"Best Ruleset for Roman Triple Line Deployment?" Topic

To get the best representation of how the Roman triple-line deployment actually worked, which ruleset do you recommend?

For those who respond I would also like to know how the Roman deployment worked and what historical evidence is the basis of that knowledge.

I like the Punic Wars supplement for Warhammer Ancient Battles. You get to swap your Roman cohorts between lines, ensuring that you can keep fresh troops up front. Of course, you give up length of line to get this, so you're always in danger of being flanked.

If we actually knew how it worked historically then we'd have more to go on, but we don't :-( All we have are tantalising snippets in the original texts and lots of filling-in-the-gaps guestimates since.

Civitates Bellantes rules portray the Roman tactic very well.

At the army level of representation, Lost Battles does a good job modelling the flow of troops between combat lines, and as it is grid based, you can arrange them in a nice chequerboard formation too:)

Dr Sabin knows far more about Roman warfare than I ever will, so will bow to his analysis on how it all worked.

tactica 2 does the three lines.

not the maniples, but it does do the lines well.

caliban will post some of his reports on how it plays.

Yes I keep meaning to finish off that Roman army to fight my Carthaginians and Macedonians for Tactica II.

At your request, Lord Keraunos…

…in Tactica II the Republican legion is the unit, and so long as the triplex acies is intact, when they break the sub-units of Hastati or Principes don't make others test for morale. It's only when the Triarii go down that morale tests occur. The only exception is if a sub-unit is destroyed in a single turn of combat (think flank attacks or massive Gallic warband assaults.

At the level of army morale, the sub-units don't count towards army breakpoint, but the legion does. For a standard consular army, you'd need to lose two legions for the army to break. This sounds pretty minor, but in practice it isn't – the three-line deployment ensures that the chances are that enemy units will be degraded to the the point of destruction before an entire legion collapses. In other words, the Romans can afford to lose more than two-thirds of their heavy infantry and still win the battle – nobody else can do that.

The combination of the rules for the triplex acies at the tactical and army morale levels makes the Romans work, at least in my opinion, as they seem to have done on the battlefield.

In other words, the rules designer (Arty Conliffe) has tried to come up with a way to make the system represent what Polybius seems to imply, although without going into the details of line relief. It's abstracted to the level of the lines, as Keraunos says, but I think it's fair to say that Arty wants to model the overall effect successfully instead of getting bogged down in detail.

Examples here in various posts:

caliban-somewhen.blogspot.co.uk

Especially the photos of Zama and Magnesia. Oh, and although this has been said for a long time now, it does look as though the rules will be published this year…

Nobody knows how it worked. So any anwser is right.

Jaz
6sided.net – Start A Blog Now!

I think Sabin and Goldsworthy (amongst others) would disagree with your view 6sided.

we have a pretty good understanding of how it worked, and some pretty good evidence to back that up now.

I don't think anyone would actually dispute that the Republican Roman legion deployed in three lines:

Hastati in the first line
Princeps in the second line
Triarii in the third line

What seems to cause all the discussion is whether the maniples were in "checker board" formation or not. Whether they were or not, it does seem clear from the evidence that the Romans were able to perform something akin to the "Passage of Lines" of later centuries. Exactly how this was done is not known. Some would say maniples of the secomd line passed through the gaps in the first line, others suggest it was file interpenetration.

Whatever way it was done, in a wargames context if you are fighting battles with multiple legions then all that is really needed are rules that allow the lines to interpenetrate. For example, Hail Caesar has the "Drilled" special rule that allows units to interpenetrate without causing disorder.

Keraunos, no, they acknowledge that they have some reasonable ideas, but no-one actually knows how the triple line worked. It is unclear whether second (and third line) went forward to fill spaces between the front line units allowing them to with draw, or it was an individual line replacement, or interspaced between front line files.

Looking forward to the first time machine…

Pretty sure it was done just like we saw in Spartacus.

Speaking of…I'm Spartacus!

"Keraunos, no, they acknowledge that they have some reasonable ideas, but no-one actually knows how the triple line worked."

Of course we can never _acually_ know, just like we can never actually know what colour tunics Legionaries wore, but we can indeed hazard some fairly informed ideas.

From a design for effect point of view it doesn't matter anyway, as long as your legions can deploy in three lines and in some mysterious way cycle subunits from the back to the front, then it is OK. Obviously if you want to model the actual drill eveolutions, you have a problem as we don't have a Roman drill manual.

