Art De La Guerre

[ksnyder]

Hello! I'm a complete newbie who decided to leap into 15mm historical wargaming last week after buying the book for L'art De La Guerre and a starter pack of Later Carthaginians. I've started to base the units but I am worried I might misunderstand what each unit represents as their names from the model company do not match the names in the book 100% of the time.

These are the ranges my models are from:
Carthage - http://tinsoldieruk.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=186_189
Spanish - http://tinsoldieruk.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=186_201

I understood the easy ones. Numidians are Light Cav, Spanish Cav is Medium Cav, Citizen Cav is Heavy Cav, etc.

The ones I am worried I did wrong are:
1) I put Citizen Infantry, Liby/Phoenician Infantry and African Infantry as all Heavy Spearmen.
2) Numidian Infantry I based as Light Infantry

Then there are the ones I haven't based yet:
1) SP3 and SP4 - They both have Javelins but they don't look as lightly armored as the other Javeliners. I'm thinking I should base them LMI. Is this right? The only problem I see from this is that the Late Carthaginian list does not have spanish LMI.
2) SP6 - This unit is named Celtiberian Scutarius by the company, but they are holding spears, not swords. The spanish do not have any options for medium spearmen, so I thought of fielding them as the militia choice in the Late Carthage list. Does this seem ok?

Thanks so much for any help!

[madaxeman]

Welcome on board!

Tin Soldiers ranges were produced maybe 30+ years ago, so it is no surprise that they don't exactly match the terms used on one of maybe 100 rulesets for ancients wargames produced 30 years later! This isnt anything like a GW world with "official" models, there are many ranges, many manufacturers and the issue iss to pick those you like, and pick figures from their ranges that sort of look "OK" - the names they are given are a good guide, but you can bet that another company's African Spearmen will look totally different to these ones anyway.

Also, having the exact match of weapons for "swordsmen" or "spearmen" doesn't really matter, both types can also use other weapons in reality, the terminology in the rules refers to how they predominantly fought, and how they interact with other types. So, you will be mixing various figures together on each base anyway, irrespective of what the name of the figure is on the manufacturers website. There is no right or wrong here, just making sure that the different troop types are easily distinguished.

For Tin Soldier Spanish ranges, I'd suggest using the less-armoured guys with javelins as the LI, and mixing the others up as the Celtiberian or Spanish MI (and I think HI) types in the list - impact, impetuous etc etc.

HI and MI will be easy to tell apart as they are on different sized bases, but Impact vs Impetuous troops will essentially look the same, so if you can say to your opponent "the Impact guys have mostly swords, and the impetuous ones have mostly spears" whilst keeping a mix of figures to give the "irregular" look and feel you will be ticking all the right boxes.

The Citizens, LibyPhonecians and Africans could all be HI, you could field them as separate units or you could mix them for more variety depending on your taste - or you might decide that some look a bit more "active" and use them as Carthagianian MI (if they exist in the list..?) - all of it will be fine as long as they can be differentiated on table, and you are not using roman legionaries as chinese crossbowmen!

[Hazelbark]

[ksnyder]

Thanks! I totally forgot that impact and impetuous can represent the use of light javelins before a melee.

This is the list I put together, I'm not sure how it would perform but my idea is to have two infantry wings, one more heavily focused on LI and the other more focused on having infantry. The final corps is the cavalry wing.

Corps 1-
3 Heavy Spearmen
3 Light Javelins
2 Light Slingers Elite
1 Elephant Mediocre

Corps 2-
3 Heavy Spearmen
3 Light Javelins
2 Medium Swordsmen Impetuous
2 Heavy Swordsmen Impetuous

Corps 3-
6 Light Cavalry Javelin
2 Medium Cavalry
1 Heavy Cavalry

With the remaining points I can get a Strategist, a brilliant and competent commanders.

[madaxeman]

[ksnyder]

Yeah I also had the fear those medium swordsmen would be trouble. If I free up two points somewhere else I can upgrade them to impact.

I assume it isn't as much a problem to have the heavy swordsmen keep the impetuous since they are the same speed as the spearman in the same corps?

[Hazelbark]

Here is my Hannibal in Spain list
1
Comp General
2 African Spear
2 Celtiberians HI Impetuous
3 Gallic HI Impetuous
2 Numidian LI jav

2
Brilliant included General *
2 Punic HC Elite *
2 Spanish Scutarri Elite MI Impact
1 Baleric slinger LI elite
1 Spanish LC Javelin
1 Elephant Mediocre

3
Hannibal Strategist
3 Gallic MI Impetuous
1 Baleric slinger LI elite
2 Numdian LC Javelin
1 Elephant Mediocre
1 Numidian LI Jav Elite.
1 Ligurian Javilmen

[Hazelbark]

So the HI command goes down first in the center and advances into the face of the enemy no matter what. It is big and dangerous and cannot be avoided. The Spear often are in the 2nd rank to move out to whichever side the enemy mounted will strike.
No one can take this command lightly and they have to face it off with at least 6 serious combat units.

Then the other two commands are ideally on each wing. The elephant goes between the MI and that group deploys out wide to approach and an angle of envelopment against whatever is facing the HI command. Each EL ALWAYS has a LI in its front. The rest of the commands skirmish, harass support as needed. The HC are great to join with your skirmishers to drive off enemy skirmishers. Then they are fast moving attackers on the flanks of enemy.

Every game you deploy and move for double envelopment realizing of course that at least one wing will be bet with a serious foe. You have a combat frontage of 13 not counting the HC. And a lot of rough you will just attack right through.

The ligurians were there as an experiment to be honest. Probably better ways to use points, but in conjunction with LI add to the ease of sweeping into terrain.