need advice on 25mm ancients ruleset to use

[Shahbahraz]

DBMM is great, but I found that the rules are sufficiently complex that you need to play them pretty regularly otherwise you forget vital bits of the rules. Given how many periods I play, I find it better to use simpler rules that I can pick up easily when I come back to a period.

Yep.. agreed. You probably need to play them monthly to make all the bits 'stick'. Still my favourite 'big battle' ancients rules. But I would struggle to remember some of the 'chrome' these days now I am not playing them regularly.

[Karadek]

Thanks for all the suggestions! Sadly, I haven't seen anyone playing Ancients at any of the local stores, so it's probably just going to be me and my friends. We're all about faster games right now, so it sounds like To The Strongest may be the best fit. I'll have to check out all of them, though.

Again, thanks a lot for all the suggestions!
 

[SJWi]

Karadek. I wholeheartedly recommend TTS but remember you need a gridded mat plus some game chits. I bought bespoke mats as ancients is my primary gaming period plus they are useable elsewhere, but I know other people use home-brew versions.

 Army lists are available for free on the Bigredbat shop.

[Maniac]

Fistful of Lead has both small scale (5-11 models a side) as well as bigger battles (~8 men per unit, so ~40 men per side3, or bigger).

It is period agnostic, and will work well for almost anything.

Saga is another good small/medium scale game, and it has Age of Hanibal coming soon.  Failing that, Age of Magic can be used without the mystical elements.  There is also Aetius and Arthur for late Rome, which is already out.

Clash of Spears is Republican Roman centric.  It is 'small' unit tactics, with units of about 4-10 models (~50ish will be plenty for a game).  It has a decent mix of commander/fatigue mechanics.

DBA is decent, fast, and would fit your limited fig needs.  However it is usually played at 15mm.  I will note that the rules are very...particularly written.  They are not the cleanest designed rules to be sure.  However, games run only 30-60 minutes a pop and are fun.

[Karadek]

I've played DBA and didn't particularly care for it. This may be because the guy that showed it to me didn't do too good a job of explaining things and subsequently massacred me both times.

I'd be open to trying it again, but it's not one I'd consider right out the gate.

[Whitwort Stormbringer]

Back in the days of Yahoo groups there was a nice mod of GW's Lord of the Rings game with lists for Romans, Celts, Germans, Dacians, and Greeks (including some mythological elements). If Your group is already familiar with those rules, that could be an option, too. Feel free to reach out to me if you'd like the files.

Otherwise, popular rule sets that scale from relatively small to decent-sized seem to be Clash of Spears, SAGA Hannibal, and SPQR. I have no experience with Clash of Spears, but all seem like they play pretty quickly and aren't too unwieldy or granular.

[armchairgeneral]

Lion Rampant

[Zingara]

I'd also recommend Lion Rampant / Dragon Rampant as being flexible for your requirements. Your basing would fit in fine and you should have no trouble in finishing in under two hours. Also pretty easy to tweak to suit your tastes.

[wmyers]

Back in the days of Yahoo groups there was a nice mod of GW's Lord of the Rings game with lists for Romans, Celts, Germans, Dacians, and Greeks (including some mythological elements). If Your group is already familiar with those rules, that could be an option, too. Feel free to reach out to me if you'd like the files.

Otherwise, popular rule sets that scale from relatively small to decent-sized seem to be Clash of Spears, SAGA Hannibal, and SPQR. I have no experience with Clash of Spears, but all seem like they play pretty quickly and aren't too unwieldy or granular.

I will second these rules.  They are fantastic and allow you to do things that others rules never even think of (ie climbing, getting knocked down, laying down for cover, crawling, etc).

[blacksmith]

Nobody plays Impetus anymore?

[Ethelred the Almost Ready]

Nobody plays Impetus anymore?

I wondered the same thing.  It is very hard to find any game reports for Impetus.  I have recently had a couple of games trying it out.  It takes a bit of work to figure it all out but does play quite well.

[SJWi]

Impetus used to be the "go to" set for Ancients in our club. Personally I didn't like it and moved to "To the Strongest" when that was released.  Everyone else seemed to follow.

[Unlucky General]

Okay, I'm likely leading with my glass jaw here but I really enjoy HAIL CAESAR by Warlord Games.

I came to it as a 25-28mm player from WRG 6th and 7th via Warhammer Ancient Battles (which I still love).

I'm not familiar with the other sets mentioned but of course I have read all the postings of their admirers.

I tend not to change rules much and stick with something I like.

All the best and I concur the best starting point is whatever people are playing that you want to game with.