"Field of Glory? " Topic

Hi all!
So I'm just wondering if the FoG rules is a dead game system now. I asked Osprey if they will print the 2.0 version of the rules and they will not.
So is it Ny idea to start using these rules or what?
I play a lot of Dba(still on the 2.2 rules)and want to combine the two.
Maybe Dbmm is that way to go, what are your thoughts on this?

I've heard that many FoG and DBX players are going over to L'Art de la Guerre ….does this mean FoG is dead in the water ? I don't know. I don't play any of them so can't comment just been hearing it on the 'grape vine'.

Nope FoG is still growing, you can buy foG 2 as book or app directly from Slitherine!

At the moment Ancients seems to be a rather fragmented period. In the UK FoG is still the largest tournament game but there are many other rulesets that get decent numbers of players.

A lot depends on what game gets played in your local area and if you want to go to tournaments. After that it is a case of what kind of game you are looking for.

Hammy is right about fragmentation here in the UK where FOG Ancients & Medieval is well past it's peak.

In Northern England this is demonstrated by FOG AM's 59% decline in popularity in the Northern League from 2011 to 2014 and the fact that they only had 9 players for the first round in 2015. Northern League attendance is down to a hard core.

The UK FOG AM competition scene isn't dead by any means but the almighty, and protracted, muddle that was the release of version 2 (where Slitherine wanted to go iPad only!) cost the game many players (me included).

Judging by the comments on the Slitherine FOG AM forum not all is well with the new version with established players seeking clarification of common issues. Sadly, it appears that the authors seem to have "moved on" and have offered little support to the new version.

In a move similar to the creation of the DBMM Commentary of a few years ago, a small group of regular FOG AM competition players have resorted to issuing their own set of clarifications (since adopted by the BHGS).

As always you will be better off looking at what's popular in Sweden before deciding.

--
Martin Stephenson
The Waving Flag | Twitter | eBay

Well in gothenburg where I live it's a bit mixed.
There where big group of Dba players in Sweden but no more.
As I've been talking to folks around it looks more like there will be easier to go Dbmm.

Thanks for the respons.

In my (limited) experience Sweden is extremely fragmented in this respect. Very little cohesion in regard to any sort of historicals-oriented wargaming club/event scene, at least if you don't count WW2 gaming. We're all taking our cues from abroad (mainly the Anglosphere) but no two people seem to be receiving the same cues. There's also a lot of outdated information, and even some "obsolete" products still on the market. I talked to two guys who were coming over to ancients from the Warhammer Fantasy and 40K scene (a very common route into historicals in these parts, at least in my experience) and had gotten enthusiastic over WAB right about the time Warhammer Historical was going to the grave. They weren't quite aware of that fact until I informed them. I tipped them off to Impetus but that may only have added to the fragmentation as I don't believe Impetus is a much-used ruleset in these parts (but then, no ruleset is).

It's a sad state.

I liked Field of Glory, but I now base my men in 28mm (and some 15mm) on 120mm bases so I can use them for Hail Caesar, Impetus and Sword and Spear, probably others as well, with the same units.

Field of Glory games also take a very long time compared to Hail Caesar and Impetus.

Not dead for me,still play it. Of course I play multiple systems.

The FOG tournament at Bayou Wars still has 20-24 players each year.

Still play but not in competitions as such (prefer FOGR fir that) plenty of alternatives out there now but FOG is still a decent playable set.

Variety is as they say the spice of life :-)

Sounds like the days before Eric the Victorious in Sweden.

Here on the East coast of the USA, the guys who ran much of the FOG AM stuff switched over to L'Art de La Guerre and ran lots of that at Cold Wars this weekend. They had a very large group of players for that system trying it out. We'll see how things look after the shininess wears off.

In Australia, the FoG:AM scene has declined markedly, at the Nationals this year, DBMM (barely) was the biggest competition, (based on days x players). Impetus has a fair amount of traction, but one of the reasons is that many of the FoG:AM players moved to play FoG:REN.

