DBA, DBM and DBMM

This family of games are played on a regular basis at our club. Chad describes DBM in more detail below. DBA is a simpler game with small armies of just 12 bases. DBMM is the "new and improved" version of DBM.

DBM Introduction

DBM is a game that sets out to recreate battles in the ancient and medieval periods, anywhere from 3000 B.C. when the first civilisations were recorded to 1485 A.D. with the introduction of firearms on a large scale.

Troops are organised into elements, which can associate with other elements to form a group. Troops are classified from a range of different troop types, from knights (fast, ferocious, if slightly undisciplined armoured men on horseback) to lowly hordes (unarmoured, badly armed and unenthusiastic peasant rabble). Within each troop type there are different classes. superior, ordinary and inferior, reflecting their historical performance. So medieval French knights are classed as superior, as they were acknowledged by contemporaries as being so, whereas English knights are classed as inferior, because they fought so often on foot that they forgot how to fight mounted! Troops are further classified as regular, meaning that they have received at least some formal training (Romans being the ultimate example) and irregular, meaning no formal training has been given (such as the Celtic opponents of the Romans!). This has important implications for how troops will manoeuvre. There are no super troop types, each one has its Achilles heel, and even the cheapest element in the game (inferior skirmishers at 1 point) can bring down the most expensive of elements (Superior Elephants at 20 points) in the right circumstances.

DBM also has an abstracted command and control, where each general rolls PIP (Player Initiative Point) dice to determine how many elements or groups of elements they can move in a turn. Because the number of PIPs are variable each turn, generals who devise over-complicated plans will most often come to grief, as just when you need them you're guaranteed to roll poorly for your PIPs! Things become even more difficult to control if you're in charge of an army with irregular. troops such as barbarian warbands or Vikings. If you want to do anything other than move irregulars straight ahead it costs you more PIPs than it would for a regular troop type. Irregular troops don.t fight any less effectively than regulars, the trouble is often getting them into the fight in the first place!

I've played quite a few different ancients rules in the past, and have to say that the DBM system is my favourite. The main reason is that it gives me less of a headache than other rules. No tiresome book-keeping is required as all the action is instantaneous, combat and shooting is resolved quickly and simply and this all frees up one's mental faculties for concentrating on the tactics you're going to use. I also like the way that as the battle progresses groups of elements get more and more broken up, so you gradually end up losing total control of your army. Other rule sets have more detailed command and control rules, but I've found that while it may be argued they are more accurate, this (in my opinion) is marginal compared to the book-keeping, mental anguish and resultant loss in playability it causes. DBM abstracts command and control into a much simpler system and gets largely the same results.

At the Cambridge City Games club there are at least four regular players of DBM with others taking occasional turns at it. We have organised a league system as a bit of fun for which we are always happy to add new members. If you're interested in joining the league, or are a beginner wanting to find out more on DBM, come to the club and ask someone to point us out and we'd be glad to get you involved.

Scores