Game: De Bellis Multitudinis (DBM)

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Firepigeon — 2008-05-10T16:59:07+00:00

The clash of armies

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Firepigeon — 2008-05-10T16:58:19+00:00

Formation

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Firepigeon — 2008-05-10T16:57:51+00:00

Elephant in the line

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Firepigeon — 2008-05-10T16:56:41+00:00

Thinking hard

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Firepigeon — 2008-05-10T16:56:12+00:00

Game in progress - Military Academy - Lisbon Portugal

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Firepigeon — 2008-05-10T16:54:22+00:00

Game in progress - Military Academy - Lisbon Portugal

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Firepigeon — 2008-03-19T01:08:54+00:00

This is not going to be easy!!!

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Firepigeon — 2008-03-19T01:03:27+00:00

Even in the heat of battle, the General still goes on with his music on

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Firepigeon — 2008-03-19T01:00:24+00:00

are you seeing this one?

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Firepigeon — 2008-03-18T23:58:54+00:00

Battle raging

Thread: Re: A very traditional table top figure wargame

Alexiusexfalso — 2007-02-13T20:13:55+00:00

Ooh, rough and tumble! :)

OK, allow me to explain where I think WAB has the edge on DBM, and why a lot of folk prefer it.

Let us imagine two blocks of eight elements are going at each other.

In DBM, each pairing has to be dealt with one at a time. Fair enough, but the pace of the game suffers. Repeat that for each engaged block, and the pace really suffers.

In WAB, the eight dice are thrown all at once, sifted, thrown again, sifted, thrown again. Agreed, that is at least one too many siftings for most (myself included), but it resolves the melee as a whole, rather than breaking it down into quanta. The wood is not lost for the trees.

DBA doesn't suffer from this as it involves so few elements. What works in DBA does not work nearly so well in DBM.

Personally, I woudn't dismiss WAB out of hand, but I prefer rules sets like Hoplomachia or Iron Bow that deliver erudite chrome and a good representation of the tactics of the day. WAB, like Deeb, is too generic to capture the spirit of a given period; it is fun, but it a little too superficial.

As for preferring DBA over DBM...yeah, I know what Phil Barker thinks of me for that, but I think he is wrong. DBA is the more sophisticated set.

Two reasons to the forefront.

DBA asserted that elements do not represent a certain number of men arrayed along a certain frontage, but represent, rather, a tactical unit, whatever that may in fact be. It is the proportion, rather than the number of elements that is important. Hence, a large engagement can be realistically played out with eight to sixteen elements a side.

Nothing childish about that. The result is a table resembling the kind of battle maps one finds in historical works. Bonaparte at Marengo has gone along a similar path.

Point the Seconde: The army lists impose the drawbacks as well as the strengths inherent in a given force. That affects gameplay; you are forced to select your ground carefully and fight for the flanks. Tactical mistakes are punished mercilessly; to do well against a good player, you need to know your army well and understand how its elements can combine in the defence and offence. The mechanics may be simple, but gameplay is nuanced.

In my opinion, augmenting DBA with the more nuanced troop classifications from DBM takes the original game in a good direction. The contingent rules, too, make for more realistic battle arrays. The points system and multiplication of bases, on the other hand, contributes nothing and detracts much.

So, kiddy's nonsense for the sandpit? Not in my opinion. Take a look at it again.

But without the built-up area rules, which suck. :)

Thread: Re: A very traditional table top figure wargame

Troymk1 — 2007-02-13T13:07:26+00:00

Are you on crack? :surprise:

First person that I have EVER heard referring to Warhammer's fist full of dice as elegant.

The top down mechanic in DBM actually represents an element of somewhere between 250-1000 people. Thats more people than your Warhammer 'army' right there.

So a single roll represents the outcome of 15 mins of real time combat. Yes I can see the difficulty, especially as without the elegance of a to hit roll, A wound roll and an armour save we can't really be simulating Ancient-Medieval combat now can we?

