"Saga's Medieval Warfare" Topic

Can anyone tell me how these rules play. I have been to the website and read the battle sample, but would like some intel from the field, so to speak. I want rules that are period specific, but allow battles to be fought from Hastings to Bosworth without too much of a stretch of imagination. Any other recommendations would be helpful.

There is a group of fellow gamers that are doing 11th century (including Normans and Saxons). We've been giving different rules sets a try. We decided that WRG/DBM were out right off the bat. Turned to Might of Arms which we didn't like. Have played Armati which has produced some fun games but lacks the period feel. We then tried Medieval Warfare. I found MW a bit cumbersome in the details but it is well written with many good concepts and worth a look. Just didn't quite seem what we were looking for. We are now test running Shattered Lances which so far looks very promising. Elegant but with considerable detail in the right areas. Can't say if it will produce good WoTR games.

Mark

The medieval warfare rules offer a very good mix of playability without sacrificing historical accuracy. I have been using them, and the companion Renaissance Warfare rules for over 10 years.

db

I like MW a lot. Play them regularly at home and at the eastern cons. Although it does take some investment to come up to speed, there is a lot of period specific chrome that makes things interesting (arrow storm, Crusader order, fire&flee, heroes). The Yahoo group (link below) offers lots of support. Great period feel if the armies are matched historically, but also lots of fun for the typical tournament mix and match.

link

There's not a lot I can add.
I had a look at MW when I was looking at medieval rules for the Crusades. I had a similar reaction to Mark- nice ideas, offset by some awkward details, so the overall package didn't really work for me.

Shattered Lances would be an option. You would however, need some house rules to take the games into the 15th C…
There's a SL yahoo group link and a recent article on them in the January issue of Slingshot.

Well, I will want a set that works well for the entire period, but I don't mind tweaking it a bit for the later periods. I have Dark Age figures that I plan on using for Pig Wars, but I will have enough to do larger battles as well. I want to do Crusades and WOTR too. All in 25mm. Do you believe Shattered Lances might work better for this?
I don't plan on playing out of period. No tournaments, just historical match-ups.

Hard to say about SL since I'm not that knowledgable about WoTR. They would work well for much of the 14th century so you'd have to use your own judgement about the significance of the differences between the 14th and 15th century warfare.

Well, I will want a set that works well for the entire period, but I don't mind tweaking it a bit for the later periods. I have Dark Age figures that I plan on using for Pig Wars, but I will have enough to do larger battles as well. I want to do Crusades and WOTR too. All in 25mm. Do you believe Shattered Lances might work better for this?

Well, in my opinion SL is simply superb for Crusades-battles. The caveat is I wrote them, so I'm a little biased. OTOH, I haven't come across anything that hads made comparable use of Islamic military literature.

WoTR will be a stretch, possibly requiring some tweaks. I've used it for early 100YW battles without hitting any snags.

The big problem using SL for 15th C Western battles, is there are no rules for things like Swiss pike-blocks or Hussite war-wagons. As WoTR tended to be free of these, it should still work…

Chthonic regards

B

Biggest changes were some artillery, better armor and hardly any mounted knights.

Shield falls into disuse. You'd think with the ammount of longbow fire you'd want one. I know the heavy armor deflected alot, but everyone didn't wear it.

Check out my rules "www.dayofbattle.com" They are for feudal wars with a crusder variant. Lots of emphasis on the leader. There is a turn by turn page on the website that allows you to walk through an entire battle at your own pace. Third edition will debut at Cold Wars and release at Historicon…Chris P.

Biggest changes were some artillery, better armor and hardly any mounted knights.

Shield falls into disuse. You'd think with the ammount of longbow fire you'd want one. I know the heavy armor deflected alot, but everyone didn't wear it.

Artillery probably isn't a big issue, really more of a quantity issue. It wasn't until we get to Elizabethan period that artillery manuals for deflection shots were being published.

Shields probaby had little utility if everyone either has a bill or a longbow ;-).

I suspect that the excellent cadres of longbowmen from the early 14th C, had eroded in size and significance by the time of the WoTR.

Chthonic regards

B

I am a big fan of the Medieval Warfare rules, but as a practical matter, they are not readily available. The rights to the rules are owned by Wargames Foundry, which apparently has no plans to publish them (I suspect they bought the rights to keep the rules off the market, and so they would not compete against the rules they do publish).

The author, Terry Gore, passed away last year, and his friends and associates are trying to put things back together.

All in all it is a shame. The rules are very nice. The game tends to slow down in combat — the combat rules are rather clunky. But the rules have a lot of nice ideas. The rules also really give a good feel for the period.

I notice that On Military Matters lists it in their wargames rules section so it does seem to be still available.

Unfortuately Military Matters does not carry MW. He has had trouble getting his stock replaced so they do not have them.
According to the Yahoo group, they have copies for sale, so you should be able to pick them up from there.

As for Wargames Foundry, they do not own the rights to the publishing of the rules so the remaining authors are going to contiue to print them on their own.