For the back story hit the June 1st post here:

259 BC will go down in history as the most drab and boring of years. Rome removed some Consular Armies and failed at rolls to re instate them…Or recruit anything new.

This year is a lot of positioning and re positioning as both sides lick wounds and attempt to get the upper hand. Rome moves Consular Army #1 to Drapernum. Hanno Hamilcar – move to Drapernum to counter.

Consular Army #1 attacks Hanno and gives him a blood nose. The whiny Cartho’s and their bought toys scamper back to Lilybaeum & 1:1 losses.

Fulvius replaces a wounded roman. Consular Army #4 sieges Massilia

Praetor sieges Drapernum, then the Siege Attrition chit!

Hanno Hamilcar – sieges Argentum. This was a nice move. If successful it is now a place I need to reduce to have control of the province. A minor annoyance and with

any luck he will stock it with targets for my Legions to smash. The game plan for Rome cannot evolve until the Naval situation is sorted out. Losing the army and

naval forces in one fell swoop last turn screwed us. The Romans cannot afford not to build armies right now as we must face off with max strength against the Cartho armies to mitigate their leadership bonus’s and army bonus’s.

258 BC

Top of the turn Roman Election turn, another mixed bag of E rated jackasses who could not fight their way out of a wineskin. We do prorogue L Manlius as he is the only bloke with half a clue.

Fail Legion raise …WHAT No bastard wants to fight….?

Fail manpower raise..Thank God for that. This could have been really bad. IF a raise happened with Rome so weakened. There would be little to prevent a storming of the mainland.

Onto the Chit pulls – L. Manlius lays siege to Lilybaeum.

Move Marcus Valerius from Tarentum to Lilybaeum.

Hannibal Hamilcar attempts to do Siege reduction. X2 fails. The force in Agrigentum sallys and kills the dudes. -1. Rock on. They wont last long but they are biting into Cartho strength. I really think Carthage has to be super cautious regarding fracturing forces, and losing small amounts of men hither and yon.

Han Gisgo sallys – 1/1. Hahahahaha. Suck it.

2 Siege Attrit: Net is Lilybaeum lose 8, of 28 pts. This is big for Rome!

The Romans lose a total of 10 IF we raise Legions correctly this is not a big loss. If we don’t..well its going to hurt.

Agrigentum loses 2 in its siege attrition rolls.

I totally fuck up raising legions. Sigh.

Return to port phase– Carthage loses a fleet and a dumimvir. Nice.

257

Roman Dumivir Moves to Lilybaeum – This negates the -3 on Siege Attrition that Cartho get and should bump up his losses.

Yes ! – the very next chit: Siege Attrite:

Agrigentum: Cartho -1 Rome 0. / Lilybaeum losses for both sides!

2^nd Attrition chit! What are the chances!

The weak E rated cousin of L Manlius, A. Manlius takes over as proconsul for the siege of Massilia where losses mount the Cartho force is down to 9 for their attrition rolls.

Agrigentum falls to Carthage but inflicts 1 losses. We can re take this later as he left just 2 troop strength there.

Lilybauem 0 losses and Rome loses 3! – FFS I cant catch a break. Rome sucks.

The THIRD Attrition chit is pulled x3 – in a row! – Seriously. WTF. Fortunately not much else is lost nor gained so Rome attempts Siege reduction @ Lilybaeum:

Siege reduction – roll a 0 .. WTF results in a Sally – 2/2 .

Move more men to Drapernum with Proconsul Atilius from Tarentum under the Senates watchful gaze.

Rome attempts to a Reduction: Massilia, fail. Finally something good!! Field consul Manlius intercepts the Cartho Army #1. Success. We attack vigorously: 5/15 on a 5:1 attack. 1/1 losses. Meh.

N.B. Cartho could have attempted to intercept the Dumivir move to Lilybaeum as he entered the port hex. We forgot to do that.

We shake our heads and wrap the turn.