"Debateable Units" Topic

The Hail Caesar army lists allow for a Hittite cavalry unit in the Late Bronze Age. Specifically, a Tiny or Small unit of mounted bow-armed scouts.

I want some! But I want to make them plausible and have an actual wargame use.

We know the Hittites were superb horsemen and horse trainers. The famous Kikkuli Text describes conditioning horses over many months, demonstrating just how advanced Hittite horsemanship had become. Their chariot arm was probably the finest of its day, and horses must have been ridden by couriers, scouts and trainers. On the other hand, contemporary depictions overwhelmingly show chariots rather than mounted warriors, and there seems to be little evidence for cavalry fighting as a formed battlefield arm.

So where do people draw the line?

If they're fielded as a Hail Caesar Tiny Unit (2 figures) they have a Stamina of 1, making them very fragile. What role would they realistically fulfil on the battlefield?

More generally, what other debatable units do you field in any period? Have you included something because the rules allow it, even though the historical evidence is sparse or open to interpretation?

I had a Hittite army with WRG Ancients rules.
The chariot units were very robust.
There were also 2 different types. A 3-horse HCh and a 2-horse LCh.
I did okay, but was never a champion player.

I think that a different set of rules than what you are using might work. But that's a hard decision.

Thanks for the reply, John. I have two suitable figures & horses – a bit of conversion needed to glue bows & quivers onto them. They're simple figures in tunics so an easy paint job.

So, if the whole thing doesn't work, it's easy to just discard them.

Personally? No. Probably my closest approach was treating Scout Grenadiers of the Guard as though they were the equals of the Guards who died in Russia. But Heaven knows I've played with enough. Tiny units of French Guards of Honor who never actually left their home cities used to show up everywhere as French recon units, because four militia light horse were six points and a squadron of regular French Chasseurs a Cheval were 20. And there was a vogue for Swiss Napoleonic militia dragoons--three casting stand with a three-casting command stand--because that command stand gave you a cheap fast-moving sapper to set charges and clear obstacles. Somewhere there is an old Courier cartoon about "historical" research dedicated to discovering such useful units.

RP, is what you're describing Min-maxing? – the gaming practice of optimizing a character or strategy by maximizing desirable strengths while minimizing unwanted weaknesses or useless attributes? The ultimate goal is to achieve the absolute highest level of mathematical efficiency and performance in a specific role?

I've never been a tournament gamer & I only sometimes use 'points' but only to decide on a roughly equal forces game.

We only use "weird" units because we like them -the Cool Rule.