Examinondas' scenarios

[Examinondas]

I will post in this thread my scenarios, some historical and some fictional (although always with some historical basis).

To start, here goes a fictional river crossing with Parthians facing Indo-Greeks.

Parthian river crossing in India c.1AD
Parthians vs Indo-Greeks
Having outmaneuvered the Indo-Greek army of King Strato, a Parthian invasion army under Suren Gondophartes has started a river crossing at two fords. King Strato has sent fast moving forces to delay the Parthians, hopefully giving the Indo-Greeks enough time to deploy the phalanx.


Download link for base FOG (no expansions required): http://depositfiles.com/files/9irmp41vd

Download link for FOG with Rise of Rome expansion: http://depositfiles.com/files/r0el0kw1w

Both armies have the same points, and the battle can be won playing as any side (although it maybe easier to play as the Parthians). I recommend giving some advantage to the AI side.

The Saka Horse Archers (armed with bow and sword) are cavalry units with a strength of 500 men. The other horse archers are LH armed only with bows, and around half of them are superior.

As of patch 1.0.3, the AI will not use the bows of the Saka Horse Archers, Indian Archers or Greek Cavalry units.

Questions, comments, and suggestions are welcome!



Edit: I have removed the "experimental" version of the scenario after reading this post viewtopic.php?p=120863#120863 . I was not aware that custom games could be played online nor that manually edited scenarios could be dangerous, sorry!

Edit2: New version of the scenario, replaces the old version.

Edit3: New version of the scenario, using Rise of Rome's models, and with minor changes to the OOBs of both sides.
Download link (note this version requires Rise of Rome): http://depositfiles.com/files/r0el0kw1w

Edit4: Download links updated on 18th July 2010

[Examinondas]

Later than expected, but I just finished playtesting a scenario loosely based on the battle of Gindarus.

Gindarus 38BC
Parthians vs Late Republic Romans
After the Parthian defeat of 39BC, Prince Pacorus led another invasion army into Roman lands the next year. The Roman forces were still under the command of Publius Ventidius Bassus, the victor of the previous war. Misled by Roman spies about the location of the enemy forces, the Parthians were surprised to find Ventidius' army deployed on a hill near the town of Gindarus. Prince Pacorus charged uphill under a rain of missiles.


Download link: http://depositfiles.com/files/fnjnmsvjl

Both armies have the same points, and the battle can be won playing as any side. I recommend giving some advantage to the AI side, otherwise it's too easy for the human.

There are three types of horse archers in the Parthian army: average and superior LH with bows, and average cavalry with bows and swords. The AI will not use the bows of the latter ones.

All the Roman slingers are elite, to reflect their impact in the battle.

For further information on the battle see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mount_Gindarus
http://books.google.es/books?id=WadVUvp2qlAC&pg=PA45

Thanks to batesmodel and deeter for the tip about making better missile units

[Examinondas]

I have updated the river crossing scenario in the first post of this thread.

The command radius of most commanders has been increased, a couple of Indo-Greek Indian Archer units have been replaced by Indian Javelinmen, around one third of the Parthian Horse Archers are now superior, and all the Parthian Mercenary Hillmen are now Medium Foot armed with Light Spears (but the number of Hillmen units has been reduced to 4)

BTW, note that all the units in these scenarios are taken from the FoG army books, and that I'm more or less following the starter armies compositions (with changes to suit the scenarios and available figures)

As usual, comments, questions, and suggestions are welcome!

[Examinondas]

Probably the last scenario of the Parthian series:

Tigris 115AD
Principate Romans vs Parthians
Provoked by the appointment of a pro-Parthian king in Armenia, Emperor Trajan set out for the east in late 113 AD. Confident after a series of successes, the Romans invaded the Parthian homeland in 115 AD. The Parthians presented a fierce opposition at the crossing of the Tigris.


Download link: http://depositfiles.com/files/048ytbc4o

My only specific knowledge of this battle comes from the following paragraph taken from WRG's "The Armies and Enemies of Imperial Rome":

Trajan with probably 8 Legiones made an opposed crossing of the Tigris in face of fierce Parthian opposition, partly by distracting the defenders with feints, and partly by covering his bridging parties with missiles from engines and from archers on ships moored in the stream.