My personal view is that DBMM has much more 'replayability' as the (somewhat complex) rules create a huge variety of outcomes with weather, stratagems, varying general quality and so on.

I only wish it had been written in a clearer, more accessible way.

My little group uses FoG for the Bronze Age & for the Punic Wars & we're preparing to move into the TYW with the Renaissance version.

I would never be so arrogant as to suggest the rules are better than several other offerings but I think they have considerable merit.

Their biggest flaw is they require quite a long gestation to absorb their complexity & their subtlety. After quite a few games, we now find they play quite quickly, reward good tactics & seem to reflect our prejudices about Ancient warfare.

As we don't play competitive games I can't see us changing any time soon.

I prefer FoG-R to the revised FoG Ancients (V2). Simple. V2 fixed non-existent problems and left anomalies that had grown out of intensive play unaltered.

Events like Usk and Burton are still fairly full, but the majority of players are now playing FoG-R rather than ancients or DBwhatever …

Its a better game and it means you can build shiny new armies in newly opened up periods like Italian Wars and French Wars of Religion

It's a peculiar outcome, but I suspect (designed to be the definitive ancients game) FoG's true impact on wargaming will be to have contributed the most successful ever Renaissance game, while many ancients players will go back to DB now DBA V3 is out and gathering converts.

Phil

I liked DBMM much more than DBM. It is well wort trying.

Nowadays though it is Piquet Pulse of Battle for me.

"So I'm just wondering if the FoG rules is a dead game system now. I asked Osprey if they will print the 2.0 version of the rules and they will not."

that's a good example of the games workshop mentality we've been indoctrinated in. there needs to be contant reprints of a rules set and army lists and the models need to be re-released over and over and over again, or the game isn't "vital." when the truth is games workshop gamers are being taken for a ride….

what really happened is not that fog died. what happened came before that …. wrg lost its dominance because barker and richard bodley scott went their separate ways…..

barker is more the idea man but can go off the deep end unless a practical person is there to anchor him back on planet earth….rbs is very practical and organzied but does not have as much of a creative touch….

so we have dbmm which has lots of interesting ideas but is bizarrely organized and worded with oodles of fancy and, frankly, weirdness. its just too odd to play unless you are going to immerse yourself and translate all the barkerisms into earthspeak… (like asl, dbmm has people who have done that and who look down on others who are unwilling to join the cult as "mere mortals" -- barker himself has said as much on mailing lists, harumphing about such lesser folk, lol!!!)

then you have fog which is fairly clearly organized and makes sense from a technical perspective but is incredibly process oriented, has little spark of interest and is dull as dirt to play…..

the schism led to there being no dominant rules set because each rules set is awful in its own way. that's a shame because the wrg rules were really THE ancient/medieval rules set for so long. it's why i have not played ancients in a long time…….

barker and rbs have to reunite for the sake of ancients. if simon and garfunkel could do it, so can they….. :-) they should start their own company, "barking bod" and put out a good set of rules again, each relying on the strength of the other.

if simon and garfunkel could do it, so can they….. :-)

Lol, I am sure the end result would be better.

Interesting comment by Tarty1 about L'Art de la Guerre. At Cold War two of the most active FOG players, including the previous US point of contact person, were playing LAdlG. Every time I walked by from my Taste of DBA 3 event, one of them was touting how good this new game is.

My problem is that the best game for me, is the one I already know, and I know and like DBA 3 for 2 v 2 games all the way up to 5 v 5 players. But there were quite a few people in the LAdlG demos. I have high regard for those two people I mentioned and they might well be on to something for the person who likes the complex game, of more than 8 pages.

They had 20 players over in the ADLG corner so was very popular, FOG ancients is defiantly dead around here as all the FOG players went to ADLG not sure about FOG-R though, I have no idea about other areas numbers for FOG-A.

Prior to start FoG about 3 years ago, the last Ancients rules I played were WRG 5th in about 1982. I bought 6th (and 7th) but never played them. I have played one game of Art de Guerre, and can't say that I was bowled over. I like big units, and can't seem to get my head around single elements buzzing about.

