Death in the Sands

 Your correspondent now finds himself with Legate Adrian’s army amongst the burning sands of North Africa.  Arrayed before us is the barbaric splendour of the Numidian army and the traitorous cohorts of Malchus Bonitus  (MalBo for short).   

Mal joined the left flank of David’s Numidian horde and Rick was appointed Tribune in command of Adrian’s (Roman) right.

The battlefield was generally open with a scattering of scrubby palm groves around the perimeter.  High dunes broke up the Eastern side of the field with some undulating ground in the North West corner. 

As expected the Numidian’s outscouted the Romans and Adrian started by deploying his left (Eastern) wing.  The Numidians responded by committing their elephants against the Roman centre.  A clash of legions was set up on the Western side of the battlefield as both armies deployed their cohorts on the open side of the battlefield.  The Romans went on to deploy a strong legionary centre opposite the Numidia elephants and the Numidians completed the deployment with a cavalry heavy right wing.

The Numidian plan was to push hard on both flanks, aiming to envelope the Romans and deliver killing blows to the Roman rear and camps.  The Romans planned to collapse their right flank and create a stronghold on the left and centre of the battlefield taking advantage of the disordering terrain.

At this point David played his stratagem forcing the whole Roman centre to fall back one square.

During the initial moves of the battle the Numidian left made steady progress pushing their heavy infantry forward and throwing their allied cavalry out to the western edge of the battlefield in what turned into a wide outflanking move as Rick’s troops drifted towards the centre of the battlefield. 

The bulk of the Roman army moved slowly forward sending their light troops to occupy the broken ground on their left.  The centre and right of the Numidian army made good progress, closing with the Roman line.

At this point then battle proper commenced with the renegade cohorts attacking and destroying Rick’s right wing cohort.  The mercenary Gallic cavalry also got in on the action charging the flank of the Rick’s cavalry, disordering them and forcing them to evade towards the Roman centre.

The Numidian left wing pressed its advantage disordering and then destroying a second loyal Roman cohort. 

On the Numidian right wing the Roman flank guard (javelin armed light infantry) was destroyed and the mass of the Numidian light cavalry began to flow round the exposed Roman flank. 

Roman missile fire was ineffective and in the centre of the battlefield the Roman cavalry had been forced to withdraw in the face of the advancing Pachyderms.  The Gallic mercenaries continued to harass the rear of Rick’s cavalry,

The Romans despaired!

As the Roman left manoeuvred to defend their camp the cohorts in the centre assaulted the Numidians, disordering their elephants and destroying the supporting spearmen.  In a move of breath taking confidence the victorious cohort about faced and charged the rear of the Numidian elephants breaking them and causing them to rampage through and disorder the Roman line.

Rick’s cavalry rallied and charged the flank of the remaining elephants smashing them and causing them to rampage off towards the Numidian Rear.

 The Numidians had no answer but did succeed in disordering the Roman Auxiliaries on Adrians left.  The Roman resurgence continued, Rick’s remaining cohort moved smartly to the right and destroyed the overextended Gallic cavalry.  Numidian morale was wavering!

On the Roman Right Adrian had succeeded in building a defensive cordon around his camps and pinned the threatening Numidian cavalry to the edge of the battlefield.  Alarum! Adrian’s subordinate general had been struck.  A mere light wound he bravely continued to direct his command.

 At last the Roman archery came into its own, destroying the remaining Numidian cavalry and driving the outflanking lights from the battlefield.  Despite the Numidian left wing finally succeeding in returning to the battle, but with only light troops in contact with the Romans in the centre and right the Numidian army was broken.

Hailed Imperator by his cohorts Legate Adrian has now earned the right to march on Rome and challenge Emperor Paul for the purple.  Our next game will be Rome vs Rome!