Battle of Adrianople 378 CE

An friend of mine, Dave, is working on a refight of the Battle of Adrianople for a Society of Ancients game day in 2022 and kindly offered to give it a run through as a learning exercise for me with Mortem et Gloriam and to give my 15mm Late Imperial Roman army a first outing. As this was a refight and is intended as a demonstration game, the scenery was pre-defined rather than using the normal MeG pre-game mechanism and there were some special rules, particularly on movement in the deployment phase. 

Goths

• Fritigern - Talented, instinctive
• Alatheus - Competent, instinctive
• Saphrax - Competent, instinctive
• ANO - Competent, instinctive
• Camp - Poor, Fortified
• Comitatus Cavalry - 6 Cavalry, Formed, Loose, Superior Protected, Short Spear, Melee Expert, Dismountable
• 4x Warriors - 8 Infantry, Tribal Flexible, Average, Protected, Unskilled Javelin, Short Spear
• Ex-Roman Infantry - 6 Infantry, Formed, Flexible, Average, Protected, Unskilled Javelin, Short Spear
• Archers - 8 Infantry, Formed Loose, Average, Unprotected, Experienced Bow
• Comitatus - 6 Cavalry, Formed Loose, Superior, Unprotected, Devastating Chargers
• 3x Cavalry Warriors - 6 Cavalry, Formed Loose, Average Protected, Short Spear
• 2x Archers - 9 Infantry, Skirmisher, Average, Unprotected, Experienced Bow, Combat Shy
• 2x Alans - 6 Cavalry Skirmisher, Average, Unprotected, Experienced Bow, Cantabrian
• Huns - 6 Cavalry Skirmisher, Average, Unprotected, Experienced Bow

Romans

• Valens, Cassio, Trajan & Victor - all Competent Professional
• Camp - Formed Loose, Average, Protected
• Scutari - 4 Cavalry, Drilled Loose, Superior, Protected, Unskilled Javelin, Short Spear
• 2x Equites - 4 Cavalry, Drilled Loose, Average, Protected, Unskilled Javelin, Short Spear
• Equites Dalmatae - 4 Cavalry, Drilled Flexible, Superior, Protected, Experienced Javelin, Short Spear
• Cataphracts - 4 Cavalry, Drilled Close, Average, ArmHrs/FArm, Long Spear, Devastating Chargers, Shove
• 3x Auxilia - 6 Infantry, Drilled Flexible, Average, Protected, Experienced Darts, Short Spear, Shield Cover
• Auxilia Sagitarii - 6 Infantry, Drilled Loose, Average, Unprotected, Experienced Bow
• Equites Sgitarii - 4 Cavalry, Skirmisher, Average, Unprotected, Experienced Bow
• Archers - 6 Infantry, Skirmisher, Average, Unprotected, Experienced Bow, Combat Shy

The rest of the post below is Dave's summary and assessment of the game, interspersed with my photos and captions.

The test game went quite well. It played for 10-11 turns and was eventually narrowly won by the Romans, who were themselves one break away from their TuG to break limit.

We used three special rules:

Gothic cavalry arrival:

Cards dealt to the two cavalry commands as normal but face up.

Black - A cavalry unit arrives at the table edge.

White - A cavalry unit moves on to the table

Colours - no arrival but can be played normally on on table units.

Arrivals were placed on table before normal movement.

For a competent general (so 3 cards per turn) this should generate approx one unit per turn but it could be none, two or three. Once all units had arrived cards were dealt face down as normal.

Roman march column:

Roman units arrive on the road in a one wide column with one MU distance between them. Units in this formation may be moved as a group. Move distance over good going is increased to 4 MU. Once within 6 MU of an enemy unit they must convert to a normal formation ASAP. Treated a flank charged if attacked in march column. Roman foot must enter the table edge on the road but do not have to stay on it.

Roman rearguard cavalry arrival:

In the test game they were allowed to arrive once all the Roman infantry were on table. This actually proved too slow so we thought they should be allowed to arrive on turn Two in future games as they historically left the road and sped forward to reinforce the heavily engaged Roman vanguard cavalry.

Because the arrival of the Gothic cavalry was a bit delayed the deciding factor was the titanic infantry battle in the centre.

The action started with the Gothic infantry deployed behind the ridge on their side of the table with only a few archers and skirmishes visible to the Roman vanguard cavalry.

The game started with only the Roman forward cavalry units and some auxilia in march columns on the road on table.

