Sundry List Changes - proposal

[nikgaukroger]

Being a number of changes that seem to have general approval based on discussions. There will be a separate one for Duty & Glory.


1. Polish Hussars (in any list), Louis XIV French (early and late), and Later Swedish Determined Horse currently classified as Impact Mounted, Swordsmen to be optionally classified as Impact Mounted, Pistol on an all/none basis.

2. For every base of Medium/Heavy Artillery in an army 6 bases of foot Battle Troops must be taken.

3. Later TYW Swedes (but not Weimarians) to also get 0-2 Heavy Artillery and give them a max of 6 artillery in total up from 4.

4. Spanish gendarmes currently rated as Superior and having the Light Lancers Impact capability can alternatively be fielded as Average with Heavy Lancers capability at the appropriate points cost on an all/none basis. (Will trawl the lists to specify exactly which troops this will apply to)

5. TYW French before 1643 minima for Chevaux-leger, etc. raised to 8 bases.

[Vespasian28]

Happy with all these

[timmy1]

Happy with all these other than 2 which should not be in the core rules.

[nikgaukroger]

New item number 5 added. Needed to be consistent with Duty & Glory change as well as being right anyway

[nikgaukroger]

4. Spanish gendarmes currently rated as Superior and having the Light Lancers Impact capability can alternatively be fielded as Average with Heavy Lancers capability at the appropriate points cost on an all/none basis. (Will trawl the lists to specify exactly which troops this will apply to)

I think this only applies to the following:

Caroline Imperialist - Spanish men-at-arms

Early Imperial Spanish - Guardias viejas

Later Imperial Austrian and German States - Spanish men-at-arms

Includes the allied lists for these armies as well, obviously.

[madaxeman]

I still think 2 penalises some of the Eastern armies too much, by making it mathematically impossible to field much mounted after buying the now-compulsory foot

12 bases of foot per artillery BG, or even 10 bases per BG would be an alternative, or 6 bases per gun up to the first 4 guns would still fix things for European armies whilst leaving mughals and Ottomans etc or even of a chance to work at 800ap

[timmy1]

I find myself agreeing with Tim...

[nikgaukroger]

I still think 2 penalises some of the Eastern armies too much, by making it mathematically impossible to field much mounted after buying the now-compulsory foot

Can you give me a couple of list examples where you think it screws things up please. When this was originally debated, and when raised again as part of this process, nobody has yet demonstrated the concern in any concrete manner - and IIRC the original debate showed that a normal Ottoman list was still perfectly viable. I seem to recall a lot of the opposition disappeared when it was pointed out that mob are Battle Troops.

Equally it has been subsequently used as a pretty standard comp rule and as far as I can see it works - unless there have been an unusual dearth of eastern type comps in the last 2+ years.

Happy to look at a mitigation if it can be shown that this does penalise. At present I am unconvinced.


For example an Early Ottoman taking 6 guns would need 36 bases of Battle Troop infantry - this can be made up of, say, 16 Janissaries, 8 Azaps and 12 Mob. I don't think that is unusual for an Ottoman list anyway.

[DavidT]

I am happy with all of them except 2.

One option with Early 30YW Swedes is to take a cavalry force with minimum infantry - I like to think of this as the Swedish army at the crossing of the Lech, where the main army sat back as a diversion and wasn't involved and the battle was fought by a small number of infantry, most of the Swedish artillery and the majority of their cavalry. This is an historical example of a cavalry force being supported by lots of artillery and minimum infantry.
Proposal 2 means that I will need to field two Swedish brigades as there are 2 compulsory artillery and, as Swedish brigades are expensive, this means I cannot have many cavalry and cannot take a viable cavalry option with the Swedes.
If you need it at all, make it 6 bases for the first BG of artillery and 6 bases per artillery stand after that and this might be OK.

[madaxeman]

I still think 2 penalises some of the Eastern armies too much, by making it mathematically impossible to field much mounted after buying the now-compulsory foot

Can you give me a couple of list examples where you think it screws things up please.

For example an Early Ottoman taking 6 guns would need 36 bases of Battle Troop infantry - this can be made up of, say, 16 Janissaries, 8 Azaps and 12 Mob. I don't think that is unusual for an Ottoman list anyway.

Sorry, I'm posting this on holiday so I don't have my lists with me (!) to do the math, but I'm thinking of Ottomans and Mughals who do sort of want 6 guns - maybe in 2 unwieldy batteries. Your ottoman artillery park plus supports looks like, erm, 330-odd points (?), plus Generals to me, leaving only around 350 or so for cavalry and LH.

[Jhykronos]

Sorry, I'm posting this on holiday so I don't have my lists with me (!) to do the math, but I'm thinking of Ottomans and Mughals who do sort of want 6 guns - maybe in 2 unwieldy batteries. Your ottoman artillery park plus supports looks like, erm, 330-odd points (?), plus Generals to me, leaving only around 350 or so for cavalry and LH.

AFAIK, the six guns aren't compulsory, are they? Should these armies be entitled to that optimal force composition? Does it actually resemble historical forces? (I'm genuinely curious here)

[Jhykronos]

I like to think of this as the Swedish army at the crossing of the Lech, where the main army sat back as a diversion and wasn't involved and the battle was fought by a small number of infantry, most of the Swedish artillery and the majority of their cavalry. This is an historical example of a cavalry force being supported by lots of artillery and minimum infantry.

Here's the problem with that logic.

