Casual Questions About Generals

[bddbrown]

A couple of questions occured to me over the weekend regarding generals - non are very urgent or important so no need to answer quickly.

* If a general (lets say cataphract) is attached to a BG of skirmishers, can the unit of skirnishers still evade a charge? If so does the general go with them?

* If you are allowed elephant generals, would the general disrupt enemy cavalry within 1 MU? Would this be the case if the general was fighting in the front rank and if the general was just attached to the BG but close enough to disrupt?

* If such a general was attached to a friendly BG of cavalry would they be disrupted?

[rbodleyscott]

* If a general (lets say cataphract) is attached to a BG of skirmishers, can the unit of skirnishers still evade a charge? If so does the general go with them?

The intention is that they should be able to evade as normal and he should go with them. It needs clarification.

* If you are allowed elephant generals, would the general disrupt enemy cavalry within 1 MU? Would this be the case if the general was fighting in the front rank and if the general was just attached to the BG but close enough to disrupt?

* If such a general was attached to a friendly BG of cavalry would they be disrupted?

Very interesting issues, which have not yet come to light because we have neither written army lists for, nor play-tested any armies with elephant generals. We need to think it through.

[shall]

Quote:
* If you are allowed elephant generals, would the general disrupt enemy cavalry within 1 MU? Would this be the case if the general was fighting in the front rank and if the general was just attached to the BG but close enough to disrupt?

* If such a general was attached to a friendly BG of cavalry would they be disrupted?



Very interesting issues, which have not yet come to light because we have neither written army lists for, nor play-tested any armies with elephant generals. We need to think it through.

Generals do indeed evade with units but it is true we haven't specifically said so.

On General Elephants, I did try a classical Indian game a goodly while ago and we didn't have generals causing disorder - the logic for this was that the generals base is symbolic and a Battle Group is a significant number of troops in every case ( So the Generals base represent him and his mount, but a NG of Elephnats is going to 20, 30, 40 Elephants and be a lot more smelly!! .

Hence this was our view in the game. We didn't get round to remembering to raise it and write it into the rules - doh - so there is no official version as yet. But in essence the only effect of troop type on a general is aimed to be movement and that's it. All that matters otherwise is IC, FC, TC.

Si

[petedalby]

Along similar lines, I was thinking about the Classical Greek List the other day and I wondered why anyone would wish to field the Generals as hoplites when they could move faster as cavalry.

Why not just have a standard move distance for a General?

Base them all as 40 x 40 and give players artistic licence to represent them historically?

They'd certainly stand out that way.

Pete

[shall]

We could do that. You wouldn't choose a hoplite general unless you had to - so that's a list issue to me. We haven't really gone through all the lists to finalise what generals should be yet.

The only worry would be that you get some pretty add things happening. The most extreme perhaps being a Hittite General - who in reality always rode along in his heavy chariot - being quite happy "boating" through a marsh with his light infantry. Similarly generals on Elephants can bomb around as much as generals who were LH.

Now one could argue that as the points are the same who cares. Or you might argue its nota primary effect so let's have the variety for each army that feels historical. Different preferences from different people, but point well made and taken.

Other views on this...

Normalise all generals back to a speed and to hell with what they were in reality? or
Keep some semblance of what they were in reality? or
Add further semblance to them still - e.g. some extra effect if with a BG of the same type?

Si

[madaxeman]

Now one could argue that as the points are the same who cares. Or you might argue its nota primary effect so let's have the variety for each army that feels historical. Different preferences from different people, but point well made and taken.

Other views on this...

Normalise all generals back to a speed and to hell with what they were in reality? or
Keep some semblance of what they were in reality? or
Add further semblance to them still - e.g. some extra effect if with a BG of the same type?

Si

I think the real issue is that we/you really need some clarity as to what the Generals element actually represents in these rules - if anything. Is it an abstraction of various aspects of command and control, or is it a rich bloke on a horse/elephant/expensive pair of embroidered sandals

Stating that would finish this debate, and a few more (ie does a generals base take up space on table ?) and also help people get to grips with the rules without importing assumptions from other sets.

