Initial thoughts on FoG from a new Beta tester

[jlopez]

Here are my first thoughts after reading the rules. All very theoretical and some gut feeling since I won't be playing a game until the Spanish competition next month.

Overall, I think its a very workable, playable set of rules. However I feel it has sacrificed too much historical accuracy for the sake of playability.

Here are some concerns I have:

1. Generals don't seem to have commands but can generally breeze about the battlefield to bolster or join who they wish (except allies). If I'm reading this right, whatever happened to the concept of the centre, right flank, left flank and optionally reserve command?

2. As with DBM there is no attempt whatsoever to have units obey an overall pre-set plan. Within the limits of manoeuverability, you can do what you want and when you want. Granted. It is a lot more difficult to zip around the table top than it was in DBM but it is still possible to correct significant errors made at set-up during the game.

3. Why bother fighting at all? Given that this set of rules is clearly intended for competitions I would have hoped some effort would have been made to make life difficult for the "I can't win this game so let's just play for a draw" brigade.

4. Gut feeling here but I get the impression that deploying in historical formations will not bring the success it should. Example: Romans vs hairy barbarians. Traditional old barbarians with infantry in the middle and cavalry extending out on both flanks. Innovative Romans with light infantry facing the bulk of the barbarian infantry, legionnaries on either side and mounted further out on the flanks. Am I right in thinking the barbarian foot won't get to do much and fight a losing battle on the flanks?

As you can see my criticism is aimed mainly at the overall feel of the game. I think the movement, morale and combat mechanism will work just fine and give a historical flavour to localised fighting. However I have my doubts as to whether at the end of the 3.5 hours I will feel I've played something resembling a historical battle.

Julian

[thefrenchjester]

Hi Julian ,

1. Generals don't seem to have commands but can generally breeze about the battlefield to bolster or join who they wish (except allies). If I'm reading this right, whatever happened to the concept of the centre, right flank, left flank and optionally reserve command?

the best use for generals is conjonction with a plan ( good use of terrain , good selection of deployement and good timing in choosing the order of march of your army )you will need to have a vanguard , center , left and right strong flanks depending where you want to push forward and overall a good reserve to exploit an advantage ( or like my use of reesrves to stop a breakthrough in my lines

3. Why bother fighting at all? Given that this set of rules is clearly intended for competitions I would have hoped some effort would have been made to make life difficult for the "I can't win this game so let's just play for a draw" brigade

I won one of the two above games in deploying the triple acies of the mid republican roman against the carthaginians and the other in playing Alexander 's macedonian army against skythians using granicus deployement so for me FOG is good
all the games I played until now were fun and interesting until the last minute with no headache after the games

. Gut feeling here but I get the impression that deploying in historical formations will not bring the success it should. Example: Romans vs hairy barbarians. Traditional old barbarians with infantry in the middle and cavalry extending out on both flanks. Innovative Romans with light infantry facing the bulk of the barbarian infantry, legionnaries on either side and mounted further out on the flanks. Am I right in thinking the barbarian foot won't get to do much and fight a losing battle on the flanks?

never made a draw since the beginning of testing ( ok I only won 2 games and lost only something like 20 games , no pain no gain

try Field of Glory one time and you will be addict as we are

thefrenchjester " in the warm wet circus"

[shall]

Don't be fooled into thinking the lack of physical restrictions means command isn't evident on the table.

Historically battles were actually organised in 10-15 major mega-units under generals - these were rigid and the generals never seem to leave their posts.

Above that one has 2-3 senior commander and a c-in-c. These are given command of flanks, centres and reserves. The vast majority of the time they stick to exactly that - and do in FOG, However, they were not rigidly fixed to this. There were times when senior commanders moved areas to respond to a crisis elsewhere or left a section under local command to take charge of somethign specific. There were also different styles of commander - those who hovered behind the lines and those who heroicly led from the front. It is also not realistic that a C-in-C did not influience the troops on a wing if he chose to go over there.

