Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[Ewan McNay]

On Tue, 27 Jun 2000, fra paolo wrote:
> The other aspect to all this is that of table size. In Doubles
> competitions, with a lot of figures on a standard sized table, the elephants
> are harder to avoid if one is using a cavalry army.

Yep. The UK doubles comp trend just didn't happen over here (for reasons
of distance, I think). [For the US audience, this involved two
historically-allied armies fighting together vs. two other such armies;
each of the 4 armies at 1250 points, so 2500 per side of 15mm figs on a
6'x4' table.] I *do* remember elephants being much more prevalent in that
environment [Ghaznavid and Med. Indian being the 'killer'] - and hence
Irreg LMI JLS, Sh making a big comeback as anti-elephant troops .

> I have thoroughly enjoyed this discussion, BTW, even though no-one agrees
> with me. I cant say the same about all my experiences of e-lists.

We're so civilised . Anyway, it's difficult to insult someone whose
name is so hard to spell correctly [Again, for the US crowd: I first
met Paul when he was playing 7th with Phil Steele; the common epithet was
"Paul S-to-Z" - although that really requires the UK 'zed' for full
effect]

Ewan

--
Dr. Ewan McNay - Behavioral Neuroscience, Yale University.
(203) 432-7005

Ewan Mcnay wrote:

> Hi Paul (and all)
>
> There was a brief (couple of years, maybe only one) period in
> which Indian armies were popular under 7th. However, the reason for their
> popularity wasn't really the elephants, but the chariots: at that time the
> rules stated that all crew fought on contact. With a fully loaded Indian
> chariot, that was something like ten figures per element frontage on
> contact...

That would make sense. I do remember there was a fashion for chariot armies
for a time. I associate it with the years after the first amendment sheet
(mid-to-late 1980s?), however, and not with the early 1990s.
The other aspect to all this is that of table size. In Doubles
competitions, with a lot of figures on a standard sized table, the elephants
are harder to avoid if one is using a cavalry army.
I have thoroughly enjoyed this discussion, BTW, even though no-one agrees
with me. I can’t say the same about all my experiences of e-lists.

Paul Szuscikiewicz

JonCleaves@... wrote:

> Actually, Paul, we have hundreds of games where 30-point-elephant-based
> armies are not dominating their competition.
> If elephant armies were blowing away their opponents across all army types,
> I'd be into this issue like Sherlock Holmes. I think we have a 'sufficient
> database' and it has not established a problem.

While FHE might have a sufficient database, it is not a “public” database in the
way that sports statistics are kept. Bill James and the sabermetricians of
baseball devised all kinds of new ways of using baseball statistics to make
comparisons. These methods have not been universally greeted with acclaim. But
the
point is that the information to construct their theories was publically
available. Nothing like that exists for ancients. The public picture is a
fragmentary one. I’m not trying to blame people or accuse people of being
secretive: Things have just happened like this because wargaming is a hobby of
amateurs.

Paul Szuscikiewicz

Philip Gardocki wrote:

> I think you will find that the British tournaments of the early 90's were
> mostly rev 6 based. The British were very late in accepting Rev 7, many
> jumped to DBM without ever owning a copy.
>

This was not my experience. All my acquaintances embraced 7th with the
enthusiasm of a convert as soon as it came out. 6th was popular in the West
Country, partly through the efforts of Paul Bailey and Keep Wargaming in
Devizes, Wiltshire, to keep it in print and to keep running tournaments.
(One of those chicken-and-egg supply-and-demand situations, I‘ve always
thought.) However, in London and its environs, including such fabled clubs
of international renown as Pinner and Reigate, 7th was widely accepted.
(And, whisper if one dares, there are those who don’t like DBM and prefer
7th, even though they play and win DBM competitions.)

Paul Szuscikiewicz