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Author Topic: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"  (Read 10909 times)

Offline pws

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Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« on: September 06, 2016, 11:42:56 AM »
Ciao,
I saw an article for the launch of this new "historical" ruleset and I cannot believe in what I read.
Here: http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/kings-of-war/books/product/kings-of-war-historical-armies.html

Romans... 1000 years of history summed in "romans". In the same lists: triarii, pretorians and gladiators!
Caio Giulio Cesare as hero of this so called Empire: please someone wake me up from this nightmare!



It's not possible that a big company as Mantic claim to be, publish such a garbage!
Even reading wikipedia a 6 y.o. could do better than this.
It is an error a typo or something, isnt' it?
  
« Last Edit: September 06, 2016, 11:45:00 AM by pws »
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Offline Steve F

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #1 on: September 06, 2016, 11:55:37 AM »
Didn't you know that Caesar was famous for his "crushing strength"?
« Last Edit: September 06, 2016, 12:18:40 PM by Steve F »

Offline FierceKitty

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #2 on: September 06, 2016, 11:57:52 AM »
It's trash, certainly. But for some reason ancients are especially prone to being turned into Hollywoodish gibberish by gamers (as also anything east of India, and thanks to that twit Grant a lot of 18th century too).
The laws of probability do not apply to my dice in wargames or to my finesses in bridge.

Offline Timbor

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #3 on: September 06, 2016, 01:48:04 PM »
You can tut-tut all you want, but I think it is a brilliant idea. Not everyone cares to know the intricate details and differences of period armour for Roman Legionaries. They just want to see the might of Rome trample its enemies  :D

KoW is a widely used ruleset, that makes for fast, tactical, enjoyable games for those of us who do not care to get bogged down for hours looking up tedious special rules. Applying this mindset to historical gaming allows for even greater exposure, and hopefully, introduction of many fantasy players to the historical scene. Using the same ruleset for both historical and fantasy simplifies things, and opens up many opportunities.

I know there are many decent historical rulesets out there, but how easy is it to get in a game? If your community has an active fantasy player base but no historical interest (like mine) it will be much easier to actually play games with your models.
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Offline Nick2729

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #4 on: September 06, 2016, 02:08:24 PM »
I'm a dyed in the wool historical gamer but think it's a great hook for Fantasy gamers into Historical.

However, the argument that you don't need to be historically accurate, even in the broadest sense, is completely bonkers! All you are then doing is using different figures for the same game - a new fantasy army list as it were. Why bother calling it Historical at all?

The fact is that it would have been very simple indeed just to lift the fan created historical lists (for a small payment or lots of kudos) from Hour of Wolves and Shattered Shields – www.HourOfWolves.org.

They have done 4 different period books from Pike to Medieval for KoW - all free pdfs.

Here is the selection of Roman armies they have done (from their Kings of War Historical Ancient Combat - Rome’s Rise and Fall! book):

CAMILLAN & POLYBIAN ROMAN ARMIES
MARIAN ROMAN ARMIES
EARLY IMPERIAL ROMAN ARMIES
MIDDLE IMPERIAL ROMAN ARMIES  
LATE IMPERIAL ROMAN ARMIES
PATRICIAN ROMAN & SUB-ROMAN BRITISH ARMIES

Now, I'm not saying these lists are perfect but they are a damn sight more granular and historical than those Mantic have produced so would it have been so difficult?

There's a lot of KoW played at the club I attend - for a Beer & Pretzels game I'd play KoW Historical but using these lists even though I play Impetus for preferance.
« Last Edit: September 06, 2016, 02:10:21 PM by Nick2729 »

Offline AWu

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #5 on: September 06, 2016, 02:20:10 PM »
Didn't you know that Caesar was famous for his "crushing strength"?

You know nothing..

