Slitherine

You are making a lot of assumptions , I feel, about what medium / heavy troops represent in the game, and your descriptives say alot.. Heavies are big burly men like rugby players? I presume you feel only lessor sized men would be used for "lighter formations and thus be "atomised" Armour has nothing to do with this, many medium troops are equal or greater that heavy troops armour wise.

Also you are using very specific exanples hear, all those Greek "stages" of combat seem reasonable but Thucydedes himslef advised "pushing" (at least from the rear ranks) was not done, and he also advised 4 ranks was sufficient in most cases....

Anyways , I do agree in a longer slug feast in the open heavies should have an edge of lighter formations, and they do ( as Chris pointed out) Also , why presume heavies are necasarily "better" trained and better able to kill "lighter" troops? Early legions were basically conscripted farmers. Why do you think as an individual they would have been inherently more dangerous than a Gallic warrior or a Spanish tribeman?

You asked for an example in a historical context and I gave you one. Apparently, it wasn't good enough. I in turn asked for such an example from you. This, you did not or could not provide.

Your presumption is incorrect. I would assume that all soldiers - particularly those labeled "superior" by a game that attempts (weakly) to simulate historical combat - would be big and burly. My intent was simply to emphasize the role of cohesion and teamwork in combat.

However, the designers of FOG as well as some of the devoted followers on this forum seem to disagree.

That's where Ill leave it. Could be a fun game but the rules are a definite drawback.

Well, all you really did was quote something from Wiki.
basically the game doesnt presume heavy troops are inherently bigger , stronger , faster or better equiped/armed than mediums, simply that they are more dependant on fighting in close formation.
Those other factors are handled by the weapons (both melee and impact), the armour rating , and the quality level of the troops.... Mediums will suffer in cohesion tests vs heavy's and generally fair poorly against mounted. Isnt this enough ?

Any ways , I can understand and have no issues if you dont like a game, to each is own. What i dont get is why you think because the game mecahnics dont fall under your perceptions of how things should work that ergo: the game is silly, the authors/desighners are somehow less than knowledgable in history and that they somehow "duped" you into buying the game because it had pretensions of being "complex" (of course one of your prior post states the game is simple but then in the same breadth not simple??)

This will be my last post on the topic (as you implied yours would be several ago, it is hard not to come back isnt it:) )
I just hate to think someone might not be able to enjoy a game from not enough experiance playing and or an incomplete understanding of all the game mechanics. You seem determined to not like, so that should be it then .

Cheers !

Heavy & Medium are nothing to do with armour and all to do with fighting styles. Heavy foot are better at resisting mounted charges and less effective in terrain that disrupts their formation.

Heavy foot could be protected and medium foot could be armoured. I think it's just you misunderstand the definitions.

I can provide you some elements on what jdbleed is talking about.

We have a game on 250pts he had Enlish HYW with longobows and heavy foot (dismounted knights i presume) and some units of heavy knights; i was welsh full of welsh spear and wels bows with a little detachment of cavalry.

The question on rules arose when dismounted knights came in contact with my welsh spears.... well i did a big slaughter of them and won the day.

This, i presume, shoul be an example on the question by jdbleed

*Remembers one glorious occasion when a little BG of Roman velites (LF, javelins) broke a BG of Macedonian Companions on impact+melee.* Things do happen!! It was just not the knight's day.

Indeed i have to mention that Welsh units are a real challenge for everyone, it is an underrated but extremely tough army.

Welsh bows are strong, Welsh spears have great mobility and may overlap many enemies.

I do believe that, in my game, welsh spears made a great effort in having a greater number of units against some units of dismounted knights so winning by number, but i might be wrong and there could be that "blades" heavy foot are underrated compared to "spears" medium foot

Not exactly sure how the welsh are armed or their armour rating as it were, but if you outnumber your opponent they lose 1 combat die for each adjacent enemy, and that is along with dice loss for cohesion state as well. They will not be reduced to below 1 die regardless but if you get 3 Welsh with 4 dice versus 1 knight with only 1 or 2 dice I would think the Welsh would have a good chance for beating their "betters". Either that or your English opponent had a really bad day with the virtual dice and rolled too many 2's thus no re-rolls for the misses.