AN INTRODUCTION TO DBMM

By Phil Barker

First printed as an article in Wargames Illustrated 2007

WHY REPLACE DBM?

DBM originated as a quick minimum adaptation of DBA for full size battles on a big table with big armies. Although it has been a very successful rule set, it is now distinctly creaky and feeling its age. Its evolution since has (largely due to pressure by the competition lobby) been in the direction of increased blandness. Since my co-author was unwilling at the time to consider any changes to Version 3.0, let alone the radical ones I thought necessary, I have acted alone. This necessitated a change in name. I chose “De Bellis Magistrorum Militum” (For the Wars of the Masters of Soldiers) to illustrate my wish to emphasise the skills of the general over those of the element pusher.

I started off by slotting changed sections one at a time into DBM for testing by an internet group. As testing went on, even those sections I was keeping were revised in turn to improve layout and simplify wording. Combined with a change to a larger more easily readable type face, this has increased the number of pages considerably. I hope the increased clarity will compensate. However, while there is more in the rules to read through, actual play is often simpler. One example is the new Spontaneous Advance section, which takes a lot more space in the rules but greatly simplifies play on the table. It is no longer necessary to compare measurements between furthest-apart front corners!

After a year and a half’s testing by an internet group that by April 2005 had played more than 200 test games and sent several thousand emails of suggestion, criticism and sometimes complaint, only about 20% at most of DBM remains in DBMM. The basic principles of play remain those DBM players are familiar with and all changes have made worthwhile improvements.

Richard has recently at short notice produced amendments for DBM, which you will see referred to as DBM 3.1. These are available only as an electronic download. They include some changes that had previously appeared in early drafts of DBMM. I mention this lest you conclude that I have copied him.

MEASUREMENT AND GEOMETRY

DBM inherited DBA’s use of geometrical constraints to govern ways in which elements could interact with enemy elements and added movement constraints to differentiate March from Tactical moves.

This initially simplified rule writing, though much of the simplicity has been since lost due to the need for tighter specification to thwart (imperfectly) the ploys of some competition players. It did not necessarily simplify play. For example, the geometric constraints that speed play in DBA can unfortunately be exploited in DBM to prevent an enemy entering combat at all! Accordingly, the principle used in DBMM is that if contact would have been possible in real life it must be possible in the game.

Another result of the geometric constraints has been the hated tactic often referred to as “the buttocks of death”, in which a small part of an element is inserted behind an enemy to convert a recoil into destruction. Several attempts have been made in DBM to eliminate or at least curb this practise, but without complete success. DBMM cures the problem by substituting a combat disadvantage next bound for automatic destruction in the current bound.

MOVEMENT

The reason March moves (out of contact) had to be distinguished in DBM from Tactical moves (in close proximity to enemy) was so that the short moves and shooting ranges of DBA could be kept while still allowing contact on a large table. We settled on a critical distance of 200 paces, corresponding to bow range. This had the unfortunate side effect of focussing players‘attention on ending movement at exactly that distance (something with no basis in real warfare), and letting skirmishers slow advancing enemy unrealistically.

DBMM cures these problems by replacing the minimum distance of 200 paces from enemy that a March move can end at by a minimum distance of 400 paces that it can start at. How close an element or group ends to enemy depends on its maximum move and whether it uses an extra PIP to stop short. This in turn affects the number of times it can be shot at before making contact. This is also affected by the new Press Forward move taken from my forthcoming horse & musket rules, HFG. In DBM, an advancing element gets shot at twice while in the same place – at the end of its own bound and in the ensuing enemy bound. In DBMM, a target element that scored more than shooters can press forward, getting it closer, but possibly disrupting its group’s formation.

