Piquet @ MindSay

So I've read the rules a couple of times, written a Forth program to allow me to enter an army list, print it out, and automatically "characterize" it for a battle.  Now it's time to decide on an army and some figures.  I already have around 8 units of 15mm Austrian infantry painted and ready to play, so it would make sense to get to work on the equally large number of Prussians I have still sitting in their baggies.

 

The only problem is, I got some 28mm figures (My Berbers, as it turns out) and lined them up in the suggested basing for FoB (which is 2x2 figures in 40mm square blocks) and it looks REALLY COOL.  Much cooler than little 15mm guys, 3 to an inch wide base.

 

I guess it's like the "lead vs. plastic figures" thing - I like the bigger, heavier figures even though they're coniderably more expensive and harder to paint.

 

This is obviously a problem, since I already own some 15mm lead, much of which is already painted.  Though I'd need to buy more for any decent sized game.

 

The smart thing to do is forget all this 28mm silliness for FoB and get my 15mm stuff in order.  I'm certainly going to play my first few games with 15mm forces, though I'll need to use some 17th Century stand-ins for some extra units.

 

But I'm not generally very smart, and the point of this hobby is my own amusement, so does it really make sense to settle for "second best"?  Maybe it does if it gets me playing faster.  Fortunately, I'm also usually out of wargaming money, so at least for the next few months I'll need to "get by" with what I already have.

 

Aside: My FoB program is 75% done, and it's cool in that way Forth programs tend to be.  In this case, the "data" for the army is just more program code that when executed creates memory structures that describe the army.  Here's an example:

Create MyArmy

   Average commander" King Hrothgar"

Brigade" Left Wing"

   Superior leader" Mike The Barbarian"

   Crack infantry unit" Mike's Marauders"

   Regular infantry unit" Home Boys"

   Poor light cavalry unit" Loitering Larry's Losers"

Once this file is loaded, you can type 'MyArmy characterize', and then 'MyArmy .army'.

 

Each "word" of the above "data" file is actually a Forth command.  For example, "poor light cavalry unit" can be read as unit(poor, cavalry(light)), though frankly the Forth version reads better. :-)  The word unit" compiles data for a new unit including the unit's name, which is all of the text following unit" up until the next quotation mark.  Pretty slick, eh?

 

I may "solidify" the program to the point where you would just run a command line tool on army list files to generate a playable list for that army, but the program will be useable by me without doing that.

FoB was waiting for me in my mailbox yesterday when I got home.  Here's a quick review:

 

The package itself contained a large ziplock bag with the rulebook, a set of reference sheets and some cardstock cards which will need to be cut out.  Why they didn't just print them on avery "business card" stock I don't know.  I guess it's marginally cheaper, but for $30 they could afford the extra few cents.  But it's no a big deal, since the cards are available electronically, and are formatted for business card stock, so I'll most likely just print my own.

 

The book itself is a 1/4" thick perfect-bound book with a glossy color cover and b&w insides.  The paper used is newsprint (I think) but seems sturdy enough.  The page layout is attractive and uses a large, easy to read font.  There are numerous illustrations, b&w photographs and sidebar commentaries throughout the rules, making for an attractive and easy to read book.  The perfect binding does mean that the book won't sit flat on a table, but frankly I don't think that players will need to refer to the book often during play so it's not likely to be a problem.

 

In the interest of brevity, I'll forego a discussion of the rules themselves, as I haven't had a chance to play them yet.  But I will say that the book is organized logically, and while reading through I only rarely found myself having to flip to an out-of-sequence page to understand what was going on.  That's quite a feat in a wargaming rules set, and the editors are to be congradulated.  Likewise, there are example situations for most of the rules in the book, and those examples "stretch" the rules appropriately.

 

I look forward to trying a small game out this weekend, though I am not guaranteed to get the chance.

There is this wargame called "Piquet" which is quite unlike other wargames out there.  In particular, the turn sequence is completely random, and a player may not even get to do ANYTHING in a turn, while that same player also has the chance to move his forces like mad in another turn, or even get a lot of chance to do things he doesn't want to, and no chances to do what he does want to.

 

Piquet is really great at modeling the effect of the difficulties of commanding an army.  Things never go quite how you plan them, orders get lost, enemies close quicker than you think they will, etc.  All of that is abstracted behind an "army deck" which contains cards like "infantry move", "artillery reload", and "do nothing" which let you know what you can do with your initiative points (IP).  IP are randomly generated by rolling 1d20, with the winner getting the difference in IP to spend on flipping cards and using those cards on their units.  There's no guarantee that you won't lose initiative every time and be immobilized!.  The deck is customized per-army [years before Magic did it], and elegantly models different national capabilities.

 

Unfortunately, Piquet is also a little on the "fiddly" side, and games can take hours to set up and play.

 

Enter "Field of Battle".

 

The Piquet guys recently released FoB, which has been described as "Piquet Light".  Though it's clearly a "cousin" to Piquet, employing essentially the same combat resolution and card system, FoB is quite different once you get past the surface similarities.  The biggest difference is in the PIPs system.  In FoB, a phase starts off with an opposed dice roll, but the commander's dice is used instead of a d20.  The difference in the two rolls controls how many PIPs are available, but for BOTH players.  The "winner" just gets to choose to go first or not.  PIPs are not spent to act on cards anymore, only to pull new cards.  The cards themselves are a bit simpler, and the "Lull" card now affords your opponent a chance to "steal" the rest of your turn!  Piquet's "morale chip" system has been replaced with a much simpler one, and pre-game setup time has been drastically cut back as well.

 

I've always been fond on Piquet's basic philosophy, but the few games I've played have left me cold, both from the slow pace of the game and the multitude of details you need to keep track of during play.  A game should be either leisurely OR intense, as I don't have a very good attention span!

 

[Volley & Bayonet is a good example of a "leisurely" game - the game takes hours to play, but the "off" player isn't very involved, so can take a restroom break, chat with friends, etc.  Chain Reaction is the opposite - the games end in less than an hour, and the "off" player often has more to do than the "on" player!  Both kinds of games have their place, naturally.  I guess it's "Baseball vs. Basketball".]

 

FoB sounds like just my ticket - I get the essence of Piquet's abstractions, but in a game that plays in 1/2 to 1/4 the time.

 

FoB is focused entirely on the "age of the bayonet", from around 1700-1900, which includes the "Lace Wars", "Napoleonics", the "Hyphenated Wars" [Franco-Prussian, Mexican-American, etc], and every American war up to WWI.  Personally, I'm most interested in the Seven Years War [Prussia not playing well with Austria] and the Mexican-American War [James Polk's Southwestern Land Grab].  If the rules covered the Thirty Years War as well my joy would be complete, but alas they don't stretch back to the age of "Pike&Shot".

 

People are hard at work adapting FoB to other periods though, and a "Chariot Era" variant is already floating around, which is of even greater interest to me than the musket stuff, especially as I already have miniatures ready to go in that period. :-)  Maybe someone (me?) could expand the rules into the "Pike&Shot" era....

 

Like most games I buy, FoB will probably wind up giving me a few weeks of enjoyment as I study the rules and daydream about playing.  I may even throw down some figures and play a few scenarios to see how I like the game in practice.  I've been trying to find any set of "musket" rules that I like for over a decade.  Maybe this one is it.  I surely don't need any more hobby projects on my plate, but once I own the rules they're not going anywhere, so maybe in a few years' time....