Steve63

  • Guest
Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #6 on: September 06, 2016, 02:44:01 PM »
+1 to what Timbor said
I attended a club where members in their 20's have very little historical knowledge and if 1 gamer wants to start playing historical games because of these rules then that's a result

Offline Mad Doc Morris

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #7 on: September 06, 2016, 02:50:52 PM »
In defence (although I'm not interested in Mantic's venture), you may notice that the units portrayed here are to be added to an army built from generic options, the so-called "Master list". Hence you're able to – more or less – accurately create, for example, a Roman army of 69AD by supplementing a core force of "spearmen", "heavy warriors" etc. with a contingent of "gladiators" as allegedly deployed by Emperor Otho.
OTT abilities for 'special chars' were also well established in Warhammer Ancients Battles. ;)

Offline Steve F

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #8 on: September 06, 2016, 03:03:27 PM »
George Macdonald Fraser once wrote a book called The Hollywood History of the World.  He spent a lot of the time taking the mickey, but concluded that, even so, Hollywood movies had given more people in the English-speaking world at least a vague idea of their history than they ever learned or retained from school.

Looking at that Kings of War list, there are two things that are simply wrong: Caesar's crushing strength, and (under all but the odd circumstances raised by Mad Doc Morris), gladiators.  Otherwise, anyone who already knows their history could use it to select a reasonably fair representation of a Republican, Marian or early Imperial army.  Anyone who doesn't already know their history would look at sort of the chapter headings Nick2729 lists, decide it's too complicated and confusing ("Camillan and Polybian?") and go back to playing orcs.  This way they've just got two pages to absorb: it's a start, it's better than nothing, and it may give them an incentive to learn more later.

Offline YPU

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #9 on: September 06, 2016, 03:07:10 PM »
Maybe, KOW "Holywood historical" would be a better name indeed. But looking at it in that light I don't mind it at all. In the end its all games anyway. If somebody wants to field an army of what popular culture think of with Romans he has more than enough options when it comes to miniatures and these rules would do nicely.

But I can't figure that crushing strength either. Unless it is supposed to represent him being equipped with the best of the best weapons and therefore reducing the opponents save value?... Yea that's the best I could come up with.  ::)
« Last Edit: September 06, 2016, 03:10:10 PM by YPU »
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Offline Timbor

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #10 on: September 06, 2016, 03:07:47 PM »
That is good to know that you can tailor lists to be a bit more historically accurate.  I think the intent of these rules are, as Steve63 said, great to get new players interested in historical games.  I think 'younger' generations have a mindset that only fictional characters can be epic, but the more you learn history the better.

In terms of Romans, before I got more interested in ancient history, and joined this fine forum, the only "Romans" I knew and identified with were the early imperial types as seen in the movie gladiator.  So... seeing four or more lists of "Romans" in a rulebook would come off at best as confusing, and at worst as elitist and would make me less interested in playing.

I think it is crucial to spark interest first, and those who enjoy the setting will naturally lean towards historical accuracy.

Offline Johnp4000

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #11 on: September 06, 2016, 03:24:14 PM »
I had the impression that the object is to allow you to design a more historical or themed kingdoms of men army.As the lists allow mythical beasts. I don't think the intention is to produce a historical game?

Offline YPU

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #12 on: September 06, 2016, 03:30:26 PM »
I had the impression that the object is to allow you to design a more historical or themed kingdoms of men army.As the lists allow mythical beasts. I don't think the intention is to produce a historical game?

I think the problem there would be that they are in fact calling it "KOW: historical"

Offline pws

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #13 on: September 06, 2016, 04:54:16 PM »
I understand and agree the "hooking into historical" and "make it simple" (especially for newbies), but if you write page wide (from side to side) historical... expect some critcs from historical fans. Maybe this is the results of too many years spended with DBx books  :-*  lol

I even play kow2 for massed fantasy battle and the rules are good, it's not my favourite setup (fantasy is not what I like most) but  the are ok to spend a evening playing, although prefer the various Rampants books.

You cannot judge a book by his cover... I admit it, and surely the "general section" is the key of this game, I hope.
Maybe the example they choose is not the best of the book? I hope.
Simply not in my top 100 of next purchases.



Offline nils

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Re: Mantic KOW - so called - "historical"
« Reply #14 on: September 06, 2016, 05:03:11 PM »
It may not be historical corect but i thing it will be fun.

 

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