I stopped playing FoG AM for about 6 months, having got back into other things but had a game of FoG AM a couple of weeks ago and was surprised how much I enjoyed them. I'm going to stick with them, until something else comes along that has decent sized units at least.

Haven't seen FoG Ancients or FoG (r) played out here in So California post Ver2.0. Was common for 15mm ancient gaming several years ago but then Ver2.0 came out… and died on the spot. Gamers and requiring electronic ipads/tablets or computers for lists or actual rules/games doesn't mix with some. FOW will find out that all too soon if they don't get the "active" market message pounding on their forums about releasing "digital lists only" vs. books boondoggle.

Heinz:

Brillant summary. Phil a great designer; Scott a great developer. Split weakened both. Worked for all most a year trying to make DBMM 2.0 workable for average player. Finally got kicked off team for daring to mention playablilty costs of some of the more exotic rules. Being a playability advocate in a DBMM team is a bit like a evolutionary biologist at a Southern Baptist Convention.

But Phil learned. He is a very smart man. Brought us back for DBA 3.0 and with the knowledge aquired from what worked and didn't work in DBMM, we solved most of the same problems with one tenth the dense rules.

FOG managed to make even dynamic medieval battles dull. A singular accomplishment. Its passing is unmourned. The damage it did in splitting the community never forgotten.

Anxious to try the "French" game as I understand it has many aspects of the DBX model.

TomT

FOG managed to make even dynamic medieval battles dull. A singular accomplishment. Its passing is unmourned. The damage it did in splitting the community never forgotten.

this may well be a transatlantic view … I relish the diversity and find talk of 'splitting' rather sinister: thankfully wargamers are allowed to choose what to play … more choice is a bonus and I am delighted that there is no dominant beast out there stultifying development the way there once was.

FoG has not passed and in its Renaissance form is still probably the most popular tournament game ..

Art de la Guerre (which I will happily try and give full attention to) is still almost invisible in the UK … clubs, events, shows (not there at all at the moment).

I'm happy to play and promote DBA V3 which is a great game (but could rapidly lose faith with it if it is used a platform for bad mouthing diversity) …

!

Phil

Good post, Phil.

@YesthatPhil: I am a French Art de la Guerre player in the UK. Granted it is still discreet, but we already had a one day event at Oxford with 18 players. We also have a tournament at Roll Call with 14 players, and another event for the Challenge.

I have posted a few battle reports, and so has Tim "madaxeman".

I don't think FOG has passed away. To be honest, FOG and Art de la Guerre are different, not aimed at the same target. I have played both and found FOG too slow paced for my taste, with too many tests.

FOG-R is something different, more violent, and therefore faster, so I like it more than FOG. And I understand why it is so popular here.

One strange thing though, FOG-R never really started in France. And while FOG is still active around a group of gamers ( about 20-30 very regulars), Art de la guerre keeps on attracting new comers, older, but also younger, which is good for the historical hobby.

As for DBA, even with the V3, it's practically dead.

As for DBA, even with the V3, it's practically dead.

Interesting definition of "practically dead" when the publishers can't seem to print enough copies to satisfy demand!

@MajorB: I meant in France ;)

I meant in France ;)

What happens in France, stays in France!

Ok, no more wine, cuisine,patisserie or lingerie : D

I'll pass on the lingerie as long as I can still get the cheese!

MEGA DITTO to MajorB. At Cold Wars I had 15-20 people participate in my DBA3 demo and games, or come by to ask questions. Many new people are showing up on Yahoo with positive comments, and old timers who had dropped out,

Not hardly dead, and not dead at all!

Is this comment from sebastosfig some nasty way to promote a game he likes at the expense of a much more popular one. A sad effort.

I didn't meant to promote a game instead of another. You mistake me. I've played dba too, and like it when I want a fast game.I've bought the v3 and really like the changes, the side support for the spears is a great one in my opinion. I was simply talking about the situation in France. Guys, you should read what other people write. I NEVER tried to promote the game, simply state the situation. If you want to play Ancients in France, this is what you'll see. Ha well.

