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I recently spent a year in Los Angeles where the natural history museum had an interesting exhibit on central American civilisations which focused on Mexico and the Aztecs. As usual one thing led to another and soon I began to think about building an Aztec army.
This led me into a search for more information on the Aztecs. The most useful sources that I dug up were (in no particular order) some old Slingshot articles, Bernal Diaz’s account of the Spanish Conquest, Ross Hassig’s book on Aztec Warfare from University of Oklahoma Press and the Osprey book MAA239 on Aztec, Mixtec and Zapotec armies by John Pohl. The Osprey book was the best painting guide, while Hassig’s book was the most informative about Aztec campaigns. From these it became apparent that the Aztec army consisted of two main parts. One part was the peasants, who received a basic familiarity with weapon handling as part of their education and were called out for the more major campaigns. The second part was the semi-professional warriors (I use the term semi-professional to indicate that warfare was an important part of their life as it was for European knights, Saxon huscarls and others). This group consisted of the Aztec nobility (who had to prove themselves in battle but received better preparation for this than the peasants) and those peasants who had managed to advance in social rank through their prowess on the battlefield.
So how are the Aztecs represented in wargames rules? As a seasoned competition player of 7th edition I had fought against my share of Aztec armies but the well oiled machinery of a typical 7th edition Aztec competition army with lots of LMI "Reg B" JLS,S,Sh (and these are the peasants) seemed rather distant from the Aztec army of history. The DBM army lists seemed to offer a more reasonable interpretation.
Thinking about how to troops should be classified in DBM is always an interesting exercise, so here is an outline of my thoughts. The bulk of the semi-professional warriors fit neatly into the Blade category as their primary weapons are macuahuitl (best described as an obsidian edged wooden sword, usually used one-handed) and shield; they fight as individuals; wear cotton armour and use an assortment of hand-hurled missiles. Deciding what type of blades is harder. They are clearly not superior blades. The argument for ordinary would be by analogy with the New Kingdom Egyptian troops that are classed as ordinary blades. But I feel the real question is should they be fast or inferior blades. Leaving that question to one side and moving on to the peasants. They are harder to classify with Scott Holder in Spearpoint (journal of North American Society of Ancient and Medieval Wargamers) issue 46 arguing for regular bow(inferior). Another option would be ordinary auxilia, based on an assumed mixture of atl-atl dart throwers, javelins, macuahuitls and shields. Another option is that used in the DBM list of superior hordes. Moving on again, the Quachic were one of the heighest ranking groups within the semi-professional warriors and they had a specific role as shock troops. Thus it would be nice to represent them as different from the majority of the semi-professional warriors. It is also necessary to look at the entire army when considering how to classify the various troops. In particular, I do not think it would make sense to end up with a classification scheme in which the peasants were better able to manoeuvre or were faster than the semi-professional warriors, nor where the Quachic were slower than the semi-professional warriors.
Taking stock of the above discussion gives me a couple of options for how you might classify Aztecs under DBM. One option is that used in the DBM army lists, where the peasants are superior hordes, the semi-professional warriors are inferior blades and the Quachic are neatly represented as superior warband - so all the troops move at the same speed. Another option would be to class the peasants as ordinary auxilia or inferior bows (depending on your views on weaponry; I would tend to auxilia); the semi-professional warriors as fast blades and the Quachic as either fast blades or fast warband (neither of which is ideal) - so again all the troops move at the same speed. A third option would be to mix the other two with peasant hordes, semi-professional warriors as inferior or fast blades and Quachic as ordinary or fast blades. Other options would be possible but they go against my rule about relative speed of peasants, semi-professional warriors and Quachic. In short, I can live with the classification in the DBM lists as a reasonable interpretation.
One of the other interesting things in DBM is looking at which armies are similar based solely on the types of troops they are allowed. Using this approach the closest army to Aztec is that of Spartacus! Perhaps, this could open up a whole new way of looking at which armies represent potentially reasonable historical opponents? Enough said, now back to the main story.
