Society of Ancients Battle Day

Society of Ancients Battle Day 16^th April 2005

The Sambre – 57BC Caesar and the Belgae using DBMM

By Adrian Webb

Historical Battle
Only a summary.
The Romans under Caesar (8 legions plus allies) were preparing a new camp, having marched to the location earlier in the day. 6 legions were already at the new site for the camp, the baggage followed by 2 new legions were still on the march.

Initial Historic deployment

The Belgae were in ambush in the woods across the river from the intended Roman camp and launched their attack as the head of the baggage column came into sight.

Map suggesting possible locations partway through the battle

My questions about the historical battle as suggested on the maps above, which are of course conjectural rather than factual:

How do the Nervii move so far to the left, having started in front of 8^th Legion and partially in front of 11^th Legion. From deployment to action they are shown as moving ¾ mile forward and ¾ mile left as they advance – how realistic is this, especially since the intended target was the Roman camp?

The Viromandui are shown initially deployed in front of the 9^th and 11^th Legions. They are shown fighting the 8^th and 11^th, again a large movement to their left.

The Nervii represent about 70% of the Belgae army numerically, but their deployment seems to cover less than half the initial frontage. Are they deployed significantly deeper?

Historically the Viromandui and Atrebates were pushed back fighting, the Atrebates must have broken at some stage as the Xth legion from the extreme left came round behind the Nervii after pillaging the Belgae camp. The marching legions may have attacked the other flank of the Nervii, trapping them. The Nervii are reported as fighting almost to the last man, only 3 out of 400 senior leaders reputedly left alive along with only 500 fighting men out of possibly 60,000. The Roman losses were noted by Caesar as heavy.

The Rules
We used the 8^th April version of DBMM. The figure scale was 250 cavalry or 500 infantry per element. Otherwise there were no changes.

The Players and Armies
The Belgae were:

Nervii C-in-C (Sue Laflin-Barker) – Left flank
C-in-C Wb(F), 2 Irr Cv(O), 5 Irr Ps(O), 5 Irr Ps(S), 52 Wb(F), 2 baggage - 43 ME

Nervii sub-general (Phil Barker) - Centre
Sub-General Wb(F), 4 Irr Ps(O), Irr Ps(S), 50 Wb(F), 2 baggage - 39 ME

Atrebates ally-general (Chris Hanley) – Right flank
Ally general Wb(F), 1 Irr Cv(O), 2 Irr Ps(O), 2 Irr Ps(S), 25 Wb(F) - 19.5 ME

Viromandui ally-general (Norman Whapshott) – Right centre
Ally general Wb(F), 2 Irr Ps(O), 2 Irr Ps(S), 15 Wb(F) - 13.5 ME

The Romans in Game 1 were:

7^th & 12^th Legions - C-in-C (Bill MacGillivray) – Right flank
Brilliant C-in-C Reg Cv(O), 6 Irr Cv(O), 1 Irr Ps(O), 20 Reg Bd(O), 8 pooled baggage – 38.5 ME

8^th & 11^th Legions (Bob Robertson) - Centre
Sub-general Reg Bd(O), 19 Reg Bd(O) – 31 ME

9^th & 10^th Legions (Duncan Head) - Left flank
Sub-general Reg Bd(S), 9 Reg Bd(S), 10 Reg Bd(O) – 40 ME

13^th & 14^th Legions (Bill MacGillivray) – Off table troops, treated as a delayed arrival
Sub-general Reg Bd(O), 19 Reg Bd(I) – 31 ME