DBM has its flaws (mostly around basing and then the rules you need to make the bases come together in a meaningful format) DBA also has these flaws but magnified by being a 'kiddy' ruleset for those who can't think in numbers greater than 12. :p

Having said that some of the best and most closely contested gaming experiences I have ever had have been with some iteration or other of the DBM ruleset. Warhammer and its historical coat followers the scene of some of my least favourite gaming experiences.

Why is Warhammer historical doing well......people like chrome and dice.

nuff said.

Thread: Re: A very traditional table top figure wargame

Alexiusexfalso — 2007-02-13T11:29:32+00:00

Funny thing is, even from a mini's perspective, DBM/DBMM/DBR fails due to The Fatal Flaw. As you know, there is nothing quite like a big table full of gorgeous terrain and mini's whose sculpting and painting belong in the Louvre, and DBM has the scope for those big encounters. However, those big encounters are resolved element by element by element...

This is why, I believe, Warhammer Historical has prospered at DBM's expense; in Warhammer, a big melee can be resolved with a fist of dice sorted in a few moments. The spectacle and drama remain intact, while in DBM, alas, they are submerged by the combat resolution mechanism.

Another thing - if I am to make the investment in a big, beautiful army, I want chromatic rules. I want what a rule set like Hoplomachia delivers - a sense of time and place, and recreation of the distinctive tactics of the day. DBM, being so generic, falls short.

No denying it, DBM/DBMM has its good points, and I can readily understand why some gamers have grown attached to it. And yes indeed, I am being really rather dismissive of a set that is, after all, a competition mainstay. It has to be judged when it is played well, by experienced players; but, having done that quite a lot, I strongly feel DBM lacks where DBA holds. DBA set out to be authentic and fast-play, and succeeded; DBM, unfortunately, achieved authenticity but drags.

Art of War is being hailed as a successor to both, though time will tell. The play testers are enthusing all over it.

Thread: Re: A very traditional table top figure wargame

ibn_ul_khattab — 2007-02-13T01:31:07+00:00

Alexiusexfalso wrote:
The immanent publication of De Bellis Magistrorum Militum is going to divide the fan base without really contributing all that much to the saga. The new rule set is not radically different from the old, and looks as if it will suffer from the same stylistic short comings - unattractive, pedantic prose, a lack of illustration and an abject lack of examples of play. Ho, and indeed, hum.

DBA is a classic, in my opinion; its bold abstractions and clever army selection makes for fast, asymmetric fun that actually feels right; had DBM restricted itself to introducing the contingent rules and nuanced troop classifications it would have been a winner. Instead, it brought points values back in, and so we are back to 1000 point shunting matches and enormous patches of elements were a handful would suffice. On the whole, it was a step backwards.

The DBM army lists are a useful resource, though.

Phil Barker's Horse, Foot & Guns, on the other hand, is worth checking out as it develops. It is DBA for the period 1700 - 1915, and points the way to how DBA can be brought up to date; troop types defined by technology and tactical doctrine, modifiers for troop quality, contingent command rules...regrettably, the balancing points system is still there, but it can always be ignored.

Sadly, a DBM-style improvement of HFG is in the works as well...

If you are into C&C or Worthington systems, you should give DBA and HFG a look. As for DBM...check out the army lists for scenario building inspiration, and lift a few concepts for your DBA'ing. That aside, lift it by one corner and drop it into a peddle bin - life is too short.

well each to their own. I suspect many people would consider the disadvantages you came up with as improvements, but that is a matter of taste. I can't really comment on DBA as I haven't played it enough, but both certainly have their fans. I guess for boardgamers DBA makes more sense as it is simpler, more elegant, and more accessable. DBM though provides a far better feel for large scale battle. Anyway good review.

