I read the article on DBM rules modifications (SAGA #47) with some interest, and Tom Coveney's letter with some regrets. I was pleased to see in the article my ideas about Ln(I) are thought as good changes. Phil Barker continues to adhere to the original. His statement, that these troops are to be "aimed at the enemy general" is just plain dumb. I have hardly played a game where my opponent didn't throw light horse in front of it and kill it. (And Mr. Barker said this would be 'sugar coming' these troops.) The times I got to the enemy line I would go after foot, cavalry, or knights. (As Mr. Barker pointed out in SAGA #48, an article in Spearpoint said they are great against these troops, and I agree. If I could just us them against armies without light horse, it'd be great. But I didn't say he had arrogantly downplayed them, I said they are "too weak against light horse").

But go afer the enemy general? Most of them are Cv(S), and if you note the odds, the Kn (I) has no chance to kill him without an overlap, but does have a chance to die. They're good against others, but not against genaals. I'm glad the lists don't require them, as they are catainly not worth the cost. If they were as ineffective agaimst enemy generals historically as they are in these rules, the Byzantines would not have used them. (Giving the plus to the Byzantine Thanatic cavalry, however, is 'sugar-coating' the troops. A fine reason they get the (S) is because of the second rank. Otherwise, they would be (O) troops. And Cv(S) vs. Kn(F) are almost equal. Making them +4 makes them decidedly superior.) And there's still no reason to designate Thematic skoutatoi as pikes.

As for double elements, they are inherently weaker because the second element is a hindrance and cannot maneuver, and its fate is tied to the front element. I believe the best solution is to make the second element cost 50 percent, rounded up. This at least alleviates the cost crunch when they are both lost to bow fire. I'm sure Phil can come up with something better, I'm just bandying ideas about.

At a recent tournament, I learned a few things I was told wrongly in DBM. The biggest was the scoring system in the back of the book. As I read it, when the battle was over you took the points for intact friendly commands and broken enemies. What I didn't realize was that the paragraph before said that when the battle ended, it wasn't the army that became demoralized, but specified that all the loser's remaining commands became demoralized. So the victor always gets all the losers points and only loses points for his own forces. So I extend my sincerest apologies to Phil and Richard for my misinterpretation of the rules and decribing them to be poorly devised.

About the letter. Tom is absolutely right. These rules are made for tournament play, not historic re-crcation (or recreation). But I feel just the opposite as he. Re-creating historic encounters got boring for me. I wanted a game where it's my army and my skill that makes the difference, and not be hobbled by the mistakes of historic generals. Take Cannae. There is no way the Romans can lose unless you force them to behave as Varro did.

The other ahistoric results are evident in Mr. McLaughlin's article in SAGA #48. I agree with everything he wrote. One of my pet peeves is that cavalry are virtually incapable of destroying spears, the same for bows vs. blades. My own solutions would be as follows:

1) Cavalry vs. Spear and Pike if doubled flee unless they rolled a one, then are destroyed. (This is his second, less preferred result, but I like it better than his skirmish rule.)

2) Blades vs. Bows, just as Knights are increased to +4 against bow shooting, decrease blades to +4 against shooting.

3) I disagree with his suggestion about LH. I believe they're well represented against Cavalry. What I may wish to be included is the rating for fast and ordinary. It seems to me that javelin armed light horse would be at a disadvantage chasing bow armed light horse who could shoot at them as they pursued. And ordinary light horse are at a much more severe disadvantage against knights than horse archers. How do they skirmish effeetively without binng ridden down when in javelin range? And they certainly can't shoot behind them to stop pursuers.

4) The Bw(X) category is rather weak. Bw(X) should count as Sp(I) against shooting (So they don't lose the effect of the front rank.) Spear backed by a second rank of bows get a +1 against everyone on contact. The bows can shoot over the spears at a -1 modifier. To make this contact stick more, along with battle line fluctuations, I'd like to see the rule of spontaneoous pursuit of a recoiling opponent extended to all elements at all times. They still get overlaps, and it would more closely simulate the ebb and flow of melee. Otherwise, someone is generally moving into contact, rather than continuing a close combat. And his Assyrian psiloi supporting spear, if he wants a +1 against everyone, then they should be doublebased, (the dreaded DBE), or maybe just increase the spears to the next rating.

5) Chariot runners? I don't know anything about chariots, and personally find no desire to include bronze-age mob tactics in any classical or medievel rules set.

As I've said, these rules are far from perfect prepresentation of realistic historic combat. But they are by far and above the easiest, and most equitable rules to depict battles. They are abstracted enough to be easily learned, and players can concentrate on using their resources to best effect, while still retaining the feel of ancient tactics. Remember, whatever I say are just suggestions. And anything I say bad about these rules go double for any other set I've seen.

Even Armati, which some like better, I do not. While I like having distant shooting by horse archers and cavalry, I have no desire to go back to counting casualties. And I think the turning movanent rule is absurd. Mounted troops did not generally move with parade ground precision, but were more likely to be mobs of horsemen galloping about. This was the only way light horse ever functioned. They could move swiftly anywhere on the battlefield. DBM's movement system works fine. It's the irregular moves costing double that make maneuver hard for their armies, and that's just great.

I would like to see frontal control extended to the movement range of an element rather than just one element widths distance. Wouldn't a unit be a little leery of charging an enemy rank exposing its own to a knight within charge reach? And I still believe you should use the stronger modifier for elemets with flank attacks. (What of a warband contacted frontally by light horse and on flank by an elephant? He gets a -1 for the flank contact and is destroyed on a recoil, but he faces the light horse, +2, rather than the elephant modifier, +4, which is smashing into his flank. The destroyed on recoil result is a well written bau~, but it makes all flanking elements equal.)

My biggest complaint lately has been about the army lists. They work best against historic opponents and even then you get some very uneven games (such as DBA Late Sarmatians vs. Dacians which is laughable). I've decided to try a DBM 100 freestyle tournament where players use DBM rules, a 3'x2' play area receive a general and camp and 100 points of any troops they want. It's not historic, but neither is Macedonians vs. Normans. And it may yield interetsing , evenly-matched games whereby players an be rated (though somehow I don't think it will ever come to pass that gamers actually want to know how well they really play! This game has such a fine equalizing quality I think it is perfect for such. There are no killer troop types. It actually makes games more realistic in the use of the linear system and making tactics much more important than the troops. I pointed out in another article it's not the troops alone that should decide the battle--it's the general and his ability to cope with the situation.