"Field of Glory Renaissance and FoG Napoleonic announced! " Topic

From the "Slitherine Stratergies" news page-

In February 2008 Slitherine Software and Osprey Publishing launched a new Wargaming rules set for playing ancient and medieval battles that took the gaming world by storm. On forums and at events interest was immense and first year sales exceeded all expectations. Now Slitherine are pleased to announce that development has already begun on two new periods in the Field of Glory series that should prove equally exciting for the wargaming community.

Field of Glory – Renaissance Wars and Field of Glory – Napoleonic Wars are being developed to the same stringent criteria as Field of Glory: Ancient and Medieval by a team of wargaming experts including many of the original writers of the previous volume. They will have the same combination of challenging, but not overwhelming complexity and exciting playability as well as retaining the same high production values as before.

Field of Glory – Renaissance Wars is being designed to allow players to concentrate on realistic deployments and battlefield tactics of the early modern era capturing the atmosphere of battles ranging from the Italian Wars of the early sixteenth century through to the conflicts of the standing armies at the end of the seventeenth century, not only in Europe but around the world. The rules will bring to the tabletop exciting battles of massed pike, flaming arqebus's and armoured cavalry charges as gunpowder slowly superseded lance and sword.

Field of Glory – The Napoleonic Wars enters the ever-popular Napoleonic era as a game designed to accurately reflect the reality of conflict in an age of colourful uniforms, muddy battlefields, volleys of musketry, cannon barrages and bloody cavalry charges. It covers a broad period from the beginning of the 1st Coalition against the French revolutionary armies in 1792, and ending with the 7th coalition and the final defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815.

JD McNeil, Director of Slitherine Software commented:
"Field of Glory: Ancient and Medieval has been a tremendous success that has re-invigorated the wargaming community playing this period. I am convinced that the same combination of wargaming expertise, enthusiasm and commitment coupled with the professionalism and high production values of Osprey Publishing should ensure a similar level of success for these two new products. We have a lot of work to do before launch but I'm looking forward to it!"

Looking forward to something new for my 30yw Swedes to rule the table with ;-p. While DBR is ok for comps etc I still prefer Tercio for period feel. Downside – the lead time on getting the books out to us gamers. I'm still waiting to hear when the Fuedal Europe book for my Norman-Sicilians is to be announced…. 2011?

One FoG to rule them all,
one FoG to find them,
one FoG to bring them all,
and in the darkness bind them.

I can't see…. I'm lost in a FoG

'wargaming experts' That cracks me up every time I read it :-)

fog – noun
a state of mental confusion or unawareness; daze; stupor: The survivors were in a fog for days after the catastrophe.

Sounds like me after playing DBR this coming weekend at Cancon 2009

I know there are a lot of people that don't really care for FOG out there, but for me it re-invigorated my intrest in Ancients. I have been hoping they would explore later periods, especially Napoleonics and am really pleased by this announcement.

Vic hussar
We used Tercio for about a year for our big ECW games and whilst more precise than WRG IIRC they were soooo painful be interested to see these.

Similarly the Naps rules are interesting but I doubt they'll sift me from the sets I currently have. Still if its gets people into the period and buying figures…

And if they do some nice army books for Napoleonics to help take some of the fear factor out of the period, so much the better!

Extra Crispy-

That has always been my problem! I have dabbled in Nappy's for about 5-6 years, even have a bunch of 15mm French and Austrians painted up… but I have NEVER BASED them! The fear factor for me is high, and there are no local Nappy gamers to shove me in one direction or another. I've read through so many Napoleonic rules sets that it makes my head dizzy. Now, for whatever reason, I 'get' how FOG plays, and enjoy the games it has delivered. So, Solid game system+High production value+army books= Happy Nappy Gamer!

I just love the "marketing speak" in this:

"that took the gaming world by storm. On forums and at events interest was immense and first year sales exceeded all expectations."

Really? I didn't notice in my area. There was a lot of interest on forums certainly, but IIRC it was mostly to do with how short bow range was!

"that should prove equally exciting for the wargaming community."

Depends what they mean by "exciting"!

"are being developed to the same stringent criteria"

What stringent criteria?

"wargaming experts"

Crusaderminis said it all!

"challenging, but not overwhelming complexity and exciting playability"

The mind boggles … would anyone who has played FoG Ancients (as I suppose we must now call it) say that it is an "exciting" game? And if so, why?

