Slitherine

i play classical indian

the army is so bad
why ?
elephant too fragile
bw useless
i remember an account of the battle between porus and alexander : very bloody for the macedonians...
it's not possible with fog rule
no chance for the indians

and what about the hussite wagon...

footslogger wrote:Something that may bear more thought about the rules is that all BG are equal in value from an AP point of view. You can kill some armies or get a winning draw without touching any of the core troops. I doubt a legion is terribly bothered if all the hired auxiliaries run away for example. I'm not sure how to do things differently because in some armies it's not as clear when there are "core" troops and non-core troops (such as WotR armies) and other armies where skirmishers really are the army.

You could simply zero-rate skirmish troops for attrition points. Only the camp and real-combat troops count. In the extreme case of a pure skirmisher army, it would be necessary and sufficient to march your foot soldiers across the table to the camp to defeat them.

Eques wrote:
Historically Romans did totally pulverize much larger barbarian armies (ask Boudicca or Cassivelaunus) and similarly a lot of historical troop types were rather bizarre, problematic or worthless.

Well, they said they did, though you might want some salt with that! Inevitably most Roman history is pretty one-sided, and when there is much evidence from the other side (Pyrrus, Carthage, Macedonia, Seleucids, Parthia) they tended to struggle - with anything approaching equal resources you'd fancy either Hannibal or Pyrrhus might have finished the legions for good.

marco wrote:i play classical indian

the army is so bad
why ?
elephant too fragile
bw useless
i remember an account of the battle between porus and alexander : very bloody for the macedonians...
it's not possible with fog rule
no chance for the indians

and what about the hussite wagon...

Certainly the fearsome beast that was classical indian of old is gone, but I'm not sure that it has no chance against macedonians. Reread the account and it's clear that the elephants were a big problem. Of course fog has removed the longstanding edge that made Indian elephants better (now all elephants are equal, even African ones, which is certainly an issue if you have elephant v elephant action).

Massed indian Bw should be pretty good at protecting the flanks of the elephants, and providing rear support. The real question is whether to allow Indian armies larger units of elephants, or whether Indian elephants should be graded differently (I would suggest that African elephants should be poor, at least when facing Asian elephants).

Though it'd be nice to bring back the maiden guard.

azrael86 wrote:

Eques wrote:
Historically Romans did totally pulverize much larger barbarian armies (ask Boudicca or Cassivelaunus) and similarly a lot of historical troop types were rather bizarre, problematic or worthless.

Well, they said they did, though you might want some salt with that! Inevitably most Roman history is pretty one-sided, and when there is much evidence from the other side (Pyrrus, Carthage, Macedonia, Seleucids, Parthia) they tended to struggle - with anything approaching equal resources you'd fancy either Hannibal or Pyrrhus might have finished the legions for good.

The original comment was about "barbarian" armies not the above civilisations, anyway I wouldn't say ancient historians were totally one sided. They weren't agents of state propaganda (or in a few cases they were but only for the particluar Emperor of the day) and quite often paid tribute to the bravery or cunning of Rome's rivals.

A modern historian writing about the first or second world wars wouldn't be expected to play down German successes or Allied screw-ups and an ancient historian wasn't much different.

Eques wrote:

azrael86 wrote:

Eques wrote:
Historically Romans did totally pulverize much larger barbarian armies (ask Boudicca or Cassivelaunus) and similarly a lot of historical troop types were rather bizarre, problematic or worthless.

Well, they said they did, though you might want some salt with that! Inevitably most Roman history is pretty one-sided, and when there is much evidence from the other side (Pyrrus, Carthage, Macedonia, Seleucids, Parthia) they tended to struggle - with anything approaching equal resources you'd fancy either Hannibal or Pyrrhus might have finished the legions for good.

The original comment was about "barbarian" armies not the above civilisations, anyway I wouldn't say ancient historians were totally one sided. They weren't agents of state propaganda (or in a few cases they were but only for the particluar Emperor of the day) and quite often paid tribute to the bravery or cunning of Rome's rivals.

A modern historian writing about the first or second world wars wouldn't be expected to play down German successes or Allied screw-ups and an ancient historian wasn't much different.

Except an ancient historian was much more likely to get executed for criticising the state...

Eques wrote:
The original comment was about "barbarian" armies not the above civilisations, anyway I wouldn't say ancient historians were totally one sided. They weren't agents of state propaganda (or in a few cases they were but only for the particluar Emperor of the day) and quite often paid tribute to the bravery or cunning of Rome's rivals.

A modern historian writing about the first or second world wars wouldn't be expected to play down German successes or Allied screw-ups and an ancient historian wasn't much different.

Well, as you said, ask Boudicca, but that is impossible, so to take Roman numbers as gospel is rather naive. Tacitus claims 80000 as Boudicca's army, which is ten times the size of Harold's army at Hastings. In fact, if true, Watling street is the biggest battle ever fought in Britain (Towton was about 80000 -counting both sides).

Caesar of course tended to include the entire population, hence his ludicrous figure of 360000 Helvetii, 90000 of whom were warriors. Apparently 30000 Romans were able to not only beat them, but inflict around 60% casualties to boot.

