SPQR - Warlord Ancients Warband game.

[Whitwort Stormbringer]

Yeah I kinda like that move. GW's 40k skirmish game, Kill Team, appears to use talent trees, and their Middle-Earth game uses something kind of similar. I'm not sure if/what other games have used them, although I wouldn't be surprised.

[Captain Harlock]

This kind of trait tree is an interesting mechanic. Im not sold at the game but this is a nice touch that would work very nicely in an age of bronze or archaic age setting.

[Thaddeu]

I already have a bunch of Celts, Ancient Germans, and Dacians for a low-fantasy side project, but not enough for a proper game of Hail Caesar, so this is probably worth my picking up at some point. And the RPGish elements might help get my friends interested...

[Nick2729]

Just watched the play through video.

https://www.beastsofwar.com/forums/topic/shock-and-horror-a-spqr-demo/

So Romans get shield wall - yep, get that.

But a unit of 12 Romans can also form Tseudo (in a skirmish game!!!) which not only benefits armour saves but at the same time has no penalty on fighting ability.
Really.......?

Whilst I appreciate it was a demo games it appeared to be a "buckets of dice" game which did not impress me. The Gauls attacks with one ten man unit went:
Roll attack dice (at one point x 30)
Reroll misses due to Druid
Reroll all hits due to Parry
Defender rolls armour saves

Just too much die rolling for me! 

[Charlie_]

Just watched the play through video.

https://www.beastsofwar.com/forums/topic/shock-and-horror-a-spqr-demo/

So Romans get shield wall - yep, get that.

But a unit of 12 Romans can also form Tseudo (in a skirmish game!!!) which not only benefits armour saves but at the same time has no penalty on fighting ability.
Really.......?

Whilst I appreciate it was a demo games it appeared to be a "buckets of dice" game which did not impress me. The Gauls attacks with one ten man unit went:
Roll attack dice (at one point x 30)
Reroll misses due to Druid
Reroll all hits due to Parry
Defender rolls armour saves

Just too much die rolling for me! 

Yeah I just saw that! 10 celts charge and roll 30 dice.... Then re-roll misses because of their druid.... Then have to roll again because of the Romans' parry rule.....  Then the romans roll to save!!!

[Lost Egg]

Hmm...doesn't sound like my kinda thing. I tried watching the video but the sound delay put me right off to be honest.

[D. Brownie]

Hi guys!
What to Say about this?
http://www.warlordgames.com/collecting-spqr-darrens-macedonians/
I was afraid It might happen... A macedonian phalanx in a skirmish, or warband if you prefer, situation. The macedonian general should be a fool. At the best would be completely useless, but probably a disaster in the real world.
Totally Unreal...
Davide

[Arrigo]

beside having some literary evidence of small heavy infantry detachment in Hellenistic times (and with various degree of success), considering the fact that warband scale is a quite ambiguous term, I do not see anything 'totally unreal', especially not even knowing if such a phalanx based formation would really be effective in the game.

Criticizing games without even reading the rules, not even mention playing...

[D. Brownie]

Hi Arrigo. It's not a matter of rules... A small detachement of pezetairoi armed with sarissae Simply don't work in the real world....

Phalanxes were effective (actually very effective) only frontally in Mass battles and with flanks and rear well defended

[Arrigo]

But what a warband scale is?  Dozens of men? Hundreds? A couple of thousands?

Well I argue that 50 pezetairoi with sarissa would be ineffective and ridiculous in real life. But I got the impression that SPQR is taking a relaxed approach to scale, with leaders and heroes being 1 to 1 and the rest more vague. It was an approach that even Richard Clarke suggested in the first edition of Sharpe Practice.  It is nowadays a common approach in several rules. Of course, being a stickler for force to space ratios this makes my nose twitching...But on the other side, considering scale limitations, money, and storage constraints, it si probably the only way to play in 28mm with some satisfaction and varied forces. It need to adapt... and accept abstractions.

As the Macedonian force, I got the impression that will be a bit sticky on the front, and if you do not have flankers it could be a easily ambushed. But well it looks nice in the pictures.

of course this  is an empty talk until we get the rules in our hands.

