I'm trying to pick up the pieces of a "Dark Age" project from some years back. I invested in some Kallistra figures (Saxons, Vikings and some Romano-British and Celts to act as Welsh/Irish/Pictish allies), principally to refight with two of my sons the wars of Alfred.
I had settled on the Dux Bellorum rules by Daniel Mersey after a lot of searching for something that replicated the hard slog and brutal ebb and flow of infantry combat of the period (and 'slog' is a word which I think I came across in an earlier rule-set, Andy Callan's D.A.I.S. (Dark Age Infantry Slog) which I think inspired Mersey's pre-cursor to 'Dux' rule-set, A Glutter of Ravens).
I quite enjoyed the rules - I painted up some bases from each side (about a third) - but the rules were a little 'two-dimensional' in some respects.
Does anyone have any other suggestions for rule sets that aren't *too* sophisticated, and that do a particularly good job at representing the infantry melees of the period with some colour and verve (rather than rule-sets that include such types of combat as an afterthought and are really aimed at Byzantine or Late Roman milieus).
I am not inclined towards skirmish rules and really want to re-fight battles of a couple of thousand men upwards (and anything that includes campaign or pre-battle manoeuvring concepts would be a bonus).
Any help from Dark Age veteran gamers here much appreciated!
Saga should work well, played both
I always thought Saga was a skirmish rule-set - do they have a version for larger battles?
It is more skirmish, gives a good game though
We found Saga was more about knowing your opponents dice board as well as your own. We thought it felt very false. Some armies are almost unbeatable. Shades of WRG
You could try Sword and Spear. They will not work for armies that rely on skirmish tactics (eg Parthians), but should work well for the period you are looking at
Saga is a good game - I'd say it's large skirmish 30-50 figures a side in 3-6 units. But it's not really attempting to be a historically accurate rule set - it is verging on fantasy / mythological and is very much a game rather than a simulation.
There is a Too Fat Lardies set of rules for this period - may be Dux Brititanium - the name is too similar to the Dan Mersey set for my memory :-\
Hail Caesar and To The Strongest are too other good ancient / medieval sets of rules - but both are generic with army lists for this era. Both represent linear warfare pretty well.
Is warfare in this era a bit two dimensional anyway?
Yes, Fred, you're almost certainly right. I think that's the challenge of finding a way to make it *interesting* that doesn't really on corny pseudo-mythology or glued-on skirmish concepts.
Gosh, that makes me sound terribly fastidious.
I'm a great fan of TFL's Chain of Command, so I might look up the other Dux - although from memory it's aimed more at the period of the Adventus Saxonum than the michelhere.
When I last looked (and that was the time of the 2 x DUX and Saga releases) They were the three main sets.
Each provides a "skirmish" experience, through Dux Bellorum more resembles a big battle.
My own views on each:
Dux Bellorum: (Daniel Mersey, Osprey)
A relatively traditional wargame with some innovative command chit issues.
My small group found the use of chits led to lengthy indecisive battles until one side rolled remarkably well.
These seem best suited to the late-Roman, Saxon incursion or "Arthurian" period, though there's no reason they shouldn't work for later battles.
Pros:
Excellent representation of key troop types (Shieldwall, Warrior, Skirmisher, Light Horse - even Roman heavy horse).
Good range of armies: Late/Post Roman, Saxon, Welsh, Pict, Irish.
You will certainly get your clash of shieldwalls with these rules.
Cons:
Defensive command token use seemed dominant, and skirmishers seemed particularly useless.
Folk on forums assured me "You'll eventually work it out" without providing much guidance.
Perhaps the implication was that skirmishers could unlock shieldwall deadlock.
My group and I never worked it out.
Dux Britanniarum: (ToofatLardies)
Another set aimed at the Saxon invasion / incursion.
If you enjoy your lard, there are mechanisms you'll recognise from Sharp Practice and Chain of Command.
The game's focus is the clash of fast moving Saxon warriors with the post-Roman shieldwall.
I believe skirmishers and horsemen are also included - Hey, It's Arthurian.
I haven't played these rules, so won't do pros and cons in any great detail.
The rules contain an innovative campaign system, and a very nice map of post Roman Britain.
It looks good, as a means to generate a series of battles and represent your lord's fluctuating fortunes.
A supplement called The Raiders introduces Irish and Picts (Maybe also Welsh, I can't remember) with a few special rules.
