"The OFM's take on Army lists" Topic

Promoted by Paint Pig's lament that one of my offhand remarks on a deleted thread
TMP link
were … useful(?), I tried to remember what I had written.

Bear with me on this. It was a late night throwaway line. This is a poor attempt at reconstructing them:

"Army lists serve two purposes.
First, they give the unimaginative gamer who does not have the time to do his own research a summary of what is allowed.
Second, they limit the options of the overimaginative gamer who does his own research."

I believe they are more important for the latter. Anyone who has faced Tiger tanks in a WW2 game of any scale knows what i am talking about.

Personally, I think their primary purpose is "bring and play". You can show up at a game store, meet a total stranger who brought his army, and be playing a game in 5 minutes.

There was also the caveat that they tend to fail on both counts, if I recall correctly.

I'm not much into competitive gaming, but army lists are useful beasts. I often look at the DBM lists when I start to put a game together, even though I have never played DBM!

Let's not forget that certain lists get to delete shields in the second rank. Point shaving is a lot art… ;-)

"Army lists are…"

…optional.

Well I´m not sure if I am unimaginative or over , but I like the quote anyway.

Actually I think Ditto hit it with uninformed. I have only used army lists with ancients, where I am most definitely out of my comfort zone. Thanks to army lists I now know the difference between early and late Roman Republican armies, and I think that is a good thing.

Thanks to army lists I now know the difference between early and late Roman Republican armies, and I think that is a good thing.

For real. Gotta start somewhere, and given how long it takes me to get an army painted and on the table, I need as few barriers to entry as possible.

I find them useful when playing a period that is not my main interest. I don't want to find expensive out-of-print books about the Polish Succession War. I'd rather field an army from the list.

And I don't want the other player fielding an army entirely of grenadiers, cuirassiers, artillery and irregular light infantry either.

That said, its a nice quote.

Like John said, they have their uses, particularly when I am tired and can't make the effort to design a game scenario.

In fact scenario generators in general are the saviour of the tired or time deprived wargamer.

I prefer to use "Army Lists" as a general background for Unit Organizations / Table of Organization and Equipment (TO&E).

As I do not (I refuse) to play Historical Wargame's with a point system that supposedly gives you a balanced opposing forces.

You show me where there has ever been a battle were two army's were balanced to fight each other.
I guess if you want to get two players together that do not know a thing about the history of a conflict, then that's the thing for you.

But when a U.S. M-4A4 Sherman Bn. goes against a Pzkw IV H Bn. it will not be an even fight.
The terrain, who is on the offence who is on the defense. the level of a commander.

Sorry give me a good set of rules, the units organized historically, and play the game and enjoy yourself.

Army lists can be tremendously useful, but they can lead to some strange behaviour where people agonize over the lists and end up with units that are quite remote from their historical counterparts. Saw a Bolt Action army list the other day designed to create as much shock as possibly when shooting …

I find them to be an excellent sleeping aid and keep a pile beside the bed. Though the influence on dreams has lead (get it) me to alternate reading nights with a similar size pile of 1970's penthouses.

As I do not (I refuse) to play Historical Wargame's with a point system that supposedly gives you a balanced opposing forces.

The best attempt at generating even battles that I've seen was in Napoleon's Battles. It took into account terrain and posture, and you adjusted the force levels accordingly.

That said, it was more of a scenario design tool, and not what we normally think of when we talk about army lists.

Army lists are for those who wish to play something a bit less rigid than chess or checkers.

For me they work quit nicely for DBX (and that bit of FOG that the club experimented with).

For other actions, there are historical battles that can be 'recreated' or just using a knowledge of history to create 'hypotheticals.'

I just think "Army Lists" can be fun but also…

You show me where there has ever been a battle were two army's were balanced to fight each other.

Just because you use army lists does not neccessarily imply that you have to play "even" fights. My gaming groups have used "Army Lists" many times in campaign seetings where simple reduction of the points value of a "force" is easier than tracking individual stregnths of each and every unit in the various forces.