The Heavy Weapons of the German Symmachiarii represent clubs. German clubmen are shown in Trajan's column, and clubs were used (at a much later date) against Palmyran cataphracts (by arabs in the Roman army, if I recall correctly).

As of patch 1.0.3, the AI will not use the bows of the Auxiliary Archers (2 Roman units) or the Saka Horse Archers (5 Parthian units). This should not affect the balance of the battle too much.

For further information on Trajan's campaign in the east see:
http://www.allempires.com/article/index ... #section_8
http://books.google.es/books?id=pZg9AAA ... q=&f=false

BTW, happy new year!

Edit: re-uploaded on 18th July 2010. Thanks to willb for reporting the dead-link!

[Examinondas]

Kallinikos 171BC
Late Macedonians vs Mid-Republican Romans
In 171BC, at the beginning of the Third Macedonian War, the Roman and Macedonian cavalry engaged near a hill called Kallinikos. Caius, the brother of the Consul Publius Licinus Crassus, commanded a Roman force with Pergamene and Greek allies. King Perseus' Macedonian army included Odrysian allies and other Thracians. The two opposing forces were evenly matched, with 4000 cavalry and 12000 light infantry on each side.

Download link: http://depositfiles.com/files/lr8tnsx46

I have used mostly Livy's Book 42 as reference, with some further information taken from Duncan Head's "Armies of the Macedonians and Punic Wars", and online sources (see below). The OOBs come from Livy 42.31, 42.35 and 42.55 for the Romans, and 42.51 for the Macedonians. The battle is described in 42.58-60.

Both forces are equally matched in numbers (as Livy states, although I might have taken it to the extreme by giving each side exactly 4000 cavalry and 12000 infantry ) and the scenario is rather balanced (although there is a very small point advantage for the Macedonians).

Useful online sources:
Livy's Book 42: http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/txt/ah/Livy/Livy42.html
The Kallinikos skirmish (Osprey): http://books.google.es/books?id=qNxLidZ ... q=&f=false
Odrysian cavalry arms, equipment, and tactics: http://www.iianthropology.org/ChristopherWebber.pdf
About the Thracians in general: http://home.exetel.com.au/thrace/welcome.htm

Some comments would be appreciated!

[Hudson]

These are great, I love the historical links

[Examinondas]

Thanks!

Even though these scenarios do not seem to be popular, FoG's scenario editor is great and I'm having fun making them.

Probably the new random battle generator will reduce the importance of user-created scenarios, but I want to make at least a couple more.

BTW, nice blog (although I don't understand a word of your WoW posts )

[TheGrayMouser]

Just downloaded these, played Parthian river crossing and had a bit of fun as the Parthians. Ran out of time and got a draw!. At first the Graeco-Indian AI was somewhat lethargic but suddenly on turn 5 went into overdrive and very agressively assaulted me, which took me by surprise. My hillman basically saved the day (had them in rugged terrain), holding off the phalanxes on the right flank long enough to reastablish my right flank. I was able to rout several units by attritional bow fire casualties alone (never really been able to do that before) Playing with basically a pure cavalry force was a completely different experiance and a lot of fun, look forward to trying the Tirgis crossing next!
Cheers

[Examinondas]

Thanks a lot for your battle report!

Did you give some advantage to the indo-greek AI or played with the balanced setting?

If you enjoyed commanding a cavalry-only force, I recommend you to try Kallinikos: cavalry vs cavalry is quite interesting!

Don't hesitate to post any question or suggestion you have!

[vakarr]

Hi, thanks a lot for putting together the Kallinikos scenario. You will find a full description of the battle at
John Drogo Montague, Greek and Roman Warfare, Greenhill Books, 2006, London, p. 81; NGL Hammond and FW Walbank, History of Macedonia III, Oxford, 1988, pp. 517-519. I found I needed to make some corrections to the text of my original book.

