"Army Lists Hinder Realism in Wargaming?" Topic

Writing in Slingshot magazine, John Hastings observes:

I fully understand the reason for having Army Lists but, like all medications, they have untoward side-effect, i.e. poring over army lists substitutes for the real problem of recruiting and training soldiers.

Do you find the use of Army Lists unrealistic in portraying the reality of battles?

poring over army lists substitutes for the real problem of recruiting and training soldiers.

And rolling dice substitutes for the real problem of maintaining and firing ammunition,
and little pastic and metal toys substitutes for the real problem of of killing and maiming People….

I may be missing the point,
but I honestly don't understand the question.

Our groups use actual TO&Es for numbers of troops and vehicles. It is probably not 100% accurate as we always start off at full strength.

No I do not. I find them to be a guide in making a decision of what I want to buy…

Let's say 'authenticity' rather than reality.

Army Lists are a blunt instrument in many ways.

Not sure I would agree with JH's point though: the real purpose of Army Lists is to stop silliness in tournaments and generic across the table 'friendlies'. They are quite good for that.

But they are used way to often in setting up so-called 'refights' where no real attempt is made to work from known army data to formulate game forces (instead 2 'list' armies are used, even though they might include kit/troops not originally present)…

I'm not inclined to 'name and shame'… but _Lists were not intended to substitute for middle-brow preparation (i.e. looking the numbers up in a book )

There seems to be two major schools of thought in historical gaming. There are those who just want to have a fun game, and those who feel a fun game involves adhering and closely to the historical battle as possible.

The second group want fog of war, difficulty controlling troops, knowing if Smith over there is overheated in his wool uniform, etc. For them, they can just take their orders of battle from history and don't need army lists.

For the rest of the gamers, army lists are very valuable. They let you know what was available to the army at the time and create "what if" games.

Army lists are a very useful tool.
What you can field & what you can't & in what ratios adds to "realism" (whatever that is).

Field of Glory……." these Republican Triarii are pretty formidable. I should take a whole army of them. wait the army lists specify the % available.'

Fun over lists any day.

Army Lists are for tournaments.

OObs are for historical scenarios.

So, no.

It's a game. If it was a re-enactment things would be different. Army lists have their good and their bad points.

Same old same old. "Your way of playing with toy soldiers is different from mine, so therefore it is wrong."
Rubbish.

Lists are mis-used. Instead of being guidelines towards realistic armies with realistic ratios of troop types, they propagate point lists which in turn leads to too many super troops for whatever period is being gamed.

Army lists are crap. They are not The Bible. They SHOULD be recommendations.

Eric

Don Manser wrote:
Army Lists are for tournaments.

OObs are for historical scenarios.

Exactly

I'm also with Don Manser in this.

Nothing wrong with army lists, I mostly use them, but they can easily steer me wrong.

They should be used as a starting point for your own research. Unfortunately, they are taken by too many as "Gospel" and discourage any individual research.

They're also an "easy" option.

Not sure how a "refight" can be such using army lists and points rather than available OOBs.

Army lists can be used as a rough guide for setting up games in a period you know next to nothing about. Or for playing equal-points tournament-style games (but not my cup-o-tea).

But if I'm well-read in a specific period, I don't need an army list to set up a game. History and plausibility will guide me. I know what a typical ratio is between different troop types in a battlefield situation, And I know how far I can deviate from that to still be within the realm of historical possibility, and at the same time providing an interesting tactical scenario for the players.

There seems to be two major schools of thought in historical gaming. There are those who just want to have a fun game, and those who feel a fun game involves adhering and closely to the historical battle as possible.

The second group want fog of war, difficulty controlling troops, knowing if Smith over there is overheated in his wool uniform, etc. For them, they can just take their orders of battle from history and don't need army lists.

For the rest of the gamers, army lists are very valuable. They let you know what was available to the army at the time and create "what if" games.

That is such a false and stereotyped dichotomy I don't even know where to start. Most of us know that as IRL, the wargaming world is not black-and white, it's shades of grey.

If the above is really how you think about different groups of wargamers, you need to broaden your horizons.

Greetings

Note that the original comment is drawn from Slingshot so the context is ancients.

The downside of army lists is that they are often written to accommodate all known options of any army. It is easy to take one option and use it for all games rather than seeing what was actually available in the time and place you are playing the game.

This becomes more pronounced with ancient lists which are typically built off limited information and often cover a relatively wide span of years and theatres.

As an example, take a game between Athenians and Persians set near Athens in 490 BC, the year of Marathon. Using DBM as an example we would use Early Hoplite Greek 650-450 BC and Early Achaemenid Persian 550-420BC lists.

These could result in a Persian army on the plain of Marathon ending up with Libyan or Indian chariots, Bedouin camels and would have quite a number of cavalry. While these might all appear somewhere in the Empire at that date in one place they would not have appeared in the environs of Athens then because they wouldn't fit on the ships.

Likewise the Athenians, using their lists, could deploy Thracians and Thessalian cavalry. Again these were used by Athens but not then and there.

You'd still get an interesting 'what if' game (possibly an Athenian counter expedition to Ionia?) but it wouldn't fit the actual campaign.

So long as one doesn't think that using an Army List makes one's armies historically accurate at that time and place (as opposed to plausible in that span of years) then that's fine. They can provide a fun game anyway which is what many of us want.

There are different pros and cons of army lists for later periods where we, generally, know more about orders of battle.

Regards

Edward

They have their uses especially in tournaments. However, like many of the "it's just a game" mechanisms they can sap the enjoyment out of the game.

