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My friend a couple years ago showed me a game called field of glory and I was very interested. Unfortunately all our other gaming friends wanted to get into 40k instead, so we played that for a few years, then quit when GW's gak got to be unbearable. Now we are looking for a new game and my friend brought up field of glory. Some of us are on-board one of the problems is we need an ear-book to choose. Right now it's a choice between "Wolves from the Sea" (the dark ages as my friend likes the Welsh) or "Decline and Fall" (the Byzantines and all that craziness). We already have army ideas for the two eras, but we want to know which one is more newby friendly to you veterans? Also if you have any other tips for us it is greatly appreciated for we don't really know what we're doing...

Have you taken a look at SAGA? It covers the same periods, is very hot right now and incredibly easy for beginners to pick up, yet takes a lot of skill to master.

Conversely, I don't hear a lot of buzz about Field of Glory these days.

FoG is kind of a tough system for beginners, I think. It's very dense, especially if you've got the first version of the rules.

I do know that many FoG players (who migrated in from DBM) are now looking at L'Art de la Guerre as the next big thing in 15mm, tournament-tight Ancients and Medieval wargaming. Bonus for you guys in that included in the book are army lists for both periods you're interested in.

You can check out a review here and a tournament report here.

Alternatively, the newest version of DBA just came out, and I'd bet it'd be pretty cheap to put together armies for both (Welsh and Anglo-Saxons or Vikings, Byzantines and Arabs). I'm putting together Ancient British and Early Imperial Romans, and the only reason why I've broken $100 for the project is because I bought an Out of Print Corvus Belli DBA army set at a local convention.

NickP wrote:
Have you taken a look at SAGA? It covers the same periods, is very hot right now and incredibly easy for beginners to pick up, yet takes a lot of skill to master.

Conversely, I don't hear a lot of buzz about Field of Glory these days.

Ive heard great things about Saga. Though if I am correct (I may very well not be) Saga and FoG handle very different numbers of troops.

 carlos13th wrote:

NickP wrote:
Have you taken a look at SAGA? It covers the same periods, is very hot right now and incredibly easy for beginners to pick up, yet takes a lot of skill to master.

Conversely, I don't hear a lot of buzz about Field of Glory these days.

Ive heard great things about Saga. Though if I am correct (I may very well not be) Saga and FoG handle very different numbers of troops.

You are correct.

Saga deals with individually based troops, of about 12 - 50 men on each side.

FoG deals with element based troops, with about 60 - 200 elements in an army (or 200 - 500 figures per side, depending).

My Republican Romans (I think they call them "Middle Republican") have about 320 figures in the army. The Gauls have about 500 figures in the army. My Carthaginians have about 400 figures in their army. The Iberians have about 450 figures. I don't yet have any Dark Ages Armies, but things like Saxons, or Vikings are roughly equivalent in numbers to the Carthaginians or Gauls.

The games have very different scopes, as well as investment levels in time and money.

MB

So what about the combat mechanism? Is one better than the other, Saga and FoG that is. I happen to be a fan of large armies, so FoG sounds good. But in your experience what would you would have liked to know before taking up FoG? Any tips?

-50KDP!!! wrote:
So what about the combat mechanism? Is one better than the other, Saga and FoG that is. I happen to be a fan of large armies, so FoG sounds good. But in your experience what would you would have liked to know before taking up FoG? Any tips?

That the game become deadly dull after a while.

Because units (Battlegroups) in FoG do not recoil, the games become rather stagnant after contact has been made.

This tends to turn all games into a march to the middle..... And then nothing.

Which is why I went back to playing Hoplon after playing FoG for a couple of years.

I think I may have mentioned it.

I do not know if you are aware of the older WRG games, by the names of DBA, and DBM or DBMM.

These, like FoG, are massed combat games.

But they removed much of what had attracted people to ancients in the 1970s and 80s. People liked them for a while, but DBA and DBM really became nothing but exercises in geometric ploys (maneuvering "elements" or "bases" of figures with mm precision to JUST the right location to totally screw up your opponent). DBA and DBM used no "Units" of any kind, nor did they have a Morale system (which the author just decided was "useless" - odd how this was the first thing anyone put BACK into Ancients rules after this).

So, a rules writer in Greece (who had written a Napoleonic game that was popular in Greece and Turkey), wrote a set of rules that added back to DBM most of what attacked people to ancients (Units, equipment differences, general variation, and Morale).

The game has not seen the popularity of either DBM or FoG (because of a lack of name recognition), but it is a far superior game to both (from everyone I know who has played it).

I can send you a PDF copy of the rules, if you get me your email address.

As far as the Army lists, they are also available (but I am currently re-editing them into a more useful format for the author - so if you tell me which army lists you are after, I can edit those first, and then send you copies).

