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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mmadsen" data-source="post: 312879" data-attributes="member: 1645">Chapter X -- A Taste of Defeat (continued)I can certainly see PCs leading this assault force:It had been a moonlit night, but aided by thick clouds that shrouded the moon, the assault force had crept unseen across no-man's-land and quietly filled in parts of the trenches skirting the fortified wall of the 8th Legion fort.  As dawn broke, the spearhead troops surged across the trench, paving the way for archers, who set about raining arrows into the fort.A few gruesome stats:But he [Caesar] does admit that every survivor was wounded -- some 250 to 300 men -- with 4 centurions of the 8th Legion cohort losing eyes to arrows.Amond the wounded...was the fort's commander, Colonel Minucius, who also lost an eye and received five additional wounds.  When Caesar arrrived back from Durres he was shown the shield of Cassius Scaevus, a junior centurion of the 8th grade who'd taken over command of the fort after Colonel Minucius and the four other more senior centurions were wounded.  If we can believe it, the had been punctured 120 times in the fight.I can just imagine arrows deflecting off shields and armor until eventually one finds an opening -- right between the top of the shield and the rim of the helmet.Caesar also claims that his men collected thirty thousand Pompeian arrows that had been fired into the fort.  Centurion Scaevus was promoted to the first rank and received a bonus of two hundred thousand sesterces, a fortune for an enlisted man.  All the other survivors of the cohort were later given duplicarius status -- their wages were doubled -- and received extra food and clothing allowances.At least the hazard pay's good.</blockquote>

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