Romans and Gauls by Allan Tidmarsh

 Searching for a participation game that can be played on a small table in a couple of hours with simple rules and 54mm toy soldiers, Anthony dug through his extensive wargaming library and just before Christmas he found this:

An article in an old wargaming magazine furnished this scenario along with "Very Simple Rules for Romans V Gauls", the rules cover just a single sheet of A4, played in an area 7' x 3'.  Written by Allan Tidmarsh (Tidders) a well known wargame blogger, and his full rules can be found here on his By Toutatis blog (link also in the list on the right).  

 Overview of the table, top left sees a Roman supply column making it's way to relieve the watchtower across the river on the right.  Ahead of them, skulking in woods on the hill a small warband of Gauls have spotted the Roman column and prepare an ambush.  Across the river the main body of the Gauls are camped by a ford while another small warband patrols the outlaying land.

Many of the Gauls in my collection were made by Alan and feature in the photos on his By Toutatis blog, they include figures by HaT, Italieri, Cafe Storme and Expeditionary Force.  My Roman troops are all Toyway/Timpo figures similar to the ones which he also used in his games. 

The Roman supply column comprising four units, lead by Legionaries with Centurion, followed by the supply detail and flanked by Auxiliary archers while another unit of Auxiliaries brings up the rear.

The game mechanics are easy to pick up, ideal for a participation game and leave plenty of room for players to customise to their particular scenario.  Players dice for initiative each turn, winner goes first, the standard move for infantry is 6" modified by a further dice throw for each unit to increase or decrease the distance by 2", so that a column like this might bunch up or get strung out on the march.

The player who lost initiative then moves his units in the same manner, after which any firing and melee take place if needed, followed by a morale test for any unit that is reduced to 50%.  And that's the end of the turn. 

The larger warband comprise the figures I painted up, mostly made by HaT and Italieri, they will need a bit more work to bring them up to the standard of Allan's figures

As the supply column proceeds, the movement modifiers have caused the Auxiliary archers to advance beyond the main body of  troops, seeing this the Gauls spring their ambush and erupt from the treeline to attack.  

In the firing phase the archers loose arrows and cause casualties but not enough to blunt the impact of the Gallic charge (no melee or morale test occurred at the end of this turn).  

Seeing the threat ahead the Centurion leads his Legionaries to support the archers while sending the supply unit to safety and ordering the Auxiliary infantry to extend the line.  The warband crashes into the lightly armed archers, cutting them up roughly and prompting a morale test which causes them to fall back on the Legionaries to hold ground.

The melee continues with the Warband breaking the archers but being contained and held by the better armed and disciplined Legionaries. 

Hearing the commotion of battle the main body of Gauls break camp and cross the ford to join the attack while the Auxiliary infantry form up on the flank of the Legionaries.

The second small Warband remained across the river to prevent any attempt by the watchtower garrison to brake out and come to the aid of the column.

The troublesome archers have been eliminated but the original attack has lost it's momentum and been thrown back, during the melee the Legion line has become disordered and both sides end the turn facing each other, winded, but holding their ground.

The fresh Warband throws itself against the Auxiliary line, spears and pilums are thrown by both sides but casualties are light.   The line holds as the charge hits home but gaps open during the melee allowing the Gauls to slip through and around the flank, their greater numbers begin to tell and before long the Auxiliaries are overwhelmed.

While the Gauls are taking trophies the supply unit quietly slips away into the wooded hills, but with another Warband patrolling the opposite riverbank it's unlikely they will get through to the watchtower.

_ _ _ _ _

I felt the melee rules worked well, only figures touching base to base are included in the combat up to a maximum of 3 against 1.  If it's 1 attacking1 then both throw 1D6, if 2 against 1then throw is 1.5 D6 (rounded up) v 1D6 or 3 against 1 it's 2D6 v 1D6 all scores subject to modifiers, highest score wins.  The short rules don't specify that the scores are cumulative so we decided that they were not, i.e. when 3 attack 1, both throw 1D6, if the attacker loses he throws a second dice if this is higher than the defenders original score then the attacker wins.  

When firing, bows have a range up to 18" and can be a serious threat, spears/pilums reach only a short distance of 4", we allowed all troops a resupply of missiles to avoid unnecessary record keeping.  Hits are decided by dice score, modified by range and cover, casualties from firing and melee are all subject to saving throws.

So there we have it, the intention was to test the rules and scenario as written with a view to future use with participants.  I thought they would fit the bill being easy to understand and quick to play, with no record keeping.  They would also easily adapt to other periods, personally I would prefer to use a larger area (6' x 8') and double the movement/firing distances, but we were specifically looking for game to run on a smaller table.       

And finally may I wish you dear reader good health and happiness throughout 2026. 

