"Good planet/ground based Star Wars wargame ruleset?" Topic

Just a bit curious to know what are some good rulesets (either official star wars or converted system/stats) for ground based warfare in star wars? Large skirmish/company level preferred.

It is the lack of minis that hurts

West End Games' Star Wars miniatures Battles is a good system.

Chain Reaction (wiht some slight mods) works real well for Star Wars type action.

Rob

Fubar or Blasters and Bulkheads if you don't mind using less vehicles. The latter is more attuned to Star Wars.

That said with creating book keeping Fubar can handle more vehicles.

The collectible minis are still pretty widely available, come prepainted, and are an excellent value for the money.

A fews squads, or platoon per side shouldn't set you back too much.

The WEG 25mm figs are harder to obtain, cost a bit more, but are decent too.

Lots of 15mm figs for decent proxies as well, if desired.

I'd recommend FUBAR as well.

link

never played this….but i get a very battle for hoth vibe

Fubar works very well. I have run very large Star Wars games with it. 20+ vehicles per side and 200+ infantry doing a Clone Wars game.

Here's a link to more of my pics.

link

Thanks,

John

FUBAR

The old Star Wars Miniature Battles rules from West End Games are actually quite good, if you can find them. They can handle a pretty decent number of troops on the table too.

I have used "Fast & Dirty" for company level skirmishes. VERY good game, but maybe too realistic and not enough "heroic" for Star Wars. For smaaller games with Boba Fett chasing a handful of rebels, "AE Bounty" is the best one I've played.

Fubar and SWBM by West End Games are good if you can find it. I used both to write home rules for Hoth and am now working on the Clone Wars.

VR
James Mattes

I converted the I Ain't Been Shot Mum sci-fi mod ("Get Your Frikking Tentacles Out Of My Face" – I think I got that right) for larger scale Star Wars actions. A fuller version of the rules is due shortly from TooFatLardies, "Quadrant 13", IIRC.

I use Blasters and Bulkheads for smaller actions.

Here's a link to the unofficial 3rd edition of the West End Games Star Wars Miniatures Battles. They all three of the books WEG put out combined into one, with some popular house rules added in. This is all with input from the original author of the game. There isn't a whole lot different between it and 2nd edition. It's a great way to check it out. Be aware the file is about 400MB in size.

link

We actually use the fast-playing WotC rules for our games – modified to add some reasonable ranges for weapons and converting "squares" to inches. There are some entertaining battle reports on our blog (links below)

link

link

Cheers,

w.

Thanks for the link to the 3rd Edition of the rules Delthos. Now to wait for it to download!

VR
James Mattes

WEG's rules were good IIRC. Blasters and Bulkheads IS StarWars, but only for squad/skirmish level, so not what yer after. FUBAR is great… has the riht feel and scale, and even 'official' stats so you don't have to do it yourself.

Now miniatures, that's something else. If you have enough of the WOC plastics, that's great, but also not hard to proxy rebel troopers, stormtroopers, or clonetroopers (yuck). Droids will be a little more difficult. Charaters almost impossible.

I have used star grunt for company sized games set in the star wars (classic) era.

hey guys,
i am having difficulty getting the wec 3rd edition rules.
Is the link correct from Delthos?
cheers

I can't find the link and my copy is on my back up drive. not sure if I can find it. check with the guys on the Yahoo

Star link

Wars wargaming groups.

VR
James Mattes

the link works fine.
its a large zip file though.

The guy who was hosting it had some issues when he was upgrading his storage. It should be fine now.

I've seen these rules take some heat for being time-consuming to write up squads, or lacking vehicle rules, or being too dependent on the RPG.

With respect to the reviewers, I have to say that I don't feel any of these criticisms te be valid.

If it takes some time to write up forces, it's because your control over those forces and their composition is unmatched by any game system around. You build and equip your units from the boots up, limited only by the types of weapons available – and there are LOTS of different types – and only very general restrictions on basic stats for species. (Humans, minimum value of 2, maximum of 4; Aliens, minimum value of 1, maximum of 6). You can use any figures you like and with very little modification use the SWMB rules to represent them.

Personally, I despise rules sets that give me a list of cuture-specific unit types then pat themselves on the back for how "balanced" they are; they aren't. Ever.

I am more than capable of using my own imagination to build my forces, thank you. Sometimes these forces work great, sometimes they get trashed, but their success or failure is mine to celebrate or bemoan. No excuses.

Vehicle rules are in the Companion; if you have the base set, there's no reason not to have the Companion, too. If you don't have the Companion, oh, well. If you DO, the vehicle rules are excellent, with the same freedom for design of vehicles as the basic game has for squads.

And while they are designed to be fully compatible with the RPG, they are in no way bound to or limited by it. I have played many, many more games of SWMB than I have of the SWRPG, and I never felt restricted by any requirement to match one to the other, though I do admit thaat the RPG can be useful for answering certain questions or settling certain interpretations.

Basically, since everyone is spending points with access to the same gear, SWMB is a set of rules for people who know their tactics and like to have units trained to exercise them. Squads arise that are inherently logical based on their skills and functions, and if one player doesn't like how another builds their forces, he is free to counter it with designs of his own.

In a way, it's like "Minecraft"… everyone has the same blocks, but no two designs are alike.

If you are looking for a "No Whiners/No Excuses" set of sci-fi rules where you make or break your battles based on your own skills, these are still, 20+ years later, the best around.

John, would you be so kind as to tell me what the vehicles are in your pictures? Their source I mean. Thank you.

FUBAR is great for Star Wars land battles. Back in 2013, I participated in a recreation of the Battle of Hoth, the Imperial assault on Echo Base, to be specific, using FUBAR, and it was awesome!

Hi all
could anyone open the xl sections for squads or are the files missing?

On a smaller scale compatible with FFG's X-Wing, infantry models are 10mm scale so a base equals a squad, 4 bases equal a platoon:

Sentinel Landing Craft

U-Wings

Speeder Bikes

AT-ACTs

Everything is still a WIP.

Are those speeder bikes the Micro Machines ones? If so, how do they scale with the Hoth stormtroopers that you are using?

Star Wars: Legion when it comes out?

Rune wars: Legion? The Collectable Imperial-Assault expansion for X-wing? Hmmmm……