Resolutive armies

[nikgaukroger]

My gut feeling is to wait and see what the own-language version of the rules does to speed of play.

[vakarr]

A time limit for turns favours those with smaller, regular armies and disadvantages those with larger irregular armies. I don't think much would happen if you only had four minutes per phase, let alone four minutes per turn!

[nikgaukroger]

A time limit for turns favours those with smaller, regular armies and disadvantages those with larger irregular armies.

I found that to be a myth when playing DBM with blitz - the differing options of the two types tend to cancel out. I'd expect pretty much the same with FoG.

I don't think much would happen if you only had four minutes per phase, let alone four minutes per turn!

Four minutes to make your moves, not the whole turn Thus the Manoeuvre Phase would be 4 mins. Actually I'd probably suggest 5 or maybe 6 due to the CMTs that may be needed.

If you are serious about wanting to speed up your game, give it a go.

[daleivan]

I will certainly give this a go--I think it's worth trying just to get faster at playing in general.

Cheers,

Dale

[petedalby]

Going back to Tim's point - I still worry that 4's of LH are too good and difficult to catch.

I wonder if there is any appetite to try an 800 point army om a 5' x 4' table at a future competition?

Pete

[david53]

Going back to Tim's point - I still worry that 4's of LH are too good and difficult to catch.

I wonder if there is any appetite to try an 800 point army om a 5' x 4' table at a future competition?

Pete

Not wanting to be difficult would'nt that then work against those LC armies or armies with large bodies of light cavalry. The fact that LH maybe too hard too catch was that historicaly they were.
Dave

[jlopez]

Going back to Tim's point - I still worry that 4's of LH are too good and difficult to catch.

I wonder if there is any appetite to try an 800 point army om a 5' x 4' table at a future competition?

Pete

Not wanting to be difficult would'nt that then work against those LC armies or armies with large bodies of light cavalry. The fact that LH maybe too hard too catch was that historicaly they were.
Dave

I've heard a lot of complaints about the rules this and the rules that. Actually, I'm very happy with how the rules work. I think they give a very "historical" result. I'm a little more concerned about the army lists and some obvious loopholes in some of them (for example: Ostrogoth allies for the Huns can have groups of 4 poor LF archers which artificially inflates the BG number for the army) but that isn't the fundamental issue. The problem we all face is that we are largely having to play unhistorical games with mismatched armies. As I have found repeatedly when playing David's Granadines, it's a waste of time trying to pursue a skirmisher army with a small, slow medieval army.

The solution has already been applied in POW competitions where players take two historically matched armies with the lists already drawn up. The player with the least points chooses which pair of armies to use (his or the opponent's) and the other then chooses which army he wants to use. You end up playing four games with balanced, historical match-ups and the less skilled player gets a slight advantage as he usually chooses his own pair of armies which he knows how to use. At a stroke, all the complaints about super troops disappear and we can get on with playing fun games with armies you would not otherwise see on the table top.

Personally, I'm a little tired of the run of the mill competition formats and will be concentrating on competitions which use the historical pairs (or similar) system. Unfortunately, that means dropping FOG for the forseeable future.

Julian

[simone]

Never being a fan of open comp either, at the end of the day it really limits the choice of army.
Simone

[philqw78]

But most FoG comps in UK are themed, at least by book now. So not too much of a problem. So far as I know only BHGS Challenge and Britcon weren't themed. There were only 2 books available at the time of the Challenge and Britcon didn't know how many players it would get, since it was running a lot of ancient rule sets.

Never being a fan of open comp either, at the end of the day it really limits the choice of army.

Although I would think an open competition would increase the choice of armies.

[jlopez]

But most FoG comps in UK are themed, at least by book now. So not too much of a problem. So far as I know only BHGS Challenge and Britcon weren't themed. There were only 2 books available at the time of the Challenge and Britcon didn't know how many players it would get, since it was running a lot of ancient rule sets.

Never being a fan of open comp either, at the end of the day it really limits the choice of army.

Although I would think an open competition would increase the choice of armies.

Even the themed competitions don't do it for me. I took a MRR to Jaén which was designed to represent your average consular army of the time: two full legions (4 BGs of 8 ) of average armoured troops. My first game against a Principate Roman (could have been a LRR) with 32 superior legionaries demonstrated that even themed competitions are flawed. There was no way I could possibly have won that game against even a bad player (it just turned out he was very, very bad).

