"Captains & Kings rules now available" Topic

We the Graybeard Gamers Group are happy the announce our AWI rules "Captains and Kings is now available. Look for and like us on Facebook to join our community. The rules are $30 USD and &3 for shipping. Feedback encouraged and we answer all questions through our Facebook community. Works for all scales.

Coming soon will be our 7YW supplement.

link

Looked around on the facebook page. Do you have a description of the rules somewhere? I like to get rules, but $33 USD for a totally unknown set of rules is not something I am going to spring for.

Yeah, I'm in the market for a SYW set of rules – have a dozen sets but none of them really grab me – but I need some description and design objectives and stuff for a set of rules from an unknown source.

Yes I will put a description up later today

Sadly the pictures were stripped from the blurb:

What the world needs is another set of wargame rules. Specifically, a set of rules that covers an area so finely combed over that hardly a button color, a battlefield dimension, or the quality of salt pork has been left untouched by the minds of historical gamers. And yet, and yet, here is something new: Captains and Kings. This is a set of rules designed with tactics in mind. Unlike the "I go – you go" style of wargaming, Captains and Kings requires constant interaction from both sides. Wargamers will enjoy how every move requires a chess-like anticipation of the next possible move. Learning and playing the rule system is easy. Mastering the tactical variables, however, will lend hours of enjoyment that will keep even to the most hardened grognard wanting to play again.

The key to Captains and Kings is a combination of the asymmetrical dicing matrix and the dynamic interaction between opposing sides. Combinations of tactical forethought, situational acuity, and nerve are required at all times in order to utilize the various forces at your command. As interplay is central, one cannot simply think to move forward and overwhelm through numbers or luck of the turn order; like in real life, your opponent will have options available to thwart your plans in your turn as well as his own. Players draw cards at the beginning of every turn that determines the turn order, the number of troops activated and in some cases the twists and turns of the fortunes of war. Players move armies by commands rather than individual units, thus allowing more period flavor. Historical tactics are rewarded while ahistorical formations, though permissible, often provide a painful reminder that one is still in the tactical doctrine of the age of reason.

Who are the authors? We are the Graybeard Gamer's Group (G3); a collection of prior military servicemen, living history reenactors, lifelong wargamers, and all around toy soldier enthusiast. We don't take ourselves seriously, but we do take having fun as our main goal for wargaming. We play, learn, and develop rules every week. It is our collective therapy, and the results are what you see before you: Captains and Kings. We have searched our entire lives for a game system that would feel right for the period being played, and most game systems reach this to a point. We always, however, always found an exploitable flaw in the mechanics, which turned the game into one of exploiting the flaws rather than working tactics of the period. We think we have developed a system that will, in large measure, neutralize such gamesmanship. However, we have a standing rule to cover such nonsense: he who plays in order to thump his chest at the expense of others must reroll all successful morale tests, as his troops think him a bore!

We have also made a conscious decision not to fill this set of rules with fancy fluff about weapons and personalities you already know. We do include some reference material to the personalities and unique circumstances—especially in the scenarios—but we find that historical gamers like to read and research this type of material on their own and not necessarily pay for the truncated version in a margin. In other words, we don't want to add fluff that increases the cost just to be over the top bling. We wanted to, and I think we have, presented a concise set of playable rules that is well illustrated with a myriad of examples to aid understanding.

Figures on bases represent troops (Right). All examples in this rules set are 54mm figures, however we've developed ways to sabot a base under your current basing scheme to accommodate any figure size.

State of Troops. The Key to Captains and Kings
We firmly believe that the number of casualties can only be successfully represented in C&K by impact directly and indirectly on the overall morale of the unit. History is full of examples of both extreme bravery and unfathomable timidity by units. The best way to explain this is that the reality of the battlefield is one of extreme noise—and in the days of black powder, smoke—and confusion, and such distractions often account for men not knowing their own level of peril outside of their "feeling" of relative safety. Thus men may stand and fight not knowing they are beaten; or men (often with militia) may take fright at the thought of being beaten and thus lose all nerve. The central combat resolution dice roll premises is, therefore, not the number of shot fired that successfully hit enemy soldiers; it is the perception by one unit over the other that they are being "beaten"

Well, its a start, but its more an advertisement than a description. I am interested, but do you have any examples of game play posted on blogs, youtube, etc?
AWI has been an interest of mine almost since I started wargaming, but I have never found a set of rules that worked for me. Do I understand from your last paragraph that there is no figure removal?

I will work on a how to vid if you'd like, though we won't be playing it again this month.

In short, players draw cards, then play a card to determine the initiative order and number of activations. Players activate commands to move/shoot/charge. The non initiative player can return fire and combat as necessary. Players alternate command activations until both cards are used up. Casualties via dice is asymmetric in progression. Hits cause units to tire which effects their ability and willingness, then more hits can cause units to waver and rout . Much as one would suspect in a war game, but the progression is not straight forward. It is easy to tire units but not necessarily so easy to rout them. Period tactics are rewarded, and napoleonic tactics like column are punished through modifiers to dice rolls. As units rout and are removed, commands then begin to test. Once a command fails all units within the command are removed.