SAGA (Studio Tomahawk)
I really ought to have enjoyed this, as it has a lot of mechanics that I appreciate in isolation.
A command system determined by battle-boards.
Various contingents, each with different strengths.
A setting closer to 800-1066, the Great Heathen army to the Norman Invasion.
The game is a skirmish with each side fielding a lord and several units - they can select hearthguard, warriors or skirkisher scum.
Command is achieved by rolling dice and placing these on a battleboard.
The different battleboards are the great selling point, and the game seems to appeal to teh type of boardgamer who likes to focus on his/her own private "tableau".
I've played about six games and didn't enjoy a single one, but I'm not that sort of boardgamer.
What I disliked.
* I didn't see a single battle develop into the classic shieldwall of the era.
* Unit placement, and mutual support seems largely irrelevant. Units activate individually, usually charge straight into contact, and burn as many dice to gain buffs in the resulting ruck.
* The Lord is the best fighter by far on the field, placing him with his hearthguard creates a unit which will only lose to teh opposition hearthguard. Most of our battles ended when one Lord (with sometimes one or two survivnig hearthguard) slew the other Lord - no other survivors were present.
* Players seemed glued to their "battleboard" to the exclusion of events (largely irrelevant as I claim above) on the main table.
* Some of the army lists and battleboards (Particularly in the first supplement, felt cartoonish and very "Games Workshop").
Now I'm not saying SAGA is wrong, it has a large loyal following.
I just didn't enjoy it to the extent it's in my bottom 10% of games played.
That's a matter of personal taste.
But if you're looking for something that has Vikings and Saxon Kingdoms, it's the one of the three written for this.
It's a tough question through.
On the one hand you have the Nu-skool skirmish or big skirmish games.
These typically address the specific setting, and represent the different troop types and command with a degree of nuance.
On the other there are "big battle" rules which cover 3000BC to 1500AD.
These may regard every army core as irregular shielded spearmen, with minor adjustments for a handful of nobles and a few handfuls of skirmishers.
Thanks, Steve, that's really useful.
It's weird, given how many niche rule-sets there are out there that the battles of the 8th/9th century don't seem to have received as much attention as they - on an historical if not tactical or strategic level - might seem to merit.
I think you have hit the nail on the head a couple of times in this thread already.
There are no tactics and however important two groups of spearmen, with a few psychopaths with axes intermingled, killing each other might have been, it isn't very interesting as a game.
I think Andy Callan, and later Dan Mersey did as good a job as you can by picking on the leadership roles and making you think about them.
But after about five games you've extracted most (all?) the interesting variations from the situation.
Gamers like to move units around and generally that doesn't happen in shieldwall warfare.
Line up, psych up, charge and kill.
Next battle please.
We played a lot of Dux Bellorum and rather as Guy has said, the tactics are limited and it all became a bit dull to be honest. Even with limiting the amount of dice that can be used for the defensive bonus, it seemed to boil down to who lost a unit first, then you were on the back foot for the rest of the game. Skirmishers had to work round the flanks to try and get a 'breakthrough' but rarely did so.
Despite loving the period, I think more skirmish level games such as Lion Rampant provide much more fun than two shieldwalls slugging it out.
Returned here to post an update, but then I saw SteveJ's comment, so I'll address that first.
Lion Rampant (form a position of ignorance).
I own the first edition which was very heavily oriented to the age of knights and castles.
A second edition has been released and I believe it stretches the era back to the fall of Rome.
It certainly introduces rules for shieldwalls.
If you can tryst your opponent to select a reasonably historic force, and not add in crossbows and plate armoured knights, you ca probably Squeeze an Alfred and Guthrum battle out of Lion Rampant's 2nd edition.
And now, the reason I returned.
Some while back, the good folks at Little Wars TV made several videos about the 1066 campaign.
This included a site visit to Hastings and refights of Stamford Bridge, Fulford Gate and Hastings.
They used their own free Ravenfeast rules which can be found here (https://www.littlewarstv.com/ravenfeast.html).
If my memory isn't playing tricks, the basic rules are designed for viking raid skirmishes where one figure represents one fighter.
They devised a big battle variant for the 1066 battles, which was pretty simple and moved along at a fair old rate.
I wouldn't expect anything revolutionary, but it's worth a look when comparing with the other offerings.