I favour a light cerise myself, or maybe that mysterious colour so favoured by mens clothing catalogues of 'teal'.

Margate, how epistomological of you
But I suggest you re read sabins papers on the subject, and holdsworthys books

They make a clear description with good evidence.

Margate, how epistomological of you
But I suggest you re read sabins papers on the subject, and holdsworthys books

The name is Margard.
I and others on this thread have said that we do not know how the Roman army deployed for battle. Some believe the "checker board" formation, others that the interpenetration was inter-file and still others that the legion deployed in checker board but formed a single line out of the first two lines when battle was joined.

Both Sabin and Goldsworthy are acknowledged expert historians and I for one would certainly pay attention to their views. However, you seem to be in possession of information not freely available to the rest of us.

Perhaps you could be more specific about which works of messrs Sabin and Goldsworthy discuss this issue and where we might find them?

There's another discussion here:
TMP link

Oi you! ;) I was trying to stay out of this….

Would you like me to add a bit more detail to this discussion? if so please can anyone who disagrees with Sabin and et al articulate what are your ideas on how this worked and the evidence to support the idea? Many thanks.

please can anyone who disagrees with Sabin and et al

Not knowing what Sabin et al actually say, it's a bit difficult to say whether I disagree with them or not. However, I have a lot of respect for both Sabin and Goldsworthy as historians so I'd be interested to hear what their take on this is.

@Margard Margard I would strongly recommend if you do not have the following: Goldsworthy The Roman Army at War, Roman Warfare (Cassell series), The Complete Roman Army. I would also look at P. Connelly's view in The Roman Army. You must get hold of Penguin books – Polybius and Livy. These are essential, Leob even better. If you can obtain them Sabin's The Roman Face of Battle, The Mechanics of the Second Punic War. Goldsworthy and Sabin set out their market stall very clearly on this subject. Polybius and Livy are your primary evidence sources.

@Editor – which ever rule-set supports your view on how it happened? Me personally, I stick with those who have put their heads on blocks to share with us their academic view point after, I suspect, they made huge time investment in looking at all the facts, evidence presented before them.

@Keranuos I concur with you and Sabin et al, until someone can actually articulate their view instead of supercilious comments. Why wouldn't I? They have done all the hard work, they have sifted through evidence, collated and double checked and reviewed and expressed their academic view. I'm not saying they are right and wrong. But what they have presented us with is a serious look at the way the Roman Army fought. One thought – during the Punic Wars the Cohort came into existence (as we know it from Caesers time onwards) when through tactical necessity maniples of hastati, principes and triarii were grouped into a Cohort. For around a 100 years(!) the maniple as we know it and the cohort as we know co-existed dependent of the tactical situation, until Marius reforms. And lastly Polybius states the second line (principes) covered the gaps behind the first (hastati) see Polybius 15.9.7-9.

@Marcus Maximus – Thank you for the book recommendations. I will try and locate some of them. However, for the purposes of this discussion it would be helpful if someone could summarise the Sabin/Goldsworthy position, of which I am currently ignorant.

"summarise the Sabin/Goldsworthy position, of which I am currently ignorant"

---> Makes me less than desirous to spend an hour or so writing a paper, then disserting it here, so folks can simply chew it into oblivion. I suggest doing your own research and report back to us. The Polybian described legion has controversies.. what doesn't.

The transfer between units is easier to visualize than to write or read from sources. Units were rarely solid blocks of men standing shoulder to shoulder. The Romans were especially good at training their soldiers to pass down the files, so good that they trained to pass whole units through each other. maniples being clumps, were easier than most formations to accomodate such moves. Even phalanxes collapsed or expanded by files, so it is not an unknown skill. It is even described that a phalanx passed through another engaged phalanx to disengage and relieve the troops in combat. It isn't easy to describe how this happens with toy soldiers.

Thank you Jeff.

@Margard I understand your request but summarising what Goldsworthy is saying for example is like republishing his book on TMP. May I suggest read Roman Army at War – most if not all of what he discusses is in that with all references to all / most of the material he uses to form his conclusions, or failing that book the next best one is the cassell one Roman Warfare.
My comment to the editor still stands.

