Roman Anti-Cavalry Tactics

midpoint · Post by **midpoint** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 7:50 pm

Evening Chaps,

Played my first game of FoG on Tuesday - had to wait until Book 5 of the army lists before I could play with my Trajic Romans [lesser known brother of Trajan] using the Principate list: http://www.flickr.com/photos/46755253@N00/898349671/

Played against another first timer using Early Armenians. I found his cataphracts to be lethal - even though we missed the rule about cavalry being able to withdraw and then charge again. I have tried to think of what I can do in the framework of the rules to reduce the effectiveness of opposing heavy cavalry whilst I'm doing what I think I should be doing to win a battle, which is to bring my legions into contact with his main infantry battleline.

I don't have cavalry sufficient in quality or quantity to fend off the cats, and I suspect a unit of auxilia won't last very long either.

Having finally played I understand that I can use light horse to slow down the cats and I have considered some artillery as a possibility - or deploying a legion deeper than it is wide to reduce the number of bases coming into contact. What did the Romans do about opposing heavy cavalry?

Michael.

daleivan · Post by **daleivan** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 8:16 pm

FWIW, Arrian's Order of Battle against the Alans advocated placing archers in the back ranks of a cohort when facing cavalry. The Principate Roman lists allows for this. I would give that a try.

Stationing your own Auxiliary cav in one rank to evade in front of the cataphracts and keep them occupied might be another option.

Also, deploying on a hill is always a good option when one has a hill available.

No doubt I'll face a cataphract army with my Late Republicans at some point, so I feel your pain

Scrumpy · Post by **Scrumpy** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 9:12 pm

Do you really expect sympathy for playing filthy R*m*ns ?

SirGarnet · Post by **SirGarnet** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 10:03 pm

Break off can make difference. Since you are even on Impact if charged but are down a POA in Melee from armour, the Cataphracts being required to break off in Joint Action if your Romans are undisrupted after Impact and Melee works to their disadvantage - they will sit at 4 MU during your turn, then charge again in their Impact Phase.

Rear rank archers are good against Cataphracts, giving you more loss absorption and a slight mathematical edge in Impact. Really, though, you really don't want to fight them with the Legions if you can keep them otherwise distracted, unless you can fight them off open ground, where they lose their Lancer POA.

Your Legions are cheaper frontage than the Cataphracts, which means you have more points at work elsewhere.

Allied forces can offer counters in the form of Pikes, Spearmen, and Cataphracts, but most of those are early period.

Mike

timmy1 · Post by **timmy1** » Sun Jul 06, 2008 6:58 am

Midpoint, MikeK is 100% correct, just don't charge the Cats with the legion. If you don't play the breakoff rule, leave the Romans in the box. I find having the sequence of play (at P168) open all the time really helps avoid such misses.

This week I was using Trajic Romans against Later Seleucids. They have 2 BG of 6 Cats, the Agema being Superior. After the Agema hit superior legionaries and broke off, the Seleucids senior commander spent the rest of the game helping the Agema perform CMTs to avoid charging the legion again.

I would add 1 clarification to Mike's point. UNLESS your flanks are a problem, if the Cats breakoff in their bound, move to 1 MU from them in your bound. They are really restricted in what they can do if you are 1 MU from them and if you can repeat the process the Cats will end up off table or will breakoff into one of their own BG and that is when the fun starts. If you leave the Cats at 4MU they then have options to get greater than 6MU from you and can second move somewhere else - e.g. into the Auxilia which you will NOT like.

Scrumpy
You should know better, EIR was a Dog under DBM, and this R*m*n is risking life and limb bringing civilisation to the barbarians, he needs all the help he can get. Us Romans are not all corner sitters.

OhReally · Post by **OhReally** » Sun Jul 06, 2008 2:39 pm

MikeK wrote:Break off can make difference. Since you are even on Impact if charged but are down a POA in Melee from armour, the Cataphracts being required to break off in Joint Action if your Romans are undisrupted after Impact and Melee works to their disadvantage - they will sit at 4 MU during your turn, then charge again in their Impact Phase.
Mike

Yes, but if you lose to the Cats on impact you are down another point on the morale roll for losing to lancers.

hazelbark · Post by **hazelbark** » Mon Jul 07, 2008 12:37 am

Just had the Trajanic types versus Attila Huns this morning.

everything average
I took lots of legion most in 4s with 2 LF support. Armoured
2 MFs of armoured swd/lt spear
1 MF of bow
2 CV armd one sw/lt sp the other sw/lanc
some dribs of LH, LFx2
Pressed forward aggressively. and herded the mounted shooty.

Now the opponent failed to have a heavy force to fix which clearly you faced with cataphracts.

But i deployed in tight side BG to side BG. Covered only aboout 40% of the table on my right. My cav were in reserve so they could lend rear support.

The idea was to wheel out. Keep the mounted behind. If something broke through they could attack its flank. And when enemy holes opened we could sortie out.

Worked rather well.

Fulgrim · Post by **Fulgrim** » Sun Aug 03, 2008 8:41 am

how about knights in an open tournament? ive been trying to imagine matchups that would work vs knight-armies but i have a hard time finding one...

jlopez · Post by **jlopez** » Sun Aug 03, 2008 8:57 am

When facing mounted it is critical to remain steady to cause a break-off after a melee. The only solution for that are units in rear supports and generals with units. Even though you maybe slowly losing, you can gain several turns to attack the rest of his army and maybe turn the flanks of the charging cataphracts.

Knights are always going to be a bitch and short of avoiding them, I might contemplate a unit as a sacrificial offering to get them to pursue away from the rest of the battle line. By the time they stop pursuit, turn around and move back towards your units you will probably manage to defeat the rest of his army. Obviously, it only works if he has one or two BGs of knights.

This "tactic" also allows you to use your drilled BGs in reserve to charge flanks once the knights have been outdistanced by the routers. You'll drop him a cohesion level as a result of the flank charge and if you're lucky he might lose another level if he loses the impact. Fighting fragmented knights kind of evens things out nicely.

Julian

Fulgrim · Post by **Fulgrim** » Tue Aug 05, 2008 12:24 pm

thanks for the input jlopez, it was along those lines i was thinking myself - that there is no favourable matchups and it comes down to avoiding combat. just have to outmnouver knights with my HF then

Do ponder to use Commagene allies to insert a 12-pike speedbump but then i lose out in legionaries

Ah well, the romans are far from finished and ill probably play my hungarians instead - easiest solution