Re the previous post, the Ancients boxed set of rules from Irregular Miniatures (designed by Ian Kay) have just arrived, thank you Postie. I take in a deep breath of nostalgic anticipation as I open the box.
Amidst my high excitement, there is a small immediate disappointment …. The box has been sent by putting a postage label on the actual box and taping it down, which now detracts a little from the pleasure of the box. I would have preferred the whole thing to be put in Jiffy bag and if I order the other sets I will ask for that.
Anyway, everything else is just a simple joy and mostly as I remember it.
There is an information sheet of A4 paper in the box that is printed to both sides. Interestingly, at the footnote there is a copyright date of 1989, which surprised me, I thought they were earlier. But that is still 36 years ago, so this is an old original set, rather than a newish reprint, so the box is a little tired (it was posh in its day with a sort of leatherette finish) and the type face and the hand drawn formation diagrams speak with an 80’s voice …. I like that, but date wise, it is interesting to see that the rules sit on the cusp of old school and modern in terms of ideas.
This is really exemplified by the two systems (you choose which one) for recording casualties. System 1 - the unit is built from a number of 6mm strips and you remove a strip to show casualties or cohesion loss. This harks back to old school single figure removal from units. System 2 - you make up a base for the unit and on a roster, assign strength. Reductions to strength are made on the roster, which is close to how we would do things today, though perhaps with dice or markers to show losses.
A couple of other things that might have felt modern in the day, measurements are in centimetres rather than inches and morale classes have different die roll strengths, so for example Class C (average warrior) use a D8, raw troops a D6 etc - that still feels a fairly modern mechanic to me.
The box is roughly 100mm x 140mm and 20mm deep. The cards inside are a snug fit and carry the entire system. They are colour coded to match the sequence of play. They have the charts, process and modifiers etc on the front face and associated notes and examples on the back. I seem to remember playing without any problems, so it will be interesting to see if a modern eye that is used to finding errata in games will now find questions … an interesting subject in its own right.
Anyway, back to the sheet of paper. It broadly sets out what the game is about, describes the nature of unit types by their function (i.e. skirmishers), draws a distinction between regulars and irregulars and sets out four morale classes from raw to elite.
They include a points system for non-historical battles and set a scale of 1mm = 1 yard for 6mm figures and 1mm = 2 yards for their 2mm figure range (yes I know, a mix of metric and imperial), but emphasise that other figures scales can be used with relevant changes to ground and weapon range scale. They suggest that the notes on the leaflet need only be read a couple of times and then not reference again for play - everything else is done with the cards.
The colour coded cards follow the sequence of play, so;
RED - Summary of the turn sequence, Initiative and formation examples
(Rear - scouting and dispositions, orders (orders can be changed if a general joins a unit).
BLUE - Rout, Pursuit, Charge and Evade
(Rear - examples)
PASTEL YELLOW - Movement (veering, rough terrain, obstacles and limitations)
(Rear - notes and examples)
GREEN - Missile Fire with modifiers and ranges
(Rear - examples)
PINK - Hand to hand fighting, there are 3 rounds (1 round per turn) to try and get a winner, after 3 rounds, if a winner not established (doubtful I think) the fight has fizzled out and the side with weaker morale side breaks contact.
(Rear - defines rear support and examples)
ORANGE - a diagram of random directions (D12) for Random elephant / scythed chariot movement and stone thrower ranging.
(Rear - the diagram explained)
BRIGHT YELLOW - some mechanic notes like how strips can be automatically lost if moving through rough terrain and the PANIC TEST procedure
(Rear - examples)
All told, there is a fair amount of rules ground covered here and I do remember getting a good game, so I am hopeful that that remains the case. What is really helpful is that when you are in a particular phase, that is the card you have in your hand and all of the information is there - you are not rummaging back and forth in a rulebook looking for related items as questions crop up. I guess it is either on the card or you are stuck and guess what ….. we can try and work it out for ourselves rather than the modern way of going straight onto the internet and asking the community / designer for an answer that 90% of the time is ‘there’ (or toss a coin as the paper leaflet helpfully suggests).
Note the author (Ian Kay of Irregular Miniatures) kindly included his phone number and said anyone if really stuck could call him during office hours … the pre-internet solution :-).
One thing that I didn’t remember was that units are given initial orders - only to be changed by the general attaching themselves. At first I though ‘orders’ - oh that’s a bind, but then as I think about that, I quite like it, it will ensure without a ton of rules overhead that the armies of the period are difficult to freely manoeuvre once battle gets going …. None of the fancy foot work that might be more in keeping with a WWII panzer formation!
Well, that is that, this was only meant to be two paragraphs long! I am really pleased with another chance to have these in my hands. I love these sort of rules that everyone back in the day seemed to do.
What next? I am pleased enough to take these for a spin with my (unpainted) Epic Hannibal set and putting them under the strain of play, which is the only way of benchmarking my rose tinted memories with the reality of the ‘then and now’ of rules.
Irregular Miniatures have been present in my hobby world since day one and I admire them for the years that they widely supported the show circuit and made figure collecting accessible to the masses. These rules are just a reflection of that sort of support, thank you Ian and team.
I will run through a few examples soon and put some observations up on my COMMANDERS site - link
https://commanders.simdif.com/dear_diary.html
