Adding things to a good set of rules is easier than adding stuff to broken rules...whilst maintaining game balance.
i would suggest therefor that the golden rule should be to err on the side of Caution and making game additions like flying troops / undead/magic/ special trooptypes, we try and points cost the stuff higher than anything in the core rules.
The reasons for this is so: 1. we dont produce supertroops (and so destroy game balance)
2. when the Fog game designers come down here eventually (after seeing to the other periods),
it will make the job a lot easier for them.
Nothing would turn people off more than seeing a sup/elite heavy foot, longbow (Special rules for HF so they can shoot), impact foot or offensive spear, sup swordsman, heavily armoured unit that can fly 24 inches
The rules are fairly generic and can handle alot of situations and troop types as it is.
"I'll gladly trade you some ARVN rifles, never been fired and only dropped once"
Good points. How to deal with this has been extensively discussed on the Yahoo group. It's been mainly list work so far. The first goal is to have list writers to come up with Basic lists using standard rules and existing troop types, allowing them to be played in the normal FOG way and against normal FOG armies.
The second level is creating, when necessary (in the list writer's view), addon troop type definitions or mods that change the actual rules in some way - for example, allowing an attribute combination or BG size option not in any current lists at one extreme, or "bolt on" magic rules on the other. For example, Elves are superhuman and there are sound Tolkien arguments for giving them novel attribute combinations, but others argue Elite or even Superior Drilled Armoured Bow Swordsmen is quite good enough. The request is that list writers provide Basic vanilla lists and then clearly identified addons/mods which players can use at their option - let the players choose.
There is a guidelines file in the files section that discusses these issues and an analysis of the principles of standard FOG list design based on available lists, as well as reminders such as checking list completeness and arithmetic.
Lists are welcome whether made up or based on extensive research (which in the fantasy context is reading the source material). Membership is not required to access the archives or files.
zellak wrote:i just tried the yahoo group web page and could not access the archives. Are you sure you do not need to be a member ?
Yes, it's set so anyone can access.
zellak wrote:Are the Superhuman Elves you mentioned HF or MF ?
In Tolkien all the Elves are superhuman!
The compromise that has been used is HF melee (Spearmen or Swordsmen) and MF shooters. There are arguments in favor of combining the advantages of both for Elves, and counter arguments it's too much or it's not necessary. The points would be high, and the main balancing consideration is that 5 or 6 BGs of superhuman Elves will still have a tough time avoiding cohesion loss from flank and rear charges from an enemy with twice as many BGs.
Isin't the real question not what stats Elves should have, but what version of fictional elves (and dwarves, orcs etc etc) you are trying to potray? Some fantasy rules deal with that by being very open and leaving it up to the player to decide what he thinks an elven should look like (Armies of Arcana), others by creating their own specific version or versions (Warhammer) and being very prescriptive. The later gets around copyright issues, and aids game balance (because the more options people have, the more some of them will exploit them to break the system.
For a competition oriented set of rules, i'd say its pretty much essential to retain tight control over lists.
IMHO the "golden standard" should be that the rules are close enough that a FoG historical army and a FoG: Fantasy army can go head-to-head on the table and, for the same points, be fairly evenly matched. So any FoG: fantasy army with magical / flying /etc super units will have many fewer bases than a Fog historical army of the same points.
I agree that they should be close to the historicals and should be able to go head to head.
You could also have a fantasy FoG army with a large number of crappy units and a few loaded heroes / monsters / MUs.
My concern is that i don't want this to turn into HotT where no matter what army you have, essentially all "knights" are the same, all "blades" are the same, all "lurkers" are the same - regardless of whether they are human, elf, dwarf, lizardmen, etc.
I think everyone is trying too hard to make elves do too much. To make Tolkien elves, why not use later medieval Danes as inspiration : mixed BG of 2 ranks would fit the film as well as your needs...
1st rank could be HF, armoured, drilled, superior (or elite), heavy weapon
2nd rank would be MF, armoured, drilled, superior (or elite), bow, swordsman
Now you have shooting units that can fight too. Of course, there are other ways we can mix up the rank weapons too:
First rank could be more roman-like with impact foot, skilled sword. 2nd rank could become longbow. These are just ways to tweak the BG so that it behaves more how you require.
I've already done some LotR Lists for Elves, that are on the Yahoo FoG Fantasy Group.
I struggled with the issues of Tokien's Elves, and the lists that I have done so far (2nd and 3rd Age elves) have fairly powerful Elves in fairly small armies (Save for the Army at the Last Alliance, which was freaking huge, but most of the remaining Elves went West after that).
I've readin considerable depth (past published materials, making treks to the University Libraries) about Tolkien's vision of the Elves, and by the Third Age, the "fading" of the Elves had reduced most Middle-Earth born Elves (such as Legolas's generation) to being only slightly more powerful than men on the battlefield. So the Third Age lists just have larger than average numbers of Superior troops with skills such as "Skilled Swordsmen". The Third Age had few of the Surviving Noldor from the First Age remaining in Middle-earth. These Elves are well-nigh-invulnerable (unless ambushed, or they catch the stray poisoned-arrowed in the throat.
The lists I did have the Elves as almost always having the "Skilled Swordsmen" attribute, but their main units are Superior Defensive Spear HF (or Offensive Spear, depending upon whose Elves they are) backed by a rank of Archers (Can't recall if they are MF or LF Superior Longbows), and then other units that are Superior/Average Skilled Swordsmen, Longbow, MF. And some various cavalry, which is either your typical Heavy Knights, or your typical Horse Archer LH.
And, of course, a couple of Elite Bodyguard units, with a smattering of "hero" types, which are going to be more common in Elvish Armies than in human.
But it is fairly easy to depict pretty much everything else in the Tolkien/Middle-earth universe easily with FoG, without having to warp the rules terribly much... Barlogs might be a bit of a struggle, as they tend to be the sort of thing your typical troops have not a chance against. They take a significantly powerful "Angelic Being" in its own right to counter them.