"realistic deployments and battlefield tactics"

isn't that what they said about FoG Ancients?

"flaming arqebus's"

That should of course read "flaming arquebuses", but hey who bothers about spelling correctly these days. As for "flaming" – it's a gun. It goes bang.

"accurately reflect the reality of conflict"

I think the jury will be out on that one for a long time to come …

"colourful uniforms, muddy battlefields, volleys of musketry, cannon barrages and bloody cavalry charges."

Oh, come on, who wrote this stuff!
"Muddy battlefields"? Waterloo, yes, but in the height of a Peninsular summer? I think not.

IIRC a barrage is a line or barrier of exploding artillery shells, created by the co-ordinated aiming of a large number of guns firing continuously. I think that was first developed in World War I!!

"bloody cavalry charges" Yeah, right.

"It covers a broad period from the beginning of the 1st Coalition against the French revolutionary armies in 1792, and ending with … Waterloo in 1815."

Hmm … broad period … 1792-1815 … 23 years … yeah, right (again).

"has re-invigorated the wargaming community playing this period."

Do you feel re-invigorated?

"wargaming expertise, enthusiasm and commitment coupled with the professionalism and high production values of Osprey Publishing should ensure a similar level of success for these two new products"

Um … please can someone explain why "wargaming expertise, enthusiasm and commitment coupled with the professionalism and high production values" will "ensure success"?

Mike, I like your style. Could the writer have had some wacky tobaccee in his pipe when he wrote all that?

FoG – Renaissance.

get-in!

Hmm.

My take on FoG, like Green Mountain Boy is it has reinvogorated my interest in ancients.

Now I also like Napoleonics and Renaissance. DBR are OK but at times make my head hurt. Shako were our rules of choice for Naps but died after attempts to amend `bugs.

One of our club members is involved in the Renaissance play testing (and seems to like them) so I'm hopeful we might get a set of rules that yet more people playing ans make the period more popular.

Same applies to Napoleonics.

So I'm ignoring the marketing hype and will watch and wait with interest.

Renaissance seems a fairly logical continuance of the existing rules but I'll have to see how well that will translate to Napoleonics.

Our group tried and FoG and thought they are okay but haven't convinced us to switch from DBx. FoG does improve on many "issues" with DBx, however, and who knows, the Renaissance version of the rules my be a far better fit than for ancients/medieval.

Greenmountainboy -

Where are you located in VT? I'm up in Franklin. Drop me a line at fluff -at- greenermountain -dot- net if you get a chance.

How many points is Napoleon?

Dugal--

How in the heck did you figure out I'm in VT??

…Oh, yeah, my moniker…

Email forthcoming.

Of course I went to their website and looked it over. Before considering being a playtester I would want to know a few things.

What is the scale? Are the games points based? How are the figures based and am I forced to rebase (because that ain't happening)? How many figures does it take to play?

I'm very interested to see what effect this is going to have on these two periods. There is a huge following for Age of Eagles, Shako, Napoleon's Battles, etc., but will these gamers switch rules and/or rebase if necessary? My guess is probably not. Also, painting Renaissance and Napoleonic armies is definitely more time consuming than many other periods, so that too will be a factor. As stated above I've seen the FOG rules at the local store, online, etc., but I've only seen one game in my area and that's been it.

Always with the negative waves, Moriarty, always with the negative waves.

FoG is a good set of rules for ancients – I hope the renaissance version is as good. A good set of renaissance rules are definitely needed.

I could easily go for FoG Renaissance – and dust off some of my old armies.

FoG Napoleonic – proabaly not.

[Always with the negative waves, Moriarty, always with the negative waves.]

It seems worse than normal today. Wargaming is probably the only hobby/industry in which the people who design and market the products should definitely NOT listen to the customers!

"Mneh… I have 175 questions that I demand be answered before I will condescend to make appropriately harrumphing comments on the web… Even though I'll most likely buy it on impulse at a convention after a couple of beers, anyway!"

"Mneh… It's probably totally inaccurate and unhistorical… unlike my free 5-page set that I have on the web, and which has drawn sixteen hits since 2004!"

"Mneh… If it involves rebasing, I'll never do it! 'Cuz everybody knows that once you play one game in this hobby, YOU CAN NEVER PLAY ANOTHER ONE!"

The Slitherine game design site for the Napoleonics version has been active for almost a year.
So I would guess that it is further along than the Renaissance rules.
I am told that it is a different designer for Napoleonics than FoG Ancients and Renaissance. So I do not expect conflicts in design which would cause delays.

