Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => Age of Myths, Gods and Empires => Topic started by: Ethelred the Almost Ready on 30 July 2022, 01:59:58 AM
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I was wondering how Swordpoint plays. Not so much the mechanics, as I have looked at a lot of information on Youtube, but does the game play well? I like the idea of the battle line rules. I am not quite so convinced by games where we see individual units regularly flanking enemy units with a resulting jumble on the table.
There are few AARs on line, so I am assuming the rules aren't commonly played. This doesn't necessarily mean the rules are bad. So are they any good????????
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Two reviews:
https://www.karwansaraypublishers.com/blogs/wss-blog/swordpoint
http://www.wargamesillustrated.net/swordpoint-ancient-and-medieval-wargames-rules-2/
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Looking at the ranges, it looks more like a large skirmish set than a big battle one. Bow range is much longer than unit frontage (as in WAB, and also the older WRG rules). As to how it plays, no idea
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A WAB knockoff. It only survived one or two games in our group.
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I would give it bonus points for acknowledging that maintaining the line was an important concept in Ancient warfare. Most rulesets allow units to fight in total disregard to what's happening around them. If you like HYW they have some excellent lists, for that period.
The only thing I didn't like about the rules was the momentum system felt over complicated for what it is trying to achieve.
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I would give it bonus points for acknowledging that maintaining the line was an important concept in Ancient warfare.
But was it?
I think if you asked ancient warfare historians, they would give the very honest answer that.... we really do not know how an ancient battle was conducted.
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But was it?
I think if you asked ancient warfare historians, they would give the very honest answer that.... we really do not know how an ancient battle was conducted.
Thanks for the replies.
Yes, we don't know, but I doubt battles had units all turning through 90 degrees to take a an enemy in the flank every time they defeated the enemy directly in front of them as many rules allow.
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Most ancients rules allow far too much control over units; in real battles the commander seems to have had only limited agency once the battle started. The commanders who did manage to shift units around during battles are the exceptional ones like Alexander, Scipio, Hannibal and Caesar.
Rules like Tactica reflect that, but then they are not very interesting for players. I quite like the balance struck by some rules such as DBMM or To the Strongest; you can do a few things, but if you try anything too complicated, you will come to grief
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Well, we should probably take it someplace else, but I am really interested in the topic.
Never really played Swordpoint, but it came out when a lot of Ancients rules were appearing so it kind of got lost in the melee.