Sword & Spear Fantasy

[Stan Shinn]

I contacted Great Escape Games (the publisher) and was told that a PDF for Sword & Spear 2nd Edition would be out, hopefully by end of month. I'd expect the Sword & Spear Fantasy rules PDF would also be coming shortly

[mellis1644]

Excellent news. Thanks

[grubman]

The game is unit based. All units must be the same frontage (or nearly the same). Typical unit frontages are 80mm for 15mm figures and 120mm for 28mm figures, but you can use any unit size you like. All distances are given in Distance Units (DU), where 1 DU is half the unit frontage.

Watched all the videos last night and ordered the game as well.  I'm curious, does the base depth matter at all? 

[Hobgoblin]

The rulebook says "Unit depth is not so import but will generally be around half the normal unit frontage". I'm playing a game shortly, but I get the impression that it's not a big deal (as in HOTT). Greater depth could make the unit more vulnerable to flank or rear attacks (by bringing the target edge closer to the enemy), but I can't see it making much of a difference otherwise.

[grubman]

...another thing I'm curious about...I know the game roots are big block ancient battles (line em up, move em forward, kill!), but do the fantasy rules lend themselves well to scenario games?  Siege battles, defend the town, breakthrough, battle of 5 armies, playing out RPG battles ect.  My years of WFB are long past, but I do fondly remember being able to use (and bend) the rules to create exciting new scenarios.

[Polkovnik]

I'm curious, does the base depth matter at all? 

Most of the time it will make very little difference. A deeper base will mean it might take longer for the unit to clear a terrain feature, and there could be situations where a flank charge will contact a unit but wouldn't have done if it had a lesser base depth.

[Polkovnik]

...another thing I'm curious about...I know the game roots are big block ancient battles (line em up, move em forward, kill!), but do the fantasy rules lend themselves well to scenario games?  Siege battles, defend the town, breakthrough, battle of 5 armies, playing out RPG battles ect. 

No to siege battles (unless you mean the part where the defenders sally forth to attack the besiegers), yes to the others.

Here's some pics of a Battle of Five Armies game:

[Nord]

I wanna be excited by this game, the mechanics sound really quite innovative and the rules sound solid. I can overcome the possible generic nature of the lists by adding a few house rules, that's a slight concern, nothing more. But every photo I see of a game in action shows two really boring long lines facing each other. That's a real turn off. Any battle reports anywhere that can convince me otherwise?

[Sunjester]

But every photo I see of a game in action shows two really boring long lines facing each other. That's a real turn off. Any battle reports anywhere that can convince me otherwise?

Unfortunately, that is what the majority of big battles were like, especially pre-gunpowder.

In my last crusades game I turned the Crusader flank and we ended up with units all over the place, facing in all directions in a right mess. But it started off in two long lines facing each other.

[Lowtardog]

Unfortunately, that is what the majority of big battles were like, especially pre-gunpowder.

In my last crusades game I turned the Crusader flank and we ended up with units all over the place, facing in all directions in a right mess. But it started off in two long lines facing each other.

Agreed you only need to watch Game of thrones or Lord of the rings to see that large armies will form ranks. WHFB is more a large skirmish rather than mass battles, you may be better looking at Dragon Rampant or Kings of War to have that scale of battle. These rules are more akin to Warmaster

[Plynkes]

Agreed you only need to watch Game of thrones or Lord of the rings to see that large armies will form ranks.

In fact I think most movie battles don't do this enough. Movie battles almost always instantly devolve into a hundred individual sword-fights, with any notion of ranks and formation vanishing the instant the lines meet, and the battlefield suddenly resembling a gladiatorial arena (because individual melees are apparently cooler than formed bodies fighting each other). I'm not convinced this happened to the degree it does in films.

[Nord]

So I picked up these rules, always willing to give something new a go. I am reading through the rules and it's quite heavy going. I started the youtube videos, pretty helpful. However, there's only 5 of them, nothing on melee, magic, undead, etc. What happened to them?

[Polkovnik]

So I picked up these rules, always willing to give something new a go. I am reading through the rules and it's quite heavy going. I started the youtube videos, pretty helpful. However, there's only 5 of them, nothing on melee, magic, undead, etc. What happened to them?

Stalled a bit I'm afraid. I am planning on getting the rest of them done, but finding time when my camera operator (my 9 year old daughter) is free without any distractions around (my two 7 year old boys) has been difficult.

[commander bernhardt]

Stalled a bit I'm afraid. I am planning on getting the rest of them done, but finding time when my camera operator (my 9 year old daughter) is free without any distractions around (my two 7 year old boys) has been difficult.

very difficult so it seems