I have read that the Celts at times could often be tactically astute as at Allia and Telamon. And they weren't the only "barbarians" to show good command, control and cohesion on the battlefield in front of the enemy. Not common, yes, but occurred more often than we care to admit. How many rules allow for this I wonder….

Citvitates Bellantes is designed to allow the Roman formations to replicate the Roman triple line formation. It is true we do not know exactly how it worked but we do know they used it and were able to replace lines in combat and shift sub-units around.
My frustration with almost all ancients rules is that they do not allow you to do this in any way that looks or feels right.
You can download Civitates at link
There are also several scenarios and battle reports on the website and more will follow
Simon

apologies margard, the bus must have jumped when I was typing your name on my mobile.

JSTOR hasSabin's 'face of Roman battle'
link

I think you can buy it from Cambridge here
link

and you can get teh 'pre-paper' 'mechanics of battle in the second punic war' here
link
(but face of roman Battle has a lot more detail)

Amazon will sell you Goldsworthy quickly – Cannae is also good in this area, in addtion to the other recommendations from him above

or you can just pop to a university library, as I did.

Happy reading

roman maniples – gaps or formed line at the point of contact

that would make a good thread for the easter weekend

I understand your request but summarising what Goldsworthy is saying for example is like republishing his book on TMP.

I'm not asking for the whole book. I am simply asking what his view on the Republican Roman deployment is. Is he pro – or anti checker board and why?

JSTOR has Sabin's 'face of Roman battle'

Great if you are student, but my student days are long gone…

OK, I actually went and looked at some books.

Essentially both Sabin & Goldsworthy argue that:

i) unlike our toys lined up on the wargames table ALL armies deployed with gaps between subunits to enable them to manouvre.

ii) the gaps in the Roman formations were wider than was conventional but were covered by the units in the second and third lines. So yes, they fought in a chequerboard formation.

There, several hundred thousand words compressed into 50 odd.

Martin, thank you you saved me the effort, and I too have read the books, I just wish a few others would. However, may I add a couple of more points to your brief summary (which I like):

1) Gaps between units (covered above) 2) Drill, training 3) superior command and control at the unit level (Romans had two centurions, senior on the right and junior on the left, two optiones (rear left and rear right) and two signiferi) 4) Pause / lull during the fighting, 5) Unit relief.

Most if not all battles have periods of a lull during fighting and it is at this point Sabin and Goldsworthy that the possible relief took place, hence point 4 above. To carry out such a manoeuvre the troops had to be well drilled and trained and had to be excellent command and control hence points 2 and 3 above.

The only thing missing is the lack of accuracy of the distance between units and ergo the space a legion would take up. Cowan has stated it would not be larger than the width of a maniple but certainly smaller.

@smacdowall I like your analysis of the Late Roman era and have a number of books by you. I am a strong convert to your way of thinking on that period. I haven't tried Citvitates Bellantes, but will now download and have a play, many thanks for the link, and I would like to thank you for your input to the hobby, it has for me been a great asset.

@smacdowall I like your analysis of the Late Roman era and have a number of books by you. I am a strong convert to your way of thinking on that period. I haven't tried Citvitates Bellantes, but will now download and have a play, many thanks for the link, and I would like to thank you for your input to the hobby, it has for me been a great asset.

Many thanks @Marcus Maximus. Civitates is based on the Comitatus mechanisms while being specific to the classical era (ie: Republican Romans, Macedonians etc) and providing mechanisms that allow historical formations to operate as they should

Smacdowall I liked Comitatus very much, I like the feeling and output it gave for combat during that period. IMHO it was an excellent contribution to wargaming and was an unique variation on wargames rules on par with Andy Callan's DAIS and Guy Halsall's Early Medieval Command. Thank you for bringing us Comitatus.

Nobody knows how it worked. So any anwser is right.

And the irony is that there is so much said in this thread about what we know so little about.

Some how, the back line can relieve the front line. That much we know. We also know from Cannae that if the formation gets flanked, line relief cannot be done. That is about all we know with any certainty.

Well the Die is Cast. Since it is a set of rules (mine) designed to follow the development of the Roman army.

Of course it is well to remember that it was not just for Punic wars Roman armies but used in the Imperial Roman armies as well. Part of the system is to get your troops fighting at their best and then when they are tired, replace them.

This subject was touched on recently here:
TMP link
and here:
TMP link