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Post by stevie on May 7, 2017 18:17:53 GMT
Well, I have finally waded through the first four books of Livy’s “Early History of Rome” covering the period between 650 to 400 BC…and here is what I’ve discovered.
The Early Romans, the Tullian Romans and the Latins of armies I/55b, I/59 and I/55c prior to 400 BC fought against each other, the I/55a Early Etruscans, the I/57a Etruscan League, and the I/36d Italian Hill Tribes (i.e. the Sabines, Aquei, Hernici, Volsci, and Aurunci, plus several others)…
…AND THAT’S ALL.
The Roman territory was tiny in this period.
Even the famous Etruscan city of Veii, just 16 Km/10 miles from Rome, wasn’t taken till 396 BC.
They did NOT fight the I/36a Early Umbrians, the I/55e Later Umbrians, the I/36a Early Samnites, the II/8b Campanians, the II/8c Apulians, nor the II/8a Lucanians & Bruttians. And they certainly didn’t fight the I/36a Ligurians. In fact I can’t find any evidence that they fought the I/52i Italiots either.
All these were the enemies of the II/10 Camillan Romans of 400-275 BC.
What does Livy have to say about the period before 400 BC?
He talks a lot about the many, many wars with the Etruscan city of Veii and the Italian Hill Tribes (the Sabines, Aquei, Hernici, Volsci, and Aurunci).
But he only mentions the Samnites 3 times:
once in Book IV xxxvii saying they captured Vulturnum from the Etruscans and renamed it Capua (in 420 BC).
once in Book IV xliv to say that the Campanian-Samnites have captured Cumae from the Greeks (in 417 BC).
once in Book IV lii about the Samnites of Campanian Capua not selling Rome grain during a famine (408 BC).
No surprises there…the First Samnite War wasn’t until 343-341 BC.
The Umbri only get mentioned once, in Book V xxxv, to say they were driven south by the Gauls (just after 400 BC).
As for the Apulians, Lucanians, Bruttians, Ligurians and Italiots….not a single solitary word. Nothing.
Again, not really surprising…one of the first requirements for being an enemy is usually you have to be a neighbour.
All these peoples were far away on the other side of the Italian Hill Tribes. And it took the Romans over a 100 years just to conquer them, let alone fight those beyond.
If anyone wishes to verify my findings and check for themselves, here is a link to one of several free versions of Livy online. This particular one is a very old translation, but I like it because it has yearly dates included for reference:-
oll.libertyfund.org/titles/livy-the-history-of-rome-vol-1
I know how this all came about. In the previous versions of DBA the Early Romans needed enemies to fight, so any old Italian tribe was given the job. It was only later when a bit more research was done that the true history of this period was discovered, and I’ll bet that’s when all the sub-lists were created…but these old stand-in so-called ‘enemies’ were never removed.
So there they sit; bygone fossils left over from earlier more primitive versions of DBA.
Some of them have been lurking in the army lists as far back as DBA 1.0!
And for 20 years no-one thought to check them or to speak out. Instead the lists were just blindly followed as ‘fact’.
They should have been sorted decades ago. Now we have to deal with them.
I was even thinking about a new category of errors for them:-
E) fictitious foes. Those that are listed as mutual enemies but never actually fought and are just made up!
Well, we can’t ignore them. Now the cat’s out of the bag people will start to wonder what other blatantly obvious historical errors we have let slip through, and they’ll start to lose confidence in all of the corrections.
But to fix every one is going to be a mammoth task and take a hell of a lot of editing.
So I suggest we just bung them all in an appendix and tell the players the following:-
yes, we are aware of the problem…
here is a list of all the corrections required…
but it’s a lot of work so it’s up to them.
Therefore I’ll remove those last green items from page 5.
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Post by macbeth on May 7, 2017 23:17:19 GMT
I think it's important to differentiate between unmatched armies according to Phil and armies according to other people that shouldn't be matched or should be. There are a number of anomalies, (I can't call them errors because Phil says there are none). These are example of where one army is listed as an enemy of the other but the other is not likewise listed. There also armies with enemies that are not within the timeframe that is given for them. I would like to see a list of all of these. But I don't want these mixed up with armies that other people think should be in the book . It would be interesting to see such a list, but I think for the purposes of consistency in tournaments we should stick to those armies that Phil himself has identified. I agree that we should keep separate issues where other players think two armies should be allied or opposed - when I made a deep dive into the playtest editions of the lists and highlighted what I thought were anomalies Phil was quick to point out that for armies to be opposed, they had to have faced off in a set piece battle, decades of low level hostility and a common border didn't cut it.
