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Post by jim1973 on Oct 27, 2023 4:16:19 GMT
A little later than our period and possibly taking advantage of the unemployed mercenaries following the Italian wars? I thought the Swiss in the Burgundian wars were quite mobile. But I may very well be mistaken as it's not my era of interest.
Cheers
Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 27, 2023 0:12:33 GMT
I am very much looking forward to DBF and its mechanics. As you allude to, High Fantasy and High/Late Medieval, will work together well. Can't wait to try my LOTR armies! We'll have to see how it extrapolates to the Ancient era. To stay on point, I'm not sure Swiss pikemen or other late medieval polearm troops (billmen, halberdiers, etc) behaved like phalangites. If nothing else, the phalangites were deployed in much larger numbers giving them much more inertia and less flexibility. But I am interested in your playtests with cheaper costs, as this may lead to a surrogate playtest of 8Pk. If 8-12 pike elements cost the same as 6 blades then I'm reasonably certain they will be in a block and act very similarly to 8Pk. I am assuming that a single Pk will still be quite weak. I do wish Alex could field his Pk as 4Ax to simulate his battles with tribal armies in Afghanistan, but I digress.
Cheers
Jim
PS Really good to see you back on fanaticus medievalthomas!
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 22, 2023 14:00:01 GMT
Making Pikes a bit stronger would make their centre breakthroughs even more likely, and encourage the Blades to shorten their line as they’ll need to have reserves. This is the approach favoured in DBF, where Pikes recoil enemy on an equal roll. It encourages historical formations. Firstly, DBF is a point cost game so the troop costs will be important if people want to translate that to historical games. Maybe Pikes will be cheaper than Blades. We'll have to wait and see. But I'd still be happy to line up my six Blades in a line with the two Spears in reserve to face a 3x2 Pike block. Doubling Romans with only 3 attacks is not that easy and the flanks of the Pikes will soon be open. The Romans will still have 10 elements in the frontline with the Pike army down to 9. Cheers Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 22, 2023 12:37:59 GMT
It depends on what you want to model, but probably yes. 6x8Pk at +6 v 6x4Bd at +5 will make it difficult for the Romans to break the line (need double overlap and 1-5 or 1-6). That seems more in keeping with the Pyrrhic Wars than the Macedonian Wars. Flank forces probably favour the Hellenistics if they can field Knights against Roman Cavalry so the balance will be against the Polybian Romans and the double element loss of the 8Pk probably doesn't balance out. Against Sp, the 8Pk will likely run over them as even pursuit won't weaken them too much and this seems too easy when compared against the long grind described in battle reports. Spears will usually outnumber them though. So I think overall, just overpowered.
Cheers
Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 22, 2023 11:44:43 GMT
Here is another thing we need to consider and take into account:- If Pikes are 8Pk, so that they match the enemy line, how on earth can the Romans defeat them, as they always did? Far better to force the enemies of the Pk to have reserves (i.e. 16 ranks of Pk facing 8 ranks of Hastati backed by 8 ranks of Principes… …the battleline is more or less the same length). Instead of whinging about Pikes, take the blinkers off and look at the wider picture… How do you force people to have reserves when they can outflank easily? As we've discussed previously, PB's design of the Polybian Roman army list suggests that the Hastati and Principes form the battleline with only the Triarii in reserve. As such, they would represent 16 ranks. Why do the Pikes need 32 ranks? Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 22, 2023 10:32:02 GMT
One question - mostly to Jim who started this thread: What are we trying to achieve with this house rule? Faced with Macedonian pike being frequently outflanked for the loss of 2 elements I have been thinking about making Macedonian Pike an 8Pk element which assumes the stats of 4Pk with rear support but as a DBE that counts double for the first loss. This has the advantages of giving the Alex’s army list 4 x 8Pk, adding a extra LH (which it needs) BUT I don’t know what the final extra element should be possibly 8Pk or Sp or 4Ax or Ps. Couple this with making the Hypaspists 4Ax or Sp or 3Bd AND making Alexander’s Companions 6Kn, this should make Alexander’s army more useful. Three points to note - I think the 8Pk idea comes from Jim’s post in 2020. Second, my Macedonians are currently at the bottom of a big stack of really useful boxes so I haven’t tried out all these ideas. Lastly - if 8Pk is a thing then what does 4Pk represent? My motivation is that a 3x2 or 2x2 block for 4Pk just isn't representative of a Phalanx. Most reports we have when facing Hoplites or Legionaries show relatively equal length battle lines. Certainly not double length that we have in DBA3. Outflanking is just too easy if half your army only covers 12 out of 60cm. Yes, you can use terrain if you're defending if it falls your way. But again, that seemed to be the exception rather than the rule. If you had 16000 phalangites, you were usually pretty confident to march out and meet the enemy. Initially, I suggested 8Pk as a powerful force but brittle due to the two element loss. It was argued that this was too powerful. This attempt is again to extend the line but keep it powerful and brittle as envisioned by PB. It also helps that no further painting is required! (And you could choose an odd number of pike elements without later regret) Cheers Jim PS The relatively poor performance of Hellenistic Pikes against historical opponents that they did beat is another motivation.
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 22, 2023 4:02:23 GMT
I don't know stevie. Gaming war is artificial in whatever sense you consider. At least some of the mechanisms are "plausible". (Spears maintaining cohesion. Knights pursuing into danger. Warband attacking en masse). Some less so. My trouble with Bd and Pk pursuing into danger is that breaking into the enemy battle line was the aim of the exercise and, usually, led to victory, at least in that part of the battle. The three "heavies' (Bd/Sp/Pk) will eventually break if left to their own devices, usually after a bit of a slog, even without pursuit.
