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27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
At long last, a historical rule set that is easy to understand, March 30, 2008
This review is from: Field of Glory: Ancient and Medieval Wargaming Rules (Hardcover)
Well, as someone who loves reading about history and playing games that are based around the ancient world, I am truly glad to see a well published and easy to read game! As a model painter, the biggest perk is that if you already own an army, then there will be very little for you to add or change. Even your older, DBM armies are based correctly for this new system! Likewise, the size of the army will be very similar in size and in painting requirement (that is, you'll paint roughly the same number of individual models to play). Unlike the rule sets for older historical games, this set of rules seems to be written for a person who wants to understand how to play. That is, understand the game WITHOUT contacting the designers! For every rule, there seems to be a clear diagram and set of examples. Better still I noticed that some rules have examples and counter-examples of when and how to apply a specific rule. Also, the main rule book is published by Osprey, with lots of their renown, great historical illustrations. So, even if you only pick up the rule book, you get a chance to look at all the beautiful artwork. The book is hard-bound and seems to have a great deal of care invested in the physical product. With 2 expansions already developed and many more on the way, you'll be able to reenact your favorite era of history fairly soon! By the way, you'll probably need at least 1 expansion book to truly build your own historical army. Although the main rule book has sample army lists for Romans, Carthaginians, 100-Year-War English and 100-Year-War French, you'll soon find yourself interested in the other epic rivalries. Now for the bad side of this game: The game was intended for people who already are playing this style of game. The writing is dense and will be difficult to get your head around if you have not experienced this hobby already. Unlike books from other game publishers, this book is very light on the introduction to the hobby of war games. Even though the authors define model scale and size, as well as how to paint models, there is nothing nearly as detailed as some of the better known game companies. Also, there is no easy list of recommended miniature makers. This means that if you want to buy and build an army, you will be left with searching the Internet with little to guide you. Fortunately, the back of the book lists the game's website and rules forum, where I'm sure many of the members will help out a beginner. So, if it wasn't obvious, I am a fan of miniature war games and Osprey's book series. I own a small collection already, but this will quickly grow to become the top choices on my personal wish list!
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Good Concepts, Difficult Reading, and Mixed Gameplay, April 27, 2011
This review is from: Field of Glory: Ancient and Medieval Wargaming Rules (Hardcover)
Field of Glory is one of the most divisive systems out there. Written from one-half of the team which brought ancient gamers DBM, you already have people which will be comparing it to that, as well as the multitude of other pre-gunpowder (Yes, they have handguns in some armies, but I'm talking from a more generalized standpoint) rules. Backed by Osprey, it's also very visible, and you could probably walk up to any historical wargamer and get some sort of recognition of the system, if not a whole book on what they think about it. The system itself is very deep; units have types, along with weapon trainings, quality ratings, armor, and whether its drilled or not. This is a LOT of stuff to keep track of, but you can do it. They each play a different role in how a unit acts: Quality will allow you to reroll bad or good rolls, depending on what your quality is. Depending on your weapon training and armor, you will receive different "To Hit" rolls, while drilling controls what sort of maneuvers you can do in movement. This is both good and bad. For example, I absolutely LOVE how weapons are handled, as it gets away from a generalized "Weapon Skill" and shows how important it is to bring the right tool to a fight. Phalanxes are difficult, but once you start breaking their ranks they lose a lot of their effectiveness. Things like Pila are put into an "Impact Foot" specialty which covers being devastating in the first round of combat, called "Impact Phase" (There is a separate round for regular combat, with different modifiers as well). That is all very nice, though there is a bit of chart reading until you get used to it. Drilling, however, just feels a bit too much. Like I said, certain units can only do certain maneuvers depending on this, or have to test for it. This feels a bit wonky, and it's something that no one in my group took to naturally. I can understand what they were going for, but it just never clicked for us, especially with all the different maneuvers you probably take for granted in other systems. There are other things which irritate me in this system more than they do in others. For example, cohesion and disorder are similar concepts to what you could find in BLACK POWDER: Battles with Model Soldiers in the Age of the Musket, but they just feel less intuitive in Field of Glory. Cohesion represents morale and Disorder represents just being properly organized, but there are different levels to both and the first level of poor cohesion is called "Disruptive", which can be really confusing when people accidentally mix their terms. This is also doubly important, as battles are won by totaling up a variety of factors which lead to the collapse of enemy morale, cohesion being one of these. Once again, another feature I like and feel is characterful to the period covered. The writing doesn't help, either. It's not that it isn't clear (Though I agree with one of the previous reviewers that the book could have been organized better), but it's written very dryly and could stand to be written simpler. Whenever I read through it, I feel like I'm reading VCR directions. They did add an expanded index in PDF form which is absolutely lovely, but overall I think the design leaves a lot to be desired. Again, I'm very mixed on this system. I really, really love a lot of the concepts in it, and the gameplay isn't bad at all. I still think they have done a great job of getting a lot of minutiae into combat without too much hassle. The problem is that the minutiae in other places could be handled better and can bog things down until you are particularly familiar with the system, and it's hard to get familiar with the book when it is so damned dull and dense. My final verdict? If you are willing to put the time into really learning these rules, you'll get a lot out of them. Few series have the same breadth, and there is a lot of detail here to love. But if you aren't willing to spend some time on these rules, or just want to dabble a bit in the period and play it occasionally, this probably won't be a good ruleset for you. Three Stars for so many flaws, but still making me want to give it another chance.
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16 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Outstanding rules-set - A mix of the new and old, April 2, 2008
This review is from: Field of Glory: Ancient and Medieval Wargaming Rules (Hardcover)
Field of Glory is an outstanding set of miniature wargames rules, blending what you can of "simulation" with producing enjoyable battles with plausible historical outcomes. MUCH better than DBM (and in English, no less!), less complex than WRG/Warrior, and more fulfilling than WAB. Clearly, these rules are setting the bar higher in this field than they have ever been. The core rulebook has only a few lists, so you will need to buy a number of not-too-expensive army books. Otherwise, this rules-set has it all, barring naval involvement and campaign settings (both coming soon). Already a favourite at conventions - solid lay-out, writing, and organization leads to few gray areas and few points to argue! Cheers!
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