Here's the text from my new Pen & Sword book about this battle:

Philip V’s son Perseus rebuilt the Macedonian army to a strength of 43,000 men, and was soon at war with the Romans again, in the Third Macedonian War. His army included Kotys, king of the Odrysai with 1,000 picked cavalry and about 1,000 infantry. There were also 3,000 “free Thracians under their own commander” plus 3,000 Paeonians, Agrianians and Thracians in his forces. Thus a quarter of his cavalry and a fifth of the infantry was Thracian.

The Battle of Kallinikos, 171 BC (Livy 42.57-60.1)
This battle took place in the early stages of the war near Larissa. The Macedonians encamped about 12 miles from the Roman camp. On each of several days the Macedonians appeared about the same time in front of the Roman camp, skirmished, then withdrew. Then Perseus moved his camp seven miles’ closer and surprised the Romanss by appearing at dawn the next day. He drew up his army near Kallinikos hill about one mile from the Roman camp. Both sides drew up their best cavalry in the centre, flanked by cavalry mixed with light-armed troops. The Macdeonian phalanx was behind the other troops. The Romans had been forced to draw up their lines hastily and they were in some disorder. Their heavy infantry stayed behind the camp rampart. The Roman forces included 1,000 Pergamene cavalry and 4,000 infantry; 500 Aetolian cavalry; 400 Thessalian cavalry; 300 cavalry and 100 infantry from Apollonia Illyrica; and 1,500 light-armed infantry from the Achaean League. The Roman cavalry itself was 2,000 strong, so the Romans’ cavalry force was slightly larger than that of the Macedonians.

The battle began with a charge by the Macedonian left wing, There the Thracians fought "like wild beasts who had long been kept caged” , defeating the Italian allied cavalry. The Thracians used their rhomphaias to cut off the horses' legs', and to pierce their loins. The whole Roman right wing was thrown into confusion. Meanwhile Perseus, supported by a royal infantry battalion forced back the elite Roman cavalry and the Aetolian cavalry in the centre with his first charge and routed them. They were saved by the 400 Thessalians, who kept formation and enabled most of the defeated cavalry to escape. In this part of the engagement the Romans lost 200 cavalry and 2,000 infantry killed, and 600 taken prisoner. The Romans were only saved from complete disaster when Perseus observed the legions advancing from the camp, and called off the pusuit. The Thracians returned to camp swaggering and singing, with severed heads stuck to their rhomphaias as trophies. That night the Romans retreated to the other side of the River Pineus, thus surrendering control of the capital of the Thessalian League, Larissa, to the Macedonians.

I haven't been able to download the scenario yet but I'll let you know what I think when I get my internet connection working properly.

Cheers,

Christopher Webber

[Examinondas]

Thanks for the quote and the references!

I just found Hammond's book on google books (http://books.google.es/books?id=qpb3JdwuDQIC&pg=PA517)

Before I get your comments, I will admit that the scenario is not 100% historically accurate

In the Roman army, the two units of Ligurian Mercenaries are not mentioned anywhere in Livy as taking part in this battle.Livy states that the Roman Consul asked the Senate for 2000 Ligurians, and I read in Duncan Head's book that Ligurians were mixed with the velites in some fighting before Pydna, so I put 2000 Ligurians close to the velites. But in fact I just added them to increase the number of Roman infantry units and balance the battle...

In the right wing of the Macedonian army there are a "Galatian Cavalry" and "Thracian Light Horse" units which probably should not be there. King Perseus' army had 3000 Macedonian Cavalry in the centre and the right wing. Apparently Duncan Head believes that all the Macedonian Cavalry should be of true Macedonian origin (and thus they would be heavy cavalry with spear and shield), and I think he is correct, because Livy described the non-Macedonian elements of the army in detail and he doesn't mention any non-Macedonians in the cavalry (besides the Odrysians of King Kotys). However, I replaced two Macedonian Cavalry units with the above mentioned ones just to spice up things...

And well, I probably should also try to justify the composition of my Roman centre, but I better leave that for another post - this one is long enough!

I look forward to read your comments!

[keyth]

I've just played Gindarus and the Parthian river crossing - good fun. Thanks for the scenarios!

Cheers,

Keyth

[Examinondas]

Thanks Keyth!

