Dominion of the Spear

I picked these rules up last year when they were getting quite a few nods of appreciation around the traps, and while I haven't done them to death I have played a few games, mainly using scenarios from the 36 Battles for Dominion of the Spear expansion.   

Last time I played I scribbled down some notes for a future blog post but lost them in a fit of organisational ineptitude. 

Monday last week I pulled the rules out again and decided to run through Marathon. I have only the beginnings of an Achaemenid army painted, but there are enough for these rules, so I set the figures up. 

Then it was all over in 14 dice rolls.

I left the figures out and started writing up a post about why I probably won't play these rules enough to warrant getting all the various iterations. The battles, I wrote, are simply over too soon.

But I couldn't get the post to where I was happy with it. I had a couple of goes over a couple of nights without it working so I let it be. 

Tonight I went down to the den to pack the figures up, but decided I would play Marathon again, and then have a go at Plataea. Why? Well, I have a day off work on Friday. Why not?

Marathon. The Athenian army is composed of four units of armoured spearmen for the Greeks. The Persians have four units of ordinary archers and one unit of elite armoured archers. The Athenians have the initiative.  

Start - Persians at the top

Turn 1: the Persian archers take out a unit of the Athenian hoplites, but the hoplites drive off the archers on the other flank leaving things even after the first three rounds of battle.

After the first turn

Turn 2: The Persian archers strike twice to leave the Athenians with just one unit on the board, meaning they will be running home to announce a defeat, not a victory. 

Marathon at game end - a Persian triumph in 9 dice rolls

Plataea. The Persians have the initiative, and an army made up of two units of ordinary archers, one of elite archers, a unit of cavalry, and a unit of armoured spearmen (mercenary hoplites). The Greeks have a unit of elite armoured spearmen (Spartans), two units of armoured spearmen, and one of ordinary spearmen.

Plataea start. Greeks to the top. 

Turn 1: the Greeks beat the archers in the centre but lose the Spartans to Mardonius's cavalry. Talk about doing home on your shield. 

After the first turn

Turn 2: the Persian archers destroy another unit of hoplites and open a gap to be exploited.

After the second turn

Turn 3: Mardonius and his cavalry win again.

At game end - another triumph for the Achaemenids, this time in 14 dice rolls.

By this time I am having fun, and am about to go to Gaugamela, but what is this, a scenario for Thymbra? I go back in time to the battle between Cyrus the Great and Croesus of Lydia.

Thymbra. The Lydians have the initiative and an army made up of two units of armoured cavalry, a unit of elite armoured spearmen, and a unit of ordinary spearmen. Cyrus's Achaemenids are comprised of two units of armoured archers, one of ordinary archers, one of scythed chariots, and one of cavalry. 

Set up with Lydians at the top. The field is fuller!

Turn 1: Cyrus's archers are effective against one of the cavalry units but Croesus's archers deal with the scythed chariots without breaking a sweat.

In war things can get blurred...

After the first turn

Turn 2: Cyrus's archers are unstoppable. The Lydian cavalry drives off one unit in its own turn but it cannot avoid defeat for the army. 

At game end - a Persian triumph in 9 dice rolls.

For the fourth and last Achaemenid battle in the scenario book we go to Gaugamela. Three battles, three wins for the men of the fertile crescent. Can Alexander reverse the trend?

Gaugamela. Alexander and his Macedonians have the initiative and an army as follows: a unit of elite armoured cavalry, a unit of ordinary cavalry, a unit of elite armoured spearmen (the phalanx) and a unit of ordinary spearmen. Darius III has three units of cavalry, a unit of horse archers, a unit of scythed chariots, and a unit of archers.

At game start. Who could ever tell which army is which?

Turn 1: the Companions and phalanx strike immediately to knock off the horse archers and the chariots. The Persian cavalry pulls one back for the team by defeating the Thessalian cavalry at the other end of the field.

After the first turn

Turn 2: the Companions and the foot companions are again victorious. Darius's men have no answer.

After the second turn

Turn 3: the Companions are deadly once more, and the phalanx turn into the flank of the remaining Persian cavalry and drive them off as well. 

The field is clear - a Macedonian triumph in 12 rolls

The Companions have three rolls and produce three sixes. Perfection!

And so I am glad that I did not publish my half-formed negative take on Dominion of the Spear. As a one-off game with miniatures, it seemed to be a waste of time. As a four game exploration of Achaemenid battles on a week night with no work the next day it was a something entirely different.

