Light horse armies?

[Sven]

How do these keep up with the changes?
I gather I'll have to be a bit more careful with them as they'll frequently be spent instead of just retreating.
Enemies can now march right up to them aswell, but on the other hand they now actually have some punch against enemy foot (especially LH(f) with support or LH(s)).
Im currently painting Skytians with options of going for Chinese barbarians (Hsiung-nu/ Hsiung-Pi).
Anyone with DBMM experience from these?

Thanks!

[toby]

Light horse have become a lot more effective against foot.

The spent result usually replaces occasions where you would have been killed previously, so is a step in the right direction.

The big changes are that infantry rarely could any kind of back rank against you and you always have the option to pull out with a repulse if you don't win, so you rarely get stuck and end up with an infantry on the flank.

A big problem is that you can end up in a lot of groups which you don't have the PIPs to move back into contact, which is where Irr LH(S) have an advantage. Get lots of generals if you can.

Your biggest enemy is Bw, who will murder you frontally.

LH(S) can take down Cv(O) and will murder Cv(I).

LH(F) have real problems against other mounted though.

The marching issue is a problem - if you can take some Cv(O) as well do so as they will stop it and can still manouver.

Toby

[Sven]

Yes they now have some frontal punch and if I read correctly cannot be flanked by foot in my bound and retreat if they lose. So charge in kill a few and withdraw might work if lucky.
It will be interesting indeed to try DBMM 

[Aloysius the Gaul]

Light horse have become a lot more effective against foot.

The spent result usually replaces occasions where you would have been killed previously, so is a step in the right direction.

They were never killed by foot other than bows and Ps(O) previously - and these still do - so becoming spent is actually a limitation on them, not a benefit!

The big changes are that infantry rarely could any kind of back rank against you and you always have the option to pull out with a repulse if you don't win, so you rarely get stuck and end up with an infantry on the flank.

Yep -that's the case with Cav too now - much more useful.

[bunwin63]

For the purpose of combat results where LH flee from higher grade LH, what is the ranking? Is it S,O,F,I?

Bryan

[Barritus]

For the purpose of combat results where LH flee from higher grade LH, what is the ranking? Is it S,O,F,I?

Bryan

Correct. It's annoying that this is nowhere spelled out.

[toby]

I think that its why the order of them was changed in the definitions or in the point table or something - to make it obvious

Its sort of intuitive that F should be better than I though. O have to be better than F because its the interaction of Numidians and Parthians that this is modelling. S are always better than anyone else.

[bunwin63]

I don't think it's intuitive that O is higher than F, as you could be forgiven for thinking that O's greater combat resilience is offset by F's greater speed.
A new player wouldn't necessarily know what historical equivalents the interaction was modelled on. I think this assumption that readers KNOW these things, or can deduce it with careful thought, without it being stated in the rules, is a weakness.

[SG]

A friendly Knight is the Light Horse's best friend - and vice versa. I'm going to love those Later Hungarians with the Kn/LH combo.

[Danzig The Doomed]

I was going to ask a similar question.

How should an Early Imperial Roman (EIR) army and a Light Cavalry army such as the Alans set about tackling each other?

I ask, because we have some historical evidence for the Romans in Arrian's Order of Battle against the Alans.

[Doug M.]

I was going to ask a similar question.

How should an Early Imperial Roman (EIR) army and a Light Cavalry army such as the Alans set about tackling each other?

I ask, because we have some historical evidence for the Romans in Arrian's Order of Battle against the Alans.

At this stage though the Alans used LH (graded as (S)) and Kn(F), so the order of battle suggests drawing up in multiple ranks with archers, and preferably artillery in support. What will happen is that the Alans need to wear down the legions using their LH to come in frontally (being Impetuous is helpful for this) and whittle them down till they can make a successful Kn charge. Has anyone tried using the feigned flight stratagem to lure the romans out?

As the Roman player, using localised counter-charges by Cv to try and drive off the LH, and using terrain effectively are the keys.

regards

[toby]

The only times I have used feigned flight, the Romans had enough PIPs to be able to hold their line each time. The problem is that the foot never follow-up against the mounted, so its difficult to pull them out of position.

I've tried it with LH(F) who are similar against the Bd to LH(S) if you double rank them, but I kept running out of PIPs to put them in with. The problem with them is that the Cv(O) would come out and murder them. With LH(S), there is a very good chance that they will murder the Cv(O), so its more risky. Charging the Kn(F) into deep and/or supported Bd is going to result in a lot of dead Kn - you need to keep the Kn to kill the roman Cv(O) or go for Bd who are only one deep. Otherwise they kill the front guy and pursue in to be double overlapped. Don't forget that LH can always opt not to follow-up and Kn don't have to follow up in the enemy bound except against other Kn.

The LH(S) will whittle down the Bd in the end, but it will be a slow process. the Art are a real pain, but if you get close enough to the Bd line they can't shoot overhead. Go for the the flanks, especially if they are anchored in rough terrain - LH can move through rough quite rapidly.

[Hammy]

Feigned flight is actually more likely to keep your opponent static rather than chasing you (strange really) as the only choices are to halt or move impetuously. Whenever I have seen it used it normally does very little.

As to dealing with the LH(S) scrum I suppose the only thing you can do is to try to pull all of the LH into the scrum while hopefully having a few reserves yourself to flank them.

The order of battle against the Alans is for fighting the knights but to be honest any Alan commander with their head screwed on would be mad to throw Kn(F) into a deep Roman formation. The Kn are far better held as a reserve ideally facing the table edge so they don't go impetuous.

Yours synically

Hammy

[Danzig The Doomed]

To push my question further:

Arrian's order of battle against the Alans does indeed have reasonably deep Roman infantry formations supported by rear rank bowmen, but many of the infantry of Auxiliaries Ax(S) and possibly some client foot.  Does this alter the tactics?

Also the Romans had some (~ ally) horse archers of their own.

Meanwhile, the Alans could in the army list could have some axemen and foot archers, as well as their charging cavalry.

This means that it is only "predominatly" heavy infantry v. "predominantly" light cavalry, with both sides having some other skills.

[Hammy]

You still working on that ulcer mate?

Probably but as the poster wanted to know how to use Alans vs Romans and vice versa under DBMM I felt that I should be honest

The fact is that Kn(F) are no going to beat legionaries and far more likely to die costing the Alans 2 ME per base. The LH(S) are just as likely to hurt the legions as the knights and if they die they will only cost 1 ME.

Holding the knights by turning them to face the table edge may well be peculiar but there are a lot of peculiar things that the rules clearly allow.

Hammy