Thread: Re: A very traditional table top figure wargame

Alexiusexfalso — 2007-02-13T00:51:01+00:00

The immanent publication of De Bellis Magistrorum Militum is going to divide the fan base without really contributing all that much to the saga. The new rule set is not radically different from the old, and looks as if it will suffer from the same stylistic short comings - unattractive, pedantic prose, a lack of illustration and an abject lack of examples of play. Ho, and indeed, hum.

DBA is a classic, in my opinion; its bold abstractions and clever army selection makes for fast, asymmetric fun that actually feels right; had DBM restricted itself to introducing the contingent rules and nuanced troop classifications it would have been a winner. Instead, it brought points values back in, and so we are back to 1000 point shunting matches and enormous patches of elements were a handful would suffice. On the whole, it was a step backwards.

The DBM army lists are a useful resource, though.

Phil Barker's Horse, Foot & Guns, on the other hand, is worth checking out as it develops. It is DBA for the period 1700 - 1915, and points the way to how DBA can be brought up to date; troop types defined by technology and tactical doctrine, modifiers for troop quality, contingent command rules...regrettably, the balancing points system is still there, but it can always be ignored.

Sadly, a DBM-style improvement of HFG is in the works as well...

If you are into C&C or Worthington systems, you should give DBA and HFG a look. As for DBM...check out the army lists for scenario building inspiration, and lift a few concepts for your DBA'ing. That aside, lift it by one corner and drop it into a peddle bin - life is too short.

Thread: Re: A very traditional table top figure wargame

ibn_ul_khattab — 2007-02-13T00:41:28+00:00

A new verision should be out next month (finally). It is Phil Barker's DBMM.

Thread: A very traditional table top figure wargame

wjohnd — 2007-02-12T23:30:40+00:00

DBM is perhaps the culmination of Phil Barkers long struggle to write the perfect set of Ancient period wargames rules.
By covering a broad historical period and providing a relatively abstract method of comparing troops types he achieves an element of playability across a broad historical period, but this sacrifices realism in the face of technological advances.

The rules have a number of strengths and sadly a number of fatal flaws too.
The main flaws arise from the style of writing. Barker is a strict grammarian and expects others to follow his often bizzarely clause filled sentences and semi-colon delimited lists. While it is possible, with perseverance and a copy of the Oxford English book Grammar, to work out what he means, it is all too likely that one will find an opponent who reads and interprets the rules differently at some key stage of the game.

On the up side, the game does produce satisfying results and, if played within the broad historical context provided by the army list books, allows players to pit their armies against a number foes whether these are real battles or 'what if' scenarios.

There are 4 books of army lists, all of which are handy to have but at least one of which (depending on your army) is essential for play.
These books are, in there own way, an interesting view of the historical make -up of the various armies across the world from Early Sumerian to Medieval Burgundian. More importantly in game terms they set out the points cost per 'stand' of figures and the allowable combinations of forces. The points cost does allow for quite varied army building and supports the abstract nature of the contest meaning that a player who owns and wishes to field an army of Medieval French Knights can do battle with Neo Assyrians mounted on Chariots. It’s not going to provide a historical or necessarily realistic outcome (who can say?) but it does allow competitions to be run.

In order to play the game it is also essential to have a (fairly large) number of appropriate, painted, miniatures which will represent your army. The game works independent of scale from 6mm to 25 mm and all figures are glued to a regulation sized base (or stand). At the 15mm scale a stand is 40mm wide and varies in depth according to troop type (close order foot have the least depth, chariots and war wagons the greatest).
Each stand costs a set number of points based on troop type and grade.
An army of 300 to 500 points would be typical and an army of 400 points might consist of around 80 stands of troops (more if they are of poor quality, less if they are mostly mounted). Stands may contain 2, 3 or 4 troops, again depending on their type.

