Iazyges. So it remains in the family

All what matters is the right tactic, is not it?

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

You try telling that to Hanhavlid (or whatever his name is!) - right now he's down the old bazaar fitting on an assortment of red cloaks . . .

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Never, Never, Never Get Out Of The Boat!

I’m in shock. Forgive me, but I really am. Now don’t get me wrong - it’s not that I underestimated Julian and his attendant crack (damn them) troops or anything. No, not at all. Quite the opposite, in fact, but I at least assumed that my Iazyges would put up SOME sort of a fight . . . After all, not one single Roman army has stood up to my nomadic lads and even one fort hastily abandoned itself so I did assume that perhaps there was some even ground here between these two sides. Well, I’ll tell you right now - I have been seriously disabused of that notion - and make no mistake!

The Battle of the Bridge over the River I-Can’t-Be-Bothered-To-Google



Well, here’s the loading screen zooming in with indecent haste upon the about to be embroiled forces. I have just hit the turn button and of course Julian in a typical piece of gung-ho daring do (nine stars! Look at them - nine stars!), advances at speed and rushes the bridge with poor old Hanvaldi and his remaining men fresh from defeating Asterius some weeks earlier and slightly further west. I’m still fairly confidant at this stage as all I’m really hoping for is to chip away at his forces so that I can box him in and wipe him out once he has crossed the river.

Anyway, I place old Hanna with his surviving spearmen in a globe/shieldwall/schiltrom formation on the far opening end of the bridge to act as a bottleneck for the advancing legionaries - the idea being that my archers can pepper them in the resultant traffic jam. My lancers I place over on the left flank guarding a possible crossing point and the remaining archers further downstream to the right to guard another potential crossing point. The sun rises, the mists clear and I see revealed for the first time the full might of a palatine army in all its imperial panoply, with purple silk dragons, gold tassels, silver-embossed armour, deep red crests, finely honed spathas, etc. I can tell you right now - if I had a mobile phone back in those days I would be dialling for a fast taxi (or whatever was the equivalent) out of there right now . . .

What happened next was so overwhelming and sucked me in so much in desperate attempts at creating fire-breaks, as it were, that I forgot to pause and capture any damn moments for posterity (thank the gods!). I’m roving around the battlefield like a manic traffic warden on amphetamines attempting to sticker every car on the block. Of course, Julian (nine stars!) surges across the bridge with his frontline elite infantry - and EVERYTHING else on the field. Okay, perhaps a couple of feinting cavalry units strike left and right for the crossing spots but in essence he simply deluges poor old Hanna and his trembling spearmen with a massive wave of Roman steel. I watch on in horror as in seconds the entire shieldwall dissolves into a crimson ruin and my Iazygy Chieftain with the crazy name vanishes as if he had never been born . . . Now I am panicking and ordering all the archers to skirmish as much a possible to slow the Romans down who are deploying into formation on MY side of the river. I note with dawning horror that these poor spearmen manage to actually kill ONE single legionary in those frantic moments before being swept away.







And the Romans just keep I coming. The Iazyges collapse in rout one unit after another until it becomes hopeless. In a last ditch attempt to salvage the situation and perhaps strike lucky I order all the remaining nomads to charge the Augustus and his guard cavalry, who are now slightly ahead of the main Roman deploying lines. Who was I kidding? It’s a massacre and I am lucky in that some of the unfortunate horsemen were able to rout to safety. In alarm, I then order all the survivors to retreat off the field of battle while reaching out for a stiff sherry with a trembling hand . . .







The Romans, all triumphant and eager to show off in front of their emperor, their beloved demi-god, continue spreading out beyond the bridge over the river and mopping up what remains of my forces. At this point I rover National Geographic-like around the battlefield and compose what I can in the pitiful aftermath of a shocking defeat.