But in the cases of one army is listed as an enemy of the other but the other is not likewise listed and armies with enemies that are not within the timeframe that is given for them. If they aren't errors WHAT are we going to call them?
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Post by davidconstable on May 8, 2017 7:44:06 GMT
There is no such thing as an error in DBA3, god says so, years ago (1968 on) they were semi-officially classified in British Army military wargames as "unintended consequences".
PB is of that period, and did work for the people who came up with "uc".
David Constable
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Post by timurilank on May 8, 2017 8:47:09 GMT
Timurilank,
I’d like to change the layout slightly on page 5 to demonstrate how it may appear in the final document.
Some of the names and titles of the armies are a bit too long to fit on a single line, even with narrow margins.
Taking out unnecessary ‘AD’ and ‘BC’ and replacing the word ‘Army’ with an ‘s’ would help, so that…
I/51 Later Sargonid Assyrian Army (680 BC – 609 BC) remove I/44b Later Neo-Babylonian Army (604 BC – 589 BC)
…becomes for example…
I/51 Later Sargonid Assyrians (680 – 609 BC) remove I/44b Later Neo-Babylonians (604 – 589 BC)
That would also leave a bit more space to temporarily fit in words like ‘wrong dates’ and ‘non-mutual’ at the end so we can ascertain how many corrections there are in each of the ‘A’, ‘B’, ‘C’ and ‘D’ categories (I think that would be better than just using a single letter, even if it’s only temporary, as people are –I hope!– already reading the page 5 corrections).
I agree. I took similar steps posting my responses; even dropping the plural form (s) .... I/51 Later Sargonid Assyrian as an example.
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Post by Dangun on May 8, 2017 8:58:34 GMT
But in the cases of one army is listed as an enemy of the other but the other is not likewise listed and armies with enemies that are not within the timeframe that is given for them. If they aren't errors WHAT are we going to call them?
Unrequited love? |
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Post by Haardrada on May 8, 2017 9:33:42 GMT
Text anomalies?😆
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Post by stevie on May 8, 2017 22:24:38 GMT
We shouldn’t be too quick to ridicule Phil Barker for all these errors you know.
After all, who should we mock?
The person that designed and supplied the information for the army lists?…
The people that edited and were supposed to proofread these lists over the years?…
Or the people that blindly followed them?
True, it is Phil Barker that says there are no errors.
But who was it that had 20 years to check for themselves, ask questions, raise doubts, speak out, and do something about the errors instead of just moaning but still obediently accepting them?
So I ask you all once again…who is it exactly that we should be mocking?
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Post by Haardrada on May 8, 2017 22:49:28 GMT
We shouldn’t be too quick to ridicule Phil Barker for all these errors you know. After all, who should we mock? The person that designed and supplied the information for the army lists?… The people that edited and were supposed to proofread these lists over the years?… Or the people that blindly followed them? True, it is Phil Barker that says there are no errors. But who was it that had 20 years to check for themselves, ask questions, raise doubts, speak out, and do something about the errors instead of just moaning but still obediently accepting them? So I ask you all once again…who is it exactly that we should be mocking? It has been a bane of rule writters since the beginning of Wargames History that errors and ommissions occur...I have been guilty of it myself,but I am humble enough to know this is enevitable and as to make mistakes is a human trait. So if I make a remark it is purely in jest without malice and hope it would be taken as such.😊 |
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Post by macbeth on May 8, 2017 23:05:40 GMT
I mock not, but do express a certain low level of frustration.
During the play test period I had some time on my hands whilst the elder of my little warbands was playing basketball. The team would have a 45-50 minute practice session that I did not need to watch and would take myself up to a table and check the lists for consistency - scribing my notes for later relaying to the group. The notes were submitted in at least two formats (word and straight email). I was primarily concerned with chronological and list numeric consistency (ie opponents within the right date range and armies listed as being mutual opponents) but did question the omission of some opponents that were geographically and chronologically adjacent. I know the submission was read because my queries about the latter were dismissed. However the Anglo-Normman vs Navarrese match up (which hangs over from DBA2) is still in the lists, to name but one of the issues I raised.
