Battle of Ad Salices - Dux Bellorum

View of the table from the Roman lines

View from the Goth lines

Roman left flank

Roman right flank

Goth left flank

Goth right flank

Goth cavalry charges 

Cavalry on the Goth left flank close

Then charge

Infantry advance

Cavalry melee

Last Sunday Craig, Garry and I met down at the Vikings Club in Lanyon, for a Dux Bellorum game with Late Romans and Goths, the Battle of Ad Salices in 377 AD. Craig and Garry were the Roman commanders, Richomeres and Frigeridus and I was the Goth commander Fritigern. Ad Salicum translates as towards the willows, hence the willow trees on the table. In our game after many rounds of close combat the Romans were able to wear down the Goth right flank and eventually it broke.

Goth right flank reforms

Goth infantry charge

Fritigern's Comitatus charge

Infantry slog it out

Skirmishers threaten a flank by the willows

Romans charge Goth warriors on the flank

Roman shieldwall wears the Goths down

Goth left flank survives another round of fighting

Goth right flank routs

Roman shieldwall wins the day

Goth left flanks remains

Goth Infantry 2

Here are some more Goth infantry. These are all from the Gripping Beast, Dark Ages Warriors plastic set, with LBM shield transfers. They are nice figures, easy to assemble and paint. My only gripe with them is they aren't armed with a seax, the standard side arm for Germanic and all Dark Age warriors. Anyway these figures will see action tomorrow as we have a game lined up at the club, the Battle of Ad Salices 377 AD with Dux Bellorum rules.

Command and Colors Napoleonics - Battle of Dohna 9 October 1813

View from the Russian lines

View from the French lines

Russians attack the village of Klein-Sedlitz

Russians take the village

French move up to counter attack

Forces advance towards the villages of Sirsen and Dohna

Last Wednesday night Rick, Simon, Phil and I met at the Vikings Club in Lanyon for a game of Command and Colors Napoleonics (CCN). The scenario was the Battle of Dohna 9 October 1813 in Bohemia with General Bennigsen leading the Russian forces against the French under Lobau. Rick and Simon commanded the French and Phil and I commanded the Russians. This proved to be a hard fought game with the villages of Klein-Sedlitz and Dohna changing sides multiple times. In the end thanks to Phil's incredible dice rolling the Russians prevailed to win 7 to 3 victory banners, while holding the villages of Klein-Sedlitz, Dohna and Ghamig.

Russians capture Dohna

French infantry form a square and bounce the Russian cavalry charge

French attack Klein-Sedlitz

Action around the village of Dohna

Russians drive the French back

Cossacks on the hill destroy a French line regiment

Late Roman Light Cavalry

Here are some Late Roman light cavalry from the new Gripping Beast plastic set. This is quite a nice addition as you can make up twelve Illyrian type light cavalry armed with javelins and shields or twelve horse archers. I decided to do a six figure squadron (turma) of each type. The javelin armed light cavalry above have the shield designs of the Equites Honoriani Taifali Iuniores in the Notitia Dignitatum and were under the command of the Comes Britanniae. This wasn't a great choice for light cavalry as they were famous for their heavy cavalry but a light cavalry squadron may be a possibility at some point in their history. The Taifali were originally a Germanic or Sarmatian tribe. The Late Roman re-enacting site Comitatus has an interesting history of them:

http://www.comitatus.net/cavalrytaifali.html


The horse archers below have the shield designs of the Equites Sagittarii Primi in the Notitia Dignitatum and were under the command of the Comes Africae. There are two options for horse archer shields in the box. Smaller ones without a boss and these larger ones with bosses, which I think look better and are easier to paint with the shield designs. The riders in this set all have saddles which wasn't the case with their Late Roman heavy cavalry set and the torsos are two part with separate heads which enable a greater variety of poses.

Overall I think this an excellent set and definitely worth getting if you are collecting a Late Roman army. The infantry set is my favourite of the three Gripping Beast Late Roman plastic boxes released to date.

Early Byzantine Horse Archers

Here are some early Byzantine Horse Archers and a Belisarius figure from Footsore Miniatures. One of the horse archer poses doesn't have a sword which is strange as it has a helmet and armour. Footsore have just released some infantry and Aventine Miniatures are releasing a Justinian Byzantine range as well, starting with the infantry. There are already two 28mm ranges for this period that I'm aware of - Old Glory and the former Newline figures now owned by SHQ, so gamers will be spoilt for choice once all these ranges are available.