Marching in DBMM is no longer stopped by distant skirmishers. These can no longer slow an advance while remaining at a safe distance, but only by entering combat at some risk to themselves. I have long held that skirmishers should not be able to slow an enemy advance by hanging about in front of it, as in DBM, but only by fighting. However, they did historically slow the advance of heavy troops by getting close and shooting at them, so it is equally unsatisfactory to have them flee immediately they are contacted. Discouragement from lack of apparent results, expenditure of missiles, and sometimes local charges or the intervention of enemy skirmishers tended to limit the amount of delay. DBMM simulates this by the new Spent combat result,, in which the skirmisher element is removed from the table but does not count as lost until its command breaks.

March moves along roads have been increased (so legionaries can march their proper daily distance), which may make roads more common on the table. Paved roads are distinguished in bad weather from earth tracks,

Another DBM problem lay in the two different ground scales when using 25mm or 15mm figures being not quite compatible and altering play. This has been cured in DBMM by making the width of an element base the basic unit of measurement. This has the additional benefits of greatly increasing heavy infantry moves, enabling them to get into contact much quicker, and often making the use of measurement devices unnecessary.

CLOSE COMBAT

DBM combat is at the same time too indecisive and too drastic.

A typical DBM battle involves 3 or 4 mixed commands, much of each of which is likely to remain on the back edge cheering on those in front. Infantry typically take half the game to get into contact, and then endlessly push each other backwards and forwards without creating gaps. Decisions occur mainly on the wings, and then not usually in time for a victorious wing to fall upon and destroy the enemy centre. Thus the centre of a Roman army fighting Carthaginians is equally unlikely to break through the enemy centre or to be overwhelmed from the flanks, preventing both the two most common historical results.

This is largely due to the DBM system of rear support, which when added to a high combat factor, often makes doubling a supported element’s score almost impossible.

DBMM differs in having some rear support apply only in the opponent’s bound (simulating increased resistance to impact) and having some reduce the opponent’s score instead of adding to their own. When allied to a change in grading factors that has (S) troops add if higher in their own bound and if less in an enemy bound (rather than adding to a losing score in all bounds), this makes combats more decisive and gives a real chance of a frontal breakthrough. Differentiating own and enemy bounds has long been the practise in DBR and players quickly become accustomed to it.

DBMM also removes rear support against missile-using troops such as cavalry, light horse and psiloi and makes it worthwhile putting these into combat against heavy infantry. Increased use is also made of Quick Kill (destruction by a score that was less rather than half), but this is generally limited to an enemy bound. Both these are tempered by the abolition in most cases of the zone of death, so that, for example, 4-deep pikes fighting psiloi or charged by knights lose only a single element instead of all 4. Of course, knights pursuing into the gap may not emerge safely…

TERRAIN

The tendency throughout the evolution of DBM has been to banish terrain further to the edges of the table, leaving a dull flat plain in the middle. The natural advantage to the defender of being able to choose his ground has been steadily eroded. Waterways are used to restrict the playing area rather than float ships and there has been constant agitation by competition organisers to throw the baby out with the bath water by abolition or having them diced for, leaving a player who has bought ships literally high and dry.

DBMM uses a different, more random, method of positioning terrain and has more varieties of feature. For example, rough hills and rough flat going are now of specified types, depending on the typical terrain in defender’s home land. In a Dry climate, rough hills are usually rocky and rough low ground usually scrub, while in Cold, rough hills are usually scrubby and rough low ground boggy. Wooded hills are now a separate terrain type and are joined by Crags, a kid of difficult hill passable only to psiloi.

The most common terrain type in nearly all countries is the gentle bare hill, yet these are rarely seen in a DBM game. In DBMM, they are half price, which should remedy matters a little.

DBMM area features are diced for twice in a fixed order. The first dice decides which table edge they are nearest to, and the second the minimum distance from that edge of the first feature placed for it, and for all features, the minimum distance from all features placed previously. Since difficult and rough hills are placed first, good going hills are more likely to be towards the centre. Rivers and roads run between edges designated by 2 dice. Waterways are distinguished from seas and lakes. They no longer seal off an edge from all risk of an enemy flank march.

INITIAL DEPLOYMENT

In DBM, the two sides alternately deploy one command at a time, starting with the defender’s largest command.

