Who asked this joker | 14 Oct 2014 9:59 a.m. PST |
link Call it an experiment in simplicity. |
Coyotepunc and Hatshepsuut | 14 Oct 2014 10:04 a.m. PST |
Looks good to me :-) When Volley & Bayonet was released, I remember reading the combat mechanics and thinking "I have seen this 'roll a 6' mechanic before." After some research, I found that the rules in question were "Space Hulk" (still in it's 1st edition!" I think simplicity of design is a lofty goal, especially if it can be achieved while maintaining "realism." DBA is fairly simple, but can be gamed pretty easily. |
Who asked this joker | 14 Oct 2014 10:21 a.m. PST |
I think simplicity of design is a lofty goal, especially if it can be achieved while maintaining "realism." DBA is fairly simple, but can be gamed pretty easily. In this respect I find it is all about the granularity. The more granularity you have, the easier the game can be…well…"gamed". Barker has gone out of his way this time to try and close up a lot of the loopholes in DBA. I have not played 3.0 enough to know if it is gameable or not. VnB was my initial inspiration BTW. |
Frederick | 14 Oct 2014 10:43 a.m. PST |
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kallman | 14 Oct 2014 10:55 a.m. PST |
As I get older I want simpler war game mechanics. My recent experience with Lion Rampant brought that home. It has been one of the most fun games I have played in a long while. Which is not to say I have not enjoyed a lot of games lately that use varing degrees of complexity, but being able to have everyone grasp the rules in less than a couple of turns and have a great time while doing so states a lot I think. John I like what you have shown on your blog and it is worth continued playtesting. As to things being gamed, that is always going to be issue with just about any rule set and the more complex the easier it is to game a set of rules because there will be that person that learns the rules so they can bend them. For me less is more. I want to spend time pushing figures around the table, rolling dice and not looking up charts all the time. |
Who asked this joker | 14 Oct 2014 11:33 a.m. PST |
I understand that they don't get the bonus for the full second rank, but each side started with four, each side lost one, leaving 3 vs 3. So why is Rome rolling 3 while Greece is only rolling two? Romans used the gladius which had them at a slight disadvantage during the initial contact. However, once they got in close they became killing machines. Hence the +1D6 for the second and subsequent round of the same combat. So if they had lost contact with the phalanx, they would have to close again. Hope that made sense. |
Who asked this joker | 14 Oct 2014 11:34 a.m. PST |
John I like what you have shown on your blog and it is worth continued playtesting. Thanks! That is the plan. I hope to have something that will fit on about 4 pages total (2 pages front and back). |
Texas Jack | 14 Oct 2014 11:36 a.m. PST |
These look good John, if I am ever able to realize my ancients project I will give them a try. |
elsyrsyn | 14 Oct 2014 12:44 p.m. PST |
Looks very interesting! I look forward to hearing more details! Doug |
Bashytubits | 14 Oct 2014 1:03 p.m. PST |
I share your sentiments John, when I was younger I used to love convoluted complicated rules. As I have gotten older I now realize that you can simulate all these aspects more simply and quickly. A good simple ruleset can simulate many things and a quick setup and play time enable many more turns to be played and keep people interested and involved. You don't want the other side falling asleep while you conduct your turn. I am a big fan of simple nuanced rules. |
Kmfisher | 14 Oct 2014 1:08 p.m. PST |
These sound very promising. I'm looking forward to seeing how you fill them out. |
Dave Crowell | 14 Oct 2014 1:42 p.m. PST |
Simple rules stick with me too. Ogre/GEV is pretty simple but still a favourite after all these years. DBA is still pretty much the same game mechanically, the rules writing has been tightened up to close loopholes. I don't have the mental energy for the Chart Fest rules of my youth. Back in the days when more modifiers, tables, charts, and cross referenced rules meant more "realistic" instead of more complicated. I especially favour simple rules when all the complicated modifiers end up canceling eachother out. |
vtsaogames | 14 Oct 2014 2:43 p.m. PST |
John, I look forward to seeing your rules. |
Henry Martini | 14 Oct 2014 3:29 p.m. PST |
Simple can work well, depending on the subject matter of your game. For instance, if you've only got a few types of combatants to consider, as with a game that's targeted at one small segment of the usual decades or centuries-spanning 'periods' we're handed. I designed a game that represents the larger skirmishes that occurred on the frontiers of colonial Australia. Because it only had to allow for Aboriginal warriors, settlers, mounted police, and soldiers, I was able to streamline the mechanics, but at the same time work in some unique and innovative subject-specific features that, while finely tuning the game to the target subject, rendered it unusable even for closely related historical events, such as bushranger versus police gunfights. |
Who asked this joker | 14 Oct 2014 4:38 p.m. PST |
@Henry Martini I think the level of play and scope of the game have a lot to do with it as well. At the level I am designing, you are a general of the entire army. You don't care about Roman line relief or that your phalanx is in double deep formation. That's for your subordinates to decide. You care about getting your formations to the right place at the right time. Example: Legionares would be all classified as veteran. Not all Legionares even in the same army would really be all veterans. However, because they do line relief, they would be more stubborn on a retreat so it would be less likely that they would route (roll a high number if they lost a melee). At this command level and level of abstraction, it is possible to have a game where a unit represents companions in one era and Feudal Knights in another era. If they met on the battlefield using my rules, of course, the results would not be all that believable. I would think the knights would fair much better. It is the same idea as DBA. Of course, a simple set such as this can readily be modified to add more chrome if one desires. |