The main innovation of the game was to move away from earlier concepts which categorise troops as Light, Medium or Heavy Cavalry/Foot armed with a variety of weapons and replaced them with an amalgam of troop classification, weapon use and effectiveness.
So for example 'normal' mounted troops who used javelins or bows but did not typically charge home are designated as Cavalry, whereas mounted troops who did normal charge are designated as Knights.
Foot troops too are categorised by their style of fighting as much as by their weaponry.
Roman Legionary and other organised swordfighting troops are designated as Blades.
Hoplites and other organised spearmen are Spear
Pike armed foot are a special category Pike
Celts and other fierce but less disciplined troops are Warband
Peltasts and other lightly armed but trained infantry are Auxilia
Massed archers are Bow
Light Infantry skirmishers are designated as Psiloi

In addition to these (and other) categories the troops are graded as Superior, Ordinary and Inferior.
Superior troops are less likely to be defeated, Inferior troops are more likely to run away when they are beaten.
A further distinction comes in between Regular (drilled) troops and irregulars. Again this is a slightly abstract term and doesn't necessarily mean a standing army existed, rather that within the context of the period, the troops of that type within that army were better drilled than their contemporaries.

The rules for movement allow combine 'march' and tactical movement so that troops who are far from the enemy get extra movement. However the number of blocks of troops that can be moved is controlled by a combination of dice rolling and organisational skill. If you choose to keep your army together in a large mass it is likely to be able to move, but if it is broken up into smaller units, it is possible that their general will not have enough control points (these are arrived at by rolling a d6 per commander on the field - typically 3 but 2 or 4 are possible), Normal troops use 1 point to do a move but poorly trained or 'excitable' troops are more expensive to control.

Combat is decided by the roll of a dice (d6 per side) and the combination of a number of factors based on relative troop type and disposition (ie are they supported by friends on their flanks, in multiple ranks etc).
The resulting values are compared and in the main the side with the highest number wins, pushing the unit back, and if the result of one side is double the other then the losing unit is destroyed. There are exceptions to these as explained in the actual rules..but I hope you get the gist.

To summarise, there are a great many rules and factors to take into account but the slightly abstracted style is both a source of versatility (the rules cover a broad range of armies an periods) and frustration (they don;t have a great 'in period' flavour being rather dry). They are also quite badly written and poorly laid out making casual play an impossibility.
However, until Warhammer Ancient Battles arrived on the scene they were the ancient wargamers’ rules of choice and are still widely played in clubs and competitions around the world.
Again this does represent something of a downside to the game. As it is often played in competitions, the rules lawyers and measuring tape twitchers can have a field day – sucking the fun out of a potentially decent game.

Thread: DBM Miniatures Rules Review.

petrospetra — 2005-06-02T02:16:40+00:00

What is DBM?
It stands for DE BELLIS MULTITUDINIS (the big battles), and are Mass Ancient & Medieval Combat Minaitures Rules, published by Wargames Research Group in the UK.
The rules have been designed to allow history buffs and gamers to re-fight ancient and medieval battles, using painted toy soldiers. The rules are designed for 2mm, 6mm, 10mm, 15mm or 25mm figures, and recreate combat with no record keeping and a minimum of dice rolls. All units are rated according to how they fought, not according to how they were armed and armored. Shock cavalry are knights, skirmishing horse are cavalry or light horse, infantry are bow, blades, spears, pikes, warband, auxilia, or skirmishers. All units are on identical width bases containing 2 to 4 figures, and square off to fight each other. Each unit has a basic combat factor versus foot or mounted, and these factors are effected by terrain, supporting ranks if applicable, and whether your flanks and rear are secure. Certain troop types destroy others if they score higher, such as knights fighting spears or warband fighting blades, but normally you need to double the enemy element's score to kill it. A brilliant command system makes you wrack your brain as you try to out-manoeuvre your opponent. Regular armies are easy to maneuver, irregular armies less so, and morale is simple but effective - if a command loses 1/3rd of its elements, it is broken, and the army breaks at ½ casualties.

The rules are a lot of fun, and are a great excuse to paint up endless armies of toy soldiers, which you can then actually use like chess pieces, hence the effort in painting them being justified.