starting up DBM feudal french, comments please

[blackcompany]

Hi all,

I have recently finished my DBA feudal english and feudal french armies and I am now turning my attention to creating a DBM sized army. I have chosen to do Feudal French first (i have a lot more spear than bow - smile.gif ).

I have put together a 400 point army. However before I painted much up, I wanted to see if I'm on the right track. My goal is to create a solid base army that I can eventually add to, change, etc once I get more experience with DBM. It doesn't have to be a "killer army" or anything; I prefer the K.I.S.S. method at first. I mainly want to make sure that I don't paint a lot of stuff that I'll never use.

So gentlemen, your comments please on this as a base for 400 points:

Command 1:

C in C - Irr Kn (F)
8 Irr Kn (F)
2 Irr Ps (O)
5 Irr Sp (I)
5 Reg Sp (I)
3 Irr Hd (O)

Command 2:

Sub General - Irr Kn (F)
8 Irr Kn (F)
2 Irr Ps (O)
5 Irr Sp (I)
5 Reg Sp (I)
3 Irr Hd (O)

Command 3:

Ally General - Irr Kn (F)
8 Irr Kn (F)
2 Irr Ps (O)
5 Irr Sp (I)
5 Reg Sp (I)
4 Irr Hd (O)

Some specific questions I have:

1. Is it best to have roughly equal commands, or does it work best to have a command devoted to one or two particular purposes, and the other commands only do a different one or two purposes? So I guess the question is, flexibility of use or not for each command?

2. Is the difference between Fast and Superior Knights as big as it seems? Is it worth sacrificing quantity for quality?

3. Does anyone have a good website for pics of french heraldry? I painted my DBA armies "quick and dirty" so I could play ASAP, but I think I'd like to make my DBM armies look as good/realistic as possible. Any other suggestions for sources on the look and feel of Feudal French armies is much appreciated.

Thanks!

Blackcompany

[John Meunier]

I don't know how many DBM players there are on this board, but this kind of question would probably be better for dbmlist@yahoogroups.com e-mail list.

JFM

[Redwilde]

Originally posted by blackcompany:
I prefer the K.I.S.S. method at first. I mainly want to make sure that I don't paint a lot of stuff that I'll never use.Well, the simplest answer for maximum use is to make sure that your army also works as a BBDBA army or two. For the few lists I've looked at closely, a BBDBA army works out to about 200 pts. With a few extra command figs, a 400 pt army can provide a pair of 200 pointers or BBers, so you can start playing right away before your English catch up.

[John Meunier]

A short answer to one of your questions is that Kn(S) and Kn(F) are vastly different animals in DBM. Which is better is a matter of taste and style, but most people who play armies that can have Kn(S) use them as such.

[Simon Davey]

First I must say that in our experience so far, the two games are both excellent but far more different from each other than might initially appear. Not the least is the different ground scale and movement distances in inches... always getting that one wrong.

As regards your army, I'd make a few high-level observations:

1. unless you're a super-pedant and disciplinarian and want all the different commands painted in a different style, then it's easy to swap things around between commands (spear elements, for example) to change their composition.

2. Three almost equal commands, in terms of elements, doesn't work best IMH experience. So you might want to change that. Not least because:

3. You've mixed up several different troop types that will cause PIP havoc - regular and irregular troops, troops with different movement rates, some impetuous and some non-impetuous. You run the great risk of getting a 1 or 2 PIP score and losing control of the Knights. And when they're gone they're gone! Once impetuous Knights (i.e. irregular ones) have moved it takes a double pip to hold them. The only other option is to do a full move straight ahead for 1 PIP. And that isn't what you always want.

4. You've got no missile capability - I'd change out many of the archer-psiloi to irr bow

5. Besides the bows, there's other interesting troop types available to you that you haven't got - use the later list and have some Ax; separate the sergeants and have a few Cav (much better for dealing with enemy LH and psiloi); some low countries pike...

6. This should have been the first point - try and use the army historically. Thus perhaps have two commands maxed out with Knights and little else. Or have one big central Knight command and then a small powerful reserve under the control of the C-in-C (maybe use those mercenary Brabants, which are Reg Kn and easier to control) - i.e. a command with 4 elements - C-in-C and three Reg Kn (or add some Hd and leave with the baggage). Handy to wheel into action later to plug gaps / deal with flanking manouevres. A foot command for soaking up the pressure / holding a flank. Pack it with regular spear, double ranked, to hold off enemy mounted.

7. The Knights question - this is the beauty of the game mechanics, as the minus one for the enemy if they beat your Superior actually makes them very difficult to double and thus kill (assuming that you aren't attacking LH with your Kn....). The minus one that YOU suffer for the Fast option in their bound can cost you your chance of a quick kill surprisingly often. I'd take the superior ones (and hey - less painting to do!).

8. There's a beautiful French army painted ip as seen through the fanaticus. I think that it is - http://www.sonic.net/~fatdogs/dbm/

I'll have a happy cup of coffee and sugegst my 400 pointer later if you like. In the meantime here's my 600 pointer later crusader for you to laugh at. As you can see it's a bit different from what I say but I've kept all the main Irr units in one command; hold the centre with the big foot command and have on offensive capability if necessary (6 Knights); main offenseive action on both flanks with the Military orders; keep Richard Lionheart in reserve; should ne both historically reasonable and good fun / easy to use:

Command 1
C-in-C Reg Kn (S) x1
Knights Irr Kn (O) x3

Command 2
Templar sub-general Reg Kn (S) x1
Templars Reg Kn (S) x5
Brothers Spear Reg Sp (O) x5
Turkopoles Reg Cv (O) x2
Brother XBow Reg Bw (O) x5

Command 3
Hospitaller sub-general Reg Kn (S) x1
Hospitallers Reg Kn (S) x5
Brothers Spear Reg Sp (O) x5
Turkopoles Reg Cv (O) x2
Brother XBow Reg Bw (O) x5

Command 4
Sub-general Irr Kn (O) x1
Knights Irr Kn (O) x5
Foot sergeants Irr Sp (I) x24
Crossbows Irr Bw (O) x8
Maronite archers Irr Bw (I) x8

Hope that brain-dump helps

Simon