TKindred | 14 Oct 2014 7:43 p.m. PST |
These days, I much prefer the "Beer & Pretzels" games to "Think & Sweat" types. I've also got a simple set of rules I call "Vikings!" only because I had to call them something. They're a skirmish-level game that plays well with multiple players, who each control 3 minis. They can also be played easily by 2 players, with groups of 3 minis each, but the more players the more "fun", as it were. I'm hoping to have it available for download when I can gin up the bucks to buy a website. It's fast, easy to learn and a lot of fun, though I may be biased in that regard. best of all, you can use any scale of mini (I originally wrote it for the 54mm Condi platic minis) as long as they are single-based. |
olicana | 15 Oct 2014 3:49 a.m. PST |
Although I applaud your efforts, you might be coming at this from the wrong direction. Warfare, especially as a game, is not about combat. It's about everything else. The everything else is what makes a rule set work and popular. Most gamers, I think, want rules that offer the challenges of command and control. Combat is usually more easily dealt with because it is a 'math and chance' question. Please, treat this as constructive, I'm not trying to put you down. I look forward to hearing how you deal with everything else. Simple is generally best and the most difficult to do. Best Regards, James |
Who asked this joker | 15 Oct 2014 5:27 a.m. PST |
Most gamers, I think, want rules that offer the challenges of command and control. Hi james, No offense taken. I always want to hear what others think. Command and control is a main bug bear of mine. Most games confuse command and control with friction generators, mixing the two concepts interchangeably. Command and control is a subset of friction. There are many sources of friction and only 1 source of command and control. Also, I've found that most command and control/friction systems to be way too restrictive, especially when it comes to movement far from the enemy line. Imagine your elite companions sitting on their thumbs in reserve simply because they failed a command roll at the critical moment. Stuff like that. I prefer command pips because they look something like orders. I know others don't like them at all. What is good about them is that they are in short supply so you end up having to move things in rigid groups to get your bodies of troops into the fight or you have to fight piecemeal. Like I said though, some folks don't like them. I'd probably make that an optional/advanced rule. I think the most important thing about a game is that a player is rewarded for making decision befitting an Ancient or medieval general. Sound military tactics of the time and not cheesey gambits. Thanks, John |
MajorB | 15 Oct 2014 6:44 a.m. PST |
when I can gin up the bucks to buy a website. You don't need to spend money. Plenty of ways to find free space to upload stuff like rules. |
Marcus Brutus | 15 Oct 2014 9:21 a.m. PST |
I disagree with what I see as John's basic point on his blog, the game design is getting more complex (he doesn't say it quite this way but that seems to me to be his point.) I actually see the opposite at work in the hobby. I see simpler mechanics and more elegant systems coming out as the hobby ages. Long gone are complex games like Empire which take many, many hours and sometimes multiple days to play. Long gone are the complex rules with a million modifiers that were prevalent in the 1980s. |
Who asked this joker | 15 Oct 2014 10:04 a.m. PST |
Long gone are complex games like Empire which take many, many hours and sometimes multiple days to play. Long gone are the complex rules with a million modifiers that were prevalent in the 1980s. Empire hit the height of the last complexity wave. It was also a sign of the times of what folks were looking for in a wargame. Take an example of today's "simple" game. Flames of war has simple and elegant mechanics. Yet, it takes something like 275 pages to explain. I've gotta tell you, that's not my idea of simple. Just because you string together several dozen simple game mechanics does not make the game simple. We are heading up to the top of the wave again. We may not be at the top but we are getting closer. |
olicana | 15 Oct 2014 11:13 a.m. PST |
Hi John, It's always difficult to be constructive on forums without getting someone's hackles up. I suppose it is because virtually no one knows each other in a face to face way so it's hard to judge where people are coming from. Personally I love pips. I'm a Piquet player. I always remember my Clauswitz when friction is mentioned. It certainly exists when it comes to getting things done on the battlefield – everything takes longer to do when people are scared. |
Who asked this joker | 15 Oct 2014 12:00 p.m. PST |
everything takes longer to do when people are scared. Much truth int that. Normally people don't want to die! Day of Battle 2 used a telescoping movement rate. At the longest range band, units moved their full movement. At the medium range band they moved 2/3s movement and at the shortest range band it was just 1/3. Essentially as a unit got closer to the enemy it was assumed they were feeling less comfortable with the proximity of their foes. It was a pretty simple way of modeling what you speak. |
aapch45 | 15 Oct 2014 9:55 p.m. PST |
This seems simple, barebones… nothing fancy. I like it I'm in college, so fast games on a small table are all I can really pull off at this point. Thanks Austin |
Who asked this joker | 16 Oct 2014 5:46 a.m. PST |
I'm in college, so fast games on a small table are all I can really pull off at this point. Welcome to adulthood. It goes downhill from here. I have most of the rules written. Working on chariots now. I have elephants and artillery worked out and ready to playtest. |