Republican Roman and Interpenetration

[marioslaz]

I don't know if it's correct to post here this question, or in forum about rules. I supposed this was more appropriate, but if I'm wrong I will re-post in the correct forum.

My question is: why isn't there special rules about interpenetration for Hastati, Principes and Triari? The manipular legion allowed this.

Mario

[nikgaukroger]

The interpenetration of the hastati and principes is assumed to happen at a level below what is represented on the table top. That is to say the maniples that make up the Hastati & Principes bases are doing it but it isn't expliciy shown by movement of the figures. The overall aim is to get the right effect of the legiones of the period.

This is pretty much following how a number of historians such as Adrian Goldsworthy now view the operation of the republican legio where the first two lines are to all intents acting as one.

One fundamental issue with the Roman line relief is that nobody really knows how it worked

The triarii are a bit more fudged by allowing them BG sizes to very efficiently act as supports on the CT.

[footslogger]

Seems like a sticky is needed on this....

[ars_belli]

I second the motion to 'stickie' this thread.

Cheers,
Scott

[hammy]

I second the motion to 'stickie' this thread.

Cheers,
Scott

Perhaps it should be in a common questions thread or a design questions thread. Come to think of it we have one of those viewtopic.php?t=9335 and it covers just this point along with a lot of other things.

[philqw78]

Perhaps this should be given a better title to attract people then as 148 views is not a lot for such an important post

[philqw78]

Something like:

FoG: Your questions answered - what was the rule writers aim; why the rules work the way they do; why troops act the way they do; why weapons are categorized the way they are; why Tibetan cataphracts can't have bows.

[hammy]

Perhaps this should be given a better title to attract people then as 148 views is not a lot for such an important post

Well the initial posting of the design questions thread was lost when the server had its issues in early January. It was only reposted about a week ago. Also where a thread doesn't get replies the read count tends to stay fairly low as you generally only read it once.

[marioslaz]

The interpenetration of the hastati and principes is assumed to happen at a level below what is represented on the table top. That is to say the maniples that make up the Hastati & Principes bases are doing it but it isn't expliciy shown by movement of the figures. The overall aim is to get the right effect of the legiones of the period.

This is pretty much following how a number of historians such as Adrian Goldsworthy now view the operation of the republican legio where the first two lines are to all intents acting as one.

Really? When a couple of years ago I organized an historical meeting in my city about battle of Zama I talked with Prof. Brizzi and with Andrea Frediani, the last one we had the pleasure to have as speaker in the conference, and nobody talked me about this theory.

One fundamental issue with the Roman line relief is that nobody really knows how it worked

This is true, but Livio (Livy) wrote about it and, even if I consider his description of Roman tactic very simplistic and that fit only to battle against minor foes, I cannot believe he invented all.

Mario.

[hazelbark]

This is true, but Livio (Livy) wrote about it and, even if I consider his description of Roman tactic very simplistic and that fit only to battle against minor foes, I cannot believe he invented all.

The question is how to model it in a game. If you are playing an strategic-level game of say WWII where counters represent 40,000 troops, you don't need to depict whether radios are in each tank or only in the company commanders vehicle. So in FoG the roman line relief is at level BELOW the level or modelling and incorporated into making hte Legion, Drilled, Superior, Skilled Swordsman. Which makes them pretty viscious against their enemies.

[nikgaukroger]

Indeed, nobody (here at least) is saying it didn't exist, just that it need not be explicitly modelled.

[SirGarnet]

Line replacement has been discussed in many threads. Following is the summary of design comments that I posted in the design notes thread:

"No Roman Line Replacement (paraphrase summary): Roman interpenetration and line replacement mainly just added complexity and flavor. No actual information how it worked and whether it was used in combat, and at the game scale it is internal to each Roman Hastati/Principes BG. Treating Hastati and Principes as the same within a BG gave the same results as including replacement rules. Current academic works seem to indicate that the first two ranks of the legions worked more closely together than initially thought."


It touches on the issues but may be too brief for this recurrent topic.

Any suggested additions/changes to improve the explanation?

Thanks,

Mike

[HannibalBarca]

Just to reinforce the "level" at which the battle is fought, consider a pre-Marian roman force:

If we model a legion as 4 Hastati bases, 4 Principe bases, 2 of Triarii and 4 Velites, as suggested in 'Rise of Rome' then each base of troops is equivalent to 2 and a bit maniples, or 350-odd men! The smallest independently commandable group (the battle group) corresponds to the entire amount of Hastati, Principe, Triarii or Velite in the legion (1,600-odd men, or half that for the Triarii).

If we model a legion as 8 Hastati bases, 8 Principe bases, 4 Triarii and 8 Velites (the other suggested amount), then the smallest possible BG (5 maniples) still represents 400 men (if we use the Triarii in BGs of 2), while most represent 800 men (Hastati, Principe, Velite BGs of 4).

Indeed, if we wanted maniples to be individually commandable (i.e. one BG=one maniple), we would need to model one legion, in FoG terms, as a whopping 40 bases of Hastati, 40 bases of Principes, 20 bases of Triarii and 40 bases of Velites. Now, I'm not going to say that wouldn't be a quite awe-inspiring sight to see, but in the average game, I think we can safely say that any fancy manipular support drill is accounted for in the BG quality and capabilities.

[Scrumpy]

Something like:

FoG: Your questions answered - what was the rule writers aim; why the rules work the way they do; why troops act the way they do; why weapons are categorized the way they are; why Tibetan cataphracts can't have bows.

I believe they can have bows. They just can't fire them.

[nikgaukroger]

Nobody "fires" bows

[philqw78]

Nobody "fires" bows

Boy scouts do. But they need 2 pieces of wood as well.

[tadamson]

Something like:

FoG: Your questions answered - what was the rule writers aim; why the rules work the way they do; why troops act the way they do; why weapons are categorized the way they are; why Tibetan cataphracts can't have bows.

I believe they can have bows. They just can't fire them.

Ahh traditional 'wargamers knowledge rather than basing the list on historical evidence..

do we have 'chained Sassanid levy' as well?

[philqw78]

they can have bows. They just can't fire them

do we have 'chained Sassanid levy' as well

They can have the chains they just can't rattle them

[nikgaukroger]

Ahh traditional 'wargamers knowledge rather than basing the list on historical evidence..

In which case you have just damned yourself into traditional wargamers knowledge as your inputs across various lists were most useful

And we do indeed have "chained" levy ...

[tadamson]

Ahh traditional 'wargamers knowledge rather than basing the list on historical evidence..

In which case you have just damned yourself into traditional wargamers knowledge as your inputs across various lists were most useful

I shall give myself a da**&d good beating....

Tom..

(finally buckled under and started ordering FoG from Amazon)