4 base skirmishing BGs

[rbodleyscott]

IIRC flee off rear table edge 2AP, still 1AP for other edges.

The other way round, 1AP for rear edge, 2 APs for other edges.

[marioslaz]

IIRC flee off rear table edge 2AP, still 1AP for other edges.

The other way round, 1AP for rear edge, 2 APs for other edges.

Not sure this can work. An army of massed troops to win should disperse in many directions against an LH/LF army, that is exactly the opposite they want to do.

Even if my experience in tournament is zero, I think better solution is to give a different way to attribute win when you have skirmisher armies involved in a game. You only need:

• define the threshold when an army must be classified as a skirmisher army
• define a system to attribute win for Skirmisher vs Skirmisher and Skirmisher vs Non Skirmisher

Of course the new systems should be consistent with the original system, i.e. based on a similar system with some adjustment. And perhaps you'll find another aspect since now you all talk about but nobody seem to worry: LH armies are hard to defeat but they don't win. Why don't you worry to realize a system where also LH owner can win if he play a good plan?

[dave_r]

I would add the opinion that Light Horse are able to win games.

Rarely are armies made up entirely of skirmishers. Light Horse normally have some Armoured, Cavalry, Bow, Swordsmen or Armoured, Cavalry, Lancer, Swordsmen to fill out the ranks and actually do some fighting.

[azrael86]

While I like the rules I'm afraid I've had the opposite reaction as far as competitions go. Armies consisting mostly of air don't win many competitions but they do spoil the weekend for those who bring a solid army and end up playing them. To the extent that it is putting some people off entering.

It's disappointing to see people saying there is no problem because tournaments are not being won by these armies. Indeed they are not. But people still play them and their opponents still have non games.

Richard is right in that these non results may well be historical. So was Hannibal ambling round Italy for years while the Roman army stayed fortified. I don't want to play that out in a competition either.

This is exactly the point. To be honest, it's long been unclear to me what anyone using a full-on skirmisher army (i.e all LH and CV B, as opposed to LH/Ln, LH/Cv or LH/Ct) is actually getting out of a competition, unless they are just wanting to show off their painting?

Hammy, the very nature of these armies (i.e. that they rarely win heavily) means that they are rarely seen or played by anyone who wins a competition, because unless it is a very small comp you are only likely to play in rd1. Equally (unless you have the right army, which appears to be mostly Cv) then if you do play them, you are unlikely to win a competition.

[azrael86]

I would add the opinion that Light Horse are able to win games.

Rarely are armies made up entirely of skirmishers. Light Horse normally have some Armoured, Cavalry, Bow, Swordsmen or Armoured, Cavalry, Lancer, Swordsmen to fill out the ranks and actually do some fighting.

Then isn't it the cav who win the game?

[azrael86]

Not sure this can work. An army of massed troops to win should disperse in many directions against an LH/LF army, that is exactly the opposite they want to do.

Even if my experience in tournament is zero, I think better solution is to give a different way to attribute win when you have skirmisher armies involved in a game. You only need:

• define the threshold when an army must be classified as a skirmisher army
• define a system to attribute win for Skirmisher vs Skirmisher and Skirmisher vs Non Skirmisher

Of course the new systems should be consistent with the original system, i.e. based on a similar system with some adjustment. And perhaps you'll find another aspect since now you all talk about but nobody seem to worry: LH armies are hard to defeat but they don't win. Why don't you worry to realize a system where also LH owner can win if he play a good plan?

A threshold would of course be open to abuse. How would you handle flank marches and ambushes that change the classification? Or is the classification applied to the submitted list and declared (telling your opponent how many skirmishers you have)?

Good LH army plan -

Start
shoot people until they fail a test, then if they are skirmishers, or you are behind their flank, or both, charge them, else continue shooting until they fail another test
Interrupt: on enemy charges you run away, move back into range, goto start
goto start

what would be a non-good LH plan?

[rbodleyscott]

I would add the opinion that Light Horse are able to win games.

Rarely are armies made up entirely of skirmishers. Light Horse normally have some Armoured, Cavalry, Bow, Swordsmen or Armoured, Cavalry, Lancer, Swordsmen to fill out the ranks and actually do some fighting.

Then isn't it the cav who win the game?

