"Making Ancient battles interesting" Topic

So how do you keep Ancients from getting too boring and repetitive?
I am by default a soloist (live in the mountains). Like many of us here on TMP (or so I suspect) I have many armies. Being a soloist, I have them in pairs. I have:
Macedonians – Persians/Indians
Carthaginians – Romans
Vikings – Scots
Crusaders – Islam
Swedes – Poles (circa 1620)
Front Note on rules: being an old dude who started with Warhammer Historical decades ago, I play its derivative "War and Conquest" for most of these. The exception being I play "Warriors of God" for the Crusades.
For all but one of these pairs, the setup is basically the same, infantry in the middle, cavalry on the flanks. The exception being Vikings-Scots (as neither of my armies has cavalry).
Alexander almost always setup the same way. Best cavalry (Companions) on the right and refuse the left. Hannibal was similar – Gauls on the right, Numidians on the left. These battles tend to be the same for me: while the infantry in the center get locked in, everything is decided by the right flank cavalry.
The Swedes v. Poles is similar, in that the Swedes can never beat the Winged Hussars.
My Crusaders usually get turned into pin-cushions before they can close. Infantry rarely matters, or even gets engaged. The rules are fun, but the Crusaders almost always lose.
I suppose part of the problem may be army composition as I tend to design them on what is fun to paint more than what is practical. I also just can't bring myself to do something weird like have infantry on a flank and cavalry in the center and on the other flank – just feels weird.
So, any advice on how to keep things interesting?
Any advice on alternate setups?

I know it's not possible for you, but what you lack is an agressive opponent to force you to think differently about deployment. I, too, am a solo player, so I feel your pain. We're cursed by knowing too much history and unwilling to play fast and loose with it. I've never done this, but perhaps a battle in difficult terrain, perhaps card-generated, would force us to adapt different formations. This is beginning to sound more and more like fighting with fantasy armies, but perhaps that's not a bad thing?

As another sometime solo gamer, I don't think the lack of a human opponent is the whole problem. The bigger issue is certainty.

If I know exactly what both armies are going to do before Turn 1 then the battle is almost over before the dice are rolled.

I've found that hidden objectives, random terrain, uncertain reinforcements, variable troop quality and commanders with different personalities all help. Even a simple rule that a wing might refuse an order or that reserves arrive unpredictably can force you to rethink an otherwise "textbook" deployment.

Historical armies often began in conventional formations but battles became interesting because something unexpected happened. As solo gamers we need to build those unexpected events into our scenarios.

Some ideas:

Attacking early so one side deploys without breakfast and fights hungry.

Luring off or bribing an ally.

Give one side a terrain advantage.

Crossing a river is always a challenge.

Two sides deploying in the dark or the fog or on opposite sides of a rise, and coming at each other slightly mismatched.

Flank marches. Lots of variations on this one: too early, on time, too late, too small, too worn out after the long march, struggling to cross unexpected terrain, enemy expected it and ambushed it, etc.

Feints.

Read Polybius' description of Hannibal's battles for ideas. Hannibal liked surprises – ambushes, unexpected deployment variations, attacking columns on the march, hiding men under sheep, fake withdrawals, you name it.

Noting that at least 2 of you are solo players, any way you could play each other via computer somehow? Set up armies without knowledge of the other and then reveal. Otherwise, I am not creative enough to help you with the issue.

I am also a solo wargamer. I have found that Command & Colors: Ancients has a host of scenarios and the card based system means that you can't always do what you want. It makes for very interesting games.

My suggestion is to research and fight historical battles. Then each battle has more meaning and once you get into it researching ancient battles and figuring out how to model what you have read on the wargames table becomes both fascinating and increases your understanding of your armies and how they fought. This is the route I took with my Dominion of the Spear solo rules and all the different rules in the Dominion series that followed. So historical battles is my strong recommendation.

Can I also suggest setting up a campaign? That way battles have a greater significance outside the immediate outcome.

You can mix things up a little. Scots sometimes had Viking mercenaries, while disgruntled Scottish lairds might back the Vikings. Look at the Macedonians/Persians/Indians and see if you can build two Successor armies, perhaps one of them Indo-Bactrian.
You might also want to consider buying and painting a few small units that might give you a different battle. While neither Vikings nor Scots were noted for their cavalry, Vikings would sometimes steal horses, giving them a small mounted contingent. Adding some Turcopoles to your Crusader army might give them some protection against other horse archers.
I think Coeur de Lion used an infantry line with his cavalry behind them while campaigning in Palestine.
There is also the possibility of using different terrain. I once played in a colonial game set in a Sudanese forest. The guy who ran the game assured us that Sudan did indeed have forests (probably something more like scrub oak than towering pines).

Grelber

There are plenty of rule books and magazines with interesting scenarios. Midgard and Lion/Dragon Rampant come to mind. Also Programmed wargame scenarios by Charles S Grant gives heaps of possibilities.

I thought this was interesting:
"Make life hard for yourself:

All my games start by writing up an Order of Battle for both sides. I try to do this in a fair way, without giving any side a significant weakness or advantage. However, I have slowly come around to the idea that the 'enemy' needs to have a points advantage to counteract any unconscious bias I may have during the game. It also means that whatever army I play I have to play well to win. Victory is more likely to be genuine and not the result of bias in decision making.

How much of an advantage is a matter of debate but through a bit of trial and error, I have settled on between 5-10% extra points for the enemy army. This equates to one or maybe two more units in the field than they would normally have in a straight fight, so a reasonably significant advantage."

link

It's well worth reading his ideas about solo play.

Deploy 0-50% of the armies as you wish; the rest are deployed at random.

Little Wars TV have two scenario packs for the Punic Wars. They are written for their Age of Hannibal rules, but should be easily adaptable to other systems.

Could even be played with other armies.

Neil Thomas's One Hour Wargames contains 32 scenarios, and Charles Grant offered Table Top Teasers, continued in Battle Games Magazine and available from Wargames Vault.

Not all massive, army level engagements, but they do offer fun tactical puzzles.