Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[joncleaves]

Rule 16.2 for your perusal. Hot off the presses.

Jon

16.2 EXPENDABLES

16.21 Representation

There are many different types of expendables. Expendables will be
identified as such in army lists. The basic types are:

· Scythed chariots
· Stampeding cattle
· War dogs
· Incendiary pigs
· Incendiary camel carts

Expendables are based as single elements according to 2.5. They are
bodies but NOT units (1.26). No command points are paid for expendable
elements (17.0).
All expendables are Irregular "A".
Other types of expendables may appear in future army lists and will
follow the rules in this section except as noted in that list.

16.22 Expendable Deployment and Command Control.

An expendable may not deploy such that there is a friendly body
between it and any point along the enemy table edge. Expendables deploy when
their command deploys. Expendables may not flank march (14.45) unless their
command does. Expendables may forced march (14.43). All expendables in the
army must forced march if any other bodies do.
Expendables are always subject to RUSH orders, no matter what order
is currently in effect for their command.
Expendables may be placed in ambush if they meet all the criteria for
14.42, but since they are subject to RUSH orders, they will probably not
remain hidden long!

16.23 Expendables and Troop State.

Expendables do not cause other troops to take a waver test for seeing
them rout.
Mounted troops take a waver test when contacted by expendables.
Expendables never rally. Expendables that charge without contact
must continue charges on subsequent bounds in a straight line until exhausted.
Exhausted expendables are destroyed.

16.24 Expendable Movement.

Tac Move March Segments
Scythed chariots move as HCh. 120p 3
War dogs move as LI 120p 4
Stampeding cattle and Incendiary pigs move as herds.80p 2
Incendiary camel carts move as wagons. 80p 2

An expendable may never voluntarily move such that there is a
friendly body between it and the nearest enemy body.
An expendable cannot make counter or retirement moves. An expendable
that faces an enemy unit within 240p may not be turned in such a way as to
not be facing that enemy unit.
Expendables must pursue routing troops and always do so straight
ahead. They may not deviate for any reason. Expendables that pursue off
table never return.
Expendables that rout do so in the first bound directly to their
rear. After that, they move straight ahead. They never deviate for any
reason. They always burst through bodies in their rout path. See 6.32.
If a rout or pursuit move takes expendables into impassable terrain,
they are destroyed.
Expendables are always subject to RUSH orders, even if their command
is subject to RETREAT orders.
Expendables never make recall moves.

16.25 Shooting at Expendables

As targets, expendables are:

Scythed chariots HCh
War dogs LI (no Sh)
Stampeding cattle, Incendiary pigs and camel carts Tr

Expendable elements count as five figures for CPF.
They take results of preparatory shooting as Irregular "A" troops. Since
they must charge unprompted if possible due to RUSH orders, they will only
take a waver test from preparatory shooting if they have no legal charge
target.

16.26 Expendables in Hand-to-hand Combat.

Scythed chariots, stampeding cattle and War dogs fight as an Irregular A
4-horse scythed heavy chariot. In addition, War dogs count their handler as
an armed driver. War dogs must charge at least 80p to get the 'scythe bonus.'
All expendable charges must be impetuous if possible.
Expendables are destroyed at the end of any combat in which they do not
pursue, destroy all opponents, breakthrough or rout. They must breakthrough
if possible.
Incendiary pigs and camel carts fight per 16.27.

16.27 Incendiary Expendables.

Incendiary expendables do not initially appear on the table. The owning
player marks which unit is 'accompanying' any such expendables, no more than
one element per unit. These elements remain off table until ignited.
A player may ignite expendables in the charge phase. The accompanying
unit may not charge in that phase. The expendable element makes a charge
move (80p plus any variable distance if applicable) straight ahead from the
accompanying unit's front. The expendable element is considered an impetuous
mounted charge. It interpenetrates any foot body (enemy or friendly) it
contacts, disordering that body. It causes the same damage as four figures
shooting naptha bombs to any mounted body it contacts. An incendiary
expendable element may be support shot, the effect being to reduce the
'naptha' damage by 1 factor for every CPF caused.
Incendiary expendables are removed before moving on to the next combat
situation.
An accompanying unit may ignite expendables as a counter-charge to a
charge targeted on the accompanying unit.
Incendiary expendables are destroyed if they enter a water feature after
being ignited.
Incendiary expendables may not be ignited by a broken unit.

[Chris Damour]

> Rule 16.2 for your perusal. Hot off the presses.
***SNIP***
> An expendable may not deploy such that there is a friendly body
> between it and any point along the enemy table edge. Expendables deploy when
> their command deploys. Expendables may not flank march (14.45) unless their
> command does. Expendables may forced march (14.43). All expendables in the
> army must forced march if any other bodies do.

Jon,
I like the "An expendable may not deploy such that..."
idea. I do not like the continuation of the "All
expendables in the army must forced march if any other
bodies do." from 7.6. I do not believe that is historical.
May I suggest "All expendables in a command must force march
if any other body in the command does." instead.
This would allow you to deploy scythed chariots in
front of the battle line in the deployment zone in the
center and force march LI on the wings. I believe that such
a deployment was used by the Persians against Alexander,
and the Galatians against the Seleucids. (Pergamenes
maybe? The battle where the phalanx opened lanes in the
formation and let the chariots roll right on through...)
BTW, did you mean to use "forced" instead of "force"?
Thanks for your time and attention.
Chris "My scythed chariots usually rolled down so I stopped
using them" Damour
<<grin>>

[Chris Damour]

> Excellent, Chris. I agree and will change it to "in the command."