The Scutari heavy cavalry and a unit of horses are front-left for the Romans, advancing confidently on a vulnerable looking unit of foot archers, little suspecting that they were actually a skull-rolling machine that went on to shoot them up on the approach then break them in the impact. A unit of Equites is on the right whilst the first two units of auxiliaries are in column of march on the road. 

The Roman Scutari attacked the exposed Gothic foot archers but were badly shot up as the main Gothic battle line appeared over the ridge.

Over the next three turns the Roman foot raced to deploy as the Goths closed the distance between them. The Gothic cavalry started to arrive on the Roman left flank but only the Alan's and Huns appeared which allowed the Romans some more time to deploy their infantry.

The start of Turn 4. Two units of auxiliaries have deployed off the road whilst the first two of four units of legionaries are marching across to form a second line. With the Scutari being shot up then broken in melee by the Gothic foot archers, the horse archers were feeling a bit exposed as the Alans and Huns closed in on them. However the surviving Equites are completing their move across the front of the the infantry to come to their support whilst the rearguard cavalry are coming up fast on the left. 

Turn 6. The Roman's first line with only two auxilia is already under pressure but Fritigern's dismounted bodyguard took a battering from the initial volleys of darts and the three legions and another auxilia have completed their moves to form a second line, leaving the superior legion, still in column of march, to the rear.

Turn 6, the cavalry. The Roman Equites Sagittarii had evaporated under the arrows of the Alans and Huns and a move by a unit of equites to push back Alans led to them taking a battering too. The Huns were busy getting themselves out of the way whilst the Roman Catphracts and the Equites, who had started off on the right flank, moved up.

Both the Roman rearguard cavalry and the Gothic horse arrived at a similar time to each other and clashed in the centre of the table. The outnumbered Roman cavalry attempting to hold up the superior numbers of Goths while the legions and auxilia confronted the main Gothic battle line.

Turn 7. The right hand auxilia is close to breaking and a legion moves up in support - too close as it turned out and they had to take a KAB test when the auxilia inevitably broke. The legions on the right were doing better, chewing their way through two larger units of Goth infantry.

Turn 9, I think. The two Roman legions on the right have broken the two Gothic infantry units and advanced in pursuit but lost three bases in the process whilst more fresh Goths are bearing down on them. The right hand auxilia is close to breaking and a legion moves up in support - too close as it turned out and they had to take a KAB test when the auxilia inevitably broke. The cavalry battle on the left is at a critical point. The left hand Equites broke in melee with the lead Gothic heavy cavalry but the Cataphracts also charged into the front of the Goths, doing better in the impact, and have expanded out. The last unit of normal Equites have charged into the foot archers and also expanded out in the melee. 

Turn 10. The two Roman auxilia have broken but the Gothic infantry centre has taken heavy losses and the survivors are facing two fresh legions. The Roman Cataphracts have broken the Gothic cavalry and their pursuit has taken them behind the flank of the other two units of Gothic heavy cavalry and are about to turn in for a flank charge. The Roman Equites, with their general leading from the front (all his other units had been destroyed so there wasn't much to lose!) are about to break the Gothic foot archers and, with that, narrowly win the race to reach the opposing army's break point.

The end. A much thinned-out table, with boxes full of casualties for both sides. It was a thoroughly enjoyable game and I'm looking forward to my next game of MeG and, having learnt from my mistakes in this game, finding a whole lot of new ones to make. 

Overall, I thought it worked well as a game and a simulation. The only thing we didn't really resolve was whether to create some kind of special rule to make the Roman cavalry attack impetuously at the start of the game as in the real battle. In the test game we forced them to advance at full speed and attack the nearest Goth unit then after that as the player wished.

I think it would work well either as a two hander or a four player game. Hopefully we can have another test game before the games day and I might even build some special scenery.

Vehicles - a learning experience!

My earlier WW2 vehicles were painted with lots of dry brushing and, for the British ones, using a olive green mixed by eye. Unfortunately this meant I had little confidence I could mix the same colour again and even within the earlier ones I have a lot of variation. Looking at those models now, I am not really satisfied with the effect. I would like to achieve a cleaner and more uniform appearance, as well as a more realistic (and repeatable) match for SCC15.