It's a curious coincidence: just last night I started to play your Paraitacene scenario (the version with the indian skirmishers). I only had time to play 3-4 turns, but so far so good. I guess the clash of the two massive phalanxes is going to be fun!

[Examinondas]

After a long break, a new scenario for Storm of Arrows:

Lucena 1483
Santa Hermandad Castilians vs Late Granadines
While returning to Granada after a raid into Castilian lands, the army of King Boabdil was attacked by the forces of Don Diego de Cordoba, Count of Cabra. The Granadines, with 700 cavalry and 6000 infantry, outnumbered the Castilians, who had hastily gathered only 350 cavalry and 1500 infantry, the Count of Cabra even forgetting his banner in the hurry of his departure. When the two forces meet, neither King Boadbil nor his father-in-law, the experienced warrior Ali al-Attar, could indentify the Count's standard and took the Castilian force to be much larger than it was. Further confusion was caused by the sudden arrival of a small Castilian force of 50 cavalry and 100 infantry at the rear of the Granadines. Meanwhile, the Count of Cabra had seized the higher ground and charged with the battle cry "Santiago!"

Warning! The following screenshot may contain spoilers if you intend to play with LOS enabled.


Download link (note this scenario requires Storm of Arrows): http://depositfiles.com/files/sl4ta5gfw

Even though the Granadines has a large advantage in number of units (60 vs 20) and in points (~400 vs ~300), the scenario is rather balanced. Of course, playing as the Granadines is a bit easier. If you're going to play against the AI, I recommend giving it some advantage. Both sides play in a completely different way, so I suggest giving both sides a try.

A few on-line sources:
- Excerpts of the chronicle of the Abbot of Rute (in spanish): http://www.iznajar.net/historia4.htm
- Chapters XV and XVI of Washington Irwin's "Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada": http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Chronicle ... Chapter_XV
- About the Santa Hermandad Nueva (the text is in spanish, but there is a nice illustration): http://www.alabarda.net/uniformes/esp/i ... mandad.htm
- About the Jinetes: http://xenophongroup.com/EMW/article001.htm

For those not interested in Medieval battles, I have updated the "Parthian river crossing in India" scenario (see the first post of this thread for a full description) to take advantage of Rise of Rome's superb models, and have also made minor changes to the OOBs of both sides. Download link (note this scenario requires Rise of Rome): http://depositfiles.com/files/2r6dbx5v5

As always, comments are welcome

Edit: New version of the scenario. Fixed some issues and improved the OOBs.

[john2412]

Played as the Castilians and was very interesting - got a marginal victory. Stayed on the high ground for a while trading shots and then like the description here decided the best way was to attack all out and went for it in the centre, this worked well as the Granadines were pushed back, only a couple of units putting up much defence. The small force I had at the rear did cause a few units to go after them even though I hadnt moved them forward, but not made much difference over all I feel ( maybe one extra unit there would have more effect ?). Having pushed the Granadines back they fell back to the river and didnt seem to want to put up too much fight prefering to retreat.

Intersting scenario thanks.
John

[Examinondas]

Thanks for your comments John!

Regarding the small force at the rear, I played quite a lot with its size and composition, but at the end went for the historical option: 100 foot (which at the scale used could only be a MF swordsmen or crossbowmen unit) and 50 cav (which could only be a Jinetes unit).

I feel this small force does what it is expected to do: just create some confusion. However, while play testing the scenario as the Castilians I have found that it can be very effective against the rear of the Granadines' left wing, it's just a matter of finding the right time to commit them. Playing as the Granadines, that single swordsmen unit broke a "phalanx" of 4 town militia spearmen supported by 2-3 crossbowmen (I guess I should not have sent my spearmen to fight into the woods...)

Anyway, I'm going to revise the scenario, because the Granadine cav is incorrectly classified as knights (should be armoured cav), and will take another look at the rear force.

