Slitherine

Hi All

The provisional details look like just what my gaming group have been looking for for quite a while. A chance to kick start this period again at Club too.

As we game in 10mm, 15mm, 20mm and 28mm is the intention to cover this range of scales.

Also will the basing be compatible with other major sets for this period?

Looking good so far.

Thanks Kabrank. One of the main aims of the rules was to kick start the ancient and medieval period, which has been floundering in recent years.

Our current plan is to make scale irrelevant, so movement distances do not change in different scales. The idea was to allow people with 25mm armies to get as interesting a game as players with 15mm armies, and not reduce it to a heavy foot slog. Obviously people will be able to make adjustments if they choose, but this will be the default rule.

Basing wise we are planning to stick to the standard 40mm element width used in rules such as DBM, so that people can use existing armies without rebasing. We have found a couple of situations where specific troop types might work better on slighter deeper/narrower bases but we're still debating whether this is more important, or letting people use their existing armies is.

A quick disclaimer - as the rules are still in development all of this is subject to change!

When you say 40mm DBM size bases is this just for the 15mm scale or is it for all scales - for example you are not going to get the DBM 25mm guys to rebase their armies down to 40mm frontages.

As I'm sure you are aware ANY rebasing is a barrier to adoption of rules - it was seen as a mistake for Vis Bellica to use a "non standard" base for example - so I would think this should be avoided at all costs. If it has to be done deeper bases are just about OK as you can sort something out with sabots, but frontage changes are out IMO.

Sorry, last post was me but I forgot to log in

Nik

You shouldn't be able to post without loggin in - tell me how you did it

Base sizes are 40mm for 15mm scale, but for 25mm they will be standard DBM size. I just don't remember what that is as I never play 25mm!

The aim is to remove as many barriers to entry. We donlt want to force people to rebase if at all possible.

Just to agree with Nik. Only two major criteria for me with a new rule set.......

1. No rebasing.

2. No argument phase (meaning as far as possible rules well written to avoid ambiguity).

I would balance any increase in depth of certain troop types with the actual gain from stipulating that. While folks can and do use sabots, a lot of people put considereable work into "base artistry", and would be resistant even to that. Good luck with the rules.

JC

OK, the last post was from me, John Curran, and I did log on, but for some reason it posted me as a "guest". Software glitcherama!

JC

We totally agree. The base size issues are only being thrown up in a couple of specific situations. The vast majority of armies will definitely have no rebasing.

As for ambiguity, the design panel is extremely experienced at finding loopholes and we'll be making every attempt to avoid them. The panel includes more than one world wargaming champion, and they know the types of exploits that the rules need to prevent and how important it is to word things carefully to avoid ambiguity. We will probably miss some but we'll do our best to make sure the rules are clean and clear on day 1 and plan to do a thorough beta test program.

It would seem from the overview that The Art of War is a unit based system which will presumably give us a good use for all those elements with standards and such we used to have in 7th edition days?

Hopefully the army lists when they arrive will not require the amount of rebasing that I am currently facing if I wish to convert my Classical Indian DBM army to DBMM. At present over half the figures in that army will have to be rebased. To me that is a significant barrier as the basing on this army is a) rather nice and b) was done by someone else who's technique I have yet to duplicate.

It all sounds rather exciting really.

Looking forward to publication.

Hammy

Hi All

Thanks for your replies

I will post a few more items that my players will be interested in later

I think there may be probelms with the site login/security as despite joining at about 10:00 am [and then loging in to post the query] I was unable to login now with the user name and PW created at that point, and the site does not know my entered email address when I tried the "forgotten password" route to recovery!!

The Fun of IT!!!

kabrank
Kelvin

The only barrier to entry is the element basing so this is all very Intriguing. I'll look forward to more info as it becomes available.

anthony

Can I also suggest some statement ASAP about some of the more unusual troop types - I'm coming from DBM here.

I've already been asked at Britcon whether the Alexandrian Imperial experimental phalanx will be represented by DBM Bw(X)/(O) DBE in the Art of War rules. The player in question wants to do the army but clearly does not want it to be unusable base wise if TAoW takes off - he isn't interested in effectiveness too much, just that he could use his toys.

nikgaukroger wrote:
I've already been asked at Britcon whether the Alexandrian Imperial experimental phalanx will be represented by DBM Bw(X)/(O) DBE in the Art of War rules.

Quoting from the Designer's Notes in the back of the Phalanx rules (copyright 1971 Simulations Publications, Inc) -

"The experimental phalanx was under development at the time of Alexander the Great's death, and consisted of a thin crust of phalangites surrounding persian archers."

Is that what you're referring to, nik?

Funny, I hadn't thought about that for years, but instantly knew what you meant, and happened to have seen the Phalanx rules a few days ago while looking for something else

Phalanx, BTW, was a boardgame, not a miniatures rules set. SPI originally did a set of 5 disconnected games covering the 3000 AD to early-gunpowder period. Then in later years, they re-did all five in a single system called PRESTAGS, Pre Seventeenth Century Tactical Gaming System. That was fun, because you could pit classical Greeks against, say Vikings...always fun after a few beers

And, from what I've read so far, it looks like AOW should offer the same wide-open potential. COOL Stuff!

Hi gang,

Interesting to hear things are moving along.

Please consider making basing at 80mm an option - both to fit 28mm figs and to mass 10-15mm figs. Both look good.

Regards

David Brown

I forget - is 80mm the standard base size for 25mm DBM? If so, we are planning to deal with that scale. What base sizes are used in different scales? 10mm, 5mm, 25mm etc. Do other ancient period games vary the base sizes at those scales? The more we can cope with the better.

60mm is the standard for 25mm DBM, although some people think it should be 80mm due to current figure size.

Warmaster uses 40mm frontages apart from "shock" troops who are 20mm - WMA is usually played in 10mm.

WAB uses a 20mm frontage per figure usually.

Can you confirm the scales for each of those base sizes?

DBM
15mm - 40mm frontage
25mm - 60mm frontage

WAB
?

WMA
?

Warmaster stands are 20X40mm (except round command stands which are between 20 and 30mm across). The longer edge is the front for infantry and the smaller one for cavalry.

Warhammer army battle is not a stand game, so the size is given for individuals and you base as much as you find convenient together. Infantry 15-20mm wide, light infantry and cavalry 20-25mm wide.

The frontages you give for DBM are correct. I have known players using their WMA armies also for DBA by grouping two stands on a 40mmX40mm base (and using what would have been the base depth when needed), which is also the size for Fantasy Rules! games, and its unoffocial historical variants.

Essentially as most ancients players would know, the DBM/DBA sizes are pretty much standard. Shattered Lances uses this system as do all the recent game releases. When you have many (most established) players with 20+ armies, rebasing is just not an option and is a huge barrier.

DBMM also includes a variant for 28-30mm figures which uses the 25mm base sizes, but in recognition of the 'bloat' of figures, reduces the number of figures per base.

There would be less problems with varying base depths (extending them) as players could use sabot type bases or agree to use variants.

Standard depths are (in 15mm) 15mm for close order foot, 20mm for open order foot, 30mm for mounted, elephants artillery are 40mm and war-wagons are 80mm largely to accommodate the models.

Hope this helps

Doug M.

Any set of rules can be made base size free, so long as the conventions within it accept that forces are on matching frontages. Nevertheless, 40mm for 10 &15mm and 60mm for 25/28mm models are virtually standard.