8 days to release... How to interpret the Troop Types

The countdown to the release of The Pikeman´s Lament rules continue... just 8 days now...

In this blog post I will explain a bit about how to think regarding Troop Types in the rules, there you also can find several sugestions of what the Troop Type can represent. During the playtest of the rules I at several occations have got questions regarding if there will be specific wars, or specific armies included in the rules and the short answer are no it won´t. not even Sweden during the TYW.

The aim with The Pikeman´s Lament, as it is in Lion Rampant, have been to include generic Troop Types that can be interpret in to about all kind of battlefield Tactics during the Pike and Shot era, as well as a bit before and after to if you want to push it.

So please don´t get to caught up in the names of the Troop Types, they are to give a good feal to the rules, instead look at them as Different battlefield tactics they can depict and shoose the one that you feel that best representing how your troops fought during that perod of historý.

That said you can well field Prince Rupert and his Royalist cavalry as the Troop Type: Trotters if you feel that they in the Mission you are going to play shall use a different tactic then their traditional dashing charge as Gallopers. It is all about how you want to use your troops in the game.

To further elaborate, I have included some Company examples and pictures using my Eastern Europe Cavalry that I painted up for our Polish War campain at the club. The minis are a mix of Fire Forge Mongol Cavalry and Gripping Beast Arab Heavy Cavalry and Arab Light Cavalry as well as a bunch of bits from my Pike ans Shot bitbox.

I field them as "Towarzysz pancerny" in service of the Polish King. At first hussars performed most services but as they grew heavier the need arose for a medium or lighter cavalry. The 16th century saw creation of lighter cavalry known as 'Kozacy' (singular 'Kozak' hence 'towarzysz kozacki') until 1648 and then known as 'Pancerni' from the 1650s on until the 1770s, 'Kozacy Pancerni' can be translated as 'Armoured cossacs') in the Kingdom of Poland or 'Petyhorcy' in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania - whose offensive armament included a shorter 'demi-lance' ('dzida') or 'rohatyna', bow and arrows, war-ax, sabre in the 16th century and a pistol or two, a carbine in the 17th and 18th centuries.

The lighter yet cavalry was created during the Muscovite Wars of the early 17th century, the most famous unit or type was known as Lisowczyk, after their commander Aleksander Lisowski, that fought in the 30 Years War as well. Along with these mentioned Polish or Lithuanian horsemen there were banners/companies of lighter cavalry drawn from Lithuanian Tatars (serving in their own banners under their precarious legal status), Romanian ("Wallachian"), Cheremis, Circassians (similar to Kozak/Pancerni) and Hungarians.

Based on the fact that they was armed and used in a diversety of ways I use to field them as Dragoons, Trotter or Gallopers all depending on what tactic I want to use during the specific Mission.

Most often I filed them as:

2 units of Dragoons @ 4 points each
4 units of Trotters or Galloppers @ 4 points each

This Company gives me a screan of fast Fragoons that will cover the advance of the Trotter or Gallopers so they will be able to advance forward the enemy and not get shoot to pieces before they can go in to action.

But from time to time filed them as:

4 units of Veteran Dragoons @ 6 points each

This Company gives me a force of very virile Light Horse that can harasse the enemy with good effect as they as Veterans performe Skirmish actions withour penelty. They can also be used to quite good effect in dence terraine to even out the advantages of Gallopers for example.