My first thought, having relied on the painting tutorials on the Crac des Chevaliers blog for my infantry was to continue with the "clean style" for vehicles. Although the results on there look great, when I made  a test I wasn't really happy with either my execution and thought it was a bit too clean on the larger canvas of a tank. Later vehicles on CdC are painted by airbrush with a panel high lighting style which I think I prefer. Although I have owned an airbrush for a few years, purchased to paint my 1:1250 / 1:1200 waterline ship models, I have never really learnt to use it for more than laying down a single uniform coat. With my wargames painting focussing on Italian Wars French and then Late Romans, there was little call for airbrushing! However I came across some great tutorials by Rubén Torregrosa on his HeresyBrush blog, applying this technique to 1:144 tanks so thought I'd give it a go.

I had some vehicles part complete by the dry-brush method but looking closely at these, the assembly wasn't that great and some detail was already obscured by the paint so I decided to strip them back to bare metal. I used a cheap paint stripper from Wilco, which worked well, followed up with a soak in Fairy Ultra and good scrub with a stiff nylon brush and a lighter brush with a brass wire brush to really clean up the surface. The brushes were from a set of 3, also from Wilco, for the bargain price of £1.00 - I'm not sure what I'll do with the miniature steel wire brush but it may come in handy for DIY.

To hold the vehicles for spraying, I attached short sections on dowel to the undersides and appropriate drilled holes in a piece of wood to hold them for drying. The Daimler AC turrets already had their magnets glued on so I just put them on top of round nails, relying on the strong magnet to hold them firmly enough.

I should at this point give a little shout out for a small model and paint shop near me in Coventry: the Paint Rack. I wanted to get the Mig Ammo filters and washes recommended on Heresy Brush and, after recent disappointing results with mat varnish, the Mig Ammo Ultra-Matt varnish that Chevalier de la Terre suggested. The paint rack was able to supply these as well as such much needed advise on airbrushing the primer and varnish.

I started with an airbrushed primer coat using Mig Ammo One Shot black. In hidsight, I think black was maybe a mistake as it was difficulty to see where the dark base coat was covering it - I'll probably use grey next time.

My SCC15 is a 50-50 of Vallejo Model Color 888 Olive Grey and 924 Russian Uniform. I started with a base of 50% SCC15 with 50% black then SCC15 applied from above and at 45° then a first highlight of three parts SCC15 to one part buff and final highlight of 50-50 SCC15 and buff. I picked out small details and some edges with a fine brush and painted details like tools and stowage normally.

The tutorial suggested Vallejo 304 Track Primer, appropriately enough, for the tracks. I didn't have that and figured any medium grey-brown would be OK so used a 50-50 mix of Olive Brown and Medium Grey.

With the painting done, I was looking forward to applying the decals then filters and washes to bring the whole thing together and add definition. To provide a smooth surface for the decals, I brushed on some Tamiya gloss varnish locally where the markings would go and over exposed details to provide a bit of extra protection. This was a huge mistake. The Tamiya varnish reacted with the Vallejo paint to produce a bubby, smeared mess and I didn't realise until I had done the last part of the last vehicle. 

So rather than a series of finished photos, here they are back in the paint stripper.

As a late addition, adding insult to injury, the paint stripper has turned the black primer into a tar-like goo that is insoluble in everything I’ve tried so far.

We (hopefully), learn from our mistakes and this is certainly providing a lot of learning opportunities!

15mm WW2 German Company HQ and another platoon.

As I've previously written, I started my WW2 15mm collection back in the early 1990s. I'd like to think my painting has improved since then but I didn't want to discard the effort I'd put into painting those earlier figures so my plan was to do a minimal update to blend them in with newly painted figures as I expended and re-based my collection to suit new rules.  However the reality was that my colours then were so far off that most details needed re-doing and even the uniform shadow colour was a poor match so by the time I'd given them a wash of Army Painter strong tone, new mid-tones and highlights for the uniforms and all the details repainted, I don't think I saved any time at all. 

The officer, panzerfaust team and a few others are painted from bare metal whilst others, including the riflemen in the three squads are the refurbs. It should be obvious which was which from the faces. All the figures are from PeterPig.

The new figures, including the panzerfaust team above, were painted and varnished after the refurbed figures and didn't suffer the satin varnish drama of my previous German platoon. Although there is a bit of sheen in the photos, this isn't apparent on the models.

With two platoons done and a third well along, I thought I thought I'd better get a company command base done. As with my British infantry, this is three figures, including a radio, on a 30 mm square base.

I've tried various materials to represent aerials. Bristles from brushes - relatively in-scale but too fragile and too much variation. Very fine piano wire - too many puncture wounds and too much blood dripped onto the miniatures. I did briefly consider cat's whiskers but he is now hiding under the spare bed so this one uses fishing line. It looks way over-scale and a bit curved but it should be tough and safe.

