Time to limit the number of BGs?

[hammy]

For those who worry large skirimisher armies do well try fighting a Christian Nubian with them. Being skimishers is alright until you meet something that shoots back with a vengence. You can't flee off table as they don't charge you. They cause a CT almost every shot. They are a threat from 10MU away. Quite capable of shooting 12 skirmisher BGs to pieces within 2 1/2 hours with 48 Sup bowmen.

I agree. The large skirmisher armies are not the real problem. They have a number of pretty obvious and effective counters. IMO if there is a problem it is the 4 element BGs of MF armies.

Actually the 4 element BGs of MF armies aren't that good against Christian Nubian either. I have managed to lose to Simon's Nubians with a swarm Dominate army and I don't think I played badly. I didn't play not to lose but when I tried to win it was a lot harder than you might otherwise think.

I only broke one BG of archers and that took two BGs of armoured MF an impact and three rounds of melee where I got 7 hits in the last round and killed 2 bases to autobreak the archers. The other BG of archers I hit with two BGs of MF (I hit slightly offset) proceeded to break both BGs of Auxilia and when I looked at the numbers it wasn't an unexpected result.

Where the MF armies really shine is against armies of shock troops that let themselves get split up or interestingly against armies with lots of skirmishers.

[shall]

For those who worry large skirimisher armies do well try fighting a Christian Nubian with them. Being skimishers is alright until you meet something that shoots back with a vengence. You can't flee off table as they don't charge you. They cause a CT almost every shot. They are a threat from 10MU away. Quite capable of shooting 12 skirmisher BGs to pieces within 2 1/2 hours with 48 Sup bowmen.

I agree. The large skirmisher armies are not the real problem. They have a number of pretty obvious and effective counters. IMO if there is a problem it is the 4 element BGs of MF armies.

Played my old rival and friend Graham Evans at the Challenge with his 19 BG MF army. As this army seems to be the prime target of comments ...

I think he would openly admit I had him on the run the entire game and in a considerable mess at times. Had it not been for him bouncing my armoured lancers twice in the open with MF, his army could easily have died - this saved a good 6 APs for him. As it was almost everything failed and we only won slightly. Throughout the game I was always on top and he was always under pressure and we even got his camp. It finished with him losing about 10 APs and me 8 APs, but on average dice I should have not lost my Arm Lncrs and a LH lncr and he should have lost another 6 AP easily - so should have been 16AP to 4AP at the end of time. So on average dice I think it was a 16-4 against him when I roughed it out.

I played the same army run by two other players. Lots of BGs. 24-1 twice against the 19 BG roman swarm. I also beat Hammy using it in a test game - I think it was 15-5 - when up in Manchester.

Basically Graham Evans is a very good player, and it takes another one to beat him - its not the armies but much more to do with players and skill levels. The army choice is just about finding one that suits your own strengths. Graham's is in causing lots of chaos and exploiting it. So 18BGs of manouvreable foot is ideal for him. Others create the same chaos but find it much less appealing ....

All that gives me comfort so far that it is not a BG number game and Graham will not get it all his own way ....

Si

[hammy]

I played the same army run by two other players. Lots of BGs. 24-1 twice against the 19 BG roman swarm. I also beat Hammy using it in a test game - I think it was 15-5 - when up in Manchester.

The game Si and I played was a clear win for the Nubians. I am fairly sure I inflicted 10 APs on the Nubians (one Bow block and all the non lancer cavalry or possibly 3 non lancer cavalry and a LH BG). That would have been a 19-6 or something like that.

[shall]

Yes sounds about right. I forgot I got your army in the end. Would have been a 19-6.

Si

[ethan]

I agree. The large skirmisher armies are not the real problem. They have a number of pretty obvious and effective counters. IMO if there is a problem it is the 4 element BGs of MF armies.

Actually the 4 element BGs of MF armies aren't that good against Christian Nubian either.

At least for me this is one of the big issues. Just because there is a good counter to swarms isn't enough. The counter to swarms need to be good armies in their own right and have a set of counters that are themselves reasonably armies, etc.

In other words rock/paper/scissors needs to work.

[nikgaukroger]

Well Si's Christian Nubians finished 4th at the Challenge and I don't think he faced swarms all the way. It isn't a bad army in its own right IMO - although in many ways it is also a swarm.

However, I'd also suggest that the 100YW which won the Challenge is a good anti-swarm, a good army in its own right and not a swarm, as are the WotR I took to 5 th and the Early Achaemenid Persians Graha, Briggs took to 6th.

[hammy]

Lots of missile power and not many shock troops seems to make a good anti swarm army. Larger BGs of decent quality foot and things like Ancient Britons are good anti shooter armies.

There is rock/paper/scissors, just not the same as in DBM.

The top 10 armies at the Challenge this year were:

100 Years War English (Continental)
Later Ottoman Turkish
Dominate Roman
Christian Nubian
Wars of the Roses (Yorkist)
Early Achaemenid Persian
Ancient British
Late Dynasty Egyptian
Dominate Roman
Hundred Years' War English (continental)

If anything it looks to me like we should be worrying about medium foot bow armies but if you follow the discussions here medium foot bow are rubbish.

