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I was prepared to be let down, but I'm very impressed with the overall package, both rules and presentation. I like their thought processes behind the rules; it was also put together by veteran tourney players to specifically eliminate the problems and cheesiness they'd seen (like geometry wars in DBA). Yes, it seems most of the stuff you're looking for is subsumed into one of the four categories; the skill rating gives you the rerolls, which are huge. In the example, the romans are superior, which reroll 1's (or 1's and 2's if you attach a commander to fight with them). Being superior, armored, skilled swordsmen allow them to average the same number of hits as 50% more gauls, including the overlaps. The number of dice you get depends on your first two ranks for foot; the question with spear and pike is do you go for frontage for more dice, or depth for the advantages? In combat, you win or lose based on the total hits you received from all opponents, vs. what you dealt out; if you received more, you make a cohesion test with the modifiers to the rolls given, needing a 7 or better (with the rerolls for quality). The most common mods are probably losing combat by 2 or more hits, 1HP3B, or losing impact combat from lancers or impact foot, and any minuses from current cohesion. The chart on p. 113 is clearer than the quick reference chart in the back.

That's what I like about FoG, most of what you're doing is almost common-sensical; you use your skirmishers the way they're supposed to be used; you use your cav the way they're supposed to be used; you use your pike the way they're supposed to be used. Combat is more about cohesion than death, which is the way it was in the ancient world. If you lose cohesion, you get fewer dice in your future combats. Fewer dice means more of a chance to lose combats, meaning you are more likely to lose more cohesion, and eventually break. It's an elegant mechanic; simple but with depth, the best kind of rules. Placement of your commanders seems critical; you can get bonuses in combat, or try to rally and raise your cohesion. It also seems all army types and styles are possible; no screwing over macedonians and romans to allow weaker nations to compete like in other rules; no myriad of special rules for each army, the rules are in the freaking rulebook; horse based armies seem equally as viable as foot based, without needing to screw around to make them fit. The focus is on generalship, not list-building or special rules.

Did you pick up any of the army books? Storm of Arrows is probably up your alley, being later medieval European warfare. I'm looking at doing Seleucids myself, but if anyone does Santa Hermandad Neuva Castilian in 15mm, I'm in. I foresee a Litko order in my future for (many) 15 and 25mm bases. Plus if those Wargames Factory 28mm plastic romans are as cheap as they're saying (48 figs for $30 is as cheap as 15mm), I'll be morally obligated to run late republican roman. I'll just spraypaint them red.

I think anything that strikes your fancy is a good non-roman army! IIRC the "Greek" book is next in line, so I'll wait to see the exact numbers of the macedonians before I commit to anything. Then, you can just proxy the pikemen through a wide range of successor states, and just slide in units specific to the faction your playing. Same thing with hoplites, or armenians and parthians; just slide those cataphracts and horse archers over. I can also see gauls and carthaginians being tougher for new players to master, because they have so many average units other than cavalry and you probably need to know the game well to get the most out of them. For gauls, I would max out the number of gaesatae for their superior skill, to hold your batteline intact at least for a little while. You just have to resign yourself to painting many naked men. The carthaginians can get elephants, which are vulnerable, but have POA's against foot in impact and melee; just screen them with your own light infantry against velites. Just a really flexible list, with gauls, spaniards, numidians, italian allies, greek hoplites, ice cream trucks, martians, avon ladies....

One thing I would like to see in the future is a historical scenarios book, with terrain layouts and possible modifications. The game designer did mention once that they did a battle (Trebbia?) where the romans had to wade across a river to get to the carthaginians; they gave the romans a negative POA for that battle, and got historical results. Your probably right, sieges may be out of their scope, or just be abstracted. Then again, most sieges are boring, not hollywood style assaults. You mostly dig in and try to starve the other guy out! I'm not sure any set of rules could cover Alexander's siege of Tyre, for instance.

I'll also be getting 25mm bases (60mm width), so any 15's I have will be saboted onto them for the correct frontage and depth when fighting 25's. If doing 15mm romans/gauls/carthaginians, I've heard much ranting and raving about how good the corvus belli stuff is. I have some of their infinity sci-fi blisters, and those are indeed good sculpts and castings. John, if you're willing to bring in one of those (10!) medieval armies, I'll be more than happy to game with them.

Try this :

http://www.oldgloryminiatures.com/categories.asp?cat=55

I'm pretty sure the discount also applies to the Crusader line, which are really nice figures, though correspondingly more expensive.
http://www.oldgloryminiatures.com/crusader.asp
You usually have to buy or make your own spears and pikes. Ancients are annoying that way (15mm is the same way).
http://www.oldgloryminiatures.com/products.asp?cat=407

I believe this is the OG manufacturers direct page, but they have fewer pictures than the other one, but some painted pics :
http://www.oldglory25s.com/

This is Crusader's page, they can take the old glory discount from there also :
http://www.crusaderminiaturesusa.com/

Also, these guys are doing plastic late republican romans and celts, but say they will do hundred years war french and english next :
http://www.wargamesfactory.com/AnnouncementRetrieve.aspx?ID=13591

DBA = De Bellis Antiquitatis ; it's a smaller scale ancients game, fast playing, more chess like and abstract. Each army has 12 bases (elements), the rules are pretty short, etc. Part of the DBx family. The larger scale rules are DBM (De Bellis Multitudinus), which is no longer in print. They were the defacto standard for ancients gaming, with a fair amount of tournaments worldwide; though almost impossible to read because they were in extreme legalese. You had to have an experienced gamer show you the ropes. There were supposed to be some pretty gamey tactics in DBM also. The writer of Field of Glory worked on DBM, but went his own way after arguing with the creator about the next edition of DBM. The creator of DBM put out DBMM instead, which is a better version of DBM, which is evidently not what people were looking for. Hence, FoG's massive sales and interest. This is also the reason for the basing conventions being the same for the last 30 years; people played the WRG series of rules, then DBM, which kept the same base sizes, and now FoG.

Go here for more DBA information :
http://fanaticus.org/DBA/index.html

Also, this page has a DBA for dummies guide, since DBA is also written in that strange legalese; even in a 12 page rulebook, it will make you grit your teeth :
http://www.wadbag.com/DBAGuide/

If you want to see the size and cost of a typical DBA army, here are starter armies :
http://www.xyston.com/acatalog/15mm_Minature_D_B_A__Army_Sets.html
http://www.corvusbelli.com/en/02_tiendacorvus.asp?IDNOTICIA=89

Hey Bianchi, have you seen this guys figures? They are incredible, if you're looking to do Robert the Bruce and "friends". I remember seeing the greens about a year ago and they looked fantastic then.

http://www.ebobminiatures.com/products/rebellion.htm#heroes