Quote from: Jilu on March 07, 2022, 11:07:03 PM
okay but is there much evidence of archers staying to die quick?

Marathon. Plataea.

There's a bit of a puzzler in that the Yamato Era Japanese list, which has little cavalry, goes up to 790, and is superceded in 794 by the Heian, which has lots of cavalry. But it was the Yamato Era Japanese that started the 38 year war with the Emishi in 773. Since there are sources for that war but few of relevance previously it might be a case of "by 773 they had cavalry, we don't really know about earlier"

Why do these Scots get full armour front ranks while C15th pikes don't get that option? I'm no expert but Heath in his Armies of the Middle ages gives Schilling's Berne Chronicles as a source for fully armoured pikemen in Swiss and Burgundian armies.

Quote from: tarnowski1 on October 01, 2021, 08:59:40 PM

Quote from: Doomsmile on October 01, 2021, 08:28:15 PM
Bit of a weird one here.

In the Qin army (early Asia, Waring States and Han Dynasty, pgs 14-15) there is an army-wide Optional Special Rule, which begins:

QuoteOPTIONAL SPECIAL RULE: Applies to Qin troops with the Devastating Chargers characteristic, either all or none.

(The rule then goes on to define the effects on those units.)


My question is: what does the rule mean by "Qin troops?"
Is it referring specifically to Close Fighters (incl. conscript close fighters and elite close fighters), or does it refer to all Qin UGs of any description with the Devastating Charge characteristic?

The later interpretation has some odd effects on the Conscripted Levies unit, and potentially very strange effects on Qin chariots which choose to take their optional DC characteristic.


Thank you for the ruling here, and sorry for the pedantry!

as the subsequent line is 'When they declare a charge they become Unprotected but gain the Fleet of Foot and Melee Expert characteristics (and can declare the charge at skirmish movement distance)'

fleet of foot is only applicable to foot so excludes mounted from the special rule and 'become unprotected' excludes the conscripts as they are already unprotected.

though yes it could be made more explicit.

But the list says "all or none". So if you do it, all troops who are DC must make this change. I would say that includes the chariots (if you don't want it, don't make them DC) and the conscripts.

Quote from: nikgaukroger on April 27, 2021, 07:59:28 AM
I think by applying the first line in the Block Move section sensibly you can knock different wheels on the head - which I think is clearly not the intention. "A block move is where you action several UGs together to all do the same thing" - I would certainly rule that different wheels would mean they are not doing the same thing. So yes, I would not see "wheeling" as being the "thing" before people mention it, the "thing" would be, for example, a 45 degree wheel to the left. IMO that is obviously the intention and, to repeat myself, would rule as such if asked.

I'm only doing this to flag a loophole that might be in the rules before it comes up in games. Unfortunately your explanation, while clearly fine for club games, is not likely to work in competition. Yes, it says "all do the same thing". But then what is meant by "thing"? The "thing" you can do in movement is defined on page 86 - "...to make a prompted action...on the prompted action table". So looking at the table on page 82 it tells me: "M3 Advance with Wheel". I would contend that as long as each UG in the block is doing an M3 move there is nothing to say they have to wheel by the same amount. In fact this interpretation - that they just need to all do the same prompted action, is supported by the last bullet of page 106 that refers to "...all TUGs follow the same action..."

Since the Moche are in there it would make sense to have the Southern Mapuche. Armament classification might be an issue. They had fairly long spears but no anti cavalry drill.

Related to this - having checked the rule book - I can't see anything that says if you use a block move to do a wheel everything needs to wheel through the same angle. So if I wheel a block of, say, four TUGs I assume they can all wheel at different directions and (since that would put them out of contact) at different move distances.

Is there something I'm missing that would prevent this? Is it the intention?

As others have said player skill is more important than army match up. A good player given a difficult army match up will still be able to design a really good version, with just the right balance of troops and cards in each command. And they'll make no errors in play, or at least very few. Whereas with me it's always a case of "yet again, I have forgotten that my opponent can do that in this rule set, and I now appear to have some really good enemy troops coming in on my flank with nothing to stop them".

Quote from: ochoin on April 17, 2021, 11:28:30 PM
I'm looking at MEG with great interest.

My little group & I are long term Field of Glory players. We field a variety of Bronze Age & Punic armies.
What I'm trying to find out is if these existing armies can be shoe horned into MEG?

There's two issues: our existing unit sizes sometimes vary from the MEG army lists eg we might have 4 bases of light cavalry when the lists state 6.
Secondly, types of figures. EG an army list might specify javelin armed skirmishers when we have bow armed.

We are not tournament gamers. I do not particularly wish to embark upon a program of adding a number of bases to existing armies & discarding units on anything like a large scale.
So: how flexible is MEG on this issue?

donald

Hello, I play mostly FOG (v3) and also some MeG (as a club player). In terms of your questions, I'm going to assume you'll want to use the largest version of the game as it's the best in terms of spectacle. Overall volume of bases on the table are similar to FoG 800 - 1000 points. What you'll probably see though is the sort of issue any change of rule set will give you - the exact number of bases you used for rule set A isn't optimal for rule set B, so you might find that a few bases don't get used any more. In the same way that my early Persian army has a single base of Hordes which were useful in DBM but have sat in the box since.

Unit sizes. For combat troops most foot are used in groups of 6 or 8 in MeG, that should fit well. Mounted is often in 6s if it's going to fight (heavy chariots, cavalry) often 4s if it's just going to occupy enemy attention. Note in MeG cavalry and light chariots can skirmish if they have any missile weapon, so check that when designing a list. In MeG skirmishers (SuGs - LF or LH) really need to be 3 deep so you'll have foot in 6s or 9s; mounted in 6s. You can have 2 deep but they're a bit of a liability as they shoot less well. Since you're only playing in your own group you could fudge this: pay for 6 bases but only deploy 4 and allow them to shoot 2 deep at full effect (and count them as broken when losing over two bases).