Hello
Haven't looked at them for a while but 'Shieldwall' may be ok for this - https://www.legio-wargames.com/_files/ugd/d44cbb_8aac05d10d854b269a901b3fc2212959.pdf (https://www.legio-wargames.com/_files/ugd/d44cbb_8aac05d10d854b269a901b3fc2212959.pdf)
Free rules from Legio Wargames described as "Recreate the atmosphere of Dark Age battles in the British Isles and Northern Europe."
Cheers
GrumpyOldMan
Thanks for more suggestions, which I shall delve into today.
I am determined to find excitement and variability in this warfare. As someone whose first wargaming venture as an adult (after an hiatus of 20 years) was Great War Western and Eastern Front (albeit 1914) which I was told would be uninteresting, I have discovered that the possibility of delight and enlightenment always exists - but I can see I am going to have to wring the wet flannel of Dark Age shieldwall gaming pretty damned hard to get anything out of it.
Mortiem et Gloriam Pacto scale?
Pendragon? An RPG but with rules for battles, IIRC. Could be a good way to make tactically limited warfare interesting as a game.
https://www.chaosium.com/pendragon-getting-started/
Dan Mersey's "Battle Ravens" that PSC produced?
All you need in one box!
I'm a big fan of Dux Bellorum. I think Mersey knows his dark ages and has done his best to make it gameable and still be in the spirit of the warfare of the time.
He has a new set called Age of Penda which might work for you. It's available in odf and print on demand, I believe it is hex-based. More here:
https://www.wargamevault.com/product/376363/Age-of-Penda-Battle-Games-in-Seventh-Century-Britain
https://mogsymakes.net/2022/06/29/trying-out-age-of-penda/
QuoteMortiem et Gloriam Pacto scale?
Repeat please, in English, or at least using full phrases.
Mortiem et Gloriam is a set of rules - Pacto the small scale version. ;)
More good suggestions, chaps - many thanks. Age of Penda looks interesting, although I have an instinctive aversion to gridded or 'hexed' wargames tables (for ultimately no good reason).
I did take a look at Mortem et Gloriam and even watched few rules presentations and for some reason it scared the living daylights out of me.
MeG is a very hard read
Comitatus is still around and well thought of. Have the rules but rarely played. Age Of Penda is well worth considering, it's basically "big battle" SAGA with more convincing history. Periods where troops lined up facing each other suit grids very well. I'm a big fan and have created my own for various periods....none of which are entitrely ripped off from others but have some traits in common!
Quote from: henjed on 03 August 2023, 11:12:46 AMI did take a look at Mortem et Gloriam and even watched few rules presentations and for some reason it scared the living daylights out of me.
Lol, yes, I was going to suggest MEG too, but only because you asked for a pre-battle system. So you could nick that, adapt it and attach it to another set of combat rules.
Gosh, I used to have a pdf of Comitatus from way back when McDowell had a draft on some yahoo group. I had flirted with late imperial Roman forces after reading Alessandro Barbero's "Day of the Barbarians". I wonder if I still have it... ?
Thanks for another good suggestion!
L'art de la Guerre v.4 (ADLG) would work well for you project.
There is a faster play 100 point game that allows for a game with c.11 bases (units) per side, with the ability to upgrade to a larger 200pt c.22 base per side game and larger still a 300pt game.
The army lists are included within the rules sets and are IMHO manageable, whereas other similar sets of rules have c.400+ lists just for a sub-set of the ancient/dark age/medieval eras.
Dux Bellorum is also a good set for the period you are specifically looking to game in. Everything said about Dux being somewhat 'limited' is correct - but in reality the national differences between armies in this era were probably very slight.
I've looked at that period (and also the Anarchy period of the mid 1100), and I'm using "Swordpoint" by gripping beast.
All I've done, as I use 10mm, is shrunk the bases - infantry (usually 4, though can be 3) on 20x20 (40x40 for 28mm), cavalry on 25x25 (50x50), and distances halved.
It includes a "line of battle" combat modifier system which supports line-fights, as adjacent units can reduce combat results on eachother, supporting a battleline.
The rules can appear a little complex, but I don't feel they are anymore so that the others in the field.
I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Great Hall Burning (Wargame Vault), which is a complete character building, force building campaign set in the Viking Age. It does go pretty deep, thus I also use Ravenfeast big battle.