Again, a better comparison than WW1 or 2 would be something like the Afghan Wars, or the American Indian wars - where cover ups and outright lies were widespread, and not really addressed until the mid 20th century.

dave_r wrote:

Except an ancient historian was much more likely to get executed for criticising the state...

For criticizing the current Emperor or his family, yes, but not for saying that Hannibal was a good leader or Spartacus was a good general 150 years after the fact.

my thoughts on improving the game are covered elsewhere, but namely.... too slow, LH too effective, benny hill phase is a joke, swarms are fun killers......

But my major concern is that this becomes a money spinning cycle a la GW with 'new' rules followed by 'new' army lists..... buy the rules, then buy an army list book a month till the full set is out, then hey ho, its time for a new set of 'improvements' in a new rulebook....smartly followed by another bank of army lists..... its like a stealth tax on my wargaming.....


How do I think this wave of improvement should be handled ...... errata released as a free pdf from this forum. useless without already having the rules or lists, but not a new rulebook.

cheers

jon

chubooga wrote: But my major concern is that this becomes a money spinning cycle a la GW with 'new' rules followed by 'new' army lists..... buy the rules, then buy an army list book a month till the full set is out, then hey ho, its time for a new set of 'improvements' in a new rulebook....smartly followed by another bank of army lists..... its like a stealth tax on my wargaming.....

I'll second this don't want a GW idea sliping in here.

expendablecinc wrote:Camps should be more valuable to incentivise their protection

I dont think thier value shoudl be based on generals or simply increased in value across the board. they shoudl have an impact on the army as a whole regardless of size (currently the value of a camp decreases in value inversely proportional to the number of BGs.

Proposal:

A camp is equal to the number of BGs in the army / 4 (rounded up) (not counting scythed chariots)
8 BG camp value = 2 AP
9-12 BG = 3 AP
13-16 BG = 4 AP
17+ BG = 5 AP

Ditch the compulsory supply camp. Plenty of battles where it never featured e.g. Antioch 1098, Crusaders v Turks (any Crusader supplies would still have been in Antioch) or 1066, Norse v Anglo-Danes (Gate Fulford & Stamford Bridge - back with the boats), Mongols – not likely to have been anywhere near the battlefield.

Scrap the difference between poor and average LF. They were all crap. I see armies where players max out on poor LF Jav to increase the army break point. That seems perverse to me.

Make terrain choice a simple roll of the die. It is already slanted towards an open battlefield; why give armies with more cavalry/light horse a better chance than an army with more foot to get favourable terrain?

Correct the singular to ‘die’, not ‘dice’.

Maybe the point system for the units seems unbalanced betwween Drilled and undrilled troops.
There is no incentive to make warbands bigger.
I found the system used in WGR 7th edition not bad.

Another thing is the manoeuvrability of regular pike units, way to easy to turn in any direction.

Same for cavalry, in reality it is virtualy impossible for horse unit to turn 90° on the spot. It should only be done by doing a 90° wheel.

david53 wrote:

chubooga wrote: But my major concern is that this becomes a money spinning cycle a la GW with 'new' rules followed by 'new' army lists..... buy the rules, then buy an army list book a month till the full set is out, then hey ho, its time for a new set of 'improvements' in a new rulebook....smartly followed by another bank of army lists..... its like a stealth tax on my wargaming.....

I'll second this don't want a GW idea sliping in here.

Totatly agree !
same as FOW or GW

Fog works well and yes it might be good to reprint but also to have the erratas/changes available online at no cost.

Jilu wrote:There is no incentive to make warbands bigger.
I found the system used in WGR 7th edition not bad.

I've been thinking something similar, but had a different solution.

Units almost always break in FoG because of failing a series of cohesion tests in combat, and the only advantage of being a bigger unit is that the "1 hit per 3 bases" -1 factor sometimes doesn't apply*. This doesn't really give a big unit that much more resilience than a small one, and when set against the advantages in manoeuvrability and in increased unit count/break point means big units are generally a poor choice.

If "big units" were able to be rallied in the turn they drop cohesion that would give a real, material benefit to size and allow them to slug it out with enemies for longer.

And/or, if the death test modifier for winning was reduced to -1 it would also help bigger units at the expense of smaller ones.

If the threshold for "bigger" was set at more than 8 bases for infantry and more than 4 for cavalry it might also encourage 6-base Cv units to appear.

If all infantry were allowed to have odd numbers of bases once they got beyond 8, it could also allow spear units to have a "spare" base to infill gaps in an 4-4-1 formation so they didn't collapse quite so catastrophically once they lose their first base.

* yes, I know the shooting one too, but that's less relevant.

madaxeman wrote:

Jilu wrote:There is no incentive to make warbands bigger.
I found the system used in WGR 7th edition not bad.

I've been thinking something similar, but had a different solution.

Units almost always break in FoG because of failing a series of cohesion tests in combat, and the only advantage of being a bigger unit is that the "1 hit per 3 bases" -1 factor sometimes doesn't apply*. This doesn't really give a big unit that much more resilience than a small one, and when set against the advantages in manoeuvrability and in increased unit count/break point means big units are generally a poor choice.

