I've talked about the mixes of weapon styles as well as using RBG in melees and thought it might be a good idea to talk some about my favorite formations too.
The first is for a Star: a 3 person combat team. Ideally, you'll have 2 bucklers and 1 case in the group with the bucklers in front. Below is a basic diagram:
As you can see, the case fighter is stationed between and behind the two other fighters. This allows them to replace either of the front fighters or protect the sides in case they are flanked. I'm not using any gunners because 3-on-3 is really too small for their use.
That changes when you double your troops. You can see from the diagram below that I've added a gunner in front of the formation. Now, the gunner only stays in front of the formation until they approach to firing range of their opponents. When they're in range to fire, they stop and the rest of the formation flows around them.
As you can see, the gunners wind up behind the line where they can still snipe the opposing forces or fill in as a reserve, if necessary.
When we double our troops again, you can see daggers being used for the first time. They aren't reserves, the same as the case fighters, but rather shock troops. Their job is to watch the battle, direct troops, repel any flanking attacks and take advantage of any weaknesses in the enemy formation.
| 12 Fighter Formation: |
| Initial: | | Final: |
| |
|
Our final doubling brings us up to 24 fighters. And you may notice that while the reserves (the case fighters) have doubled each time, they are the only group that does. The front line of bucklers nearly does, but is always 1 less than double the previous size. And the shock troops have quadrupled in number while the gunners only increase by 1 each time. This is because I prefer a more conservative - a more defensive - formation. An example of this is when you compare my 24 fighter formation to the typical 24 fighter formation most people would use given the same mix of weapons:
| Initial: |
| Mine |
| | | | G | | | | | G | | | | | G | | | | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | | C | | C | | C | | C | | C | | C | | C | | C | | | D | | D | | | | | | | | | | | | D | | D |
|
| Theirs |
| C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | D | | G | | D | | B | | B | | | | G | | B | | D | | G | | D | C |
|
| |
| Final: |
| Mine |
| B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | | C | | C | G | C | | C | G | C | | C | G | C | | C | | | D | | D | | | | | | | | | | | | D | | D |
|
| Their |
| C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | D | G | | | D | | B | | B | | G | | B | | D | | | G | D | | C |
|
| Head to Head |
| Mine |
| D | | D | | | | | | | | | | | | D | | D | | | C | | C | G | C | | C | G | C | | C | G | C | | C | | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B | | B |
|
| C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | B | | C | | D | G | | | D | | B | | B | | G | | B | | D | | | G | D | | C |
|
| Theirs |
As you can see, their line is wider than mine (12 to 9). This isn't as big of a problem as it might seem for a couple of reasons. The first is that the gunners in my formation will have hopefully thinned out their front ranks some, forcing them to drain some of their reserves to fill the holes in the line. The other reason is that while they have the troops to attempt a flank, my formation has the shock troops already in position to deal with them.
Unfortunately, I don't foresee the the chance to actually use the 24-fighter formation, or even the 12-fighter formation very often because of the sheer rarity of getting that many fencers on the melee field up here (let alone that many fencers willing to fight with bucklers), but I can always hope. And if anyone does get the chance to try these out, I'd love to hear how it goes.
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