BTW, I'm glad to hear that the Granadines ran towards the river and didn't stand to fight after the initial clash: this is what they did in the real battle

[john2412]

Thanks for your comments John!
I feel this small force does what it is expected to do: just create some confusion. However, while play testing the scenario as the Castilians I have found that it can be very effective against the rear of the Granadines' left wing, it's just a matter of finding the right time to commit them. Playing as the Granadines, that single swordsmen unit broke a "phalanx" of 4 town militia spearmen supported by 2-3 crossbowmen (I guess I should not have sent my spearmen to fight into the woods...)

I found that with those two units the Granadines did what you did and sent forces in to the woods to attack them, I backed them up to avoid being overun and lost one unit immediately being left with just the swordsmen who I swung round to the left of the advancing forces and came down on to the side of the main force. I doubt they would attack like that in reality being so small in numbers but they did do some damage and had a destraction effect. Maybe they would have had more effect if I had brought them down immediately but of course would have been heavily outnumbered. Interesting what happened in the real battle as I didnt look that up before I played it preferring to tackle it my own way with the knowledge however that the Castilians did indeed decide to charge head on - but it was really the only option they had to avoid being picked off by bowmen. Maybe we have just proved that what happened was the ONLY way to tackle it and then the forces did follow the same routes !!

I think it also proves the AI is significantly better in the latest version of the game.

John

[Examinondas]

I have just updated the Lucena scenario, fixing some issues (the most notable is that the Granadine Heavy Cavalry is no longer classified as Knights) and introducing lot of changes in the OOBs.

These modifications in the OOBs were necessary to rebalance the scenario after the changes in the AI introduce by the 1.2.6 patch (specially with respect to the behaviour of archers), but I have also learned a bit more about the composition of the Castilian and Granadine armies, and thus I believe the new OOBs are historically more accurate. Still, there are probably too many armoured units in the Castilian side, but then I cannot simulate the confusion among the Granadines, so this may be OK for game purposes. (In fact the whole scenario is not completely historical so...)

Some of the changes in the scenario should address the issue pointed by John with regard to the small Castilian force at the rear of the Granadines. First, the swordsmen are now superior (in fact, the army lists doesn't give the option of average swordsmen, as they were in the previous version), and second, the forest is now a bit bigger, so the Jinetes should evade off-map less frequently. The Castilian main-force's right wing is also a bit weaker now than before, so it may collapse without the help of the rear-force.

Note that the scenario has changed so much that even if you played the previous version, you should play it again!

As usual, comments are welcome. I would also appreciate more information about the Castilian and/or Granadine armies of this time frame.

BTW, somehow I forgot to comment on this

Interesting what happened in the real battle as I didnt look that up before I played it preferring to tackle it my own way with the knowledge however that the Castilians did indeed decide to charge head on - but it was really the only option they had to avoid being picked off by bowmen. Maybe we have just proved that what happened was the ONLY way to tackle it and then the forces did follow the same routes !!

Yes, my thoughts exactly Isn't it great that we can simulate a historical battle so well with FoG?

[john2412]

"Some of the changes in the scenario should address the issue pointed by John with regard to the small Castilian force at the rear of the Granadines. First, the swordsmen are now superior (in fact, the army lists doesn't give the option of average swordsmen, as they were in the previous version), and second, the forest is now a bit bigger, so the Jinetes should evade off-map less frequently. The Castilian main-force's right wing is also a bit weaker now than before, so it may collapse without the help of the rear-force"

Played it again today and again won, but this time was much tougher to tackle - yes the rear force was more effective and the Castilian right flank was never in danger combining that with the weak forces I had on that side. Went for it in the centre again and looked for a while like the Castilian whole line would collapse but then the Granadian forces started to fold from the centre and broke back to the river. Interestingly this time the Castilian LEFT flank was always in severe danger and although holding long enough to get the victory in the centre, it would never have made progress as the Granadians did not back away on that side. If the Castilian centre HAD broken the left fland could not have helped at all and would have collapsed.

John

[Lupus]

Hi,

Just played Gindarus. Very neat scenario, but one point of criticsm. It's a bit difficult to distinguish between the LH and Cav units based on the unit image. IMHO, it would be a better approach to use 3 figurine images for the Cav and 2 figurine for the LHs. So it would be easier to distinguish between the unit types without having to look on he attribute panel.

But the scen was fun to play. Thx for sharing.

L