What if large units got built-in rear support?

We would have to work the wording but the basic idea is that if you have a full "extra" rank of troops you count as having rear support (and perhaps allow odd numbers of bases as well).

So a unit of 6 spearmen deployed three wide fights as it is now. A unit of 9 spearmen deployed three wide counts as having rear support.

If you wanted to be extreme what if we let rear support count more than once? (perhaps to a maximum of +2 or +3)? So if you have 12 spearmen deployed 3 wide you always test at +2. If you then had another 6 base BG providing rear support as it does now you would test at +3.

madaxeman wrote:

Jilu wrote:There is no incentive to make warbands bigger.
I found the system used in WGR 7th edition not bad.

I've been thinking something similar, but had a different solution.

Units almost always break in FoG because of failing a series of cohesion tests in combat, and the only advantage of being a bigger unit is that the "1 hit per 3 bases" -1 factor sometimes doesn't apply*. This doesn't really give a big unit that much more resilience than a small one, and when set against the advantages in manoeuvrability and in increased unit count/break point means big units are generally a poor choice.

If "big units" were able to be rallied in the turn they drop cohesion that would give a real, material benefit to size and allow them to slug it out with enemies for longer.

And/or, if the death test modifier for winning was reduced to -1 it would also help bigger units at the expense of smaller ones.

If the threshold for "bigger" was set at more than 8 bases for infantry and more than 4 for cavalry it might also encourage 6-base Cv units to appear.

If all infantry were allowed to have odd numbers of bases once they got beyond 8, it could also allow spear units to have a "spare" base to infill gaps in an 4-4-1 formation so they didn't collapse quite so catastrophically once they lose their first base.

* yes, I know the shooting one too, but that's less relevant.

Big units also do not face the 25% casualty CT modifier as quickly. At least with respect to 6-stand units vs. 4-stand units.

ethan wrote:

madaxeman wrote:

Jilu wrote:There is no incentive to make warbands bigger.
I found the system used in WGR 7th edition not bad.

I've been thinking something similar, but had a different solution.

Units almost always break in FoG because of failing a series of cohesion tests in combat, and the only advantage of being a bigger unit is that the "1 hit per 3 bases" -1 factor sometimes doesn't apply*. This doesn't really give a big unit that much more resilience than a small one, and when set against the advantages in manoeuvrability and in increased unit count/break point means big units are generally a poor choice.

What if large units got built-in rear support?

We would have to work the wording but the basic idea is that if you have a full "extra" rank of troops you count as having rear support (and perhaps allow odd numbers of bases as well).

So a unit of 6 spearmen deployed three wide fights as it is now. A unit of 9 spearmen deployed three wide counts as having rear support.

If you wanted to be extreme what if we let rear support count more than once? (perhaps to a maximum of +2 or +3)? So if you have 12 spearmen deployed 3 wide you always test at +2. If you then had another 6 base BG providing rear support as it does now you would test at +3.

Add an IC in the neighborhood and you are +5 vs. shooters. That makes for quite a bulldozer.

spikemesq wrote: Big units also do not face the 25% casualty CT modifier as quickly. At least with respect to 6-stand units vs. 4-stand units.

madaxeman wrote: Units almost always break in FoG because of failing a series of cohesion tests in combat, and the only advantage of being a bigger unit is that the "1 hit per 3 bases" -1 factor sometimes doesn't apply

OK - only real advantage [/b]

marco wrote:i play classical indian
the army is so bad
elephant too fragile
bw useless
no chance for the indians
and what about the hussite wagon...

I think the Hussite wagons work well. You really don't want your knights to charge them.

The Classical Indian comes apart is if its opponent manuvers. The Macedonians are vulenerable to terrain.

But then there is teh quesiton historically was it an even up fight in numbers?
Also I think it is easierr to figure out how to play the Macedonians than the Indians. The Indians have several good counters to the macedonian mounted force.

GordonJ wrote:5 Weapons. "Skilled sword" causes problems in equal-points games because so many Roman foot opponents end up at a double minus in melee (and even Dacian falxmen fight at a -1). Why not treat skilled sword (I think the category itself has merit) the way FoG 1 treats a mounted light spear: it only applies if the combat would otherwise be evens? Armoured legionaries fighting protected swordsmen would now be +1, not +2; protected legionaries would also be +1.

And we could extend this approach to melees between skilled swordsmen and heavy-weapon armed foot, although I acknowledge the objection that the historic Roman response the to the falx was to increase the legionaries' armour rather than spend more hours at sword practice. Legionaries would still be +1 in melee against falx wielders.

I note that up-armouring is of no benefit at all versus heavy weapons in the game. Perhaps an up-armoured legionary is represented in game effect by "skilled swordsman".

According to Roman history, legionaries were able to cut through infinite numbers of barbarian swordsmen with no casualties, so IMO the skilled swordsmen POA is working correctly. Also it is a waste of points vs anything other than foot swordsman and HW. Probably all that is needed is a note in Roman army lists that skilled sword makes equal points games imbalanced with historical barbarian opponents.