Game Balance

[Jilu]

Just one thing, please do NOT kill the game.

[madaxeman]

The skill of moving your troops were you want them is for me one of the best bits of FOG, take it away or make it near impossible will IMO damage the rules.

I fully agree - however those matchups where a mounted skirmish army fights a largely foot army currently appear to require a near "impossible" amount of "skill" on the part of the pedestrians to bring a mounted skirmisher enemy to battle. For anyone who wants to play with foot armies therefore, the rules probably already appear somewhat damaged.

Equally, in the few games where I have tried using skirmisher-rich armies against foot armies I have generally found that they requires too little skill to use to give me an enjoyable game - never mind my opponents. As there are now a number of armies I own that I don;t really want to use that's also something that I think damages the rules.

tim

[grahambriggs]

The skill of moving your troops were you want them is for me one of the best bits of FOG, take it away or make it near impossible will IMO damage the rules.

I fully agree - however those matchups where a mounted skirmish army fights a largely foot army currently appear to require a near "impossible" amount of "skill" on the part of the pedestrians to bring a mounted skirmisher enemy to battle. For anyone who wants to play with foot armies therefore, the rules probably already appear somewhat damaged.

Equally, in the few games where I have tried using skirmisher-rich armies against foot armies I have generally found that they requires too little skill to use to give me an enjoyable game - never mind my opponents. As there are now a number of armies I own that I don;t really want to use that's also something that I think damages the rules.

tim

I like the fact that manouver is important and, for slow moving troops, you have to think ahead. What I dislike about FoG is that it's a little too easy having manouvered to a position to change your mind and run away again, if you're against a slower enemy.

[madaxeman]

I like the fact that manouver is important and, for slow moving troops, you have to think ahead. What I dislike about FoG is that it's a little too easy having manouvered to a position to change your mind and run away again, if you're against a slower enemy.

I think I might have a match report i progress that demonstrates that particular point very well indeed Mr Briggs!

[grahambriggs]

I like the fact that manouver is important and, for slow moving troops, you have to think ahead. What I dislike about FoG is that it's a little too easy having manouvered to a position to change your mind and run away again, if you're against a slower enemy.

I think I might have a match report i progress that demonstrates that particular point very well indeed Mr Briggs!

Does it contain the phrase "cringing like a 7 year old girl"?

[madaxeman]

I like the fact that manouver is important and, for slow moving troops, you have to think ahead. What I dislike about FoG is that it's a little too easy having manouvered to a position to change your mind and run away again, if you're against a slower enemy.

I think I might have a match report i progress that demonstrates that particular point very well indeed Mr Briggs!

Does it contain the phrase "cringing like a 7 year old girl"?

More like "cringing like a 7 year old girl carrying a 6' wicker mantlet whilst competing in a ballet competition"

[philqw78]

Dressage is a much better entertainment than ballet.

[hazelbark]

I like the fact that manouver is important and, for slow moving troops, you have to think ahead. What I dislike about FoG is that it's a little too easy having manouvered to a position to change your mind and run away again, if you're against a slower enemy.

Agreed.

Two "ideas" variation on existing ideas.

1) no 90 turn and move if in the "extended" Restricted Area of 6 MU.

2) If you are moving away from an enemy in the extended Restircted Area you take a CT. Away is defined as you could be contacted with a Rear charge. Not a flank chanrge. The check occurs at the beginning of the move. (So you may get the -1 for unsecure flank) You could exempt troops that are in a formation capable of evading.

Quesiton is should Skirmishers have an extended restricted area that applies to non-skirmishers

So its harder to dodge out of the way. And if you just about face to run away you may have some bad CT rolls. Formations that turned to retire away from an enemy would have had a challenge keeping morale intact.

[HannibalBarca]

Nevermind retreating in the face of the enemy, I've always wondered why there's no CT test for troops that evade a charge. (It might even help in that Cav. versus LH debate too!) Yes, light troops are supposed to fight like this, but a sustained pursuit ought to scatter tham as a coherent fighting force too. If you wanted to be really fancy you could give the CT a bonus of however many whole MUs the charge was short after the evade move: send your light horse after theirs, and they're likely to scatter; send your legionaries and the light horse will be less concerned.