Maneuver is very restricted, so it is difficult for regiments to react quickly to flank threats.

We are still working on 7YW cavalry rules in order to bring a supplement that will support large bodies mounted troops. The current cavalry rules work for the small units in AWI, but they are not optimal otherwise.

What constitutes a command? You said you move commands rather than individual units. I am trying to figure out what you mean here. Is a command for example a brigade of x number of regiments? If you move as a command, do you model individual regiments at all?

Not trying to give you a hard time. I really want a good set of AWI rules. I like what I am hearing in terms of mechanisms, but I don't understand the scale of the game. By that I am not meaning figure scale. I want to know the organizational scale of the game.

In addition to Bill's questions above, are the game cards playing cards, or ones specific to the rules?

What basing convention(s) are used for the game's fundamental maneuver elements (replicating regiments/brigades/wings)?

EDIT: found the following graphic on the Facebook page:

A command is as it would have been historically. Say Lafayette is the commander and the troops under him would be the regiments he commands.

Another example from one of our scenarios: at Hubbarton, Riedesel commanded the reserves. We interpret that as a unit of 2 bases of Bretmann's grenadiers, a unit of three bases being Riedesel's hessians, and a skirmish unit of two bases being Brunswick Jaegers.

We like for units to be historical units, so the bases that constitute the units are factored from the relative number in the unit as reported and the historical impact they had in a battle. Most grenadier units are smaller converged units, most lights are represented as light infantry so two bases, and most line are three bases. Sometimes we consolidate where either two or more similar smaller units (often converged or states troops) worked together, or where the historical evidence suggest a number of small units of unknown size were present in a sector but history does reflect an adequate role for any individually (often militia).

We try to keep things at the regiment, therefore, where possible, and create regiments for game play from lesser units converged

If factoring "effectives" per base, would this be done on a flexible scale (and/or battle by battle) – sometimes equaling [around] 100 effectives per base, and sometimes amounting to more troops per base?

The basing we recommend in the rules are suggestions. We like large bases, so we suggest using sabots under alternative basing scheme. However, any scheme will work as long as both sides are relative in terms of what constitutes a regiment.

The cards are part of the game. Right now you have to cut them yourself as they come in sheets. We are working to correct that without driving up the price

A full regiment is three bases. Converged or depleted is two bases. Skirmishes have two skirmish bases but different rules, so don't compare directly.

Forgot to add, when a command is activated, the units within that command all have the opportunity to move/shoot/charge/fight. The command doesn't move as a giant block like in DBX.

If you are doing historical battles, what is the ground scale you use for transferring the map to the table?

The size of units is relative to the number of men and their effectiveness in that battle.

In our Cowpens scenario, the Carolina militias are grouped into a single regiment (x3 bases) of militia to reflect their effectiveness and relative number compared to the British line troops they faced. The same number of militia might have been better reflected as depleted at another battle, say Long Island.

Ground scale is relative to the battle. Typically we set the lines 24" or 36" apart as the start point depending on if the battle had more or less maneuvers. Most are set at 24" since it was more common to set piece.

We use the effective ranges of weapons in helping to set ground scale as well.

How many scenarios are included with the rule book – as getting a feel for the adjustability of the "scaling" might be something aided by Ob's for multiple-sized battles. (?)

Do we order these through the Facebook page, or do you have a store on the web?

There are three learning scenarios, Cowpens, Camden, and Hubbarton. We have three other scenarios I'll put up on the FB page when the are formatted where it will take

Bill, I found the linking text under the EVENTS header on their Facebook page (via PayPal).

Thanks TT ;), have it ordered – btw, reminds me somewhat of "Tattered Flags" Gettysburg: The Wheatfield, by Victory Points Games, a hybrid boardgame I've always admired (that started out originally as a miniatures ruleset).

There is a link on the FB page that is listed as an event. Click that link and it will take you to paypal.

Hope you like it. Everyone seems to enjoy playing it at conventions.

I ordered it. We shall see…. :)

Captains & Kings sound like it might serve well as the tactical rules for playing scenarios generated by a campaign game system – I'm wanting to use the upcoming board game from Worthington Publishing, called New York 1776 for this purpose:

link

If interested, Worthington is still allowing pre-orders for NY 1776 priced at the successful KickStarter level that's recently ended, and including all the stretch goals reached in the board game's KS campaign.

I don't see why not. An interesting idea to be sure

All orders will be mailed tomorrow. Thanks!

Thank you TT.

How adaptable would the rule system be to the ACW period?

We have used it for ACW. Biggest problem is that with extra range, units tend to bog down. House rules can be used to fix this. Another concern is that post napoleonic era, maneuver in mass is the rule. This rules set is design to force players to use linear tactics. Again removing some penalties and restrictions could make it work. We have ACW in our hopper, it just isn't on the docket for this year. We are always open to suggestions through our FB page.