Going back to my original thoughts:

"Part of the issue is that I'd got figures out for it. The figures probably took about fifteen minutes to find and to set up. The game itself was over in about two minutes, or as long as it took to make 14 dice rolls."

But this was the wrong way to look at the game. 

Will I buy the other games in the series? I'm not sure. I have the ACW version and that will certainly lend itself well to a themed evening of gaming like the one tonight. I think I might look at the horse and musket ones. I will see. I don't think there is any need to worry either way: I've had my money's worth in games from this series tonight already, and anything that helps to inspire a blog post is doing well given my recent output! 

In other news, I got to see a band play this week in Nelson, and they were brilliant. New Zealand's efforts in the arts can often lead to a sort of cultural cringe: you take a peek and want to slink out the door. Not so with Auckland's The Beths. 

Here's a solo acoustic version of their song Mosquitoes. They are a four piece and all excellent musicians but Liz Stokes is the songwriter in the band. She is quite a talent. If you get a chance to see them, take it!

Asculum for beginners

As mentioned in my last post, I was fortunate enough recently to get four players together for a crack at my old favourite, Lost Battles. 

Right up until the night before I was unsure of what scenario to use. The need for Romans was obvious. But should I go with homogenous forces to cut down on rules shock - Pharsalus? No, we needed elephants. Should I go for Hannibal? Trebia? Cannae? Zama? No, these three splendid affairs need to be reserved for when players know the rules enough to savour them.

In the end, the decision was Asculum. The triple advantage of aesthetically pleasing troops, closely-matched armies (by the standards of Lost Battles), and a mix of different types to show the rules to advantage won the day.

The goal was to play a first game to run through the rules and a second to give players a chance to put their knowledge into practice. This was probably a little ambitious.

The day started with a brief outline of the armies and Lost Battles rules concepts. The best way to learn these rules is to play, so we tried to get into it as quickly as possible.

View from behind Pyrrhus's left flank after the deployment turn.

The Greeks moved first and elected to reinforce their right flank with a unit of veteran heavy cavalry, giving them a significant advantage in that area. The central zones all advanced, but not before a hit had been scored on the Roman light infantry.

The Romans refused their left and left centre, but advanced elsewhere. 

On turn three, amid command problems (low command die roll) the Greeks made the decision to not advance their right centre or right flank into contact, even though the latter had been reinforced. Battle was joined seriously in the centre and centre-left and the cavalry of the other flank exchanged charges.

Initial advances, shown from the Greek side.

These positions were maintained for the next few turns. Hits were scored on both sides, forcing players to choose which units to put into the lead, which units to give combat bonuses to, and, on the Greek stage, how best to employ the special characteristics of the phalangites. 

With the Greeks still not advancing their right, they were able to put a lot of command points into combat bonuses, which sped up the attrition on the Romans. Nevertheless, it was the Greek cavalry who gave way on the left, buoying Roman morale.

The day was racing by, and the Greeks realised the need to get their right into contact. As this was happening Sulpicius staved off disaster by rallying three hits out of four, saving the Roman right centre from rout. Pyrrhus got himself into the action in the centre, but in doing so exposed himself to risk. As the battle went on, Pyrrhus's zone broke, carrying the man himself off the field.

The Greek right flank swept the Roman cavalry away, but it was too late. 

Gleeful Romans spoke of superior tactical acumen; resentful Greeks cursed those fickle mistresses, the dice.

With neither side able to completely rout the other by the end of the tenth turn, points were tallied up. Rome this time was victorious.

As there was only an hour left, we had a quick debrief instead of the ideal second game to 'consolidate knowledge' (what was that about being too ambitious?).

Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and the players new to Lost Battles are keen to do it all again. 

A successful day then, and I chuckled to myself during the post-mortems: by turns they all gloated, grizzled, moaned and what-iffed like wargame veterans!

Great to get people together for some good old fashioned figure gaming. 

Upcoming game day

There has been a slow move back towards a figure gaming focus at the house of Prufrock. I placed a couple of orders with the excellent Potbelly Miniatures (elephants, if you must know!) and have been gingerly plucking elements out of the lead pile for some attention. With the Waitangi Day holiday coming up next weekend, I have decided to invite a few people over for a figure game.

I am thinking Lost Battles multi-player, but have not yet settled on the battle. Heraclea, Asculum, Sentinum, Sellasia, Zama, Magnesia and Pharsalus are all on the table (as it were). 

We shall give it some more thought!

Hope 2026 has started well for all wargamers.