And as for nasty, you don't know me and I don't know you. But thanks to your comment, I might now have an idea.

kind regards, monsieur.

I played at Usk – no Art De La Guerre – nor at Burton … I attended Hammerhead and WMMS, no ADLG … I saw none last year at the 20 shows and events I attended.

I spoke to a couple of people I know who have played it because I am genuinely interested but would honestly restate my non-pejorative view that it is still almost invisible in the UK … clubs, events, shows (not there at all at the moment). with its implication that it might well lift its profile.

I note that sebastofig points to three BHGS events all of which I have dropped from my programme so apologise that I have missed them – although really it needs exposure at shows to convince me it has arrived.

My point was not talking ADLG down, just contrasting what I see on this side of the Atlantic (where FoG-AM and FoG-R combined are still the top format) with the reports of what seems a very different environment in other countries.

I know many of the contributors to this thread to be fine folk and respected wargamers … I can only assume that threads about games being dead are inevitably more heated than plainer which do you prefer topics.

Phil

@ sebastofig

I thought your post starting with "I am a French ADLG player…." a fair statement of your views. I personally found nothing nasty in the post.

We all have different tastes and that is reflected in the plethora of rules available.

I only game with a small group so information on this is dead & that is dead doesn't concern me.

sebastofig, your posts have been nothing but gentlemanly and enlightening, and I thank you for shedding some light on the French historical wargaming scene for the rest of us.

This being a mainly-Anglosphere forum, I've more than once felt that a majority of TMPers aren't quite aware or mindful of the fact that the wargaming scene tends to look a bit different (often in subtle but meaningful ways that are difficult to explain in a mere few sentences) in many countries outside the Anglosphere. Much of the discussion on TMP centers around the differences between the UK and North America (occasionally Australia and New Zealand get to speak up, but it's really mostly about the trans-Atlantic gulf). These intra-Anglosphere differences tend to get bigged up and made out to be a case of two opposite poles. It's a paradigm/narrative that doesn't leave much room for the rest of the world, which I find a bit humorous.

I thought the line

As for DBA, even with the V3, it's practically dead.

was bound to be provocative given that the rules continue to sell out everywhere (even now, one of the traders at WMMS thought 20 would do for the show and had run out by 11:00am)

Nevertheless I accept sebastofig's explaination.

Re Rhoderic's comments, there are inevitable distortions with an English speaking forum. As formerly a president of an international wargames association, I am keen to know what is going on in other countries (and have played in half a dozen European countries as well as some of the further afield English speaking world) but don't pretend to be up-to-date (hence my interest in ADLG etc.) …

Fragmentation has been a very good development where (like where I am) there are plenty of open-minded players and so lots of choice – but I accept it can be a complication where people only play occasionally or where there are few players.

In such cases I think someone will have to take a lead, pick what they find convincing and invite people to join them and play the game. If they've picked well, and are prepared to do the work, then people will come.

I would suggest DBA 3 but I'm good with Basic Impetus (provided you adopt a charge responses module) … although it is far from dead, I wouldn't go with FoG purely because I think it is quite complex to learn (well, despite its simplicity, it is a big dense and intricate book ) … and maybe ADLG would be worth a look.

One thing I am sure of: DBA will continue to be well supported, with a lively Yahoo group, an exemplary forum and plenty of chat and pics here, too.

Phil

DBA V3 is enjoying a small renaissance at our club for multiple games/campaigns in one meeting but FOG and FOGR are still the mainstays for one big game players.

I suspect DBA will long outlive many rulesets because of it's simple playability and flexibility.