In 218BC, the Roman army of Scipio senior faced the Carthaginian army of Hannibal in the general area of the Po and Ticino rivers. One battle was fought before winter, and at that battle, the composition of the Roman army was about 3000 cavalry and 7000 light infantry. Now based on that, should the ancients lists be updated so the Republican Romans don't have to take any legionaries?

[vexillia]

What about Hungarian/Translyvanians?

[nikgaukroger]

What about Hungarian/Translyvanians?

What about them?

[madaxeman]

Sorry, I'm posting this on holiday so I don't have my lists with me (!) to do the math, but I'm thinking of Ottomans and Mughals who do sort of want 6 guns - maybe in 2 unwieldy batteries. Your ottoman artillery park plus supports looks like, erm, 330-odd points (?), plus Generals to me, leaving only around 350 or so for cavalry and LH.

AFAIK, the six guns aren't compulsory, are they? Should these armies be entitled to that optimal force composition? Does it actually resemble historical forces? (I'm genuinely curious here)

They were known for having "big" artillery parks and "lots" of cavalry on both wings. This is already quite hard to achieve even with existing foot minima, to the point at which Ottomans are rarely seen on table. Perhaps the other points revisions will fix part of this anyway, but if infantry are 6 per gun it becomes even harder.

I'd also argue that once you get past 4 guns there is a bit of a law of diminishing returns, so the compulsory foot tax becomes more harsh. Likewise with 2 batteries of 3 being materially worse than 3 batteries of 2. Possibly even Heavy Guns and their limited ability to traverse also are not really that much better than Mediums. Between all of these I would hope there was some opportunity to exercise a bit of subtlety in how this rule is implemented

[DavidT]

I like to think of this as the Swedish army at the crossing of the Lech, where the main army sat back as a diversion and wasn't involved and the battle was fought by a small number of infantry, most of the Swedish artillery and the majority of their cavalry. This is an historical example of a cavalry force being supported by lots of artillery and minimum infantry.

Here's the problem with that logic.

In 218BC, the Roman army of Scipio senior faced the Carthaginian army of Hannibal in the general area of the Po and Ticino rivers. One battle was fought before winter, and at that battle, the composition of the Roman army was about 3000 cavalry and 7000 light infantry. Now based on that, should the ancients lists be updated so the Republican Romans don't have to take any legionaries?

Other FOG-R lists have special campaigns to cover this sort of thing e.g. the Scots Covenanters have special options for the Battle of Philiphaugh and I believe that there are similar specials for some of the Ancient & Medieval lists. So maybe this is something which should be included in a Republican Roman list as a special. It's not needed as a special for the Swedes as, currently, the existing rules and lists allow the Swedes to represent this.

[Jhykronos]

Other FOG-R lists have special campaigns to cover this sort of thing e.g. the Scots Covenanters have special options for the Battle of Philiphaugh and I believe that there are similar specials for some of the Ancient & Medieval lists. So maybe this is something which should be included in a Republican Roman list as a special. It's not needed as a special for the Swedes as, currently, the existing rules and lists allow the Swedes to represent this.

Small changes in troop availability for a special campaign is one thing, but every general in history had the option of taking a portion of their army on a special mission.

[Jhykronos]

They were known for having "big" artillery parks and "lots" of cavalry on both wings. This is already quite hard to achieve even with existing foot minima, to the point at which Ottomans are rarely seen on table. Perhaps the other points revisions will fix part of this anyway, but if infantry are 6 per gun it becomes even harder.

I'd also argue that once you get past 4 guns there is a bit of a law of diminishing returns, so the compulsory foot tax becomes more harsh. Likewise with 2 batteries of 3 being materially worse than 3 batteries of 2. Possibly even Heavy Guns and their limited ability to traverse also are not really that much better than Mediums. Between all of these I would hope there was some opportunity to exercise a bit of subtlety in how this rule is implemented

I'll give you that... and pinning down historical numbers and OOBs for the Ottomans is not an easy thing, either.

Of course, you start doing favors for the Ottomans and the Mugals, and the Safavid players (both of them) are going to start bellyaching about why only those armies get special treatment...

Here's a thought... didn't those two armies also make substantial use of fortifications for their foot as well? Maybe allow fortifications to count as stands in the calculation for the ratio, or something.

[ravenflight]

Sorry, I'm posting this on holiday so I don't have my lists with me (!) to do the math, but I'm thinking of Ottomans and Mughals who do sort of want 6 guns - maybe in 2 unwieldy batteries. Your ottoman artillery park plus supports looks like, erm, 330-odd points (?), plus Generals to me, leaving only around 350 or so for cavalry and LH.

AFAIK, the six guns aren't compulsory, are they? Should these armies be entitled to that optimal force composition? Does it actually resemble historical forces? (I'm genuinely curious here)

They were known for having "big" artillery parks and "lots" of cavalry on both wings. This is already quite hard to achieve even with existing foot minima, to the point at which Ottomans are rarely seen on table. Perhaps the other points revisions will fix part of this anyway, but if infantry are 6 per gun it becomes even harder.

I'd also argue that once you get past 4 guns there is a bit of a law of diminishing returns, so the compulsory foot tax becomes more harsh. Likewise with 2 batteries of 3 being materially worse than 3 batteries of 2. Possibly even Heavy Guns and their limited ability to traverse also are not really that much better than Mediums. Between all of these I would hope there was some opportunity to exercise a bit of subtlety in how this rule is implemented

Would "two BGs of 'foot battle troops' per BG of Artillery" fix this?

That way you would be able to take 2 big unweildy BG's of Heavy guns, and would neeed to take only 4 BG's of 'battle troops'.

[timmy1]

No. If you had three Early Tercios you could only take one BG of artillery.