But I would still choose FoG over a game like DBM, WAB, or any other ancients/medieval set that wasn't Hoplon.


MB


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh, and it is difficult to compare the combat mechanisms of FoG and Saga.

FoG uses unit-unit combat.

Saga uses individual-individual combat.

The two are very different.

MB

I would love to see the other version. Thank you.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, for the army lists, we're looking for Justinian Romans/Byzantines and Ostrogoths. Like the Gothic War.

SAGA is for skirmishes - 1 figure = 1 man.

FoG is for big battles.

If you want to play a newer, better, big battle game, take a look at Sword & Spear. The basing is the same as FoG, so a lot of FoG players have switched to it.

http://polkovnik.moonfruit.com/sword-spear/4583102656

Try to look past the 1990's website design.

I note that DBA has been a popular and successful system for 25 years, so it clearly has some merits despite not including a clear morale mechanism.

However let's not argue about the merits of individual rulesets.

The main point is that if you buy an army and base it for the "WRG standard" base sizes, used in WRG Ancients, DBA, DBM, FoG, Hoplon, Impetus and others, it will be compatible with 80% of the rule books on the market.

I think you would have more fun using Hail Caesar by Warlord.

-50KDP!!! wrote:
I would love to see the other version. Thank you.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, for the army lists, we're looking for Justinian Romans/Byzantines and Ostrogoths. Like the Gothic War.

Sorry for taking so long.

I just sent a PMN explaining the delay.

I am just about to start working on converting the Dark Ages Lists, beginning with these two (since they are the armies I tend to like in this period).

Give me about a week.

MB


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Empire1 wrote:
I think you would have more fun using Hail Caesar by Warlord.

I have been looking at Hail Caesar. It is a huge improvement, as far as Rick Priestly's venturing into Ancients goes. Warmaster Ancients, and the Supplement for it was a pretty big learning curve for Priestly stepping out into the complexities of real world warfare and the sorts of things requiring abstraction or depiction in the game.

I think it a better Fantasy System (For the "Hail Sauron" adaptation) than it is a proper Historical System.

But it does play well. I cannot recall if it uses traditional WRG basing, or if it is more Warhammer basing.

I am thinking, since it is primarily a 28mm system, that it is a 20mm basic figure frontage, which 28mm figures these days should be. Really the WRG standard for 28mm should just be 2x that for 15mm.

But... I have only played it once, and it worked well for Romans and Gauls, which tends to be the archetypical matchup of Ancients rules.

MB

I thought Warmaster Ancients was a pretty playable rulebook, though it is a bit lucky in terms of how many command activations you might get if lucky, and have a cavalry unit romp all over the map.

Hail Caesar looks fun from battle reports. If the basing is not WRG compatible, you could fairly easily convert it and make armies that work with Hail Caesar and all the rules that use standard WRG base widths. These include the original WRG Ancients, Warrior, DBA, DBM, DBMM, Field of Glory, Impetus and Warmaster as well as many other rulebooks.

I argue that the 20mm square bases used by WHFB and WH Historical are impractical (as shown by the frequent use of movement trays) as well as incompatible with most other rulebooks. Since WHFB and WH Historical are now defunct, unsupported rulesets, it is fairly likely their basing systems will fade away.

Are 20mm square bases incompatible with WRG basing? I thought WRG basing was 60mmx20mm, which would mean 3 20mmx20mm bases standing next to eachother would get you your WRG compliant setup.

Unless I am confused (I may very well be, I only just started looking at DBA the other day) 20mm bases would be best for all systems, assuming you could also magnetize them to stick to appropriately sized movement trays

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I thought Warmaster Ancients was a pretty playable rulebook, though it is a bit lucky in terms of how many command activations you might get if lucky, and have a cavalry unit romp all over the map.

Hail Caesar looks fun from battle reports. If the basing is not WRG compatible, you could fairly easily convert it and make armies that work with Hail Caesar and all the rules that use standard WRG base widths. These include the original WRG Ancients, Warrior, DBA, DBM, DBMM, Field of Glory, Impetus and Warmaster as well as many other rulebooks.

I argue that the 20mm square bases used by WHFB and WH Historical are impractical (as shown by the frequent use of movement trays) as well as incompatible with most other rulebooks. Since WHFB and WH Historical are now defunct, unsupported rulesets, it is fairly likely their basing systems will fade away.

I completely agree that the 20mm square bases for WHFB and WAB are impractical, and tend to have little basis in fact (for representation of troops).

My point was that the 20mm Frontage was appropriate. The depth is a problem, and just because you have a 20mm frontage does not mean one need limit a single figure per base.

The claim was to have a WRG standard based upon a 20mm frontage, which is 2x the 15/18mm frontage (and similar depths).