Thanks guys, I understand.
I for one am happy about the release of dba v3, because of its format. Ideal to introduce new players.
In one of my former schools (I'm a History teacher), I had created a ruleset which was a cross between Basic Impetus and warmaster ancients. It was a blast. The kids loved it. At the moment, I couldn't find any dba ruleset. But I digress.
;)

Dang, I meant "at the time"

FoG AM never caught on out here. My club looked at it, and then rejected it for reasons best summed up by one member as "it just doesn't push the right buttons." Once you get past the Wow! factor of pretty pictures, the system itself just wasn't particularly exciting. The rules layout wasn't always easy to follow, with an explanation of a rule in one part, and the actual detail in another. FoG R didn't even get that far. Basically we always felt FoG was written by and for a particular kind of convention gamer, and we were more into a social kind of game that people could join or leave on an ad hoc basis.

Fragmentation is not a bad thing. I play mostly DBA for Ancients with an occasional game of DBMM or Lost Battles while I use DBR for Renaissance gaming. However, it is good to see a vibrant community.

Ancient or Renaissance wargaming dominated by competition rules systems with little variety, either through rules systems, or defined points values, is not always good for the wider hobby. There is plenty of gaming beyond stylised tournament play.

Lots of rulesets, lots of regional/national/club variations and microclimates – what chance do a dozen posters on one web forum out of hundreds have to make sense of it all eh?!

The only trends I think anyone can say with any certainty are that:

- there is more fragmentation than there used to be in Ancients sets (so finding what your local player pool prefers is even more important than it ever was), and

- Smaller, faster games (DBA, ADLG, and arguably Saga as examples) continue to gain popularity in a world which was once exclusively the preserve of 3.5 hours brain-bending rulesets.

Vive le(s) difference(s)!

Our club, in NoCal, has switched in mass from FoG AM to ADLG in the last 3 months or so. I enjoyed FoG very much, but the rule in Ancients seems to be, like in evolution, 'punctuated equilibrium'- we seem to want new rules every 4-5 years or so. WGR7th gave way to DBA, DBA to DBM, DBM to FoG, now FoG to ADLG. In another 5 years it'll be something else. Reistance is futile.

Thanks Father Grigori. I hope honest evaluations of games based on several play throughs will not be supressed to promote "diversity".

I'm all for everyone playing what they enjoy. I simply worry that dull rule heavy games will turn off players and give them a false impressions as to how dynamic and interesting medieval battles can be on the table top.

Looking forward to trying L'Art but currently really enjoying DBA 3.0. (It has brought back interest in ancient/medieval gaming in the area – long dormant after players tried FOG (and DBM 3.0 – conversly we loved DBM 2.0).

TomT

Enter DBA 3.0 …

Thomas Thomas:
To be honest, it was a set I really wanted to like, ever since the article in Slingshot about it (when it was still The Art of War). But as a set, I found it less than easy to read. I have plenty of experience of reading rules, WRG from 5th edition on, and sets from Tabletop, Donnington, etc. I can usually just sit down with a set and pick out what I need to get started. The layout in FoG just didn't work for me or the other people in the club. We also didn't like the artwork. Yeah, at first it looks great, but when you are trying to find a particular rule, the pics and the hints all over the place just get in the way. Plus the pics were just…pics. The photos didn't relate to anything in the rules (and I swear some were old ones I've seen in Miniature Wargames many years ago), and the Osprey plates, well once you've seen them, you've seen them. I don't mind artwork, but it should be relevant. Black Powder, with photos of the games being described is a much better use of photos, and the sets by the Perfect Captain are the best examples I can think of that show how to use colour and illustration in rules.

The rules themselves? Well, back to units defined by armour, training, weapons, etc. (Back to the 1970's.) But everything has to have an even number of elements and generally only allow one troop type. The kind of mixed formations people could experiment with in DBx are not allowed. Lots of dice throwing, and you can call pluses and minuses Points of Advantage, but they're still tactical factors. The command rules were the strangest. To be part of a battle line, all units have to be within the command radius of a general, rather than the line itself being in command. This led to 'battle blobs' as people tried to squeeze units into a small radius. This seems counter intuitive and just doesn't look right. Any general being able to command any unit, even those in another command, also seemed odd. And command didn't actually do much. In DBx or C&C it's critical, in FoG it almost feels incidental.