The rest of the turn plays out and then I pause in a moment of respect to fallen Hanhavaldi and his men and then determine revenge on the Roman emperor. In an instant, I order Adelhaide, my elite Oakley wearing assassin, to make straight for the Comitatus with orders to take out the apostate. It’s a discreet black-box op and the slinky man is soon off into the oncoming snows of an early Winter. I wait to watch in glee this unfolding moment of backstabbing and then Adelhaide also demonstrates a knowledge of complex maths as he reports back after scoping out the target that he has a single percentage point of a chance and would I mind if he booked out some early holiday time instead? Gnashing my teeth in frustration, I order Rando south to hem in the Roman Comitatus and prepare for another show-down. Sirmium will fall soon and with luck I can wear Julian down and wipe him out by sheer force of numbers before reinforcements arrive from the east of Singidum (right, who am I kidding?).

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Just When You Thought The Writing Was On The Wall

By the time the clash of arms and cries of the slaughtered had finally faded away from my spinning mind, and old Hanhavaldi’s memory was now growing into that of Iazygic legend (forming the basis of the later oral epic known as ‘Hanhavaldi and the Pants Down Battle‘), I remembered that I was actually raiding and pillaging an entire Roman province and that it was time to move on and mourn no more. Speed and devastation were my main weapons - yeah, that’s why I was stuck 6 turns into a siege, for the god’s sake, sure . . . - and it was time to use these weapons against Julian. In an instant, I had our side of the river which the emperor had recovered surrounded by not one but TWO Iazyges armies, with Etreleus in overall command. There is something deliciously ironic in opposing Julian with a Greek-sounding commanding barbarian of distant Iranian/Sarmatian stock! Now, if the little misopogon ( - google it, for heaven’s sake) advances, he will fall straight into a mass of unyielding steppe nomads and it will be ‘cheerio, old boy, and thanks for all the olives!’ (Remember, I am still drunk on sherry at this point).



Now, with that done, I turn to the wider strategic picture: way up north, my lazy hazy ambassador, Vannius, drifts deeper into Quadi territory and, to my disappointment, finds that the hovering Quadi horde has vanished - which I find just a tad too convenient. I advise Vannius to travel west and north as, to be honest, I haven’t the faintest idea what’s up here and he could do with a sight-seeing budget holiday. Off he goes, all grumbling about mixing with the locals in the economy-class of the caravansaries.





Then I spot something. My numerically-aware elite coward - err, I mean assassin, is within striking distance of Singidum with it’s solitary Valens and his guard cavalry. If I could infiltrate him into the fortress-town and take down the unsuspecting future emperor, his cavalry will disperse and the town will be UNMANNED . . . Praying with all the fervour of a deluded monophysite on a jagged pillar of volcanic rock (just think of the piles . . . ouch), I send Adelhaide into the town through one of the unguarded culverts which pierces the thick bastion walls on a moonless night (who am I kidding: he walks past the guards swigging unfermented yurt-lite and the stink alone makes sure no-one will bother him - this isn’t Assassin’s Creed, after all) and order a preliminary recon of Valens. I hold my breath and then after the quick whirring of dried lentil beans on wire - tock, tock, tock - Adelhaide reports back that the mark has a seventy eight percent chance of evading assassination. He tells me this with such innocence and while also perusing and old manuscript detailing the various beach resorts along the Euxine sea coast that in a fit of pique I order him to carry out the mission. Shocked and a little dismayed, he eventually agrees and shaves his head in true barbarian style as a ritual acceptance of possible death. I affect not to notice the curious bar-code tattooed on the back of his skull and the fact that he is the forty-seventh graduate of the assassin school deep in the barbaricum. And off he goes, his bald pate glistening in the light of the oil lamps and the tallow candles, his red scarf flickering in the slight wind like an inebriated snake.



Days pass and I begin to wonder on my wisdom - he is the only assassin I have and despite his preferences for sudden holidays I might need him in the future. But I needn’t have worried. He is in and out like the tongue of an adulterer - and old Valens emits one strangled cry before tumbling to the mosaic floor. Even before the death rattle is over, his elite Roman guard cavalry have cashed in their food annona for hard currency and bolted out the gates chucking away arms and armour as they go. Singidum is an open chest of treasure and without a single moment of hesitancy, I throw every available Iazyges I have and who is in range straight into the town to do what all good barbarians do - rapine, slaughter, devastation and pillage, all the while mentally sticking two fingers up to Julian (though why I do that as he’s not French and I am neither in the Middle Ages nor a longbowman escapes me for the moment) - this is going to be VERY ugly!