So, 28mm heavy infantry would be four figures to an 80mm x 30mm base.

And, Warmaster Historical was a good start, but it failed to account for all manner of ancient troops (specifically during the Hoplite to Imperial Roman period - such as the Caetrati/Hammipoi who could support Cavalry or Light Horse - but there were others).

It was a good start, but suffered from problems of many kinds due to the 3 base/unit as well (turns out that the rules incorporate the fix to this already. It is just that most people did not see it). For instance most Phalangites, and Gallic Barbarian Warbands would be in units that were significantly larger than what would be 3 stands (4 to 6 would be more appropriate).

But.... It failed to launch, so to speak. It had a lot of hype and people tried it, but ultimately the Ancients players rejected it fro the same things I constantly rant about (lack of a standard ground scale to abstract units). Due to this, you had archers who were shooting some 3,000 yards, with an explanation that was not sufficient to account for it. As Rick Priestly might have learned at the time, archery in ancient armies was rarely as effective as we tend to think (due to episodes like Agincourt throwing a bias). But when there were not sufficient justifications for the assumptions of play, people abandoned it.

MB

Rihgu wrote:
Are 20mm square bases incompatible with WRG basing? I thought WRG basing was 60mmx20mm, which would mean 3 20mmx20mm bases standing next to eachother would get you your WRG compliant setup.

Unless I am confused (I may very well be, I only just started looking at DBA the other day) 20mm bases would be best for all systems, assuming you could also magnetize them to stick to appropriately sized movement trays

That might be true but due to historical accident the WRG base sizes were established many years ago and players have huge number of armies based up for them and don't want to have to rebase. For example, I have three armies in 15mm and two in 28mm, all based for WRG element widths.

What it is is that in all the rulebooks that use the WRG standard width base, the depth of the base and the number of figures on the frontage help to indicate the formation type of the unit depicted. Width (frontage) is more crucial than depth.

So for example a heavy infantry unit will have four figures on a 40mm front (15mm scale) or 60mm front (28mm scale), while a light infantry unit will have only two figures. Depending on the rulebook, the HI unit will have one or other combat advantage versus the LI unit, either by having more figures fighting or just from a tactical bonus. However the key point is that the other players expect to be able to recognise the general type of unit they are facing from its appearance.

This doesn't mean you couldn't use WHFB based figures on sabots as you said, and just adjust the element width to say 80mm to accomodate four figures. You might want to make a slight adjustment to movement rates too, otherwise units will wheel rather slowly, but this IMO is not crucial and would not usually have a massive effect on battles. At any rate it would affect both sides equally if they were using WHFB based figures.

If you adjust movement to base-widths, as the new DBA/DBMM rules do, then the wider frontage is not an issue, as ANY Frontage will wheel at the same rate relative to its frontage.

The point I was trying to make is that we need to shift the "WRG Standard" so that 28/30mm bases (elements) are exactly 2x the dimensions of the 15/18mm figures.

The 60mm frontage can work for 28mm figures (with the specified number of figures), but they have become very crowded on that 60mm frontage when compared to 15mm figures.

I have begun to base all of my 28/30mm fantasy and Ancients/Medievals on 80mm frontages, with depths twice that of the 15mm depths for the same troop type.

The bases just look better than cramming everything so closely.

And.....

It allows people with WAB/WHFB figures to fight against other's non-WAB/WHFB armies without having differences of frontages.

It is simply time to do this, the older crowd's time is passing.

MB

60mm frontage was adopted when historical figures were mostly true 25mm. There has been scale creep.

80mm frontage would allow compatibility with WHFB based armies.

I want to rebase my Aztec army anyway, so I"ll think about changing to 80mm wide, though I think in the FoG and DBA rules, nearly all the units are three figures to a base.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
60mm frontage was adopted when historical figures were mostly true 25mm. There has been scale creep.

80mm frontage would allow compatibility with WHFB based armies.

I want to rebase my Aztec army anyway, so I"ll think about changing to 80mm wide, though I think in the FoG and DBA rules, nearly all the units are three figures to a base.