The perennial problem of basing. It's boring I know!

I collect old toy soldiers, I wargame with 54mm toy soldiers, and I have got too much stuff.  Like everyone else I have too many collections, too many projects on the go and to be perfectly honest it's all become a bit of a mess.....actually it's a lot of a mess.

To impose some semblance of order on the wargame bit I plan to review what I've already got then for each period create initial core armies of 100 foot, 20 mounted and 2 guns.  These numbers were suggested by H G Wells as sufficient for a game, and this seems eminently sensible to me, when I reach the required numbers I will stop and move on to something else.  That's the plan, in so much as there is a plan.  Anyway it's the only plan I've got so with this in mind I broke out my Celts:

Here is the current foot contingent........and already we have a problem.  

I have sufficient toy soldiers to make up the requisite number of foot, the mounted are based, undercoated and awaiting paint, there are also enough bits waiting to be assembled into 2 war chariots. The figures hail from a number of manufacturers including Italieri, HaT, Cafe Storme and Expeditionary Force.

I started this project by painting up units of foot, then got bored and moved on to something else.  Then several superbly made units came up for sale and I couldn't resist the opportunity to jump start the project again.  The problem is integrating my existing figures on the smaller bright green bases above with the new acquisitions on larger flocked bases.

I always base my toy soldiers individually.  Here my old ones are on 2p coins while the new acquisitions are on flocked poker chips, so there is a noticeable size difference.  I don't get worked up about frontages and larger bases are fine for irregular troops but I do care about the overall appearance and want them all to look roughly similar as this pulls them together visually as a unit, also the new ones look like they are running across someone's carpet!

So what to do about this?  I don't think the new additions will give up their poker chips easily but I could probably scrape some of the plush flock back, at the same time fixing the older figures to washers which would give them a similar base size.  have I just answered my own question or can you think of a better solution?  All suggestions gratefully received.

Upcycling a display cabinet for toy soldiers

 Some years ago I picked up an IKEA display cabinet in a charity shop, and have been very pleased with it.  I got it for a reasonable price, and some time later learned that it is their DETOLF model, which is a "Best Seller" and is still available brand new for a very reasonable £65.  Here's what it looks like:

I use it to house my 7 Years War collection of wargames armies, which are quite attractive figures but the collection has now outgrown the four shelves in the unit.  It can house about 300 foot figures but as you can see the big drawback with this unit is that there's a lot of empty space and for years I've been looking for a suitable method to install additional shelves.  A few weeks ago a friend on facebook gave me the heads up on a firm in Northern Ireland who produce custom made supports and Perspex shelves for this very unit.  So I got some! 

The original shelf for two Regiments of Infantry (BMC AWI), two guns and two companies of Grenadiers (HaT and various conversions).  The new shelf supports are a bit fiddley to attach but after acouple of goes you start to get the hang of it and I managed to add a further eight shelves in the space available.

The new layout with additional shelf, for 2nd Cuirassiers, two more Regiments of Infantry and some light troops.  The figure of Old Fritz on the left is an early tin flat.

The original display of the Cuirassiers was a bit cramped.  The bronze disk in the foreground is dated 1757 and is a Campaign Medal issued for the battles of  Lissa (Leuthen) and Rossbach, I found it in a junk box of old coins 50 years ago when I was a teenager working a Saturday job in London's Portobello Road Market, it seemed appropriate to display it here.

The Austrian shelf (these also double as French but I need to do more flags) Three Regiments of Infantry (HaT Prussian infantry), two companies of Grenadiers (Italieri) a unit of Pandours (various conversions) and two guns (BMC)

On the left are the Russian contingent (BMC AWI) and on the right the Army of Brunswick (Marx infantry and HaT cavalry)

New layout with additional shelves.  The Brunswickers on the top shelf and below them the Austrians with the Pandours at the front covering the guns.

And finally a closer look at the Russian Infantry and Artillery.

Woking Wargames Day 2022

 A couple of weeks back (how time flies) I went along to the Woking Wargames Day organised by Mike Lewis of the Little Wars Revisited Group, there were four games in play throughout the day and here is what they looked like:

Mike Lewis put on the Battle of Quatre Bras using Neil Thomas' Napoleonic rules.

The Prussians take the crossroads..........

................and hold it to win the game.

Anthony Morton brought along his Romans and Ancient Germans, as seen on this blog recently.

We didn't use these German cavalry last time we played so I was very pleased to get this shot of them.

Pat (sorry didn't get your last name) treated us to his Anglo-Normans game using the Lion Rampant rules, which seem to be universally popular with 54mm wargamers.

The figures used are 54mm metal castings from Irregular Miniatures.

Nice to see all the different shield designs.

The fourth game of the day was Eric Kemp's Italian Revolution skirmish using Eric's own simple fast play rules.

