Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[joncleaves]

<<[Digression: I was once again amazed at how little LI I faced. I took
all the reg LI available to me, and it was critical to allowing me to
get the line into action and dictate the battle (as well as contest
some terrain). In none of the three games did I face an opposing line
of force-marched pickets, meaning that I had a tempo from the start. I
know Jon in particular disagrees with the need/desire for LI. Well,
I'm unpersuaded again .]>>


I think you're being unpersuaded by the wrong combination of conditions. I
see the matchups you had and I see other issues than those players not
choosing LI. But that is just me...

Any chance you'll take the 1600 point version of that list to HCon? One
can only hope...but I would bet against it...

<<[Digression again, and JON ALERT: rules Qs. Neither from my games, but:
1. a unit of El has elected to halt from 2 CPF in prepfire. It is
then charged and either recoils or routs the chargers. May it/must it
follow up? It's a compulsory move, but they're under mandatory halt.>>

It has to follow up - it is mounted and such is compulsory.

<<2. Should the Mongol list rule for picking up terrain be dependent on
table size? With only 3 terrain picks on a 4x3 table, and being able
to pick up two of the opponent's, they never saw a single piece of
terrain on the table. Perhaps make this 'pick up n-2 pieces'?]>>

No, we playtested it with short tables/points and are comfortable with the
rule as written.

<<My final game brought a third cav army, Normans. This was a much
better balanced force, though, including two 6E MI JLS, Sh units and
two units of LI along with 3x2E IrrC LC and a massed force of IrrA and
IrrB HC L, Sh. >>

Again, I draw a different lesson from this matchup with your army and the
players involved than the requirement to take LI...lol For example, I'd be
commenting on someone taking two 6E MI JLS Sh in a 1200 point tourney long
before I first made mention of LI ratios...

<< The small LC units were heroes - they got caught
between the battle lines while shielding the HC from prep fire, all
exhausted, and then proceeded to pass the next eleven waver tests for
further fire.>>

Another example: someone allowing themselves to be taking 11 waver tests has
bigger issues than he didn't take sufficient LI...

<<So, I'm not sure that I learnt as much as I might have done about the
Tang, given that I fought three opponents with massed cav and
vulnerability to bowfire.>>

Now, that I agree with....

J




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[Ewan McNay]

I decided to take Mark Stone's advice for PointCon and give Later Tang a
try - also as I expect it might be a potential opponent at CW in a
couple of weeks. I was very, very lucky with opponents' armies and
terrain, but nonetheless this did indeed feel like a very potent force.

At 1200 points, I had (from memory, but I'm pretty sure):

CinC in 2E Reg A/B unit of HC L, B, 1/2 Sh
2E Reg C HC L, B, 1/2 Sh
3x 2E Reg C LC B
3x 6E Reg D LI B
3x 8E Reg D (1E Reg C) MI LTS, B, 1/2 Sh
6E Reg D LMI B
3x 2E Tibetan mercenaries: 1E IrrB SHC L, B, Sh + 1E IrrC MC L, B

In all games, my terrain picks were Open / Hill / Hill. The intent -
and
the actuality - was to narrow the frontage using steep hills but make
sure
that I had an open plain for the spear blocks.

Game 1: against Tibetans. Pretty historical! - and I confess that it
was
good to see so many historical matchups on the tables. We had Midianite
against Early Indian (and the Indians also fought the Sumerians);
Mongols
against Hohenstaufen; I fought three other Chinese-plateau armies;
Greeks
against Indians; and so on.

The Tibetans had gone for a more expensive strike cav setup - rear
ranks of IrrB EHC - and had some extremely useful JLS, B, Sh terrain
infantry who rapidly persuaded my LI and LMI that they did not really
want to fight for the steep hill on my left (the only terrain). Their
main line was IrrC LC B, though, which had to split fire rather than
concentrate on the MI, allowing the MI to fire without fear of taking
2CPF (and hence a waver) in return. Incidentally, shielded SHC with B
are perhaps the ultimate in good fire-splitting troops. So, along the
line on the centre and right the Tang pressed forward slowly and the
opposing LC slowly approached exhaustion. On the left, close to the
steep hill, the Tibetans had massed their heavy cav, and eventually the
CinC took himself and a second SHC unit into the leftmost MI block.
The SHC had got to within 80p while being shielded from bow fire, and
one of the LMI units had come off the hill to add a little fire into
the spears' flank, so we could not take the risk of firing in prep, and
the SHC hit fresh (but not impetuous, a questionable decision).
Support fire was mediocre, but the non-CinC SHC unit rolled -3 in
combat and broke off, leaving the CinC stuck in the middle of the spear
block. [On even dice, even without support fire, the SHC units do not
do a CPF to the spear block - hence my thought that they should go in
impetuous even though that gives the spears an extra +1]. In the
following bound, I blocked off access to the overlapping spear
elements, and so the CinC was facing 18 fresh spears - exit one CinC,
and everyone decided that was enough reason to go home; simultaneously,
on the right, some SHC had managed to turn the LC flank, and two
Tibetan mercenary units both rolled long when chasing LC who had to go
into column - and that was the game.