Having decided to build an Aztec army I had to find some suitable figures and information on how to paint them. I considered, briefly, trying to build a 25mm army but common sense prevailed when I realised just how many figures I would have to buy and paint, so I settled for 15mm. There are a fair number of 15mm Aztec ranges; those I investigated included Falcon, Grenadier, Minifigs, Naismith and Tin Soldier. Of these Tin Soldier are much chunkier than the others, so I did not use any of them, but the rest fit reasonably together. The Naismith figures are a bit smaller and the Grenadier range (which only came out as I was completing the army, so I have not investigated this in as much depth) seems to be short on basic peasant types but has lots of variants in each pack and a superb command group. For those considering an Aztec army I will briefly identify which figures I used for each group:
Overall my army is about 40% Falcon, 40% Minifigs, 17% Naismith and 3% Grenadier. For information on what colours to paint figures I relied on the Osprey book. Hassig’s book had some useful extra information about shield and suit patterns. In some ways the most complex group to decide on painting schemes for were the semi-professional warriors (excluding priests, Quachic, eagles and jaguars) who wear full bodysuits. Mine are divided into four classes which link across to the rank structure in Aztec society which was based on numbers of captives previously taken in battle. Most numerous are those in the lowest group who wear red bodysuits (with what is best described as little back equals "=" signs scattered over them) without back banners, then there are those in white bodysuits (and red "=") without back banners, those in blue bodysuits with back banners and finally those in green bodysuits with back banners.
I still have little experience actually wargaming with my Aztecs and none with fighting historical opponents (some time I hope to put together a Tlaxcallan army). However, it is worth recounting my experience so far.
Late in 1995 a friend of mine, John Medhurst, suggested we should enter the Godendag 96 DBM doubles competition (at Usk in the UK). In case you don’t know; the competition was for 500 AP armies which were allowed one reliable ally general (it would hardly do for one player to change sides part way through the game!) and was played on 6’ x 4’ tables. The use of allies was not compulsory.
For some strange reason and after much debate, we decided to use the Aztecs. A competition is a way of learning about a new army if rather a baptism of fire. It also required a fair bit of work as the army was not yet finished. I ended up painting 350-400 figures in a little over a month (fortunately they were almost all peasants who are simple to paint, unlike the professional warriors in their bodysuits!). However, we had settled on an army list (see below) - after all we had to submit it before the competition.
A DBM 500 army point Aztec army is large; the army we fielded had a total of 580 figures. We organised the army as follows;
| CinC as Reg Bd(I) 10 Irr Wb(S) 3 Irr Bd(I) 10 Reg Bd(I) 7 Irr Ps(O) |
Sub Gen as Reg Bd(I) 15 Reg Bd(I) 6 Reg Bw(I) 6 Irr Ps(O) 5 Irr Hd(S) 5 Irr Bts(I) |
Sub Gen as Reg Bd(I) 48 Irr Hd(S) 6 Irr Ps(O) |
Sub Gen as Reg Bd(I) 15 Irr Hd(S) 5 Irr Ps(O) |
The basic strengths of the army are that it is very big (140 elements or 94 element equivalents in DBM terms) and has four regular generals which allowed us to assign the all-important PiP dice. The weaknesses are equally obvious: a total lack of mounted troops; lots of impetuous troops; low manoeuvrability as all the troops are inferior regulars or irregulars (later editions of DBM have improved the manoeuvrability of inferior regulars significantly); a major vulnerability to knights (which destroy every troop type on a simple win; no need to score double) and a slight problem about fitting the entire army onto the table if we are the attackers (which is likely with an aggression of three). We did not include any Otomi (Wb(F)) as they are also impetuous and move at a different speed from the rest of the army.
Our basic plan was that the Quachic (Wb(S)) and the rest of the professional warriors (Bd(I)) would be our main strike force. They are more effective against foot than mounted so they deploy in the centre and attack the enemy infantry centre (if one exists). Meanwhile the smaller peasant horde holds or contests a piece of difficult terrain on one flank while the large peasant horde protects the other.
We discussed the possibility to deploying the large horde as a long line in front of the other commands if we should face a cavalry or light horse army and see how long it took the enemy to cut their way through it - a plan born of desperation. However, the real worst case would be a Medieval army full of knights and such armies could be expected in a 500 AP competition.
We arrived in Usk on a snowy Saturday morning, late due to the snow, with an army neither of use had used before and which we had only finished painting late on Friday. However we had tried deploying it a couple of times just to see if it would all fit on the table (which it did but not by much). There was even another pair crazy enough to play with an Aztec army (mainly Tin Soldier figures); I still marvel at how they managed to get seven chunky Tin Soldier figures on a horde base (I had settled for five figures to a horde base).
Our first game (which started late) saw us invading Medieval Hungary (see map 1). We expected a flank march by the Serbian allied contingent (Kn(S) and LH) and were unpleasantly surprised when it rushed out of the village and destroyed our smaller peasant command. The Serbs, assisted by the Hungarian CinC and his knights, then went on to wreck the next Aztec command. The Quachic and professional warriors found that war wagons were tough - an inconclusive slog developed - and the assorted Hungarian light horse retired slowly in front of the larger peasant horde. Overall we crashed to a 10-0 loss and easily finished the game early despite our late arrival. The battle confirmed our fear about knights. Indeed we were only able to destroy two (yes, two) enemy elements. Not a very good start.
