Let me share with you guys exciting, new and fresh EPIC scenario for Commands & Colors Ancients. As you probably very well know, this my preferred way of playing that fantastic game – allowing more than two of my wargaming friends to take part in fierce battle!

However, as I played all official and many unofficial scenarios, the time has come to do something on my own! What I decided was to focus on the Second Roman Civil War, and thus grand clashes between Julius Caesar and Gnaeus Pompey. So far with my group we played following of my designs:

All four sessions were great fun, exciting fight and sometimes very close results. Continuing with this good tradition, I created the EPIC Munda (45 BC) battle; the last battle of the Civil War is yet to unfold!

PS. As always, you can click on each picture to see the details.

Some of my articles regarding C&C system:
Commands and Colors games – my 3 favorite
[REVIEW] Commands Colors Ancients
Strategy Article – Skirmishing and Evasion
Strategy Article – Breaking The Line, Holding The Line

EPIC Civil War series:
EPIC Illerda (49 BC)
EPIC Dyrrhachium (48 BC)
EPIC Pharsalus (48 BC) 
EPIC Thapsus (46 BC)
EPIC Munda (45 BC)

Munda (45 BC)

Historical background

Following Julius Caesar’s victory at Thapsus, the remnants of the Pompeian army under Titus Labienus fled to Spain. Here, the garrison legions had revolted in favor of Gnaeus Pompey, the eldest son of Pompey the Great. Pompey gathered a large but mostly inexperienced army of thirteen legions. Caesar traveled to Spain to put a final end to Pompeian resistance. He brought three of his crack veteran legions, the 5th, 6th and 10th, but most of his army was also composed of newer recruits.

Pompey deployed in a strong hill top position so Caesar was faced with an uphill battle. Rather than maneuver for advantage, Caesar uncharacteristically ordered a frontal assault on the strong enemy position. The Pompeians fought with true desperation, for many of those soldiers had been pardoned by Caesar, and then deserted back to Pompey. For them there would be no second chances.

Finally, Caesar’s 10th legion on the right managed to push the opposing forces back. Pompey, under council of Labienus, ordered troops to move from his right to the threatened left flank. The faltering of both wings eventually caused the raw legions in Pompey’s center to bolt back toward the town. About 30,000 Pompeians died – most slaughtered in the rout. Gnaeus Pompey perished with them, and also Titus Labienus, Caesar’s trusted aide who became his bitter opponent.

With his victory at Munda, Caesar finally brought the civil war to an end. He returned to Rome and became “Dictator for Life.” Peace did not last long as Caesar only ruled until March 15, 44 BC when he was assassinated.

Set-up

We played in four of us, split (randomly) in two team of two players each. The idea was for one player on each side to be an overall commander (in that case Lukasz for Cesarian side and me for Pompeian) while the other member of the team would take role of a wing commander (Kuba was facing Marcin). And then the dice were cast, and the rest became history…

The placement of both forces and commanding generals (click to open in the new window). You can see the huge mountains / rough terrain area occupied by Pompeian army as well as Cesar’s legions ready to roll!

Session report

Let the fun begin! Without too much maneuvering, Caesar decided to mimic historical solution and charged headlong towards the hills. The losses started to mount on both sides.
The pressure continued with clever play of “Clash of Shields” by Caesar as well as “Double Time” frontal assault the in center. The losses – similar to historical outcome – were significant.
Ok, it was time for our counter-attack – we cannot take constant beating form Cesarian side. The cavalry charged and hit some weakened infantry but in process was countered by well-played first strike!
Our Pompeian forces also tried a trip on the other side of the map; I almost killed light swing, losing in the process whole heavy infantry unit! Good leader survived…
In the end, the battle in the center turned into Pompeian side favor and I decided to charge downhill!
I was immediately checked and counter-attacked by Caesar and couple of heavy units accompanying him. As you can see, again the losses were staggering and both armies were losing troops in droves.
That was a risky call but I decided – worth a try! With my remaining units in the center – only two mediums and Auxilia – I charged alone Caesar, killed its legion and the great leader too! What a calamity for “Dictator for Life” army!
Having nothing to lose, Lukasz unleashed his cavalry using Mounted Charge. He played it really well, killing two of my units in process. However, my response inflicted enough damage to end the game.

Conclusion

Final look at the map – a pretty a-historical result, with definitive Pompeian side victory although at the great human life cost.
close-up on the left Cesarian wing – they won 3-0 here. Completely unimpressive performance from my side.
But the results on the other wing – and especially in the center (no Cesarian unit at all there) surpassed any of our hopes. Here the battle was decided, Caesar died, and the game ended!

Summary

I knew I will have fun playing EPIC Ancients again and I was not disappointed. The game was tense, with some twists and turns, a lot of surprising developments, death of Julius Caesar and unexpected victory by Pompeian side. The only pity, that with this scenario we finished the Civil War campaign and will need to move to the new one!

That experiment proved that transposing regular CCA scenarios to EPIC format can give impressive results and fantastic gameplay. I will definitely continue and post scenarios to CCA NET page:

More session reports to come – enjoy!