Cheers
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Post by stevie on May 8, 2017 23:40:37 GMT
I do apologise If my previous post has ruffled any feathers…and it wasn’t aimed at any single individual. I just didn’t want this thread to turn into yet another “let’s bash Phil Barker” rant. If you look at my profile picture, and have seen Life of Brian:- ”What has Phil Barker ever done for us?.......…” (you can fill in the rest of the conversation for yourselves)  |
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Post by macbeth on May 9, 2017 4:54:11 GMT
No feathers where harmed in the making of my response Stevie.
And like the PFJ I reserve the right to rant at the set of rules I have purchased with my hard earned - whilst at the same time enumerating all the things that I should be thankful for.
It's all good
Cheers
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Post by Haardrada on May 9, 2017 6:27:14 GMT
I do apologise If my previous post has ruffled any feathers…and it wasn’t aimed at any single individual. I just didn’t want this thread to turn into yet another “let’s bash Phil Barker” rant. If you look at my profile picture, and have seen Life of Brian:- ”What has Phil Barker ever done for us?.......…” (you can fill in the rest of the conversation for yourselves) No feathers ruffled at all Stevie, I have a great respect for Phil and Sue andeveryones efforts as 3.0 is a massive step forward for DBA in the right direction.Most the errors pointed out in this thread are mostly who fought who and when so may be made by other parties. When 3.0 was launched I like many others was eager to see the finnished item but did comment on patience and the need to take time to get it right.In the end and with hind-sight it needed that little more time. Never mind now though its done and you and Robert have made great efforts and sacrifice to correct these errors which everyone should appreciate.😊 |
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Post by davidconstable on May 9, 2017 7:34:08 GMT
PB is a nice person, but once his mind is set, that is it, it takes a lot to change it.
He has taken over the years to doing a re-write of his rules, making them far more complicated.
The original pre-DBA rules often got discussed in Slingshot, but these days with the diversity of rules, that could not happen.
I tend to think these days that wargamers want an instant pick up and use set of rules, I am of an age which saw the introduction of army lists (no joke), we had to do our research the hard way, NO fanaticus, Google, Wiki, or for that matter online historical texts.
Hopefully a more accurate list of opponents will come out of page 5, but I would not give you any odds better than one thousand to one against them being fully correct (and at those odds I could loose a lot of money), there will always be errors, sorry, unintended consequences, and for that matter disagrements.
David Constable
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Post by Dangun on May 11, 2017 3:35:21 GMT
We shouldn’t be too quick to ridicule Phil Barker for all these errors you know. After all, who should we mock? The person that designed and supplied the information for the army lists?… The people that edited and were supposed to proofread these lists over the years?… Or the people that blindly followed them? So I ask you all once again…who is it exactly that we should be mocking? This sounds very reasonable, but I disagree for two reasons: We pay for this product, and editing can be reasonably expected. Secondly, there are very simple technological fixes to this problem. A simple database would eliminate any non-overlapping dates or inconsistent enemy pairings. Failure to adopt such a technological fix is hard to explain other than by a cumudgeonly personality. Whatever you think of Triumph, the online summary database of army lists, fixes this problem. MeshweshI'd agree though that just wanton personal attacks are probably not very productive. |
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Post by felixs on May 11, 2017 6:23:54 GMT
The corrections are great and very educating to read.
The DBA army lists are a great asset. There is no easier way to build (more or less) historical armies anywhere. The foes and allies lists are great, but obviously partly guesswork (whether this is guesswork by rules authors or guesswork by historians who are not rules authors). That is especially true for the earlier times and for the non-Western regions of the world (arguably even for the non-English speaking regions...).
The lists give workable approximations and that is fine.
If one wants something with more alignment with the sources, one needs to do a lot of research and design armies for specific battles or campaigns.
In practice, there are few problems with the lists. And the corrections here do a great job of sorting out those problems.
What is important, however, is: The RULES are good. And they work.
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