Sometimes easier to get a layout up and running in Gimp then translate to the gmic command
This for 2 wide by 3 deep V(V(H(0,1),H(2,3))),H(4,5)) which equates to 'VVH0:1H2:3H4:5'
And what is the gimp default as a command, 3 wide x 2 deep H(H((V(0,1),V(2,3))),V(4,5)) is 'HHV0:1V2:3V4:5'
but the more groups the more obscure it becomes

best of luck
A bit of experiment getting each tile the same size. No joy with that. I think this should scale to 400 wide but then montage takes over and fits in depending on landscape/portrait proportions anyway. However it does make a smaller image. For 2x3 layout
./gmic *.jpg -fx_scaledown3 0,1,0.99,1,400,16,0,2.27,1,3,0 -montage 'VVH0:1H2:3H4:5',3,0 -o output.png
Gmic is a bit short of a general scaling filter (at least I can not find one) I would use ImageMagick in your bash file prior to gmic.