Round 2 brought a truly fortunate opponent for the Tang: Northern
Dynasties Chinese in an all-cav option. Something like 5 units of 4E
LC B and 6 units of HC L, B, Sh with a token unit of LI B.

[Digression: I was once again amazed at how little LI I faced. I took
all the reg LI available to me, and it was critical to allowing me to
get the line into action and dictate the battle (as well as contest
some terrain). In none of the three games did I face an opposing line
of force-marched pickets, meaning that I had a tempo from the start. I
know Jon in particular disagrees with the need/desire for LI. Well,
I'm unpersuaded again .]

The opposing Chinese missed their first two terrain picks, meaning that
I could get two steep hills: one on the right flank at table centre,
and one extending out of the opposing deployment zone on my left.
Honestly, this game was decided on approach phase 1. The opposing cav
line had set up half on those steep hills, and chose to approach 40p
rather than march off. That took them completely out of the game; they
never made it off the hill, and that meant that the flank where they
could have brought some pressure to bear never happened. To be fair,
trying to fight a wall of LTS, B with HC was never going to be fun, but
the actual battle was short, violent and gruesome. To make matters
worse, the Northern Chinese found themselves up against Midianites in
round 3!

[Digression again, and JON ALERT: rules Qs. Neither from my games, but:
1. a unit of El has elected to halt from 2 CPF in prepfire. It is
then charged and either recoils or routs the chargers. May it/must it
follow up? It's a compulsory move, but they're under mandatory halt.

2. Should the Mongol list rule for picking up terrain be dependent on
table size? With only 3 terrain picks on a 4x3 table, and being able
to pick up two of the opponent's, they never saw a single piece of
terrain on the table. Perhaps make this 'pick up n-2 pieces'?]

My final game brought a third cav army, Normans. This was a much
better balanced force, though, including two 6E MI JLS, Sh units and
two units of LI along with 3x2E IrrC LC and a massed force of IrrA and
IrrB HC L, Sh. The small LC units were heroes - they got caught
between the battle lines while shielding the HC from prep fire, all
exhausted, and then proceeded to pass the next eleven waver tests for
further fire. One got to 41 CPF before it finally vanished, a record
for me.
Up until now my SHC had merely trundled along behing the spear blocks.
here, though, they had an important role in taking out the JLS
infantry which could beat up on my spears - while avoiding being caught
flat-footed by impetuous IrrA HC! I was helped rather by the Norman
Sub going onto Rush orders at game start - so I was able to draw the
one unit of opposing LHI JLS, Sh into an impetuous charge at some LC,
leaving it on a compulsory rally right in front of a spear block: 32@1
tired the LHI, and then the spears could win the combat. On the right,
my Tibetans continued their stellar performance by rolling +4 on
contact with a JLS block to send them home, and the blocking LC meant
that an IrrA Norman unit had to charge home alone into a spearblock
which rolled +2 on support fire; 24@4 against a 6-man HC unit did not
leave many alive to make contact.

So, I'm not sure that I learnt as much as I might have done about the
Tang, given that I fought three opponents with massed cav and
vulnerability to bowfire. However, the regular LTS, B line with SHC in
reserve behind able to come through any gap desired when the spears
contract is a potent force. None of my opponents placed any
significant terrain, and I suspect that having to fight over a few
pieces of brush would have made life significantly harder. Good to
know if I'm facing Tang in the future.

I might consider upgrading spear blocks to front-rank HI, especially at
2000 points: it does lose much of the cheapness advantage, but it makes
life much easier when facing opposing bow-armed troops. There's
another unit of Tibetans available; I was happy with the rear rank as
MC, so they're only 100 points per unit, a bargain. Probably though
this army is best at 1600; I suspect that at 2000, you run out of
sufficient troops that you really want. Weaknesses: probably
elephant-pike armies; I still think Late Romans; terrain; oddly,
possibly opposing SHC armies.

