Battle of Actium - Set-up

Just a preliminary set-up for another game I've committed to host at the annual local convention, Enfilade!, in May. I used some cork board with dried coffee grounds for the shoreline just to give the game a bit of aesthetics. I also ordered some Irregular 2mm Romans and a marching fort to place on the terrain. Looking forward to painting up the little guys as the smallest scale I've painted so far is 15mm. Anyway, here's the initial deployment - well, actually I'll have Antony's forces a bit further out from the shoreline, and Octavian's forces further apart from Antony's. Just wanted to have everything in the photo op.

Most of the ships are CinC which I scored from an old TMP sale. The command ships are Langton, and several ships as well as Cleopatra's are Valiant/Ramming Speed

Still working on the Victory Conditions, but one element will be Cleopatra escaping with her treasure ships.

View from the shoreline occupied by Octavian's land forces - Antony's large command ship offshore.

A bird's eye view from the shoreline.

Arruntius facing Octavius in the center, with Cleopatra and her treasure ships in the rear.

I have a home brew set of fast-play rules based a bit on Hail Caesar and Diadochi. Movement will be hexed based using a nice Hotz mat, of course, which should make movement cleaner and faster. The map below shows Octavian with Agrippa on their left flank, but I have Octavian on the right for the game. I may have his actual placement unknown to Antony's forces, with a Victory Condition being his capture or destruction. I've seen differing numbers of ships involved from various sources. For this game, they'll be close in number for each side. The main difference will be classing more of Antony's fleet with larger vessels.

 

A play-test will follow soon, and I'll be sure to post the results.