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"Age of Reason versus Koenig Krieg" Topic


Koenig Krieg

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Prince Alberts Revenge30 Sep 2006 2:10 p.m. PST

I own AoR and have played many good games with it. However, as a rules addict, I have been intrigued by KK. How do they measure up against each other? Size of armies, combat resolution, speed of play, complexity, command and control, etc…Also, are KK still available? Were they ever reprinted? Thanks!

Personal logo Der Alte Fritz Sponsoring Member of TMP30 Sep 2006 2:34 p.m. PST

I only played KK once, at a convention, and did not find it much fun to play. Maybe it was the scenario, but I was required to roll some rediculous die score in order to activate my troops. So I sat. And I sat. And I sat, snooooooooze, snorrrkkk, etc. AOR is a decent set of rules, not my favorite, but I like them and would play them again. I don't like the opportunity fire rule or the ability of a unit to change its facing before declaring a charge, but other than that, its a fun set of rules.

KK seemed to be more complicated than AOR to me.

UCantBeSerious30 Sep 2006 3:12 p.m. PST

The locals have been playing the computer moderated Carnage and Glory and it seems to be a really solid set.

John the OFM30 Sep 2006 5:40 p.m. PST

You have to roll to activate troops? Screw that.

NJDante30 Sep 2006 5:54 p.m. PST

I also played KK at this past Historicon and overall did not like it. I did like the pre-battle movement. We moved cards which represented the brigades before the battle to position our troops. This stage of manuever was the best thing in the game. Once the figures were on the table and we were playing the game things went down hill. It had some odd activation, sequences and prussian cavalry can kill everything. At the same convention I did get to play in the Might & Reason demo game. That I really enjoyed. It will be my set of choice for the SYW once it is released.

YogiBearMinis Supporting Member of TMP30 Sep 2006 6:13 p.m. PST

I have only played KK and AoR a few times each, own both, and vastly prefer KK.

Zhao Zilong30 Sep 2006 6:19 p.m. PST

Never played Age of Reason, but have played a few battles of Koenig Krieg. My views of it are – its fun if your Prussians – Its not if your fighting them. And yes I can confirm that Prussian Cavalry kill everything.

OldGrenadier Fezian30 Sep 2006 7:30 p.m. PST

I cut my teeth playing KK, and I don't recall any sort of activation roll, but the initiative rules for HTH can be a bit thick to work through.

Lannes30 Sep 2006 8:54 p.m. PST

I prefer KK. Yes, it can be tough to play against the Prussians (I play French), but wasn't it historically?

ioannis01 Oct 2006 2:50 a.m. PST

Yes it was…A balanced SYW game representing a classical battle of the era should give you a small(er) but strong Prussian army versus a large(r) but less efficient opponent.

I like both KK and AoR. My only complain for both sets would be the need for each side to complete all movements before the next gets a chance to play!

marius121401 Oct 2006 4:08 p.m. PST

Koenig Krieg is the first wargame I ever played some 19 years ago and I still like it today. Austrian cavalry matches up quite well against Prussians but the other nations struggle with inferior horse. We have some local house modifications to clear up ambiguities in the rules. I do not like these rules for AWI applications as I don't feel they translate well to small scale skirmish based battles. The game is mechanically easy to teach to a beginner but requires a subtil grasp of its nuances to play as a commander in chief.

Personal logo Der Alte Fritz Sponsoring Member of TMP02 Oct 2006 11:50 a.m. PST

If the Prussian cavalry is that much better than that of the Austrians and French, then there is something seriously wrong with the KK rules.

Personal logo Dye4minis Supporting Member of TMP02 Oct 2006 6:40 p.m. PST

They aren't! In KK, Cuirassiers are rated the same. The difference is that a Regiment of Prussian is 15 figures while Austrian are 16 (which makes them only marginally better.) French heavy Horse are in 12 figure units and are , therefore weaker.

Of course, many gamers insist upon charging fresh troops with fresh troops! The attacker usually gets repulsed! KK is no different.

Funny, Alte Fritz; I found Age of Reason more complicated than KK! In my last game ever of AOR, I had Austrian howitzer fire drop on my unit of cav, on a road, in the middle of a woods, no LOS to the target from the firing battery (6+ inches of dense woods between them and my unit), score hits! As incredible as that may sound, the rules allow it!!!!

After that game, I swore off AOR, discussed with Todd Fisher, got the revisd set---you can still do it!

May be fun but that is plain unrealistic! Desert Storm didn't have that good of blind firing! />(

Tom Dye
GFI

Personal logo Dye4minis Supporting Member of TMP02 Oct 2006 6:54 p.m. PST

NJ Dante: The game's deployment phase can be ignored, if desired. I can tell you from past experience, I have lost more games in the Deployment stage than in fighting the battle! Gamers put themselves in situations where they would have yelled "foul" if asked to play in a pre-set scenario. When they do it, they have nobody but themselves to blame, for poor generalship!

Prussian Cav is not that good. (Unless they hit you after a few losses!) The "Frederick" rule usually should not be used for encounter games. All it does is give the Prussian player a slight edge because Freddy is on the field. I have won playing Austrians against the Prussians using Freddy. Simple plans work!

The nuances are in the play of iniatiative. Some get it, some don't. Every maneuver element gets to activate in the Move/Fire Phase. If you had to wait a long time before you could move,(Alte Fritz) then too many brigades were being used! best played with 2-6 gamers.

The best games in ANY period I have ever played (since 1967) have all been KK games!

When one reads the rules (and is allowed to PLAY the rules, as written) the game plays very well and painlessly (unless you just did something stupid….but will get zapped, like in any rules against a competent opponent!) Convention games are NOT the best way to learn any rules set! Chanceds are that the players are not well versed in the rules being played, nor had much of a chance to even read them! (Sound familiar?)