Anyway - I had a great time meeting friends again. It's worth
repeating how impressed I was with Asif - denying Dave M's Mongols a
5-point win while running an experimental (and highly suboptimal) army
setup is no small achievement for a new player.

> Anyway - I had a great time meeting friends again. It's worth
> repeating how impressed I was with Asif - denying Dave M's Mongols a
> 5-point win while running an experimental (and highly suboptimal)
army
> setup is no small achievement for a new player.

Thanks Ewan - I highly appreciate the praise, especially coming from
you "Machine Gun".

Although, in Dave's defense, he got caught on a rules hang up about
cancelled charges, and I was also fortunate to have my 2 LC skirmisher
units hang up a large chunk of his skirmishing flank force for as long
as they did.

As for sub-optimal list, you got THAT right! That's the last time I
ignore a friend's advice and try out some of my hare-brained ideas at
a tourney!

I have to add a big shout out to everyone who came to Point-Con. I
had a blast, and it was a lot of fun to meet people and attach faces
to names I've seen on this list.
-------------------------------------

My only pet peeve would have to be the small size of the gaming
tables. One of the reasons I like playing 15mm as opposed to 25mm is
that on a 4x6' table, there's more room to roam, and it allows mounted
troops and light skirmishers to do more. On the smaller 4x3' table,
it was a lot easier for people to just do what you did - take large
blocks, anchor around some terrain to help compress the table even
more, and blast away with large numbers of figures at anything that
got close. Trying to penetrate THAT with cavalry is rough -
especially with a cagey and experienced opponent at the helm of
said "wall-to-wall" force.

I'm just curious to know if 4x3' is the standard size for 1200pt
battles? It's something for me to keep in mind for the future when
designing my forces.

That and the d#mn mongols stealing all my terrain! (mumble,grumble)

Regards,
Asif

[Todd Schneider]

We use 4x4 tables for 1200 point games here in the
midwest, but AFAIK thats not the rule, its up to the
director.

Todd


--- shahadet_99 <shahadet_99@...> wrote:
>
> > Anyway - I had a great time meeting friends again.
> It's worth
> > repeating how impressed I was with Asif - denying
> Dave M's Mongols a
> > 5-point win while running an experimental (and
> highly suboptimal)
> army
> > setup is no small achievement for a new player.
>
> Thanks Ewan - I highly appreciate the praise,
> especially coming from
> you "Machine Gun".
>
> Although, in Dave's defense, he got caught on a
> rules hang up about
> cancelled charges, and I was also fortunate to have
> my 2 LC skirmisher
> units hang up a large chunk of his skirmishing flank
> force for as long
> as they did.
>
> As for sub-optimal list, you got THAT right! That's
> the last time I
> ignore a friend's advice and try out some of my
> hare-brained ideas at
> a tourney!
>
> I have to add a big shout out to everyone who came
> to Point-Con. I
> had a blast, and it was a lot of fun to meet people
> and attach faces
> to names I've seen on this list.
> -------------------------------------
>
> My only pet peeve would have to be the small size of
> the gaming
> tables. One of the reasons I like playing 15mm as
> opposed to 25mm is
> that on a 4x6' table, there's more room to roam, and
> it allows mounted
> troops and light skirmishers to do more. On the
> smaller 4x3' table,
> it was a lot easier for people to just do what you
> did - take large
> blocks, anchor around some terrain to help compress
> the table even
> more, and blast away with large numbers of figures
> at anything that
> got close. Trying to penetrate THAT with cavalry is
> rough -
> especially with a cagey and experienced opponent at
> the helm of
> said "wall-to-wall" force.
>
> I'm just curious to know if 4x3' is the standard
> size for 1200pt
> battles? It's something for me to keep in mind for
> the future when
> designing my forces.
>
> That and the d#mn mongols stealing all my terrain!
> (mumble,grumble)
>
> Regards,
> Asif
>
>
>
>

[Ewan McNay]

shahadet_99 wrote:
> I'm just curious to know if 4x3' is the standard size for 1200pt
> battles? It's something for me to keep in mind for the future when
> designing my forces.
>
> That and the d#mn mongols stealing all my terrain! (mumble,grumble)

I'm not sure that you can complain *both* about having too little space
*and* about having terrain removed .

However - yes, a 4' frontage is standard for 1200 points, whether 3' or 4'
deep. There's not much difference in troop density on a 6' frontage,
though; the difference perhaps is that terrain pieces do not change size
as the table shrinks.