Introduction
This is a long rambling post on how I have moved from my Ancient
Battlelines Clash rules to a new rules set, When Warriors Collide to replay
ancient battle scenarios. And two quick
battle reports with the new rules.
Background
After testing out lots of
fast play ancient rules sets on a 2’x2’ table, in 2012 I then decided to
write my own solo fast play rules and test them out replaying ancient battle scenarios
from the Peter
Sides booklets.
My rules could best be described as a combination of Bill Banks Ancients
and Justified
Ancients combined with the reaction-type
mechanisms of Rally Round
the King. More details and design
notes on these rules are on its own blog page
for Ancients Battlelines Clash.
In 2018 after hundreds of games with ABC (and about only a
third of the way through the Peter Sides scenarios) I became unsatisfied with
some minor aspects of the rules. This
led to 3 years of ad hoc changes and revisions, some minor, some more major,
some then abandoned. Played some more
games but really not feeling the love for any of these changed rules. Liking, but not loving. At the end of 2021 I started from scratch
with Bill Banks Ancients but added in many ABC elements. It is a different enough ruleset but similar
enough to some gridded rules I did try out that combined Bill Banks Ancients
with ABC. These gridded rules are called
When Warriors Collide. So this new
ruleset can be When Warriors Collide version 2.
These rules are different to BBA, ABC and WWC 1.0 but contain elements
of them all and am currently enjoying playing with them.
Bill Banks Ancient to
When Warriors Collide – resolutions.
At the end of 2021 I was looking at some rules I could play
to play some very fast games on a small grid as I was getting interested in Imperator
again. I dug out Bill Banks Ancients
(BBA) as I was thinking I could just use them.
Also, I knew there was an Ancients CyberBoard game box
so it would be easy for me to playtest these on the computer. I ended up making quite a few changes to BBA
to end up at When Warriors Collide (WWC).
Bill Banks Ancients is a hex grid, ABC is free form. One thing that I really like about Armati (my
favourite Ancients rules) is that two units can frontally be meleeing an enemy
unit. Hard to do with square grids but
easy to do with hex grids by units facing to a hex spine rather than another
hex. This was an early variant to the
BBA rules and one I have always liked for BBA.
My first change to BBA is facing it to a hex spine.
I do like in BBA are the combat values when ordered and
disordered and how that is tightly linked to the combat 1d6 CRT table (with
1:1, 2:1, 3:1 ratio columns). My first
foray in my own set replaced the CRT with JP Kelly’s 1d6 variant that replaced
the 3 column CRT and ratios with modifiers to a d6 roll and have used this 1d6
mechanic that ever since in my rules. But
it is not the same and not as nuanced as the CRT. So my first resolve was to keep the CRT (it is
easy to memorise and I can reproduce it from memory even 30 years after first
playing BBA) and also keep the ordered/disordered combat values where possible.
The next resolve was to keep the turn sequence. This is basically IGOYGO (each player turn is
player move, other player shoots, player melee). ABC uses a right to left and test for group
activations.
The last resolve was to minimise the unit types - keep only
the BBA ones and only add any if absolutely necessary. This should not be hard as my existing rules
uses unit types very much the same as BBA.
I would then add things from ABC that I was passionate about
including in an ancients ruleset that was missing from BBA. These are mainly movement restrictions,
reducing missile ranges and making light units more vulnerable.
So how did I go with
my resolutions?
Keep the CRT.
I have kept the CRT.
One thing I have considered is changing a die roll result of
3 on the 2:1 table from a DD to an M.
This would then enable a single d6 type result where 1=AD, 2-5=M,
6-7=DD, 8+=DE and modifiers of 1:! Is +0, 2:1 is +2, 3:1 is +3. Only the 2:1 die roll of 3 doesn’t fit unless
changing it to an M result. But really,
I am sticking with the CRT and if I really feel that 2:1 causes too much DD I
will change it.
I really like combat being based on ratios and the 1:1, 2:1,
3:1. I have seen, and been guilty many
years ago, of creating further results for 3:2, 5:2 etc but the game really
works with the three ratios and I believe really manages to capture combat
without having +1 or -1 combat values dramatically affecting the game. The combat values are selected to work
against different unit types and creating a more nuanced CRT seems to ruin
this. Of course, I defeat some of this
argument by changing some of the combat values…
Keep the combat values
I could not help but change the combat values.
