Warband Historical Playtest: Alexander vs Porus

A few years ago I wrote and published a modest little fantasy wargame called Warband.    Since then I've been steadily developing other games that will hopefully one day get out into the wild, including what I'm currently calling "Warband Historical" (a better title will be sought!  I'm currently considering "Comitatus")  Anyway, its taken a lot of work so far, including design, playtesting, redesign, playtest, redesign, etc.

This week, after we struggled through a game of Impetus last week, using Alexander's Macedonians and Porus' Indians, my friend persuaded me to throw down Warband Historical to refight that battle.  I don't like to push my pet projects on my long-standing gaming "buddies" so I took a bit of persuading; but as it happens, we ran with it.  Here's the result.

Because the chaps at the table were only vaguely familiar (if that) with the way the game works, we stuck to the basics and didn't bother with the terrain placement and weather rules.  The armies deployed in sequence and I found it interesting that both sides followed closely the typical historical deployments of their respective armies.  The Alexandrian players in particular arrayed their force in almost textbook formation that Alexander himself would be proud of!

Alexander deployed behind his solid core of heavy pikemen.  His left flank was held by a mix of subject troops like elephants and Persian archers.

The phalanx

On his right flank, the skilled Companion cavalry stood ready to attack, their right protected by the Podromoi fast moving lancers.

Porus, the Indian king, resplendant upon his painted elephant took position in the centre of his battle line amid a mix of elephants and archers.  His elite infantry, skilled swordsmen and the fearsome, if somewhat bonkers gada-wielders flanked by some skirmishing light archers faced the weaker Alexandrian flank.

King Porus...possibly.  Isn't he splendid!?

The gada in all its glory!

On Porus' left flank he positioned his cavalry to try to blunt the Companions positioned across the field.

The opening battle array.

We've mocked up a few bases using our 15mm historical miniatures.  They'll do for the playtesting at least.  Basing is still in flux for the rules, and is likely to be along the lines of "whatever size you like as long as they're 2 wide and 1 deep".  We're going with 10x5cm because Warband is intended to use this size and it looks rather good with full units.

Anyway, the opening moves of the battle saw the Indians push their whole line forwards.  Porus successfully issued a whole army order and managed to get his archers into range, while maintaining his overall cohesion.  Units normally have to "motivate" (roll dice) to be able to move; the better the roll, the more they can do.  However, under certain conditions, the army commander can override this and take control of a number of units at the same time.  Its a risk, as you could have a large part of the army not moving, but if it works its a great way to make a coordinated action.

Alexander responded by opening his attack with his cavalry.  His plan was likely to try to break the Indian cavalry and open the Indian flank.

Porus managed to generate poor "Command Points" throughout the game, whereas Alexander did rather better (he is an "exceptional" commander after all!)  Command Points are a crucial part of the game, allowing you as player to add dice into any of the various movement, attack, and protection dice rolls that occur during the game; but also to perform other interventions such as rallying routed troops, improving your initiative, and so on.

Porus' archers were now in range, and they did their best to pepper the macedonian phalanx with arrows.  

The dense hedge of raised pikes, phalanx armour and overall battle experience of the Macedonians shrugged off this archery with little effect, much to the chagrin of the Indians.  Porus' Command Points were poor and so he couldn't provide enough command inspriation to increase the effect of his shooting.

As the centre hits stalemate, we have the first decisive action of the game on the cavalry flank.  Confident of their own superiority, the Companions charge into the Indian cavalry, but despite some success on the part of the Companions, the Indian numbers were too much.  

Podromoi

Companion cavalry

With the Podromoi unhelpfully failing their motivations and therefore unable to help (Alexander was too far away to use his Command Points to inspire the Podromoi to action), the Companions broke and routed.  The Indian cavalry were now in a position to flank the phalanx!

It's going well...and then it all goes wrong!

The phalanx advanced through the hail of Indian archery, and approached the mixed line full of confidence and with only minimal casualties.

At the crucial moment, despite Alexander himself frantically trying to inspire them (spending multiple Command Points to add extra motivation dice) the phalanx faltered and went in piecemeal!

Some units have special abilities that increase their chances of being able to move into the attack when up close, but the phalanx doesn't, and despite a good chance of being able to attack, some terrible dice rolls saw half the pikemen standing off as the charge went in!  As it happens it was the units facing the Indian elephants who managed to attack.

That said, phalanx attacking to the front are near unstoppable, particularly as these pikemen are "fierce" and were able to make direct charges.  This piled on the conditional combat bonuses and meant that their attacks on the charge were devastating!

In the swift but brutal melee, King Porus broke and routed, as did much of his army.

The battle was not over however, and the Alexandrians had suffered losses too.  At this stage, matters were still in the balance.

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 The Indian cavalry turned on the flank of the phalanx and managed to destroy one unit, but the sheer pressure of the Macedonian pikes up front did their terrible work.  In the final turn, the Indians could still pull out a draw, if they could break a couple more units.  

But with Porus off the field, and therefore having no command inspiration, they couldn't quite defeat enough to get the draw and the pikes mopped them up for a well deserved win!

Run Nelly run!

 The game finished in two hours and the chaps agreed that the game was easy to pick up.  With a couple of turns everyone knew what they were doing, and were "fighting the battle, not the rules".

My interest was in observing how the rules hung together and I was please to see that everything pretty much worked as intended, giving a smooth, intuitive game that didn't tax the player's brains; except of course to figure out what they were going to do to try to win the game.

Overall, I'm happy with where things are at the moment.  Now to stress test the hundreds of army lists!