marioslaz wrote:
Anyway, IMO the problem is not HF cannot get LH, because this is historical. The problem is when I play with an infantry army I cannot do nothing versus an LH army. My thought is it could get a good result without modify movement rules in an unrealistic way.
I think what is missing, as people have hinted at, is why these two armies would be fighting out on the steppes (or anywhere for that matter).
If we modeled it on the Romans marching on Ctesiphon maybe we would get somewhere. It seems like the historical record is something like:
- Romans get tired of Parthians, decide to nick Parthian treasure.
- Romans invade, clever Romans pick a parth through hills, along a river, etc. They tend not to wander out into the middle of nowhere.
- Parthians send out masses of skirmishers to harass and wear out the Romans along the way, but this is not enough to stop Romans
- Parthians could just ignore Romans, let them sack capitol but decide to make an effort to stop them and thus we have a battle.
It seems to me each of these is important and perhaps not well thought out in the rules. The rules are fine for two "heavy" armies clashing but the mobility allowed to lighter - especially skirmisher armies doesn't work as well.
I think two related changes would help a great deal.
The first and fourth point are important, they are the reason there is a battle. These are not just two a randome confrontation, they heave decided to have a battle. In particular, IMO we should agree that this represents the battle part of the campaign for the Parthians, not the days or weeks of harassing skirmishing. I think this has been discussed a good deal but some of the suggestions to cut down on the running away make a lot of sense. 2AP for lights fled off table (and easier to flee them off) and possible an increase in the value of camps (which might help with the Benny Hill end game, if camps counted as 1/3 of your attrition points instead of 2 they might be worth working a bit harder at to defend).
We probably need to give the Romans some greater chance than a +2 Initiative army rollin vs. a +4 and getting stuck in the steppe, competent Romans had no real reason to leave the hills or river valley they were marching through. IIRC Crassus was thought just to be stupid in the choice of route and even if we think Crassus is a +1 initiative army, it is still likely to happen to Caesar with a +3 or whatever. There is no reason the Romans HAD to be caught on a flat featureless plain...I also believe some Chinese armies had a habit of going out into the steppes, but then they took mostly moounted armies to do so...
Now, I actually like the FoG terrain system for the most part and I am good with leaving some greater value in winning the initiative roll, but the current Steppe terrain is too extreme IMO. So, what if we stick just a couple more terrain choices out in the steppes. This simulates the Romans having a plan to go through friendlier terrain, but perhaps getting caught at the edges of it, somewhere a bit friendlier for Parthians. I get somewhere on the order of 6 total available choices of RGo/DGo in the terrain list, which guarantees the Romans can try and get four pieces down. The Parthians will then try to get three opens down (along with the Romans compulsory open) to try and limit the total terrain, as opposed to taking the terrain themselves to try and minimize and get it in the corners.
I think we have to look back and give our generals a bit of credit, civilized armies incapable of managing didn't tend to wander out onto a flat featurless bit of terrain unless they were incompetent and steppe armies didn't offer them battle in any case without a reason. FoG is not IMO about weeks long harassment campaigns and so we shouldn't have bits in the rules to make up for that. If you feel that "well that isn't fair the steppe guys wouldn't fight an even points battle, they would skirmish the Romans down first..." Either rationalize it as "they already did, the Romans started out with 1200AP so this is looking pretty good now" or just get on with it as we have to rationalize every even points battle in some way...
Undoubtedly there are other changes possible, but I believe my initial four points are in the ballpark. Let's back up and ask why we might conceive of this battle happening and shape the terrain and outcomes appropriately.