The Xth legion was deployed as superior, the pooled baggage represented the baggage column. 8 Bd from each Roman command were initially deployed as single elements in the camp area (contrary to the deployment rectangle rules) and these had to be moved using Pips from their own command.
1st Game The Belgae surged out of the woods across the board, heading slightly to their right so that the Atrebates and Viromandui were facing the Roman left, the Nervii sub-general was heading straight for the Roman centre and camp area, leaving the Nervii C-in-C heading for the Roman left. In the Roman 1^st turn the delayed arrival rolled the required 6 and marched on to support the Roman right flank. The first contact was the Belgae centre against the Roman centre on the hill slope in front of the camp, but with limited effect. Across the board the Romans were struggling to organise their troops with average to low Pip dice.
In the next couple of bounds the combat in the centre rolled back and forth, the losses favouring the Romans, but with no decisive result until the last but one bound. The Viromandui and Atrebates manoeuvred in front of the Roman left looking to create an opportunity to exploit their numbers, whilst the Nervii C-in-C crashed headlong into Caesar’s command which had not yet been able to integrate the elements arriving from the camp. Sue’s Nervii having charged uphill into Caesar’s front line destroyed 3 Bd out of 7 combats in this first attack. In the succeeding bound the Romans tried to rebuild their line and bring up the reserves; the combats destroyed several Wb. In the following bound Sue’s Wb moved spontaneously to fill the gaps left by the destroyed elements and managed to get overlaps at the ends of the line. The end result was 5 Bd destroyed this turn.
In the Roman bound Caesar charged in to help fill the gaps in his line "driving back the enemy in front of him and slaying many." However in the following Belgae bound Sue filled the gaps in her frontage, bursting through in one place to take on the Roman Bd still coming up from the camp in column. End result, 5 more Bd destroyed, making 13 in all, breaking the command and inflicting 8 ME losses on each of the other commands because of the pooled baggage. This disheartened the two smaller Roman commands, regardless of other losses.
Over the next bound the Nervii sub-general was destroyed and his command broken and the Atrebates inflicted damage on the Roman left flank which, added to the baggage losses, broke that command. The Roman losses were now over half and the army was defeated. Thoughts from the 1^st Game Pooled baggage can be a useful way to strengthen all commands, but if the command containing it is broken then it can have a catastrophic (or nearly so) effect on the army as a whole.
If the Roman baggage had not been in the broken command, the Romans would have lost the right flank, 38.5 ME, plus 8ME out of the left flank (including the general) and about 4 ME from the centre, total 50.5 out of 140.5. They may well have been able to hold on and recover to a victory since the Belgae had lost their centre, 39 ME, about 7ME from their left and a few ME from their right, total about 50 from 115. Generally the Romans being uphill were on higher factor than the Belgae in the Belgae turn, resulting in fairly low losses except on the Roman right where the dice were a little bit extreme. However in the Roman turn the factor tended to be 5 for the Bd vs 3 or less for the Wb (overlaps etc) resulting in a lot of doubling on the Wb, let alone the "destroyed if less than" outcome. In the centre whole ranks of Wb were being destroyed for little Roman loss. Getting out of the woods was a slow process for the Belgae, even with good Pip dice.

Changes to the Armies
Having noted the effect of the loss of baggage on the Roman army in the first game, the Roman list was changed for the second game as were the players. The general deployment did not change

For the 2^nd game the Roman army was:
Baggage and Allied cavalry (Bill MacGillivray)
Brilliant C-in-C Reg Cv(O), 6 Irr Cv(O), 1 Irr Ps(O), 8 pooled baggage – 18.5ME
7^th & 12^th Legions - (Adrian Webb) – Right flank
Sub-general Reg Bd(O), 19 Reg Bd(O) – 31 ME

8^th & 11^th Legions (Bob Robertson) - Centre
Sub-general Reg Bd(O), 19 Reg Bd(O) – 31 ME

9^th & 10^th Legions (Bill MacGillivray) - Left flank
Sub-general Reg Bd(S), 9 Reg Bd(S), 10 Reg Bd(O) – 40 ME

13^th & 14^th Legions (Adrian Webb) – Off table troops, treated as a delayed arrival
Sub-general Reg Bd(O), 19 Reg Bd(I) – 31 ME

2^nd Game
The first few bounds followed the form of the 1^st battle, except that the delayed arrival did not turn up till bound 3 and was directed in its entirety to the Roman extreme right flank.

