Post by korgoth on Nov 24, 2008 23:21:15 GMT -6
Idly musing, because I didn't get to run my EPT game tonight due to an illness... 
... I'm a big baby when I'm sick. Anyway, I was thinking about level and level titles as rank, something which is present in EPT (at least, it's there if you want to use it).
I was thinking that you could do something like that in a game based on "Polybian" manipular legions in Mid Republican Rome. Something like so:
1 - Veles (AC 8, javelin, spear and shield)
2 - Hastatus (AC 6, pilum, gladius, breastplate and shield)
3 - Princeps (AC 4, gladius, chainmail and shield)
4 - Triarius (AC 4, longspear, gladius, chainmail and shield)
5 - Centurion* (AC 4 or 5, gladius and chainmail w/ optional shield)
* - I think that pre-Marian infantry officers were still called Centurions, but I'm not positive.
If you wanted, you could even take it further, for example:
6 - Eques (AC 4, spear, spatha, chainmail and shield)
7 - Eqestrian Decurion (AC 4, spear, spatha, chainmail and shield)
On the other hand, it might not make sense to extend the progression up through the cavalry, both because then there's little place for light cavalry in such a progression and because Roman cavalry wasn't exactly all that and a bag of crustula.
Anyway, it just struck me as an interesting thought since the manipular legion had those tactical stratifications (not just ranks but differing tactical classifications), and you were expected to progress up through them.
Just to spin it out further, I guess if you did a Polybian Roman Military D&D game you could fight all sorts of human enemies (Carthaginians, Celts, Hellenistic Greeks, etc.) and some monsters (African forest elephants and eventually the mighty Asian elephant in all his armored and howdah-ed glory).
Just thinking out loud.
... I'm a big baby when I'm sick. Anyway, I was thinking about level and level titles as rank, something which is present in EPT (at least, it's there if you want to use it).I was thinking that you could do something like that in a game based on "Polybian" manipular legions in Mid Republican Rome. Something like so:
1 - Veles (AC 8, javelin, spear and shield)
2 - Hastatus (AC 6, pilum, gladius, breastplate and shield)
3 - Princeps (AC 4, gladius, chainmail and shield)
4 - Triarius (AC 4, longspear, gladius, chainmail and shield)
5 - Centurion* (AC 4 or 5, gladius and chainmail w/ optional shield)
* - I think that pre-Marian infantry officers were still called Centurions, but I'm not positive.
If you wanted, you could even take it further, for example:
6 - Eques (AC 4, spear, spatha, chainmail and shield)
7 - Eqestrian Decurion (AC 4, spear, spatha, chainmail and shield)
On the other hand, it might not make sense to extend the progression up through the cavalry, both because then there's little place for light cavalry in such a progression and because Roman cavalry wasn't exactly all that and a bag of crustula.
Anyway, it just struck me as an interesting thought since the manipular legion had those tactical stratifications (not just ranks but differing tactical classifications), and you were expected to progress up through them.
Just to spin it out further, I guess if you did a Polybian Roman Military D&D game you could fight all sorts of human enemies (Carthaginians, Celts, Hellenistic Greeks, etc.) and some monsters (African forest elephants and eventually the mighty Asian elephant in all his armored and howdah-ed glory).
Just thinking out loud.