Rabble in Hoplite Armies

[Bill Hupp]

I'm organizing my legacy 15mm hoplite armies for Triumph! (and at the same time organizing 28mm Vendel Classical Greeks for Triumph! Armies) and have a question about the minimum required rabble troops.

First, in trying to understand the Rabble category is the description.

This is the catagory description:
Poorly-trained or poorly armed infantry fighting in loose order. Effective enough in bad going, where their native loose order is no disadvantage, but badly outmatched fighting in the open against, well, almost anything. Examples include armed mobs, unshielded peasants throwing rocks or javelins, Libyan hordes, and the like.

Second, in the army list the desription is "Psiloi armed with javelins". Rabble are rated the same for fighting, but slower, and Panic rather than Evade against close order foot, etc. and the don't shatter Elephants.

So this doesn't fit any of the catagory descritption, but am I right in understanding this as essentially creating less effective skirimish troops?

When this was created as a minimum number of troops in a 48 point army, what is the 'proportion' of the total army that was being considered for these types of psiloi (partcularly when comparing to the legacy system)? (The Thessalian armies have 4-20 Rabble.)

Just to make sure my questions are not misunderstood, I am NOT being critical. It seems to make sense to me. Just trying to have a better understanding of the logic. In most cases you'd have 3-4 light stands of skirmishers and light foot, with at least one being rabble and possibly 2 to get to 48 points, to protect the flanks of the Hoplites.

[David Kuijt]

Be careful not to get confused by older legacy system classifications. In DBA and other DBX systems, "Psiloi" meant skirmisher, and included both troops that always and forever acted as skirmishers (Balearic slingers, various bow-armed troops who fought as foot skirmishers) and also some (but not all) javelin-armed troops. Javelin-armed troops without shields were usually rated Ps(I) (sometimes Ax(I), if I recall correctly, but as I've never played DBM/DBMM my memory may be faulty); javelin armed troops with shields could be Ps(S) or could be Ax(O) or other "Auxilia" class troops. This worked sometimes, and other times ... less well. In particular, peltasts (javelin and shield troops during the Greek (Hoplite), Alexandrian, and Hellenistic periods) were an historical troop type that straddled two of the buckets used in the DBx systems -- sometimes considered to fight as skirmishers (Psiloi), sometimes as melee troops (Auxilia), and sometimes little was known so either option was allowed for. Which worked moderately for the bigger versions of Legacy games (DBM, DBMM) where there was many more buckets and the difference between Ps(S) and Ax(O) was fairly small (Ps(S) could serve in an army in much the same way as Ax(O)), but was quite an odd situation for the smaller versions of Legacy games (DBA) where the differences in play between the Psiloi bucket (troop type) and the Auxilia bucket was quite a bit larger.

So if our color text says "Psiloi", all we mean is that the name "Psiloi" is the familiar one that those troops used to refer to themselves (or that other contemporaneous writers used to designate them). It does not mean any reference to any troop classification system used in any other gaming system. In the same way, when Roman Auxilia are referred-to, we mean the troops that Romans called Auxilia -- they are rated in Triumph in a variety of ways depending upon the time period, including Heavy Foot, Light Foot, Raiders, and sometimes other troop types as well, since "Auxilia" is only synonymous with a Light Foot open-order melee fighting troop type in the minds of modern players of the DBx system games.

In Triumph, peltasts are usually classed as Light Foot. Javelin-armed troops without shields are almost always classed as Rabble. So the Leves of the Polybian Romans are Rabble; once they get helmets and small shields and some esprit de corps and wear wolf pelts and are velites, they are Light Foot.

Does that help clarify things for you? In the paragraphs above I tried to avoid using absolute terms -- there are 650 army lists, it is quite possible that something else happened in one or two of them.

[Bill Hupp]

Thanks Dave. I appreciate what you are saying about those troop classes being ambiguous and likely all such classification systems have that to some degree.

I was trying to be specific with the Hoplites armies, so best to think of these troops as just poorly trained Javelin guys. And I can match that up to descriptions of those guys in the Ospreys and WRG books (which then match to the figures.)

I’m not sure you can totally ignore the legacy systems as they have influenced the manufacturers in how they organize their figures for sale (same as what I’m trying to do for the 28mm Vendel figures,). If you are trying to upgrade an older army, particularly one that was acquired, you may have these ‘extra’ figures.

For now I’ve got some light Thracians, 3 figures on a 20mm stand, I can put on a larger plinth stand to get the needed rabble. For the Vendel figures we’ve got some Levy troops with no armor and small small shields that should work nicely.

