The Battle for Sicily and other Casse mini-aars

[Zim]

Captain Cadeyrn surveyed the battlefield warily. Nothing had seemed to go as planned on this expedition. The general Amminau that led it had fallen ill a couple times during the long journey, and a trip that should have taken months had seemed to go on years. Then when the enemy was finally met, the general had decided to retreat so as to be out of range of the garrison of the city they had been sieging, who were reinforcing the large army of the Carthaginians that had appeared out of thin air. Not only did they fail to retreat beyond the range of the garrison, but General Amminau had disappeared, and whether he had fled, or been separated and taken by the enemy, or had been separated and seeking to find us this very moment was impossible to determine.

Now the captain was stuck on this forsaken rock called "Sicily", far from his home to the north and cut off from any possibility of escape or reinforcements, facing a superior Carthaginian army led by an experienced general and for what? The same thing that likely induced the mercenary army in front of him to join the Carthaginians, money. Cadeyrn didn't know how much his nation's Roman allies were paying his ruler to help them take this island, but he knew it must be much as just feeding the Casse army as it took such a trip would cost an enormous amount of money. Hopefully money that wouldn't go to waste...



Cadeyrn lined up his men in preparation for the coming battle. While he was somewhat intimidated by the superior armament of the enemy, a mix of Carthaginian soldiers and Sicilian mercnaries, he couldn't help but feel proud of his men. Each seemed willing to face the coming onslaught and die to the last man if need be, although if Cadeyrn had anything to do with it the Pheonicians would be the ones doing the bulk of the dying.

He lined his slingers up in front of the main line, with orders to retreat behind it if neccessary. Archers were lined up behind, while on the main line he tried to intersperse champions and those hardened veterans from Britain's tribal wars among the less experienced men, in order to encourage them.



The first contact of the battle would consist of a cavalry charge by the Carthaginians. Although at first fearful of the heavily armed Greek cavalrymen, the likes of which were not seen in their island home, Cadeyn's men stood strong against the charge while those not in the melee loosed their javelins. Before the main lines of the two armies met the cavalry had been routed.



The enemy general's retinue would be another matter. Although they would eventually be repulsed their charge and the ensuing melee led to the deaths of many Britons, as they fought like demons and the armor they and their horses wore seemed to shrug off javelins as if they were nothing.



For hours the two lines clashed. The better equipment of the enemy took its toll, but by spreading his men somewhat thinly Cedeyrn was able to flank the enemy. Slowly but surely, the enemy's right flank gave way. Cedeyrn only hoped it was going quickly enough to save his center, which was losing ground. The need to peel off some units from the flank to stave off the enemy's city garrison who had finally arrived did not fill Captain Cadeyrn with confidence.

[Cute Wolf]

How could you put casse on Sicily without kicking romans from Italy first?!?

[Zim]

Then the battle hit a turning point. A uit of Midlander spearmen had managed to bog down the enemy general. One of their number, braver than the rest, threw himself in front of the general's horse and thrust his spear into the horse. He would be trampled, but the enemy general died soon after to the nameless spearman's comrades.





Their leader and employer dead, the Carthaginian mercenaries began to throw down their weapons. Before long panic set in throughout their entire army. Only a few brave native Carthaginian units such as the so called "silver shields" held on longer, fighting nearly to the last man. Perhaps if the Carthaginians had filled their army with such men the outcome of the battle would have been different, but they hadn't and they paid dearly for it.






This battle would decide the fate of Sicily. Lilybeo fell immediately after, and Messana would fall shortly as well despite their ruse of allying with the Greek states, as if the Casse would fear the threat of war from a people so far away. Syracuse wisely decided to declare its independence from the Carthaginians, and Cadeyrn decided to leave them alone, as his people had not been paid to take independent cities. Rome would surely get to them soon enough. It was time to head home.

The most significant thing to come from the Battle of Sicily was not the changing of territory from Carthaginian and Greek hands to Roman, but the manner in which it had been done. The battle would become famous throughout the so called "civilized" world, who muttered fearfully at this people from the edge of the world who appeared out of nowhere to fight for the Romans. Aside from the muttering, perhaps it occurred to some that for a hefty fee these warriors might consider taking up their causes as well...

[Zim]

Lots of patience, mostly. I took the game slowly the first 40 or so years, slowly conquering and building up Britain and waiting for the Celtic reforms. Once the Time of Soldiers hit (which the AI Celtic factions had a surprisingly large hand in bringing about) I built up an army, gained military access from my allies the Romans by offering them some of the money I had spent while lying around Britain with a smallish military so many years, and set off, landing in Gaul and walking to the south coast while a small fleet sailed around Spain to pick my men up and land them in Sicily.

It's an idea I've been kicking around a bit. One of my favorite things in the game is matching up against different armies and taking settlements and reading the descriptions for wonders in them, etc. I wanted to take a faction with a realtively small recruitment pool for its unique units and take their armies around the world, without having to manage a huge empire, so I came up with the idea of having the Casse act as mercenaries working in the employ of various powers (for now mostly Roman but that will likely change at some point...).

I have them loot the cities and raze MIC buildings (when they're unusable by the people I'm taking the cities for, which is most of the time so far) but the majority of the infrastructure is left intact so that the new owners I hand the cities to have no trouble keeping them (and getting use out of them). As Britain is built up it's actually not too hard to support a full stack (or later slightly more) and a navy large enough to ferry them around, so long as the army doesn't have too many elites.

I thought it might be interesting to post some mini aars of the Casse's exploits around the globe...

How could you put casse on Sicily without kicking romans from Italy first?!?

[BerkeleyBoi]

I love it. Excellent AAR! I look forward to other mini stories.

EDIT: And how come so few people are reading this thing? This is some awesome writing... and a unique idea!

[the man with no name]

It's cool but it's hard to read. Use the enter button genourously.

[Zim]

BerkeleyBoi Thanks for reading! I'm hoping on having the next, rather longer installment up within the next few days.

the man with no name Are you saying that there should be more space between paragraphs, pics, etc?

[Mikhail Mengsk]

Great battle, keep rocking!!

[the man with no name]

BerkeleyBoi Thanks for reading! I'm hoping on having the next, rather longer installment up within the next few days.

the man with no name Are you saying that there should be more space between paragraphs, pics, etc?

No but that you should use the enter button generously when typing. Look at this guide.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=117122

[Zim]

I take it you're referring to this section?

In addition to grammer and sentence structure, I once read a thread where someone mentioned using the "Enter" button generously. Obviously, if you paragraphs are long and thick, they can be hard to read and turn off the reader. Try to keep them long enough to be a paragraph, but, do use the "Enter" button generously.

I went through the aar again and the vast majority of the paragraphs are in the 3-4 sentence range, with very few venturing a couple sentences beyond that. I'm not sure whether I can split them much further without rendering the aar less rather than more readable...

I'll see about keeping the sentence length shorter next update. That should result in more frequent, shorter paragraphs.

No but that you should use the enter button generously when typing. Look at this guide.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=117122

[BerkeleyBoi]

Maybe he means how the AAR was arranged. If you indent it a bit and center everything, it might look better. Check out MAA's for a good example.

[Moosemanmoo]

Pretty cool little AAR, I think I'll give this mercenary faction idea a spin