Having a points system also gives some relative vaule to units which can help the serious historical scenario designer to adjust the victory conditions of a given scenario so that each side has goals/objectives matched to the relative size of the forces.

I guess if you want to get two players together that do not know a thing about the history of a conflict, then that's the thing for you.

Pretty bad assumption there. I know plenty of guys that are extremely knowledgable on the historical battles of the periods they enjoy and yet still have a lot of fun with "Army Lists."

Cheers, VB

One of the reasons I am not a fan of many of the more recent ancients rules are army lists without any scale, as in men per figure. With the older WRG games it was relatively easy to turn a "researched" army into figures. Especially if relatively well documented such as Roman units that often had a nominal number of troops per maniple or cohort. 480 men => 24 figures for example. Then if understrength easy to adjust.

When a rules systems limits a unit to a number of stands, where the number of figures on the stand actually means nothing, then building an army without a list could lead to more contention. When I look at rules set where some comment says a figure represents 40 to 100 men then what do I do when turning a unit mentioned as containing 1000 men into a gaming unit? An opponent might get perturbed about so many "elite" stands (using a 40:1) compared with the levy stands (using 100:1).

Army lists do put some breaks on this but never seem to adequately incorporate prior casualties, experience and current funds (armor and horses can be expensive).

Army lists are a drug……and I am an addict

I like army lists for periods I don't have much research in. Sometimes, that can be as simple as a % breakdown for how many troops usually carried each type of weapon (say, Killer Katanas style)

I really like the new Flames of War format, where you have your company assets, then the Battalion, regiment, and division/corps support choices. So you can legitimately say, "No divisional or corps support is available, this is a 'quiet' sector."

Or if you're gaming at lower levels, a TO&E for the entire company, and maybe a list of typical supporting weapons/platoons attached from battalion or higher.

Army lists, if historically accurate, suck! Once played a Kursk game, and as the first to show up at the con game, I choose Germans. I got ONE Tiger, and a handful of MK IIIs and like 2 MK IVs.

:(

Sucks!

I expected like two dozen Tigers! (the Russian dude got like 2 dozen T-34s!)

Also unfun at times. I don't want no stinkin' Roman army that is ALL Legions with like 1 unit of Aux and maybe a cav unit! I want bows and Pelosi as well!

I enjoy handpicking the forces!

Smokeyroan,

I think you'd rather have Psiloi than a 74 year old former Speaker of the House… unless that's what you want in the first place.

Army lists simply give people a clue.
Research is hard.. in all periods.. in ancients there's not enough source all the time, in modern times there's often too much conflicting sources so you can have the argument over what kind of leather jacket the nazi s were wearing.

I find the feedback on army lists given to me has always been the most positive from folks who are starting off and want a framework of what to work toward. So DBx and FoG and WAB (and its successors) have extensive lists of what and who and how and where…. this is helpful stuff if you are making a choice of Balearics or Cretans for your Hibernian army (only to realize those figures are not on the list!!)

One of my favorite finger points goes out to Armati-- which is in itself a fine set of ancient rules-- but was hampered by a complete lack of detail in their army lists. Players don't just want to have Pelosi's in their Pyrrhic army-- they want to know that their Pelosi's are Acarnanians. So there is a reasonable gaming system that I felt slipped up because they did not give out better research to the players….

I think you'd rather have Psiloi than a 74 year old former Speaker of the House… unless that's what you want in the first place.

Nah, Pelosi was probably alive back then, anyway.

Besides, aren't skirmishers usually riddled with slings and arrows? Seems perfectly fitting for any politician!

I would say that army lists have revolutionized wargaming and if you don't believe me, look at any convention setting. The army lists appeals to a cross multitude of gamers and while many of these individuals are interested in rule systems vs time period, there are still an active group that enjoys the army list vs. a traditional battle.

What is wrong with a traditional battle, in my mind, why would I waste 12 hours playing any system that offers you a battle with the same terrain, forces and situation that was already fought. I for one can read the history of the battle and not have to commit countless hours of replaying it to see if I can lose the battle, but only lose it in a better way then they did historically.