The first change I made is disordered phalanx is 3 not
2. This brings it into line with
disordered heavy infantry. The main
change is it makes light infantry just as effective against a Phalanx and Heavy
infantry. I tend to think a phalanx,
even disordered would be as effective as disordered heavy infantry.
The second was to make Mixed Missile 1 not 2 whether ordered
or disordered. MM at 2 is really too powerful against other infantry – these
are supposed to be peltasts and skirmishes.
But what is does mean is it reduced their effectiveness against mounted
units. To reflect this I gave them a * rating and so now they are doubled
against mounted units.
See later but missile ranges are a lot less and once in
melee a missile unit will melee, not use missile fire. A reason to add the * to Mixed Missile is so
when in combat with mounted they do as well they used to. Well, not as badly anyway.
Due to missile armed unit meleeing against units one hex
away rather than using the missile table, this also meant I needed to give the
* rating to Light Archers, disordered Heavy Archers and disordered Chariots for
a similar reason. Actually, the
disordered Chariots, the * rating worked
out well as in BBA Chariot on Chariot melees would end up 3:1 once one was
disordered and one was not. Now it is
2:1 like other cavalry melees.
Disordered Chariots still fare the same against infantry as in the
original game. The * rating to missile
units has stood up to some playtesting.
I was concerned it would not work very well but seems Ok and I like that
is was already something in the rules (the * factor) and am not adding in
complexity.
Keep the turn sequence
I may go back to doing a group at a time – i.e. move a
group, do any enemy missile fire at that group, melee with the group and then
activate the next group. For now, the
simple first side moves, other side fires, first side melees works and is just
as easy to mark a unit and walk away mid turn and come back later to take u
where I left. I can see myself going
back to group activations again (where a group does everything when activated)
but all one side then the other side is keeping
the rules simple.
Minimise the unit types
This section will only really make sense if you are
familiar with Bill Banks Ancients.
Summary: same unit types with some tweaks.
Only one chariot type still.
MM represents my LI and SK.
Light Cavalry by default has the B attribute.
Thought about a Shock cavalry e.g. companions as Combat Value
(CV) 6 but decided against it.
I changed the leader concept – units are elite and are
x2. They also are worth a lot more to
panic rating. There is now only one
leader ant the only advantage to the leader is they can rally units. For a few
games I did not use this and was using leaders take care of elite units that –
the leaders in scenarios will start on the elite units. So Companions will be heavy cavalry with a
leader. Leaders are not removed (see
later) so this neatly managed to remove the necessity of providing for elite
units. Poor heavy infantry can be
represented by CV 2 infantry, and poor cavalry by CV2 cavalry, these latter two
already exist in the game. The original
BBA scenarios also did this, for example representing early Roman poor cavalry
using this method. However, leaders do
not really move and if using leaders to represent elite units, why not just
make them elite?
I renamed Light Infantry to Medium infantry as Light
infantry sounds too light and these are really warbands, poor heavy infantry
etc.
I added a Warband unit type but this already exists in BBA
as a Light infantry unit that is x3 once as per BBA – I just defined them in
the rules rather than as described as a optional rules.
Movement restrictions
Movement rates are huge in BBA. Infantry move 2, Heavy Cavalry move 5. Most scenarios have battlelines starting 2-4
hexes away from each other. And a unit can
turn 60 degrees when moving into a hex.
So flanking is easy and moving around the battlefield is easy.
I halved movement rates – All infantry moves 1, All mounted moves
3, except Knights, Chariots and Elephants move 2. I did for a while have Mixed Missile moving 2
but after playtesting this in a few games it did not work.
I also implemented simple turning restrictions – Heavy
infantry units can move or turn, Cavalry and can move and turn (1 movement
point per hex turn). Light cavalry and Mixed Missile can move or turn as much
as they want.
Reduced missile ranges
Reducing movement values also meant reducing missile ranges. Now A fire range is 2 and B fire range is 1.
Light units more vulnerable
Light Cavalry and Mixed Missile are destroyed if disordered
for a second time (i.e. on an M or a DD result and already disordered).
Other changes
Leaders are not removed and replaced as per the sequence of
play. A leader stays with a unit throughout the game. However, a leader may move to another unit as
per the existing rules and will DD the unit it is moving from.
I also renamed Panic as army rout and it is based on unit breakpoint
values rather than combat strength. The
games ends on a Panic/army rout.
