Battle of Uruk 2271 BC using Ancient Warrior Battles (001)

Introduction
I have written some fast play ancient rules to replay historical battles on 2'x2' tables.  Here is the link to the rules: Ancient Warrior Battles rules.  I have played a few games with them already but need more testing.  Since 2000, I have always wanted to play all the Peter Sides scenarios from his Historical Battles books.  Marry the two together and we have a match! The link to a page for background and a list of the scenarios is here.

Observant readers will notice that the Battle of Uruk does not appear in the Peter Sides books.  I wanted to have a simple battle with Ancient Near East troops and I found this battle of Akkad Vs Sumer.  So I am going with this one before tackling Megiddo.  It is different to the other battles I will play as there is not a defined army composition or deployment map.  But I've always wanted to play a game in Ancient Mesopotamia.

Battle of Uruk aka Unification of Sumer
Sargon of Akkad defeats Lugal-zage-si of Umma leading a army collected from Sumerian provinces.  See the Battle of Uruk wikipedia article for some information.  More  information and a scenario can be found in the GMT Games Great Battles of History game Chariots of Fire (link to boardgamegeek entry).  I did not use the Chariots of Fire scenario for this game but the game still has good background information. Note that the date of the battle depends on the chronology used - I've gone with 2271BC from Wikipedia.

Troops
There is not much information on the Akkadian and Sumerian armies.  I have used guesses and composition from a number of different army lists (Milgamex, WRG Ancients, FOG, DBM, Ancient Warfare, Armati Warflute lists and Hail Caesar) and the WRG Armies of the Near East.  I have assumed that the onager carts are out of fashion for Akkad, but still used by Sumer.  Akkad army is also differentiated by more loose order archers and some household spearmen.

Akkad
Army Type: Missile
Skilled general +1 (Sargon)
2 Household Spearmen -  Heavy Infantry, light armour, average fortitude, long spears
4 Spearmen - Heavy Infantry, light armour, low fortitude, long spears
4 Light Archers - Light Infantry, light armour, low fortitude, bow, archers
2 Javelineers - Skirmish Infantry, low fortitude, javelin
2 Skirmish archers - Skirmish Infantry, low fortitude, bow
Breakpoint: 8

Sumerian alliance
Army Type: Missile
Average general +0 (King Lugal-zage-si)
1 Onager cart - Light Chariot, light armour, low fortitude, javelins
6 Spearmen - Heavy Infantry, light armour, low fortitude, long spears
2 Light Archers - Light Infantry, light armour, low fortitude, bow, archers
2 Javelineers - Skirmish Infantry, low fortitude, javelin
4 Skirmish archers - Skirmish Infantry, low fortitude, bow
Breakpoint:  8

Note: Breakpoint is worked out as 50% of 2 points per heavy infantry and 1 point per light infantry (0 for skirmishers). An army breaks when reaching its breakpoint.

Deployment
I will use the optional rule that you must deploy in a certain amount of groups.  Akkad can deploy in four groups of units, Sumer in three.  You can split groups after deployment, for a slight penalty to orders.

Terrain is a flat plain.

I rolled for random army deployment.  This is similar to the battle tactics in Rally Round the King.
Akkad will defend along the line and deploy at least 50% of the spearmen in a second line in the centre as a reserve.  This reserve did not play much of a part in the battle until too late.  Bad plan Sargon!

Akkadian deployment

Sumer will focus on their centre and right flank and use missiles to disorder the enemy before using the spearmen as a hammer.

Sumerian deployment

Akkad is the attacker (only advantage here is moving first).

Deployment, Sumer to the left.  Apologies for the shiny board - it glows in the flash but otherwise it very matt.  Ah well.

If you have sharp eyes you will not that a lot of the troops don't really look ancient Mesopotamian.  Some are, but the rest are Assyrian allies and a couple of Persian allies as well.  I got most of these as part of a larger lot of painted figures.  The onager battle cart is a light chariot.  I was not going to paint up special figures for this one-off battle. And the field is grass where should really be earth but I don't have any other surface to play on.

