"Looking for rules that make you roll dice to move." Topic

I wish we would have a generic rules section.

Don't know where to put this under.

I'm looking for rules – Genre independent, doesn't matter which.

that require players to roll to move there units.

I don't like fixed distance moves.

The Sword and The Flame are one such set of rules. And, although the original set are all about British Colonial warfare, there are a great number of variants. Go to Sergeants Three and see what I mean.

Chain of command by two fat Lardies
Very very good platoon lvl ww2 rules

IABSM (I Ain't Been Shot, Mum) also by Too Fat Lardies.
WW2 @ Company level has dice variable movement.

Yes, Too Fat Lardies rules use this mechanic, as do "The Rules With No Name" from Foundry which I think are available free online somewhere.

"Mousetrap" is a game where your pieces' movement is dictated by dice roll. Remember the catchphrase, "Roll the dice, move your mice"? Other than that, I agree IABSM does use dice for movement and is a great rule set. Unless you like mice…

Um, forgive me for stating the obvious, but you can do that with any rules set.

Just figure out the average movement rates, and maximum ones, and then choose the appropriate dice to make that happen. Using two dice together will get you closer to the normal movement rate desired, but permit some occasional slow and fast rates too.

For example, say your rules suggest a movement rate of 6" for infantry. Just roll 2D5 dice for their movement each turn. That gives you an average of 6" of movement, a minimum of 2", and the occasional made dash of 10".

You can either use different dice for higher and lower movement rates, and/or just add or subtract a point or two, if you want to stick with one set of dice.

Like Mako11 says if it's not tournament gaming you're doin' I'd figure out what rule system you like first and then insert your random movement rule…thats what I do. Mind you the TooFatLardes sets mentioned are excellent and do this already…

This is a standard feature of many Chris Peers rule sets, such as 'In the Heart of Africa' and 'Contemptible Little Armies'.

Even warhammer does that nowdays.

The answer to any WW2 question on TMP is always "Chain of Command" and that's the case for this question as well :-)

Brian:

I m working on a set of skirmish rules that will (one day) encompass most periods and lots of genres. In it you roll dice for movement as follows:

A unit type has a base move. Say, normal human infantry is 4". On move orders, you have the choice of then rolling one or two D6. The sum of these dice p;us your base is your movement allowance for the turn. So if our human here rolls a 3 and a 5, 3+5+4=12" for that turn.

The catch is for each die rolled, there is a negative DRM to shooting. So trade speed for shooting. BUT you have to declare how many dice you roll before shooting.

And the DRM applies regardless of how far you move. Example: our human needs to get to that wall over there 10" away. He decides to roll two dice and hope he can get there. Oh no! Snake eyes. He opts instead to move just 2" to his right, behind a bush. Regardless, he will still shoot with the DRM for two movement dice.

E-mail me at mark@scalecreep.com and I'll send you a copy of the play test version.

"Hail of Fire" movement is diced.

Too Fat Lardies do rules for a number of time periods, all of them (I think, every one I have seen) feature variable movement.

Some of the Two Hour Wargames rules give a mini a fixed normal move, and dice can be rolled in order to fast move. Normal = 8in. A successful roll = 16in. and an semi successful roll = 12in.

IIRC some Piquet versions have diced for movement.

Two Hour Wargames rules have a dice roll to activate. if you roll bad to just stand there.

but Chain of command is the only one I know of that converts dice to inches for movement.

Cheesesailor beat me to it, Hail of fire is one.

I made my own D6 Movement Dice with stickers cut to cover the pips. One side a 1", two sides a 2", and three sides a 3". Add one inch for veteran troops. To double move, just roll two dice. This is for a 1/300 scale game. Make sure to declare where you're moving before rolling the dice.Then bite yer nails you dont end up short and in the open!

And yes, Mako11 is absolutely right. Its probably the easiest house rule to add to a standard game.

Wellington Rules (Napoleonoc Wars) and Santa Anna Rules (Mexican American War) both use dice for movement. For better trained troops a greater portion of their movent distance is fixed while for worse troops a greater percentage of movement is randomized. Also terrain effects are mostly "minus dice" rather than a fixed penalty.

See: link

When you say you don't like fixed rules you need to have a coherent reason. Our rules have a mix of fixed and variable length moves.

As an example very high speed (better than 20 mph peak), no sharp turns on a predefined track no dice. The distance is larger than the time bound so its where you need to stop or where you were foolish enough to do it in sight of the enemy.

Where fatigue and disorder is possible such as foot troops moving as quickly as they can, it's a fixed distance plus a dice roll. In our case 4+ 1/2 a D20 rounded up. This leads to increasing disorder as you would expect the further distance is travelled.

Where troops are in a potentially confusing and/or complex situation not well understood by the troops, egg moving into a building, it is more random, we use half D20. Our normal well controlled move is 6" for the same comparison. This represents a half turn in our rules.

