Post by Fadril Adren on Oct 5, 2015 19:13:54 GMT -5
Wargames rules, it seems, are somewhat like buses: You seem to spend ages waiting for a set to come along, and then two or three arrive at the same time. Last year (2010) this was true of Napoleonic rules, this year it’s the turn of Ancients, with several new Ancients rulesets being published at approximately the same time.
One of these is Hail Caesar, the latest offering from Mr. Priestly and Warlord Games. As you may expect, following on from the successful publication of Black Powder, these rules follow roughly the same format, and can indeed be seen as the Ancients ‘version’ of these earlier rules – or you could alternatively view these rules as a progression from Rick Priestley’s earlier work on Warmaster Ancients – either viewpoint has it’s merits.
Hail Caesar is a 192 page, hardback book, which is produced in sumptuous full-colour and is lavishly illustrated with photos of many different miniatures.
The rules cover most of the ancient period, from Biblical times to the Crusades.
As with Black Powder before them, these rules are designed to play multi-player games on a large table (typically 12’ x 6’) although much smaller games are possible – playing with 6mm figures, about the smallest table area you can play on is 4’ x 3’, halving all movement distances and ranges.
The rules are relatively fast play, using a pretty free and easy movement system and a straight forward combat system which aims to reflect both the impact of hard-hitting troops and the endurance of highly trained and disciplined soldiers.
The command and control system will be familiar to anyone who has played Warmaster Ancients or one of its deriritives. However, just in case you’re not, your army is divided into a number of commands, each with a leader. Leaders have a leadership value (an average of 8), and you have to roll equal to or less than this value on 2d6 in order to issue an order to a unit. If you pass, you issue 1, 2 or 3 orders to the unit, depending on how much you rolled under your leadership test. You may only roll once for each unit in a turn, and a failure immediately stops that leader from issuing any further orders that turn.
Units move by being given orders, an order being a clearly defined instruction announced by the commander to the opponent(s); such as," the Saxon Thegns will advance around the wood to their left to turn the flank of the Norman line". two d6 are then rolled against the command value of the general. the result allows 1 to 3 actions in the event of a success, or may fail, or even result in a blunder (a random move, usually with undesired results!). Fail and you stop issuing orders with that commander; though the commander in chief has the right to order one re-roll per turn.
Movement across the board is pretty fast – Infantry move a 6”, Cavalry at 9” and Light Cavalry at 12”, so issuing 3 orders to a cavalry unit could potentially see it racing off right across the board, so that use and wording of orders is actually quite important…simply ‘Advance towards the enemy’ may not be enough!
Combat takes the ‘buckets of dice’ approach, with several d6 being thrown when in combat, each needing to score 4+ in order to hit (though some modifiers may apply). Many units the get a morale save which can save some hits (this is variable, dependent upon the unit) and the unit then takes the unsaved hits, which affects the units Stamina. You finally roll on another table to see the outcome of the combat. So, whilst each combat has 3 different dice rolls involved, it soon becomes quick and easy to carry out. There are rules for units to support each other in combat, and various special rules cover combat outcomes. Perhaps the most controversial rule is within the combat system, as almost every troop type (with the exception of Infantry armed with Pike, Long Spear or Double Handed Weapons or Cavalry with Heavy Lances/Kontos) gets a short range missile attack (up to 6”) – this represents the activity of skirmishers with the formation, or the formation being able to throw various hand weapons prior to melee combat taking place. Although the system works well, I think it certainly raises a few eyebrows.
The core mechanic is based on Black Powder, which in turn was descended from Warmaster, perhaps Games Workshops best (if still imperfect) set of rules. Formations of troops are grouped together to form 'divisions' within an army, and each division is led by a General - one of which is identified as commander in chief. Units do not have casualties removed, rather they are marked in some way during the game to show losses. Therefore single figures are not essential, though multiple bases for a unit are valuable to represent formation changes. Figures based for DBM would work perfectly with this. The rules recommend basic unit sizes of 16-24, though we have found units of 12-16 to be perfectly satisfactory.
Shooting and combat are similar to Black Powder, but with a slant to hand to hand, units typically role 2-3 dice in shooting or 4-9 dice in hand to hand. The default being 4+ to hit, in combat both sides roll dice, and in either case, any hits may be reduced by a morale roll (identical to the Save roll in Warhammer). This is closest to Armati of the three other systems. Warhammer is buckets of dice by comparison, whilst DBM is on the fall of one D6 and a load of obtuse modifiers.
Units can take a limited number of hits, but these in themselves do not destroy a unit, until double their value are suffered, rather break tests are taken either when a unit loses a round of combat (suffers more hits than it's opponents) or has sixes rolled against it by shooting. The lower the roll on 2d6 the worse the result. The tables are subtly progressive.
There are two major additions to combat, supporting units add a small number of dice to melee, as does a general. However any general joining a combat will risk death or injury. This again swings the game more in line of Armati, but has a similar effect to the modifiers in DBM. One other point to make is that some units have higher combat values in the first round of a melee than in later ones. Representing the impetus of an aggressive charge.
As with BP, units can be varied by special abilities or weapons, and a range of sample units are presented. Along side this the second half of the book provides seven scenario's and therefore 14 sample armies covering two and a half millennia.
Although the book is just under 200 pages long, less that half are actually devoted to rules. The rest of the book contains details of several scenarios that we fought with the rules in different eras, showing how the rules can be amended to better fit various times in history, or particular scenarios.
Ultimately, these rules are scenario driven. They do contain a fairly rudimentary points system (added, it would seem, under duress by the author), but that is not how the game is designed to be played. The lack of points has already ruffled feathers on various web forums, as it seems that some players seem to struggle without them. However, I do not see why you simply cannot use army lists created under another system and then bring that army to these rules.
Also (and this is made plain in the text) these rules are not intended for tournament play – which would also back up the original lack of a points system.
My own experience of playing these rules so far has been a positive one – Though it was played as a smaller skirmish of the Romans versus Germanics. Although the rules contain both a table of contents and an appendix with a rules summary, looking for key information (in our case, notes on troop disorder) ended up with several minutes spent frantically leafing back and forth through the book until we found the relevant passage. Surely publishers should have learnt by now that if they are going to produce a 200 page rulebook, they need to ensure that it is navigated easily.
Ultimately, Hail Caesar is a fast-play set of Ancients rules that gives an excellent basis for gaming the period, whilst actively encouraging the player to adapt the rules to meet the challenges of particular battles or conflicts.
The design philosophy is summed up in the introduction: “a ruleset that allows several friends to get together and play an exciting game over the course of an evening, sharing banter and a few drinks, and still have time to go for a curry afterwards.”
It does exactly what it says on the front, and I, for one, am really enjoying them.
- FADRIL