[AAR] 230 BC in Paonia - An ambitious roman

[Narakir]

It's my first attempt of writing an AAR in English, I hope you'll like it.

Last summer. The second Taratinum legion of Numérius Rupilius, who was suposed to guard the frontier of Illyria to block the way of the newly conquered province, against incursions of the furious hordes of the Dacian empire. (Dacian had expanded massively in this game, they own all north eastern europa).

Numérius is a good general, he had never made his proofs yet, except when he drilled his men. He decided to not follow the Brutii familly orders and to cross the river, heading deep in dacian territory paonia, hopping to conquer the land quickly and to find a Dacian army to crush.


"A true roman don't fear any barbarian, never !" He said to his centurions. The army marched all the spring trought the dacian lands, without encountering any ennemies. Numérius wanted to reach their city before winter, but he made a mistake, his men were begining to suffer from cold, long march and illness. So the roman commander stoped his army and built a fort in the middle of the dacian territory. During the first week he send three scouts. One returned, without his head... Numérius had what he wanted, but the dacian didn't came. Every following morning he was thinking "when will they come ? when will I have my battle ?" Two weeks after, Mars had heard his prayers....

"The barbarians !" screamed a young Hastati.


But the dacians didn't approched the camp. Numérius watched the sky... an eagle was flying. "What do we do commander ?" asked a centurion "Let's get out of those walls and kill them ! do you see this eagle ? it's victory !"

The roman army left the camp, the barbarians didn't moved. Numeruis deployed his army in two lines, the princeps and the hastatis formed the first line ready to throw thier pillias, as the second line was formed by Illirians and greek peltasts, to cover the ennemi with a shower of javelins. On right flank was a cohort of triaris. On the left more triaris, the thracians mercenaries and numerius cavalry. The main objective was move in a straight line towards the ennemy. Covering them with a shower of projectiles and then engage them, hopping the triaris on the right will hold enought time to let the left flanking the ennemy and the cavalry to charge them from rear.


As the Dacians weren't moving, Numérius decided to take the advantage. The roman legion was marching at twillight !


The dacian cavarly moved and tried to cover the manoeuvers of the infantry and wasting some ennemy pillias.


Finaly, the two lines finaly faced each other. The barbarians roared and shaked thier weapons. From the roman side, Illyrians and Thracians mercenaries screamed thier warcryes, as the legionaries started to shake thier gladius to thier shield like one men, to give them courage. Then form both sides came the silence. Fear of death and rage for victory were in the heart of every man. Time has stoped for few seconds...


A scream camed from the roman line and breaked the silence : "Pillias ! fire at will !" The show began...


The dacians retreated to be out of range of the pillias. Numérius decided to use this moment of confusion to charge the barbarians.


The fight begun, all was going like it was planed. The roman cavalry emerged from the woods ready to attack the dacians in thier back. The main line of legionaries was surprised by the counter charge of thier ennemies, the deadly falxes begun to slash roman heads like butter...


The roman line holded enought but suffered serious loses. Hopefully for them, the dacian leader fell to an Hasatati sword. Then the roman cavalry charged the ennemy and caused great loses. The dacians had lost thier energy, thier leader and were attacked from back by cavalry... they started to flee.


The surviving romans, helped by the cavalry runing after the barbarians. They were full of hate, in a bloodly trance and cuted the ennemy in pieces without mercy. The Illyrians who stayed, behind the main battle line during the fight, losed thier patience and rushed for blood too.


The battlefeild was covered with dead bodies. Snow has turned to red. But Numérius was happy, he had his battle and his victory. He watch all the dead bodies and tought "What if the deads were able to talk, my men would say to me ?"


He turned his head and saw the survivors, out of breath, covered with wounds and screaming for victory "Baaah... stupid I'm, the deads don't talk !".


After his victory and despite the loses the roman commander rushed to take the ennemy city. He arrived near it at the end of winter to began the siege. He send some scouts to watch at every river cross and bridges of the territory.

Did he succeded, despite his Phyrric victory ? It's an other story...

I hope you liked this AAR as I liked writing it :original: sorry for all the mistakes english is not my main language.