Professional killers?

[philqw78]

Hammy read back what you quoted

As for the superior undrilled moving better than average undrilled

[grahambriggs]

Hammy read back what you quoted

As for the superior undrilled moving better than average undrilled

Never let facts stop a good rant

[hammy]

Hammy read back what you quoted

As for the superior undrilled moving better than average undrilled

Never let facts stop a good rant

[nikgaukroger]

Hammy read back what you quoted

As for the superior undrilled moving better than average undrilled

Never let facts stop a good rant

Hardly rated on the Essick scale though

[stefoid]

bwahaha! its nice to cop a spray and not be in the wrong for once. I think Ill print this thread out and show my missus just to show her its possible.

[shall]

One of the features of FOG is that the subtelty of the system is much less obvious than it first appears both in its realism and game mechanics. The following post exctract basically sums up the gam design objective perfectly. The whole idea is that by having a string of simple things corss-linked correctly you get 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 = 10000s of outcomes and loads of subtlety.

To me most of the arguments above are entirely understandable things to raise inthe early days until you have really understood what is under the bonnet despite its apparent simplicity. All the above is is new people arguing with people with 2-3 years of play experience. All good fun and we shouldn;t put off the newbie from raising questions and should wisely listen to those with all the play experiences to feedback. Althoug of coruse a nice rant is always a good lauch for all of us

As for "fanatics" vs "Romans" discussion it is very speculative and simply depends on what you think will happen. Is a Samurai a fanatic and were they easy to kill? We could debate for a lifetime. What may well be true is that per minute at the beginning "fanatics" get and take more hits BUT we ar not modelling minutes we are modelling outcomes and phases of battle. Personally I would back the trained quality Roman to do more damage and take less than most so called "fanatics" overall, but not necessarily at the beginning. Hence most fanatics will tend to be match for them in IMPACT but often suffer gradually as it wears on into MELEE. We felt overall the balance was the right mic of both realism and game play.

Of course if you believe Fanatics would do better, make more hits and suffer more damage with idential POAs and Armour and Grading you have a different premis that's all. Not one I personally agree with as a desinger from either a historical or game design point of view, that's all.

We can all have different views on what should happen - of course the rules are bound to be calibrated carefully to represent what we think would happen.

However, for me the amazement is that so much subtlety is represented in the current rule set with, essentially, few enough tables to fit on a single side of A4, that are clear to read, easy to understand, and, in combat amount to rolling a set of dice to attack, followed by three more dice rolled by the loser to determine the effects.

The simplicity of the combat resolution mechanism hides a great deal of complexity, with the interaction of the modifiers to the result behaving in subtle ways that really I've only touched on in this post. I think the concerns raised in the original post are valid concerns, but are already covered, both by the existing subtle complexities not immediately apparent, and by the desire to keep the system simple to resolve in game play.

[SirGarnet]

Simon, do you recall where the full post you quoted from is located?

Thanks,

Mike

[plewis66]

Page two of this thread, by me.

Please don't assume that because Simon quoted a part of my post that he endorses the rest of it!

[SirGarnet]

It was a good post.

I'm looking for a quotable paragraph or multiple sentences that succintly explain what you mentioned in the quote and Simon in the first paragraphs, but in a way that distinguishes how it works in FoG in particular vs. other dice-based wargames. FoG has a large number of simple mechanisms without a lot of chrome modifiers, but these interact and compound to create a complex tactical texture.

Most wargames use dice, often lots of dice, and lots of modifiers to boot, but in some cases the results can still be pretty predictable, even binary, making the complex superstructure just superfluous chrome, and tactical choices partly illusory. The weight of rules, factors, attributes and modifiers seems to have more depth at first but with more play it can become apparent that such depth includes sinkholes where you don't want to go - the more it favors min/maxing, the less rewarding for those seeking texture rather than just surefire wins.

As a result of FoG's streamlined mechanisms it seems to be the new players and casual reviewers who seem to find it a simple or simplistic collection of primarily familiar devices. The individual mechanisms mean FoG is very accessible to new players shown the game. Similar mechanisms could have been combined to make a bad game. Instead, the way they are integrated and sequenced make a robust and effective game, which becomes more apparent with play. Those who play more discover more depth and subtleties and it is encouraging that they continue to do so even after years of play.

I'm trying to find a good way of expressing the above that is generally understandable to cut and paste for the design principles thread.

Mike

[shall]

I wrote a desing principles piece on this at some point. It expalined how the ideal game desings combine simple things to create subtle and varied results. And also how an ideal desing keeps excitement levels up throughout play. And a few other things.

I can try and dig it out if you like

Si

[SirGarnet]

That would be most kind. Sounds very interesting.

[azrael86]

One of the features of FOG is that the subtelty of the system is much less obvious than it first appears both in its realism and game mechanics. The following post exctract basically sums up the gam design objective perfectly. The whole idea is that by having a string of simple things corss-linked correctly you get 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 = 10000s of outcomes and loads of subtlety.