Themed competitions are just an open competition with some limitations and encourage you to take whatever army you reckon is the best and maximising it's good points. If you don't and go for a historical list all you are going to reasonably achieve is give points to your opponents. Just take a look at the Legions Triumphant pool at RollCall. A stunning variety of armies? I don't think so.

I realise that historical pairs isn't everybody's cup of tea but I'm no longer prepared to travel 4-5 hours each way and two nights in a hotel to play with armies I don't like or which can't win a competition when there are alternatives.

Julian

[hammy]

I like the idea of matched pairs of armies but for me that would be a huge problem. While I have getting on for 30 armies I can only scrape together a handful of matched pairs and they would not make particularly good games.

It may be an interesting format for a pairs tournament mind you where each pair brought historical opponents and then you played one home and one away game.

[jre]

This is interesting also because we are discussing how to differentiate our local tournament next year. In Spain we do not have so many players as in UK, so open tournaments seem to be a fixture for many small tournaments in the future, at least till the translated rules spread, and rather than a wide variety we usually get a few sets, some of them almost clones even if they are from different army lists (small sets subject to fads, of course):

3 superior knight BGs, 3-4 LH, some infantry for pivoting and holding the centre, one or two rough terrain MF, and LF chosen more as filler than killer... Or the shooty cavalry clone, though that is less popular because it requires practice to use effectively.

Another problem is the effect of small list advantages. How most Late Republican Romans tend to have Armenian allies or are Brutus and Cassius... Or how most Ancient Spanish (mine included) use Sertorius.

So one of the ideas I was considering, rather than limiting us to one book or two (which is still a likely result), would be to fix a date, and allow any army available at that date, using the conditions on that date. Choosing the date will be delicate, but if done well in advance it could be interesting, and may highlight geographical differences rather than historical differences.

Because it is to be expected than an army may beat either the army it replaces, or the armies it cannot beat, so there is an advantage. One of the reasons why most people prefer to use Successors rather than Alexander's. That this is often true is a sign of good design from a rules point of view, but a problem for tournaments.

José

[jlopez]

I like the idea of matched pairs of armies but for me that would be a huge problem. While I have getting on for 30 armies I can only scrape together a handful of matched pairs and they would not make particularly good games.

It may be an interesting format for a pairs tournament mind you where each pair brought historical opponents and then you played one home and one away game.

You could always borrow armies but actually, the historical pairs system also works for singles. Say you and Martin club your armies together to get an MRR vs Carthaginian pair. You form a team but play as singles. One of you (usually the poorer player) plays with the MRR vs Carthaginian pair and the other will play with the opposing team's pair. You can also decide to play twice with your pair and twice with the others, as agreed between you and your partner. At the end of the tournament you have a singles score and a team score.

Another advantage of this system is you don't have an issue with scale. You can field any scale as long as both armies are the same. You can also apply special rules which are anoted in the lists. For example, in the above pair you could specify that Carthaginian Spaniards and Gauls can retreat 2 inches from melee, dragging Roman infantry BGs along with them if they pass a CMT. That would enable you to simulate the centre at Cannae. Obviously you would have to make sure the lists didn't become too unbalanced otherwise your opponent would always choose the better one!

José's suggestion for restrictive themed competitions is, I'm afraid, doomed to failure as the restrictions have to be very heavy to artificially achieve what the pair system does so elegantly. Given most Spanish players have few armies it would turn people away rather than attract more.

Anyway, that's my two pennies worth. Maybe you could try the historical pairs system at the BHGS Challenge as a separate pool to the open competition? It might attract new players who prefer historical games? I for one would be interested.

Julian

[robertthebruce]

I think that the historical pairs tornaments it´s a nice idea, but it´s also true that not all the competitions can use this format. I´m trying to make themed tournaments in Spain, I Hope that the next year, the most of them will themed.

But the skirmishers armies "problem" can´t be fixed only with themed tournaments, the most of people are taking strong army list, Knights, Pikes, Superior cavalry... ect ect, and they complains when it´s time to play agains a skirmishers army. Players need to change the quality obsesion . I hadn´t see bowmen MF in any army this year, the players says, "It´s rubbish", but maybe it´s a good solution against "light" enemy.


