Slitherine

Have I got this interaction correct ? The following situation arose in a game last week and led me to reflect on the safety of LF in terrain vs mtd . . .

single BG of 8 LF (with bow) completely in rough terrain charged by 2 x BG of 4 LH (1 BG with lance).

Impact = 4 LF dice, split 2+2; vs 3+3 disordered LH dice - no POA for any BG. LF lose combat and are at -1 for loss, -1 for vs lancers <even though they didn't get the POA, they are still lancers> = LF lose cohesion level and 50/50 a base loss also.

Melee = now 3 disrupted LF dice, split 2+1; vs 3+3 disordered LH dice (1 BG with a + POA for swords). LF lose again, now a cohesion test at -2 or -3 depending on outcomes above (and another 50/50 base loss).

So, even if this melee proceeds into the next turn the LF are doomed without some real luck; and the LH are in no real danger (with potential breakoff and zero bases lost cos of winning).

Which feels like a bit of an odd result given LH charging into (say) a plantation and <odds> beating light foot in a less than ideal environment.

** (Actually in the game this turned out okay cos the LF were outrageously lucky throughout, always managing a hit or two even when needing 5s and being hopelessly outnumbered in dice; it helped passing all the cohesion tests they were asked to take no matter what the score needed. Sod the interactions; just thorw lotsa 5s and 6s !) **

I'd noticed this before too. Rough is light horse country...

Uneven ground like an open field is light horse heaven. Rough is still quite good for LH but not as good.

I have no problem with skirmishing foot aremed with knives being slaughtered by LH in an open or even rough field.

Difficult terrain makes things even which seems reasonable.

I suspect that people are expecting terrain to be like DBM terrain and it isn't. I saw someone do very well in a comp with no terrain troops in a Roman army. He just sent the legionaries into the rough where they are more than man enough to beat anything less than the best medium foot.

Uneven ground like an open field is light horse heaven. Rough is still quite good for LH but not as good.

I have no problem with skirmishing foot aremed with knives being slaughtered by LH in an open or even rough field.

Difficult terrain makes things even which seems reasonable.

Yes, the interaction is very different from DBM. What you have to remember is that DBM has no shooting - so this is included within the combat. Within FoG shooting is a separate beast - consider this - Light Horse enter difficult going. As the LF you have two options:

1. Engage in Hand to Hand
2. Skirmish and shoot

Based on the fact that the LH will be disordered or severely disordered they immediately have a minus on the Cohesion Test and will have less dice than the LF - they will lose the shooting battle. If you charge in rough / difficult then the LF are almost certain to get away - LF can still slaughter LH in rough going you just have to utilise different tactics.

Disordered does not affect cohesion tests, only severely disordered does. OTOH, you do have a point in that the LC will move at the same speed as LF in the rough, giving the latter a few shooting opportunities.

hammy wrote:Uneven ground like an open field is light horse heaven. Rough is still quite good for LH but not as good.

I have no problem with skirmishing foot aremed with knives being slaughtered by LH in an open or even rough field.

Difficult terrain makes things even which seems reasonable.

Not quite the LH don't get any worse if disrupted, but the LF do. I think the reduced dice for skirmishers should not apply against severly disordered enemy.

hammy wrote: I suspect that people are expecting terrain to be like DBM terrain and it isn't. I saw someone do very well in a comp with no terrain troops in a Roman army. He just sent the legionaries into the rough where they are more than man enough to beat anything less than the best medium foot.

Well if it was good enough for Chinese armies, then it should be good enough for Ceaser's elite legions.

dave_r wrote: Based on the fact that the LH will be disordered or severely disordered they immediately have a minus on the Cohesion Test and will have less dice than the LF - they will lose the shooting battle. If you charge in rough / difficult then the LF are almost certain to get away - LF can still slaughter LH in rough going you just have to utilise different tactics.

THe LF will have less dice than the LH as the LF loose 1/2 dice for fighting non Fragmented LH, in addition to any reduction for disruption while the LH loose 1/3 or 1/2 for disorder / severe disorder but don't loose any more for disruption.

THe LF will have less dice than the LH as the LF loose 1/2 dice for fighting non Fragmented LH

I meant shooting rather than in close combat!

hammy wrote:Uneven ground like an open field is light horse heaven. Rough is still quite good for LH but not as good.

I have no problem with skirmishing foot aremed with knives being slaughtered by LH in an open or even rough field.

