Red vs. Blue - Triumph! AAR

A little while ago I saw that the print version of Trumph was finally released. 

Triumph is an attempt to capture the speed and relative ease of play of De Bellis Antiquitatis, but written in English instead of "Barkerese." Other difference between DBA include a system of army building, more troop types, and a randomized placement of terrain. 

Having played the game before, using the in-development PDF rules, I found Triumph to be a fun game that delivered on its promise. 

The print version of the rules is a full color, coil-bound book. The text is easy to ready, there's plenty of pictures and diagrams, and the layout is fairly easy to follow. It even has a detailed table of contents and an index!

My two armies for these solo game have been adopted from a couple of demo armies that WGC produce for Triumph.

The Military Order of Azool represents a professional army of quality troops.

The opposing force is a raiding clan from the Rojon Mountains. The Rojonite army prefers quantity over quality, but has a potentially devastating punch from their woolly mountain elephants.

One of Triumph's mechanics that I've talked about before is the randomized terrain placement. All armies have an Invasion Rating and a Maneuver Rating. To determine the terrain on a table, both players first roll a die and add their Invasion Rating. The battle takes place in the home environment of the losing army.

Both players then roll a second die and add their Maneuver Rating. The winner of this roll-off is the attacker, and gets to select the terrain and also gets the first turn. This player assigns a number to each terrain piece (as well as whether or not to take a road, stream, or coastal area), then rolls on a d66 table that shows where each terrain piece is placed

I really enjoy this system, since it removes some of the fiddly bits of terrain placement that other games have.

For this battle, the Rojonites won the Invasion roll, while the Azoolians won the Maneuver roll.

This placed the battle in the forested homelands of Azool, with a mix of Forests and Marshes.

The Rojonites were in three battlegroups, with a main battleline of Warriors, Warbands, and Elephants. Their Rabble cowered in a forest, while a second line of Warbands waited in reserves.

The Azoolians formed up in two groups of mixed raiders and archers, with knights and their artillery on either flank.

The goal of Triumph is to be the first to remove 16 points (a third of a 48 point army) of your opponent's army, while losing less of your own.

The first turns saw both sides advancing towards each other, as most of these games do.

One group of Azoolian Knights swung around to cover the Rabble in the forest. On the other side of the battle, the Rojonite Elephants were forced back from artillery fire.

As the two sides closed, the Rojonite ranks were somewhat jostled by Azoolian arrows.

Undaunted, the mountain clans and ranks of soldiers finally clashed. One unit of Rojon Warband was the first to be destroyed.

The officers of the Azoolian Military Order called out for order and reestablished their lines, causing more Rojonite Warbands to collapse and flee the battle.

In a momentary surge of elation, the Rojonite warlord and his warriors seemed to punch a hole in the Azoolian lines. If they could keep the momentum up, this break could be exploited for a devestating victory.

However, the attack somehow stalls. While the Elephants reach (and easily wreck) the Artillery, a unit of Knights flanks and panics one of the Rabble units in the woods, destroying it in return.

While the Azoolian Archers can't score a hit against the Elephants (which started to lumber towards the enemy camp), a flanking manevuer by the Raiders in the center was enough to destroy a unit of Rojonite Warriors, which placed them over the 16 point limit and ended the game!

Not exactly the most riveting of games, but it was a good reminder of how Triumph played, and solo action still looks to be my only source of gaming for the time being.

Woad to the Vanquished - Triumph! AAR

April 28th was International Tabletop Day, and Half Day Studio was running an all-day event with various games to celebrate. Everyone who came in and played entered for a chance to win a raffle, with the prize being the Roman Invasion of Britain starter set for Hail Caesar, donated by Warlord Games.

I decided to run a couple games of Triumph! for the event using my 15mm Ancient British and Early Imperial Roman armies. While these had originally been intended for DBA, they work just as well for Triumph!, which was a system I demoed and played in an event at during Cold Wars. 

Following the army lists on Meshwesh, I came up with the following lists:

Early Imperial Romans 

5 Elite Infantry (General)

4 Raiders

1 Archers

2 Javelin Cavalry

Ancient British

10 Warband (General)

4 Battle Taxis

2 Bad Horse

Basically, the Romans have a smaller but better army, while the British have more troops of lower quality. However, their Warbands can kill the Roman Elite Infantry if they manage to just outscore them in combat, rather than the normal need to double their combat score. 

For the first game, Bill chose to play the Romans. Somehow, the British managed to win the Topography roll, and the Romans chose to fight in an Arable landscape. Having won the Tactical advantage, the Romans then got to chose the terrain. We ended up with a Village, a Gentle Hill, Rough Ground, and a Coast.

The Romans set up their Elite Infantry and Archers in the center of the, with their Javelin Cavalry and Raiders taking up either flank. The British set their long line of Warband across from the Roman infantry, and had their Battle Taxis and Bad Horse on the flanks.

While the Roman Raiders and Javelin Cav advanced, their Elite Foot held back. A poor dice roll for the British meant that only the Battle Taxis could move forward.

The British infantry seemed content to watch as all the action developed on the flanks. A bad combat for Bill saw one of his Javelin Cavalry shattered by the British Bad Horse. On the other side of the battlefield, the Raiders and Battle Taxis edged closer together, hemmed in by the coastline.

The resounding clash between the Raiders and Battle Taxis saw two of the Roman units shatter. Meanwhile, the Roman Javelin Cav and British Bad Horse circled around, keeping each other from exploiting an open flank.

While Bill managed to remove a unit of Bad Horse from the table, the loss of another Raider unit was enough to cause the Romans to break. The British cheered and celebrated their victory!

But it wasn't to last for long...

Since Triumph! plays so quickly, we decided to set back up for a second game, with Bill commanding the Romans again. This time the Romans won both the Topography and Tactical roll. Bill chose a Village, a Steep Hill, a Forest, and a Stream as the terrain.

The British infantry were flanked by their Bad Horse, while the Battle Taxis were set up opposite the Roman camp. The Roman Elite Infantry and Archers set up in the center once again, but were now flanked equally on both sides by Raiders and Javelin Cavalry.

With no terrain in the center of the table to slow anyone down, both sides raced towards the fight.

Bill managed to sneak around the flank of the Battle Taxis with a Javelin Cav, and caused it to shatter. The British were forced to break up their chariot charge to deal with the Roman cavalry.

The British left flank had descended into chaos, with the Battle Taxis and a unit of Bad Horse moving to hem in the Roman Javelin Cavalry. On the Roman left, Bill sent his other Javelin Cav units to intercept the last of the British cavalry.

Undaunted, most of the British infantry continued forward.

Like the last game, the flanks were embroiled in combat while the center refused to commit. Bill's units were much more stubborn this time around, and refused to budge.

Unlike the last game, the Roman legions surged forward into combat. This was a risky gambit - while the Elite Infantry had a superior combat factor, they would be shattered by the British Warband units if beaten in close combat. This was best demonstrated by the Romans losing a unit of Elite Infantry in addition to a unit of Javelin Cav.

What had started as two lines of battle had become a bloody mess. The Roman Legionaries and Auxilia managed to kill two units of British Warband, and the British failed to respond in kind.

The Legionaries had finally gotten to grips with the enemy, and their swords chopped through the British Warbands. Three more units fell, pushing the British over the break limit and securing victory for Rome.

While there were a couple rules I needed to check, Bill and I found Triumph! to be a fun set of fast-play ancient rules, with relatively easy to understand rules and interesting in-game mechanics that rewarded tactical thinking. I'm hoping to play more in the future.