gozerius wrote:I have run Medieval Germans in DBM using a City CinC with max (R)Sp I. I just haven't done it with FoG yet. I have the troops and that composition will be used, it's just that right now in my area we are still in the crawl stage of FoG mastery and are using primarily starter armies with variations. If you know what you are facing, it can make your troop buying choices easier. If I know that I'm fighting a mostly foot army, crossbows are nearly worthless, so take the compulsaries as poor and put the points somewhere else. I think that right now a big factor in the decisions poeple are making is based on what can get painted up the fastest. Obviously, if I need 800 points, the quickest way to get there is to buy the minimum of low point per figure types, and max out on the high point per figure types. A base of hordes costs as much cash as a base of superior drilled knights. It should be noted that keeping your poor troops out of the fight was precisely the tactic used by many a winning general.
Like you, I also liked to field fighting inferiors in DBM - mostly inferior spear and inferior blades. People tended to regard such types as filler - to be used more as spectators. But this didn't really accord with how I thought the armies had fought in reality. Quite often it worked in the game also. Where opponents would often try to skirmish-out better close-formation infantry, I found that they would usually accept combat with inferiors. Weight of numbers - overlaps and reserves would then often balance-out inferior fighting power.
I had been wondering about trying this in Fog, but felt that for most types the relatively small saving in points made by taking troops as Poor did not properly offset their large drop in fighting power combined with significantly weaker morale. Even when looking for a massed army, in most cases it looked better to go for a lesser arm or armour grade, rather than take BGs as Poor.
It then occured to me that I hadn't seen any Poor troops apart from LF and the odd mob of spectators used in Fog, nor had I seen any in battle reports. So I wondered if mine was the general perception.
From the poll and the weight of replies this does seem to be the case at the moment. There have been some really interesting examples of the use of particular Poor units. That Bactrian BG of Poor light spear bow does sound like good value. Carlos pointed out that Poor LH can make decent skirmishers. Hammy's idea for using economy-Byzantine lancers sounds good. The point made about downgrading to Poor when fulfilling minimum quotas, in order to free-up points for the troops you do want, is also a good one.
Have to say that most of these have a slight feel of the special case about them. Suggesting that people need to think quite hard before selecting Poor troops. In a way that they don't when picking Superior or Average ones.
But these are early days. As tactics develop more use may be found for them. Also your point about people wanting to build an army naturally starting with high-value elements is a good one.
If in six or so months Poor troops are still a rarity, I do feel this is maybe something that should be looked at. In the meantime, if anyone makes any further sightings of these troops (in your own or your opponents' armies), and particularly if you have ideas on how to use them, do please post them here.
Alan
