Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[scott holder]

I'm going to use this Forum topic as the resource for my flailing efforts to make a niche army playable (wtf I mean by 'playable').

Here's what we ran at Fall In 2022, no issues (with these):

1. Artillery mounted on wagons can both move and shoot in the same bound (but still cannot both prep AND support shoot).

2. Hussite wagons that are mobile may deploy without reorganizing wagon position as a charge response.

3. Hussite Organ Guns have one shooting range, 160p, out to which they fire 2xcrew (six figures firing per model).

4. The recall range for Light Infantry entirely in non-difficult terrain with respect to Hussite Wagons is 80p instead of 40p.

5. Shooters not mounted in wagons with a Hussite wagon ahead of them in their body may also fire 360.

6. Hussite artillery in wagons see over LI and may shoot over LI if all other shooting priorities are followed.

7. Hussite opponents must assign all commands Attack Orders.

8. Hussite wagons must deploy at least 120p away from any table edge.

9. No incendiaries unless your army has them regularly (think fire lances, hand-hurled naptha bombs, etc., basically nobody will equip their Mongol list with fire arrows for example). You will not be able to adjust your lists if you discover you're playing against Hussites. Thus, if you have artillery that's allowed incendiaries, you must purchase them as part of the list from the git go.

For Cold Wars 2023, we're gonna try the following as well:

10. Elephants ignore the effects Fighting Transports provide for a Defended obstacle (opponents will still count higher, I'm gonna take this one slow). As of now, such El that are targets for shooting, the shooters will take the -2 penalty. This one is very much open for changing but we'll see.

[scott holder]

Couple of additional thoughts:

We might also look in the next iteration to see how any interaction between El and wagons plays out in regards to counting opponent higher. Initially I was gonna let El ignore both but for now we'll go one step at a time and see how it plays.

I'm also still toying with limiting 2HCT in wagons to fighting only 1 rank if the first rank is in the Fighting Transport (they could still just line up behind). For Cold Wars we'll stick with the 1.5 ranks like we did at Fall In. There are ways to beat that as Sean showed in his last game with Rich. And of course El in an Open will be a different dynamic, assuming somebody brings an army with em.

scott

[scott holder]

Post-Cold Wars 2023 feedback:

All 10 of the above items, when they came up, worked fine, that includes #10 regarding Elephants.

I am going to drop 2HCT fighting 1.5 ranks if the front rank consists of 2HCT in the wagons. Rich played 2HCT just in the wagons (no 2nd rank) and we all agreed that worked but any more, no.

The final variable that's still on the table (but not changing for now) is how we calculate CPF. A close-order element in a TF counts the entire stand as 9 for CPF purposes. The question has been asked "why aren't they just 5 like other models?. Comparisons to something like Burmese El with gobs of crew, still "just" 5 for CPF. Same with artillery. Keith Stratton put it best at Cold Wars "Wagons don't bleed".

The basic wagon unit composition that Rich has been running comes out to 30 casualties needed for 1 CPF. If we made TF just like other "crewed" models, that would reduce that number to 22. Historically, 30 seems accurate. Again, we'll see after another round of playtesting.

scott

[Todd Kaeser]

I would LOVE to see a Hussite list 1600 or so to see how it would configure - units and costs and such.

Todd

[scott holder]

You can put it together using the following broad constructs:

Both subs, all Knights (basically 4 units of knights)

6E LC Skirmishers

1-2 2E units (not sure at 1600pts but always 1 unit) of Bombards, Irr C

Each wagon unit consists of:

2E Wagons
2E MI 2HCT
2E Shooters in 2nd rank behind wagons. Rich had them as 1E CB, 1E HG but both of us are looking at having the unit entirely of either CB or HG, then the next unit the same, keeping the ratios in mind.
2E Bowmen

All Irr C although Rich is pondering making the 2HCT in the Wagons Irr A.

By game 3 at Cold Wars 23, Rich and Rob had a setup that allowed for offensive action using the Knights and Bombards as the strike force. Mind you, as a strike force, it's not out there from the Wagon frontage too much but they found it a decent enough combo.

Rich is also exploring the Polish Allies as an option, at least at 2000pts. Feel free to post something at 1600pts with the Poles.

Another idea is maybe bring the Poles into play would be to use the Hussite subs as single element HC that are basically always attached to the Bombards. If developing the Hussite strike force per above, then the Knights go with the Sub/Bombard. The CinC commands the wagons, the Poles basically the other strike force.

Again, beats me, I've got too much else on my plate to delve into this much more than those broad brush strokes.

scott