Difficult terrain makes things even which seems reasonable.

I suspect that people are expecting terrain to be like DBM terrain and it isn't. I saw someone do very well in a comp with no terrain troops in a Roman army. He just sent the legionaries into the rough where they are more than man enough to beat anything less than the best medium foot.

Yep . . . I have no issues with the rules and the outcomes they generate. IIWII.

What didn't feel 'right' to me was the idea of <actual> light horse (or cavalry, for that matter), haring into a plantation after foot and 'beating' them <odds>. It wasn't the expectation of terrain being like DBM-terrain I was suffering, but rather a perception that an <actual> orchard (or patch of heavily scrubbed or rocky ground) isn't the sort of place to expect mounted troops to do well . . . in the "real world".

Historically-speaking, was LH (or other cavalry) the/a favoured troop-type for clearing out "rough" ground ?

This is rough going I'm picturing that is far more disrupting than mere 'broken ground'. It is (in FoG terms) sufficient to disorder any such mounted that just venture within; let alone set about giving the hows-your-father to any foot they meet along the way.

I guess that I have a view of any <actual> impact/melee including a relatively close range exchange of missiles as well as some good old-fashioned biff. And it isn't intuitively obvious for a <FoG> lance to be a factor in whatever exchange that did take place. It's just hard for me to imagine <actual> mounted troops having such an advantage.

A CMT for mounted charging foot entirely in rough/difficult going ?

Keef wrote:I guess that I have a view of any <actual> impact/melee including a relatively close range exchange of missiles as well as some good old-fashioned biff.

I guess this is where the problem arises, because close combat in FoG does not include any prolonged "relatively close range exchange of missiles", so one should not expect the outcomes to represent this. Prolonged close range exchange of missiles is what happens when the BGs are close but not touching, and has the appropriate outcomes accordingly.

Of course some missiles may be hurled/shot just before contact, but this is only deemed to have significant effect in the case of those troops with an impact POA to represent a volley of javelins, pila etc., or with extra dice for support shooting from rear ranks. Troops attempting to use missile weapons as a substitute for effective close combat weapons are represented by having no POA at all in impact or melee. This is not to say that these weapons have no effect, but that they are less effective in a close combat situation than proper close combat weapons.

Treating close combat as hand-to-hand combat is certainly a paradigm shift from DBx, which has become the orthodoxy. However, this is rather ironic, because when DBx first came out, Phil and I had no end of trouble convincing people that bases in contact could represent short range shooting!

We have chosen to make FoG slightly less abstract than DBx in an attempt to reintroduce more differentiation between "shooty" troops and close combat troops and hence enhance the historical "flavour" of the game.

Hello to all the growing FoG Community (this is my first post here). I think we are living exciting times in the Ancients Wargaming World with this new rules set and hope all the best for it, for its authors and for us, the Ancients Wargamers that are waiting for too long for something like that.

Keef wrote:What didn't feel 'right' to me was the idea of <actual> light horse (or cavalry, for that matter), haring into a plantation after foot and 'beating' them <odds>. It wasn't the expectation of terrain being like DBM-terrain I was suffering, but rather a perception that an <actual> orchard (or patch of heavily scrubbed or rocky ground) isn't the sort of place to expect mounted troops to do well . . . in the "real world".

Assuming that the Troop’s quality is the same for both LH and LF, I think that IMHO we still have to consider 2 other important interactions to the LH account:

1 – As this combat with these BG’s must be part of a larger battle going on between even armies, the cost (or “effort” relative to the all army) of the troops committed here is also relevant. With Swords and Lances in the BGs of LH and Bows in the LF, I would guess that the “effort” of the former it’s bigger and tends to be rewarded accordingly.

2 – Besides the above, the LH committed 2 BGs or 2 independent units or 2 low level commands, splitting this way in 2 halves the 1 BG LF response to the charge of the mounted.

OTOH and to the account of the LF, it would also be interesting to know how the shooting in the previous turn was handled. Assuming the charge of the LH was frontal and had to be declared in range of visibility to the LF <covered> inside the plantation, I would say that there had to be shooting in the turn before, with (I suspect) advantage to line of LF Bows. By the way, if the LF are enough inside (or behind) the plantation, they can control the effectiveness of the charge, by shooting at maximum or effective range the turn before the charge or even halt it because outside visibility range. There is good and better Rough both for LF and LH depending on the type.

Just my 2 tiny cents