The Game
Akkadians cautiously advance with the left flank kept back in reserve. The Sumerian javelin-armed skirmishers advance with the other Sumerian bow-armed skirmishers and inflict 3 retreats (that covert into destruction) on the Akkadian skirmishers. This leaves the Akkadian leading spearmen a little exposed.

Sumerian javelineers (backed up by heavy spearmen) that routed opposing skirmshers

Low fortitude skirmishers really don't hang around long. 

The exposed Akkadian heavy spearmen after being stripped of their skirmishers

Sumerian troops continue to advance, except the chariot/onager cart keeps rolling a 1 for orders and does not move;  only a 1 will fail. The battlelines get a lot closer and finally the chariot moves.

Main battlelines get close (top centre right).  Akkadian reserve line is at bottom left.

 The Akkadian reserve line (on their right flank) finally moves up and forces the Sumerian skirmishers to evade.  As this reserve line was supposed to be in reserve, I did not move it until a few turns into the game. The Sumerians attempt to rally disorder from the evading skirmishers. Needs a 4+.  Both roll a 1. At least the Sumerians are getting the 1's out of the way early!

Akkadian reserve line (on right) has advanced and caused Sumerian skirmishers (at left) to evade.  Green maker indicates disorder.

Rather than advance the Sumerian spearmen battleline through their own skirmishers, the Sumerians will keep the skirmishers in front and try to inflict some disorder on the advancing skirmishers.  And possibly force some of the Akkadian spearmen to react by advancing and therefore breaking up their battleline.  The skirmishers fire.  The Akkadian spearmen all pass their test (so much for that idea!) and charge the skirmishers, who all fire again and retreat through the rear spearmen.  Retreat = destroyed for skirmish infantry interpenetrating close order infantry.  However, when firing again they did manage to disorder one average fortitude spearmen. The Akkadian spearmen pursue the retreating skirmishers and charge into the the Sumerian spearmen.

Battlelines meet.  Sumer to the bottom, Akkad to the top.  Sargon is top right, King Lugal-zage-si is at the bottom centre.

All the Sumerian spearmen stand to the charge and close combat ensues. Despite the better fortitude of the Akkadians, one routs, one retreats (forcing it to move 1/2 move or 4cm back) and one is pushed back.  The retreating spearmen is pursued for further combat. 

View post combat - note the Sumerian advance(due to pursuing) in the middle.

The pursued Akkadian spearmen unit is routed.  As is the attached Sargon.  Oops.  Well, I did design these rules to be fast!  Akkad has lost 6 breakpoints already (2 more until the army is broken), Sumer none.

State of play, Sumer to the left.  Note the breakthrough of the Sumerian troops in the centre, next to the disordered Sumerian skirmishers.

The chariot is in charge range, but fails its charge orders roll. The Akkadian archer facing the chariot fires and forces the chariot to retreat (archery is not great in this game but the chariots rolled a 1 for being fired on - the only score that would force a retreat).  In the centre, there is a lone Akkadian spearmen against the lone Sumerian spearmen and general.  An Akkadian roll of 1 and Sumerian roll of 6, even with a couple of modifiers for each side, guarantees the Akkadian spearmen are routed off the board.  Akkad has reached their breakpoint and have lost.

Verdict
While an interesting and fun battle, I did not really get the sense I was replaying a historical battle.  It was a good run out for the rules, and cleared up some minor points.  The rules got a good run but it was a fairly familiar straight up battleline Vs battleline.  Compared to other historical battles I've done in the past, I did not get a feel for what the commanders were up against, nor why they did what they did.  But this is fair enough for the Battle of Uruk as it was a free form setup. The entire game took 5 or 6 turns and 1 hour including setup, writing it up as I went and taking the pictures. So maybe 30-40 minutes if I did not blog it.  This is the speed I am looking for, so good so far.  Onwards to some historical battles with the deployment taken out of my hands.