[bahdahbum]

3) Allow LF to contribute to the initiative bonus. I assume this bonus is intended to some extent to represent scouting. dont LF do this too. Perhaps LF could count as 1/2 an element for reaching the 10 and 24 element mark to get initaitive bonus'. This would give armies without an effective LH arm a chance to get some terain on the table. Do we really believe that some horsey army struggling through the home forest (or hills, marshes, whatever) of some horseless tribal people are going to get the drop on them every time? I realise this is not entirely what Initiative is intended to represent but isnt it part of it? It is very easy at the moment to fight on a virtually featureless plain if you want to.

I like that idea .

FOG is a game that needs some improvement , but not a complete overhaul . KISS is the best solution or write other and new rules .

[VMadeira]

3) Allow LF to contribute to the initiative bonus. I assume this bonus is intended to some extent to represent scouting. dont LF do this too. Perhaps LF could count as 1/2 an element for reaching the 10 and 24 element mark to get initaitive bonus'. This would give armies without an effective LH arm a chance to get some terain on the table. Do we really believe that some horsey army struggling through the home forest (or hills, marshes, whatever) of some horseless tribal people are going to get the drop on them every time? I realise this is not entirely what Initiative is intended to represent but isnt it part of it? It is very easy at the moment to fight on a virtually featureless plain if you want to.

FOG is a game that needs some improvement , but not a complete overhaul . KISS is the best solution or write other and new rules .

I agree with both these statements.

Besides if LF is going to be less "invulnerable", as per other threads of the forum (which is also good IMO), this could be a valid compensation for them.

[madaxeman]

3) Allow LF to contribute to the initiative bonus.

FOG is a game that needs some improvement , but not a complete overhaul . KISS is the best solution or write other and new rules .

I agree with both these statements.

Besides if LF is going to be less "invulnerable", as per other threads of the forum (which is also good IMO), this could be a valid compensation for them.

The whole initiative-based-on-mounted-capability thing is IMO an entirely arbitrary aspect of the rules invented to enable some armies to have a better chance of getting terrain they can play in, and with a hokey post-hoc justification to do with "scouting" tacked on as a sop to the easily fooled historical accuracy buffs amongst us.

There is nothing inherently wrong with designing a terrain selection system to give all-mounted armies a better than evens chance of getting the terrain they need, as they clearly could be far more disadvantaged by the generic scattering of "average" terrain (that many previous rulesets have favoured) than most, but the problem that needs fixing is that this currently has gone too far in their favour.

Adding LF to the mix would be just another arbitrary piece of sticking plaster on this issue, who's only rationale is that it pays lip service to the same hokey old "scouting" chestnut as the original rule. You may as well add in MF too, as they can do a bit of scoutig, and move better through rough terrain, Then why not add in HF as they need clear terrain to be effective? Oh, and chariots.....

Really, what's needed is a cleaner simpler fix that cuts to the heart of the issue - giving terrain-dependant armies a reasonable chance to get what they want and need to be viable, but without throwing the entire game balance out of the window at the same time.

[marty]

so perhaps generals should be the only factor on initiative. If its not a scouting issue then I see no reason to give cav an advantage in terrain selection. I would suggest that there has to be a huge amount of terrain before most cav armies are going to face a problem. In fact 800 points on a 6x4 gives so much space and LH are so manouverable that they will still have plenty of space to zip around with virtual impunity. It might be slightly harder for them to win so consistently (eg infantry cant catch me but I cant force them out of the terrain they are hunkered down in). This is probably an improvement on the current situation where the run around army has a good chance of winning and almost no chance of losing (unless facing a clone of itself).

Of course we could always just say everyone picks 3-5 terrain peices of whatever sort they like (No more than 2 of any type, only one coast, etc) and do away with the road been a super open space. This would be simpler than the current system and probably fairer.

martin

[rbodleyscott]

The whole initiative-based-on-mounted-capability thing is IMO an entirely arbitrary aspect of the rules invented to enable some armies to have a better chance of getting terrain they can play in, and with a hokey post-hoc justification to do with "scouting" tacked on as a sop to the easily fooled historical accuracy buffs amongst us.

Just because you are paranoid it doesn't mean that they aren't all out to get you.

[shall]

Considering the whole of this stream my sense is we want:

1. Less chance to manouevre an army away from contact once deployed
2. More chance to finish off games in benny hill mode
3. Less freedom for drilled and skirmishers, but not so much as to damage game fun and feel

Some of the ideas mentioned could contribute to those objectives, a few would go too far IMO.

I suspect to deal with them we probably need 1 or 2 "new mechanisms" rather than tw3eaks to existing ones.