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Burn, Baby, Burn!


I’m in! Singidunum is mine! My Iazyges flood into the devastated town and begin a rampant orgy of wanton looting and destruction. They butcher, maim, mutilate and massacre without regard to age, sex or religion. They set fire to, wreck, plunder and desecrate every building of worth whether it’s brand new or hundreds of years old. They couldn’t be more barbarous if they had just read ‘The Dummies Guide to Pillaging’ or subscribed to ‘Rapine Quarterly’. Days pass and I watch the loot pile up and fill the coffers of these stout sons of the steppes. Pots of gold, religious icons and crosses, bejewelled garments, gilded ornaments, gems, coin hordes - all tumble into the saddle packs and chests until there is nothing left and the town is a smoking, abandoned, ruin. Only the walls remain standing, some avenues and the Governor’s Palace which is simply to big to be demolished without the aid of Greek engineers and water pipes, or something . . . Finally, my strategy has paid off! And then I see the accounts as some Syrian slaves work tirelessly (well, they are slaves after all) through the night. From being somewhere in the mid-twenty thirty something in debt, I am now ‘only’ in the mid-tens of thousand in debt. I baulk in shock. I have just raided and massacred and plundered a MAJOR Roman town and only wiped away half of my debt . . . This plan needs some serious re-thinking if I am to keep these nomads happy.



Good news arrives soon though even as the horde evacuates the empty town. Young Vithicab reaches maturity and coming of age and - despite his name - decides to go into the pillaging business rather than starting up a taxi business. Nice. Another leader of nomads with a strangulation of a name . . .



Time to move the seasons forward and now comes the dread I have been expecting: Julian, sitting pretty on my side of that river whose name eludes my search engine. With trembling fingers, I reach out and hit the end-of-turn button and watch through closed hands over my eyes as the strategic map pans around the moves of all the other factions. Here come the Romans - and . . .

Where in all the gods is Julian?

I gaze timidly at the map and see that the old Neo-Platonist has vanished. His army has vanished. His nine whooping stars have - vanished! Absolutely nowhere to seen. Well, would you believe it? This is too good to be true. I have been given a breather and Sirmium is close to falling too. More loot.

Wasting no time, I move the Iazyges from Singidunum south to block and/or engage the nearby Roman field force all the while sneaking Friggy into their ranks to spy out their strength. Bingo! The old master-spy (never asking for a holiday, him, no sir!) delivers and I scan in detail the troops of this Comitatus. It’s a mixed-bag of units obviously scrapped together from along the limes and commanded by a Jovinus with little command ability. Yes, it’s time to avenge the defeat to the west by the river with the slaughter of these Romans while maintaining my siege of Sirmium. I send the Iazyges south to intercept the Romans and then watch as annoyingly they fall just short of engagement. Next turn then! Elsewhere, everything is turning over nicely - Vannius is ambling west through the barbaricum and sampling the local, ahem, ‘wares’, if you know what I mean . . . The siege will end either next turn of the one after that and hopefully my coffers will finally reach back into the black and it will be time to turn my attention to another Roman town and also strike deeper into the Empire as these Romanoi are soft and easy pickings (did I mention I suffer from selective memory syndrome?). Time to hit that end-turn button again! Ah, this is the life!

[julianus heraclius]

I shouldn't tell you this, but if you want more cash after raping and pillaging, then, destroy every building within the city. Some are worth a hefty sum, but only if you want to leave the place a shell and not use it for your own evil ends.

And where's Julian? It's like where's Wally or where's Bin Laden. Don't worry he'll show up. He maust have had more pressing things to deal with.

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Yeah, I did destroy every building. And I think Julian's off to deal with the Persians! Lucky me . . .

[Octavius Vatco]

Great AAR..... What are the houserules for making one?


GO Daquiz... Go F.E.U