Good Lord! Do 'ya mean someone actually LISTENS to me?
I gotta tell my wife... <<grin>>

> Yes, I do mean to say forced march. The march is forced, not a march of the
> force. Neither way is grammatically correct, but this is the lesser of two
> evils.
Sorry, I wasn't trying to beat your chops over it. I
thought that it might have been an artifact of "cut and
paste" editing.
Chris

[joncleaves]

Excellent, Chris. I agree and will change it to "in the command."

Yes, I do mean to say forced march. The march is forced, not a march of the
force. Neither way is grammatically correct, but this is the lesser of two
evils.

Jon

[joncleaves]

Me? Use cut-and-paste editing? Why I'd

never

do that,

Chris.

[Mark Stone]

--- On February 24 Jon Cleaves said: ---

>
> I would not take the war dogs, for one thing. Top players are too good at
> dealing with expendables and they are guaranteed points lost. The chances are
> you will need to keep your points ratio down and that you won't be able to
make
> them pay for themselves. They also aren't my 'style'.
>

I'd like to reiterate Jon's point here. Lately I've played several games against
Lenney Hermann where he's been toying around with scythed chariots, and it's
really driven home to both of us just how hard they are to use effectively.

As I've been thinking about these recent games, I've realized that one of the
biggest negatives of expendables is that they slow the game down. Instead of
battle lines coming to grips on Bound 2 or 3, there's always a kind of "holding
one's breath" period while waiting to see what the expendables do. I typically
have some light troops well forward of my main battle line just for this
purpose, and thus things that would normally happen on Bound 2 are happening on
Bound 4 instead.

In my opinion, this can be a disaster for both players, as it greatly compresses
the remaining time to get a decisive result. The last three games Lenney and I
played the scores have been 2-1, 3-1, and 4-3. In the three games combined, the
scythed chariots have routed one LI unit, shaken one LI unit, and participated
in killing an HC unit that was going to die anyway with or without the scythed
chariot (the HC had just routed an enemy unit, watched everyone pass their
resulting waver tests, and thus was the proud recipient of a double flank
charge).

Now, the 4-3 result isn't so bad. If I'm in a tourney against a veteran player,
I'd feel pretty good about being on either end of that score. But for a guy
running scythed chariots to average 5 points over 3 games is just not
acceptable. I honestly feel one would get more value out of spending the points
on some additional LI that overall can do a more effective job of channeling the
battle in the desired direction.


-Mark Stone

[Ewan McNay]

Interesting. I've always used the scythes to speed the game up by
(assisting in) clearing away any opposing LI screen, pinning the enemy,
forcing him into reactive mode, and acting as a far-flung screen to allow
my own rapid advance.

Despite their low factors against LI, they're great tools for clearing
opposing LI: they force a waver when charging, act as a cause of unease
for said waver, and can almost always burst through which may cause a
second waver and will certainly leave behind a LI unit which is rallying
disordered and easy to kill. And this leaves my own light screen intact
and unoccupied, hence able to seize space/harass/whatever.

If the enemy puts the LI into brush to avoid these problems - well, then
the scythes ignore him and try to do some real damage or force mounted wavers.

As I said, interesting. Running expendables is an art, and one which is
often held in contempt .

Mark Stone wrote:

> --- On February 24 Jon Cleaves said: ---
>
>
>>I would not take the war dogs, for one thing. Top players are too good at
>>dealing with expendables and they are guaranteed points lost. The chances are
>>you will need to keep your points ratio down and that you won't be able to
>
> make
>
>>them pay for themselves. They also aren't my 'style'.
>>
>
>
> I'd like to reiterate Jon's point here. Lately I've played several games
against
> Lenney Hermann where he's been toying around with scythed chariots, and it's
> really driven home to both of us just how hard they are to use effectively.
>
> As I've been thinking about these recent games, I've realized that one of the
> biggest negatives of expendables is that they slow the game down. Instead of
> battle lines coming to grips on Bound 2 or 3, there's always a kind of
"holding
> one's breath" period while waiting to see what the expendables do. I typically
> have some light troops well forward of my main battle line just for this
> purpose, and thus things that would normally happen on Bound 2 are happening
on
> Bound 4 instead.
>
> In my opinion, this can be a disaster for both players, as it greatly
compresses
> the remaining time to get a decisive result. The last three games Lenney and I
> played the scores have been 2-1, 3-1, and 4-3. In the three games combined,
the
> scythed chariots have routed one LI unit, shaken one LI unit, and participated
> in killing an HC unit that was going to die anyway with or without the scythed
> chariot (the HC had just routed an enemy unit, watched everyone pass their
> resulting waver tests, and thus was the proud recipient of a double flank
> charge).
>
> Now, the 4-3 result isn't so bad. If I'm in a tourney against a veteran
player,
> I'd feel pretty good about being on either end of that score. But for a guy
> running scythed chariots to average 5 points over 3 games is just not
> acceptable. I honestly feel one would get more value out of spending the
points
> on some additional LI that overall can do a more effective job of channeling
the
> battle in the desired direction.
>
>
> -Mark Stone
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
>
>

[joncleaves]

>
> As I said, interesting. Running expendables is an art, and one
which is
> often held in contempt .>>

Just to be clear, I totally agree and do not hold Warrior expendable
art in contempt. It is 6th/7th expendables i hold in contempt. :)

But Ewan makes a great point here (setting the record for Ewan-Jon
agreements in one day...). I can't tell you how many times someone
has thrown their LI in front of my Scythed chariots and acted like
they had outfoxed me....lol

War dogs don't cause that waver, as they are not mounted. But for
hitting LI in brush - or better chasing off LC/HC who don't want to
waver, hard to beat...

J