Has anyone else picked up De Bellis Fantasiae (DBF)?

[Dice Roller]

Just the thought alone of playing DBA and its various derivations is enough to give me the shits.

[Hobgoblin]

Just the thought alone of playing DBA and its various derivations is enough to give me the shits.

What is it that you don't like about the system? I understand the common complaints about the rules writing (more with DBA than with HOTT, which has much more humour in the writing), but I've always found the system to be extraordinarily smooth in play.

I remember, as a teenager, getting hold of the rules when they first came out (though I presumed they were an old set). My friends and I were blown away by how fast and slick the gameplay was in comparison with Warhammer, etc., - and with how much more like a classic fictional or historical battle the game felt.

[Dice Roller]

It's just a bit too abstract and a bit too much like playing chess. Utterly soulless.
And yes, there's the dreadful Barkerese that is just impossible to escape from and just playing any of the DBX games I feel like I'm endorsing it and that leaves me feeling dirty and sordid. And not in a good way.

[Hobgoblin]

It's just a bit too abstract and a bit too much like playing chess. Utterly soulless.

Ha! Bizarrely, I've always found HOTT one of the more soulful fantasy wargames - in large part, I think, because it's (a) rooted in a decent attempt at historical simulation and (b) based on myth, legend and the better sort of fantasy fiction (rather than being derivative of derivatives like so many games). So it seems a bit more 'authentic' and 'rootsy' than (say) Warhammer or Kings of War or whatever. Army lists based on the Battle of the Five Armies, Moorcock's multiverse and the Elder Edda reinforce that feeling.

I think the open modelling and painting possibilities that HOTT offers give it a certain sort of soulfulness too: it's much more of a creative blank canvas than most games. There are some great Gloranthahn examples here and here (the blog of Simon Miller - Big Red Bat on this forum). Jar-Eel the Razoress and Simon Miller's Crimson Bat are cases in point:




I can think of few other games that really get that sort of creativity going - perhaps Kings of War's diorama bases.

And yes, there's the dreadful Barkerese that is just impossible to escape from and just playing any of the DBX games I feel like I'm endorsing it and that leaves me feeling dirty and sordid. And not in a good way.

 

I don't think I've ever been fully exposed to it, as the HOTT rules aren't in full Barkerese, by all accounts. I do own DBA 3.0 but have mainly used it to play D3H2 and already knew how the rules worked from HOTT. I'd say that the HOTT army lists are quite nicely written and often funny; there's a tongue-in-cheek aspect to HOTT that is part of the fun (the 'soul', if you like!).

It's worth saying that DBF isn't in Barkerese at all; it's clearly written and well explained.

[Byrthnoth]

The DBF website you linked to suggests 36 elements as a standard game ? are you planning to play it at that size Hobgoblin, or at a more HOTTish 12 elements or so?

[Hobgoblin]

The DBF website you linked to suggests 36 elements as a standard game ? are you planning to play it at that size Hobgoblin, or at a more HOTTish 12 elements or so?

I'm planning to go big! I always enjoy HOTT games with 36AP armies (and a single PIP die), and I've often staged games with two or three 24AP commands a side (so around 36 elements on each side).

My current painting project involves digging out hundreds of miniatures and basing them from 28mm HOTT/DBF (I reckon that's the best way to get most of them on the table at the same time). The HOTT armies I have painted at the moment are mainly 1/72, but I'm aiming to replace those with 28mm (more character and more visual impact). Some of the monsters work in both scales, though, and I have a lot left over from earlier 28mm projects.

[Hobgoblin]

Oh - and one thing I'd add for fred: in the recent iterations of DBx, movement is based on base widths (this is an optional rule in HOTT but is a great idea and has become standard since). So you could play HOTT or DBF either with 40mm squares or with doubled-up frontages for 80mm (perhaps with a strip of masking tape underneath to hold the elements together). If you've got a lot of 10mm stuff, that would give a spectacular game.

[fred]

Thanks - I had wondered about doubling up 40mm square bases after seeing some of the diagrams. We tend to have big armies.

I?m not at all sure about the single opposed dice roll for combat resolution.

[Hobgoblin]

Thanks - I had wondered about doubling up 40mm square bases after seeing some of the diagrams. We tend to have big armies.

I?m not at all sure about the single opposed dice roll for combat resolution.

It's a single dice roll per element (barring the flanking and overlapping ones, which modify the main attacks) - and almost every combat will involve quite a few elements (again, the line of battle is very important in the DBx system). So a typical combat might involve something like six or eight die rolls (three or four from each side).

Is it the mathematics of the die rolls that you're dubious about? I think the fact that the rolls are opposed tends to stop it being too swingy. The extreme results come when one side rolls low and the other rolls high, which dampens the volatility of outcomes, and you typically get quite a lot of 'shoving matches' - especially between lines of heavy infantry (Blades, Pikes and Spears) - which feels right to me. The 'shock troops' (Warband and Knights, for example) can disrupt this, though, which again feels right.

If you have big armies, doubling up the bases sounds a good plan - especially if you're using a big table. The one disadvantage of using squares throughout is that certain elements benefit from rear support (Warband and Spears in HOTT), and this can look a little odd with squares. But it's more an aesthetic thing than anything else. A 10mm game with 80mm frontages would look spectacular!

[Inkpaduta]

To each their own. But, for me, I really enjoy DBA and HOTT.
They are two of my main rulesets. I use them for everything from
the Trojan War to 1980s Cold War. HOTT is great with Ragnarok and other
mythical periods.

[LouieN]

I cannot find the rules on Military Matters

[blacksoilbill]

I cannot find the rules on Military Matters

I think they are only selling them via Lulu.

[blacksmith]

I'd have got it if sold it digitally.

[Hobgoblin]

I gather from the Fanaticus forum that there's been some hold-up with On Military Matters.

The no-PDF thing seems to be a WRG standard (an anti-piracy measure, perhaps?): I think HOTT was briefly in PDF at some point, but the current edition hasn't ever been, as far as I know.

To each their own. But, for me, I really enjoy DBA and HOTT.
They are two of my main rulesets. I use them for everything from
the Trojan War to 1980s Cold War. HOTT is great with Ragnarok and other
mythical periods.

Precisely how I feel! Mythical battles showcase something that HOTT does really well and perhaps better than any other ruleset: allow hugely fantastical elements to be involved in a tabletop game without any hassle or fiddliness. If you want a god or a vast airship or a flying whale (or Simon's Crimson Bat), you can just get on with it. Most other fantasy games require a welter of special rules and templates and complexity to do something like that.

One project I've reignited in this regard is a plan to create a Moorcockian flying ship; I'd bought a cheap plastic kit ages ago as the basis for it, but didn't find the time to covert and paint it: I'm going to put that right shortly.

[Cat]

The no-PDF thing seems to be a WRG standard (an anti-piracy measure, perhaps?): I think HOTT was briefly in PDF at some point, but the current edition hasn't ever been, as far as I know.

Yes, that's a Barker thing.