In DBMM the defender deploys his entire army, then the invader deploys all his. This enables the invader to make a plan in response to what he sees (and the defender to try and sucker him). There is no longer any necessity to have a mixed command that can respond to whatever may appear opposite, and there are now solid advantages to deploying mounted troops on the wings in historical style. Deployment is much quicker than in DBM. The invader no longer has an automatic right to the first bound.

The zones next to the table side edges in which deployment is banned are larger, especially for heavy infantry. This increases the difficulty of extending flanks after game start to rest them on what is historically a non-existent feature! Even if this is done, an element close to an edge is considered automatically overlapped.

DBMM flank marches usually arrive quicker than in DBM and cannot be detected by counting baggage. It is also possible to keep a command off-table behind your own table edge to arrive later. Flank marches can also arrive by water. In DBM, naval landing parties are from warships and necessarily small.

These are supplemented in DBMM by the potential arrival of a whole command on a waterway edge in impressed shipping such as fishing craft or small traders which need not be represented by models. However, the command runs the risk of attrition, especially if the enemy has naval superiority or if sailing at a season when bad weather is likely. In DBM, waterways are often used to reduce an opponent’s deployment width, and so are of maximum width. In DBMM, the further the water extends into the playing area, the closer such a landing is to the enemy vitals! However, enemy near the landing site do not flee as they do from a land flank march, though they do have to make room on the beach.

BAGGAGE

Baggage is compulsory in DBM and free. Its sole function is to provide a target for raiders, roughly the same function as the camp in DBA. A successful attack on baggage greatly helps to demoralise an enemy command, but is very difficult to pull off, since even light horse usually run out of PIPs before getting close enough.

Historically, an army’s baggage increased the army’s staying power by providing supplies and similar services. Its role was generally positive rather than entirely negative. However, sometimes an army chose to increase its mobility by leaving the baggage behind or was insufficiently organised to have any. Baggage in DBMM seeks to simulate this. It is not compulsory, can be varied in quantity and must be paid for. In return, it increases the level of loss needed to dishearten or break its command or defeat the army. It can be decentralised as command baggage (as for instance the camel-loads of arrows that could accompany Parthian horse archers) or partly or completely pooled in a single command as army baggage. Army baggage has only a slight effect on the command it is actually with, but a large effect on the army’s morale. Command baggage has an intermediate effect on the morale of its own command and a smaller effect on the army as a whole.

Another change is that litters carrying generals or sacred objects and standard wagons are classed in DBMM as superior baggage, rather than as inferior war wagons as in DBM. Although more vulnerable themselves than before, they now provide a positive tactical factor for friends in contact with their front, flank or corner.

COMMAND AND GENERALSHIP

The DBM regular command system was a big improvement on earlier systems, but has proved to have faults. These are most apparent in pairs games, where there is a great deal of time wasting horse trading as to who gets which regular dice score.

DBMM started by replacing this with a system in which the player designates after deployment which regular command will get the highest, second highest or lowest scores, as in Big Battle DBA. This requires the player to make a plan, which can be changed only with difficulty and confusion. This since been modified to allow specified commands to use a rounded average of scores, on the grounds that many regular armies (and possibly even some war gamers) lacked the imagination to have a tailored plan.

Another new command feature is that some armies with lists that justify it historically have generals specified as Inert or Brilliant. Inert generals get extra troops but lose command effectiveness. A Brilliant general is very expensive, but can use 2 brilliant strokes during a game. The most common uses of these are to double a PIP score after dicing or add to a close combat score in the general’s bound. A Brilliant general is NOT a magic bullet. Only really good players have the sense of timing to use one effectively, and even these may be frustrated by an opponent who allows them no chances. The classic confrontation between an Inert and a Brilliant general is Darius versus Alexander. The battle of Gaugamela between the two has twice been fought as a DBMM test game, with very satisfactory results.