To me an army list allows an ease of gaming. I can show up at a hobby store, or an event with a list and get a game going in a matter of minutes. Now does this impact my love of history, no it doesn't. In fact it is through some of these army lists that I have gotten into new areas of learning about history.

There are always folks in every setting though that will fall under who the OP is bringing up though and I can see his point.

What is wrong with a traditional battle, in my mind, why would I waste 12 hours playing any system that offers you a battle with the same terrain, forces and situation that was already fought. I for one can read the history of the battle and not have to commit countless hours of replaying it to see if I can lose the battle, but only lose it in a better way then they did historically.

If you did better than the actual combatants did in similar/scenario situation then did you really loose? You really have to learn how to evaluate what "success" is in a given situation.

Many times in history it was a no win situation. A force simply was not going to hold. The question is can they hold long enough in "this" action to help influence the campaign outcome elsewhere?

That's a problem with looking at "one-off" list type battles in isolation as singular events. Sure they are fun and I play more than my fair share of them, but individual battles are not historically singular events. They are almost always part of a bigger campaign and a "good loss" here can contribute to the overall success in the campaign elsewhere. It might even be the decisive event of the campaign.

Also, it's not always the case that historical loser must lose again in the scenario game/refight. I recall many games where my mates and I "changed history." Some of those were the most fun I've ever had in wargaming.

So sure, have a ball playing "list based" games. List building is clearly a game in itself! But don't decry historical scenario gaming either. They can be just as fun and rewarding if you and your mates see the bigger picture and know how to assess what the results on the table top in an unbalanced situation actually mean.

Cheers, VB

VB,

I wasn't decrying about them, rather stating my opinion.

The scenario you describe is rarely used and actual play. I have played in many of these historical battles and while the tone of the scenario is enjoyable most of the time, it is also can be one of those things that can be extremely painful.

I played in Napoleon's Battles a few years ago in a battle of Somosierra. I was in command of the Spanish artillery reserve which was set to arrive on turn 8. I spent literally the first six hours of the game as a spectator. By the time my reserves were historically timed to arrive the game had reached the same climax as the Battle of Somosierra and the French had taken the field. I wasn't even able to bring in my reserve because the Spanish were in retreat and decided not to use it. This was a one off battle.

That is the issue of historical battles, for people to take part in them, then things not only need to be researched but needed to be times to ensure that all parties playing can take part.

If historical battles lead to a campaign such as you hint to, then there is a motivation for most gamers to game. I have played several campaigns in Fire and Fury and have found the ones that spawn from a historical opening battle to be much more enjoyable to the groups vs a singular event.

The one thing about historical battles is that you may have one of those gems of a game in which your opponent has cold dice or makes a critical mistake that didn't happen in the original battle.

In nearly every traditional set battle I have played if both sides are knowledgeable about the battle, then the end result of the game is very comparable to what really happened. If one side isn't as knowledgeable the you get those rare gems of games in which you have an unexpected outcome. It comes down to your opponents knowledge level of the situation, the rules and making use of the same tactics that the victor first achieved.

One of the last historical set games I have played in recently was a Johnny Reb III game in which we played out the first day of Gettysburg. This game was enjoyable as it took the timing of the forces first meeting and allowed the players to evolve the game. The ending of the first day saw that the Confederates pushed up Cemetery Hill only to be repulsed by the combined firepower of the cannons sittin on that hill. It would have set up a very interesting day two, as many units were shattered and the Union line would not have been a fishhook, but day two didn't happen as the organizer of the event didn't know what to do as he wanted to go the the traditional battle order of day two.

That was a shame.

I'm not knocking historical based scenario battles or skirmishes. They are a hoot and can be terrific if run by the right people. I have played in too many of these though that were planned terribly, or the organizer had too big of a concept to continue the game into later rounds as we got off the rails of the game, that they wanted to remain historical.

I have played both list and traditional set battles, and while I favor list games, I won't turn down a set battle. The thing I will question though is if it is completely historical, is it in a rules system that offers enough flexibility to change the outcome and does the organizer have it set up so that everyone can take part in a timely manner. When it comes to these kinds of battles, they are much harder to set up and run and really require the impartial organizer/referee to help the game flow.

