Slitherine

Having been playing FoG fairly intensively for over a year and thoroughly enjoying it, I might add, I have, non-the-less, found several game mechanics which I am not very happy with.

One of these, of course is the ridiculous range of outcomes inherent in the combat system resulting in oft repeated instances of, for instance, superior cavalry rear charging a non-evading LF, losing heavily and being disrupted or even fragmented. That should be able to happen but it should be an absolute outlier result, not the very common occurence that it is.

However, what irks me the most is the 'Multiple attackers; single defender' syndrome. So, I elect to attack an enemy BG with one of mine. I lose, possibly as a result of the above, so attack the same enemy with another of my units. This attack also fails. I now have two BGs in, say, the front facing of the enemy, one of which is now fragmented. I am able to attack with a third BG, in a flank, but this also meets with no success.

It is now the enemy turn. He has a single BG being attacked from three directions. But he can decide which of my three BGs to attack back. Naturally, he goes for the fragmented one, succeeds and routs it, possible causing one or both of the others to disrupt. Am I alone in thinking that the situation as described just feels wrong? How can a defender simply ignore all of the other units and pitch all of his strength against just one selected BG? Surely the player, who has outnumbered his opponent at that place on the battlefield, should have an important tactical advantage?

And, to my mind, that raises another issue. FoG is an IGO-UGO system with all the inherent disadvantages that come with it. In the above example, in reality, I would have initially selected either to attack with one, two or all three of my units and, if the latter, all three would have gone in to the attack pretty much together. It is an unrealistic luxury to be able to test the water with one, then another, then another in the hope of achieving a result.

An idea would be to have no combat finalised until the attacker has committed all the units the he intends to put into the attack on that unit. He may over-commit or under commit but, once the units have been assigned only then is the 'combat button’, pressed so to speak. Then, there would be as many combat resolutions as there are units attacking but, for each unit attacking unit above one, the defender would fight at an increasing disadvantage.

So, in the example at the top, I would have had to initially commit to attack with three units (after which the defender could not be attacked again). There would still be three combat resolutions but, after the first one, the defender would fight with, say, a -1 POA then a -2 POA, against the other two. This reflects the tactical advantage inherent in the situation, I think.

Similarly, when it becomes the turn of the lone BG, it now has to attack all three surrounding units, with the same disadvantages as above and could not just select the weakest one, as we have now.

Missile fire would operate under the same rules, so the attacker would have to commit what BGs are going to fire and then the results are calculated.

Sorry, a little long winded and probably not well worded but hopefully the idea is there.

I understood, you want phases I have thought about this too and there actually is no reason why the game couldnt have been developed w a phase based resolution that actually follows the TT to the T, and it wouldnt need involve sending back turns between players either, to finish one turn.

You could have the impact phase where you declare charges, then the game checks for anarchy on non declared troops, the anarchists move to targets (under your control), then you move and resolve other impact battles, next comes the manuver phase , you move all your remaining eligible troops, then missle phase where you declare all your targets (as you illustrate above) then resolve, next all troops in contact resolve melees and finaly you end turn and ( i guess their would not really be a joint action phase but troops have a chance to rally then etc) and then its your opponents turn.
I guess the only problem is that in the TT both players resolve missle combat at the same time so the above might give the active player too much 'combat control" in their hands for too long ... but im sure something could be figured out...

Would certainly change the nature of the game and i think would make battles flow a little more realistically than a normal turn based apraoch.

Phases would be great but I have a feeling that the FoG system, for the PC, is very much oriented towards very fast playing games, with the emphasis on both fast and game. Unfortunately this has conspired to work against realism in the way that the TT seems to have captured it. A great shame and missed opportunity IMHO. As it stands, it is an OK game with a fantastic multiplayer option but it could have been (may still be?) a fantastic game as well.

I too have often thought about this. I too see problems with the ability to resolve combat in whatever sequence favours you best. This is particularly evident in Pike or Spear based armies, whereby it is a real advantage if you can get one unit to rout and then disrupt others, so you increase the chances of more routs, etc.

What the battle is trying to simulate is a period of time in a battle, e.g. 5 minutes. There is a need to see what each unit in the army has done in that period and then adjust the units based on losses. The reality would be that all combat takes place more-or-less at the same time, whereas the game has it happening sequentially.

What is needed to best simulate reality is a movement and combat system similar to the board game 'Diplomacy'. In this game all moves and attacks are proposed by each player and then the movement and combat is resolved based on the nett effect of the proposals. Using this approach all movements would be proposed and all attacks would be proposed. The normal FoG resoloution would then take place using support, POAs, etc. and movement would only happen into an open but contested hex (i.e. 2 opposing units tried to move into an open hex) if a unit won the combat.

Just my thoughts, I realise it is unlikely to happen because the game is where it is and isn't likely to change that much

I too wish they had kept the phases, but don't count on them being included in the future. In fairness though, they did include the support mechanic which sort of helps with outnumbered combat and remember that the dice are only rolled once per combat type per turn.

Deeter