I'm now most of the way through another platoon. After that I plan to do a couple of MG42s on tripods then I'll be back to the British 4 KSLI for another company and the carrier platoon. 5 platoons down, only another 11 to go, plus vehicles!

First German Platoon

For this first platoon, I used all new figures and tried to follow the clean painting style and colour choices on the excellent Crac des Chevaliers blog.

I'm pleased with the result and it is certainly an improvement on my earlier WW2 Germans, painted with lots of dry brushing and with a far too blue field grey, but inevitably it falls a bit short of what I was aiming for. Not quite as clean as I wanted and the varnish has gone satin - not sufficiently mat varnish really is my Achilles heel! 

These took quite a long time. A combination of  trying to follow somebody else’s methods and a strictly defined colour scheme with much less space for making it up as you go compared with my Romans or Italian Wars collection. Ah well - practice makes perfect.

One issue from using a single base for a section, including the LMG team is that you can’t really use prone figures firing a bipod MG42 mixed with upright figures. It looks ok with advancing figures, as below, but I’m not 100% convinced by the standing firing figures. 

I especially pity the loader here, being used as a rest for the MG42. Really hope he has some good ear plugs!

Back to Normandy in 1944

4th King's Shropshire Light Infantry, A Company. 4 KSLI were part of 11th Armoured Division, landing on Juno Beach on D+7 and playing an important role in the division's battles through Normandy to taking Antwerp, liberating the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp and ending the war on the Baltic coast of Germany to block a feared Soviet advance into Denmark.

After a sustained effort painting a Late Roman army, I have turned my attention back to World War 2 gaming in 15mm

My British and German forces were based for "Overlord" by Barrie Lovell / Firebase Games. Whilst these are very detailed and have the feel of being realistic and grounded in personal experience of military practice, they don't give a very quick game and max out at an infantry company plus support per player. It seems to me that most identifiable actions in this period were battalion sized so I would like to be able to depict that on the table top with a reasonably playable game and a satisfying sense of scale. 

The question then is: which rules? Convincingly depicting scale seems one of the hardest challenges for WW2 rules. Having two or three infantry figures on a base seems common then different rules use a base as an sub-component of a squad, a whole platoon or a company and sometimes there is no easy way to tell from looking at the game whether you are seeing a company or a brigade.

Overlord has an infantry section as three bases - two rifle groups and an LMG team. A British late war platoon is 14 bases, 45 (independently moving) bases plus support for a company. It is easy to see why it bogs down beyond a company per player! I've just bought the new "O Group" rules from Reisswitz Press which look really promising but has just three bases - as few as 9 figures for a platoon and that just seems too few to to me to look like a platoon. 

A regular opponent and I have been trying to write our own rules with one base per section and separately depicted platoon command and support. I'm therefore expanding and rebasing my collection for these potential new rules or O Group, with 5 figures on an infantry section  base - enough for an NCO, LMG and three riflemen so three bases looks a bit more like a platoon of three squads.

Different platoon representationss. Left to right: three bases of three figures; three bases of my new five figure section bases; three sections plus command, PIAT and 2" mortar and an Overlord German platoon - a British platoon would have an additional base for the 2" mortar. 

As well as rebasing, I needed some additional figures. I painted the earlier figures with a lot of dry-brushing and washes but my painting style has moved on since then and I'm trying to use the clean three layer technique, taking advice on paint choices from the excellent Crac des Chevaliers blog. I started off with a lot of enthusiasm for updating the older figures with webbing and packs to match as well as new high-lights and helmets. After the first platoon though I slacked off to just the helmets and a few high-lights on the battledress. Without the closeup lens you only notice the hats and bases anyway.

Another dilemma is basing style. I've stuck with the same style as for my Late Romans and (more importantly) all my scenery, with one small difference. The sand to provide texture for my British bases was picked up off the beach at Arromanches, so Gold Beach, a few miles to the West of where 11th Armoured actually landed on Juno. 

Late Roman Army for Mortem et Gloriam

 

One of the invariable rules of wargaming with a competition/points based set of rules is that there are never quite enough points for what you would like to do and choices have to be made. Late Romans seem particularly expensive so this restriction bites especially tightly - a good thing for us slow painters as it reduces the number of figures needed!

To field the figures I have painted so far as an army under the Mortem et Gloriam rules, my draft army list is below. I'd welcome criticism of this from MeG players and suggestions for improvement, both with the figures I have already painted and the additions and alternatives I have further down.