In the centre the combat between 8^th and 11^th Legions and the Nervii sub-general was first off, this time followed quite quickly by combat across the whole front as the Belgae tried to repeat their earlier successes.

However, the Romans had excellent Pip dice early on the in the game and this combined with slower movement by the Belgae meant that the Romans were ready long before the Belgae arrived (3 formed lines of troops on the right and in the centre).

The Nervii sub-command was broken first, followed by the Viromandui and then the Atrebates. Sue’s Nervii again were beginning to blow holes in the Roman line in front of her, but the losses amongst the rest of the army caused the defeat of the Belgae before any Roman command was even disheartened, although some were beginning to suffer.
Thoughts from the 2^nd Game
Placing the Roman baggage in a reserve command was hugely beneficial, providing the Belgae could not destroy the allied cavalry.

Because the Romans were organised and had plenty of Pips, I (as a Roman player) was quite happy await the arrival of the Wb. I did lose several combats and even had a few recoils in my own bound, but still was destroying large numbers of Wb.

General overview
In both games there were two related critical factors:

The speed with which the Belgae could get to the Romans (the difficulty of getting out of the woods when they didn’t start the bound at the edge and required Pips);

The Pips the Romans had to organise themselves (get the troops from the camp to their own command) before the Belgae arrived.

In setting up the game I may have placed the Roman front line too far from the Belgae ambush. However, the map above suggests they should have been ¾ mile or so apart, say 1500 paces or 750 mm and they were about this far apart on the table. Perhaps more of the Romans should have been deployed in the camp area? Also, perhaps the Roman flanks were too far back relative to the centre?

Having made the decision to use only hills permitted by the rules I felt that the overall rising from the river nature of the ground and the plateau effect at the Roman camp were not suitably recreated. Had the slopes extended all the way to the river the Romans may have been more aggressive perhaps with different final results.

In the 2^nd game the Nervii C-in-C’s command was not deployed at the edge of the woods and this delayed them exiting the wood by several bounds (as worded at present impetuous troops in a wood that cannot see an enemy do not actually move).

In neither battle did the Nervii attempt to turn the Roman right, which is suggested by the speculative maps, although I do wonder at the practicability of this as noted above. In practise this was perhaps irrelevant in the first game as the Roman flank was smashed anyway and the Nervii were heading for the flank of the remaining Romans. In the second game the deployment of the Roman reserves to this flank effectively precluded an on table march around this side.

In both games the Atrebates on the Belgae right did try to manoeuvre for advantage, successfully in the 1^st game, unsuccessfully in the 2^nd.

The overall effect on me was that organised Bd with a tactical advantage (uphill) should confidently face Wb, even when faced by 5 or 6 ranks. Disorganised Bd, even with a tactical advantage, are likely to suffer heavy losses to Wb. A second and reserve line are critical when fighting troops that can inflict a quick kill on your troops.

With both sides benefiting from quick kills in their own bounds, there was little recoiling so both sides pretty much fought it out where they stood. There was little ebb and flow of the battle lines and little pause once combat commenced because the impetuous Wb were always driving forward to fill gaps.

Historically the Xth Legion was able not only to defeat the Atrebates (say ½-1 hr), pursue to sack the Belgae camp (say 1-1½ hours) and then return to attack the Nervii on the opposite flank (say ½-1 hour). This suggests a timescale for the battle in the region of at least 2-3½ hours before the Xth Legion attack the Nervii, during which the Xth legion moved in the order of 3 or more miles, much of this in woods, including fighting and pillaging. In DBMM terms this equates to 9-10 pairs of bounds.

Both games lasted this long, but Xth Legion never had an opportunity to move forward, let alone that far. Perhaps march moves are too slow? Leaving a small allowance for combat, the Xth Legion needed to move say 3 miles, 6300 odd paces, in 1½ to 2½ hours largely through difficult going and is not possible to re-create in the game.