To me most of the arguments above are entirely understandable things to raise inthe early days until you have really understood what is under the bonnet despite its apparent simplicity. All the above is is new people arguing with people with 2-3 years of play experience. All good fun and we shouldn;t put off the newbie from raising questions and should wisely listen to those with all the play experiences to feedback. Althoug of coruse a nice rant is always a good lauch for all of us

As for "fanatics" vs "Romans" discussion it is very speculative and simply depends on what you think will happen. Is a Samurai a fanatic and were they easy to kill? We could debate for a lifetime. What may well be true is that per minute at the beginning "fanatics" get and take more hits BUT we ar not modelling minutes we are modelling outcomes and phases of battle. Personally I would back the trained quality Roman to do more damage and take less than most so called "fanatics" overall, but not necessarily at the beginning. Hence most fanatics will tend to be match for them in IMPACT but often suffer gradually as it wears on into MELEE. We felt overall the balance was the right mic of both realism and game play.

Of course if you believe Fanatics would do better, make more hits and suffer more damage with idential POAs and Armour and Grading you have a different premis that's all. Not one I personally agree with as a desinger from either a historical or game design point of view, that's all.

We can all have different views on what should happen - of course the rules are bound to be calibrated carefully to represent what we think would happen.

At last we are getting some discussion on the point, as opposed to the rather feverish defensiveness of earlier posts! The points at stake are, as have been summarised earlier:

why do drilled and undrilled troops of the same grade display the same characteristics (in effect ferocity - the get more hits)
why does being a 'devoted follower' help you to do parade drill?

To consider the drilled perspective for a moment, surely the longer an essentially even combat continues the more likely it is that the trained soldiers will prevail, certainly if they do not become disrupted?

[philqw78]

To consider the drilled perspective for a moment, surely the longer an essentially even combat continues the more likely it is that the trained soldiers will prevail, certainly if they do not become disrupted?

Many, many 'Drilled/Trained' armies have been to Afghanistan. So far the 'Undrilled/Irregular' locals have always come out on top. And it has not been a short combat.

Just because someone can march up and down the square, is 'Drilled', it does not make them an effective combatant.

[rbodleyscott]

why do drilled and undrilled troops of the same grade display the same characteristics (in effect ferocity)?

Why shouldn't they? Drill means drill, not weapons training or ferocity.

Why does being a 'devoted follower' help you to do parade drill?

It has already been pointed out that apart from skirmishers and cavalry, Poor Drilled troops manoeuvre far better than Superior Undrilled.

Most Undrilled Superior troops are warrior elites. It is reasonable to expect them to be more practiced and hence capable in every regard than their Undrilled Average followers.

You may disagree, in which case we must agree to disagree.

[plewis66]

As I was writing this, Richard said pretty much the same thing with a lot less waffle, but I can't bring myself to delete this having spent nearly half an hour waffling...


I think there's still some confusion and ambiguity about 'trained soldiers'.

Soldiers can be trained to march in squares, and they can be trained to fight.

Being able to march well does not necessarily make you any better or braver a fighter.
Being able to fight well does not necessarily make you much better at maneuvering.

So, there is Poor, Average, Superior and Elite that (largely) represents how 'hard' you are, and Drilled and Undrilled which represents how nippy you are.

Being Superior or Elite makes a bit more likely that you are able to follow orders. This is represented by allowing rerolls on CMTs.

Being Drilled allows you (and I think this is what Hammy has being saying all along) to carry out a whole bunch of manoevres, in a whole bunch of situations, that Undrilled troops - no matter how handy they are in a fight - can't even contemplate. This is in addition to requiring a seven rather than 8 on the CMT. So, Superior Undrilled need 8's on CMT, but reroll 1's. Average Drilled, don't get a reroll, but they only need 7 on CMT, and, there are a whole bunch of manoevres they can do without a roll that Undrilled troops need to CMT for, and there are more manoevres that Drilled CMT for, but that Undrilled cannot ever, do, ever, even if they are Elite.

So (IMHO) it's not really precise enough to say: ' the longer an essentially even combat continues the more likely it is that the trained soldiers will prevail'. The statement is certainly true if by 'trained', you mean 'trained to fight' - i.e. Superior or Elite. In this case, they will prevail, because they are better at fighting. But it's far from clear that soldiers trained to drill (Drilled vs Undrilled) will be better in a scrap, just because it goes on longer.

To get my own head clear again, I think this is the situation.

Being a trained soldier has two possible (but not exclusive) interpretations.

Being trained to fight (Quality - Poor, Average, Superior, Elite).
Being trained to maneuver (Training - Undrilled, Drilled).