Cheers

David

[simone]

But most FoG comps in UK are themed, at least by book now. So not too much of a problem. So far as I know only BHGS Challenge and Britcon weren't themed. There were only 2 books available at the time of the Challenge and Britcon didn't know how many players it would get, since it was running a lot of ancient rule sets.

Never being a fan of open comp either, at the end of the day it really limits the choice of army.

Although I would think an open competition would increase the choice of armies.

On paper it should since you can choose from all the army lists, in reality it restricts the choice to those armies that can provide a little of everything and be competitive, it limits the choice to the usual suspects. It also promote some players to get stuck with the same army which they grew comfortable with and do not try anything else.
Simone

[jlopez]

I think that the historical pairs tornaments it´s a nice idea, but it´s also true that not all the competitions can use this format. I´m trying to make themed tournaments in Spain, I Hope that the next year, the most of them will themed.

But the skirmishers armies "problem" can´t be fixed only with themed tournaments, the most of people are taking strong army list, Knights, Pikes, Superior cavalry... ect ect, and they complains when it´s time to play agains a skirmishers army. Players need to change the quality obsesion . I hadn´t see bowmen MF in any army this year, the players says, "It´s rubbish", but maybe it´s a good solution against "light" enemy.


Cheers

David

I'm not talking about all competitions. Just one would be nice but I doubt anyone will have the courage to try something different, just in case it puts off people. The funny thing is that the people in Spain who complain about any hint of a change to the format are usually the ones who don't attend competitions. I can understand why a competition that is doing well might want to stick to the usual open competition but we have at least three competitions in Spain which have failed to get more than 12 players. You would think that would give them some incentive to try something different.

You may recall that my 24 longbowmen and 6 MF crossbowmen were unable to defeat your Granadines... I played well, so did you and the result was a draw.

Actually, like I demonstrated at Jaen, skirmish armies are not a problem. All I have to do is hide in terrain where skirmish shooting is ineffective and you have a guaranteed draw. Not much fun but far less risky than a fruitless chase where all the risk is taken by the slower, smaller army.

Julian

[nikgaukroger]

Anyway, that's my two pennies worth. Maybe you could try the historical pairs system at the BHGS Challenge as a separate pool to the open competition? It might attract new players who prefer historical games? I for one would be interested.

No reason why variant competitions couldn't be held assuming there is enough take up. Perhaps you could canvass for interest so we can see if it may be worthwhile offering such a comp?

[madaxeman]

But the skirmishers armies "problem" can´t be fixed only with themed tournaments, the most of people are taking strong army list, Knights, Pikes, Superior cavalry... ect ect, and they complains when it´s time to play agains a skirmishers army. Players need to change the quality obsesion . I hadn´t see bowmen MF in any army this year, the players says, "It´s rubbish", but maybe it´s a good solution against "light" enemy.
Cheers
David

The players at our club have noted that its usual only to be fighting on maybe 2/3 of the width of the table. That leaves a lot of empty space for fast moving light troops to escape into - and you need to use a lot of MF bow to cover more than 2/3 of the table width at best.

It also means its a long long way for troops to go if they are deployed on the "wrong" side of the board - or if they beat up their opponents and then try and rejoin the battle elsewhere.

smaller tables or more points - still my view.

[jlopez]

Anyway, that's my two pennies worth. Maybe you could try the historical pairs system at the BHGS Challenge as a separate pool to the open competition? It might attract new players who prefer historical games? I for one would be interested.

No reason why variant competitions couldn't be held assuming there is enough take up. Perhaps you could canvass for interest so we can see if it may be worthwhile offering such a comp?

Thanks Nik. You can find a proposal for a Historical Pairs competition at the BHSG Challenge here: viewtopic.php?p=69791#69791

Julian

[nikgaukroger]

I am very very interested to see what response there may be to this - I think it is probably an under-appreciated form of the game for ancients players.

I've tried it only once in a DBM 200 competition, but it certainly had merit. I think on balance I prefer completely open or tightly themed competitions, however, as an addition to the existing mix I'd be tempted ...