Playing Phil Sabin's Phalanx

It's not a secret that Phil Sabin is one of my favourite game designers. The evolution of my 15mm Ancients figure collection, for example, has been directed primarily by a desire to play Lost Battles. But sometimes it is good to try something different from the norm, and I decided to have a go at one of Phil's earlier designs, Phalanx, published in the Society of Ancients's Journal, Slingshot.

My original plan had been to combine Phalanx with the combat system from another of Phil's games, Legion II, but after setting up thought it was probably best to play Phalanx as-is first: if I'm going to muddle something, it's just as well to have a baseline to allow comparisons.

The first thing you notice is that Phalanx has quite a good selection of scenarios. I hummed and harrred a little, then settled on Heraclea. Pyrrhus would be perfect for my purposes. 

For the terrain I am using the Memoir '44 battle board, and for figures I rummaged through the collection. It looks a little cramped, but is not entirely displeasing to the eye (and certainly better than my attempt at making an offset squares mat a few weeks ago!). 

In Phalanx the armies deploy from a camp on their baseline, with the Romans moving first in this scenario.

Rome has six units of heavy infantry, two units of light infantry, two units of heavy cavalry and a leader (Publius Valerius Laevinus). Pyrrhus has himself as leader, five units of heavy infantry, two of light infantry, two of heavy cavalry, and an elephant unit.

Once an army has had four or more of its units routed (the general's unit counts as two) at the end of its turn it loses - unless it has fewer units routed than its opponent.  

The battlefield is an elongated hex (marked on my board by terrain pieces to indicate the boundary) and the only terrain in play is a river. Both armies deploy out of their camp, so it takes a little time for the armies to close. 

The battlefield from the Roman side after two turns. 

Movement is one hex per turn for most units, but cavalry get to move two. Light infantry and elephants can move two at certain times. There are rules around facing, when units change facing, and whether units can attack after performing a particular move. This all combines to give different units different limitations and give each troop type its own characteristics. 

Of course, it takes a little time to assimilate all these characteristics, and while I did not realise it at the time, there were several weaknesses in the Pyrrhic deployment

Pyrrhus's deployment is not ideal, but he hasn't realised that yet.

Enjoy the view while you may, horsemen!

As with most Phil Sabin games, the nuances of the combat system come out in modifiers. Phalanx is deceptively simple - three units versus an infantry or elephant unit will kill it, while two units versus cavalry will kill it. But there are exceptions: some circumstances add an extra attack unit equivalent; some disregard one. Again, it all takes time and experience to assimilate.

The lines clash - Rome is about to launch attacks.

In two more turns it is all over. Rome kills off a unit of cavalry on their left, exposing Pyrrhus. The Epirote army kills a Roman light infantry in its turn; Rome then has the numbers to kill the elephant and Pyrrhus's unit, taking them to four units lost. The Pyrrhus-less Epirotes can only pull back one on their own turn, so Rome wins 4 units to 2, which counts as a sweeping victory. 

Rome has cracked the Pyrrhic centre left, has superiority on the Pyrrhic right, and has killed Pyrrhus. Game over!

Phalanx is an interesting game. I played this solo, and it was very much a learning experience. The combat system is largley deterministic, which makes it difficult to solo satisfactorily, in much the same way that chess is difficult to solo satisfactorily. 

Next step will be to try it with the Legion combat system ported on. 

Quick review: Phil Sabin's PHALANX

The other day I had a quick try out of Phil Sabin's early set of ancient rules, PHALANX. They originally appeared in Slingshot as diceless rules for historical battles, but Phil has made a simplified version available on his Lost Battles yahoo group as a free download.

The game is played on a hex grid, nine deep and eleven wide (so you can use a Commands & Colors board, for example). Each side has a baggage base and ten fighting units - seven of hoplites, one of peltasts, and two of cavalry. One hoplite unit contains a general.

Spartans and Thebans!

Units move either one or two hexes depending on their type, and there are some neat little 'Sabinisms' to give unit classes their own character while keeping rules to a minimum (the rules are in fact just one page long).

It's an IGO-UGO game, and deployment (in another familiar Sabinism) is included in the play, with both sides deploying onto the field from their respective baggage bases.

First turn: both sides commence deployment.

There is no luck in the game except in choosing which side goes first. Combat is won by ganging up attacking units on the enemy, so that two attackers will rout peltasts or cavalry, three attackers will rout hoplites, and four attackers will rout a general's unit. The general's unit itself counts as two attackers when on the offense.

Jockeying for position.

When a side finishes its turn and finds itself with four or more of its own units routed, the game is over, and both sides score points based upon how many units were routed during the game.

As you can imagine, with IGO-UGO movement and diceless combat, the game is all about carefully manoeuvring units into position to defeat the enemy before the enemy can defeat you. It's more like chess with figures than it's like, say, DBA.

Three units of Theban hoplites attack the exposed Spartan allies (and brace themselves for the counterattack).

It does not work very well as a solo game (for obvious reasons!) but I think it would be quite good against an opponent. I imagine playing a match over two games to allow both players to have a turn moving first and tallying up the total points scored to decide the victor would be nice way to spend an hour or two with a wargaming buddy.

There are some ideas for optional rules on the Yahoo group, and a few others suggest themselves already. Secret deployment would be one obvious tweak, as would some kind of initiative challenge system to potentially change the turn order during the game.

It would be good to look at the historical battle scenarios too, but I'd need to get hold of the Golden Years of Slingshot DVD first to access the original articles, and even then I'm not sure if it will have everything - the rules may well have been included with Slingshot as a separate booklet. I can probably find that out from Phil himself at some point and update this review with that information EDIT: Yes, it has been confirmed that the Slingshot DVD does contain the necessary rules and scenarios.

(Relevant Slingshot issues w. page numbers.)

Anyway, if you have a hex grid mat (or board) and some appropriate figures (or counters), you might like to try it out. It's simple to learn, and the price is certainly right!