Ok, not quite unwashed masses, I'm talking about my players here, those that are NOT Battle or Unit Commander

I've not *yet* run the full battle system - purely because I'm still familiarising myself with the rules - but I have run the old battle system and a hybrid of both, and one thing my players love is being involved in the process. Being unit commander is great because you get to roll the all important battle roll, but what about the others? Is there anything they could do too?

For example, I have thought about creating the position of standard bearer in the unit, and giving him the job of rolling the Battle Effects for the round (the 3d6-10 roll) or the hornblower who rolls Play (Horn) to rally the unit. It's abstract but it gives someone else *something* to do which has an effect above and beyond the normal combat rolls. Even if the effect is minimal my players still enjoy it; it makes them feel that they are feeding *something* back into the system.

As I don't know the battle system that well I thought perhaps a veteran player might be able to suggest something that could be rolled by a player, or something that could be turned into a roll for a player, to achieve this.

As far as characters go, there really isn't much they can do, since they are busy fighting. If the knights have a lot of glory and good battle skills I suppose you could put each in command of his own unit.

If/when you swtich to the Book of Battle, the players do get some more to do.Mine often get polled by the Unit Commander to see what they want to do (attack vs. 2, withdraw or what). Invariably some guys want to play it safe and others want to take chances and earn more glory.

As far as rolls go, there are a lot more things for the PKs to roll in the advanced battle system too. There are rolls for squires and followers after each battle round.

I tend to let the Players roll the dice that determine thier opponenets, opportunities and surprises, as well. If someone is out of the fight, I let them make the rolls for the "bad guys".

Yeah, with the Book of Battle rules and plenty of comments from the peanut gallery on what the eschille should do (which I try to limit unless the unit is disengaged) this hasn't been a problem.

I've not *yet* run the full battle system


Run it first, please.

Yeah, with the Book of Battle rules and plenty of comments from the peanut gallery on what the eschille should do (which I try to limit unless the unit is disengaged) this hasn't been a problem.

I agree. Try to get the players to discuss tactics in character (as opposed two power gaming players), it works wonders and makes for good storytelling. Example: The unit commander is aggressive, and starts ordering a "push deeper". Traits and passions now enter play. What do the Prudent character think? Those that are wounded? Those that have a Love (family) passion towards those that are wounded? Those that have high Reckless and Proud and would prefer "attack vs two"? Even if every order cant be discussed this open up for post battle quarrels and role playing: "Great, Sir Unit Commander, that we won all that glory, but your bad decision making meant that my squire is dead and my brother in the hospital, dying."

One thing that can happen is that since the PK's combat skills vary from chracter to character, some might not realize how tough a time others are having.

In my group the character who is the Unit Commader has been around since the start of the campaign and has Sword 32! He is all but unstoppable on the battlefield. Most of the other PKs, however, are young knighs who were rusked into knighthood to stem the Saxon menace and who find foes with Greaptspear 15, or being doubling teamed a serious challenge.THere have been a few times when the commander wanted to press on, but was flatly told by the other PKs that if he did, they would not survive it.

We were still playing the Boy King campaign with 4th Edition, when the PKs had a similar 'chat session' with the Unit Commander. Up until then, if a knight fell from his horse, the rest of the group pressed on. This led to the alone knight getting mobbed more often than not, and captured/wounded badly. So they told the Unit Commander that in the future, his next command if someone fell, was to be 'Lets go rescue him!' rather than 'Ride on!', or he would be riding on alone. The battle casualties dropped off after that, too. :)

SInbce our group swithed to the BoB, knights have tened to press on when one gets unhorsed. What happens now is that in BoB, you have to go into extened melee to rescue someone, meaning another buh of combat rolls. THe unhorsed knight is busy mounting up and can't fight, so someone else gets double teamed.

Now since in the BoB, the knights often get unhorsed becuase they were beting doubled teamed to begin with, it often is a case of the knights sacrifcing one for thre good of the unit. If they stay, other knights will probably get unhorsed (or worse) during the rescue attempt.

Squires are real lifesavers in BoB.Since they are there specfically to aid thier knight, they can get the knight a new mount. SOme of my PCs have given thier squires chargers for just this reason.