Yes, but the mythical bogieman of the all-LH army simply doesn't exist in tournaments anyway.

It's a straw man argument.

We won Burton with a Seljuk army consisting of 5 BGs armoured bow.sword cavalry, 9 BGs of LH and 1 BG of Poor LF.

Now you won't see many tournament armies with more than 9 BGs of LH, so I regard this as a LH army.

But we did not play for draws and we won the tournament.

Clearly the fact that we did not play for a draw proves nothing because we won the tournament so the LH army must still be unfair.

This is an argument that the LH cannot win, because the goal-posts are moved if a point is made in their favour.

Of course this is nothing new. Even in Ancient and Medieval times the heavy armies were crying "unfair" when LH armies would not fight them on their own terms. Those dastardly skirmishers have been receiving a bad press throughout history right up to the Vietnam War and the present day. And throughout history the non-skirmishers have been trying to get the "rules" changed so that they can "win" on their own terms rather than deal with the skirmishers through good tactics and discipline.

Anyone for a Papal ban?

[grahambriggs]

I would add the opinion that Light Horse are able to win games.

Rarely are armies made up entirely of skirmishers. Light Horse normally have some Armoured, Cavalry, Bow, Swordsmen or Armoured, Cavalry, Lancer, Swordsmen to fill out the ranks and actually do some fighting.

Then isn't it the cav who win the game?

The cav and LH complement each other. Bow cav by adding weight of shooting. Lancers by making the enemy bunch up so the LH can go round the flanks.

The cav can fight hand to hand in the right circumstances. But the LH often prepare the ground by disrupting the enemy first to provide those circumstances.

It works with LH + knights too.

These "air plus grit" armies are much more difficult to play against. You can't spread out enough to push the skirmishers off table as the tougher troops will punch straight through you. If you clump up against the grit the LH will get round the flanks.

[ShrubMiK]

I don't have a particular beef with the way LH, and by extension LH-heavy armies, work under the rules, and I'm not too bothered about changes to the rules to address this "problem".

I don't have any particular beef with LH-heavy armies appearing in competitions, or the current competition scoring rules - although I have offered suggestions of how they might be changed I'm certainly not a member of the "crusade"!

I do get the feeling that Richard is displaying a bit more attitude on this topic than is strictly necessary to be thought totally impartial on the subject though

I would actually argue that it is the proponents of guerilla or assymmetric warfare that are "changing the rules" because they couldn't win with (conventional) "tactics and discipline", but I guess that's all semantics.

Anyway, it would be perhaps instructive to look at how tournament victory conditions work for something like a Vietnam skirmish game: Hide somewhere, fire from ambush, watch US troops dive off the track into pre-positioned stake traps, run away and hide in impenetrable tunnel system, game finishes, claim win, express disbelief that the US player says he didn't enjoy the game...then wiat 6 years until opponents are worn down by ennui and voluntarily withdraw from the tournament, leaving only the communist players to scrpa amongst themselves for the final placings

[azrael86]

It works with LH + knights too.

These "air plus grit" armies are much more difficult to play against. You can't spread out enough to push the skirmishers off table as the tougher troops will punch straight through you. If you clump up against the grit the LH will get round the flanks.

Indeed it does. After you've killed the knights then the LH hide and you end up with about a 13-7 having killed nearly 50% of the enemies pts! Happened to me last year against portuguese and Hungarian. Come to that happened under DBM against Serbs...

But at least part of the army has come to fight.

Nice to see you won the tournament Richard, but then with that list you never had to fight any BG you didn't want to!

[hammy]

Hammy, the very nature of these armies (i.e. that they rarely win heavily) means that they are rarely seen or played by anyone who wins a competition, because unless it is a very small comp you are only likely to play in rd1. Equally (unless you have the right army, which appears to be mostly Cv) then if you do play them, you are unlikely to win a competition.

Possibly. Tim (who has been known to win tournaments from time to time) seems to play a lot of these armies. I can't say I have faced many and the last couple of times I did the games were interesting enough.

I played plenty of Heads I win, Tails we draw games of DBM over the years. I really hated facing Beja where you got hit by a load of really rather tough combat troops then when you killed them all the rest of the army just danced away.

[rbodleyscott]

Nice to see you won the tournament Richard, but then with that list you never had to fight any BG you didn't want to!