Cheers
Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 21, 2023 4:02:29 GMT
Great link menacussecundus, Lovely camp, looks like it could work for 15mm and 20mm and inspire imitation in other scales. CarlL Certainly works in 15mm fanaticus linkJim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 21, 2023 3:58:13 GMT
Certainly possible. Pursuit has always been a puzzle for me. Was the intention to potentially get charging, impetuous troops into trouble like the Byzantine cavalry at Manzikert? Warbands, Elephants and Knights I can understand, but Blades are puzzling. Romans were mostly disciplined. Vikings were more spear and shieldwall than axes. Is it to try and recreate Cannae without a feigned flight mechanism? I'd rather give lighter troops the option to pull heavies out of line if they win the combat. May help 4Ax.
Jim
PS Good excuse to get my Khurasan Polybians painted up and out against Phillip V
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 20, 2023 23:43:47 GMT
That would make them less brittle. But pursuing single blade elements would struggle.
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 20, 2023 13:06:27 GMT
This is a specific house rule as I am not too familiar with Swiss pikes and their battlefield performance, other than their excellent reputation. For me, Hellenistic pikes were more static but fielded in huge numbers by the Successors. PB has modelled pikes as strong but brittle. He also seems to want them to pursue Romans onto rough going as described at Pydna. The former is fair enough. The latter seems more of an exception than a rule for Hellenistic pikes. So I did some 6v6 tests between Pikes and Spears and Pikes and Blades with the following changes: Pike +3 with +3 side support and no pursuit. My observations were: - Everybody got "wins" - Blade pursuit was not suicidal - Pikes were brittle
Once the support was stripped from the Pike it was very vulnerable. This made the flanks particularly vulnerable as you only needed one push back to get a 5-2 advantage. Perhaps this is too much and Pikes may be able to get side-support from Spear, 4Ax or even Cav and Knights in order to make the flanks more robust. Will need to test it on the battlefield as these were just in isolation. I'll keep you informed if any progress.
Cheers
Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 20, 2023 12:46:41 GMT
I'm happy to give the developers of DBF a bit of slack. They're probably quite excited as their project progresses. "Fixes" will always be in the eye of the beholder. They won't be for everyone and they will only be house rules for DBA3. In the mean time, I'm going to start a thread on house rules for Hellenistic pikes for people to try.
Cheers
Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 19, 2023 12:13:35 GMT
Never been a fan of the main GW lines but Bloodbowl is legend! Also, the Lord of the Rings skirmish game (Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game) is one of the best skirmish games and easily adaptable to historicals. I'm painting up some Victrix ancients currently for a variant I found online.
Cheers
Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 17, 2023 7:56:27 GMT
...why are Greek battles so often used to prove the superiority of certain types of troops? In China the fighting was completely different. Europe was regularly conquered by Asian hordes. Didn't these people care about Greek tactics? I was pointing out a rules anomaly given the Thebans have 2x8Sp in DBA3, a well known fact to most DBA3 players. But people will always find fault when they look for it. Jim
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Post by jim1973 on Oct 17, 2023 2:33:34 GMT
I must admit that I quite like the 12 element-a-side format. It’s abstract yes, but also nice and simple. And all armies, no matter what their actual size, can be split into 12 parts. However, I also realise that trying to make all element types of equal value is practically impossible…the rigid and limited DBA two-dice combat system just hasn’t got the variety. So a points system is a way out, but it itself is not perfect. Take Camels for example. What should their point value be? The Camel combat factor of 3 against both foot and mounted makes them equal to Auxiliaries and Cavalry… But they have a ‘quick kill’ against Knights, so should cost more… And they’re ‘quick killed’ on an equal score by Blades, so should cost less… Then add on their terrain advantages, which only really applies when defending… Now I’m not saying that a point system won’t work, but it’s not as easy a fix as many people seem to think. Don’t get me wrong. The 12 element game is sheer genius - or at least it was in 1990! It’s just that over 30 years us players have got more discerning and now understand that if it’s just 12 elements then they need to be balanced….so either balance them or introduce a points system (that will invariably break the 12 element principle) to do the balancing for you. For me “rock, paper, scissors” is balanced. So is (for the geeks amongst us) “rock, paper, scissors, lizard, Spock.” So why can’t we balance Sp, Wb, Ps, Ax, Bw…….” It is a war-game…War=history, game=playable contest! So the closer we get to all units being considered equally valuable on the table-top the better war-game we have. Plus it IS historically justified - do you think Samnites thought they had zero chance vs Romans because they were Aux and the Romans Bd? Plus it’ll rectify historical anomalies such as LH armies being “pants” under DBA. I'm also a big fan of the 12 element game. Most of my reading seems to show battelines expand/contract to roughly equal length most of the time so the 12 elements work well. Not sure I want a points based game with significant differences in element numbers, as flank attacks are so devastating in DBA3 regardless of what element is on your flank. Probably works better in bigger battles but I like having lots of different armies rather than painting more of what I've got. But agree that 4Ax, Pk and LH (Horse Archer) need work to get closer to history and better game balance. I don't need perfectly balanced but not less than 60/40, otherwise it loses the fun factor. Cheers Jim PS One important historical battle where it seems the main battlelines were unequal was Leuctra, but in DBA3 the Theban double elements allow for both to be equal! Go figure?
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