My, you have had a rough introduction to DBM! I shall have to come and show you how its done.

Firstly, the two piece terrain may have been legal, depending on whether the two pieces were different. If not, it was illegal by reason of being symmetrical. Assuming its legality, the answer was in your own hands. You were entitled to remove both pieces and replace them with ouhers up to 15 inches in diameter with their centres within 6 inches of the riginal position.

Since you were refighting Northallerton, which is on the North York moors, rough gentle hills covered with brush would have been appropriate, not woods. These would have been deadly to knights and been no inconvenience at all to any of the Scots except their few knights. In the real battle of Northallerton, the English knights dismounted.

7th did have a realistic terrain system, but one which had a huge disadvantage. Players spent all their ingenuity on terrain picking rather than tactics and took too long about it. In the 500 AP DBM pairs competitions Sue and I fight in, you are allowed 30 minutes to get to your table, set terrain and get both armies deployed. Anything you save is added to your nominal 2 1/2 hour playing time. The swinging penalties for failure have never yet been needed.

For the first year of gaming, some players with mounted armies did try to set minimal terrain, but they have now realised (a) that this makes them totally predictable, (b) that it is I easily foiled by a canny opponent, and (c) that there are types of terrain to suit every troop type. The best players now put down the maximum number of terrain pieces of varied type and size. Your opponenl does not know which you least want to be removed and those he does remove or change help you guess his plan. The ultimate response is to leave them all UNCHANGED, which does nothing for the defender's confidence!

Now, there is one innovation in the DBM terrain system that Amaican commentators seem to be missing. We no longer have bad terrain, we have difficult going and rough going, with very different characteristics. Difficult going hinders command, partly by restricting visibility. No army in the world ever went through woods, vinyards, buildings or enclosures in line and retained its formation unless it did a lot of stopping to reform. The sensible way of getting through is in a single column. However, such terrain is rather rare on battlefields. The type most often mentioned in historical accounts is the gentle slope, rather smooth, or rough with rocks or bushes. Rough going does not affect foot movement but in combat favours foot over mounted and loose foot over close. And while impetuous knights are allowed to avoid difficult going, they are not allowed lo ignore troops in rough!

As for the fatality of a close formation foot army against a knight army, Sue and I took her Ancient Brits to the last convention, practically all loose warhand and open slingers with a few light horse and next to no chariots. Our only really decisive win was over a Light (Chinese heavy chariot) army and it was their combination with crossbows that gave us the most trouble. We used mixed tenain modelled and painted with a terrain prize in view at the next competition. We took a gully, smooth, rough and partly rough hills with thorny gorse blooming like yellow fire, rough ground with flowering thorn, rock and new bracken, and not just woods, but bluebell wonds. We are now looking for 15mm squirrels to complete the effect... However, we expect fierce competition from a Chinese temple and paddy fields, so for next year we are currently painting a fortified Roman city from Firebase Games.

It is possible to control even a hrbarian army in DBM if you are clever enough (though I have considered fining my Gothic knights with parking brakes or chaining them to trees) and to follow a plan. Simple plans work better than WMing plans. However, loss of control is not necessarily unrealistic and in the real battle of Northallerton, just about the entire Scots army was out of control.

As I rememher it, the few knights charged, made a hole in the English infantry then went impetuous and spent the rest of the battle looting baggage. The Galwegians insisted on usurping the post of honour, charged out of control, were shot up on tbe approach then thrown back, charged again and muted before contact. The disgruntled Highlanders of the left wing refused to charge at all and slipped away while no one was looking. Only the Lowland and Strathclyde contingents behaved responsibly but only cleared the ruck to reach the English line just in time to be demoralised.

There are no troop types in DBM that cannot bc destroyed by some opponents, just some that cannot be destroyed in frontal comhat. Any troops can be destroyed if fixed frontally by one element and flankled hy another. With a bound representing nearly 10 minutes it is reasonable that an element that is not so fixed should be able to turn in time to face. If it is the end element of a line, its inability to then recoil fully is usually fatal to the line and it is then that flank attacks really pay off.

It is not strictly true to say that WRG is allowing 7th to fade. It is more thal we have accepted that its decline is so rapid that the life support machine can soon be turned off. DBM is now the major competition set in the UK and it seems the 7th "Top Guns" are converting to it faster than the generality of 7th players. This is not regarded hy estahlished DBM players as an unmixed blessing, and has necessitated a new amendment sheet (v 1.2) to block their clever tricks. This will he finalised on June 1st and will then be available from the Keep for the usual addressed envelope and IRCs. There will be no new printing of the rules this year. We will also post it on Internet and send copies to magazine editors. It differs from the bootlegged interim version that has already appeared on Internet.

There were 50 teams at the last west country DBM pairs competition and they nearly filled the entrants sheet for the next one before it could be thrown open to newcomers. This pairs circuit has 3 country Hotel venues at the moment forming a 50 mile side triangle. There is talk of a fourth next year, but this is likely to fill up with the same people rather than make room for others. The first of the 4 games is against the nearest historical opponents, the rest on strict Swiss chess. We squeezed in Mike Kroon visiting from Palo Alto at the last one, playing with my Patricians, so he may have something to report. I gather we play faster over here.

The big advantage of DBM for me is that I can go and play without being interrupted with rule queries. With the old style rules, to play in public was impossible for me. I'm a wargamer. I get my kicks from playing games.

Jeff Bolton does seem to be a glutton for punishment. His new amendments all upset the intended play balance. As for his new victory conditions, he should read the last line on P.25. "Under no circumstances should lost army points (AP) be a criteria." This is not a whim! There are overwhelmingly good reasons! We really, really mean it!

For Neil Hammond, modern Mongols still put meat under their saddles, but as a dressing for the pony's saddle sores. Either the Huns were pulling Ammianus' leg, or he was guessing, or they were really hungry.

Original Article (Saga 49)