Following the trend of everyone starting their own, here's mine.
First impressions of AOW 5.01
My first impression was : "100 pages! Do I have enough paper to print it all out?" I did have enough, but ran out of both black and colour ink. Having all the tables in intense yellow was a major contributary factor to this. I also discovered that "Word Viewer 97" crashes if I try to print pages 91, 92 or 100. I got around this by saving the screen and printing the resulting picture.
Overall impression, once I'd read the rules:
This seems familiar from pre-DBM days or other games - Define troops by a number of movement, equipment, quality factors, declaring charges, reaction tests, morale states, disorder, shooting, melee, N dice per figure needing X to hit, saving throws, command radius for generals. So a similar bottom up mechanistic approach to earlier WRG editions but with the details more abstract. "Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent"
Oh yes, and I think I??™m going to need buckets of dice in a variety of colours.
Impressions as I read through: here I'm mainly giving my reaction to bits of text as I got to them with the occasional comment added after I'd read the whole thing.
P4. Bottom: OK, I'll just skip the next 77 pages as you are telling me that the first item of interest is on p81.
P5 para 5: Reads as though concentrating my forces etc will destroy their will to fight. Natural interpretation of ambiguous "their" is the wrong one.
P 6: Add "Base" as a (the first) key concept as it is used a lot and never defined. Bounds should also be introduced as a key concept before Interbound. Bullet 9 does not actually describe what a "Death Roll" is and should probably be changed to "Casualties and autobreaks" as the death roll is a simple mechanism, not really a key concept, which is the removal of bases.
P8 change "reap" into "wreak"
p 9: CHOOSING AND DESIGNING YOUR OWN ARMY Why are you sending me to P81 now? Do I need to go there now or can I skip it? Change it to lower case and add it to the end of the previous para. Or omit the reference. The appendix didn't tell me how to choose and design my army anyway - If I were a beginner I would need an explanation of how to use point values, BG sizes etc from army lists for that. Appendix 6 is rightly an appendix and is of the same nature as "Tactical advice for beginners" (so should be next to it, or integrated into it).
p9 terrain section: How much of this will I need long term, how much is for beginners only?
p10 can I choose both compulsories? If so, what are the opponent options?
p12 Schematic phases example was good. In the table, "charging troops move" needs to be added to phase 1
p14 phase 3, seems to imply that a cohesion test for being shot is needed only if >6MU from a friendly BG.
interbound, pursuers move twice? "move routers and pursuers...move pursuers"
p15 call a "killed 4 more and 3:1" a "major victory" to distinguish it from an army break?
p17 middle para - change "than" to "then" .
As written, a group of 9 would have 4 in front, 5 behind. Elsewhere I got the impression that the rear rank could not be more than the front.
p18 Colours missing from table so I can't tell what causes disorder.
p20 A simple move is allowed if you fail the CMT. But on P17 it says "If the player has .... rolled on the CMT table ... the battlegroup's move is over". Actually this appears to prohibit making any complex moves.
Can scythed chariots halt? (this is not listed as an advance move, but it??™s not a move at all).
Definition of "Advance" differs from that given in the glossary.
p24 I found the restrictions on normal formations and expanding confusing.
p25 implies that only front rank troops can step forwards.
p28 Non-skirmish slingers can charge without testing.
Warwagons don't turn to face, but at this point you have not told me that anyone else turns to face either.
"Aligned with enemy front" needs some clarification (parallel? not offset?)
p31 "Turn without changing formation" to me this means a wheel. Needs clarification as you probably mean something analagous to the procedure for a 90 degree turn on p23.
p33 Exchanging position: two "it" with different meanings so requires effort to understand.
Text seems to imply that only the rear BG exchanges position, not the front one.
p40 Shooting in the order chosen by the shooting player. But both players are shooting, so who chooses the order?
P41 Crossbows, firearms and artillery get a disadvantage for shooting any foot? Can this be right?
P45 "In essence" makes me think this is going to be more complicated than what you are about to tell me here.
P46 para 3 is effectively a bullet list and a table presented as plain text so harder to follow than if presented as a bullet list and a table.
P48 second sentence, "when they do not have any effect at impact." Makes me worry that there are two possibilities: when they do and when they do not and only in the latter case do they start to have an effect in melee. I think I??™d delete this sentence.
I??™d also rewrite the bullet on overlaps below as it smacks of a circular definition. If I didn??™t already know the special meaning of "overlap" from DBM I think I??™d find this bullet a little obscure. Try:
"If your line is longer than your opponent??™s then one file of troops overlapping on each side may be able to join in the combat. The exact criteria allowing troops to fight as an overlap are defined in the glossary (see P94). Overlapping troops contribute their normal combat dice. Overlaps may have been created by expanding in combat (see P34) or in other ways. " (not sure if that last sentence is needed).
Do third and 4th rank pikes contribute to the POA of the first two ranks of overlaps?
P49 Impact POA table is not in the section describing impact combat (should be there).
Should charging defensive spear (acting counter to doctrine) fight on even terms with defending defensive spear ?
p50 Impact bullets not in impact section. Melee POA and bullets not in melee section. Melee bullet on P51 "rear ranks" should be moved up to 2nd bullet.
P52 support shooting in impact phase needs to be in the section on impact phase.
P57 Test to bolster or rally is missing from bullet list of tests.
p66 I need to fit 2 chariots on a 40 mm square base for a general!?
P68 Scythed Chariots - Wot, no stampeding cattle?
p72 Gengis will normally choose to fight at home then.
Would make sense to move this whole section into the main rules and put the beginners setup rules in an appendix.
P73 What do all the terrain abbreviations mean? Terrain descriptions and effects table should come first.
P77 (and elsewhere) if all chariots count protected, why not just list them as protected in the army lists instead of making a special rule?
P93 "Advance" has a different definition on the CMT
P95 allows PD other than stakes to be picked up if enemy within 6MU. Was this intentional?
Playsheet 3: Don??™t need point values on a play sheet as they are irrelevant to the play of the game. Put an aide memoire for the full setup procedure and/or the terrain effects chart here.
Lawrence Greaves
