Clash of Spears ancient skirmish game

This is a play test of a new rule set due out in December written by Alvaro Erize from the US.

We have had a couple of games previously but this one had a greater familiarity with the rules after re watching a video of the game here.

This game pitches a Roman supply convoy against marauding Gauls trying to intercept it. The Romans have a coupe of units of Gallic allies hanging around.

The first part involves scouting until all of the scouts are locked. Light units send out 2 scouts, one of which is a dummy. Those familiar with Chain of Command will be familiar with this mechanism. This picture shows all of the scouts locked. The dice record the number of movement action each scout has made. This can affect the starting fatigue number when units are placed on the table so take care how far they move.

Units are then placed on the table alternatively depending on where the scouts are.

The final units are placed on the table.

First blood to the Gallic raiders who have targeted the Gauls allied to the Romans.

In this game the active player gets 3 actions including the usual move, fire, melee, rest etc. Some of these generate fatigue others don't. After the players first action he must say if he intends doing another. If he does his opponent gets the chance to react with one action.

This unit of archers supporting  their Roman allies has, for example, five fatigues already having performed 2 actions. They have been fired at which also generates fatigue. As fatigue increases effectiveness reduces accordingly.

These are the lads attacking the archers. 

Unit of 8 legionaries takes its first casualty having formed close order and advanced to the cover of the hedge.

At the end of each turn all of the action dice are removed but any units that have not used all of their actions automatically rest removing the fatigue accordingly. For example a unit with 4 fatigue that has only used one action will drop to 2 fatigue.

The convoy advances as archers come out to meet them in support.

A Roman unit also heads out to support the convoys approach

The archers fire.

Behind the main building the Gallic allies are attacked by archers with devastating results, 4 casualties.

Another volley finishes them off as there is only one figure left the fatigue being double or higher the unit is removed.

The convoy makes its way towards safety.

The screen of archers takes more casualties.

The Gauls fail to dislodge the Romans from behind the hedge.

The Romans win initiative and switch to open order allowing them to move faster and gain the safety of the large house with the suppies

The Roman/Gallic casualties.

The Gauls only lose 5 figures!

Despite the disparity in casualties the Romans succeeded in saving their supplies so a victory to them.

We will be checking how we used the rules and apply any mistakes when we play another game next week. 

These seem to be a very nice set of rules and i can see this system being developed into other periods in the future.

Cheers

Mick

Wargaming rules and Command and control.

Like most gamers who prefer historical games as opposed to Fantasy or SciFi the search for rules that get as close to replicating reality as possible seems never ending. Each new set is eagerly awaited in the hope of new mechanisms that will bring our games that little bit closer to the Holy Grail of duplicating the reality war. A hopeless task of course as our little metal or plastic men don't shed real blood. We have all experienced the horror of chipped paint or a broken bayonet but this pales into insignificance compared to the horrors experienced on real battlefields. This is, of course, not what we're after anyway is it?

The subject of Command and control has bothered me for some time. Dice rolls or the drawing of cards are two popular methods of helping to achieve realistic mechanisms for this key component for modern rules. They are popular because they introduce a chance element. Now this is all very well but just how realistic is it?

To take an example, i recently had my first ever game of  'To the Strongest' up at the club. This was a good old dust up between the cream of English Chivalry with their trusty Longbowmen at their side and the evil French. Now this was our first attempt at these card driven rules and we made several mistakes which may, or may not, have contributed to a glorious English victory. A second game was organised last week with the corrected rules being applied. This time it was a Macedonian civil war game. On this occasion i was a spectator to the action and was taking particular notice of the C&C rules and their impact on movement.

Now most people would agree that the armies involved in these games were made up of good quality troops. Why then did many of them spend a number of moves doing anything but what their general wanted them to do? Well the higher the card you draw for your first move the harder it will be to get your troops to make a second move as you have to get a higher card to activate a second time. This continues until you fail. The Black Powder type rules are dice activated where you need to get equal to or lower than the command value of the General on a dice roll in order to move. Anyone who has played these sorts of rules will have witnessed Brigades rooted to their starting positions move after move while their mates are advancing resolutely across the battlefield.

How realistic is all of this? Well not very is the answer. Command and control exists in real armies in order to ensure soldiers do what their commanders want them to do. Their training and discipline takes care of the rest. Now, of course, soldiers did stop doing what their commanders wanted them to do but i suggest this happened when they were much closer to the enemy than most rules allow for. I believe the catalyst, more often than not, would be enemy activity of one sort or another. The classic example would be a line of British redcoats appearing from behind a ridge and pouring a wall of lead into an advancing French column, stopping it in its tracks. Worked most times i believe.

So, whats to be done about this? I'm not suggesting that troops should go charging across our tabletops without any form of testing. Far from it. I do feel, however, that there should be some form of trigger in order for them to do so. I have one or two ideas that could be introduced into existing rules like Black Powder to make C&C a bit more plausible so i will have a couple of test games to see how they work out. Along with some other tweaks i think they could work out fine. 

Who knows but i may do a complete set of rules some day.

As if there aren't enough already eh?

Thanks for looking,

Mick