The third command innovation is to allow the use (at a price) of 15 stratagems from among those listed by ancient authors such as Frontinus. Some of these are already permitted by individual DBM army lists, but others, such as Feigned Flight, are new. Each army is allowed to include up to 3 stratagems in its order of battle, but to choose only 1 of them to use at order-writing time.

MORALE EQUIVALENTS

One almost universal feature of DBM competition armies is the combination of powerful strike troops to do the fighting with a mass of cheap “filler” troops, whose practically only function is to increase the number of losses needed for demoralisation. DBMM combats this by an extension of the element equivalent system of DBM. The theory is that the loss of some types of troops is more dangerous to the army’s morale than that of others. For example, a medieval army would be far more badly affected by the loss of nobles and knights than by that of peasant levies. The ultimate loss of course is that of a general! Conversely, legionaries of the Roman republic would receive more moral support from the presence of veteran triarii behind them than from levies, and might well regard cheap skirmishers sent out in front as small loss..

In DBMM, an element of average troops is 1 morale equivalent (ME). Expendable troops such as scythed chariots or stampeding cattle are zero ME. An element of foot skirmishers, levy or hordes is ½ an ME, while one of elite troops such as knights, elephants, war wagons or artillery is worth 2 ME. An army baggage element is worth 1 ME to the command it is with and an extra 2 to the army, giving a trade off between morale benefits and provision cost. Command baggage is worth 2.

Any general of any troop type is worth 4. This makes the impact of a general’s loss in ME sufficient that it is no longer necessary to dice specially for his loss.

There were some worries that varying ME would make it hard to keep count of losses, but this has not been a problem in practise.

BROKEN COMMANDS

In DBM, commands become demoralised on losing a third of their original element equivalents. A minority have long thought this too sudden and predictable. DBMM substitutes a two-stage process. A command that loses a quarter of its original morale equivalents becomes disheartened. All but its elite troops suffer a minus one tactical factor in close combat and impetuous troops cease to be so. A command becomes broken when it either loses a quarter in a single bound, or a third in the entire game, or half lost or spent When it has lost half, it ceases to have a PIP dice

Two effects of these changes are that a disheartened attacking command has a motive for retreating to take up a better position and a victorious defending command has a motive for counter-attacking. A third is that the remnants of a broken command can only hold on for a short while if pursued vigorously, providing much better opportunities for the victors in a flank combat to redeploy effectively against the flank of the enemy centre.

VICTORY POINTS

The current DBM victory points system has the advantage of being zero-sum, which eliminates player collusion. It fails in other respects; by not providing a big enough results range when working out the next round matches in a big competition, by giving too much credit for a “no-score draw”, and giving no credit to the loser when games have teetered on a knife edge between a 1-9 and a 9-1, before being settled by the loss of a single element.

The DBMM system retains zero sum, but increases the victory points at stake to 25, which in the usual UK 4 game weekend will give a possible total of 100. It starts by awarding 25 VP to the winner, and then docks that by 1 for each of his commands that has been disheartened, broken or lost its general, and by 2 for each tenth of his army ME that has been lost or broken. His final score thus reflects both organisational damage and casualties. A victorious army that has had its casualties spread over all its commands will suffer less than one that has them concentrated in 1 or 2 commands, but it will still suffer. The loser’s score is now 25 minus the victor’s score.

The only circumstances not then covered are those when neither side has lost at finish time or both sides have lost. If neither has lost, DBMM allots 10 VP to the defender and 15 VP to the invader (who has been ravaging the countryside and acquiring loot, while the defender refuses decisive battle and loses revenue and prestige). This will discourage defenders from constructing a terrain citadel and hiding in it! If both have lost, the 15 points go to the defender (since the invader’s losses, disorganisation and foraging difficulties make it impossible for him to continue his aggression) .

TROOP DEFINITIONS AND LISTS

There are minor changes to some troop definitions and these have affected army lists. Since the lists have to be rewritten, I am taking the opportunity to incorporate changes that have been floated elsewhere.