Another Fantastic Test Game

 After much more writing and re-writing I played another game of my nascent big battle fantasy rules.

This time I once again pitted the elves against the orcish hoards. Even though this is my third post on the subject this is actually my fourth test game because I replayed the last game after making some amendments. Every game is bringing to light areas that need attention and this last game prompted me to make some major changes that I'll try out soon.

One of the issues that came out of this game was unit activation. I'm using a card mechanic for activating leaders and units. I decided on a card activation from the start because I started this project to create a set of solo rules for myself. I'm keeping with this but I also included a 2 Functions for each unit when activated system. It works but I really needed to define what units can and can't do. I played this last game to the letter of what I'd written and found that much of my reasoning was still in my head an not on the page.

One thing I worked on since the previous game is Fantastic Creatures ~ Both single creatures and units. Units like the Orc Boar Riders is easy. They're just Heavy Cavalry with the Special Ability: Gore. The big spiders needed more thinking. What I came up with is various Creature Profiles. Lesser Creatures, Medium Creatures and Greater Creatures (I need a better word to replace Medium!). Then there are sub-classes of these three categories. So the Spiders are Lesser Creatures ~ Fast. With the special rule: Scuttling.

The Lesser Creatures can be fielded as single models or as companies. As singles they can be mixed with regular units. Medium and Greater Creatures are always single models. The ogres below are Lesser Creatures ~ Brawn with the Special Ability: Strong

I also tested the Magic system a bit more and found that it's pretty damn solid. Which is great. The magic can be powerful but it's not overpowering and to the get big results requires a level of risk because your foe can oppose your Spell Casters with Counter Spells . The elf queen got whacked a bit in the early moves. Each side had multiple spell casters this time around and it was easy to keep track of what was happening with them. A few offensive spells effected the battle and it was the support spells that had the greatest impact.

Another thing that needed testing was the terrain rules. These are pretty basic but they still needed to be tried. The rules worked but needed more definition.

The elves had their own unit of ogres and faerie folk for this game and they certainly added some colour.

The game has a point system and I decided to try it. But what I did was to put out a bunch of stuff that I thought looked equal and then calculated the numbers using the point system. I was pretty happy that both sides came to around 120 points. Both sides were just under so I had to tweak the numbers with a couple of additional special abilities or small upgrades.

Skirmishers work as I want. They cause barely any casualties but they do have the ability to prompt a Test of Valour. To a fresh unit this is pretty much negligible but a bad roll on 2d6 can cause a unit to halt and disrupt an advance. Against a damaged unit an unexpected Test of Valour has the potential cause a retreat. 

I got to put my Granbretanians on the table too. I have more of these troops but I chose a difficult paint scheme and they've been sitting on my paint desk for ages. I need to paint them and get more to build them up. I sculpted these figures for Eureka Miniatures several years back.

The Brass Bull below is an example of a single model Medium Creature. You could also include other creatures in this class like, a manticore, lesser giant, umber hulk, owlbear, gryphon... etc.

One thing that works well with these two armies is that they have very different units. The elves have, what I'm calling: Spear and Bow (sort of bill & bow or sparabara). This is a mixed unit with good ranged power and decent defence but a pretty rigid formation. The orcs, on the other hand are mainly warbands which are more flexible and harder hitting in their charge. 

While I was sitting back and looking at the rules I looked at the table and I was pretty happy with what I saw. It looks just how I want it to look: Lots of troops in solid blocks and lines with plenty of colour and a variety of troops and creatures.

I gave the elves a general on a dragon. I didn't want this creature/unit to be over powerful. I found that I really had to define the rules for flying units. What I had was very sketchy. In the pic below the dragon is about to use a breath weapon on the orc shaman. Spell casters have defensive values based on their level. There are 4 levels: Acolyte, Magician, Wizard and Sorcerer. This guy was a Wizard so he had pretty decent magical defences and managed to survive the fiery blast.

Ogre Battle:"Eh yoo. Yeah. The one with the club. I want a word with ye."

The chariots played a bigger part in this game. They did a bit of shooting and also managed to chase off the enemy skirmishers and a pack of wolves. The chariots charged but the skirmishers and wolf pack both managed to Evade. So it was a bloodless victory for the charioteers.

Not so bloodless on the opposite flank. The efiin cavalry got the worst of it in the first clash but in the second round some lucky dice managed to kill the orc commander and slowly turn the tide.

In the centre: No such luck. A warband with an attached ogre smashed a phalanx in the centre. Phalanx is another of the unit formations and behaves as your expect. Strong to the front and vulnerable to the flanks and rear. This time around the orcs hit hard and the elfin phalanx rolled abysmal dice. 

The elf general/dragon got into the rear and I expected it to be an overpowered move but I played it through to see the result.

The dragon charged into the rear of the warband but, rules as written the warband had a chance to Turn to Face the new threat. This made the dragons' attack pretty worthless but also left the orcs surrounded. This cause a lot of confusion, much note taking and plenty of rewriting. 

Part of the problem is that I had forgotten to write any rules for a unit falling back into enemy units. I know what I thought should happen but I hadn't put it into words. A good learning experience.

The Ogre Battle ended with the Faerie Folk being Worsted (ie: Breaking) and leaving a big gap in the elvish line.

Meanwhile the Granbretanians pinned a unit of Spear and Bow with their brass bull and marched a regiment into the elvish flank.

I left it here because I had plenty to think about but the elfin line was in a bad way and looked on the verge of collapse with in the next turn or two.

Conclusions:

It's getting there. Slowly but surely it's getting there. There are still aspects I'm unsure of how to tackle at this stage ~ Undead armies being one of them. I have some ideas but nothing solid as yet. Victory conditions being another.

I made some major changes to the combat system after this game. I had it so that a units' Armour Protection directly cancelled out hits before Casualties were calculated. This had the effect that weaker units could not inflict any casualties at all on stronger units. So, I re-thunk and re-wrote. Now I'm going to replay this game with units' Armour Protection (AP) values slightly boosted all around but making the value a pool of d6's to be rolled to cancel Hits. 

For instance: Heavy Foot had AP-5, meaning that you needed to get 6 hits to inflict 1 Casualty because 5 hits would be automatically cancelled. The system worked but... So now Heavy Foot have AP-6 and they get to roll 6d6 to try and cancel hits.

In case you were not aware, this is a Bucket o' Dice game. I justify this choice thus:

To my way of thinking hundreds of troops charging into the fray and fighting desperately

for their lives is aptly conveyed by a fist full of dice. It may not be perfect and it may not

be accurate but a dozen dice clattering on the table-top and the uncertainty of the result

seems like a viable substitute to the ringing sound of spear on shield as you try to pull

off a desperate victory in the face of almost certain defeat.