Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[John Murphy]

Okay, I'll open myself up to being bombarded here. Let me just say
that this whole post should be understood with a giant "in my opnion"
which I will not bother inserting into it everywhere.

I don't know if Paul G is on the Warrior e-group list and I guess that
he is really the one to ask.

I've been mulling over the Dark Age Warrior Maurikian Byzantine army
list - an army which I have had for a few years and on which I have
done some amount of reasearch. There are a few items that just seem
not quite right and after considering wether to raise the issue I
have decided to go ahead and post this message. All said, I admit my
experience with the rules is much less than most of those who make
these kinds of comments - but I think the nature of the comments has
more to do with the history than the details of the game mechanics.

Let me begin by saying the list is a lot better in my opinion than the
old lists from 6th edition, or for that matter than the DBM lists. I
am guessing that the troop usages, based on my limited playing
experience, are much closer to what one imagines from reading the
source material. But unfortunately the list seems to have in common
some quirks from the older editions of the DBM army list which I only
mention as an aside since that is clearly out of scope here.

First of all, why have the boukellarioi and optimates become required
troop types rather than, for instance, having a noted "if any used"
asterisk next to their minima? To the extent that they are even
mentioned at all in historical sources, both were, together with the
foederati, the component units of a supposedly elite opsikion (later a
theme) stationed in Northwest Asia Minor near the capitol. Throughout
most of the empire they would not have been necessarily present unless
trotted out for a major campaign like an old Roman praesental army -
which is basically what they were derived from. There would be plenty
of border conflicts in which they would not be there. And even at a
major conflict such as Yarmuk I haven't seen any source claiming they
were present - although there is dire lack of that kind of specific
OoB material on that battle it appears that the Byzantines may have
used mainly local or "provincial" forces there.

Also, more contraversially, what is the basis for removing the
double-armament from the line troops, particularly veterans? This
seems to have happened back in the NASAMW list revisions days. It
would seem that the Strategikon can clearly be interpreted either way
depending on the passage chosen - so why force one choice rather than,
say, an option to add L to the LC and B to the HC/EHC? The possibility
mentioned by some that the rules are not friendly to L-armed LC
doesn't really answer this as an historical question especially when
they'd still have bows anyway. And why make the bouk's all HC instead
of splitting them HC/LC like the line troops? Other sources would seem
to imply line troops with LC detachments or seperate LC units as in
the list (without really indicating wether they have lances to go with
their bows or not) but also either mixed HC/LC units, which is how I
suppose the list explains them, or double armament - or for that
matter both.

Finally why force the Optimates to be Irr since thieir degree of
Romanization in organization, training and equipment seems to be open
to historical debate? Glad to see you gave them the option for lances
at least - a step in the right direction.

Anyway, without wishing to open a can of worms on a list on which
someone did a lot of work and made it much improved, I'd still like to
ask these questions.

[scott holder]

All I can say is that in this case, such questions should be directed to
Paul Georgian. He provided me with a rough outline of the lists vis a
vis the Fast Warrior lists. I then drafted each list, submitted them to
him, he edited them, I then incorporated those changes. In a couple of
instances, we discussed how to handle certain things in terms of fitting
his reading of the historical data into a Warrior construct.

We all feel that the best authority we have on Byzantines and how they
should be represented is Paul. I defer to his judgement on these
issues.

The questions below are all good ones, please don't take this email as
an out-of-hand dismissal of them. But, this is a good time to point out
the inherent "interpratory" nature of list work. And as I mentioned in
the notes, people have been "interpreting" the Strategikon for years so
why should this list be any different? hee hee hee hee.

>>> jjmurphy@... 5/30/02 3:05:00 PM >>>
Okay, I'll open myself up to being bombarded here. Let me just say
that this whole post should be understood with a giant "in my opnion"
which I will not bother inserting into it everywhere.

I don't know if Paul G is on the Warrior e-group list and I guess that
he is really the one to ask.

I've been mulling over the Dark Age Warrior Maurikian Byzantine army
list - an army which I have had for a few years and on which I have
done some amount of reasearch. There are a few items that just seem
not quite right and after considering wether to raise the issue I
have decided to go ahead and post this message. All said, I admit my
experience with the rules is much less than most of those who make
these kinds of comments - but I think the nature of the comments has
more to do with the history than the details of the game mechanics.

Let me begin by saying the list is a lot better in my opinion than the
old lists from 6th edition, or for that matter than the DBM lists. I
am guessing that the troop usages, based on my limited playing
experience, are much closer to what one imagines from reading the
source material. But unfortunately the list seems to have in common
some quirks from the older editions of the DBM army list which I only
mention as an aside since that is clearly out of scope here.

First of all, why have the boukellarioi and optimates become required
troop types rather than, for instance, having a noted "if any used"
asterisk next to their minima? To the extent that they are even
mentioned at all in historical sources, both were, together with the
foederati, the component units of a supposedly elite opsikion (later a
theme) stationed in Northwest Asia Minor near the capitol. Throughout
most of the empire they would not have been necessarily present unless
trotted out for a major campaign like an old Roman praesental army -
which is basically what they were derived from. There would be plenty
of border conflicts in which they would not be there. And even at a
major conflict such as Yarmuk I haven't seen any source claiming they
were present - although there is dire lack of that kind of specific
OoB material on that battle it appears that the Byzantines may have
used mainly local or "provincial" forces there.

Also, more contraversially, what is the basis for removing the
double-armament from the line troops, particularly veterans? This
seems to have happened back in the NASAMW list revisions days. It
would seem that the Strategikon can clearly be interpreted either way
depending on the passage chosen - so why force one choice rather than,
say, an option to add L to the LC and B to the HC/EHC? The possibility
mentioned by some that the rules are not friendly to L-armed LC
doesn't really answer this as an historical question especially when
they'd still have bows anyway. And why make the bouk's all HC instead
of splitting them HC/LC like the line troops? Other sources would seem
to imply line troops with LC detachments or seperate LC units as in
the list (without really indicating wether they have lances to go with
their bows or not) but also either mixed HC/LC units, which is how I
suppose the list explains them, or double armament - or for that
matter both.

Finally why force the Optimates to be Irr since thieir degree of
Romanization in organization, training and equipment seems to be open
to historical debate? Glad to see you gave them the option for lances
at least - a step in the right direction.

Anyway, without wishing to open a can of worms on a list on which
someone did a lot of work and made it much improved, I'd still like to
ask these questions.




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