The Rally Point

[stockwellpete]

So I guess the Numidians are banned

Yes, they would be under this proposal as would the two Moorish armies in "Decline and Fall". Not that these armies are usually chosen for tournaments.

[stockwellpete]

just want to say that I really want to participate in the discussion, but lacking in enough experience I keep my mouth shut. I played a horde army with the spartacus slaverevolt, but actually I did not find them to hard to beat. What is true is that you have to spread your troops out to drive the slaves of the field. I have no idea if this is a Non-historical tactic?

Everyone is welcome to join in, Chris. In the real world there would not be map edges, unless the battle was fought in a tightly constrained area, so this "herding tactic" is not very realistic. It is also true when this tactic is used against horse-archer armies. In reality the horse-archers could not be caught by enemy foot soldiers and would be free to keep on firing until they ran out of arrows - they wouldn't run out of space though. One of the things we are trying to do with this is to reduce the chance of battles occurring where one side just stretches out across the map in a cordon as if they were policing a football match or a demonstration. It doesn't take much skill and it is very boring once you seen it done a couple of times.

[chris6]

I got your point. The limit of the maps. Now I know why I do so badly with Lighthorsearchers....

Actually I have no other idea than what you already brought up here. Even if this result in the banning of some armies. I did some 1000 Point battles the last couple of weeks and yes: its more or less a straight ahead battle. No much room to manoever around. Almost the same when you have a horde on the 400 Point based game.

[batesmotel]

For an essentially open competition like the Digital League, I'm stromgly opposed to putting any restrictions on the armies other than where there may be an error in the army list itself. As an example of the latter, I think Allied hoplites for Spartan allies may erroneously listed as Superior rather than average in lists that are allowed to have Spartan allies.

Beyond that I think the restriction against choosing the same army season after season is a better way to prevent players specializing in "super armies" or "horde armies". There are counters to all of these specific army types and letting players learn how to deal with them seems better than artificially restricting troop choices and complicating army set up.

Chris

[batesmotel]

As a further thought, I assume that if these restrictions on armies are implemented, then the committee will be responsible for verifying that each army used in the competition is valid. I guess the only way to do this would be for each player to send a full screen shot of their army after deployment to the committee so they can review the army as setup and then approve it's use in a game. Due to FoG of war it isn't really feasible for each player to verify that their opponent's army is legitimate since they may well never see the entire army at once and it is unreasonable to expect them to keep track of the opposing BGs while the game is in progress.

Chris

[voskarp]

...or the committee can assume that players won't be cheating, and if someone is complaining it could ask for verification, screenshots or whatever applicable.

/Oskar

[stockwellpete]

Beyond that I think the restriction against choosing the same army season after season is a better way to prevent players specializing in "super armies" or "horde armies". There are counters to all of these specific army types and letting players learn how to deal with them seems better than artificially restricting troop choices and complicating army set up.

No, that does not address the problem associated with the "super armies" at all. There is a simple choice available here - either continue with what the committee did in Season 1 which was basically not to allocate the "super armies" at all, or introduce these restrictions so that players can use them in Season 2.

[stockwellpete]

As a further thought, I assume that if these restrictions on armies are implemented, then the committee will be responsible for verifying that each army used in the competition is valid. I guess the only way to do this would be for each player to send a full screen shot of their army after deployment to the committee so they can review the army as setup and then approve it's use in a game. Due to FoG of war it isn't really feasible for each player to verify that their opponent's army is legitimate since they may well never see the entire army at once and it is unreasonable to expect them to keep track of the opposing BGs while the game is in progress.

I think the committee credits all the players with much more intelligence and honesty than you seem to do, Chris. There may be a few false starts in the early matches but once the season gets under way then I don't think there will be too many problems. Restricting an army to 50 units and/or 10 LF/LH units is not that difficult, after all - and committee members will be available to help anyone who has a problem with it (some new players may need assistance).

[Jonathan4290]

Not that many are going to use the Numidians or Moors but are these armies really part of the problem we're describing (mass horde armies or super armies)? Maybe except the Moors and Numidians from such restrictions?

Overall though, I really like the modest changes you've made to the identified super armies. They're rather simple and mostly just correct things that should never have been there (like the free supporting LF bow).

[stockwellpete]

Not that many are going to use the Numidians or Moors but are these armies really part of the problem we're describing (mass horde armies or super armies)? Maybe except the Moors and Numidians from such restrictions?