The actual values you use will be dependent on what you want the model to reflect. Our fast move was fined tuned by analysis a number of test cases where we had decided what the result should be regardless of the rules. We then ensured the rules gave us the answer we wanted. Test cases would be running across a line of MG fire vs. skirmishing across An MG line. Again the relative arrival times for troops in fast need to be assessed on reality and game theory. We settled on ˝ d20 plus 4 as it gives a marginal penalty of disorder trying to move fast while ensuring generally you get there a lot quicker but they are not shooting. Fatigue rules are not necessary as excessive use of fast results in a level of disorder with is untenable except in situations where such disorder is the least worst option. In our rules the point of the fast move has to be designated at the start of the bound or when first called. The player can nominate a distance much less than the maximum . At such a point most of the units will reach this spot allowing further moves to be in a coherent formation. An example would be sprinting across a narrow gap covered by the enemy so that the casualties are minimised by minimising exposure time (with some limitations of course).

Nordic Weasel's FiveCore rules should all do that. I have the modern and the scifi rules and they have a fixed movement when outside of the enemy's sight, but variable when within. I would assume that their World War II rules would too.

Adding to those mentioned above, AK47 is an obvious contender, as are various grid based Peter Pig rules which use dice to regulate the transition of terrain.

Grand-daddy of them all is of course Fire & Fury with the infamous 'manouvre table' which combines random movementand morale. An oft copied mechanism.

Interestingly I came across a battlegroup level set of military rules from 1978 which also used random movement for company and battalion sized formations (modified by posture, terrain etc). Although the random movement table was couched in percentages, curiously they went up in increments of 17%….

Thanks all I think I have enough to work with from now on.

As was said before, you can convert any fixed-movement rules into variable movement rules. The amount of variance is determined by how much influence you attribute to the die.
E.g. if the standard move is 8", replace by 4+D6, giving you a range from 5" to 10". Or replace by 2D6, providing a range from 2" to 12", with more probability of rolling 6,7,8. Any variation is possible, as long you keep the expected value somewhat identical as before, give or take 1". You can throw in some modifiers on dice type as well. E.g. if the general is nearby throw D4, otherwise throw D6. Etc.

A clever and fun solution I once read about (but never implemented myself), is to use a bunch of wooden skewer sticks (let's say each 20cm long), and make different colored marks on each of them. but slightly different on each stick.
E.g. you might put a red mark for infantry, roughly around 8cm, and a green mark for cavalry, roughly around 16cm – but the exact positioning is different on each stick.
Them, when you want to move a unit, draw a random stick, and it immediately indicates (no measuring), how far you can move.
The idea can be expanded to firing ranges as well.

The main advantage is that you do not need numerical measurements, as all distances are determined ad-hoc by drawing sticks.

Although the random movement table was couched in percentages, curiously they went up in increments of 17%….

I guess 16.666% would have been too difficult to handle ;-)

This is starting to bleed over into design, which I find fascinating as well.

I like the stick method, I have heard of that too. Never tried it.

I also thought it would interesting to associate the + or – mods to the movement die based on overal condition of the troops, be it a squad, platoon, etc depending on how large/scale of your game.

So a squad that has low moral might roll 1d6-3 compared to a squad that has excellent moral roll 1d6+4, etc.
any total resulting in a negative would have be considered 'pinned' etc or all prone, or something.

I play all games solo, so the more control I can take away from the 'units' the more exciting the game becomes when play solitaire.

In addition the accounts I read about real war how they allways refer to it as complete chaos in the thick of a big fight, I think a somewhat of a controled chaos element add that to the sim/game.

If you wish, send me your postal delivery address to sigurd@eclipse.net, and I will send you my game "Oh God! Anything but a six."

The movement rules use dice to move. There are two movement methods.

The first is, that each unit has an ability score to move. You must roll less than or equal to this to move the unit. You can use officer ability points to raise this score up to 5, but you can never raise it higher than this, a six will always fail.

The distance you can move depends on if you have the initiative or not. If you DO NOT have initiative, you can only move two measures (a measure is the frontage of your line infantry units in normal battlefield formation). If you HAVE the initiative you can move as far as your heart desires but you must stop if you come within one measure of an enemy unit or enter rough or very rough terrain.

The second movement method is the "Maneuver." In this you can specify an officer or group of officers within one measure of each other as a "maneuver group," You can attach to this maneuver group any number of units so long as they are within one measure of the "maneuver group." Same method the total of the officer ability in the group is the ability and it cannot be greater than five. If you roll less than or equal to that all units attached to the group and the group itself can move the same distance if you have initiative or if you do not (two measures, or unlimited, having to stop when you come within 1 measure of an enemy unit or entering rough terrain.

Bag the Hun from Too Fat Lardies does this….movement is Aircraft Speed plus a random D4 roll, though higher skill pilots and certain other conditions alter this.

Main effect is that tailing someone can end up with overshoots – tailing a better pilot will often end up that way unless you circle round.