"Rules for 6mm ancients?" Topic

I am considering getting into Egyptian time frame for battles.
I would use 6mm figures.

I have no idea which rules to use. Could someone please tell me their favorite rules and why you use those rules. My table that I use is a small kitchen table.

Thanks,

Joe

DBA would be the game for you. 2'X2' game board. 12 units per side. 6mm works great with DBA because you can put down multiple ranks on each stand and they will look like real units in the ancient army. Simple rules. You can get in a couple or 3 games in a short evening.

It depends on the size of your game

As Joker suggested DBA and even DBM can be fun

I would recommend sets where casualties are removed by the base and/or unit rather then as individual figures " Hail Caesar" is good for this as is the historical version of "Kings of War" (KOW).

A while back I also played Warmaster Ancients tat was fun and easy to play Unfortunately it is out of print Their Army lists are very thorough

6mm single figure removal. That I'd like to see.
And I'll bet somebody here does it.

To the Strongest,. You can fight the biggest actions on a 6ft x 4ft table. I fought Pharsalus with 81 units and 3,500 figures on a table this size, so a small kitchen table should allow you to do all sorts of smaller games. It is a grid based system, simple to learn, but nicely subtle in execution. Army lists are downloadable free from the author's website.

Molllinary

As long as you adjust your base size and measurements for the size of your table, you could use almost any set of rules. And if you do have even 6x4, you can use the rules without an adjustment, and as mentioned the DBx ones are good to go as is without adjustments.

So Impetus, Might of Arms, Hail Caesar, To the Strongest, etc. etc.

Legio VI is specifically designed for 6mm figures and they are free to download.
link

I agree with others that rules that use bases instead of figure removal is best for 6mm ancients.

Not knowing your ideas, I've always thought that 6mm is often better on _larger_ bases than what we normally use for, say, 15mm figs. I normally play DBMM in 15mm, so use 40mm wide bases. But for 6mm I would go for 60mm wide _at_least_ so you get the mass effect as shown in Simon's picture above. In DBx, 60mm wide bases are standard for 28mm.

So, if you base in 60mm bases, you could play DBA on a 4'x4' board in notional 28mm scale, and get the effect that you are using massed armies.

However, lots of people turn to 6mm because of the cheapness of the figures, and I am afraid if you went for masses of 6mm figs packed in on large bases, it ends up being just as expensive as 15mm or even 28mm. and you have to paint them all (though you should use a more "impressionist" style with 6mm).

JohnG

That's my goal--although mine don't look as good as Simon's! To give you an idea, I believe you can get 3, or maybe 4, Baccus chariots on a 60mm base.

I think Command and Colors Ancients converted to minis, or even Tactica converted to using large blocks of troops and casualty roster sheets would work well.

Mighty Armies Ancients?

I would also recommend Scutarii from link

"6mm single figure removal. That I'd like to see.
And I'll bet somebody here does it."

That is how I used to play WRG 16xx-18xx (albeit with elements a few loose figures for casualties).

Grid based Ancients would work fine – we play both Lost Battles and CnC Ancients using figures and grids. Figures range in size from 6mm to 28mm, depending.

But DBA is probably the best starting point, all the figures I use for other rules are based to DBx standards.

You could play a really "big" 6mm game on a 3' x 4' table, using a 10cm grid and 8cm wide units.

Here's a pic of the game that Mollinary mentions at the top of the thread, which was played on a 10cm grid using To the Strongest! Although I mainly game in 28mm, myself, I am really coming to appreciate the convenience and apprearance of mass once can get in 6mm.

If you want fast-play rules, both To the Strongest! and Sword & Spear works fine for 6mm in my experience.

Art de la Guerre works great with 6mm figures. It is the most complete and fun Ancients ruleset available at this moment in time. Also all in 1 book are all the army lists with lots and lots of options. You can play tiny 100 point games on tiny table 60x80, standard 200 point games on a 80x120, or bigger 300/400 point games.