Rules Change - To Keep Battle Lines more Intact

[timmy1]

Simplier is to change the 4, 5, and 6 results to be VMD of plus 1, 2, and 3 MU respectively.

[david53]

Currently skirmishers are able to pull apart BLs of shock foot with no risk which, in my opinion, is wrong.

Those troops charging out that you have used are classed as medium foot in FOG so that would have a different range to test.

If we are using Greeks as an example what about the first time that a Spartan army was defeated at Pylos 425 (Athanians 800 archers and 800 peltests against 440 Spartan Hopilites of these 292 Spartans were captured)and that was caused by Light troops swarming around them and evading when the Spartans charged them only to come back again(Page 278 History of the Peloponnesian War) .

If troops in front of you are shooting at you with bows and you can not return fire how long before you want to charge them out the way. Being heavy you'll have armour large shields and spear more than like against a guy with nothing but a bow so who's the good runner then?

I think FOG has it right theres not that much chance of you being pulled out of line if you make it harder all you'll do is walk in a line across the table?

[timmy1]

So no Girly Skythan vested interests there then Dave! :)

[PaulByzan]

I think the later Byzatines are not quite that bad. Lancer front rank and bow rear rank are IMO a pretty decent troop type. The point is not to sit there and shoot up the enemy...The bows are IMO there to make them much less pleasant to skirmish and in general they play like Reg cavalry lancers which are a solid troop type.

The cataphracts are IMO a bit pants, but others think they are quite valuable. As I posted above I would prefer to see them with an option to be armoured elite cavalry instead of cataphracts (based on my extensive research...err reading what the Khurasan Miniatures guy/web site has had to say about them) but I will admit that I haven't done extensive research on the army recently. In any case I don't view the cats as pivotal, though if they were mandatory it would be a bigger issue.

The Nikephorian problems are not IMO the cavalry which is pretty solid. It is twofold. First, they lack any LH which...Given a relatively large number of other lists which seem to not have this level of forced change this is a pit puzzling and a genuine problem - especially given teh second problem...Second, the foot options are a problem. You can't get any LF without taking the minimum heavy foot and the heavy foot has some issues. it is not terrible but neither is it great. The Nikephorians were an army that was pretty successful and I believe thought to be tactically very flexiblea and well trained. It is hard to imagine given how FoG works that this is an army that often completely lacked any skirmishing capability - especially when most of their enemies had such a capability.

Fortunately, the Thematic list fixes many of these issues. It has some internal LH, you can take the LF without taking the heavy foot and if you do take the HF it is a IMO at least more useful than the Nikephorian heavy foot. the figures are same if you assume it is a late Thematic army so just carry on. One might argue that havin mandatory average cavalry is a problem, but I think those are actually fine, just have to be handled carefully. FWIW, this is on my short list of armies to work up and I will probably start it late this year after finishing up the Qin.

Ethan,

Some agreements and disagreements here. I think mixed lancer/bow battle groups are a bad way to simulate the Byzantine cavalry from the Maurikian to the Nikephorian periods . One, the bowmen are too expensive as they are missing one of the main abilities that make CV bowmen more expensive, that of being able to evade since being in the a BG with lancers prevents this. Two, if the BG takes a caualty then you are stuck with a bowman in the front for HTH purposes. Third from a historical purpose the lancer/bowmen mix was never 1-1, it was more 3-2. Bow*, lance/sword more accurately simulates this from a gaming and historical perspective. (Frankly, I think all regular Byzantine Cv from the Maurikian to Nikephorian periods are more accurately represented as Bw*, lancer/swordsmen, period.

For this reason agree, that the Nikephorian cavalry in the pre-1042 period are quite good and not the problem of that army. The superior Bw*, Lancer/swordsment armored, sup, Cv are tremendous even at 19pts. As you stated, the problem is that they can't get internal skirmishing horse or Lf without buying the skutatoi. It creates an unrealistically unflexible feel to the early Nikephorians. I may have to look to the Thematics myself. Hate to do that as the Nikephorians had really fixed all the Thematic problems rather than being less effective tactically.

Paul G

[DavidT]

[quote="david53
Those troops charging out that you have used are classed as medium foot in FOG so that would have a different range to test.[/quote]

I always thought that they were part of the hoplite formation, i.e. part of the HF in FOG, but were outside the scale which FOG was trying to represent. Therefore they are probably best represented by giving the HF a chance to catch the LF.

[quote="david53
If we are using Greeks as an example what about the first time that a Spartan army was defeated at Pylos 425 (Athanians 800 archers and 800 peltests against 440 Spartan Hopilites of these 292 Spartans were captured)and that was caused by Light troops swarming around them and evading when the Spartans charged them only to come back again(Page 278 History of the Peloponnesian War) .[/quote]

And you will still be able to do this, however, now there is a small (1 in 36) possibility that the hoplites might catch the LF and you could change history.

[quote="david53
If troops in front of you are shooting at you with bows and you can not return fire how long before you want to charge them out the way. Being heavy you'll have armour large shields and spear more than like against a guy with nothing but a bow so who's the good runner then?

I think FOG has it right theres not that much chance of you being pulled out of line if you make it harder all you'll do is walk in a line across the table?[/quote]

The chance of being pulled out of line is still the same - it's just that there is now a small risk for the LF.

[ShrubMiK]

>I always thought that they were part of the hoplite formation, i.e. part of the HF in FOG, but were outside the scale which FOG was trying to represent. Therefore they are probably best represented by giving the HF a chance to catch the LF.

Careful. Are you saying that ALL HF have integral lightly armed troops for catching skirmishers? If not, then it would seem preferable for any army which has such a capability to represent it by having a BG or two of these more lightly-armed troops represented separately on the table.

[DavidT]

I am only citing an instance where a tactic was adopted to counter enemy LF. I don't believe that it warrants separate BGs of MF hoplites. I am sure other armies tried similar tactics when pestered by LF, but considering the lack of written evidence about these armies, we will never know.

The proposal gives a small chance to HF to catch LF, representing the possibility that the LF stood their ground yelling insults for just too long before turning tail, or that the HF were a bit faster than anticipated (by having less armour as per the hoplite example) introducing a degree of uncertainty for the LF player.

At present, skirmishers can disrupt enemy formations with impunity.

[ethan]

Perhaps Byzantines should be light spears instead of lances?

[ShrubMiK]

I can see this developing into the recent LH thread part deux

I don't think HF need extra capability to catch LF. If historically armies needed in some cases to introduce different types of troops to address this perceived weakness, it should be represented on table by adding troops of the appropriate type, as this retains more flavour and requires the general to make more decisions, and allows more differentiation between different armies and tactics. Isn't that what wargaming should be about, rather than increasing blandness of troop types and tactical systems and leaving it up to the dice to decide whether the general was good or not?

>the possibility that the LF stood their ground yelling insults for just too long before turning tail

That's already modelled in the rules - if the LF are bow/sling armed and foolish enough to stay within 2MU, that can be caught. Failing a CMT and deciding to stay where they are and shoot rather than turn around and retreat to safe range and not shoot is a way this might happen which doesn't involve complete carelessness by the general. I've seen bow-armed LH caught by cataphracts often enough!

One thing I did suggest previously was that effective shooting ranges could be reduced. That gives the shooter the option of hanging back in complete safety, bu twith reduced chance of causing any damage, or being more aggressive but accepting a risk of being caught in the process.