It is very clear, when looking at the rulesets separately produced by the prior co-authors of DBM, which of the two understands how to create an appealing product, and which of the two is so wrapped up in his ways to be beyond help.

FoG simply blows DBMM away.

I'm very excited by these rules. I think I've gotten my money's worth from the rulebook just in re-reading it: the leather covers, attractive photography, and clean writing style make it a pleasure to peruse.

Reading the Slitherine forums makes it pretty clear that it's going to be tough to teach myself how to play, though. No matter how much of an improvement they are over DBM, the rulebook would need to be 500 pages long to cover examples of all the various situations that can arise when you've got multiple battelgroups at odd angles executing charges and evasions and failing tests and so on.

Still, these rules have energized me enough that I'm in the midst of what will probably turn out to be at least 60 hours of re-basing some armies to the DBx/FoG standards so I can try them out at my club, and that's saying a lot, given that I've resisted this undertaking for over a decade.

Leather covers? Is there a collector's edition I didn't know about?

We've played a couple games now and I find FOG to be a solid set of rules.
Much clearer writing than DBx which will hopefully prevent the sort of lengthy arguments over the intent of the authors or the definition of words like "contact", "edge" and "to" that DBx occasionally suffered from.

I find the idea that FOG was going to be a "gateway" game and bring new players into ancients cropping up a lot, but I think this is wishful thinking on the part of folks not directly involved in the rules.
FOG is not likely to fill this role, and I don't think from what I have read from the authors that they intended it to. They set out to create a top notch ancients game, not an intro or gateway game, and I think they have done a pretty good job.

FOG is a fairly complex set of rules, especially if you don't have much background in ancients gaming. The game plays well once you get a few games in, but for someone coming to it cold there are bound to be hurdles.
Another factor is the armies are large, requiring a fairly large investment in time and money to get on the table, no problem for those who already have a closet full of ancients figs, but for the new player...

Sorry about that, brain fart. What I meant was "high quality hard bound cover that feels nice", but my brain substituted "leather cover".

I personally do derive some amount of pleasure in how nicely put together and presented the rules are. The fact that no cows were harmed in the making of the book should be considered a bonus.

Hehe, no problem. It is indeed a nicely presented set of rules. Leather would have been overkill

Yes, FoG is not a trivial game and does require a lot of toys to play it. There are however a good number of wargames clubs where it is possible to get to play games and borrow armies if required. If anyone near Manchester (the real on in England) wants to learn look up the Manchester Area Wargames club www.maws.org.uk and pop along.

okay...

for those of us that don;t care two Sh##ts about miniautres, are the rules realistic and comprehensive enough to make this purchase wothwhile using just plain old counters. I want combat realism, tactical overplay - is this system wothwhile, and is there cardboard for non-collector types? Hey dont get me wrong, I love painted miniatures, I just dont' have the time. That is a hobby on top of a hobby. I just want to recreate battles...

I cant say I agree to this.

Im just getting started in Ancients and picked FoG, I read through the main book, orderd the first army book (Rise of Rome) and have alreay ordered the models for TWO armies, the Carthage Starter army and the Mid-Republican Starter Army. I did all this for $140, including shipping.

Granted I did not order Metal minis, but I happen to like the plastics.
here is what I ordered.

Republica Rome - Needed for Starter Army.

Hastati / Principes 64
Cavalry 24
Triarii 16
Velties 8
Itallian Foot 24
Commanders 3

139

Boxes Needed to fill starter army.

HäT
8051 - Roman Command x1
Officer Foot 4
Officer Mount 4
Cavalry Gladius/Spear 4
Triarii 20

HäT
8021 - Roman Cavalry x2
Cavalry 12

HäT
8018 Hastati & Velites x2
Hastati 32
Velties 16

HäT
8017 Princeps & Triarii x1
Triarii 48


HäT
8035 - Roman Catapults x1
Hastati 16
Velties 16
Scorpion / 4 crew 4

HäT x1
8040 - Italian Allies
Italian Foot 48

$60


Carthaginians

Models Needed for starter army
Command 3
Galic Cav 12
Spanish Cav 12
Numidian Cav 24
African Spearman 48
Gallic Foot 24 (Already have)
Spanish Foot 18
Numidian Foot 12
Balearic Slingers 8
Elephants 2

163

Boxes Needed to fill starter army.