Map 1
The second game found us being invaded by Lysimachus with Thracian Allies (see map 2). A mass of Thracian peltasts (Ax(S)) slowly pushed back and finally broke the smaller peasant command which was defending the great temple. Elsewhere the battle developed slowly; we were reluctant to face the Macedonian cavalry (Kn(F)) in the open (i.e. to advance beyond the woods). Eventually, Lysimachus advanced the phalanx far enough forwards (and in only 3 ranks) so that it became a reasonable target for the Quachic. A long slog then developed between the Quachic and the Phalanx and a group of our professional warriors (Bd(I)) and more Thracian peltasts (Ax(S)). The Thracian peltasts slowly got the better of our professional warriors but meanwhile the Quachic broke the phalanx. The loss of the phalanx demoralised Lysimachus’ command and gave us a narrow 6-4 victory. We began to feel that maybe the Aztecs were not quite as bad as we had at first feared.
Map 2
The Sunday morning found our Aztecs invading a Medieval Hindu Indian kingdom (see map 3). The Indians opened the battle with a strong cavalry attack on our left wing (the large peasant horde) and a slow advance by the main Indian command. The Indian cavalry attack was thrown onto the defensive by the early arrival of our flank march and the fighting on this wing began to turn our way but was ultimately inconclusive. Meanwhile our main attack developed in the centre. The main Indian line was composed of 2 rank deep archers, with swordsmen (Bd(F)) behind, interspersed with elephants. The Indian commander let the swordsmen through just before contact - though this tended to result in a rather uneven front line. The Quachic again proved their worth cutting through the swordsmen and then the archers, despite heavy losses to the Indian elephants. At the same time our boats unloaded their peasants behind the Indian line and the peasants quickly fell on the Indian archers. Eventually, the Indian losses climbed to the point at which the main command became demoralised and with it the entire Indian army. This gave us a 10-0 victory, though I could not help but wonder what the Aztec reaction would have been to elephants given their reaction to horses.
Map 3
Our final game found us defending against the might of the Roman Republic (Polybian Roman) with Numidian and Pergamene allies (see map 4). The Pergamene allies spent the game slowly gaining control of the central marsh, which meant they did not have enough PiPs to get the Kn(F) into our main line. Our main line hung back and watched the slow advance of the Romans. Indeed events proceeded so slowly that no combat occurred on our right. Meanwhile, the Numidians had advanced slowly but steadily round the other side of the marsh. We watched this advance nervously as we wanted them to keep coming forward, but they were being cautious and might cease advancing too soon. Eventually we decided they had advanced far enough and we sprung our ambush; peasants came streaming out of the temple complex, aided by slingers from the marsh, in an effort to catch and box in the Numidians. We managed to catch a few elements but the rest were able to retire pursued closely by the peasants. However, they could not get completely away and we eventually broke the Numidians. This gave us another narrow 6-4 victory and a respectable, but not brilliant, overall score of 22.
Map 4
Overall we ended with a respectable score of 22 and were surprised it had gone so well - this was probably as we had been lucky not to meet more Medieval Knight armies. The lessons I learnt about using the Aztecs were:
Pohl, in the Osprey book, stresses the importance of feints in Aztec warfare. This is impossible in DBM with an army of impetuous hordes and inferior blades, which leads me to conclude that it might be more accurate to classify the peasants as auxilia (ordinary) and, perhaps, the semi-professional warriors as blades (fast) or auxilia (superior). Also, Pohl notes the Aztecs once hid the Quachic in pits from which they ambushed the enemy. How should that be represented on the wargames table; perhaps the Aztecs should be allowed to use pits to place a concealed ambush in?
On a more serious note, Hassig attempts to use the information available on Aztec warfare and government to explain the Aztec system of imperial control and why it was so vulnerable to the Spanish. In addition, he shows how the Aztecs used flower wars as a method of engaging an enemy whom they were not strong enough to conquer outright.
Finally, I will close by noting that I have enjoyed researching, building and using my Aztec army: Aztec culture is very different from those of the Old World; the figures are colourful and interesting to paint (ideal if you do not like painting horses); the army is fun to play with, different from almost any other army and not without its merits in DBM.
Since I wrote this, Jim Esler has written a couple of interesting articles about Aztecs for Slingshot. In issue 187 (Sept 96) and issue 195 (Jan 98) Jim presents some thoughts about the classification of Aztecs in DBM terms, while in issue 202 (Mar 99) he presents some very useful painting information (and comments on Falcon & Gladiator 15mm figures).
| Last revised: August 25, 1999. | |
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