Friday, October 25, 2024

Mass Combat

 This is a system designed for large scale combat, specifically between smaller sized armies. This won't emulate thousands on thousands, but would emulate a few hundred to a thousand odd soldiers on each side (think the Black Company). This system likely becomes extremely unwieldy after 10+ units on each side.

Units

Units come in 5 types: Infantry, Ranged, Cavalry, Siege, and Heroes. These are loose terms, treants are infantry just as axmen are.

Each unit is defined by its name, its health, its damage, and any special abilities. For example:
  • The Fourth Vanguard of Poles (Infantry): 8 hp, 1d6, +2 vs Cavalry
  • Goblin Rust-Arrows (Ranged): 4 hp, 1d4
  • The Grain Knights (Cavalry): 12 hp, 1d8, Unbreakable
  • Seedmark's Onagers (Siege): 4 hp, 1d6
  • Malicrag, the White Dragon (Melee Hero): 12 hp, 1d8, Can attack anything, Flees at 4 hp.
How units are acquired is up to the GM. 

Combat

Before battle starts, the commander of each force decides their intended actions for each form of unit according to the following rules:
  • Siege units attack anything before battle, but cannot fight during battle.
  • Infantry must attack other infantry, unless there are no opposing infantry in which case they can attack anything. Infantry can also defend a target, taking attacks instead of it (regardless of which side goes first).
  • Ranged may attack infantry, ranged, or applicable heroes.
  • Cavalry may attack anything.
  • Heroes may attack anything applicable to their type.
Afterwards, combat is started in the phases of Siege (First Round Only) > Ranged > Infantry >  Cavalry.

During each phase, each commander rolls plus their charisma (or attempts a Charisma check, or whatever fits for the game) to determine which force acts first. Units that are attacked are stuck in combat, and cannot perform their intended actions, instead attacking one of the units they are engaged with. IE: if you send your infantry to attack a certain unit, but they are attacked first by a different unit of infantry, they are stuck fighting the second infantry. Attacks always hit.

After initial engagements, units alternate attacking a unit they are engaged with, and ranged units firing at valid targets, unless a unit is engaged with them, in which case they fight in melee (ranged units fight in melee with a d4). If infantry or cavalry becomes free of engagements, they may engage a new enemy, abiding by their regular rules.

When the tide of battle shifts dramatically against a side, all of its units must make a morale check (2d6 attempting to beat their health). Units that fail are removed from combat. Unbreakable units never flee.

Post Combat

Afterwards, damaged units may regain 1d4 hp, up to their max at the start of combat. All other damage taken is permanent. Units with 0 hp are fully lost, though units that fled due to failed morale are allowed to return to the army and heal.

Example!

The Shields of Wrenn (Led by Galian, Savior of Wrenn) are a mercenary company charged with protecting a town from an aspiring necromancer and his horde of undead minions. The Shields have access to the following units:
  • Wrennish Militia (Infantry): 4 hp, 1d4
  • Long Mountain Dwarves (Infantry): 8 hp, 1d6, Unbreakable 
  • The Rangers of Elding Lodge (Ranged): 6 hp, 1d8, Fights in melee with a d6.
  • Galian, Savior of Wrenn (Infantry Hero): 19 hp, d8, 3rd level fighter
The Necromancer has access to the following units:
  • Zombies (Infantry): 8 hp, 1d4, Unbreakable, Is defeated when their necromancer dies
  • Skeletal Knights (Cavalry): 8 hp, 1d6, Unbreakable, Is defeated when their necromancer dies
  • The Necromancer (Siege Hero): 4, 1d8
The Shields decide that their best course of action is to take out the necromancer, which means defeating his undead first, thus splanning to send both units of infantry to attack it, as well as their archer, and Galian.

On the opening round, the necromancer goes first (as he's a siege), and strikes the Rangers of Elding Lodge for 2 damage, dropping them to 4 hp.

Moving to ranged attacks, the rangers go, pelting the zombies for 2 damage and dropping them to 6 hp.

