| 2nd
Punic War Warmaster Campaign |
The
main goal of this effort is of course to have fun,
but also to help bring together gamers from the historical
based Fall of
the Ohio Gamers and from the Fantasy/Sci-Fi Louisville
Warhammer Gamers Association. Members
of these two gaming groups are conducting a refight
of
the 2nd Punic war using Avalon Hill's "Hannibal" as
the Strategic vehicle and Warhammer Historical Ancient
Warmaster as the Tactical vehicle to fight out the battles
generated in the campaign using 10mm wargame models.
Conversions
I. The "Hannibal" games
uses Combat Units (CUs) as the basic measure of army
combat strength. Two
CU's approximate a full Roman Legion which is fielded
in Ancient Warmaster at about 1000pts. Ultimately we
will use one CU as 500 Ancient Warmaster army points,
however we well start the campaign with one CU equaling
250 Ancient Warmaster army points while the player/participants
build up their 10mm miniature collections.
II.
Some of the "Hannibal" strategic cards
had to be modified to make sense in the Ancient Warmaster
battles when played.
III.
We will use Carthaginian CUs from the "Hannibal" Game
to build armies from the Cartaginian, Gallic, and
Macedonian
list. Roman CUs will be used to build armies from
the Republican Rome, Imperial Rome, and Greek Hoplite
(Syracuse/Sicily) list.
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Campaign Summary - Final Thoughts 29JAN06
Our refight the 2nd Punic War as a Warmaster Ancients Campaign
has come to a close. Hannibal at long last was pinned down at
Rohne by Nero. Hannibal was outnumbered 6:1 in the final battle.
As you might expect Hannibal was wiped out with the rest of his
troops by the revenge hungry Romans.
We fought
this campaign to a conclusion in just over six months, from
June 14th, 2005
until January 28th, 2006. We had nine major
participants involved and a few “joiners” jumped
in on a battle or two. We played 14 Strategic Rounds and fought
out four major and one minor battle on the Table Top.
It’s a shame Hannibal had been run down. The Carthaginian
Strategy had just started to evolve with a 2nd front opening
up in Italy. I’m not sure Rome ever had a strategy other
than to attack Hannibal and Garrison Sicily, but “to the
victors go the laurels.”
All but one major battle were Carthaginian victories. Team Carthage
did very well tactically when fighting from the northern Italian
stronghold of Gallia Cisalpina where they had local support of
the Celtic tribes like the Boii and Insurbians. The Carthaginians
won three battles there, beating a larger Roman Army every time.
The Carthaginians then opened up a second front in southern Italy
with Hasdrubal. At last a strategy! Hannibal draws of Roman attention
in the north, breaking Legion after Legion from his stronghold
while Hasdrubal grabs land in the south. But alas, the many victories
won against the odds by the Carthaginians made them overconfident.
They ventured away from the support of their stronghold to drive
on Rome itself. The next battle was a defeat for Hannibal and
then Rome brought up fresh reserves while Hannibal had none to
call on.
From here on out it became a race as Hannibal attempted to fall
back on Spain to rebuild an Army. But Rome kept the pressure
on Hannibal pursuing him across the Alps and finally crushing
him in Rohne (central France).
In the end
I’m
very pleased that the campaign went to a solid conclusion and
I thank all those who helped to make it
happen. It was a great learning experience. And I hope to take
the lessons learned here and make it even better the next time
around.
Some key “Lessons Learned” from
this campaign experience:
1) The “Card Driven” campaign of system of “Hannibal” was
difficult for many to grasp. I feel it left some with a sense
of helplessness.
2) The Battles were too darn big! It was very hard to schedule
a battle and get enough people and enough miniatures at together.
3) As much as I like to be inclusive and let as many people participate
as possible, a certain degree of dedication should be required
for people to play in the game. Serious battles were often hinged
on the actions and skills of not so serious gamers who just wanted
to push troops and roll dice. Nothing wrong with that, but the
players who worked hard to learn the rules, follow the campaign,
and often provided miniatures had watch some of that hard work
go up in smoke while players who had little to no idea of what
they were doing were allowed, by me, to fight in many of the
games.
What’s next? I’m interested in hearing what ideas our gaming community
might have, however after conversation with many, I am initially
inclined to run another Warmaster Ancients campaign that will
have multiple factions/teams. At least half a dozen countries/teams,
so that diplomacy will be a significant factor. This may be a “pure
historical” period using something like “Successors” or “Sword
of Rome” as the basis or it may be “hypothetical” where
we have teams/counties that range from Ancient Egyptians to Vikings
probably fighting it out on some imaginary continent/world, think
Hypoboria, Greywawk, maybe even Middle Earth as the Game Map.
No need to rush out and start preparing anything yet, just some
initial ideas and connectivity and workload issues may yet rule
out me doing anything while away next year.
Tom
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