I am curious about the Ren. supplement books for the army lists.

I pick that your 'army' will be a single corps.

Points will be structured, so that you *could* play the old guard, in the same way as you *could* just take a company of JS2's in FOW – but good luck having enough troops to cover your table.

And I think they will use their own basing, but it will be 'very' close to the 'Napoleon's Battles' 4 square boxes of 4 figures per box= 1 batallion, as this is pretty common and allows you to make all the basic geometric shapes the new gamer will expect, but with a reasonable number of figures per unit.

However, I recon, they will state they are basing agnostic, and not really care if it is or not, for the simple reason that they are aiming at new gamers, not us old moaners.

Now, If I were A and B, or Essex, or whoever, I would be making friends with the team quite soon, and would start premparing 'packs' with one batallion of exactly the right figures in it, including standard bearers and whatnot and most importantly, these packs would including bases meeting the rules *preferred basing sizes*.

so mum can pickup a 'thing' for son's birthday without having to worry about whether it is complete or not, and the more imaginative toy stores can stock your stuff as they do with FoW.

And I pick the Ren rules will be the pretty darn similar to the current ancients rules, just as DBR was to DBM, and Armati Ren is to Armati, etc.

And Nap suppliments will cover:
one each for
'revolution and italy'
'Waterloo
'spain and wellington'
'russia and german liberation'
'austerlitz to eylau'
'wagram and "early" spain'

maybe a colonial one including egypt and asaaye.

Its how I would do it, anyway.

Of course, I also remember being told about 6 yers ago that there was to be a WAB – Napoleonic produced.

Oh great! – now we'll get points values, rules to generate terrain and "line up 800 points from the Aprroved Army List (tm)" – for playing in tournaments. ALl the reasons I've gone off Ancients.

Can the actual product live up to all of that hype?

What's this?
Mike Snorbens and I singing from the same song sheet

"One FoG to rule them all,
one FoG to find them,
one FoG to bring them all,
and in the darkness bind them."

But fear not. The Hobbits will save us (You know:- Bilbo, Frodo, Shako)

"One FoG to rule them all,
one FoG to find them,
one FoG to bring them all,
and in the darkness bind them."

But fear not. The Hobbits will save us (You know:- Bilbo, Frodo, Shako)

Stop it! Both of you!

oh yeah, has to be points values.

Can't make the package accessible to newbies without points values to balance out all the periods and armies into something playable.

Can't make the cost benefit if the package is not accsssible enough to newbies.

ergo points.

tonight, I have a corp of French 1814 line, 70 percent Maire-Louise, reinforced by a brigade of Cuirassier and Caribiner. Extra points spent having Davout in charge.

Just like the 70's, but with 15mm metal instead of 'converted' 20mm Arfix plastic.

wait till you see the saving throws !

BTW, are we going to see such lists as Napoleonican French and Muratian Italians?

Renaissance is a logical outgrowth of FoG ancients but not Napoleonics. I share the skepticism of Mike Snorbens and others but a set that I could use for my TYW armies would be nice. My local gaming buds are Gush resistant so they've been in the box for a good while.

"Mneh… It's probably totally inaccurate and unhistorical… unlike my free 5-page set that I have on the web, and which has drawn sixteen hits since 2004!"

Do I detect a hint of hubris here? Not afraid of losing "market share" are you, Sam?

Will the zombies of the Napoleonic era be presented in a historically accurate fashion?

Griefbringer

[Not afraid of losing "market share" are you, Sam?]

You were the one with the page-long grumbling and harrumphing about it, not me! I sympathize with anybody going through the rigors and expense of a full-scale professional game release.

Besides, there is no such thing as "market share" in wargaming. Everybody buys and collects multiple sets. The more big, glossy, colorful and interesting products that come out, the more interest is generated, the better for everybody.

I have to pick this apart Sam…

"Mneh… I have 175 questions that I demand be answered before I will condescend to make appropriately harrumphing comments on the web… Even though I'll most likely buy it on impulse at a convention after a couple of beers, anyway!"

They say nothing on their website about their rules other than that they are testing them now. This is not like the ancients community where all armies are based the same with a similar size and scale.

"Mneh… It's probably totally inaccurate and unhistorical… unlike my free 5-page set that I have on the web, and which has drawn sixteen hits since 2004!"