Basically, it feels like a retrograde set. It works, and you have a game with them, but it wasn't the kind of game I or my friends enjoyed. I think Madaxeman has it right; people are moving towards faster playing games with fewer rules. I personally like DBx rules, but I can't see myself playing anything more than DBA 3, or BBDBA 3. I've got to the point where I just don't want to be bogged down by rules. I just want to play the game.

I read FOG and gave it a pass based solely on that reading. It did give a mathematic taste ala old WRG stuff. I used to play DBM like a feint until 3.0 fixed problems that only internet user group whiners felt. Most of those people went on to form the DBMM community and those rules were a perfect example of committee develop product, much like a sports car from Korea: shiny, but plastic and slow.. DBA has always been a decent fall back set of rules that has two issues. 1. It is a small game arbitrarily limiting army size, thus an army like Lybians never gets played because points wise it is always disadvantaged by stronger forces--both having 12 bases as the determinant rather than points wieghted force composition. 2. Any time you run a DBA event of any variation (ancients to Napoleonic variation) you end up with DBA players and no one else. DBA is cult like from the perspective of other types of convention gamers, and they basically reject the cult out of hand.

I won't even bother with GW products since they aren't supportive. I agree with T Thomas that DBM was a great system. Why can't we see it resurrected? Because everyone now thinks they can write rules and publish. They do, and many are fun--saga for example--but what made DBM 2 work dispite the barklish was the elegance of the dance of manuver combined with chartless clarity of factors. Oh to lament…

It's been interesting to read other people's opinions on FoG.

We stage a demo game annually at a Train & Hobby show & most of the crowd haven't even heard of wargaming, much less seen a game.

When we mention that even in a single period such as the Bronze Age or the Punic Wars, there are a plethora of rule sets to choose from, there's looks from disbelief to horror.

Yet I think this is a decided strength of the hobby that there are a choice of rule sets that try to meet the differing viewpoints of gamers.

This is why I would never disparage ANY other rule set: what's my meat is your etc….

Our FoG experience is a little different from several here.
We decided to move into Ancients & selected FoG because it was "flavour of the month". I'll leave you to decide whether that was a sound basis for a decision.

The book is a little dense but, when supported by a "player's index" we found on the web, is quite useable ( I could fulminate over the authors' criminal act in not providing one but oh, well).

I guess we are a determined bunch because I think the rules need a determined approach to learn: they aren't easy.
However, once learnt they provide a quick & decisive game: a Starter Army conflict is over I less than 3 hours. This is a good time span for one of our Friday night games. Add a few units & you have the fodder for one of our 5 hour Sunday games. It meets our needs, do you see?

I do like the feel of the game: it meets my prejudices about the Ancients period. Typically, there's some absolutely vital manoeuvring that is not easy (particularly with undrilled troops), a "shoving match" then a catastrophic cascade. Someone (above) said it was "dull as dirt to play". I'd disagree & even a dour Scot like me threw his hands in the air & cheered when my Spanish cavalry beat my opponents Triarii in melee a few weeks ago (after getting them disordered by terrain & hitting them in the flank….& with some lucky dice rolls).

It is a game of nuances. I read Father Grigori's comments (above) with interest. He, for example, rightly points out there are simplifications eg a commander can control any unit (though NOT Allied units & vice versa which, of course, adds that historical pertinance) & I agree this does not fit every historical scenario. A Roman commander surely could give orders to every Roman unit in an army but a Gallic leader probably couldn't. I would argue,though, all rule sets sacrifice some accuracy for simplicity. You can't say FoG is too complex & then argue it's not complex enough in one breath.

I could argue points. I wouldn't mind if shooting wasn't a tad more destructive & if Commanders had some sort of heroic role in melee (instead of being 'chief cheerleaders') but isn't this nit picking & if I really wanted to, there's "house rules"?

To sum up (if you've stayed with me through this waffle!) we like it. So do others. You hate it? Not a problem but allow that it does tick someone's box.

…..& now moving into Renaissance games for us choosing FoG-R was a no-brainer.