NEW RULES TO COME

They have been discussed for long so I suppose not to suprise anyone.

These will be the new amendments that will be added with te new version of Advanced Impetus that will be released on September 1.


The rules

Depth bonus for Warbands
+2 depth bonus for Impetuous FP and FL versus foot has been restored


Large Units T+T (New rule)
Large Units entirely formed by shooters (T) must fire with the front Unit
and not with the rear unit. This means that their shooting capability is not
reduced until the rear Unit is destroyed and the front Unit takes its first
loss.

FL with VBU 5 and Javelin (New rule)
All FL Units with VBU 5 and Javelin, with exception of Iberian and
Lusitanian Elite Scutarii (Extra Impetus 4), will now have Heavy Javelin
instead of javelin. Heavy Javelin costs the same as javelin and performs
like pilum, but rolls 2 dice on attack and 2 on defence.

Scorpio (New rule)
If you pay the cost of a Scorpio light artillery (15pts) unit, you can
provide all Roman legionary Units (FP) of Caesarian Romans, Early Imperial
Romans, Middle Imperial Romans with attached light scorpios.
These weapons shoot at 30U 2 dice (no matter of VBU of the legionary) but
cannot shoot at less than 5U.

If legionary unit moves the attached scorpio cannot fire.

If the legionary unit is in disorder the attached Scorpio cannot fire.

Attached scorpios are lost after the legionary unit's first contact with the
enemy. This is still true even if the legionary unit suffers no losses.

Depth bonus for Warbands
I would seriously consider making the depth bonus +2 for FP and +1 for FL - it's much easier (possibly too easy) for the FL to retain the flank contact bonus than the FP even when pursuing.

In our last games we gave FL +1 and it worked well, and was scary. I fear +2 would have steamrollered the enemy (legions and 3 deep pike).


FL with VBU 5 and Javelin
Still don't understand why heavy javelin and pilum would have such fundamentally different characteristics - the pilum is a heavy javelin.

ok, I will make some consideration about the +1 thiugh the +2 is someting that was in the past and FL usually was not that strong. Now there is the Discipline modifier.

Yes pilum is an heavy javelin but it is the tactics that differs, Romans legionaries (FP) were more more trained to wait and countercharge, while FL (and not FP) with heavy javelin are more fast troop and can use javelin more on charge.

Great I like all of these.

I think moving to +1 impetuous FL against infantry needs to be further play tested before being implemented. For the moment the +2 should apply to both types of Impetuous FL. As Lorenzo mentioned, +2 was the norm until recently. With the advent of quality and flank support units receiving the charge of impetuous infantry stand a better chance of surviving the initial onslaught. Of course impetuous FL also get the benefit of flank support which is why it is critical to disorder units in groups advancing so that they have to charge separately.

I agree it needs further testing GC - and that's why I suggest it goes in the September AI, for testing!

It's true that most warband is outclassed by their opponents but that's true whether they get depth bonuses or not.

Disorder does nothing to prevent flank support in our experience, sure impetuous advance requires forward momentum but unless the separation between enemy lines is "just so" the final contacts will happen such that the FL maintain the contact regardless of advance or pursuit individually. That's been our (limited) experience.

In fact the impetuous advance not to contact of the non-disordered units pretty much guaranteed flank support for their disordered mates - this was not hard to engineer on the field.

This is not the case with FP who are easier to separate.

We found like others that impetuous infantry losing the +2 bonus against infantry really weakened warband armies. This was especially true in the context of the improvements to linear tactics and discipline. The problem was that warbands weren't generating enough melee dice to get them moving again (and take advantage of their high impetus values.) +2 dice seems to be just enough to make winning melees a really possibility. Is +1 enough for FL. I'm not sure.

Me neither which is why it needs wider testing.

0 depth bonus guts them agreed, +2 depth bonus may be right but it's a fine balance with the flank bonuses. And DISC modifier.

Depends how adept enemy get at disrupting the warband far enough away to break their coherence. Used to be you only had to separate them enough to prevent support contact - for flank support that's 'deepened' considerably.

And you only need a couple of units to stick (preferably with partial contacts) and then the dice start adding up fast (relying on depth to absorb casualties).

We saw all results in our games with +1 FL against 3 deep pike and pilum FP - halted and disordered the attack fragmented in one section due to pilum. A 3 deep pike block hit, pushed back and blown away in one wild charge and steady supported aggression against other pilum and pikes that ground away and required reserve units to be flung into the FP line to prevent total collapse.

In those games the +2 would have tilted the balance (possibly - it is all about the CT really so an extra combat dice here and there is just plausible deniability )

dadiepiombo wrote:
Yes pilum is an heavy javelin but it is the tactics that differs, Romans legionaries (FP) were more more trained to wait and countercharge, while FL (and not FP) with heavy javelin are more fast troop and can use javelin more on charge.

On this question, I'm not convinced. I agree that roman infantry waiting for the gallic charge is a picture we're all familiar with but in the Pyrhhic, punic, Macedonian, Mithridatic, Parthian and Civil Wars we see aggressive roman infantry not passively waiting on the enemy to close.

I think the tactical difference between say Iberian FL heavy javelin and Roman FP pilum is not in differences between the weapons but in the difference between FP and FL. This doesn't need combat dice to distinguish it and Roman FP shouldn't be discouraged from attacking where it makes sense.

Re +1 vs +2 I'm all in favour of +2 - easy to remember and only 1 line on a playsheet :-)

I can remember +2 for FP and +1 for FL, that's fairly basic memory going on there, and I'm getting up there in my years ... lol.

Seriously, I'm ok with however Lorenzo wants to include it in the Advanced Impetus rules, and if it is discovered that it isn't working, then it can always be changed.

Cyrus The Adequate wrote:Re +1 vs +2 I'm all in favour of +2 - easy to remember and only 1 line on a playsheet :-)

well on that basis we should leave it at 0 - nothing to remember and a whole entry deleted from the QRS

however I reject the premise of that methodology

No because my playsheets are still not showing the change to 0 so for me leaving it as +2 is perfect :-)

Are you're play sheets the one's provided by Impetus, or something self produced?

Hi I play using reference to the quick reference sheet that you can access from the Impetus website - I think the latest version is No.6.

Is it Ken (Cyrus on the forum) who produced this? Its very useful and wonder if there are plans for a version 7, picking up the latest changes ?

Cheers Jez