Quote from: henjed on 03 August 2023, 11:12:46 AMMore good suggestions, chaps - many thanks. Age of Penda looks interesting, although I have an instinctive aversion to gridded or 'hexed' wargames tables (for ultimately no good reason).
I did take a look at Mortem et Gloriam and even watched few rules presentations and for some reason it scared the living daylights out of me.
I think it is probably overly complex for what you appear to be looking for (IMHO).
But then I am not a 'fan'. I find the pre-battle process too elaborate and complex for the end result.
You might be better off finding a simpler set of table-top rules (maybe Dux Bellorum from Osprey) and then looking for a board-game of the era to play out your campaign. Just a thought.
'Battles for Prydain: Heroic Combat in Dark Age Britain 450-650 AD' comes up regularly as 'highly recommended' in online searches, but I've never played it. Whether it is too 'tactical' and not 'strategic' enough, to combine with a tabletop wargame, might be its challenge.
Thanks for the suggestions. I feel quite (and fairly, I have to say - I *did* ask) inundated.
I'm still prevaricating - but as it's a few months until I'm scheduled to rebase the figures I have (and paint some more) I will continue to ponder.
It's probably best to note all the titles then look for slightly larger reviews online.
Before doing that, try to visualise your own impression of the battles that interest you.
Does it involve two shieldwalls pushing away until one flees?
Does if centre on shieldwalls, but with looser action on flanks and household troops waiting their moment to intervene?
Do you want a campaign system, with your invaders looking to raid / settle, and the defenders needing to drive them away?
Are you more interested in tiny raids and ambushes where shieldwalls may not be appropriate?
And finally
Do you wish to include mounted combat, or do your troops always fight on foot?
And that's another reason for my prevarication! I am keen on some sort of campaign system, and had envisaged medium size battles (representing a couple of thousand men a side) with some flexibilities for Welsh/Irish/scotti(sh) allies (some of whom might be cavalry and which wouldn't be 'true' shieldwall) - but then I keep seeing some small action/large skirmish rules that strike me as more interesting (mechanically) and (dare I say it about dark age slog) more fun.
How about the computer game Total War Saga:Thrones of Britannia? Save you painting minis. Or is that siggestion sacrilegious on this forum :P ?
QuoteHow about the computer game Total War Saga:Thrones of Britannia? Save you painting minis. Or is that siggestion sacrilegious on this forum :P ?
FWIW I found the "Thrones" battles grew quite boring for much the same reason as table top shieldwall v shieldwall can be. It was interesting a few times to experience managing unruly nobles and family members and populations that hated your wars. But even the campaign mechanics are not correct. E.g. the campaigns of men like Ecgfrith, Penda, Offa and Cadwallon covered long distances in a fraction of the seasons the game allows. (fan built mods exist). Sticking with TW, I found "Age of Charlemagne" in Attila was better.
There are more fun (sillier) options like Civ III conquests where you can load up your longships with insanely powerful beserks and go round attacking all the AI civs. And Field of Glory has a direct computer equivalent for example if you like that rule system.
Does anyone know another "dark age" computer game where you can use the campaign features but switch the battles to tabletop and the input the outcome? That might be the best use.
If you just wanted to avoid painting but have the tabletop experience: Battle Ravens, The Helion paperboy series or Wofun minis might be a better option. The latter two ARE sacrilegious as they have 10mm options. But they are flat so dont compete well with the sheer joy from your very own painted Pendrakens.
QuoteAnd that's another reason for my prevarication! I am keen on some sort of campaign system, and had envisaged medium size battles (representing a couple of thousand men a side) with some flexibilities for Welsh/Irish/scotti(sh) allies (some of whom might be cavalry and which wouldn't be 'true' shieldwall) - but then I keep seeing some small action/large skirmish rules that strike me as more interesting (mechanically) and (dare I say it about dark age slog) more fun.
The answer may be a mash-up of systems.
Relatively few contain a campaign system, but that's something you can homebrew fairly easily.
Try to pick up clues form reviews.
Are there rulesets that can "bathub" well; using similar systems for guerrilla actions around Athelney or the Battle of Edington.
Have you considered computer moderated rules. Computer Strategies V7 rules'To Me!' covers the Dark Ages and early Medieval and has sophisticated campaign and solo modules. I ran Norman Conquest and Anarchy period campaigns with it very successfully. No dice, no tables to consult I wouldn't use anything else. Runs on any Windows PC; a tablet is ideal as it's more 'mobile'.