A Brief Battle in the Delta

As the early sun gleams off the ocean, an Egyptian fleet sees the outlines of Greek ships appearing to the east.

Around 378 BC the Athenian General Iphicrates found himself leading a force of mercenaries in Persian pay attempting to put down a revolt against Persian rule by the restive Egyptians.  Little is known of this campaign and no record has come down to us of any naval action.  The timing, however, lends itself to a clash between fleets of old trieres with a sprinkling of the new tetreres and penteres that were being introduced at this time (triremes, quadriremes and quinquiremes for the Latin speaker).  So, as a trial for some mass ancient naval combat rules under drafting I decided to pitch a force of Athenian trieres stiffened with some tetreres, looking to move into the mouth of one branch of the Nile delta to run supplies and reinforcements through to Iphicrates but instead running into a fleet that the Egyptian rebels - or freedom fighters - had put together.  Presumably the Egyptians had aid from somewhere like Carthage as they had a few penteres to give heft to their line.

Each side was given 48 ships.  For the Athenians eight of these were Tetreres, tougher and able to carry more marines than the Trieres while being a bit faster than the smaller ships and just as nimble.  The Athenians put these larger vessels together in two groups of 4, one with each of their first two squadrons.  Each of these squadrons also had three groups of 4 trieres while the third squadron had four groups of 4 trieres.

The Egyptians spread their 6 heavy ships around to stiffen up five groups.  Two served with the Admiral's group.  His squadron of 6 groups had 2 further penteres, one in each of two groups while the remaining 3 groups were all trieres.  Each of the other two squadrons had 3 groups of ships, one of which had a penteres and 3 trieres, the others being only trieres.  The six penteres gave the Egyptians a slight edge in weight and marines against the Athenians but the Egyptians were less easy to turn.

Each group was represented by one base, giving 12 bases a side.  Each base had an accompanying record card to keep track of damage and provide a ready reference for fighting qualities and movement.

A view before play began.  Both fleets are set out in approximate starting positions, each base on its record card.  The Egyptian fleet is in the bottom left, aiming to stop the Athenians in the top right from getting past them and up river to join Iphicrates.  The extra card by each squadron is a name card for the squadron commander.  Play begins with rolling for each commander to determine how many intervention points they get to use during the battle - these allow a die roll to be retaken or can be exchanged for one extra exertion point for one base in their squadron.

The Egyptian squadron commanders with their intervention tokens.

Starting position from behind the Athenian fleet.  The Admiral is leading his squadron off to his right, backed up by the second squadron.  The third keeps to the left bank heading up river.  In the distance, the Egyptians have deployed the Admiral's large squadron in line together with their second squadron.  The third squadron forms a reserve behind the right of their line.

The end of turn 1.  Both sides have advanced at measured pace.

At the start of turn 2, the Athenian Admiral turns his squadron to face the Egyptians while the second squadron turns 90° and heads back to the left, looking for the Egyptian flank.

The Egyptian Admiral committed his squadron, all of his bases using exertion points to close the distance and make ramming attacks on the Athenians.

Turn 2 started to reveal problems with the rules.  It was too difficult for a ramming attack to succeed and, even when successful as with the Egyptian admiral's base on the left of his line, it did not deliver substantial damage.  Out of six attacks made in near perfect conditions, only two caused any damage to the Athenians.  Having to turn the record cards over to mark damage to individual ships, then return to the front to update the overall strength also proved inconvenient - just about OK when each player was only dealing with 12 cards but we wondered what it would be like in the thick of a bigger battle.

Turn 2 ends with the Athenian third squadron bases all using exertion points to close the distance with the Egyptian reserve line.  Only one base can get close enough to ram.  Its Egyptian target uses an exertion point to counter-attack.  No damage is caused to either side!

Turn 3 saw the Athenians capitalise on the failure of the Egyptian attacks in the previous turn, successfully running several of their bases through the Egyptian main line to join their third squadron in piling in on the Egyptian reserve.  In return, the Egyptians managed to grapple several Athenian bases.  Both sides saw grappling as the way to go given the difficulty of getting in a good ram attack.

The Athenians pile in on the Egyptian reserve, sacrificing a few laggards to keep the main Egyptian force occupied. Pinkish markers indicate grappling and boarding actions.

Turn 4 and the Egyptian reserve squadron is surrounded.  All three bases are on the verge of being overrun by Athenian marines.

Turn 4 saw the Egyptian main squadron reduce one of the Athenian bases to its last marine but they were not getting on so well with their other boarding actions.  The Athenians were chewing through the marines in the Egyptian reserve and could be confident they would be overwhelmed in the next turn.  The Egyptian commander had suffered a serious loss of joie de vivre when the massed ramming attack in Turn 2 had returned such little reward.  We decided to end the test game here rather than prolong his agony.

So, not the most enjoyable game.  It revealed a major flaw in the mechanics of ram attacks and quite a lot of other rough edges that need sanding down, especially over movement on a square grid with bases that can face in 8 directions.  On the plus side, both players liked the squadron activation system - every squadron activates in each turn but the sequence of activation varies from turn to turn as tokens are drawn from a bag.  The Egyptian commander did mutter darkly about how fishy it was that the Athenians always seemed to manage to activate two of their squadrons before he got a chance to act - he should have paid more attention to his morning sacrifices.  Also, both players liked the grappling and boarding mechanism.  I plan to revise the rules quickly, then rerun the same scenario to see whether we are getting closer to a game in which winner and loser both feel they have not been frustrated by the game mechanics, only by their own generalship.

All the ships used are from Tumbling Dice's 1:2400 range.  Each model has magnetic material put on the bottom to engage with steel sheet on the base for ease of removal and reorganisation.