When Gary told me about Phil's new experimental "8th" ed. rules I was sceptical. But, if the truth be told, after playing my first game while I am still sceptical, I am impressed. I may say this despite winning the match I had with Gary this past Sept. Gary had already played one game with Tom, so he could share his experiences with me before we started. This was of great help because otherwise, I would really have been playing in the dark. My experience with DBA's movement rules also helped.

Still, not knowing what the good "match-ups" under this rule set were, all I could do was line up my troops and hope for the best. Once you set up your battle lines in this game, you're pretty well stuck with them.

Gary chose his Romano-British led by Arthur himself, while I relied on my trusty Early Asiatic Successors led by Antigonous (the myopic) One-eyed, his son Demetrius (the rash) Besieger on the left flank and Pyrrhus (I am just learning) of Epirus. Gary's army was a coalition of allygenerals running the centreleft of his army, with Arthur and his cavalry on the right. My army had Demetrius, some lance cavalry, LC and Elephants on my left flank, Antigonus and the Infantry in the centre, and Pyrrhus and some more cavalry on the right.

The battle was short and sweet for the Macedonians, but not so nice for Arthur. His ally-generals were, from the start, reluctant to move. Arthur, therefore, took the bulk of his cavalry up against Demetrius. Both generals quickly became separated from the main battle lines during the march segment of the first turn in the subsequent turn they manoeuvred to close with each other. After some desultory skirmishing by the LC, things were cleared away for the heavier horse. The elephants with a supreme effort, managed to catch a unit of Briton HC in pursuit, after the latter had evaded the charging pachyderms.

The Britons broke, tails between their legs, crying something about the return of Claudius. Arthur and his bodyguard then took on Demetruis with his bodyguard in the main event. Another unit of Briton HC took on my colonist lancers in a side show. Both Macedonian units were in wedge. Things then went rapidly from bad to worse for the Briton King. in a sharp but short melee, Arthur was killed and the army standard of the Britons fell. The Britons on the right flank took this to be a bad sign and broke. End of story? Well almost. I needed to see more of the rules so we continued the battle, concentrating now on bringing the main two battle lines into combat. In this engagement, Gary's missile fire proved more effective than mine and a unit of Macedonian lancers was thrown back after charging a Saxon warband. At that point we ended the game on time. Better luck next time Gary.

All in all the game lasted 3-4 turns. This brought out the comment that this set of rules speeds up the action. Another point to be made. I admit my set up was not the best and this hampered me severely later on. For example, my Irregular foot got left far behind everyone else, and there were units trailing all the way across the gap between my left flank and my centre. None of these units were able to move because I could not afford to pay the command points to move them! Hence I admit my success in the battle had more to do with weapons (lance vs JLS) and tactics (wedge) than with my manoeuvring skills. A good dose of luck also helped (dice rolls which allowed my Elephants to catch Gary's HC, and lot's more). Still I learned a lot from that game.

Here on some comments on the rules:

1. I agree with Gary's contention that missile fire is I deadly under this rule set. The extreme results are too easy to achieve.

2. The main effort of recoiling a unit by missile fire or melee result is to disrupt the continuity of the battle line. The gap creates major problems (i.e. the player who's battle line was broken may need more points to operate effectively).

3. The single advantage of "A" class troops (over B's) is that in one melee result they stand rather than recoiling (see 2 above), and in another are destroyed, rather than routed. Both these results are marginally better for the owning player concerned.

4. The disadvantages of ally generals and allies are increased in this set of rules (e.g. increased chance of treachery and harder to move). Yet there is no hint of any intention by the author of the rules to cut down their point cost.

5. Irregular foot now get left further behind in marching (even regular close formation foot move faster).

6. Personal, Army and Sacred Standards all have great new advantages morale-wise, but devastating disadvantages if they are lost in combat (army rout, etc.).

7. It is now important to have at least 3 generals for a 1500 pt army. Any less and you are risking "battle line breakup". Units not within 240 paces of a general are double the cost to move.

8. I don't think we have yet seen all the implications of the new combat (esp reach advantage) rules.

9. Randomness and extreme results in combat and missile fire are back in this rule set after many years when we had got use to predictability (random results were much rarer in the 7th ed, except for Irr "A" class). Now the worst unit in your army has a chance against the best In your opponent's.

10. Morale is much harder on Reg C's. They have definitely been downgraded in value (they have the same base number to save from shaking as D's - 4). Other morale types have also been downgraded: Irr A and B's but it is worse for the Reg C's.

11. Pens and paper are all but eliminated from this rule set.

Final Comment

I think this rule set, with some minor changes can be a lot of fun. But fun is the operative word. A "serious" competition gamer may prefer the predictability of the 7th ed to the randomness of the 8th. Yet the 8th has the potential of bringing a lot of people back into the hobby because of its simplicity and enjovability.