General's Abilities

[Gunny Highway]

Everyone, I have a question/observation:

 The rules state that each side gets 1 command action per 500 pts. spent for the battle. Therefore a roman army vs. a carthaginian army would have 4 action pts. if it is a 2000 pt. fight per side. How does  the game reflect different generals skills? i.e. Hannibal vs. Varus would not be considered a equal matchup say Hannibal vs. Scipio which many consider a more even battle. Do the designers consider the players as generals therefore it is their skills that decide the battle? Just a thought,

                                                              Respectfully
                                                              Gunny

 

[Kevin]

Good question!  The rules don't account for different generals.  Of course, "Foresight' is based on Hannibal's strategic brilliance.

I suppose when you play your tactically clueless friend you can call him "Varus" and your ruthless friend could be "Scipio."   

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And to whet your appetite a bit more for Alexander & Persia, there are 3 generals in the Alexander faction (Parmenion, Nikanor, and Alexander himself).  They show up in the form of replayable command cards.

[gull2112]

Of course, the "General" is supposed to be the players, but I get what you're angling for here. Kevin was spot on with the foresight comment, and Alexander v. Persia has the general cards which are a great innovation.

At one time I thought that in order to reflect a superior general it would be a simple expedient to add a command action (say 5 for 2000 points). The problem with this is that a good commander doesn't need the extra CA's and a poor one will never have enough. Also, as many of us will attest, even at 1500 points 3 command actions seems to be too few and at 2500 points five command actions seems to leave players with a mitt full of cards as they always have plenty of CAs.

I also thought that a well trained army could be reflected by granting an extra command action and conversely a poor one could be penalized a command action, but once again, the simple expedient doesn't create the intended effect.

The ideal thing about foresight and such faction abilities, is that they yield the feeling and effect of what they are trying to simulate (in this case the effect of having a certain general present).

Oh, and just to initiate you into the friendly back and forth of these boards, I feel it incumbent of me to point out that unlike Hannibal, Scipio never lost a battle, and in the end he totally pwned the great one, thus garnering the appelation "Africanus." I just read a bio of Scipio by B.H. Liddel Hart and his thesis was that Scipio was the greatest military commander of history and that he was totally robbed of the title and overlooked by historians. Maybe, maybe not, I just thought I'd bring it up.

[Gunny Highway]

Hey Gull,
Great comments! The reason I like Hannibal the best is he was able to pull Gauls, Spaniards, Cretans, Italians, Libyians, Thracians, etc. into a fighting force that nearly brought Rome to her knees. One of Hannibals great abilities was his talent for using the weaknesses of the Roman Generals against themselves. Robert E. Lee had a similar talent. (My opinion of course) Of course, Rome's great strength was her ability to recover from several military disasters and staying right in Hannibal's face. This kept the Roman allies from deserting her totally. Although some did from time to time. I do concede Scipio was one the greats and did defeat old "one eye" when it counted. A world empire was their reward.....

                                                         Respectfully,

                                                        Gunny