So:

Poor Undrilled - crap at everything
Poor Drilled - crap fighter (reroll 6's), likely to break early (25% loss?), but can manoeuvre well (you only need 7 on CMT)
- you can even do things that ANY undrilled troops cannot even attempt (you use the 'Drilled' column);
- however, you're still pretty crap, so must reroll 6's on your CMT's (iirc?)
Average Undrilled - A better fighter, a bit more likely to be handy in a fight (no rerolling 6's)
- but you need 8's on CMTs, and can't even attempt some things
Average Drilled - Fight like above, but you manoeuvre better. Not only do you only need 7's, but you can attempt tricky manoeuvres.
Superior Undrilled - A proper good scrapper.
- You're not only dangerous (reroll 1's), but you are less likely to run away (you break on a higher percrentage
- can't remember what )
- You are more likely to be able to follow a simple manoeuvre order (reroll 1's)
- but you still can't run about like someone trained to manoeuvre
Suprior Drilled - A proper good scrapper who knows how to dress a rank.
- you fight like above, and you also know how to perfrom complex manoeuvres
- You are also more likely to be able to follow a simple or even complex order (reroll 1's on CMT)
Elite Undrilled - You are a seriously hard b*****d.
- You are going to hit people hard (reroll 1's & 2's).
- You are going to be even less likely to run away
- You are even more likely to understand an order to do simple manoeuvres (reroll 1' & 2's)
- You still don't know how to perform complex manoeuvres
Elite Drilled - You are a seriously mobile hard b*****d
- You fight like above, but you also know how to move about the battle field in complex ways
- Not only do you know how to manoevre, but you are more likely to understand simple or even complex orders
- you reroll 1's & 2's on CMTs

[grahambriggs]

To consider the drilled perspective for a moment, surely the longer an essentially even combat continues the more likely it is that the trained soldiers will prevail, certainly if they do not become disrupted?

Don't think so. Unless, that is, the drill was specific to fighting tooth and nail for longer than the enemy. Some troops had this of course - Roman legionaries could be an example. But in this set of rules, drilled seems to mainly relate to movement drill, which combat drill could be part of "skilled swordsmen" or other capabilities. There are many troops in the lists who had a spear or sword but don't get those capabilities as they didn't have the attitude/practice to use it.

[azrael86]

To consider the drilled perspective for a moment, surely the longer an essentially even combat continues the more likely it is that the trained soldiers will prevail, certainly if they do not become disrupted?

Many, many 'Drilled/Trained' armies have been to Afghanistan. So far the 'Undrilled/Irregular' locals have always come out on top. And it has not been a short combat.

Just because someone can march up and down the square, is 'Drilled', it does not make them an effective combatant.

On the contrary, combats (battles) in Afghanistan are quite short. It's the wars that go on and on...

[azrael86]

why do drilled and undrilled troops of the same grade display the same characteristics (in effect ferocity)?

Why shouldn't they? Drill means drill, not weapons training or ferocity.


You may disagree, in which case we must agree to disagree.

So you are saying that it is a simple interpretation chosen for ease of play at the expense of variety?

[ars_belli]

Comments deleted by author.

[azrael86]

As I was writing this, Richard said pretty much the same thing with a lot less waffle, but I can't bring myself to delete this having spent nearly half an hour waffling...

and why not..

I think there's still some confusion and ambiguity about 'trained soldiers'.

Agreed. Semi-drilled anyone?

Soldiers can be trained to march in squares, and they can be trained to fight.
Being able to march well does not necessarily make you any better or braver a fighter.
Being able to fight well does not necessarily make you much better at maneuvering.

Though presumably spending 3 hours a day practicing will make you a better shot with the missile weapon of your choice?

So, there is Poor, Average, Superior and Elite that (largely) represents how 'hard' you are, and Drilled and Undrilled which represents how nippy you are.

Being Superior or Elite makes a bit more likely that you are able to follow orders. This is represented by allowing rerolls on CMTs.

Interesting this one - in fact you could make the case that undrilled superior knights are LESS likely to follow orders (ask Philip IV)!

Being Drilled allows you (and I think this is what Hammy has being saying all along) to carry out a whole bunch of manoevres, in a whole bunch of situations, that Undrilled troops - no matter how handy they are in a fight - can't even contemplate. This is in addition to requiring a seven rather than 8 on the CMT. So, Superior Undrilled need 8's on CMT, but reroll 1's. Average Drilled, don't get a reroll, but they only need 7 on CMT, and, there are a whole bunch of manoevres they can do without a roll that Undrilled troops need to CMT for, and there are more manoevres that Drilled CMT for, but that Undrilled cannot ever, do, ever, even if they are Elite.

So (IMHO) it's not really precise enough to say: ' the longer an essentially even combat continues the more likely it is that the trained soldiers will prevail'. The statement is certainly true if by 'trained', you mean 'trained to fight' - i.e. Superior or Elite. In this case, they will prevail, because they are better at fighting. But it's far from clear that soldiers trained to drill (Drilled vs Undrilled) will be better in a scrap, just because it goes on longer.

As I understand it, the qualities that lead us to classify undrilled troops as superior are not always the same as those for drilled troops. And all I was asking is whether any thought had been given to this, in terms of the consistency of their performance (which as written, makes them identical in combat).