Completely Random Clash of Spears/Mortal Gods Thread

[Ethelred the Almost Ready]

Clash of Spears has really captured my imagination, the game reports look interesting and seem to represent ancient skirmishes in a realistic way.  From what I have seen, Mortal Gods is a bit more gamey but looks to be a fun game.   I would be quite happy to play both games.  Mostly I will be solo gaming. Can anyone comment on the solo play-ability of these rules?
I haven't played any ancients for 30 years (with Minifigs 15mm Greeks and Macedonians) but I have a great love of ancient and particularly Classical Greek history.  So, I am drawn to these rules as I can get back to ancients and not have to paint too many miniatures.  I have also recently read the Christian Cameron books which have given me some ideas for what I would like to game. 

In the interests of starting to collect figures I have some questions.
The Mortal Gods figures have Athenian marine archers with helmets and linothoraces.  Other than depictions of Herakles with a bow in armour I cannot find any other depictions of armoured archers.  Did these exist?

I want a Persian War/Pentecontaetia era feel so did want, possibly, a few more Corinthian and Illyrian helmets than are available with some figure lines - I am planning to go metal with Gorgon and Aventine miniatures.  Footsore has heads for conversion - mainly designed for Victrix miniatures.  I was thinking of using these with the Aventine miniatures.  Is it necessary to pin head swaps?  Will they cope with just gluing?

Finally, anyone played Mortal Gods yet?  How does it play?

[seldon]

  Love the title ... And very happy that we have captured your attention..

Regarding CLASH, let me think.. I've actually never done solo gaming... CLASH has alternate activation of units, so I guess you could use a card system..  you do have to make quite a number of decisions through the game so we would need to come up with an "AI" for that:
1) which unit to activate ( and which character spends the command points for that )
2) how many actions to take, play it safe and not get too much fatigue or go all in and hope that my friends will protect me later while I rest
3) the enemy has to decide if they try to react and how to react
4) finally in combat the defender has to choose between hold, defend or counter-attack

When the rules are out, we'll be glad to see if you can come up with something and we can try to get it through the community of players... You would need some decision trees for those concepts mentioned before...

Hopefully we will finish editing our gameplay video and release it before end of week or next week and you guys can have a look...

( very glad to share the spotlight with Mortal Gods, I have it myself and I will try to play it once I finish all my critical path items for CLASH , my Greek Colonies armies will have to stand in for Motherland cities such as Athens and Sparta )

Francisco

[D. Brownie]

Clash of Spears has really captured my imagination, the game reports look interesting and seem to represent ancient skirmishes in a realistic way.  From what I have seen, Mortal Gods is a bit more gamey but looks to be a fun game.   I would be quite happy to play both games. 

Hi, I can subscribe Word by Word what you Said. Great expectations of historicity from CoS, I bought the PDF rules of Mortal Gods. Not played but from what I see, I like It even if Remember Me something of 300.
Both games, especially CoS I think, involve many tactical decisione, hard to take by an AI... This AI should be very I....

The Mortal Gods figures have Athenian marine archers with helmets and linothoraces.  Other than depictions of Herakles with a bow in armour I cannot find any other depictions of armoured archers.  Did these exist?

Not an Expert of classical Greece, but asking myself about the existence of this marines I read something...
https://www.persee.fr/doc/antiq_0770-2817_1979_num_48_2_1945
https://www.academia.edu/34860989/David_M._Pritchard_2018_The_Archers_of_Classical_Athens_Greece_and_Rome_65.1_86-102

Athenian archers were created around 482 and in the second half of the century were a corp of 1600 members ( toxotai). On every Athenian ship there were 4 of them along 10 marines (hoplites epibates - i.e. "that are above" of the ship). They came from thetes (not landowners free citizens) and received 1 drachm everyday. They are light troops and so no body armour and above all no marine archers and archers, but Simply archers that could be employed even on ships.
The same thing with marines... There was not a well trained Athenian marine corp, Better than normal hoplites. Normal hoplites were employed on ships, sometimes the younger ones ( so weaker than Land hoplites), and sometimes were employed in this role even the thetes... There was a debate between modern authors, but not if the marines are stronger than normal hoplites, but if the same vs a lower level.

Substantially from this point of view Mortal Gods Is historically inaccurate.

[seldon]

Not an Expert of classical greek, but asking myself about the existence of this marines I read something...
https://www.persee.fr/doc/antiq_0770-2817_1979_num_48_2_1945
https://www.academia.edu/34860989/David_M._Pritchard_2018_The_Archers_of_Classical_Athens_Greece_and_Rome_65.1_86-102

Athenian archers were created around 482 and in the second half of the century were a corp of 1600 members ( toxotai). On every Athenian ship there were 4 of them along 10 marines (hoplites epibates - i.e. "that are above" of the ship). They came from thetes (not landowners free citizens) and received 1 drachm everyday. They are light troops and so no body armour and above all no marine archers and archers, but Simply archers that could be employed even on ships.
The same thing with marines... There was not a well trained Athenian marine corp, Better than normal hoplites. Normal hoplites were employed on ships, sometimes the younger ones ( so weaker than Land hoplites), and sometimes were employed in this role even the thetes... There was a debate between moderna authors, but not if the marines are stronger than normal hoplites, but if the same vs a lower level.

That is truly very interesting... I people like CLASH I hope one day to figure out a way to do some kind of game related to amphibian actions.... pretty cool info !!

Despite that, I must say that the Mortal Gods Athenian marines do look pretty... I'd be willing to depart a bit from strict historical records and allow a bit of what if for those minis

[Ethelred the Almost Ready]

Yes, reading through the description about the marines, Athenians in general and Spartans I get the impression this is a game not simulation.  The Athenians, for the game, are said to be aggressive and better armoured, the Spartans good on defence.   Their blurb about the marines is thorough fiction.  But I think these sorts of distinctions may make the game fun.
Clash of Spears seems to be more of an attempt at a simulation.  For the use of similar figures I think we will get two very different games.
Brownie, I think you gave that link before.  It is a great read.  I suspect archers just didn't have the money for armour and helmet, otherwise they would be hoplites.

[D. Brownie]

Normally yes, but not necessarily... Thethes cannot be hoplites even if rich (in someways like at Rome before Marius you have to own a Land to be a legionarius).
But on the contrary in One article One Athenian archer Is Said to be on board with his slave, so Is not poor.

Yes, two different games. I like both, but Simply if I play with Athenians I won't use marines. Just don't have things totally absurd and illogical like single fighters armed with sarissae...