Neil Thomas has published quite a few books and initially I ignored them. Some of the reviews objected to their simplicity. And then I read a review in Slingshot, magazine of the Society of Ancients (SOA), which was very positive, extolling the virtues of his simplicity which still provided interesting games.
I have enjoyed his One Hour Wargames book complete with very simple rules for armies of no more than 6 elements. For my current plans I have chosen to take some of his ideas in his 2007 book published by Sutton publishing. It goes by the unoriginal title – Ancient & Medieval Wargaming.
The section that interests me is Dark Age Warfare and specifically Dark Age Armies. His rules limit troop types – in this era just 4 types of infantry and 3 types of cavalry. Some armies fielded Elephants so they are permitted.
The Infantry types are Dark Age Infantry to contrast them with classical Heavy Infantry of say Rome or Greece; Warband; Heavy Archers and Light Infantry.
The Cavalry are the usual Heavy and Light plus Cataphracts.
The period covered is 300-1100 which for some people may stretch the limits of what the Dark Ages means but in terms of fighting styles is fine with me.
His basing assumption is for 28mm – 120mm x 80mm or 4 number 60x40DBX bases grouped together. I am using Impetus 80mm wide bases for 1/72 plastics which vary between 20 and 25 mm high so fit well. I use 60 mm deep bases to allow some diorama type basing – this suits the plastic sets which you buy in bulk in lots of different poses. Typically a Dark Infantry base might have 8 figures on it rising to 10 or 11 if they are the professional guard of the rule or his “hearth” guard or household troops. I like to see some variety and my wargaming approach is that “what you see is sort of what you might get” rather than “WYSIWYG” or what you see is what you get.
The Frankish Armies list comprises
Nobles (Heavy Cavalry) 3 to 6 elements
Retainers (Light Cavalry) 1 to 3 elements
Spearmen (Dark Age Infantry) 1 to 4 elements
Archers (Light Infantry – bow) 0 to 2 elements
His description says this list works for Carolingian, Ottonian and Norman forces. So thats ideal.
Right now I have
4 Heavy Cavalry (need ideally 12)
1 Light Cavalry (need ideally 6)
6 Dark Age Infantry (need ideally 8)
3 Light Infantry (need ideally 4)
Actually to start with I want to use two similar armies for local feuding – hence the numbers shown in brackets above.
I have some more saxons on the go who can at a stretch cover for ottonians and maybe southern normans/lombards? I can soon rustle up some light infantry bow.
So to get this little project to it’s first stage of having two flexible armies, of 8 elements each, i need to get some more cavalry painted.
The Wargaming Erratic 