Russ and I had another FOG Punic Wars clash last night.
No photos (sorry!) and this will be a generally short report as a consequence.
After dicing for terrain, I noticed that the left corner on my side was sheltered by two enclosed fields - perfect flank protection for the infantry. I tried to lure Russ to the middle by depolying my skirmishers and cavalry there - but he wasn't fooled. Instead he piled his cavalry on my left (his right) and lined up his remaining troops (including 2 elephants) in a mass battle line. I put the infantry in the sheltered corner regardless.
The opening moves were predictable. My velites moved forward to combat his slingers (accompanied by the Italian allies) to counter the Numidian light horse who'd wandered in front of my cavalry). A series of charges took place as I attempted to trap his light horse in front of his onrushing cavalry.
The Carthaginian line wheeled as one - which I thought would take ages to complete and keep his left-most troops out of the battle for a while. I therefore started to move my heavy troops out of the corner - to support the velites / cavalry combo OR exploit any opportunities that arose.
During the charges and evades, Russ' battle line got close enough to my pursuing cavalry for an elephant to jump out and tangle with one of my cavalry BG's. This became the key battle at the centre.
The other Roman cavalry got lucky. One or Russ' light horse got trapped and had to evade through his Gallic cavalry (which became Disrupted). These then charged my velites and Roman cavalry (the former passing a CMT to stay put). After a confused battle, the Gauls Fragmented then Broke - going through the Spanish cavalry behind them. These in turn became Disrupted and faced the same velites / cavalry combo (the Velites having to waith for the Spanish to become Fragmented before jumping in.
The consequence was that both Gallic and Spanish cavalry were Broken and fled for the hills - with the cavalry in hot pursuit (the velites choosing to attack the Light Horse again - catching them in the flank).
Meanwhile the Cartho battle line slowliy wheeled. The cavalry tried to kill the elephant but as it required 3+ hits to force a death roll - and Hannibal close by to ensure the cohesion tests were passed - the grey beasts stood firm - allowing the Gauls and the other Numidian Light Horse to surround them. That was basically the end of the cavalry - they soon lost bases and Autobroke.
Up by the hills, the remaining Roman cavalry - bouyed by their success - also caught some slingers in a column, hitting their rear. Somehow, the Romans contrived to lose the combat (an echo of when my velites were caught in the rear by Russ' veteran African spearmen - and won!). That was the incident that put Russ off FOG for a considerable time - yet he enjoyed the same improbable outcome last night. We agreed that as a result, the velites / spearman incident will never be referred to again.
The combat developed - the Romans failing to deliver either deaths or effective cohesion tests (Hannibal and his +2/12" combo!) on the crappy slingers - and hence to deliver a victory for the Romans.
Russ began moving troops over to his right hand side - including a BG of African Spears and some more skirmishers. My foot continued to move in their enclosed position to create a coherent (and condensed) front meaning that Russ would struggle to get his troops together to be effective in the small 'hole' between the enclosed fields.
We left it there. Technically a draw (although the Carthos had lost more BG's). We then argued about the likely outcome. Russ' view was that the Cartho foot were unscathed and - with two chunky elephants - were likely to give a good account of themselves.
My view was that the Roman foot were similarly unscathed and were close to taking on the right hand side of the Cartho line with 3-4 BG's going toe-to-toe with one BG of the African spears - and with the Roman horse eventually bashing the skirmishers (those ++POA's had to come off at some point!) they would be free to wander around the Cartho rear and do some (unhindered) damage.
But as usual we ran out of time to fight to a finish.
It was a closer fight than most of the Punic Wars fights we've had. We agreed that the Carthaginians are hard to fight effectively and we think that a full game (with me taking the Carthos for a change) would be educational for us both!