[David Kuijt]

Thanks Dave. I appreciate what you are saying about those troop classes being ambiguous and likely all such classification systems have that to some degree.

They must. If you have 8 buckets, or 12, or 20, you are still trying to put an infinite spectrum of behavior-mixes into a finite set of buckets, and will end up with cases where one troop type does not clearly fit in a single bucket. That's the same for Triumph as it is for every other system.

I’m not sure you can totally ignore the legacy systems as they have influenced the manufacturers in how they organize their figures for sale (same as what I’m trying to do for the 28mm Vendel figures,). If you are trying to upgrade an older army, particularly one that was acquired, you may have these ‘extra’ figures.

I wouldn't characterize what we're doing as ignoring legacy systems, but if I understand what you're saying above, I'm not sure I agree.

Yes, manufacturers put out army packs for systems that existed 5, 10, 15 years ago, a mixture of AdG, DBA 2.2, DBA 3.0, FoG, and other systems. Some successful in their day, some flashes-in-the-pan, some well advertised but never very successful (FoG). But our game is our game -- we cannot and should not be held hostage by army packs for other systems. Our path forward is to make the best game we can, hopefully succeed on the merits of our game, and let the manufacturers recognize that and make up army packs for Triumph. If we change any aspect of our game based upon what army packs exist for any legacy systems, we are letting the tail wag the dog.

[Bill Hupp]

DK,

You certainly are free not to agree with me. I'm just stuck in the middle of getting into this side of the hobby right when everything started changing.

The changes aren't that radical either compared to other periods and rule sets, they just require a little bit of work (which is not unpleasant.) I suppose it is really just seeking confirmation from others that may have already gone through the process of creating a particular Triumph! army.

Bill

[David Kuijt]

DK,

You certainly are free not to agree with me. I'm just stuck in the middle of getting into this side of the hobby right when everything started changing.

The changes aren't that radical either compared to other periods and rule sets, they just require a little bit of work (which is not unpleasant.) I suppose it is really just seeking confirmation from others that may have already gone through the process of creating a particular Triumph! army.

Bill

Now I'm getting confused, Bill. I didn't see this sort of question anywhere in your previous posts. Could you express your concern again, so I'm answering the issue that really concerns you?

[David Kuijt]

I'm going back to your original question, Bill.

I'm organizing my legacy 15mm hoplite armies for Triumph! (and at the same time organizing 28mm Vendel Classical Greeks for Triumph! Armies) and have a question about the minimum required rabble troops.

First, in trying to understand the Rabble category is the description.

This is the catagory description:
Poorly-trained or poorly armed infantry fighting in loose order. Effective enough in bad going, where their native loose order is no disadvantage, but badly outmatched fighting in the open against, well, almost anything. Examples include armed mobs, unshielded peasants throwing rocks or javelins, Libyan hordes, and the like.

Second, in the army list the desription is "Psiloi armed with javelins".

In the Osprey Elite #7 on The Ancient Greeks there is a good discussion on Psiloi page 20-21 (under the section header "Greek Psiloi", not strangely). I won't reproduce the text here, but it fits our descriptions for the Rabble troop type very well. If you look at Plate E (by Angus McBride, and I weep that he no longer makes illustrations, having left us) that's exactly what we're talking about.

Let me see if I can find an image of it online:



That's exactly what we're talking about -- Greek Psiloi. Rabble in the Hoplite Army.

[Rod]

Looks perfect for converting that spear chucking light infantry into a dude with a rock

[David Kuijt]

Looks perfect for converting that spear chucking light infantry into a dude with a rock

Right. Chop off the spear, add some irregular blobs of gel-style crazy glue, let dry completely, prime and paint.

I was doing this a few months ago for the Early Swiss "Lost Boys" (enfants perdus) who are rock-throwers. Proof the technique works even into the 14th/15th century!

[Bill Hupp]

Thanks DK. That is exactly the picture I was thinking about in the Osprey book after reading your first reply.

I think the only point of disagreement is a belief on my part that people commonly use a practical 'anchoring' technique in their thinking. For gamers it is anchoring from one game system to another. You may to be less of a rules and period junky than some of us, certainly than me. If I couldn't anchor from one system to another and analogize in game terms it would really slow me down.

But it is perfectly right for you to clarify any quesiton in terms of just how Triumph! approaches something.

And slingers and archers (which I am a bit long on (less Skirmish stands than Ps stands usually) are easily converted as you guys noted.

I have a temporary fix for a game tomorrow where the Greeks and the Galatians are going to mix it up.