The Moors and Numidians would be examples of "massed skirmisher armies" really. The "horde armies" can be slightly different inasmuch as they will have lots of MF (and sometimes lots of skirmishers too). The Later Moorish army list is all LF and LH, except for a few MOB while the Later Moorish (later) list does have some other choices. It is possible to pick 400pts armies of 83 and 84 units respectively for these two Moorish armies which is just way too big really. Similarly, the three Numidian armies can each pick over 80 units at 400pts as well. I think we could consider exempting these armies from the "10" part of the 50/10 rule because the DAG forces a player to pick more LF/LH than 10 units. I think a player wishing to use one of these armies in this competition would have to approach the committee first - it is quite unlikely that this would ever happen, I think.

Other armies have greater issues with them though - in "Storm of Arrows", for example, the Medieval Irish (early) could pick a 114 unit army at 400pts with a huge number of LF kerns; the Medieval Portuguese can field up to 33 LF/LH; and the Granadines can field up to 72 LF/LH! There are lots of other examples like this.

Overall though, I really like the modest changes you've made to the identified super armies. They're rather simple and mostly just correct things that should never have been there (like the free supporting LF bow).

Yes, it should make them quite interesting to use, Jonathan. The Romans can still have some "elite" veteran Legionaries and the Swiss will still have their pikemen at the centre of their army - but the free supporting LF archers will be history under these proposals. I actually think that the tournament committee is quite entitled to "tweak" things every now and then to make things more challenging. Another idea that we still have in the locker is to say that armies must have either 3 or 4 leader units in them - and maybe we will poll that for Season 3. It would make for some interesting choices and would almost certainly see a reduction in the use of "inspired" leaders and the increase of "anarchy" in certain types of army.

[Turk1964]

What we are attempting to do here is have players choose armies which are competitive and evenly matched where possible. In the first season we haven't allowed the "Super armies " at all but we have looked at these armies and are willing to allow them with restrictions. This will ultimately make a better competition for everyone and player ability will prevail instead of an armies composition winning the day. We have also suggested a restriction on the amount of skirmishers in an army to prevent what I call the flooding tactic, where a player deploys 20 or more LF/LH and proceeds to sit back and shoot their opponents army to pieces.As Pete has mentioned horde armies with this ability can field huge armies and by weight of numbers and missiles defeat their opponent easily.

[ericdoman1]

I have no problem with most of the changes. Not sure what allied troops mean though? Is it you buy an ally general and those troops are allied? You have to consider that other armies will be dropped, eg Parthians who have 9 compulosry lh. I think in historical armies lf were really mf or you had a very small number of skirmishers.

It's a shame you can not change the points cost of some troop types. For example lf support should be 1 pt more or do not allow them to be used. Surprised to see no Catalans, although the Achaians and Early Aragonese are pretty similar. They are in my view super armies, alongside Post Seleucids, Palmyrans, Dacians and Dailami. I'd probably only allow 8 superior Dailami, (no warriors) or 50/50 average and superior, also 50/50 protected and armoured and say 10 Almughavars. Although players would proabbly have a good idea of the army composition then. It may even be easier just to drop them all. That would be 4 armies from HMA and 2 from EMA.

Thing is once you have dropped the so called super armies and or possibly reduced their effectiveness, you may find other armies may then be the new "super" armies so what to do then?

[stockwellpete]

I have no problem with most of the changes. Not sure what allied troops mean though? Is it you buy an ally general and those troops are allied? You have to consider that other armies will be dropped, eg Parthians who have 9 compulosry lh. I think in historical armies lf were really mf or you had a very small number of skirmishers.

Yes, you have to pick an allied general for those armies where we stipulate "8 or more allied units". You can actually pick a 400pt exclusively Parthian army with 10 LH and there are numerous allied options available so the Parthians will still be in play.

It's a shame you can not change the points cost of some troop types. For example lf support should be 1 pt more or do not allow them to be used.

Yes, we agree with this and that is why we have excluded the "Warrior" units from the Arab Conquest and Dailami lists.

Surprised to see no Catalans

The Catalans are there, Eric - in the High Middle Ages group.

although the Achaians and Early Aragonese are pretty similar. They are in my view super armies, alongside Post Seleucids, Palmyrans, Dacians and Dailami. I'd probably only allow 8 superior Dailami, (no warriors) or 50/50 average and superior, also 50/50 protected and armoured and say 10 Almughavars. Although players would probably have a good idea of the army composition then. It may even be easier just to drop them all. That would be 4 armies from HMA and 2 from EMA. Thing is once you have dropped the so called super armies and or possibly reduced their effectiveness, you may find other armies may then be the new "super" armies so what to do then?

