DBM: A Short Review

This is a review I wrote in April 1994 for our club newsletter after my first game of DBM.

For those of you who don't know DBM is short for 'De Bellis Multitudinis'. It is a set of Fast play Ancient rules that WRG brought out about 18 months ago, a further development of the DBA game mechanism and an alternative to 7th edition.

Being, as I am, at the forefront of new developments I had my first game of DBM last week. I must say I was more impressed than I expected to be... more so than you'd think for a die-hard 7th edition player.

The game has a very different feel to it, the troop scale is slightly larger but more to the point it feels like you are commanding a much larger army. This is mainly because the level of detail available to the general is greatly reduced the differences between troop types is simplified. The smallest tactical entity is an element rather than a unit, but in order to manoeuvre effectively elements need to move in groups. The rules encourage these groups to operate in fairly rigid lines, which is quite historical, it is dangerous to be outflanked or to have gaps appear in your lines. Long range shooting is mainly useful for creating gaps in enemy lines, therefore reducing his ability to manoeuvre effectively.

There isn't as much room for fancy manoeuvring as there is in 7th edition, but I think criticisms that it is just a dice game are unjustified. The tactical possibilities are much subtler, historical tactics work well in most cases, and at the end of the day it's all just calculated risk. You find your battle lines become a bit of a scrum with a lot of pushing and shoving going on, the player who is smarter at plugging gaps, exploiting weak points, and outflanking his opponent will generally win.

The game mechanisms are much easier to pick up, by the end of the game I was making most of the calculations from memory. This is where DBM has caught on as it is easy for beginners to pick up, and not too taxing on the brain power for those of us who aren't as young as we used to be.

I don't think it will ever fully replace 7th edition (...famous last words?) but I do think it is a viable alternative. The army lists don't provide as many options as 7th edition, they tend to force you to use more of the common troop types, and the base sizes are pretty much the same. So provided you can vary the composition a bit you should be able to use any Ancient army with either set of rules.

With our club having a large proportion of beginners in Ancients, and one who isn't as young as he used to be, some who are struggling a bit with 7th edition, I recommend we all have a go at these rules to see which we prefer as a club.