Types of figures. I don't think there'll be a problem here. FoG and MeG list writers have similar sources (and indeed Nik Gaukroger was heavily involved in both).

Some things to expect:

- the first games will be slow because it's a new rule set to you. Remember those first dozen games of FoG where you were flicking back and forth in the rulebook to try and find the relevant rule? That will happen. That's really just newness, though I'm told there are one or two quirks of rules layout (I'm fortunate to have learned with more experienced players).
- shooting occurs at a different point in the sequence to FoG, and people close to a charge can shoot at it.
- charging and movement is alternate by unit.
- the way generals work is different. Subordinate generals each have a command, and the commander in chief can do as well (or can just manage from afar). The quality of generals vary according to how much you pay for them. This affects what they can do through a card based mechanism (2-5 cards per general per turn). Getting the army structure and balance right is a skill that continues to elude me - "yet again, a better player is matador to my bull".

Quote from: nikgaukroger on April 19, 2021, 08:20:46 PM

Quote from: mad lemmey on April 19, 2021, 08:03:57 PM
As Roger said on another thread, they predate the Renaissance by a good way!

As a point of information the Southern list did not start until 1536.

As to when you date the start of the Renaissance, that is a whole different question 

That's an odd date to start. They were around for centuries before, though we have no written record. They fought the Incas at the Battle of the Maule which is held as late 15th century in early sources, 1532 in others.

Quote from: sultanbev on September 28, 2020, 09:21:33 PM
As a a non-ancients player trying to learn the period(s), this is an informative article.

1000 man "regiments" if you will sounds right, as the decimal system or organisation seems to be a common thread throughout the region and well into the 19th century.

If a 1000 man unit is 10 ranks deep, then presumably it's frontage is quite narrow, in this case 120'. Assuming each rank needs 3 foot minimum to wield his bow, it's gonna be 30' or more deep.
Do we know how this compares to contemporary armies? Did they only have 4-6-8 deep units?
Another thought is, if they used spears to tie the shields together to make a barricade, presumably each file would use 3-4 of it's spears to do this, the rearer ranks passing their's forward to use as required. Afterall, they're not needing them whilst they are shooting. And if they are replacing casualties in the ranks in front of them, they'd be able to find a spear underfoot if they didn't have one to hand.

If the unit is firing, I'd guess only the first 2 ranks would get anything like aimed shots at the target. All the 8 files behind would be overhead shooting presumably trying to hit the rearer areas of approaching enemy units. Whilst not particularly accurate - a unit would have 200 aimed-ish shots and 800 random-ish area fire shots - this is still a lot of shots.

If the shield bearer is the officer at the front, presumably he's the better man, and could shout fire directions when he's not using his spear or bow. But once in close combat, could the 7 rear files carry on overhead shooting, or would they be pressing up against the front ranks to hold firm, and to fill casualty spaces?

if the officer is the front ranker, then presumably when the front rank has fallen dead and wounded, the fighting quality of the unit (as apposed to individu als) would then fall by a quotable factor in wargaming terms?

Infantry depth varied. A pike phalanx could be 8 or 16 deep depending on the need. Hoplites seem to have been mostly 8 deep but sometimes went deeper to put pressure on (Thebans at Leuctra) or thinned them out to match enemy frontage (Athenians at Marathon). It's unknown whether the shields were tied together or not. If they were, spears would be awkward to use, you'd probably want plain lengths of wood. The man at the front was the leader of ten, or Dathapatis. The sense from Herodotus is that they shot until close combat was imminent, at which time they took up their close combat weapons.

Very sorry to hear this. I first played Steve in 1978 in a student wargames competition. Always a good guy. Rest in peace mate.

Hello all, I've done some digging into how these troops were used (see link). I've made some suggestions as to how rule changes might better model their behaviour (there's a thread in Rules Queries to cover) However, having just published the new book it's unlikely that that will change anytime soon. However, I believe we could get most of the benefit by addressing the army lists, so I've put a section of suggested changes in for those. In a nutshell, it shouldn't be possible for the entire infantry component to be Immortals and apple bearear because they were a small fraction of the army.

cwatp.blogspot.com

Gents, to chip in to this debate, and widen it to a discussion of how the Early Achaemenid infantry should work in rules and army lists, I done a bit of looking through recent works on the subject. It's longer than a forum post should be, so I've put it up on my blog.

cwatp.blogspot.com

Quote from: Simon Meg-Meister on June 28, 2020, 11:30:14 AM


FALLING BACK

The rules are generous in movement options throughout with a different table on the website if you want a sense of what is probably closer to reality.  It is a bias that gives us the best balance of game fun and historical realism and by having both Prompted Action Tables people wanting historical refights can use that.  We then get the best of both worlds.

FWIW I haven't seen Fall Back being used excessively because the points system favours doing damage. Plus it is costly with Formed and Tribles as you often are using the Yellow and Red cards you need for so many other moves.  So it feels in game terms to set a fine challenge of decision making at present.  That said I am ot present at many competitions and that distance can give me a false impression so keen to hear if it does feel excessive as we move forward.  Always had a watching brief on it.

I will store for the future under a watching brief. Not changing anything for a few years from here as very well balanced overall.

Si

I've seen it used to pull back several TUGs of pike as a group and on another occasion a TUG of elephants as a delaying tactic while the battle was won elsewhere. Both were when the enemy started the move in charge range which is what made it extra odd. In terms of the refight PAT that does seem more historical. I don't think it would be less fun than the current PAT. After all, both players would have the same restrictions.