Please, KK is not Brain Surgury! There are variations (plainly stated, BTW)(ie: The Frederick rule) but play is straight forward and IMHO, well explained. (I have only found 2 areas that required "fixes"…and 1 of those was a typo! )

Suggest another look!

Best,
Tom Dye
GFI

Pipesmoker03 Oct 2006 4:32 p.m. PST

I have played AOR many times, and enjoy it. It is an easy set to understand, and you can get a result in an evening game.

Every group has a set of "house rules" to make it suit the group.

We have no issue with the indirect fire of either a mortor or howitzer (it does have penalities).

Pipesmoker

Broglie04 Oct 2006 1:10 a.m. PST

We played the War of the Spanish Succession variation of KK for years and it was the best game ever in the club. I think a major factor was that all players took the time to learn and really understand the rules and this makes a huge difference from casual games with a different ruleset each game.

In all the years we played KK I never remember having to dice for activation ????????

We did have to make a few modifications to clarify certain situations particularly as we had 72 battalions, 12 cavalry regiments and 20 guns a side.

I never really took to AoR and had problems with Napoleonic style columns and skirmishers in a SYW game. AoR are also much more long winded.

For such a popular period the market is hardly flooded with rule sets.

Broglie04 Oct 2006 7:49 a.m. PST

Just to make a liar out of me for my last statement a new set of SYW rules has just appeared on the Hobby News page – "To stand like a Wall"

marius121405 Oct 2006 5:43 p.m. PST

Good comments Tom. Prussians in KK have a manuver advantage (double function infantry)and with the initiative rules can exploit it. Their opponents have to deploy well and use fire to negate the Prussian advantages. Having said that the Coalition forces can certainly bash the Prussians around pretty well. French heavy cavalry regiments except for the small chevaleguer regiments are the equal of the Prussian heavy cavalry. The dragoons have a disadvantage because of slightly lower morale and smaller units. Given even die rolls the Prussians will win. They then can exploit their advantage. The wise French player will hold his cavalry in reserve and make a Prussian run an artillery gauntlet to get the French mounted. Recognizing the strengths and weakness of your army and your opponents is part of tabletop generalship. The Prussians can really bash their opponents if they get the upswing. Their advantages can be negated by careful play. They get much less of advantage over their opponents than I have seen Napoleonic French get over their enemies in most rules.

ADC2Davout20 Feb 2007 8:31 a.m. PST

"but I was required to roll some rediculous die score in order to activate my troops. So I sat. And I sat. And I sat, snooooooooze, snorrrkkk, etc."

Realizing of course a late entry as only discovered string . . .

Agreed, been playing K.K. for a while now, and never even heard of "Activation Rolls", as they simply do not exist in the later version/print we play.

Remember, there are 2 editions to the rule set.

Also, concerning the Prussians, they are tough with the extra operation. But even the author points out that they are always on the attack, as well as was greatly outnumbered while on the attack.

Ergo, the Allies always start out with at least a 33 – 50% numerical advantage, even behind trenches, though deploy first. Which is the way it usually was for Fredrick [?] . . . We play more with Eastern scenarios.

Also, K.K. is so sweet because the Author actually took the time to put in a very useful troop listing – Awesome!
Remember 2 things that can kill a rule set even before painting up the first fig; [Too] Slow of Movement [i.e. Killer Katannas II], and lack of [any] Troop listing [i.e. Final Argument of Kings]

AoR, is by far more complicated with the 'Greyzones'. . . where as K.K. keeps thing more simple.

Lastly, can tell you that I think the Author was more of a "Austri-filer"[as opposed to a Prusso-filer] . . . LOL!

I.e., the Austrian Grens are better than Prussians, and the Austrian Cuirassiers, against only 12 figs for the Prussians in my edition of the rule sets, get whopping 16 figs.

Plus while getting more Pondours than just one Prussian Jager unit, the Austrian Grenzers are better than Prussian Freicorp [all primarily used for Skirmishing situations]. Also all inf. is 25% bigger as well.

Have also compared K.K. to(as mentioned) "Final Argument of Kings" [again more complicated than needs be, and Cav units only 8 figs per ergo just looks – wrong], and "Fields of Glory" [actually not that bad in play, similar in factoring in modifiers as K.K., but does not look or move as nice as K.K.]

Really can't miss with K.K.

Arch Duke of Nothing06 Jan 2014 4:07 p.m. PST

I agree I had a blast with KK and that was back in 1999!!!

In reference to the Austrians….they should have better cavalry and artillery! Yes, I am biased but it is still true!

Nadir Shah07 Jan 2014 7:09 a.m. PST

In Koenig Krieg there is no activation to move brigades. Although the system is not I-Go-U-Go, the overall generals roll against each other multiple times in a turn to see who gets to activate the next brigade or independent unit, all formations get to act in a turn, no troops miss out. My guess is that was a scenario thing.

Since this event new owners have bought out and completely updated Koenig Krieg. It now has wonderful support, multiple army list handbooks covering all the major and minor players in the war including the Portuguese. Soon to be released will be the exotic armies like Nadir Shah's Persians, the Afghans and the various armies of India such as the Marathas, Mysore and Moghuls. There are 6 missions and the game includes hidden movement which helps recreate the fog of war in the inital stages before battle proper is commenced.

It is a wonderful game in which players that prefer to play points can use historically researched and carefully playtested lists which are balanced and allow historical orders of battle. No a Prussian army is not a game winner. In fact during the last few tournaments here in Australia and Italy is has been the French, Austrians and Russians which have achieved more results in the top three. The Prussians, British-allied, Spanish and Ottomans also ranking in the top three on occasion.

For more info on Koenig Krieg please visit

link

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