"Elephants – are we doing it right?" Topic

In the couple of ancients rules I have played, elephants are much more effective against cavalry than formed infantry. Especially, if you deploy more than one – it can really shut down a cavalry wing.
That being said, and operating under the assumption that Hannibal is waaaaaaaaaay smarter than me, at Zama, why did he deploy his half-trained ellies vs the Roman foot, rather than neutralizing the cavalry wings?
Am I missing something?

At a guess….he saw the Roman infantry as his real opponent & outnumbered & with inferior grade troops wanted to maximise his chances of breaking them.

I think ochoin guesses right …

Shielding against a superior cavalry opponent is, indeed, the right employment of the elephant … but it is essentially a predictable and defensive tactic. It won't wrong foot Scipio and won't help you much in beating the Roman legions.

At Zama Hannibal takes the win all risk of using the elephants to give him an edge over the Roman infantry (but he knows he must do that or he is finished).

If the stratagem had paid off it would have cemented his reputation (though doubtless Rome would have been back, and back*) … but it didn't and so we scratch our heads and wonder what we are missing …

Phil
*Rome never forgives, never forgets and never gives in!!

It just seemed to me the infantry fight was pretty even, until the Roman Cav reentered the picture.

I did read one account that suggested that maybe he expected his own cav to route, and was hoping to win the infantry fight before the enemy cav returned.

I feel that Hannibal's elephant corps was not well trained. Half of his elephants could have negated the enemy cavalry advantage, and the other may have been just as effective as the full elephant charge…gamers in hindsight recognize this.

As it turned out delaying the Roman allied cavalry would have been more effective, but in this case I feel Phil is correct, Hannibal risked all for a possible swift decisive victory, reminiscent of other Roman invasions that lost discipline so far from home, and he underestimated the experience of the Roman army on that day.

I always felt he deployed them against the Roman infantry on the chance he could get a quick win.

this is the sort of discussion Allen's input would be insightful.

The general consensus is that the elephant corps were not adequately trained or commanded. Hannibal found himself outnumbered in cavalry – but elected to use elephants against the infantry. It's a very interesting question to re-play.

"this is the sort of discussion Allen's input would be insightful."

Yes, Allen will be missed, here and on many forums.

Also the majority of the Roman cavalry was provided by the Numidians. They were use to elephants. Hannibal realized it might have been better to try them on troops not use to them. Better a quick victory then a long drawn out fight where his troops inexperience would show.

Elephants were better as a screen than an offensive force against cavalry. The elephants could have been used to block one or both wings, at least delaying any intervention by the Roman cavalry.

Again, since I feel his elephants were poorly trained he may have felt that the only use for them would be a shock attack.

Later Numidian armies did include elephants, however they seemed to insist that they be used in an offensive way as well, also leading to bad results.

I think it is likely that he didn't believe his infantry could win against the Romans, his victories always came from some form of outflanking manoeuvre, in a prolonged head to head clash the Romans would win. Purely delaying the Roman flanks would only delay the inevitable.
Therefor he tried to use the elephants as expendables, to break up the Roman formation, in the same way that scythed chariots were used, with equally poor results.
Taking this thought further, how much influence did Hannibal have at Magnesia? While scythed chariots were a traditional Selucid device did Hannibal whisper in Antiochus' ear something like "I tried charging with elephants, that didn't work, I'd keep them back amongst the infantry if I was you, maybe you could try your luck with the chariots!"

I dont think Hannibal was at Magnesia… he was too busy getting the Seleucid fleet sent to the bottom.

Hannibal's infantry at least maintained a draw. Had he released an elephant reserve then he may have prevailed if the cavalry could be kept at bay. But without the initial elephant charge would the Romans have simply sliced through the Carthaginian first line like butter??

Magnesia is like Cynoscephalae and Pydna, complete tactical implosion on one side leading to disaster. It seems in this period nobody could figure out the right offensive or defensive stance against the legions, and were always flip flopping between too aggressive or too passive… or both…

All of this just illustrates what kind of well honed weapon Hannibal's army was at Cannae, and how that had degraded by transporting to Africa and forced to engage a veteran army. The Seleucid army never really had much of chance against veteran Romans given their inflexibility and bad generalship, with an added dose of weather issues, and bad dice rolls.

True, but what might have happened if the Selucid army had deployed in a more traditional manner with the phalanx 16 deep and protected on the flanks? It might not have beaten the Romans but could it have forced a stalemate and a more honourable peace? Unlikely with the Roman psyche.
But if that tactic had been used then elephants could have been useful.

@JJartist

Hannibal is also thought to have devised a plan to level the playing field in regards to the cavalry. Both H.H Scullard and Richard Gabriel believe Hannibal gave them the order to give ground and drive the opposition off the field, which could explain the ease of the Roman victory here (though against this they may well have just perused too far, and Lazenby believes that it would have been very risky to expose his flanks like this). With the cavalry off the field, Hannibal's only chance of victory would be to break the Roman centre, thus he threw all his weight against the numerically inferior Romans, starting with the elephants, then three waves of infantry. The strategy almost worked, as we can see the hastati were exhausted after their struggles against the first two lines. It is also thought that Hannibal set up the third line to prevent Scipio's infantry flanking his first two lines.

I have no doubt from his set up that he had knowledge of Scipio's tactics and the fact he was facing a very experienced army.

@True, but what might have happened if the Selucid army had deployed in a more traditional manner with the phalanx 16 deep and protected on the flanks?

I dont think it was totally the deployment, it was the lack of action. The phalanx has to move… standing still was the problem… let let the battle come to them….by the time it got there they were surrounded.