Order of March for Tournaments

[kal5056]

What is everyone doing on Order of March for multiple game Tourneys?
Do you require OM to be set with list submission or is it a deployment choice?
Do you allow change from one game to the next?
Thank you all
Gino
SMAC

[rbodleyscott]

What is everyone doing on Order of March for multiple game Tourneys?
Do you require OM to be set with list submission or is it a deployment choice?
Do you allow change from one game to the next?
Thank you all
Gino
SMAC

Most tournament rules specify that the OOM should be submitted in advance and used for all games. The reason being to avoid wasting time at the start of each game.

[hazelbark]

yes after seeing this the only possible reason for a march change is to have a trick deployment or hide a flank march. Most of which is silly and time consuming.

[shall]

And sillt time wasting was one of the things we aimed to avoid right from the outset

Si

[SirGarnet]

yes after seeing this the only possible reason for a march change is to have a trick deployment or hide a flank march. Most of which is silly and time consuming.

Can you think of examples of how a flank march can be better concealed by changing an order of march?

Or is it silly since you can't do much? The only thing I see work at hiding a flank march is setting ambush markers if terrain is suitable.

Is "trick deployment" distinguishable from a subtle or misleading deployment plan?

Varying order of march based on the opponent and expected terrain can improve an army's prospects of victory, I think much more so for toolkit armies than one dimensional ones. Shifting the odds towards certain types of armies is the reason I'd be against allowing swapping of order of march in matches - but where is the inherent time consumption in the match if one OOM is swapped for another and the troops go down in a different order?

Curiously,

Mike

[philqw78]

The problem comes with people who will change their order of march depending upon what the enemy have just put out, therefore giving themselves best match ups as the troops come out of the box and avoiding unfavourable match ups in straight deployment.Most people would not do this, some if only because of the embarassment of being caught or challenged about it. Others don't give a shit.

[SirGarnet]

The problem comes with people who will change their order of march depending upon what the enemy have just put out, therefore giving themselves best match ups as the troops come out of the box and avoiding unfavourable match ups in straight deployment.Most people would not do this, some if only because of the embarassment of being caught or challenged about it. Others don't give a shit.

Didn't occur to me you were thinking about that.

That's a big cheating step past choosing pre-game from preset OOMs based on the opponent and should be penalized creatively in a tournament: mixing up order of march would certainly throw the army into confusion - everything frozen in place their first turn and all BGs starting disrupted would seem generous.

But you must admit it does speed up rather than slow deployment when a player does as he pleases!

[philqw78]

Didn't occur to me you were thinking about that.

I am a very cynical man

[rbodleyscott]

But you must admit it does speed up rather than slow deployment when a player does as he pleases!

Au contraire. He has more decisions to make and hence will take longer.

[peterrjohnston]

The problem comes with people who will change their order of march depending upon what the enemy have just put out, therefore giving themselves best match ups as the troops come out of the box and avoiding unfavourable match ups in straight deployment.Most people would not do this, some if only because of the embarassment of being caught or challenged about it. Others don't give a shit.

Which raises an interesting question, how can an umpire check the pre-competition OoM has being followed? Asking the opponent
would seem the obvious way, but that feels overly intrusive.

Rgds,
Peter

[shall]

Life has to have some trust in it ... even amongst us wargamers...

If you really want to record the BGs as they go down and call the umpire - not hard to do - but porbably pointless.

I don't think its enough of an advantage for people to change ... people may make the odd genuine msitake.

In DBX how did you ever know the player used th army list submitted and didn't have 3 slightly different 400 pters to choose from .... has an umpire ever been asked to cheack someones list is the one entered (I never was).

At the end of the day we are wargaming, not running in the Olympics with Duane Chambers (who I beleive won't be running anyway!)

Si

[SirGarnet]

I used to check each and every DBX army list at at least early tournaments during the first round since people were making mistakes in hand calculations and in restrictions. I think it's actually easier the way the FoG lists are laid out, particularly Olivier's calculator or similar is used.

Unfortunately, only the opponent can verify OOM. Since all troop types must be declared when deployed, is there any strong reason not to hand each list (containing the OOM) to the other player once all its troops are deployed (i.e., after any ambush/FM are revealed)?

Mike

[peterrjohnston]

Si, I was asking about the deployment order, not that the troops used are correct. Checking deployment was pretty common in DBM (think of the ITC with its two maps).

Mike's suggestion might work.

Rgds,
Peter

[shall]

OK I understand ........ and agree with Mike ...

The deployment is less critical than the position of commands in DBM, albeit not unimportant.

My other points are just to say we do of course trust each other a lot as the potenial is there on many fronts.

I suppose, a bit like cricket, I would rather see it gentelmanly and trusting rather than 1984 style over -heavy.

I do worry that such issues give a false impression to non-comp players who may get the feeling it is all terribly serious and untrusting - which for my part is very far from what I find.

Generally very much fun, trusting and quite light-hearted in my experience.

Si

[carlos]

MikeK,

Up for each gamer community I guess, but here in the UK players are more relaxed about it. I would only ask for list and OOM if I spotted something bizarre like light troops coming last, or the opponent matching my deployment (deploying troops always in front of mine) every single go.

[philqw78]

Deploying light troops last is a great idea

[terrys]

Up for each gamer community I guess, but here in the UK players are more relaxed about it. I would only ask for list and OOM if I spotted something bizarre like light troops coming last, or the opponent matching my deployment (deploying troops always in front of mine) every single go.

I often deploy some light troops last - so as not to give away the area of battlefield where I'm not going to compete.

[shall]

I often put 2 down in the first batch and save 1 until last. You can then use that one to join another and try to dominate one piece of terrain. It depends a lot of the army.

I am using Spartans at the moment and eveybody expects lots of hoplites but not max LF. So they can be worth saving.

It all depends and there is a fair bit of fun in it. The order depends more on what typoe of edge you want to achieve. On average I think I prefer moving first if I have a HF army.

Si