To infantry, the necromancer beats Galian in a charisma test, and the zombies charge into the Wrennish Militia, attempting to destroy them before they can attack. They hit for 3, and the GM rules this is scary enough to cause the militia to flee. The dwarves and Galian then engage the undead, easily defeating them.

Finally the skeletal cavalry attack the rangers, engaging them with 5 points of damage, easily defeating them. Were Galian not played by a foolahrdy player, and the Dwarves of the Lone Mountain not unbreakable, this would likely the end of their battle.

Luckily, it isn't, and on the second round of combat the dwarves and Galian assault the necromancer and easily deal over 4 damage, ending the battle.

Afterwards, the milita are patched up for their missing 3 hp, their wounds more psychological than physical. Sadly, the Rangers of the Elding Lodge have met their last hunt, and are given a proper burial as a respect for their service.

Friday, October 4, 2024

Making Cairn Combat Better

The Rules

On each character's turn, they get two actions, but only one of which can be used to attack or take a similar action (push, disarm, trip, etc.). A PC can forgo their second action to guarantee they go before their opponents (ignoring the DEX save).

Combat takes place in zones. Zones are approximately 40' areas. Moving between zones is an action, but moving within a zone is free and can be done at any point. A blast hits all creatures in a zone (or a number of creatures equal to the damage roll). You can use melee weapons to hit anything in your current zone. Ranged weapons can hit up to one zone away.

When a creature is hit in melee combat, it becomes in engaged with the creature that hit it. While engaged ranged weapons cannot be used, and if an engaged creature attempts to flee, all enemies engaged with it can attack it for free. A creature can disengage as an action to escape an engagement.

As an action, a PC can take a defensive action (block, dodge, or parry). If they take a defensive action and are attacked, they gain fatigue (but gain no fatigue if they are not attacked).
  • Block - Attacks against you are impaired. You need a shield to do this.
  • Dodge - When attacked, roll a d8, subtract your armor, then reduce your damage taken by the result. If the damage s reduced to 0, you are disengaged for free.
  • Parry - When attacked, roll your weapon's damage and if it's greater than your opponent's damage, deal damage equal to your roll to their STR. If its lesser, take their damage directly to your STR. Neither of these hits trigger a critical damage save. If equal, nothing happens.
Everything else is Cairn as written.

The Explanation

I'm trying something out here, giving you the rules first and the reason for the rules second.

Anyways: Cairn's combat isn't the best. That's not a complaint, it's not trying to be good. I however, prefer my combat to be a bit more tactical. This is the goal of Block, Dodge, Parry, but I have some issues with BDP's implementation.

Quick and full turns are better represented by two actions (in my opinion) and I prefer zones to vague range bands, though that one is entirely personal taste, and I think engagements are necessary to allow the fighters to actually protect their squishier comrades in the back line, but what about the eponymous block, dodge, and parry.

Blocking and dodging in BDP work the same, they grant two weapon speeds (balanced and either fast or slow) impaired. Frankly, this has always felt really weird to me. For one its a punishment for using the middle tier of weapons, with none of the narrative bonuses of a fast weapon (ie: easy to hide) but none of the mechanical benefits of a big two hander. Yes you get a shield, but you can do the same with a dagger.

BDP attempts to fix this with the weapon clash system. I think it's a good system, though I wonder how useable it is at the table, but I applaud the implementation. A balanced weapon is equally likely to be the first to hit as it is to be the last to hit. That's useful, being average is often good.

But it doens't change that blocking and dodging are binary choices in BDP. Either blocking does the thing, or it doesn't. That's dull.

In my attempts at changing it, I wanted blocking, dodging, and parrying to hit different niches. Dodging is better than blocking, but only if you are unarmored, and blocking requires a shield (or a weapon capable of blocking). Parrying prefers big weapons (or a parrying dagger) but comes with high risk and reward. And that's ignoring passive defense in armor. Is it better? I don't know! It's not tested! Most of what I make isn't!

I've still been trying to implement the face down defensive card mind games of His Majesty the Worm into a game with dice. I'm not sure it's entirely possible, but the mind games of playing a horrible roll as a riposte and then acting like you played a good card is just so tempting. I need to find a way to implement this into a game that doesn't use tarot.