Champ De Bataille

Vae Victus #9

by Martin, Monnier & Stratigos

Reviewed by Carl Gruber

Vae Victus' Champ de Bataille (Field of Battle) is a board version of the popular miniatures series "De Bello Multitudinus". The magazine game features Soissons 486, with a Gallo-Roman army taking the field against the Franks under Clovis, and Poitiers 732 where Charles Martel leads the East Franks against the Moors, a "battle" rather downgraded in importance by recent historians. Counters are also included for Byzantines, Persians, and Arabs, used with additional scenarios included in later issues.

The best way to describe Champ is by comparison. It's nowhere near as detailed as GBOH, but, at the same time, it's not a no-brainer like DG's "Old Bag" Quads. It's more like an upgraded, and meatier, version of SPI's venerable Prestags system. Units are rated for their combat values against infantry and cavalry separately, and then they are broken down into mounted and foot, "impetuous" (usually irregulars or barbarians) and light … skirmishers, light cavalry and auxiliaries. Units are then, further, rated for weapon type and quality. Leaders are not presented as individuals but are combat units, probably representing their household troops.

The rules barely span 8 pages. They have to be read quite carefully, though, because there is a lot of interaction between the units types and classes, and there are lots of rules for command, stacking, fire and melee, and unit demoralization. The actual command rules are minimal but interesting. Both sides roll a die at the start of each turn, and that is the number of "groups" (analogous to GBOH's lines) that can be activated. Since groups are formed of adjacent units faced in the same direction, the confusion of combat can often disorganize groups and cause armies to go out of control. Certain units (mainly barbarian) are also affected by "impetuous" movement toward the nearest enemy units. Champ succeeds in creating a lot of command problems with minimal fuss.

Combat is also deceptively simple. The games does not use a CRT. Rather, both players roll a die, add the combat ratings of their respective units and then consult a rather long list of die-roll modifiers for the effects of stacking, unit types and troop quality. The final modified die rolls are then compared to produce a numerical differential, applied depending on the classes of the defender and attacker. Results range from retreats and routs to outright destruction.

Champ is not especially complex, and yet it somehow manages to account for most of the factors in combat of the Late Classical/Early Middle Ages. While not a definitive portrayal of the period's warfare, it is still far better than the lamentable Men at Arms and the aforementioned, and laughable, Four Battles of the Ancient World. Champ can also be played to take a breather from the confusion over which latest version of GBOH's cavalry pursuit and phalanx rout rules is the final one. [Ed. Then again, Carl, you haven't seen Simple GBoH.] This is a lot of game packed into a small package, and one that has become quite popular in The Old World.

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© Copyright 1996 by Richard Berg
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