Yet another question.. Optional Contingents in Meshwesh

[greedo]

Sorry about all the questions

So I see on Meshwesh about Required Troops and Optional Contingents. Both have min and max values.
Does it mean that really the min number of the Required troops should really be 1? Is the min/max only applicable to optional contingents?

Thanks again,
Chris

[David Schlanger]

Hi Chris,

Sorry I don't think I am completely understanding your question! Which specific list are you referencing?

Thanks,
DS

[greedo]

Hi David!
I think I’m trying to figure out what “required” and “optional” means.

Polybian Roman for example has its heavy foot as required but they are 0-8 min/max numbers. If you can have 0 of them, why are they required?
Wouldn’t that make them default optional?

Thanks again,
Chris

[David Kuijt]

I think I’m trying to figure out what “required” and “optional” means.

Polybian Roman for example has its heavy foot as required but they are 0-8 min/max numbers. If you can have 0 of them, why are they required?
Wouldn’t that make them default optional?

Hey Chris.

The required troops are the basic troops required for the army. Whether or not you take any allies or contingents.

Any optional contingents are optional. You take the whole contingent, or none of it. That's the option. If you take such a contingent, then you must take every line of the contingent. You cannot take some lines and not others. (although if all the lines have a minimum of zero, you have the freedom to take that line at "0" stands, of course.)

I suspect you are thinking of other games where the language "required" and "optional" was used to mean something very specific and irrelevant to Triumph -- i.e. when the minimum troops in one line item were 0 it meant one thing, and when the minimum troops in a line item was 1 or some number greater than one it meant something else. That's nothing to do with Triumph. In Triumph if the troop line says zero is an option, you can take zero.

[greedo]

Fair enough.
I looked at my various armies and now for the life of me, I can’t find any optional contingents so I guess it doesn’t matter
Thanks again,
Chris

[greedo]

Found it! Early Hoplite Athens.
https://meshwesh.wgcwar.com/armyList/5f ... 08/explore

There is an optional contingent of Thessalian Jav Cav, 1-2.
If it's optional, why have a minimum of 1?

And in the required section, everything except heavy foot has a min of 0. Should all of these go in the optional section?
Just trying to figure out the correct way to build the forces.

Excited as my new Mats by Mars battle mat will be arriving today, so I'll mark it up with faint deployment areas and be ready to play. The play area is a an odd size, but I'll just put marks where the "end of the world" should go. Will send pics soon!

[David Kuijt]

Found it! Early Hoplite Athens.
https://meshwesh.wgcwar.com/armyList/5f ... 08/explore

There is an optional contingent of Thessalian Jav Cav, 1-2.
If it's optional, why have a minimum of 1?

You don't need Thessalians. That's optional.

If you take Thessalians, then you must take 1-2.

If you're going to make the point that this could have been written in the army lists as "Thessalian Cavalry 0-2" and it would have been exactly the same in practice, that's true for standard triumph. But if you click on "Showing troop options for ... Grand Triumph (3 main army commands)" you'll see it would be completely different -- 0-2 would have become 0-6, but 1-2 becomes 3-6.

And in the required section, everything except heavy foot has a min of 0. Should all of these go in the optional section?

"Optional Contingent" is not the same thing as something with a minimum of 0.

Go take a look at the Yuan in Japan, Java, and S.E. Asia army list.
http://meshwesh.wgcwar.com/armyList/5fb ... f4/explore

That should make clear what the difference is. If you take any North Chinese Subjects, you add all the lines under the Optional Contingent for North Chinese Subjects to your army list. All of them. Yes, some are 0 minimum, that's not the point.

An optional contingent is a group. Maybe a group with one line (rarely, but sometimes, as in your Thessalians example), but a group. You can choose the group, or you can choose not to take that whole group. You CANNOT take two stands of North Chinese Crossbowmen and have 0 North Chinese Spearmen and Halberdiers -- that would be illegal.

[greedo]

Thanks for this. The penny dropped! Now it's making sense. Contingent = Whole Group is the key concept here, where you take the whole. All or nothing.

So in the Chinese example, I couldn't just take the N Chinese Raiders or skirmishers. I'd have to take the Min 1 Spearman and the Min 1 Crossbowman as well if I wanted either Raiders or skirmishers, but I could take Spearman & Crossbowman + optionally a Raider (since min 0), and a skirmisher (since min 0).

Thank you again!

[David Kuijt]

That's it exactly.