I still have some figures left over, some which I am planning to paint, to give me some more alternatives. 

 
Top left is three Legio Heroica Ballista so three bases of light artillery, either as a stand-alone unit or as an option for the three Legions, replacing an infantry base.

Below them some lance and bow armed heavily armoured cavalry with half armoured horses. I have 12 of these and was originally thinking of an extra unit of lance and bow armed loose order cavalry but these don't exist in MeG for the Romans so I thought I'd swap in a couple of fully armoured horses and paint up 8 of them as two bases of close order cavalry to give the option of a 6-base unit of Cataphracts. I can't see me ever having enough spare points to field this however.

Bottom left are some heavy cavalry which I want to use to increase the Honoriani Taifali Iuniores to 6 bases. Unfortunately I only have 5 riders so some creativity will be needed to avoid having to pay a minimum order postage charge on a single 15mm rider!

Top right are 4 groups to expand my 3 Legions and the Petulantes Seniores Auxillia to 8 bases, including one with integral archers. Another option is to buy another pack of legionaries and/or auxiliaries and paint one or two more infantry units for an infantry-heavy army.

Finally, bottom right, 4 more archers to give the option of expanding the Sagittarii Venatores skirmishers to 8 bases.

Late Romans - my original inspiration

In my early days of wargaming I was given the PSL Guide to Wargaming, published in 1980 and long out of print. This contained chapters on various periods, each written by a different person. The chapter on the ancient period was written by Phil Barker, of the WRG, and amongst the illustrations were some photos of his Late Roman army using Minifigs 25mm figures:

'Late Roman artillery with stone-throwing heavy engines and bolt-shooting light engines deployed behind a screen provided by the Batavi. Pack animals and draught oxen wait in rear. The engines are by Hinchcliffe Models.'

'Late Romans in action against their most dangerous traditional enemies, the Sassanid Persians. Persian super heavy and extra heavy cavalry advancing supported by elephants have been countercharged by Roman cavalry. The Persian infantry huddle miserably in the rear, while their light cavalry attempt an outflanking move. The Sassanid figures are obsolete (and that was in 1980!) Miniature Figurines.'

Phil Barker summed the Late Roman Army up with these words: 'Gibbon would have described these as decadent. They would probably have described themselves as up-to-date! Compared with the earlier army described above, they use much more cavalry including super-heavies and horse archers. The infantry have lost their metal armour in favour of moulded leather or none at all, but carry big oval shields painted in colourful regimental patterns, and have added a variety of light throwing darts of very long range to their earlier weapons. Each unit includes a proportion of archers. High quality regular troops can be combined with a variety of barbarian irregulars. A good all-round army and my personal favourite.'

The combination of the rather grainy black and white photos, the captions and Phil Barkers positive comments and personal endorsement had me convinced - I wanted one just like that. The Nottingham Wargames Club, where I was a member, had largely gone for 15mm so I followed suit and started collecting my own Late Roman army but my slow painting, exacerbated by the demands of 'O' and 'A' levels meant that it was still unfinished when I went to University, where other pursuits took over, so it sat in suspended animation for almost 40 years before I picked it up again in late 2018.

'Right wing of Late Roman army formed for battle. Light cavalry of the Promoti and Scutarii on the extreme right, then Catafractarii guard the outer flank of the infantry with the Alani in support behind. Two Palatine Auxilia units, the Cornuti and Victores, form the first infantry line with the Legions of the Lanciarii and Herculiani in support. The Emperor and his bodyguard wait behind the junction of the cavalry and infantry. Figures by Miniature Figurines.'

As I haven't painted my bolt-shooters yet and have neither stone-throwing heavy engines nor Sassanid Persian Super Heavy Cavalry to pose for a photograph, here are some of my Late Romans in more or less the same formation:

Right wing of my Late Roman army formed for photography. Light Cavalry of the Secundo Sagittarii and Promoti Seniori on the extreme right, then Catafractarii guard the outer flank of the infantry with the Honoriani Taifali Iuniores in support behind. Two Palaitine Auxilia units, the Celtae Seniores and Leones Iuniores (probably) form the first infantry line with the Legions of the Lanciarii Galliency Honoriani and Secunda Britanica in support. The Emperor and his bodyguard wait behind the junction of the cavalry and infantry. Figures by Miniature Figurines, Asgard/Table Top Games/Alternative Armies' Isarus, Gladiator Miniatures and Legio Heroica.