It's been a bit since I've been by. The nice folks at
grogheads.com have been publishing a fair amount of my stuff and I've not been to the table as much as I'd like either. With that as prologue, HL and I set to several rounds of
Commands and Colors: Ancients as we prepare for our part in the Grogheads Central Command, set to begin this very Thursday at Columbus, OH's own Origins game convention. I stand shoulder-to-shoulder with those who remember that Origins was once a wargame convention and would like to see wargaming return to a place; its rightful place having been usurped it would seem by a combination of lovely boardgames and silicon chips.
Particularly exciting this year, we're going to have some wargaming geared to younger gamers. We've chosen
C&C:A because of its relative simplicity, but also because it's offered for sale by the fine folks at Enterprise Games who are one of the sponsors of Central Command. We've got three slots available and have chosen three different scenarios, each of ascending difficulty, so that certain rules can be taught as we go.
The first is, appropriately enough, the very first of the included scenarios, the battle of Akragas (406 B.C.) It suits the present purposes as it offers a limited number of troop types and has no terrain. The historical narrative of the battle is reasonably well handled here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Akragas_(406_BC) where, to sum up, the Syracusans come to break the Carthaginian siege of the city and win rather handily. In our own dust up, HL had the Syracusans.
The image above is the board at start. My big bats are the two heavy chariots, one unit to either side. They punch hard and can follow up a successful melee with another melee, but, at two blocks, they are near an archetype of the glass cannon. My foe men for their part have that cluster of heavy infantry in the middle that, while slow, represents the very best of Greek spear-and-shield fighting; all together best avoided.
It didn't take too many turns for matters to go pear-shaped. The Syracusan right fell on my left -- as a dad, I'm pleased the boy is finding some aggression, but I digress -- and, with a couple of lucky rolls, wiped out my chariots before they could do anything more than kill a light infantry block or two. My right flank is ordering pizza from a charming local eatery; or something else unproductive.
The left is not improving. Dionysius has crashed his medium cavalry well into my lines. If I'm not mistaken, I'm already down 3-0 in victory banners at this point.
I managed to turn the tide just a little bit by wheeling Himilco and his mighty auxilia (sigh) who, with the assistance of a "Clash of Shields" card, joined in my single best turn of the game. With the bonus that card confers in hand, I was able to cobble together three victory banners. Although, as can be seen, my other heavy chariot unit is gone. HL proved unnaturally adept at rolling red squares this afternoon.
The end, though, was one of those moments for which
C&C:A is deservedly well-regarded. Daphnaeus had marched his heavies all the way across the board -- one hex at a time -- eventually to reach Himilco's command. I would note in passing that Dionysius has scampered off to behind the Syracrusan lines. His five heavy dice were enough to end the rest of Himilco's troops and then, at the last, Himilco himself.
Final score: 5-3.
This will be a good scenario for Origins, I think. Short setup and HL and I managed the whole of it, with photography, in well less than 45 minutes. Here's to a bit of groggy goodness in Ohio this week.