Can't knock you for an opinion Gerrin. You like what you like and that's all that matters. You've clearly had enough experience with both list and scenario type games to make your call. I must respect that.

I suppose I must be a bit more fortunate as my group tends to do a good job with set scenario & campaign type gaming. Rarely do we have the issues that you encountered above. So with us it's mostly historical scenarios and campaigns when we game locally, but then most of us also get in to list gaming as well to include tournaments. We frequently host and travel for the later. So it's not like we don't do a good bit of both list and scenario gaming. Guess the point I'm making is that for us rarely does the later of these end up as a "waste of time" as you seemed to characterize scenario gaming as in your initial post here.

Cheers, VB

VB

Thats the issue when I try to type these things when doing other things, didn't mean for it to come across that way at all, and it sounds like if I can make a trip to your neck of the world that I would enjoy what you guys are doing there.

Gerrin

lLists are a sort of half way house for Ancient and Medieval games. Atone extreme we have the troops that actually were in armies and that counted, on the other we have the potential troop types that an army can field. The whole is hugely influenced by the ability of the gamer to use the troop types in a way that is either best practice for the period or handling them in a way that only a god like gamer who knows the rules and the last 2000 years of tactics can do.
Army lists generally do not give realistic armies, they produce kampfgruppes that have all arms combined together . Hence, if it useful to have some light infantry and some cavalry they will be there. An early imperial Roman army gets Sarmatian allied cavalry to give it some mounted punch, or some Armenian cataphracts. However that is better than allowing a free for all in which the player just picks what he wants with no maxima and nothing to prevent him having the cataphracts and the Sarmatians together. If we fielded realistic armies they would be much flatter and more boring. Roman armies might manage one unit of cavalry and a few skirmishers and masses of legionaries. If you picked that army then it would be destroyed by someone who picked an all arms force. So army list writers try and allow as much of the flexible units as they can , without unbalancing the army.
An earlier poster mentioned the WRG 6th 1:20 scale. That is fine , but leads to an army with 6 cohorts, that has cavalry, skirmisher and larcher support. That may be fun to fight with, but let us not pretend it is a realistic force. If we fielded realistic forces with 80% legionaries then flexi-forces would just waltz around them. I both sides fielded accurate numbers of heavy infantry in line than our battles would be bore fests with little in the way of tactics as most Ancient and Medieval battles actually were. .

so generally army lists create a fun game, but it is not realism, it is a compromise in which playability has a bigger voice than historicity.

Having option does not mean you have to take them if you think they may not be so historically sound. Most list forces can be as historically accurate as you want them to be as it seems most have a solid "core" that has a sound hstorical basis. The extant to which one moves away from that "sound core" is a player's choice.

And then….there are plenty of non-list game players who manage to generate unlikely/unrealistic OOBs and all without the aid of any list/army builder to blame it on!

Cheers, VB

I see them as a necessary evil – a bit like political parties.

It's better to research from scratch but only on in a hundred has the time, brains, books and energy to do a good job. For everybody else there are army lists.

You can't blame the list for the idiot who builds an army that is legal but ridiculous.

If people turn up at tournaments with such ridiculists (sorry Anderson) then imagine what they would do with no army list to limit them? You'd have King Tigers in 1940!

Also – scenarios are not the answer as GERRIN makes clear. They are fraught with difficulties too. People do tend to get tunnel vision and follow the plot – especially they designer/organiser who may want more of a tableau than a tabletop game.

A solution is to disguise the scenario but that is complicated and not all battles can be disguised effectively.

I prefer hypothetical engagements using forces that seem credible to exact reenactments or free for all list picked armies.

I find them a useful tool when building and painting a new army up.

They give the troop types and the minimum and maximums you may need.

In a period like Ancients where most of the books on the subject are subjective any way,
So what is wrong in using someone else army list,

As wargamers you want to get your figures in use on to the table, so as a start for an army I can see no problem.