ADLG Later Carthaginian v Republican Roman

My first game at the club for a considerable period saw my 15mm Later Carthaginians take on Stan's Republican Romans.

The Carthaginians won the initiative and decided to attack in the mountains (I'd chosen a lot of LI!). Initial deployment saw the Romans in two heavy infantry columns and one cavalry column while the Carthaginians had Spanish infantry and elephants in the centre with flanks of cavalry and light horse:

The Carthaginians throw forward skirmishers and decide to concentrate on the middle Roman column:

The Legions advance while the Roman cavalry retreats!:

The Legions in the centre are looking a bit isolated, there may be an opportunity for the Carthaginians here:

Skirmishers exchange fire:

The Romans concede control of the marsh to the Numidian skirmishers and the Roman cavalry continues to fall back:

The Roman foot press forward, they are better troops but their flanks may be vulnerable:

Crash! The Carthaginian elephants and Spanish foot hurl themselves into the Legions. With overlaps for the elephants it is as good as it gets for them. One elephant crushes the Legion in front of him, the Spanish foot draw and the other elephant manages to lose to the Legio it is facing taking a hit:

More Legions join in the fight, the victorious elephant almost crushes another Legion but the supporting Spanish fare badly. Meanwhile the left flank cavalry evade from the second Legion block:

The cavalry return to protect the elephants and Spanish flanks but things are going downhill rapidly for the Carthaginian attack with markers on every unit:

One elephant is down!:

The second elephant falls, rampaging through the Legionaries in front of them and giving them another hit!. The cavalry has been forced to engage as well:

On the right the Carthaginian mounted have chased the Roman cavalry back to their camp. Two Numidians from each army faced off with the Carthaginian ones exploding at impact rather disappointingly. The left flank cavalry battle on but the Carthaginian centre is broken:

The Romans have taken some losses but is is the Carthaginian army that is struggling. Maybe the elite Carthaginian Noble cavalry lead by their general can still pull something out of the bag against the Roman cavalry near the camp?:

The answer to that prayer is that no they can't, one of them takes a hit and the one with the general two hits!:

The general is cut down and the Carthaginian army breaks:

A game in which the Romans battered their way through the Carthaginian army in true Roman style! Stan (a very wily and experienced Roman commander) surprised me by taking all his Legionaries as armoured which rather ruined my plan of weakening them with massed skirmishers (armour makes a huge difference to the chances of being hit by skirmisher fire) so, even though I got what few foot and elephants I had in to their best advantage it wasn't enough to make a significant breakthrough especially with the dismal failure of my right flank cavalry.

Still it was nice to play Stan again and come to the club to say hello to people. The club is in what I would call an 'estate' pub in North London and had obviously had some work done on it over lockdown with (even) more lights added:

An awful lot of effort has gone into the display!: