Alex vs Rome = First Game

[madaxeman]

Early Imp Romans vs Alexandrians 8-10 BGs per side, no skirmishers on the roman side(3 x 6-man legions, 8 archers, 4 cataphracts, 4 Cv, 2 Auxilai blocks) vs 2 x 12 Pike and 1 x 8 Pk, 8 Hoplites, 2 x 4 LH, 6 Companions, 6 Cretans, 8 Li jav, 2 El.)

Table got cluttered with terrain as we both chose probably too much.
This left us fighting on a narrow frontage, with the alexandrians pushing their pike past some orchards in the middle of the table - which they hoped to screen off with LH - and the romans wheeling out of the orchards with 2 blocks of auxilia and their cav to confront them. On the far side the Alexandrians had Companions vs 8 Bowmen.

The Greek cretans exchanged fire with the Roman formed bowmen to open the battle, and it seemed that the exchange was fairly even, but also fairly derisory. The Romans then moved up to shoot the companions, which had no real effect. The companions then charged in and broke the Romans immediately, causing the nearby Roman Cataphracts to fail a cohesion test.

In the middle the Greek skirmishers pushed forwards and drew a charge from one of the three legions - who rolled long and contacted the central block of pikemen in their charge. The pikemen were caught in 3 ranks and without a general in the front rank and were forced to take - and fail - a cohesion test. The 2 Greek elephants protecting teh flabnk of the pike units were also charged by auxilia, and one w skilled immediately - the supporting Ps having great effect - causing the elephant unit to break immediately also, and making another pike unit fail a cohesion test.

In the melee phase the romans pushed forwards again and further disrupted the pikes, even with extra overlaps of pikemen starting to count.

In the next greek phase the Companions (who had rallied) clattered the badly disrupted capaphracts and broke them also. The elite Pikemen also charged a legion, and with good dice and the waver test from the broken cataphracts disrupted it also. But with only 2 files they were unable to capitalize in the melee phase, and the romans held on - but the 3-deep pike block broke in teh middle of the Greek line.

Meanwhile the LH skirmishers from the Alexandrians were retreating in front of the advancing roman cavalry and auxilia - and seemed relatively powerless to stop them.

Then we gave up as time was getting late ....

Questions:
1. Terrain types are not yet in the lists ?
2. Rivers are very close to the edge of the table -very little effect - why worry about saying how many bends they can have?
3. I assume cataphracts are not "cavalry" for scouting?
4. Oddly, its not immediately clear if its IGOUGO - especially for shooting etc - or if some things happen in both players turns.
5. Having move distances/section after Impact in the rules seemed counter-intuitive as the first few turns are moving, and impact also means you need to know charge distances
6. If you fail a CMT, we assume you can do a simple move ? Is this explicit anywhere?
7. Shooting - do 2ned ranks measure ranges independantly?
8. Shooting - see 4. Could be clearer
9. Shooting table in the QRSheet is poorly laid out - the "+" column doesnt need to be in the middle - copy the one in the main rules!
10. Are skirmishing bows just as good as normal bows - again according to the QRS they are
11. HP3B, etc - how this rounding is done is a key conpect and needs to be explained more clearly or earlier
12. What happens to a general with an eliminated unit ?
13. is Broken a cohesion level a general can rally a unit from ?
14. how do you decide if Pikes count the 4th rank for the POA - when there are some 3 deep and some 4 deep?

Overall impressions -
Very simple set of rules once you get to know it we suspected
The skirmisher/evade aspect of it might need looking at as they dont go to far away and seem to be able to come back easily, and the "are you in charge range?" aspect means skirmishers can tempt people into range when they can be hit - a whole battle line could easily end up staggered with variable charge moves to make it an easier target next time around.
Surprised only one element can die per turn - seemed slow
Elephant units of 2 will break after one is dead - ouch! (as they say)
We saw little use for generals in movement/3C for anything other than moving big lines of foot twice - and that was marginal in our game - but we did have drilled troops and a narrow table. Generals may as well be in the front rank as they seem to add value there and are impossible to kill
It broke down into a unit based game once the armies got close, with units turning to hit each others flanks. They functioned as "units" not "battlegroups" at this point in the game - ie my spears started to turn 90 degrees, form a colum and march behind some of my pikemen (who had won in the impact phase) to try and hit a legion in the flank next turn. It was a bit psychic of them being able to do that, which was all about having resolved the impact phase before doing movement
Liked the "half-waver" test concept a lot. Visually it will need markers though I think.
There is not much chance to rally troops (from disrupted or the other one) however as combat seemed to resolve over 1-2 bounds and that was the main source of disruption in our game. Again, not sure this is a good function/game mechanic for generals to be engaged (as their primary function) in
The paper-scissors-stone of DBx may still be in there - but the way PoAs are presented doesnt quite m,ake it as obvious -or put another way, the link between troop type and their combat effects vs different enemies is not as clear. But it might be there I suspect...
Pikemen must be in 4 ranks against legions!
There will be some very clear comparisons with WarHamster Ancients when this gets published. Similar look and feel - this set has more gradings and is more complex - especially for the mechanics of movement. Making sure the flavour of different troop types comes through will probably be the key to AoW not being seen as "why would I want to play whats basically a more complicated game of WarHamster?" s Warhamsters biggest failing (IMO) is the lack of differentiation between troop types, esp the paper/scissors/stone elemnt

tim

[shall]

Tim

Thanks for the feedback. A lot of general points will be interesting to assess after 2/3/4/5 games. Given some of your thoughts it might be worth trying a heavily undrilled army and one with lots of skirmishers. Good to here you are finding the rules themselves simple. The endless challenge is to make them look as simplke as they are and keep the differentiation from WAB etc. as you say.

Keep throwing us your ideas and comments. Some specifics to follow.

Si

[rbodleyscott]

Very simple set of rules once you get to know it we suspected.

As Simon says, the challenge is to make them appear as simple as they are while at the same time explaining everything in exhaustive and unambiguous detail.

Unfortunately doing so makes them seem more complicated than they really are. (As opposed to the old PB technique of making the rules "look" simple by cramming them into as few pages and sentences as possible).

[shall]

Specifics as promised

1. Terrain types are not yet in the lists ?

On the to do list. Pelase make up something sensible each time for now.

2. Rivers are very close to the edge of the table -very little effect - why worry about saying how many bends they can have?

Idea is to have a Coast = secure flank, River = semi-secure flank. Not a big effect in shrinking table -perhaps not necessary in AOW? No of bends jut to stop the mad people from deploying a 45 degree repeating zig-zag.

3. I assume cataphracts are not "cavalry" for scouting?

Correct

4. Oddly, its not immediately clear if its IGOUGO - especially for shooting etc - or if some things happen in both players turns.

Which bits aren't clear so we can fix them. Its IGO WGO UGO and both sides shoot and fight in the tohers bound (inc beig allowed to expand a melee).

5. Having move distances/section after Impact in the rules seemed counter-intuitive as the first few turns are moving, and impact also means you need to know charge distances

We tried to be different but are coming to the same view I think.

6. If you fail a CMT, we assume you can do a simple move ? Is this explicit anywhere?

Yes and yes.

7. Shooting - do 2ned ranks measure ranges independantly?

No but perhaps we don't say so. Will check.

8. Shooting - see 4. Could be clearer

Again help with which bits so we can address please. Ta

9

. Shooting table in the QRSheet is poorly laid out - the "+" column doesnt need to be in the middle - copy the one in the main rules!

I see what you mean. On the fix list.

10. Are skirmishing bows just as good as normal bows - again according to the QRS they are

Same POAs biut fewer dice. In the other shooters box for number of dice as not MF/Cv with bow/LB

11. HP3B, etc - how this rounding is done is a key conpect and needs to be explained more clearly or earlier

No rounding at all. Jsut pass the threshold.
So 2 base BG = -1 for 1 HIT
4 base = -1 for 2
6 base = -1 for 2
8 base = -1 for 3
12 base = -1 for 4

Kept very simple this way. As it isn't clear I'll ad a fix to this.

12. What happens to a general with an eliminated unit ?

If elimiate by combat then 10-12 to kill him. If by firing can't be killed. Then he can be charged/shot at on his own and if caught he's dead. Hopefully he will malke a successful run for it in the interbound.

13. is Broken a cohesion level a general can rally a unit from ?

Yes its a full ladder of STEADY, DISRUPTED, FRAGMENTED,BROKEN. They can be rallied over 3 interbounds from broken with good dice. ICs good at it. -s for the states in same table mentioned above.

14. how do you decide if Pikes count the 4th rank for the POA - when there are some 3 deep and some 4 deep?

Fight the 4 rank deep ones with 4 deep factors and the 3 deep with 3 deep factors. Basically as any combat gets mixed break it into bite size pieces, store the hits (we put green dice behind files if it gets complex) and then add them back up for the result on each BG.

[shall]

It broke down into a unit based game once the armies got close, with units turning to hit each others flanks. They functioned as "units" not "battlegroups" at this point in the game - ie my spears started to turn 90 degrees, form a colum and march behind some of my pikemen (who had won in the impact phase) to try and hit a legion in the flank next turn. It was a bit psychic of them being able to do that, which was all about having resolved the impact phase before doing movement

Tim could you expand a bit on the scenario as its hard to comment on this one. It does of course break down to individual BGs as the game evolves. Was it your imact that made them want to do this?

Ta

Si

[rbodleyscott]

6. If you fail a CMT, we assume you can do a simple move ? Is this explicit anywhere?

The answer is yes and yes. (Not sure what Simon means by the rest of his answer.)

[shall]

Neither do I. Mis-read the question . Amended already. Ta.

Si

[madaxeman]

It broke down into a unit based game once the armies got close, with units turning to hit each others flanks. They functioned as "units" not "battlegroups" at this point in the game - ie my spears started to turn 90 degrees, form a colum and march behind some of my pikemen (who had won in the impact phase) to try and hit a legion in the flank next turn. It was a bit psychic of them being able to do that, which was all about having resolved the impact phase before doing movement

Tim could you expand a bit on the scenario as its hard to comment on this one. It does of course break down to individual BGs as the game evolves. Was it your imact that made them want to do this?

Ta

Si

Yep. I had a line of the following BGs
8 Spears, 8 Pk (Sup) 12 Pk (A), 12 Pk (B), with the pikes mainly facing off against 3 legions.

The middle legion had charged and was now beating the Pk unit (A). I'm going to break in the next turn or so

My Pk S charged the left hand legion and won well in the impact phase, and so should then be well set to cane the legion in the melee phase.

This meant my Sp unit, knowing the combat was going well for the Pk S and that it would not need to charge in to support them could turn, form a column and move behind my Pk(S) unit to menace the flank of the legion fighting Pk unit (A)

This just seemed a rather cynical and technical maneuver to be making within such close range of an ongoing combat.

[rbodleyscott]

This just seemed a rather cynical and technical maneuver to be making within such close range of an ongoing combat.

Indeed. Of course, if I did it, my superior pikes would then lose. Doh.