I participated in a WRG 7th game t'other day. An army of Teutonics knights faced an English force, which, of course, was equipped with the dreaded longbows. I helped run the English…each side had about 12 units, and 4 of our English units were 24-man longbow units.
I found out, early on, that my longbows were doing just as much damage to the enemy as he was to us. The opposition had "bought" some huge units - I think they had 36 men in them - of normal, light infantry bowmen, and these guys rapidly ran in and began trading shots with the longbowists.
WRG 7th uses a chart of Figures-versus-Factors (FVF) to determine the number of hits a unit takes when fired on or in melee. The kicker is that, to record a hit on a unit, the FVF chart result must exceed the number of men in the unit. There must be at least one casualty per man to have the hits effective. For example, with my 24-man unit, when the enemy fired, the chart result had to indicate at least 24 casualties, otherwise the hits were sloughed off.
Thus a chart result of 35 hits would cause my unit to take one hit, while a result of 54 hits would inflict 2 hits on my unit.
And so what was happening was that my all-powerful longbowists were hard pressed to inflict hits on the huge 36-man enemy units.
The trick, therefore, is to "buy' huge units of cheapy bowmen to act as an absorbing sump for enemy arrows. Most of the cheapy bowmen won't fire (figures in the first rank, plus half the second rank will fire), but the bulk of the troops are there simply to cushion impacts by the enemy.
The melee and fire charts are interesting... the author, Phil Barker, after years of intensive research, after years of pawing through old manuscripts, after years of examination of more than 10,000 battle records of antiquity, was able to distinguish 20 types of units, each one of which is historically and realistically represented in the FVF chart. Troop types range from super heavy cavalry to heavy cavalry to extra heavy infantry to light medium infantry to light heavy infantry to heavy chariots to just plain vanilla light infantry... the list goes on.
In addition to unit type, there's a listing of weaponry. Each type of unit is cross-indexed with the weapon used against it... such as 2HCW (2-handed cutting weapon) and JLS (which, I think, is a javelin) or an LTS (light thrusting spear?). And each weapon gets its own appropriate 6-sided die modifier against the target unit. It's all done so precisely and accurately that it's hard not to believe in the result.
After determining the appropriate weapon factor, there's another list of situation modifiers... for example, knock off -1 if you're disordered, knock off another -2 if you're facing the dreaded 2HCW, add a +1 if you're at a higher elevation, and so on.
Now, having arrived at the proper and applicable facters, it's time to go to the FVF chart. Factors are listed along the left hand column, while the number of figures runs across the top. Below, I've taken a portion of the middle of the chart to illustrate what's going on.
CHART #1
| Factors | Figures | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | |
| +2 | 12 | 14 | 16 | 18 | 20 |
| +3 | 16 | 18 | 20 | 23 | 25 |
| +4 | 18 | 21 | 24 | 27 | 30 |
| +5 | 24 | 28 | 32 | 36 | 40 |
| +6 | 30 | 35 | 40 | 45 | 50 |
About 15 years ago, in an article in the REVIEW, I looked at this chart and noted that when 8 figures, using 5 factors, clobbered an enemy unit... any size enemy unit... then 32 little men fell down. Not 31, and not 33, but exactly 32 little guys fell down. This is precision to the nth degree! It is obviously the result of decades of research, of being able to pinpoint an impact systematically and scientifically.
And then I drew up my own scientific chart:
CHART #2
| Factors | Figures | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | |||
| +2 | +2 | 12 | 14 | 16 | 18 | 20 | |
| +3 | +3 | 18 | 21 | 24 | 27 | 30 | |
| +4 | +4 | 24 | 28 | 32 | 36 | 40 | |
| +5 | +5 | 30 | 35 | 40 | 45 | 50 | |
| +6 | +6 | 36 | 42 | 48 | 54 | 60 | |
In this FVF tabulation, Chart #2, I simply multiplied figures by factors to get the resultant number. And the tabulated results are not too far off from the official WRG 7th chart, Chart #1. Which brings up the question... is my result of 40, when comparing 8 figures versus 5 factors to the official chart result of 32, that much off? Would the game play any differently if you used 40 instead of 32?
