Command and Colors Ancients: Lake Trasimenus

Another round of hybrid gaming converting the Command and Colors: Ancients board and blocks game into a miniatures game using 6mm miniatures from Baccus and the Hexon terrain system. All the minis and Hexon tiles were supplied by Mikey.

Table view as seen from the Republican Roman's (me) side
Note the use of string to demarcate the battlefield zones

Obviously a more visually satisfying gaming experience
playing with minis on a terrain table, IMHO and of course, the
Command and Colors system is perfect for this type of conversion 

This was definitely a challenging terrain for the Romans

Carthaginians and Republican Roman Medium Infantry

Roman General and Heavy Infantry about
to face a Carthaginian Cavalry charge 

Back to Hacking and Slashing with Command and Colors: Ancients

Being the self-styled 'Historical Miniaturist' plainly states that I delve into miniatures and history. It also implies that I'm a gamer (primarily historical) and like most gamers I'll play anything provided that it has drool-worthy eye candy.

'A Viking we will go, a Viking we will go...'

A diorama of my Roman Cavalry being supported by allied
Numidian Elephants sometime during the Punic Wars.

Since I like well designed board games and the 'look and feel' of miniatures my gaming group's latest foray into this hybrid gaming world has led us to the Command & Colors family of games. After a few games with the actual board game we were hooked. It was only a matter of time that we would substitute the game blocks with our minis played on a larger 4" hex map from Hotz and terrain features.  

 

Vassal screen shot of an epic scenario: Battle of Dertosa.
This classic Punic War matchup between Hasdrubal (Hannibal's brother)
and the Scipio Brothers make a fine minis conversion 
as all the battles in the C&C boardgames.

I can now reuse my Republican Romans (built for Field of Glory and was gathering dust) and game this army to my heart's content. Of course, I have to supplement this army by acquiring a few more units and some repainting of the shield colors to represent unit types used in the game (see pics at the bottom of this article).

Numidian Elephants from Corvus Belli bringing up the rear with
the blue shielded Triarii and green shielded Hastati in the fore.

A Roman Fort from Baeuda is the backdrop for the Hastati with
more Corvus Belli Iberian troops in the fore.

Corvus Belli Iberian troops

Corvus Belli Numdian archers painted as generic Greeks
screening the Iberians.

Someone tell me what manufacturer these Velites are. It's been a
few years since I've put this FoG army together and the brand eludes me.

A Roman Fort from Baeuda with Numidian Elephants and Numidian light cavalry both Corvus Belli. 

'The Elephant of Surprise.'

Roman Cavalry from Corvus Belli and another forgotten manufacturer. 

My command stands featuring my two favorite Consular Generals: 
Nefarious Purpose on the white horse with Crismus Bonus on the black.

All you need to play is to follow this recipe: 

One box of Command & Colors (Ancients or Napoleonics)

One 4x6 Hotz Mats w/4" hexes (your choice of green fields or dessert)

Obligatory terrain: trees and hills

6 mm or 15mm miniatures (6mm for Napoleonics and 15mm for Ancients in our case) 

My re-purposed Republican Romans with repainted shields and ready to go:

Rear rank Legionaries: Triarii and Hastati Heavy Infantry (4 per base: RED)
Allied Italian States as Auxilia Light Infantry (3 per base: GREEN)
Velites Skirmish Light Infantry (2 per base: GREEN)

Coming soon: Roman Medium Infantry (4 per base: BLUE)

More Mid Republican Romans

One of the cool things about FoG that was never reflected in Tactica (another rule set popular in the '80s) was the baggage camp.  The Romans being who they were used fortified camps.  FoG allows you a 40mm x 80mm area to represent this.  I ordered the Roman Fort and tents from Baeuda.  The small area allowed some parts of it to fit quite nicely in this camp stand.

 

It looks empty so posed in context and populated with some units will breathe some life to this plain camp.  Here's the camp manned and guarded by Italian Allies with Numidian elephants (which are still one of my favorite ancient units) and Light Cavalry.

Meanwhile two squadrons of the Equites ride by in column on the way to the battle line.

And let's not forget the generals: Consul Scipio Africanus and his two subordinate commanders: Crismus Bonus and Nefarious Perpus.

Teaser and a break from Modern: Mid Republican Romans for FoG

Awhile ago (make that 2 years ago and some change) I got into Ancients again.  At that time FoG was a highly anticipated rules set to be published by Osprey and replete w/a plethora of recycled images from Osprey's extensive library.  

Since I use to play Tactica back in the day as my intro to Ancients and Medieval periods I thought I'd give it another try.

Here's a few shots of my Mid Republican Roman's (Scipio Africanus' army).

My Triarii (blue shields) w/ Numidian elephants and the Hastatii (green shields) in the foreground.

(click on the pix to enlarge)

Foreground: Hastati, background: Triarii

Hastati

Spanish Scutarii (allies) from Corvus Belli

Italian Allies Pedites Extraordinarii (white shields)
next to my Spanish with the Cretan archers in white tunics screening the front

The important but brittle Velites with the ubiquitous wolf's head

More to follow...