Do Army Lists Hinder Realism in Wargaming?….no

Does blindly following Army lists hinder realism in wargaming….can do

They are a tool, and as such use them as a starting point, if you want realism, then make sure you sense check what you are getting as you go along. Any tool can be used to help you, or hinder you.

Army lists are a useful way to look at troop types, proportional quantities, etc. without having to spend hours and hours reading books – which is especially useful in the early stages of starting a period. I have found that the more I 'know' a period the less I look at wargame army lists.

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with them, it is how you use them that will answer the question.

Frankly, if a game of recruiting and training soldiers is the alternative to army lists, no thanks.

There are so many assumptions in Hastings' statement, I don't know where to begin to unravel his meaning in game terms.

Bill

Army Lists are just another tool to be used to make the game you want.

the problem with army lists are that they are normally written by reasonable people …and are written to provide flexability.

They are then used at the extreme edges of that flexability built into them, and this is normally way beyond what the list writer intended…or worse, anticipated.

One normally sees the results in people discussing whether they should take 3 normal platoons in their army rather than 2, but have the entire battalian support company attached without a blink of an eye.

Players seem to be more sensible when driven by TOE's rather than the beast called an army list.

They are then used at the extreme edges of that flexability built into them, and this is normally way beyond what the list writer intended…or worse, anticipated.

Well, part of that is the quality of the list… it should be play-tested too. Often they aren't.

The other part is human nature and part the nature of game play. ANY player will attempt to maximize their opportunities within the game rules. We need to get over that…it isn't going to change.

Bill H.

Good heavens Phil, I am not that dim. :D

I am just saying that is what these questions always come down to. One side of the argument says points/lists/balanced games aren't "real". Those players want realism in their game and find that satisfying. They often can'tsee that anyone could have fun any other way.

Then everyone else sees these things as tools for having fun in whatever way they choose. Many people actually play historical games without caring about realism one bit. They just want to have fun. Look at the success of Flames of War. :)

I am a huge champion of the fact that there are a million ways to enjoy wargaming, and each is equally valid. I was just saying these kinds of loaded questions tend to split opinions along those lines. It has happened a hundred times and will a hundred more.

olicana wrote:

Army lists are a useful way to look at troop types, proportional quantities, etc. without having to spend hours and hours reading books

I've often used DBA lists as a guide to get a feel for the proportion of unit types in an ancient army.

DM

I fully understand the reason for having Army Lists but, like all medications, they have untoward side-effect, i.e. poring over army lists substitutes for the real problem of recruiting and training soldiers.

This John Hastings seems to have difficulty distinguishing fantasy from reality.

At what point have real world commanders used wargame army lists to recruit and train soldiers?

And at what point have wargamers recruited and trained actual soldiers to fight in tabletop wargames?

The premise of this thread is absolutely inane.

Good heavens Phil, I am not that dim. :D

Glad to hear that! I took your statement perhaps a bit too seriously, my apologies!

No worries. : )

A little while ago we had a topic about the unrealism of points systems. Now we have one on army lists. Why don't we make up one on "Force Pools" as well.

Do Army lists have bad points-- yes-- so does everything we do. One might ask "What Army," "When," "Where," "How," etc. All an army list is a real of phantom point system building to a certain criteria, and all of it really-- meaningless.

Armies are not fixed quanitites. I recall once my fathers oft rejoinder. "Vass you dere Charlie?" He was a colonel in the Austro-Hungarian Army in WWI and one of my friends was once lecturing him on the Army he had served in.

All of these are artificial collections of opinions as to what the specific army WAS, and these do not often take into account the vicissitudes of time and situation, but that is NOT a mandate to consider these things.

It's a game.

It's playing with toy soldiers.

It's doing what you want.

Army lists are irrelevant, as are point systems, force pools etc. They merely represent top-level generalizations which often do not hold up under close scrutiny, but that is no argument for discarding them.

It only has validity if you feel that if you win a game of Afrika Corps as the Germans it proves you are a military genius and would have won the desert war if you had been in charge.

It only has validity if yo feel that wargames have a historical varacity and can "prove" anything, in which case you are looking for legitimacy.

When my friend and I decided in our 18th cenury Imagi-nation Armies to construct a Turkish style army to face our European troops we went out and did it. He designed his army with a nod to Osprey, I designed mine with a nod to Mozart. His tries to embody more "realistic" formations and powers, Mine is pretty much is "The Army of Ikea: A Farce in three acts." They both work excellently on the table top.

I don't think either of us used a list.

'

I play historical scenarios. For example Breitenfeld in the TYW. A huge scrap, using points or army lists from many rule sets it would be impossible ie. FOG(R). But it is not a problem the orbats are available.

On club nights I play pointed games with armies, usually, of equal points or smaller historical scenarios.

I like to play campaigns with the ORBATs/TO&E taken from the historical ORBATs/TO&E, no army lists or points if Emperor X had 12 Guards regiments in 18**, that is what he has.

As far as I can see all systems work none any better than others for what they achieve. I see no reason to argue on system against the other or throw a track because someone at the club wants to play a game with points, lists or Orcs or Goblins (Or wears white socks other than for sport)

Tally Ho!

"Do you find the use of Army Lists unrealistic in portraying the reality of battles?"

Depends on the army list and the period covered.

We could sum up the situation fairly simply, by remember the principles of sport in England:

Orders of Battle are used by the Gentlemen.

Army Lists are used by the Players.

I play *games.* Realism can go take a flying leap.

I don't have to recruit or train the toy soldiers sitting on my self. They're all ready to go as soon as I start throwing dice!

And really, my army lists are *very* accurate describing how well these werewolves would fare going up against alien invaders.