Players are still working out plans and different armies. Swarm is most definitely not the only good option.

[marioslaz]

I don't think real issue is rock/paper/scissor. I think the real problem is to find a system more historically accurate to determine game end. IMO the best I ever seen is the system of "Wargame in the Age of Reason" but I must admit that system it's not suitable for tournament purpose.
There is another important issue about game end. Whatever is the system you decide to use to determine game end, you must test it with armies which historically fought one against other. In general speaking, armies of nations who had relationship evolved in a parallel way developing countermeasure to each new weapon/tactic. I think you cannot pretend a such system give a good result with any armies confrontation.

[philqw78]

The top 10 armies at the Challenge this year were:

100 Years War English (Continental)
Later Ottoman Turkish
Dominate Roman
Christian Nubian
Wars of the Roses (Yorkist)
Early Achaemenid Persian
Ancient British
Late Dynasty Egyptian
Dominate Roman
Hundred Years' War English (continental)

Surely this is the top 9 Hammy, as 100YW is there twice

[Robert241167]

Check out the Dominates Phil.

I assume Hammy meant the top 10 finishers.

Rob

[philqw78]

Check out the Dominates Phil.

I assume Hammy meant the top 10 finishers.

Rob

Well, for purely selfish reasons then, that puts Bosporan in the Top 10

[hazelbark]

Big armies contain poor/average troops, that are prone to rout in mass when things start to go bad. FOG lacks a similar mechanism.

You don't understand the Dominate AT ALL.

It has somethng like 6 BGs of superior. The rest Average. Sometimes it has an IC. All the average troops are Armoured.

Also it deploys wide. So a rout or defeat in one sector does not effect the rest of the army.

And FOG does have a mechanism. When units break the neigboring units check. And people have had plenty of examples of their army blowing up at this point.

[hazelbark]

The top 10 armies at the Challenge this year were:
Ancient British
Late Dynasty Egyptian

Especially unique these two.

[nikgaukroger]

One of the spent all their time amongst the top tables, the other submarined beating up a teenager along the way

[hazelbark]

One of the spent all their time amongst the top tables, the other submarined beating up a teenager along the way

So who is the more clever?

For the record the teenager put up a tougher fight than his dad, who was on the exhalted GB Gent team.

[nikgaukroger]

So who is the more clever?

The one who finished highest I suspect.

[marioslaz]

You don't understand the Dominate AT ALL.

It has somethng like 6 BGs of superior. The rest Average. Sometimes it has an IC. All the average troops are Armoured.

Also it deploys wide. So a rout or defeat in one sector does not effect the rest of the army.

And FOG does have a mechanism. When units break the neigboring units check. And people have had plenty of examples of their army blowing up at this point.

First, I never dare to write in this manner about another member of this forum.
Anyway, because I'm a quite patient man, before to ignore you and your offensive phrases I try a last reply in a polite way. When I say FOG lacks a mechanism to simulate domino effect in ancient battle I refer to the situations where an army is near to rout and it becomes hard to get the last BG rout needed to obtain an army rout. In another thread I started a couple of weeks ago Si confirmed this is an issue also for him and he is working to a solution. IMHO there should be a sort of a new test, we could call it Army Cohesion Test, to take when something of bad occur to your army (commander killed, BG breaks, and similar). You would need to test only when your attrition points go over a determined threshold and if you fail it a first time your army becomes shaken (for example a -1 to all CT test) if you fail a second time your army breaks.
I know this kind of solution will be adversed from all wargamers interested primarily to tournament

[hazelbark]

Mario,

Since you found my comment excessively personal, I apologize. Your comment about tournament gamers is intemperate and inaccurate in my view.

[philqw78]

FOG lacks a mechanism to simulate domino effect in ancient battle

I thought the final push of the domino was when you reached AP = to the number of BG in your army.

I'm sure some armies carried on fighting well past this and others went a long time before. But they would be scenario rules. There can be difficulties ending games though.

If your opponent won't roll over and die then you need to come up with a plan, just like a real general had to stop his enemy escaping the field in good order so they could not re-group and fight another day.

[marioslaz]

Mario,

Since you found my comment excessively personal, I apologize. Your comment about tournament gamers is intemperate and inaccurate in my view.

I'm sorry and apologize if my point of view about tournament gamers appear intemperate, because this doesn't reflect my thought. I must again remark I'm writing not in my native language and I need often the support of a vocabulary.
I don't feel superior in respect a wargamer who like to play tournament games, but we have different objectives. In synthesis and with a brutal approximation:
historical player: accuracy is a must, fast and easy a significant option
tournament player: fast and easy a must, accuracy a significant option
There are also other differences, but they have an impact on other aspect of game only. For example, many of us be astonished we didn't ended a game at 800 points in a game session (well, we didn't ended not even in 2, because we hope to finish this evening which is the third game session on the same match ). One of the reason we take so long is we love a lot also particular, like terrains. I suspect that not a lot of players would play a tournament game on a such table, which for us is a standard:



Again, this doesn't imply we feel better than other players, but only we love different aspect of game.

Differences. Just differences. It seems our society fear differences. I love differences. I love to discuss with men who have different point of view. Of course if there is mutual respect (misunderstanding don't count at all).