Larry Irons writes:

On Sunday at the monthly club meeting of the Colorado Military Historians, I playtested a scenario that is a refight of Magnesia (189 BC) between Rome and the Seleucid Kingdom. My main sources for this battle are Livy and Bar Kochva. Further I balanced the points of the two sides to get as close as possible by using a different number of men per figure for the Romans and the Seleucids. I plan on also offering a more historical but less balanced scenario as well.

I have played this scenario with Ancient Warfare, Macedon and Rome and DBM. The play-balanced scenario is a very good fight between the two sides, with it being a hard fight to either side. However, Macedon and Rome by Computer Strategies does very well with the historical situation, with the Romans doing very well. When playing DBM you scratch your head wondering how the Romans could ever have won.

I used a number of scenario specific rules including

1) An African elephant versus Indian elephant rule
2) Making Anticohus a fanatic general
3) A special rule for checking morale for casualties to single element units
4) A special morale rule for chariots and elephants taking missile casualties
5) A "Do not remove" rule for routing elephants and scythed chariots allowing these to cause greater havoc

The above were used to try to emulate some of the situations that took place during the battle.

I used a historical setup for the two sides based on Bar Kochva's interpretation of the battle location. This allowed the Seleucid army to extend beyond the right flank of the Roman army. I put the light troops camels and chariots in the front rank of the Seleucids and the main Seleucid battle line in the second rank.

The Romans were deployed with legions on the left and cavalry and allies on the right. The battle started with both sides advancing. Both sides' skirmishers shot it out with the Romans coming out a little better. The Seleucid scythed chariots were tempted out and eventually became fragmented from being outdistanced during pursuit. This allowed the Romans to charge and take out the chariots with their cavalry. The chariots routed off causing a morale cascade just like historically.

The Seleucids and Romans started closing with their heavy troops and it was pretty much up in the air, except where the phalangites could get to grips with the Romans where they were doing a good number on the Romans.

We ran out of time before we had an army break point, but at the end of the game it was still a toss up. The Seleucids had lost 5 units, mostly skirmishers, and the Romans had lost 3 units, one of which was a large peltast unit, another was a cavalry unit.

I will be using this scenario for Tacticon 2003 in Denver during the Labor Day weekend. It is a colorful battle and should attract some fantasy players to come over from the dark side.