Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[Chris Bump]

In a message dated 09/05/2001 4:32:34 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
martin.jerred@... writes:

<< I want a rules system that acts as an administrative model based
on identifiable/accountable precedents from history so that Vikings *do*
fight as Vikings as per the historical record [and this means the "against
whom" is their historical opponents]. Once that is decided upon [and broken
down into it's constituent building block data points, ie JLS or 2HCW; LMI
or HI; etc] >>

Martin, I think that you make my point here. I was not purporting that
a-historical opponents should be the deciding factor as to their performance
or ability, but rather that they cover so much time and potentially so many
opponents and stood in both loose and close formation and fought with a
multitude of weapons and varied in class of morale and hence eagerness that
to try and make them generic as a genre on a matrix would be to disserve them
and likely make them worse than they already currently are vs non-historical
opponents.

As to whether or not the rules were written primarily as a set of rules for
historical match ups that allow other or visa versa, I do not know. I
obviously was not involved nor do I know Phil. The very act of simplified
categories of troops, armor and weapons that does not take into account
advances in technology seems to support the idea that as he was designing
this the thought was how to easily play a what if. But I have no evidence to
support that.

Chris

[joncleaves]

I'll throw this kerosene on the fire:

Whether or not Phil B had a-historical what-ifs primarily in mind with WRG 7, we
do not with Warrior. As we have been playtesting, we satisfy ourselves first
that historical matchups work as best we can make them.

>Message: 5
> Date: Tue, 04 Sep 2001 19:58:51 -0000
> From: deothoric@...
>Subject: Re: let the whiners begin
>
>Hi Boyd ! Maybe we're the only two on both lists ? So if you're not
>happy with DBM and not happy with Warrior, maybe you could do better ?
>
>thrill us and we shall come !
>
>(Derek Hannan, NYC, playing DBM almost exclusively but willing to be
>wooed).
________________________________________________________________
Nope you're not, and I suspect there are more lurking quietly in the wings
;-)

Like many [I suspect] I want Warrior to work.....I just have this crisis of
faith when it comes to optimism.

As Boyd has said the DBM list has enough facile arguments in it, enough to
make the "open letter" issue here a mockery.

Gamers are gamers regardless of the rules and will [seemingly] argue to
death anything [and I do mean anything] in endless, frustrating circles. Do
not confuse this as being constrained to one or another "games system", it's
not even constrained to the genre "wargames"

Cheers
Zippee
[UK]

Subject: Re: let the whiners begin

vercengetorix@... writes:

Not exactly. What I am trying to say is that 7th had
layers of unnecessary manual calculations. vikings
fought as vikings reguardless of spear, javelin, or
sword. I do not want to reinvent the DBM bandwagon,
but some simplification would be helpful.
< snip>

in reply: cncbump@... writes:

This is where we part ways again. Vikings fought as Vikings vs whom? They
are Vikings in this game for flavor only. In a chess format they are troop
types with a variety of weapons and armor and could just as easily be almost
any dark age army. I am afraid that once such simplifications were made
there would be no differentiations between Varangians and Bondi fighting for
the Normans. That cannot be your desire. Where would you place them in a
matrix? They may have done well historically against historical opponents,
but how should they do against SHC or Knights. I believe that the whole
premise of WRG is the what if of a-historical matchups.
____________________________________________________________
[MJ] Whilst I accept that this is your opinion [and that you're entitled to
it], I couldn't disagree more. A-historical is the oddity as far as I'm
concerned. I want a rules system that acts as an administrative model based
on identifiable/accountable precedents from history so that Vikings *do*
fight as Vikings as per the historical record [and this means the "against
whom" is their historical opponents]. Once that is decided upon [and broken
down into it's constituent building block data points, ie JLS or 2HCW; LMI
or HI; etc] the matrix impact of non-historical match-ups resolves itself.
Under no circumstances in my opinion should a-historical performance be the
driving force.
___________________________________________________________
cncbump@... writes:

We just happen to
use it for Ancient rules set aswell.

[MJ] No, NO, NO, - it is first and formost an ancient rules set [well early,
mid and late medieval as well] It just happens to get used for competitions
which just happen to consider it easier to not set historical
boundaries/limits [because it is easier] and because not doing so can lead
to interesting situations.

<snip>

Cheers
Zippee
[UK]

[scott holder]

I want a rules system that acts as an administrative model based
on identifiable/accountable precedents from history so that Vikings *do*
fight as Vikings as per the historical record [and this means the "against
whom" is their historical opponents]. Once that is decided upon [and broken
down into it's constituent building block data points, ie JLS or 2HCW; LMI
or HI; etc] the matrix impact of non-historical match-ups resolves itself.
Under no circumstances in my opinion should a-historical performance be the
driving force.

>Let me stress, as the sorta "historical philisophical force" behind Warrior
(since Jon has become the "author" in the nuts and bolts context), this is
EXACTLY what we do and it's a carryover from Phil who took the exact same
approach. We are interested ONLY in ensuring that the "contemporary vs
contemporary" matchups have the historical effects (as interpreted) intended.
Anything doofy that happens outside of that is taken into account but only to
a very very very small degree and then only if we see a potential consequence
that really is outta whack. And offhand, I can't think of any:):)

Scott
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