FOG reflects all the above by making it essential to put generals onto major command areas but allowing them some flexibility in a crisis or if there is an opportunity. 80%+ of the time they are simply to busy commanding their wing to do anything else. So play it an you will find:

• The 10-15 generals who commanded the big blocks are 100% rigid to their commands and are not even represented physically
  
  The 3-4 senior commanders are in practice 80%+ limited to looking after thier allcoated wing/centre/reserve but have the flex to take a chance and go to either side in a crisis

The net effect of this seems to give an excellent representation of real battles and real behaviour of commanders - all the options therein without forcing an over-rigid structure onto it. We hope therefor to have found an elegant solution that relfects history far better than has been managed before by taking the rather radical step of removing rather than enforcing black and white restrictions.

As for pre-planning we have taken a similar view to avoid masses of writing before a battle. In FOG your pre-plan is represented largely by your deployment and choice of where the generals go. This is also true in real like - you don't write it down other thasn for your generals and most battles in this era were realticely compact and didn't follow a rigid plan. However get this wrong and you will have a hard time in reality and you will in FOG too.

So in essence FOG has mechanisms in built that reward historical and good play - a good initial plan, allocaiton of general to the right tasks, knwoing when to deviate from this plan and timing it well........but without applying hard-wired restrictions to do so. This is what gives it the speed and fun factor to go with the historical accuracy.

After 100 games at Britcon last week histoical feel seems to be one of the big +s of the rules.

Regards

Si

[jlopez]

Another thing I forgot to mention:

Shouldn't mounted units standing to receive a charge from other mounted and shooting at them on the way in get a negative POA at the impact phase to reflect the lack of momentum?

I realise the shooters get a negative POA in the shooting phase but it doesn't very fair on the chargers who have got all worked up charging, gaining momentum and all that and don't actually seem to derive any benefit from it in the impact phase. At the moment it's a no-brainer, you take a pot shot and that's it. If given the alternative of shooting normally (ie no negative POA for shooting during impact) + negative POA on impact OR countercharge without shooting but no negative modifier you have a slightly more difficult decision.

Just an idea.

Julian

[shall]

The POAs are ste up to include natural repsonses so there is no need to think about them at the micro level.

You will see some foot troops lose their normal POA if charging shock mounted for instance.

Si

[hazelbark]

1. Generals don't seem to have commands but can generally breeze about the battlefield to bolster or join who they wish (except allies). If I'm reading this right, whatever happened to the concept of the centre, right flank, left flank and optionally reserve command?

I was worried about this but found in practice it isn't an issue. About the only generals I have been able to send to other sectors of the battlefield are ones essentially abandoning their sector as lost. And I never got to where I wanted to be. So i think this point is likley our frame of reference changing from other rule sets. I do think historically they were more restricted, but they are such a big part of the mechanism and frankly need to do more then that can, I don't see further restrictions as especially helpful.

I think there is an ally general restriction of stome kind.

[rbodleyscott]

Shouldn't mounted units standing to receive a charge from other mounted and shooting at them on the way in get a negative POA at the impact phase to reflect the lack of momentum?

Only foot troops can shoot at enemy charging them. Mounted are assumed to be countercharging (although they are not physically moved on the table - as Simon says this is all taken care of by the POAs).

[jlopez]

Shouldn't mounted units standing to receive a charge from other mounted and shooting at them on the way in get a negative POA at the impact phase to reflect the lack of momentum?

Only foot troops can shoot at enemy charging them. Mounted are assumed to be countercharging (although they are not physically moved on the table - as Simon says this is all taken care of by the POAs).

Aha. Missed that one completely. Problem solved. Thank you.

[shall]

Have fun. Let us know how it feels after a couple of games. Experience suggests it takes about 5 games to get the hang of the urles and about 20 to figure out decent tactics.....

Si