[jetengine]

This is literally why the myth of "Historical gamers are no fun rivet counters" exist.

This is not a historical re-enactment game,  no Warlord game is. Its Hollywood History occasionally allowing you to tailor your stuff to be more accurate if you wish.

[Coenus Scaldingus]

I've played enough Rome:Total War to know that a few dozen phalangites are all you need to defend an entire city. Narrow street, rows of pikes, and after a few minutes, all that's left of the enemy are a pile of bodies piled up in front of your completely unscathed soldiers.

[Captain Harlock]

It seems that Warlord tries to unload all of these old plastics. They saw what Footsore and Victrix did with Mortal Gods. The difference is that Footsore Had a game and needed minis. Warlord has minis and needs a game.

[Arrigo]

well,

after having read the review of Mortal Gods in the latest WSS I ended up unimpressed. One could even say 'It seems that Warlord's name attract plenty of negative people in forums...'

This is literally why the myth of "Historical gamers are no fun rivet counters" exist. This is not a historical re-enactment game,  no Warlord game is. Its Hollywood History occasionally allowing you to tailor your stuff to be more accurate if you wish.

This is something that always puzzles me. It appears that you can only have the two extremes of the spectrum. One could even snap and say that  re-enactement and wargaming are two different things.  Or even worse... this is really  why the myth 'Historical wargames are useless twat that just play with toy soldiers' exist.

Are Warlord games on the lighter side of the spectrum, yes. Are they just hollywood history, well, Bolt Action was decided to be that, and both Priestley and Cavatore were positive on that. Black Powder and Hail Caesar are a bit more nuanced. It must also be said that as much Bolt Action caters to Hollywood it also caters to a lot of preconceived notions held by wargamers.  It is also warranted to highlight, once again, that according to Kevin Zucker usually a designer can concentrate only on one aspect of a topic in detail. Thus in the end the perceived realism of a game will usually depends on how players perceive the designer's focus. By extension the whole appreciation of a game will depend on how it satisfies particular needs from the players themselves.  Little example, one of my favorite game systems, all eras, is Jim Day's Panzer/MBT. It is extremely detailed. On the other hand I am touching ASL even with a pole or a sarissa.  I think the latter is detailed, but massively inaccurate. Other people are the opposite. We can discuss for ages and both extremes are wrong.

What D. Brownie says was perfectly sensible, even people not obsessed by rivets are expecting plausible results in a game. His surprise at seeing a fully arrayed phalanx was perfectly understandable, and not just a rivet counting outburst.

It is also worth to note (again) that we are discussing a game that we know very little about, because it has not yet been released. Let's wait when we have it on our hands before butcher it and each other...

I have pre-ordered it.  Now, people who knows  me knows I am quite on the heavy end of the wargaming spectrum, so why? I am intrigued about a lighter game that allows me to deploy reasonable 28mm forces that do not kill my wallet and my shelves. Plus, let's be frank... I cannot really found interesting to paint more than 30-40 chaps of the same army in 28mm, before they just become  mass.  Anyway I already consider the majority of miniature games the lighter spectrum of my wargaming hobby.  Looking forward to see SPQR. If it is a bummer... okay I have bought and even played several bummers in my life...

[Tokhuah]

As primarily a Historic Euro gamer who plays some war games I have no problem with intelligently designed abstractions as long as it results in an improved player experience.   Castles of Burgundy and London (1st Ed.) are excellent examples of this principle.  SPQR's smaller model counts and campaigns with Hero progression sounds good to me.

At the end of the day war games need to have an option for smaller footprint formats and include other contemporary game design features or whither.  The Roman Empire of miniature gaming, Games Workshop understands the need for scaling.  They may be terrible at game design but they are great at making money so their decisions are worth looking at from a business perspective.  Hail Caesar is probably sputtering under it's own weight of too much 28mm plastic so let SPQR serve as an accessible gateway.

I have placed my order for the rulebook and am on my way to building a dual use Alexander/Successor force.  Knowing the general lack of interest in my area for big army historical, and a general stigma associated with square bases and movement trays I am making the ultimate sacrifice... round bases to really make it look more familiar.  Rebasing at some point is always an option.