When is DBA (F) not DBA (F)?

Just three of us this week, Chris, Phil & me, due to other commitments and illness. We were at Chris' for some more DBA (F) playtesting. Chris wanted to try it with some 25/8mm figures, namely the rag-tag fantasy armies he has assembled from my 50 year old Minifigs (and other) Middle Earth figures and some other figures he's picked up from Steve.

This meant he could tailor the armies to what we want to test whilst broadly basing them on historical DBA 3 lists. It has to be said that Phil does not like this very much and has a long term fantasy bug bear.

Correspondence with the rules writers for DBA (F) has convinced me that we are a bit late to the party, and that our feedback, whilst welcome, is not going to shift anything in the final released product. Basically, therefore, we're just getting used to the new rules ahead of attending a tournament or two next year. Perhaps.

First game was me v Phil. I've got what looks like a Saruman type army. The centre is four elements of old ME range Uruks acting as Fast Auxilia. On their right is a 7 Horde made up of ME range Goblins. To their right are Fast Warbands using modern-ish GW Orcs of some type. On the left are two Psiloi (sorry -"Skirmisher") elements made up of some enormous GW things. They're Psiloi as they're too big to get more than two on a base. The Knight general base is made up of I don't know what.

Phil has an Army made up mostly of my Harad forces. The cavalry at the back are converted from Warrior Mameluks. The elephant isn't one of mine, but it does have ME range Harad spears on the base. The right hand end of his line has Minifig Samurai, with added turbans on their helmets and small shields. Some are Solid Blade and some are Fast Warband. Then there's a couple of Essex middle eastern bow elements and finally some Psiloi from a range I can't identify as they aren't mine.

I was defending, and moved first, widening out my line.

Phil threw his warband forwards my Fast Auxilia, forgetting the new Quick Kill only applies to Solid Auxilia. In any event he'd got the move distance wrong and hadn't made contact. Phil isn't so good at judging 25/8mm Bws as he is at 15mm and often makes this type of error in this scale.

My first attempt to exploit this error fails and I am recoiled. I'm just about to have Psiloi element flee, too.

Two turns on. Phil went for some of my Aux with his cavalry general, but just recoils me, as happened with my Aux v Wb combat. I then counter attack in my turn and kill the general. Some debate follows. Phil hadn't realised it was his General, as he can't read the labels on the bases. He was dead anyway on a 6:1 roll, but would the previous round have been different. Chris suggests Phil can transfer his "flag" to one of his blades instead. Well, why not?

I also kill the front warband. I should have lined my flanking unit up with the rear element to make it fight the next turn, apparently. Well, my left centre looks a bit of a mess, but I've killed some elements and not lost anything.

Two turns on again. Phil has moved his line up, but again fell short. In my turn I flank the other warband, and then pile into the blades with my Fast Aux. The flag bearer is the "new" general.

I kill the Wb, as expected, but I lose both the Aux, which wasn't. Dice rolls were very poor, and would be for the next turn or two. The game is currently 3:2 to me. I just need to kill one element in my turn

This is the end game state, after a turn each. On my right I got my warband into the wood, overlapping and flanking Phil's two bow units. I'm on 3 v 1 on the end of the line, so odds on I should get a kill either through doubling or a recoil. I'm 1:6'd and bounced, so don't get my kill. We go into another turn.

Phil piles into my left and out rolls me all along the line, killing two elements and winning the game 4:3 I didn't win a single combat in the last three turns. That's what we love abut DBA.

Oh well.

The DBA (F) changes made little difference to this game, so it wasn't a good test either way. Chris & Phil then played a game where Chris had a load of Light Horse. Chris tried to exploit the new LH rules and came a bit unstuck. The only other talking point arose from the interpretation of a rule that has moved directly from DBA 3 to DBA (F).

In the post game discussion we concluded what I said at the top of the post. It's very unlikely we're going to make any difference to the final product. We agreed we would probably attend a competition in February which is going to showcase the new rules, so it looks like this is what we will be playing this time next year and in between.

Better start saving my pennies.