S

[nikgaukroger]

Considering the whole of this stream my sense is we want:

1. Less chance to manouevre an army away from contact once deployed
2. More chance to finish off games in benny hill mode
3. Less freedom for drilled and skirmishers, but not so much as to damage game fun and feel

Some of the ideas mentioned could contribute to those objectives, a few would go too far IMO.

I suspect to deal with them we probably need 1 or 2 "new mechanisms" rather than tw3eaks to existing ones.

S

This may be the case, however, be careful that mechanisms aren't retained/remain unchanged when amending them may be the best way to get the desired result - that has been one of DBMM's big failings IMO and has led to unnecessary complexity of wording and mechanisms.

[bahdahbum]

that has been one of DBMM's big failings IMO and has led to unnecessary complexity of wording and mechanisms.

That's why the KISS principle is so important

reduce LH to 6 MU : simple

add some initiative due to LF : simple

For game balance let's say drilled and undrilled need an 8 for CMT or both car do the same but 7 for drilled or 8 for undrilled : simple .

Please nothing complicated .

[peterrjohnston]

1. Less chance to manouevre an army away from contact once deployed

I think that's more of less chance to manoeuvre away from the enemy when close to the enemy. I don't see a problem when away from the enemy; the game would be somewhat dull if we just deployed and went straight forward.

Several solutions have been proposed, including making CMT harder, shorter move distances, etc. Perhaps another for CMTs would be to add "enemy non-skirmishers within 6MU, -1 (or -2)". (within, not at, to avoid second moves blocking a response).

2. More chance to finish off games in benny hill mode

In theory this isn't a problem as the rules are about fighting battles. In a club game, if my opponent persisted in using an army that avoiding combat by evading, I'd either take a counter to that like massed bow or a similar style of army, or if the worst came to the worst, just stop playing them for dull gamesmanship.

Also club games often have the luxury of "unlimited" time, so one can play to a result. In a competition though, with time constraints, it is very easy to take an army that can avoid combat by using an army that is principally composed of troops that can evade, or move fast enough to avoid combat, or lose it's main "combat" troops and time-out the game as unbroken using "benny hill" tactics with evaders. It's a little like the unbreakable commands idea of DBM. Heads I win, tails we draw.

In summary, I would say the problem is that there is no penalty for evading. There should be. I also think that this is probably the hardest problem to solve. The danger is one could go to far and make skirmish armies untenable to use, which would be a great shame. Whatever the ideas to balance this, it would need a lot of play-testing.

In my view this is all compounded by the non-rules problem of the scoring system for competitions. There are certain armies that can employ the "avoiding combat tactic", and have the benefit of high army break points using cheap "filler". IIRC it was Graham Briggs who said for DBM what army wouldn't benefit from the addition of 4 LH(F). Perhaps for the FoG scoring system one could say, what armies wouldn't benefit from the addition of 4 BGs of poor LF with sling or JLS? The arguments on this can go round in circles, but it's important to realise this is essentially not a problem with the rules.

(I've always liked using steppe armies, and Dominate Roman, but I always feel vaguely guilty if I use them in FoG as it feels like you are offering your opponent a no-win situation. This isn't right.)

I suspect to deal with them we probably need 1 or 2 "new mechanisms" rather than tw3eaks to existing ones.

I agree with Nik and others above, it's important to avoid unnecessary complexity. However, to summarise my views, it would be that the game needs both more "friction" in what you, as the general are trying to do, and more judgement in balancing risks of where one is winning to where one is losing. Everything seems to run on rails at the moment.

[Rekila]

In summary, I would say the problem is that there is no penalty for evading. There should be. I also think that this is probably the hardest problem to solve. The danger is one could go to far and make skirmish armies untenable to use, which would be a great shame. Whatever the ideas to balance this, it would need a lot of play-testing

I have always think that evaders should past a CMT to stop evading as pursuers do.

[madaxeman]

that has been one of DBMM's big failings IMO and has led to unnecessary complexity of wording and mechanisms.

That's why the KISS principle is so important
reduce LH to 6 MU : simple
add some initiative due to LF : simple
For game balance let's say drilled and undrilled need an 8 for CMT or both car do the same but 7 for drilled or 8 for undrilled : simple .
Please nothing complicated .

in part it will depend what the objective of v2 is. Is it to improve the lives of the current group of active players, or win back the interest of those who have bought the book but then failed to warm to the rules as currently written.

The former may be easier to do with a couple of small tweaks, but how many copies of v2 would be sold is the question. The latter could require more fundamental surgery - but with a bigger sales volume for Osprey & Slitherine were it to work.