Normans – SAGA Abilities

Analysis and learnings’ from the Normans’ battle board and SAGA Abilities

Seventh in my series, the others I have done so far are.

• Carolingian Franks
• Anglo Saxons
• Vikings
• Anglo Danes
• Welsh
• IRISH

Carrying on with the original format for these we start with –

Quick Overview of Faction

So what can we take in an Normans warband. Following on from the Irish, the Normans are a multi choice faction.

There is a note in the SAGA Age Of Vikings 2019 FAQ’s regarding equiping levies

NORMANS : FACTION RULES (PAGE 17)

Add after the equipement options of the Levies :

“Ìf your Hearthguards are equiped with javelins, your Levies mustalso be equipped with javelins”.

SAGA Age of vikings 2019 faqs

They also have the choice of 2 Legendary Units – William The Conqueror and Morvan LesBreizh

Williams comes with 2 fun rules, the first allows him to use We Obey twice a turn and the second is a good one – each time you use an advanced ability you get to roll a die, which can be modified if you have dice in your Activation Pool, if you score 5 or more you get to activate the ability and leave the related SAGA dice on the battle board so it can be triggered again later.

Morgan, apart from allowing 2 unit special equipment options, also blocks the warband from taking crossbow armed warriors. He also gets the ability during the terrain setup phase of Clash of Warlords scenario to move any previous placed piece of terrain Up to M. For a potentially mounted range equipped warband this overs a great opportunity for you to manipulate the table in your favour.

So we have a fairly flexible list with some interesting options.

SAGA Abilities

So onto the battle board.

Basic SAGA Abilities

The Normans as with the majority of battle boards in the Age of Vikings have 3 basic abilities which activate units based on unit type e.g. hero, hearth guard, Warriors or levies.

These 3 basic activation abilities are –

• KNIGHTS – Activate a hero, or a unit of hearth guards
• SERGEANTS – Activate a unit of warriors
• FOOTMEN – Activate a unit of levies

COMBAT BONUS

No surprises here, this operates as for most factions in the Age of Vikings. That is you place SAGA dice into the ability and spend them to up your attack or defence dice during Melee, Shooting or Shooting/Reaction on a 1 for 1 basis, or a 2 for 1 basis for the relevant rare symbol.

ACTIVATION POOL

Again no surprises, this is a common ability, for 1 of the rare saga dice symbols you can take 2 of your available SAGA Dice, roll them and add them to your inactive Saga dice pool – see my post on SAGA Dice for more information on the different states of SAGA dice. Because this is a basic ability that is triggered in the orders phase, so long as you have enough available SAGA dice – and remember when you trigger an ability the SAGA dice used to trigger it becomes available, so you really only need a minimum of 1 SAGA dice in your available pool prior to triggering to use- and you keep rolling the rare symbol a 1 in 6 chance you an trigger the ACTIVATION POOL multiple times.

Advanced SAGA Abilities

As with all the Age of Vikings battle boards there are 10 Advanced SAGA Abilities.

• 4 are triggerable during the Activation Phase
• 2 are triggerable during the Activation/Reaction Phase
• 3 are triggerable during a Melee activation,
• 2 are triggerable during a Shooting activation,
• 0 are triggerable during a Shooting/Reaction activation,
• 0 is triggerable during the Orders Phase,
• 0 is triggerable during the Orders/Reaction Phase,

So no Order, Order/Reaction or Shooting Reaction abilities.

Lets take the most prevalent first abilities triggerable in the Activation Phase.

IMPACT – this can only be activated for a mounted unit, so if you took no mounted units then don’t bother with it. It allows you to activate a mounted unit to charge or shoot, during the combat that follows the attacker may re-roll any attack dice that score 3 or less. Even remembering the standing cant reroll a reroll rule, that is a pretty strong ability.

Volley Fire – another ability limited by equipment – this one is limited to units with bows (which covers only bows, and not composite bows and crossbows), when triggered, you activate a unit to shoot (hence why they need bows) the range of their bows becomes L+L. Remember you will still need line of sight.

