007 Cannae (216 BC)

** This thread discusses the Content article: 007 Cannae (216 BC) **

Eric S. Raymond wrote some comments about this scenario on his webpage. CLICK HERE to read full article.

I think this scenario is quite unbalanced in favor of the Carthaginians. Between their cavalry superiority, 2 more command cards, and their lights' ability to evade, they will normally be able shape the battle pretty much to their liking; the fact that they almost controlled that shape anyway even with my three lucky Line Commands is the best possible evidence for this. The designers set out to force something not far from the historical movements and results and succeeded quite well.

To rebalance this, you could give the Romans competent command (5 cards). But it's probably best to play it as a flip-flop set and give the win to the player with fewest total losses.

Solo Play:

The initial movement of the armies very closely matched the historical events with the Romans trying to close in the center and Carthage trying to attack the flanks. Unfortunately, repeating the historical process wound up with almost the same result. There were some highpoints: such as Rome defeating the Carthaginian right flank and the initial light ranged fire managed to eliminate a block from the Warrior units. The Carthaginian left crushed the opposing Roman forces effectively disintegrating the enemy forces. It was several turns before they could try and finish off the lone units, but Rome decided to force march and try to eliminate the heavy units and beat them back. Victory was not to be as a full strength Roman heavy unit was wiped out in a battle back to seal the outcome.

Carthage 7 - Rome 3

Very close battle. Rome almost battled there way into a victory, but they just could not quite do it. Carthage pushed their center forward to meet with the Roman line, but after the initial attacks it kind of stalled out with only the Roman units attacking. The bulk of the Carthaginian success again came on the left wing as it very effectively crushed the Roman units. The heavy push forward is quite effective against the auxilia and medium cavalry. Rome's chance at victory would have came if on the final attack against their Atilius led heavy infantry did not have to retreat. This allowed a follow up attack that eliminated the unit. The following turn Rome had two auxilia in position to advance and eliminate two single block units.

Carthage 7 - Rome 5

Played this yesterday. It does I think favour the Cartheginians. It was a very cautious battle with both of us spending a lot of time getting our battle lines in order.

The heavy units are obviously the best advantage the Cartheginians have, but if they are not used wisely the Romans can win. I took Marhabul from the light cavalry and put him with heavy infantry. He is far more useful there I think.

I won 7 flags to 4.

The Romans need to use their Auxilia as light infantry as much as possible, targeting the Catheginian heavies with ranged attacks. They also need to make sure that their heavy infantry get into the battle at the right time.

I watched a second game after I played my match. It come down to the last die roll, with the Cartheginians stealing a victory by wiping out a full strength medium cavalry unit in a single attack back by medium infantry when it was 6 flags all

Catheginians 7, Romans 6.

Looking at Don Clarkes' results site plus the above shows the following:
Carthaginians 21 wins and Romans 8 wins.

So it appears from that to be a 2.5:1 win ratio in favour of Carthage.

A Roman win! On both flanks the Carthaginian cavalry quickly racked up flag after flag, taking six flags for two, but couldn't quite close the deal when the Roman center pushed back. The Romans were able to pull their most badly damaged units to safety while pushing forward for the win.

Rome 7 Carthage 6

Solo Play

The game started very bad for the Romans with the Cartagiian pushing well on the right flank. Even if the banner advantage for the Cartaginian was not high the Roman losses were so high I almost wanted to stop playing, but then the Romans Medium Infntry clashed back the Cartaginian Heavy Infantry (clash of shield card!) and the game slowly turned to the Roman advantage which started to collect banners and after 15 turns the right Cartaginian flank was back in the base hexes and the lost the game.

Roman 7 Cartaginian 4

Solo Play, close game with Carthage winning 7:6 in the end.

Both sides managed some effective moving into place for strategic effect but battlebacks and a well-timed Mounted Charge turned things for Carthage, two mid-game line commands once things were in place were also sweet. That said the last two moves were "it's anyone's game".

Two games, two Carthagian wins. In the first one, two "Order Heavy Troops" command cards for Carthage sealed the deal on both wings. Also, Carthagian light troops had some great dicerolls in softening up the legions. It wasn't even close, 7-2

In the second game, slugfest in the middle (troops were somehow sucked in there due to such command cards) went a bit better for Carthage. Much closer game, but still comfortable Carthagian win.

Overall, 2 command cards for Carthage is huge.

I just played this solo once again, with Carthage winning 7 - 5. This though, I tried the solo method of giving one side all their cards, and the other only one. It was a surprisingly even contest with the Romans had their chances,