Yes, all we are trying to do is take the edge off some of the most powerful armies so that they can be used in the competition. We are very much envisaging this as an interim measure for Season 2 and we will have to then see how the armies are balanced in the new Unity version before deciding if we continue with all the restrictions. We are a lot more definite about the 50/10 rule. As you said at the beginning of your post, a lot of what is designated LF in the army lists should really be MF. To be able to pick 80 "poor" Irish kern LF is just daft really.

[ericdoman1]

I meant I was surprised to see no Catalan army in any of the HMA divisions this season.

[batesmotel]

At the moment at least, I would seriously consider not playing next season if these changes are made. I've lost to, beaten and won with horde armies, lost to and beaten super armies and am willing to do so in the future. I think the committee if getting far more "pro-active" than is required and seem to take the whole competitive League idea far too seriously on the whole.

Chris

[stockwellpete]

At the moment at least, I would seriously consider not playing next season if these changes are made. I've lost to, beaten and won with horde armies, lost to and beaten super armies and am willing to do so in the future. I think the committee if getting far more "pro-active" than is required and seem to take the whole competitive League idea far too seriously on the whole.

Sorry to hear that, Chris, but you don't seem to be very keen on what we are doing.

What we are serious about is providing a high quality tournament that players find interesting and enjoyable. And if you look at the results so far of polls 3,4 and 5 then I think we are entitled to feel that we have made a very reasonable start. The army composition changes and 50/10 rule will not affect everyone and if you are someone who doesn't like the restrictions placed on the "super armies" then just pick some different armies - there are dozens and dozens to choose from.

[zumHeuriger]

Question on 50/10, allies and Parthians:

Will there be a restriction on choosing allies (like Saka) which will make the mandatory troops over 10 LH/LF. That seems a little restrictive. I would be in favor of no more than 10 "voluntary" LF/LH.

Tom

[stockwellpete]

Question on 50/10, allies and Parthians:

Will there be a restriction on choosing allies (like Saka) which will make the mandatory troops over 10 LH/LF. That seems a little restrictive. I would be in favor of no more than 10 "voluntary" LF/LH.

Tom

Hello Tom. At the moment the way we have framed it is that 10 LF/LH is the maximum for the entire army. So the Parthians have 9 LH that are mandatory leaving just one other slot available for a LF or LH unit. But I think that you are touching on an important issue here. What we are trying to do is to make players use skirmishers as skirmishers. If you are confronted by a 45pt army and 25 of them are LF/LH then all those units are not really skirmishing, they are constituting the main body of the enemy force.

I think one way of dealing with this is to give exemptions from the 10 unit rule to specific armies in the DAG that have substantial compulsory elements of LF/LH. So maybe if we said the Parthians would have a limit of 15 LF/LG, which could be made up of 9 compulsory LH and 6 optional LF/LH? How would that suit you? Similarly, the Numidians are compelled to have 16 LF/LH by the DAG, so maybe the limit for them should be 20 LF/LH? Something like this would be quite flexible and it would keep all the armies in play - and it would still deal with the travesty of other massed skirmisher armies such as the Medieval Irish and Medieval Portuguese.

The committee haven't discussed this idea at all but if players feel it is worth investigating then we can do some work on it for you all.

[stockwellpete]

Just to develop my last point a bit more in reply to Tom, I have gone right through the "Rise of Rome" DAG list and found the following armies where it is compulsory to have large numbers of LF and/or LH . . .

Numidian (Juba I), Numidian (Bogus) and Numidian (Juba II) - all must pick 8xLF and 8xLH = 16
Early Armenian, Early Armenian (Tigran) and Early Armenian Khosrov) - all must pick 4xLF and 6xLH = 10
Parthians, Parthians (Saka Campaign) and Suren Indo-Parthians - all must pick 9xLH = 9

So there are just 3 clusters of armies there that might be exempted from the "10 LF/LH rule" - maybe a limit of 20 for the Numidians and 15 for the Armenians and Parthians would be acceptable to most players?

[ericdoman1]

With the Saka and other similar armies/allies, you have the option of cav or lh. Some armies have the option of lf or mf.

Possibly you bring something in where an army that has say a minimum of 8 compulsory lh and or lf. Excluding those armies, who's lh can be cav and lf can be mf. So min of 8 compulsory could have 50% more, rounded up. Numidians Juba I have 16 compulsory lh and lf so can have 24 lf and or lh, I can not see anybody using Bogud or Moors. Parthians 9 lh so 14. Thracian armies have a min of 11 lf/lh so 17 lf/lh. All other armies a max of 10 lf and lh

Some armies can use Libyan allies, they have 8 compulsory lf, the main army will prob have a min of 3 lf, no point really using the Libyans as you'd want some long range missile fire?

I would imagine Chris/batesmotel would say that I am over complicating matters, K.I.S.S.