Firstly apologies for not posting for a while. My last few posts were about my Old World project – which has actually moved on, so I will post some updated photos at some point!

Recently I have been thinking about campaign rules for ancient and medievals. I thought the best bet would be to start with something simple, but a step up from a very simple ladder campaign where you just fight a series of battles and tally up the victory points at the end. I came across the campaign rules in DBA. DBA (De Bellis Antiquitatis) is a great wargame for a quick battle so this would be ideal for a campaign as I could get the battles completed. There are official DBA campaign rules in some of the books and in Hordes of the Things, but like many things DBA somehow the simple is made complicated by the way it is presented and written :) So I had a go at summarizing the rules in a more simplified way – really as an aide for myself for when I play my DBA campaign – solo by the way at the moment. I left out a couple of things such as Allies and Supply – they felt like they were a bit overly complex to start with.

DBA Campaign Rules 

Map and Number of Players 

Between 3 and 6 players seems to be ideal. Each chooses an army – hopefully same historical period, but could be a what if set-up. 

The cities are connected to each other as per the diagram below, but this can be altered to look more like an historical map – see the example below as well.  

Starting Positions and Army

Each player has 1 Capital and 2 other cities 

1 player controls central city as well 

Starting Army 12 Elements – reduced to 10 if no battle during a year. 

Turns 

Year divided into 3 turns – Spring, Summer and Autumn 

Before starting each player secretly notes location of their field army. Revealed as they take their turn or if invaded.  

Each player then rolls to see who goes first and turns taken in order. 

End of year return to winter quarters – must dice if crossing the sea.  

Recruitment – at the start of each subsequent year can replenish 1 element from reserve for each city controlled. If not possible to have 12 elements then use Hordes to fill the gaps.  

Movement 

Armies move 2 nodes per turn as long as cities controlled by the player. 

If moving by sea roll for each section and on a 1 they lose d6 elements – losing mounted elements first. Then decide to continue or not.  

Allies 

Ignore rules for thes for now. 

Supply 

Ignore for now.  

Invasion 

Defender chooses to send field army to fight a battle or to stand siege. 

Battle Results 

Elements destroyed transferred to reserves. 

Elements leaving table return to army straight away. 

If general or camp are lost then loser losing 2 further elements due to demoralisation. 

If defender is defeated then lose their city and must retreat to nearest adjacent city. If that his not possible then army is destroyed. 

1 prestige point gained by the victor per element destroyed or retreated off table minus their own elements destroyed or retreated. First player to take a camp gains 2 prestige and also 2 prestige for destroying general.  

Sieges 

If Defender doesn’t fight with field army then siege begins. Attacker takes city on a 6 if defender garrisons with field army or 5 and 6 if no defending field army. 

Defender field army destroyed if city taken. 

Attacker loses 1 element if fails to take the city. 

Siege can continue until winter. Each turn the change to take the city is increased by 1. 

On subsequent turns a besieged field army can sally out but not retreat. 

Winning the Campaign 

At the end of a pre-determined number of years each player counts up their prestige points – 3 for each city under their control. If a players capital is taken they are out of the game and their cities become independent. Independent cities can be besieged.