End note
Despite the numerous changes, the aim was the provide a more
constrained game so units are less able to dash all over the table, and provide
more nuances to the units combat values. It is not really Bill Banks Ancients anymore,
but the bones are there!
It also provides for a game with less rules and fiddly bits
than my previous Ancients Battlelines Clash, and the QRS easily fits on one
page. Even going from hexes to hexless
just required a few extra phrases here and there.
Bonus playtests
I began playing these rules in CyberBoard using Megiddo
as the battle. I played three full games
of Megiddo using this venerable electronic play assist software.
 |
| CyberBoard game in action |
All were such great fun and different and wanted to play
some more games of the same battle. I thought I should really be using my
miniatures. Firstly it was going to be with 6mm and I printed off a hex
grid. Then I decided it should really be
with my preference of 15mm so quickly drew up a hex board on a spare piece of
cardboard. Just after completing the
temporary hexboard I then thought – why not just use free measurements to see how
it goes? I should really give the rules
a go on a 2’x2’ table converting 1 hex to 1 basewidth (40mm) of movement. I like grids, hexes are ok – both regulate
movement and take all the fiddle-ness out of freeform movement. I am used to freeform movement and don’t feel
like creating a special grid/hex board to play.
Battle of Megiddo 1457BC
Scenario
Egyptians
3 Chariots, CH
3 Medium Infantry, MI
2 Light Archers, LA
2 Leaders
Breakpoint: 9
Allies
2 Chariots
2 Medium Infantry, MI
3 light infantry, MM
2 Leaders
Breakpoint: 8
Deployment
Game 1
The Egyptians will advance in the centre and probe with
their left flank.
Egyptian chariots charge.
It will be 2:1 on the enemy chariots without a leader, 1:1 with the leader
Vs leader (or the clash with no leaders).
The left flank advances slightly to bring the archers into range.
Both Chariots are armed with missiles so it becomes a melee
(if only one had missile it could have had a missile attack).
 |
| Chariots clash |
The result: one Allied chariot disordered, two Egyptian ones
disordered (the centre and the left one).
The Allied turn has their right flank move off the hill to
clash with the Egyptian left flank.
Otherwise they would just sit there and take the missile fire from the
longer range of the Egyptian bows.
Disorders distributed.
The Chariot clash continues and sees one chariot from each
side eliminated (including an Egyptian leader).
 |
| Overview of melee status |
An Egyptian chariot charges into the flank of the remaining
Allied chariot and disorders it. On the
Egyptian left flank they manage to rout the two mixed missile units.
 |
| New state of play |
The remaining allied chariot in the centre is routed under
the flanking attack of the opposing chariots.
 |
| The final chariot melee |
This causes the
allies to break and they flee the battlefield.
 |
| The final positions |
Game 2
 |
| Deployment |
This time everyone on the Egyptian side advances. The Chariot combat sees all of chariots
disordered.
 |
| End of Egyptian turn |
The Allies have to advance their flanks, otherwise the
longer range light archers will just pick them off. The light t archers on both flanks fail to
inflict anything in retaliation of the advance.
The centre Egyptian chariot is routed.
 |
| One Egyptian chariot routed |
In retaliation, one of the Allied chariots is routed. All other melee result in mostly
disorders. Subsequent melees see the
last Allied Chariot routed and a right flank mixed missile.
 |
| The end is nigh |
The loss of an Allied left flank mixed missile sees the
Allies panic and flee the battlefield.
 |
| End game. |
Verdict
This second game sort of followed the first. In one of my CyberBoard games, the
Egyptians were unlucky and lost all their chariots and lost the game. I also tried a game where the Egyptian right
flank moved against the Allied left flank but that ended badly for the
Egyptians as well.
I did the battle twice on the 2’x2’ table and worked OK so
gone is the hex grid for now. I have begun my continuation of the
Peter Sides historical battles with these rules so expect to see some blog
posts with these sometime later. I am
also writing the rules out so these will get posted sometime later too. When I started the conversion to Bill Banks Ancients I was thinking of using Cyberboard to play out a lot of historical games. But having got miniatures out on the table that idea has fallen to the wayside.
Lol, and while searching internet to get a link
to Bill Banks Ancients I came upon a thread on TMP from
2014. In it there is a suggestion to
use 10mm figures with Heroscape
terrain. In 2014 I had no Heroscape but now I do. I had forgotten about them when thinking
hexes. Maybe I will give the rules a go
on a Heroscape but don't hold your breath :-)
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