Why did the author go through the charade of listing a chartful of bogus values, when he could have simply declared... 'get the answer by multiplying figures by factors'. I think I got an inkling of the answer when I queried those table-side in our game about rating the rules on a scale of 1 to 10, where 10 represents metaphysical perfection.
There were 5 of us in the game, and the results were 8, 7, 8, 7, and 2. The 2, of course, was my own rating, but note how high the other ratings were. All the participants were extremely content with the way the charts and procedures depicted, in historically accurate fashion, the armies and capabilities of the period.
Consider the following conversation between Lord Krul and his subordinate, the Earl of Brogg:
- Krul: Brogg, I want you to raise a unit of 14,000 cheapy bowmen.
Brogg: But my Lord, that's an extraordinary size unit... we'll have to feed these people, and in the field, not all of them will be able to fire their weapons.
Krul: No matter, Brogg, all I want them to do is to absorb all the arrows the enemy will be firing at us. The old parchments say that the more men we have in a unit, the harder it will be for the enemy to achieve an impact on our unit.
Barker must have read my previous article on his tabulations, since years later, Barker did, in effect, give up the WRG 7th approach of specific weapon impacts and spurious chart listings. He turned to his DBA/DBM rules, in which there were only a few generic weapon types listed... there were 'blades' and there were 'spears' and there were 'pikes' and a couple of other types.
In fact, I've heard that Barker sold the complete rights to WRG 7th to a group headed by Scott Holder. Holder and company refuse to let the dead remain buried... they're now re-writing and reformatting and play-testing a new, all-new version of WRG 7th, to be titled WARRIOR.
I'm curious about how many of the WRG procedures will be carried on by WARRIOR. For example, in our battle, each side got to place 4 terrain sections. We English chose 4 'broken ground' sections, the better to hold up the Teutonic mounted knights. In contrast, the Teutonic knights chose 'open ground' sections, to keep their cavalry unhampered.
Then we gave our leaders orders... a menu of 6... rush, attack, probe, hold, delay, or retreat. Then we diced to see how the leaders accepted their orders. We had assigned 'attack' orders, but by tossing high, our leaders escalated the order one step up to 'rush'. And what effect did that have on the battle?... I have absolutely no idea... units moved and fired and fought as usual.
Two of the 5 participants were WRG 7th experts, and they guided the rest of us. But I noted that throughout the game, neither of the experts could function without a chart in hand.
One of our light-heavy-infantry longbow units was charged by light infantry... unfortunately, my boys lost and routed back. I diced to see how far back... a lousy die roll, and they only went back a wee bit. Bad news for the archers, for the oncoming light infantry caught up to them and smacked 'em again.
The rout was 'seen' by a couple of nearby units... both of which had to undergo a 'waiver' test... the WRG equivalent of a morale test. More lousy die rolls...both of which became 'shaken' as a result. The 'shaken' status is one degree below 'disordered'. A unit, by remaining immobile for a turn, can recover from being disordered... 'shaken', however, is another can of worms... it requires a general to ride up and provide guidance and counseling.
Unfortunately, one of the two units that tested was the general himself. So now I had a shaken leader, who, in turn, needed another general to ride up and help him recover. Leaders cannot 'self-recover'... they, too, require counseling.
And the shaken general was, himself, in trouble. He had fought a unit of the enemy knights, held his own for a moment, but after the test, due to his 'shaken' modifiers, he lost the second round and was routing back. And keeping pace with him were the enemy knights, getting in their free hacks. Our general was in no position to help anyone.
Each side had a purchased a 1600 point army. At battle's end, we English had lost around 570 points during the battle, while the Teutonic knights lost some 250 points. This 2-to-1 loss ratio indicated a major victory for the Teutons.
In all, an interesting game, but not for me. I'm not a 'chartest', and the need to constantly reference the combat charts didn't sit well for me. But now I'm sitting on the edge of my seat, awaiting the publication of WARRIOR& what new and arcane procedures will be unveiled?
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© Copyright 2000 Wally Simon
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