Huns/Supporting units and shooting

[Spectrar Ghost]

A few parts to this topic, loosely related:

1. Are units with stands supporting a combat (but none actually contacting the enemy) eligible to be shot at? They would be in WM, but I'm thinking that the explicit inclusion of those units in the engagement in WMA would make them ineligable?

2. If a regular unit charges multiple Skirmishing units, do the Skirmishers Evade the charge individually or as a whole? For instance, if a unit of Cavalry inside 10cm charges a unit of Light Cav (Skirmishers), and makes corner-to-corner contact with a second unit of Light Cav, does a) each unit stand and shoot and Evade if possible in sequence, b) the units each have to score a hit for either to evade, or c) the units have to score one hit between them for either to evade.

3. Does anyone have enough experience playing with or against Huns or other Skirmishing Cav armies to have suggestions for dealing with them? I played a solo game tonight of Huns v. Romans, and Huns seem like they'd be a very frustrating opponent. It seems like the quantity of shooting they put out is large enough to disassemble just about any organized defence, and frankly catching them in order to take the offensive is difficult. Of course once you do get a successful charge against them, the charged unit is likely to be wiped out.

The only ways I can see to counter them would be to hit them repeatedly from close range with Cav and hope they fail to hit with their stand and shoot, or to have multiple potential chargers so they would need to evade beyond missile range or face a second charge with no option to evade, thus forcing them to at least make a command roll to get back into missile range.

[Guthwine]

Not really an expert here but id say:

1) Supporting units count as in combat, so no eligible target for shooting. (page 38&50)

2)Skirmish evades are done unit by unit, so my bet would be a) . Scoring hits really doesnt affect the skirmish evade, it only determines the driveback.

3)Sadly, no.

[jchaos79]

1) I agree with guthwine, supporting units count as in combat.

2) skirmishers rules has been subjected of some reviews. As far as I know there are three way of dealing with skirmishers:

- As it states in warmaster ancient rulebook.
- As it states in warmaster ancient armies rulebook. It shows some patches of the original rules.
- As it states in the ancient warmaster rules update. They are another patch fo the warmaster ancient armies rules. Well it is more another pack of rules than a patch.


The three rules are made by rick priestley. I have played with the three, and my opinion are:

- Warmaster ancient rulebook: skirmishers overpower. If one army have more than the other they are not fun games.
- warmaster ancient armies: skirmisers not so powerful but a little more complex rules. Slow the game and it is not really fun.
- Rules update for warmaster ancient: new rules, not explore too much, but seems easy. Skirmishers, in my opinion, simulate what they are. Recomendable.
- warmaster medieval: you can choose playing skirmisher rules or brigade army rules (vanguard, center rearguard).

Which set of skirmisher rules are you using?

3) Never played with skirmisher army. Well we try once a home army nubian for bronze age based in skirmisher units in the very beginning against egyptians (using warmaster ancient rules). As you said it was quite impossible to catch the skirmishers and finished with egyptians quite quickly. The battle was strange and left us with an uneasy feeling.


I'm toying with the idea of making a parthian army...

Tell us here your impressions of hunnic army. I am interested in.

[Spectrar Ghost]

I'm using the rules as printed in WMMA, which I believe are the same as in WMAA. I'm printing off the latest skirmisher rules from Rick's site as we speak, and will peruse them tonight.

I'll certainly post my experiences.

From the last game (caveats: it was a solo game on a nonstandard table size - my dining room table):

The amount of firepower Huns can level is terrifying - several times I found myself rolling 9 or more dice against a single enemy unit in the shooting phase, while still shooting several other units as well. This means that Huns will disorginize and drive back units en masse to the point of dispersing one [Infantry] unit due to >20cm driveback and driving several other units off the table over the course of the game.

The evade from charge rule is a phenomenal boost. With the subject to chance rules from WMAA, the Hun units really didn't need to worry about being charged, since only Cav could hit them, and only from within 10cm (inside shooting range) and only if all three shots missed (1/8 chance overall). That means the initiative is almost impossible to grab from the Huns. Units tend to evaporate if a charge does hit however.

It's truly difficult for me to imagine a counterstrategy that doesn't involve a purpose built army right now; there are some ideas I have to mitigate the Huns' superiority, but none that I think could reliably turn the tables on them.