Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[joncleaves]

My $0.02

<<Bodies move very independly and,
as long as their are friendly bodies within 120 paces, are completely happy.
Note that 120 paces is wide enough for enemy bodies to advance through.>>

I have trouble reconciling the above. If 120p support distance is enough to
allow close order units to move around like tanks SAFELY, then why note that
120p is enough for someone to move through? Well, the issue is that 120p CANNOT
be charged through unless both shoulders of the gap are routed/already in hand
to hand. If you have someone charging through a gap less than 2E wide without
that condition being met, then you have someone not playing Warrior.
This 120p support rule is designed to reflect that the notion of 'unit' can be
somewhat arbitrary in any ancients game. We take unit to mean a group of men
who identify with one another as 'being together' for combat - under the command
of a single local 'captain'. how many men were in a West Sudanese infantry
'unit'? Don't know - you get to decide. the more groups you want to put these
men in, the more of your total military effort will go into commanding them
separately (command factor points). Where did one unit start believing a unit
nearby would be able to protect their flanks? Also somewhat arbitrary -
Warrior's answer is one foot approach+charge move/less than the size gap an
enemy can charge through.

Read this:

<< Flanks are secondary. Mutual body support
in a single line is relatively worthless.>>

And then what immediately follows it in Mike's post:

<< Kills are gained by, in my
opinion, sending other bodies (typically cavalry or barbarians) between the
blocks of infantry to either flank the enemy, or break through locally.>>

If flanks are secondary and having mutual support in an unbroken line is
meaningless, then why the concern that enemy bodies will gain those flanks? Of
course flanks are not secondary and of course an unbroken line is better than
gaps greater than 2E that the enemy can charge through.

Two 8E hoplite units facing the same way, with front edges along the same line
and 120p from each other cannot receive an enemy charge into the space between
them unless both are in hand to hand and/or routing. Ceratinly it would be
'better' for them to be closer together (at <1E it would not matter if they were
in hand to hand, the space could not be charged into EVER).

I coached some players this weekend about the importance of maintaining a battle
line and the effect in the face of a good general of lots of angles and open
flanks and 'ancient tank infantry blocks'. Then last night I disrespected my
own advice to get an advantage and paid for it (thus better illustrating the
lesson than I had on Sunday....). Warrior is designed to make it hard to move
your units in an ahistorical manner, hard on open flanks, hard on surrounded
units.

<<b. For good or bad, Warrior determines the effectiveness of everything by
what they are armed with and what they are carried. There is a significant
amount of information that training and morale were far more important than
weapons except for extreme differences.>>

I agree with the latter sentence and not with the former. If the former were
true, for example:

-no weapon would fight more than 1 rank (there is no pike as long as 16 ranks of
men - they fight 4 ranks due to formation and doctrine, not the weapon)
-HTW would not resolve to other infantry (trained swordsmen) at 1.5 ranks.
-B's and Reg A's would not get back one random factor minus (a far bigger deal
than 90% of players realize) - same with D's losing a +1.

We do feel however that tech made a big difference, no doubt. I could grab 100
guys and give them swords and train them to stand and take a cav charge for a
week. I could take another 100 for a week and give them 12 foot spears and
large shields. I have no questions in my mind which group would fare better
when the charge came.....

J