All the figures were conversions made from just about every American Civil War range you can think of.

Garibaldi's Red Shirts get to grips with Papal Zouaves, Eric's conversions are always a joy to behold.

The home made rules were very easy to assimilate and gave a realistic outcome despite Eric's legendary ability to throw a 1.

I can't remember which Regiment these chaps represent but they were a welcome addition to the Papal forces.

That's all for another year folk's, I missed the last two and am already looking for ward to the next one.

What have the Romans ever done for us? Part II

 We left our Roman Cohort battling against overwhelming odds, surrounded on three sides by the Germanic tribesmen.

Outnumbered three to one, with more tribesmen ready to join the fray the Romans can see two more cohorts of their comrades racing over the northern hill to rescue them. 

Too late, the Romans are cut down to a man.  

Victory conditions for the Tribesmen is to get 3 units off the table via the road to the south, so technically the game is over at this point but we couldn't just leave it there, it's not about winning, it's all about playing the game.

Just when it looked like it was all over, a unit of Roman auxiliary cavalry thunder around the woods to the north west in hot pursuit of the fleeing Tribesmen.

At the same time the alarm is raised as a body of Roman skirmishers and seen working their way through the woods.

The Roman cavalry witness the massacre of their infantry and spur headlong into a charge.

The Tribesmen reform to meet the threat from behind while their archers find easy targets among the advancing enemy cohorts and cavalry.

Back in the woods, the Germanic skirmishers have sprung an ambush on their Roman counterparts, both sides are expert at fighting in loose formation and making full use of cover, they slug it out but with little progress and few casualties on either side.

The Tribesmen have turned to face their pursuers and throw themselves into the attack, more Roman infantry are approaching from every direction but their attacks are made piecemeal and the Germans break them up systematically.

In the end the Tribesmen have taken a lot of punishment but have seen off the Romans and now continue on their way, to lick their wounds and fight another day.

The game ran to about 12 turns and reached a surprising but satisfactory conclusion, in summing up we felt that the slower ponderous movement of the cohorts was the deciding factor, if they could have caught the tribesmen as a cohesive force rather than entering piecemeal then their armoured front wuld have won the day.  As it was we both learned a great deal about the importance of pinning the enemy and then delivering flank attacks, something which is difficult to achieve in later periods with OHW where firepower is more dominant.

And it was great to play with such nice toys!

What have the Romans ever done for us? Part I

 Well they gave us roads!  And here's a nice straight one, just the job for scenario 13 of One Hour Wargames (OHW) by Neil Thomas.  After several grid based games in recent months we decided it was time to get back to a more traditional style of play.  That's not entirely true, Anthony has recently built up a very nice 54mm toy soldier collection of Romans and German Tribesmen, and we were both itching to see them on the table.  Here's how it went:

One Hour Wargames is an ideal game system to use with 54mm toy soldiers and requires minimal amounts of terrain, we chose scenario 13 which sees a German raiding party returning home chased by a Roman Legion looking for vengeance!  

The battlefield is split sown the middle by a fine straight Roman road running North to South, in the north corner is a small hill and on the other side of the road, a little further south is a sizeable forest.  The opening position sees 6 German units following the road from the north and discovering their route home blocked by a Roman cohort on the road to the south of them.

We used the OHW "Ancients" rules but incorporated the Warband features from the "Dark Ages" section, as it better reflects the nature of the German tribesmen and gives them greater mobility with a combat bonus to offset the armour advantage of the Romans.

The Germans drew 4 Warbands of warriors, 1 of Archers and 1 of Skirmishers.  The Romans drew 4 Cohorts of infantry, 1 of Auxiliary cavalry and 1 of Skirmishers.

The Roman Legionaries here are modified from A Call to Arms figures to make the poses more realistic, all the figures in the collection have been expertly converted by Rupert of  Drum and Flag toy soldiers.

As the German tribesmen charge headlong up the road two of the Warbands peel off to move around the flanks of the Roman cohort blocking the way.  The skirmishers have already moved into the woods behind them to protect the rear, with OHW skirmishers have little combat value but are good for holding rough terrain, from which they can dominate the surrounding area with fire while remaining relatively safe.

The Warband figures are converted from several sources including Weston Toy Co Mexicans, and Expeditionary Force Early Germans

Here the German skirmishers (converted from HaT figures) have taken up position in the woods to protect the Warbands from any pursuers.

Two more Cohorts from the Roman Legion have now appeared on the hill to the north east and charge in support of their beleaguered comrades. 

The Roman Cohort blocking the road has been retiring in order, maintaining a steady line while the Tribesmen bear down on them.

The leading Warband slams into the Roman shieldwall while two more hit the flanks.  Can the Cohort hold out long enough for their comrades to reach them in time?