HäT
8056 - Carthaginian Command and Cavalry x1
Foot 32
Mounted 16


HäT
8055 - Spanish Cavalry x1
Mounted 12


HäT
8022 - Celtic Cavalry x1
Mounted 12


HäT
8024 - Numidian Cavalry x2
Mounted 12


HäT
8019 - Hannibal's Carthaginians - Spanish Infantry x1
Spanish Foot 36
Balearic Slinger 12


HäT
8020 - Hannibal's Carthaginians - African Infantry x2
North African Heavy Foot 24
Numidian Foot 12
African Light Foot 12


HäT
8023 - War Elephants x1
6 Elephants 3 Crew/ea

$69.5

I ordered from http://www.michtoy.com
Every box was $7.50, with the exception of the Carthage Command - $8.50 and the Elephant box - $8.50

I plan to cut my bases from thick plastic card that I already have to save money.

I took the time to investigate what came in each box prior to ordering using this site. http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/
Also is interesting to not is that these HaT sets are damn near perfect for these armies with very little left over, and nothing un-usable.

I included the model number for each box set in the title of the boxes, if anyone is interested.

I agree the rules are glossy and very nice. Production was superb. I thought there were some negatives. One is the rate of movement. Knights and heavy foot move at almost the same pace. I found that simply incomprehensible. Why ride a horse then?
Another flaw was I agree about your comment concerning Impact. History has many examples of Shock Troops, usually heavy horse but not always, breaking their opponent with a charge. So I was disappointed with the concept.
The rules remind me of the transitions WRG rules went through. The system was quite good on 5 and 6 edition, then they got fancy.
Unfortunately, I believe gamers are looking for systems that play quicker and easier such as Memior 44, Command and Colors Series, War Machine to name a few. Hey, I was raised on the Old Column Line and Square 30 years ago.
I thought your review was very good and informative. Thanks

You wouldn't say that if you were the horse. Do you really think they galloped everywhere?



A good answer from tbe forum:

Think you are worrying to much about just the factor at impact rather than the net effect. The overall effect is quite often catafracts will win the impact and then go on to give the foot a right spanking in the melee. Just as often the foot will win, there will then be a probably indecisive melee followed by the cataphracts rallying back to charge in again to have another go. If the foot continue to win over the course of a few turns, and resist a few charges, the cataphracts will lose the occasional death throw and they will slowly get ground down after launching repeated charges, which seems reasonable - this is a decent sized 'if' however.

Also, your classic cataphract armies have bowed armed LH with them as well - save the cataphract charge for when the foot have been disrupted by shooting and things start to look really nasty for the foot.

So, whatever the POAs are in any given phase, the overall outcome will be either the foot get spanked or the mounted rally back, which seems fair enough. Looking at your numidian pointy stick donkey rider example, whatever the POA at impact are, this does not change the fact they will be slaughtered if they charge into combat with heavy foot - as they should do.

Do you really think light foot ran everywhere? And do you really think that a human is faster than a horse? I assure you: not in open field. Not to mention physical endurance.

Field Of Glory rulebook, page 126:
"The choice of scale is again a compromise and has been made with a view to making movement distances and missile ranges sufficiente to ensure that players are faced with enough decision making to keep the game interesting while still maintaining a reasonable simulation of historical march rates and shooting distances.".

I want realism, so I add 2 MUs to movement of Light Horse, Commanders, Cavalry, Knights and Cataphracts, but ONLY if in open terrain.

There are over 15,000 (fifteen thousand)requests and answers to rule quiries on the official forum! There are a good few forums to add to the total too. That fact alone indicates beyond doubt the unfathomable mechanics! FOG is like one of those strawberry scented bars of soap... it smells absolutely delicious on the shop shelf, but try eating it....

There are indeed 15,000 posts in the rules forum. That does not translate to 15,000 questions or anything remotely like that number.

If you want to go by number of posts then any set of wargame rules with a forum is by your definition going to be unfathomable. Flames of War for example has 39,000 posts in the rules forum.

DBMM which is served mainly by a mailing list has in excess of 60,000 posts IIRC.

I have run two FoG 'boot camps' to introduce the game to other players and played a number of teaching games at different venues. The general reception I get is that the rules make sense and I see players who I showed the ropes playing games on their own on a regular basis.

a "full" game of foG takes at least 4 hours or so..
thats just too freakin loooong