Hittite Empire, 1380 BC to 1180BC

 Book 1, List 24

This list represents the Hittite state at it's most extensive and powerful. After the acquisition of Mitanni it was the most powerful state in Anatolia and with Egypt and Assyria one of the 3 most influential states of the time. This was my choice of army when looking to expand my armies into the Bronze Age, and is my only book 1 army. When deciding the army it was a close run thing between the Hittite and New Kingdom Egyptian, however, I decided that the latter were too predictable and so chose the former.

The figures I have used are nearly all Essex Miniatures. I chose them as a safe bet with good mail order and not knowing too much about the alternatives. The only real problem I have is that the Essex chariot is not big enough to fit 3 crewmen needed for the Hittite's own chariots. To get round this I've deployed the 2nd spearman on foot as a "runner", which has the advantage that they are more plausible morphs into other nations chariots, maybe Mitanni or something similar. It is of course possible that this is how the third crewman operated anyway.

The core of the army are the Hittite and allied chariotry supported by Hittite infantry, Anatolian chariotry and Anatolian infantry. The Hittite chariots differed from most of their contemporaries from about the time of the battle of Qadesh by being specialised for close combat rather than the maryannu system of chariot borne archers. Thus they have the option to be graded as Reg Kn(O). The Hittite infantry is Reg Ax(X), which can be a vulnerable troop type,with the Anatolians being Irr Cv(O) chariots and Irr Ax(O), Irr Bd(F) and Ps(O) infantry. With the incorporation of Syrian states into the empire around 1340BC the army adds to the Hittite and Anatolian core Syrian troops. These are Irr Cv(S) maryannu chariots and a mass of infantry graded as a mixture of Hd(O), Ps(I), Ax(I), Ax(O), Ps(O) and Bw(I) - all Irr - and a small contingent of Reg Bd(F). A small number of the maryannu can be upgraded to Kn(O) from the city of Ugarit. The post 1340BC is not surprisingly the period of choice for this list.

The army is Regular in that it can have up to 3 Hittite generals as Reg Kn(O), however, there are options for 2 Anatolian ally generals as Cv(O) and 2 Syrian ally generals as Cv(S) or Kn(O) if Ugaritic. With the exception of wanting a 4th command, or playing a scenario, I can see no reason at all why you would want to take one of the ally generals instead of the Hittite ones and loose the advantage of PIP allocation.

In use the army has a good mix of troop types, its biggest weakness is a lack of close order foot able to hold or attack an area of ground against most opponents. However, against historic enemies this is not a crippling problem as there are next to no Kn troops around that can sweep away the army's infantry in a single bound. That said the Ax will not stand indefinitely against Cv and may need the Bw(I) allowed to support them if they are likely to face many or be needed to hold open ground against them. However, in practice this can be a theoretical problem as the army has a very large chariot force which is a powerful mix of Kn(O) and Cv(S) that can be expected to do the fighting with enemy chariots. The infantry are then used as supporting and bad going troops, as was the case historically.

One factor that is a big plus for this army when fighting historical opponents is that with the exception of the Egyptians none has any good foot able to stand up to the Kn(O) in the open. This means that unlike the Hittites opponents cannot really take any sort of risk in exposing their foot in case they are ridden down in short order, whilst their own chariots may be at a disadvantage to the Hittites in close combat; this restricts their options which is good for the Hittite player.

As you might expect this army has its biggest problems with non-contemporary opponents especially those with good foot, LH and Kn. In these sort of match ups the use of available terrain and the manoeuvre allowed by regular generals is all important, allowing you to keep fighting as much of the time as possible with the more powerful elements of the Hittite army. In these games the victory will probably be won by the lighter troops operating from bad terrain in support of the chariots, getting onto flanks, etc or fighting in terrain disadvantageous to the enemy.

hittiteforcampaign400ap.txt - the army I used at Campaign in 2001.

v2listshittite400ap.txt - probably a better all round 400 AP Hittite army.