True up to a point, but it took 3 BGs of armoured cavalry to take down each BG of knights that we beat during the tournament.

It is essential for an army with weaker troops to pick which enemy it fights otherwise it will inevitably lose.

It is typical throughout history for the skirmish army not to be given credit for their victories because they "didn't fight fair".

If all you want to play is line up and crunch then be my guest. Pick a like-minded opponent and go at it. It ain't my cup of tea, however.

As I said before, if the LH play for a draw they get slammed, if they play for a win they get slammed. You surely cannot be demanding that they be played for a loss?

[hammy]

I played against a LH and shooty cav army at Burton and in then end it all boiled down to one key combat. One of our spear BGs went disrupted and it and the crossbow next to it were charged by a couple of BG of shooty cav one of which was disrupted. In the end we lost the resulting combat but it was a close call. Once we had a hole in our line we were unable to complete the expected victory. Had that fight gone the other way or the armoured spear not been disrupted at that point I think that the LH army was in big trouble.

[azrael86]

Nice to see you won the tournament Richard, but then with that list you never had to fight any BG you didn't want to!

True up to a point, but it took 3 BGs of armoured cavalry to take down each BG of knights that we beat during the tournament.

would that consist of one that gets killed while the other two flank charge the pursuing knights?

[benos]

actully i think part of the problem has already been covered.
There are answers to the light horse etc (cheers to dave r etal who have mentioned solutions)

However a fair number of better players including some who were involved in development like playing light horse armies
this makes them seem better than they are. Perhaps the metagame needs to evolve a little.
Personally if the middle tables have a number of players with a must not lose at any cost attitude. I'll lose a few games and have alaugh on the bottom tables (and they are a different problem to light horse really). Remember its a game it should be played for fun.

And if this doesn't convince you perhaps next time i get a chance to play Nik we should make me use a nomad army while he uses infantry.
Since he is a much better player than me if they are broken he won't win as quickly as usual ...actually I'm probably not the best as i would go for a win anyway. But until you are getting the results that are showing players getting highly unusual results it is hard to judge where the issue is.

Ps sorry for picking on you Nik just the biggest gap in playing skil/experience i could see getting matched up off the top of my head.

Ben

[rbodleyscott]

Nice to see you won the tournament Richard, but then with that list you never had to fight any BG you didn't want to!

True up to a point, but it took 3 BGs of armoured cavalry to take down each BG of knights that we beat during the tournament.

would that consist of one that gets killed while the other two flank charge the pursuing knights?

No.

Like good generals ought to be, I prefer to be economical with my troops' lives.

(Anyone who says who cares about the troops' lives, they are only toy soldiers, is missing the point.

In my games, I am trying to emulate the better historical generals, not just throw everything in and hope to win the dice war.)

[petedalby]

Is this the longest thread yet? Are we any closer to a conclusion?

Personally I'd go for Difficult terrain against a LH army


Difficult to find any in the steppe !

Hi Olivier! Of course in my head I won the PBI roll - so Hilly or Woodland please.

[olivier]

Hi Olivier! Of course in my head I won the PBI roll - so Hilly or Woodland please.

With heavy infantry army I wish to move first, as wicked LH player cunningly dispatch their IC, so am I and without to much Cv. I Hope to have a +2 advantage on PBI.
Difficult on this term to expect a good terrain, I rather like have a sound strategy for the worst terrain possible .
BTW Pete, did you go to Britcon this year? I owe you a revenge.... and a beer !

Is this the longest thread yet? Are we any closer to a conclusion?

Certainly not! After the LH case we must burn the other game killer : The Swarm and their worst incarnation the MBDR !

[marioslaz]

I think we are still missing the point. With actual system, against one army with a lot of skirmisher an army of massed troops has not a true tactic, because if you run back to shooters, as you know, you must sweep all enemy BG from the table. The story of paper-scissor-stone is not a solution, because this mean you have not a balanced game if you are not coupled with a similar army; you likely will have an easy or hard game, not a balanced one. And in the meantime in Italy people are talking to limit LH to a very small number of bases because otherwise game are boring. I don't think this could be a solution...

[petedalby]

BTW Pete, did you go to Britcon this year? I owe you a revenge.... and a beer !

I'll definitely be there Olivier - probably in the late period.

Great if you can make it again. Look forward to it.