For 80mm frontages:

For FoG:

HI: 80mm x 30mm: 4-figures per Base.
MI: 80mm x 40mm: 4-figures per Base if Drilled, 3-figures per Base if Undrilled.
LI: 80mm x 40mm: 2-figures per Base.
Knights/Cavalry/Camelry: 80mm x 60mm: 3-models per Base.
Light Horse/Light Camelry: 80mm x 60mm, 2-models per Base
Cataphracts: 80mm x 60mm: 3 or 4-models per Base
Light/Heavy Chariots & Elephants: 80mm x 80mm/100mm: 1 chariot or elephant per Base

For DBx (DBA, DBMM, HotT, Hoplon):

Blades/Swords, Spears, Pikes/Sarissa: 80mm x 30mm: 4-figures per Element
Warband/Barbarians: 80mm x 40mm: 4-figures per Element, 3-figures if Fast (Non-Fast may also be mounted on 80mm x 30mm Element)
Auxilia/Peltasts, Bows/Archers: 80mm x 40mm: 4-figures per Element if Regular (Reg), 3-figures per Element if Irregular (Irr)
Psiloi: 80mm x 40mm: 2-figures per Element
Knights/Cavalry/Camelry: 80mm x 60mm: 3-models per Element
Light Horse/Light Camelry: 80mm x 60mm: 2-models per Element
Cataphracts: 80mm x 60mm: technically 4-models per Element, but 3-models per Element if the figures won't fit.
Double-Elements/2E-Elements: Double the width of a typical Element of whatever type, with two ranks of the appropriate type figures.
Double-Element Wedge Knights/Cavalry/Cataphract Elements: 80mm x 100mm: 1-model in front rank, 2-models in second rank, 3-models in third rank.

The distinction for infantry between 3 and 4 figures is important, as it allows for the identification of things like Close-Order Warbands, or Legionaires, and Loose-Order Auxilia or Warbands. Or the difference between a trained Phalanx of Spearmen, and a mob of guys who happen to be armed with spears.

Trust me... The differences in number of figures on the particular sized bases/elements (An "Element" is just a base, with 2 to 4 figures, or 1 - 4 models on it) is an important part of why the rules systems who have adopted these distinctions have tended to have a greater staying power than rules that do not allow such easy distinction between various troop types.

Historically, what we call "Heavy Infantry" was remarkably easy to pick out from their marching and fighting formations as opposed to "Medium Infantry" (what DBx puts on 80x40 bases, with 3 or 4 figures - the depth and fewer figures meant the troops were much more spread out during their marching, which could be easily distinguished from the tighter formations of Heavy Infantry types).

MB

In the old WRG 7th rules, which my Aztecs are based for, a lot of the Aztec army was considered to be regular LMI therefore being based four to a base.

I thought LMI was only based 4 to a base if Regular in 7th edition.

7th basically established Element Basing (the 40m / 60mm frontages for 15mm / 25mm), and the figure counts for the various figures.

Reg 40x20 troops were/are 4 to a base/element, and Irr were/are 3 to a base/element.

Are Aztecs Regular troops?

MB

That's true. Reg LMI can be based four to an element. I think it was an option in 7th because it may not have been allowed in 6th, but I would have to check to be sure.

In the Aztec list all the "Knights" are Reg A LMI in 6th and 7th edition, while the bulk of the infantry can be upgraded to Reg LMI. Only the warrior priests have to remain Irr.

DBA v3.0 rates them as 3Bd or 5Hd, so I may have to rebase everything, partly depending on what FoG says.

I agree that it is most important to keep the base sizes compatible, then you can play whatever you want.

Since FoG canged hands I think the support is not exactly good and the e reader is not at all convenient to use. I feel this may contribute to it slowly fading away.

BeAfraid: do you plan to release Hoplon outside the yahoo group? I think it is a hurdle to get the rules, as not everyone wants to subsrcibe or is this a copyright problem? if you could send me the pdf that would eb rgeat, as I would be interested to give them a go.

I did not know that FoG had chnaged hands but I think it is more that Osprey published it on behalf of the designers because Osprey have such good experience in wargame publishing.

To me, the game is complete. The designers had the benefit of decades of experience with Ancients casual and tournament play. They did a lot of play testing and the rules were pretty good in their first edition and only needed a bit of tidying up for the v2. There are about 15 army books covering a huge variety of armies.

I don't see it needs any more material.

Slitherine have concentrated on variants of the rules to cover the other main historical periods like Renaissance and Napoleonic. This is exactly what WRG did after their Ancients rules became a good success.

I agree, the game is good as it is. I was refering to the e-reader, which is just horrible in comparison to other readers in terms of navigation, lack of a search function etc. I should have bought the physical book, I know, but the idea of the reader did appeal to me.

 infinite_array wrote:
FoG is kind of a tough system for beginners, I think. It's very dense, especially if you've got the first version of the rules.

I do know that many FoG players (who migrated in from DBM) are now looking at L'Art de la Guerre as the next big thing in 15mm, tournament-tight Ancients and Medieval wargaming. Bonus for you guys in that included in the book are army lists for both periods you're interested in.

You can check out a review here and a tournament report here.

Funnily enough it's the same with the gaming groups around here, moving away from FoG and to L'Art de la Guerre. Haven't played it myself yet but heard some excellent things about the game system.