Who said that? Nobody has challenged the accuracy of the rules – although we are going to guess it will have a competitive points-based system and we'll take our shots at that.

"Mneh… If it involves rebasing, I'll never do it! 'Cuz everybody knows that once you play one game in this hobby, YOU CAN NEVER PLAY ANOTHER ONE!"

Do you enjoy rebasing? Many players don't and rules designers need to keep this in mind if they want to sell their games. There are far too many rulesets out for people to have to rebase.

Asking the scale (unit sizes and number of units on the table, along with are the maneuver units battalions or brigades)is fair. Asking about the basing (Napoleon's Battles? Empire? V&B? Doesn't matter?) is a non-starter for some of us.

I do not think Sam has to worry about market share.
Though I too am curious about the Army lists for FoG napoleonics.

God will the nonesense ever end. Why must we use the same ruleset for every period from stone hand axe to nukes. Come on people! Guess what? There is a difference between a hand axe and a cannon, and no it is not the number of dice you roll for a hit or for damage. You cant just go hand axe range 6 inches, damage 1d6. Nuke range 36 inches damage 6d6. I think I will just crawl back under my rock and wait for the next great rule set to rule us all to come along.

You can only use the nuke if an Ace is drawn, so it isn't THAT good.

I don't think Sam is worrying about his market share. I don't think he's overly concerned to defend whatever Slitherine put out as FoG Napoleonics – he has his own ideas and projects, which can certainly stand against anyone elses.

He's certainly supportive of those who don't want to rebase their armies (and who does?) Indeed, I've recently seen some rules in development from Sam where he goes further in adjusting the rules to various existing base sizes than any set I've ever seen (including my own).

He's simply saying that wargamers as a group are cranky, hyper-critical, and often make negative assumptions before seeing a product.

And that's true. That's just who we are. Have I told you how much I hate rules A,B and C recently? And figure ranges D, E and F as well. I do it as much as anyone :)

I don't think Slitherine do themselves any favours with their choice of rather oily, unctuous advertising copy. Probably something along the lines of, "If you liked FoG ancients, you'll like this. If you didn't, you won't!" would have served them better.

I have to pick this apart Sam…

I think you find that was irony! :-)

I am really excited about this news. We sci-fi/fantasy gamers that want to get into historicals were always a bit lost. There was no force organization, point costs, missions/senarios, ect. A hundred rulebooks, not sure how to paint the figures..

FOG was a breath of fresh air, even though it was WAY more complicated/detailed than anything we have ever played.

Ive always wanted to do pike and shotte, and napoleonics, maybe now I can, hopefully on a 4X6 table with equal forces.

Perhaps their market is those people who might like gaming the Napoleonic Wars but want nothing to do with Napoleonic Gaming.

Napoleonic FoG could have no figure scale, no ground scale, no time scale, broad and consistent national characteristics, no attempt at recreating history but instead allow more capture the flag battles. No command structures, no artillery minutea, and, most importantly, no need to know anything at all about the period to do well.

Almost zero simulation. For Napoleonic gamers, this is heresy.

Howard is right. My initial reaction to all things FoG is "Bleugh!" and I don't know the first thing about it! Ha!

But if Snorbens is agin it, then I reckon I must be fur it!

F.O.G., Virgil!

Malcolm, I'd like to know:

- is precise basing important? If yes, then what is it?

- is the maneuver unit a battalion, brigade, or something else (may 'generic element')?

- how many figures would an average unit have? Or is it just a series of elements?

Those questions are important to me. I want to know before investing anymore time looking into the rules if my collection will work. If not, fine. If so, then I'll try them out.

It's that simple.

So seriously…I was one who was sucked in from the FOG hype. I was horribly disappointed with the rules. Too complicated. Too intricate. Shooting is broken (TM).

I probably won't even give the other historical books a look.

'wargaming experts' That cracks me up every time I read it :-)

Former drip under preasure?

Extrapolating from FoG then yes, precise basing will be important. The maneouver unit is a generic element. In FoG, units range from 2-12 stands based on national characteristics/army lists. I would expect that to continue. So French might be able to purchase 24 stands of infantry and can put them in units of between 4 and 8 stands ea.

I know nothing about it but my suspicion is that it is not for people who currently enjoy Napoleonic Gaming. It will be for those wanting to play without the weight of details and historical information that is a characteristic of Napoleonic gaming. We are the button and bean counters.