1) Can crossbow men use “Volley Fire”?  I know it says “bows”, and I suspect the answer is “no”, but I would like that confirmed.

No. A crossbow is not a bow. 

A bow is a bow. A crossbow is a crossbow.  A sling is a sling. 

DUCAT – StUDIO TOMAHAWK SAGA FORUM

PURSUIT – Activate a unit to charge, this activation will generate no fatigue. The charging unit gets 3 bonus attack dice during the melee from the charge. To maximise the benefit of this, use it after you have already activated the unit once during the turn.

DEX AIE – Old French for God Be With Us – triggering this lets you Activate your Warlord for a fatigue free charge, the warlord then gains 4 bonus attack dice and Resilience (2) until the melee ends. To maximise the benefit of this, use it after you have already activated the Warlord once during the turn.

Lets see the abilities triggerable during the Activation/Reaction phase

ENVELOPMENT – this ability triggers after a unit activates but before it is resolved. It lets the Norman player trigger a move activation for all their mounted troops. This was corrected in the SAGA Age of Vikings 2019 FAQ’s, where the stipulation that this only effects your mounted units more than M away from any enemy.

GALLOP – this is basically ENVELOPMENT lite, it is limited such that it can only be triggered by an infantry unit that is activated to move or charge that is within M of one of the Norman players mounted units, again it triggers before the activation is resolved. You get to Activate the mounted unit to move.

Now the abilities triggerable during the Melee Phase.

CHARGE – this is triggerable for a mounted unit which has charged. It generates 2 attack dice or 4 if you use the RARE symbol. You can also gain 3 extra attack dice, but you will suffer 2 fatigue at the end of the melee instead of the normal 1.

SUPERIORITY – this can be triggered also during SHOOTING, it allows you to remove a fatigue from the enemy unit in order to inflict 2 extra automatic hits. Remember these are just hits, the enemy will still get to roll defence against it.

RETREAT – when triggered it generates 2 defence dice, if your unit is mounted and the enemy is on foot you gain an additional 2 defence dice, bringing it to 4.

That leaves 1 Shooting ability to look at.

WOUNDED – This ability generates a single fatigue on the Enemy target unit at the end of shooting, so long as the attacker inflicts at least 1 casualty. I seem to remember a similar ability on the HUN board when I played against them.

So that’s all the abilities, so what have we learned about the Normans?

1. Take some mounted troops.
   1. 5 of the SAGA abilities,
      1. either can only be triggered by Mounted troops (CHARGE and IMPACT),
      2. only benefit mounted troops (CHARGE, ENVELOPMENT, GALLOP and IMPACT) or
      3. mounted troops get better benefits (RETREAT).
   2. CHARGE can be triggered by any SAGA die Symbol, its a lovely little pick me up for your Mounted in Melee, keep it ready and available and don’t forget to use it.
2. Bring some Ranged troops along,
   1. else WOUNDED and VOLLEY FIRE wont be useful, they use UNCOMMON symbol to trigger, so should be fairly easy to trigger and not being able to because you’ve got no Ranged unit seems a bit of an error.
   2. SUPERIORITY also can be triggered by shooting and can be a great way to help finish off an already fatigued unit.
   3. The extra range from VOLLEY FIRE could be a nasty surprise for unprepared opponents, it could also force some caution into them. It does only cost an UNCOMMON symbol so it’s not that expensive.
3. Maximise PURSUIT and DEX AIE, perform an activation before using them, else the fatigue free element won’t generate any benefit.
4. Line up ENVELOPMENT and/or GALLOP, watch your opponents turn and use them to keep your units safe, or position your mounted troops ready for your next turn. The FAQ’s alteration make ENVELOPMENT slightly less powerful but does allow you to still move all other units.

I would still recommend a rounded Warband with some basic foot soldiers, just because mounted and ranged troops both get reduced armour, and as such can be pretty weak in Melee without triggering abilities to boost themselves. Think hit and run tactics, supported by ranged attacks. Force your enemies to take your charges not the other way round.

Hope this was interesting/useful. Having completed all the boards I have played or played against, I intend to continue on those I have not played.