[rbodleyscott]

Perhaps, if we are using "markers" to show Cohesion tests, generals should also become "markers". Then you can show whether he is in the front rank by putting his marker on one of the front bases of the BG in combat.

What do people think of that idea?

It would certainly make it clear that generals are not troops, and all could move the same speed.

[jdm]

I think it might come to that, we still want the visual repesentation of nice figures on the table, generals being a good oppertunity for some nice paint jobs, but a marker denoting he has joined the front rank might be the way to go

Regards
JDM

[bddbrown]

I like the sentiment, but generals are won of those bases that people really like to go to town with. I think we need to keep the visual element of generals - they should be one if not the most impressive figures on the table.

[donm]

There is no reason that the marker could not be a smaller base, with say a single figure on. After all we are talking about one person in most cases. A marker base would certainly look better than the current arrangement when a general joins a unit. We have rectangle BGs on the table giving the look of an ancient battle and then we add a general and we get a 'T' formation. The larger the generals base the worse it looks.

Don M

[shall]

It certainly feel like generals are better as an ad-hoc base as small as possible. We were trying to avoid any rebasing but I guess allowing people to go to town on their generals would be a good thing.

Si

[hammy]

Another option would be for generals to be substituted for an element in a BG they are fighting with. That way the generals base would only be present if he is not fighting or not with a BG. You could go as far as not allowing mounted generals to fight in a foot BG and vice versa.

I don't know if this makes things easier or harder but I have also had issues from time to time with general elements getting in the way.

[madaxeman]

well, his (or her) base size / troop type "as depicted" is irrelevant to movement + fighting ability, so it seems odd to make it important for evading, occupying space on table or - perhaps more debatably - disordering friendly and enemy horse.

Maybe make all generals 30 x 40 or 40 x 40, then the only rebasing is for 20x40 generals ( assuming all other 15 x 40 generals turn into "DBE's") ? AFAICS you can pretty much choose at the start of any combat phase to say if a general is in the front rank or not - as they get a movement phase of their own before all combats - so is it worth the messy replacement of bases to make this clear?

The othr thing is how do displaced generals move - does it allow you to shift ther position and get a Free move ..? who decides where they go?

Elephant generals remain a conundrum - as do non-dense elephant formations. Warhamster issued a "fix" for this in the last army list book... but stealing is theft - and anyway, its not that good a fix

[shall]

Mya as well say that our emerging views are that:

1. Generals should be symbolic and do what you want to make them as pretty as you can - base sizes will be irrelevant and left to be as sensibly small as they can be for the figures used - so no putting Cesar on a 2ft square base with an entire Preatorian Roman Garrisn for display purposes!!
2. What they are on will be irrelevant - they will all move the same (maybe 7MU but yet to be finalised)
3. Therefore they do nothing as an individual item - no DISR effect if on Ele. In part because it represents a single general not a base of Elephants so reasonable to have it different anyway
4. Movement bits being refined at present.

Si

[madaxeman]

- base sizes will be irrelevant and left to be as sensibly small as they can be for the figures used - so no putting Cesar on a 2ft square base with an entire Preatorian Roman Garrisn for display purposes!!
Si

you need to watch this - a 2 foot square base is good for command and control !

[shall]

Luckily it doesn't fit in the deployment area so the general will be lost unless the user allows the umpire to saw it down to reasonable size......


On a more serious note reasonable base sizes will be defined....we'll fix the distance issues in due course.

Si

[lanceflint]

A simple but annoying problem occurs when a general joins a unit. It causes a lump that unrealistically extends the size of the BG.
One proposal would be that when a General fights with a unit and therefore relaces one base to show its position, but fights as that base, then why not remove that displaced base from the game temporarily?

Lance.

[rbodleyscott]

A simple but annoying problem occurs when a general joins a unit. It causes a lump that unrealistically extends the size of the BG.
One proposal would be that when a General fights with a unit and therefore relaces one base to show its position, but fights as that base, then why not remove that displaced base from the game temporarily?

Lance.

That seems rather a good idea to me. What do others think?