Saturday from 1:00pm to 6:00pm and Sunday from 11:00am to 5:00pm
avalon.gamecon.us/reg/Events.asp
The scenario will be a meeting engagement between 8-12 Russian and German tanks in mid-1944. We can have up to three players per side and each player will have four vehicles. There is no infantry involved. The battle will start at a range of about 2000 meters. If all of your vehicles get blown away there will be reinforcements for you. The main idea is to have fun and make it an enjoyable weekend. I'll be using the 1/144 scale Tank Museum miniatures with some forests and hills to break up the terrain and allow maneuver to make flank attacks. Sorry, not much eye candy to see this time. If you have cool terrain we can use you are welcome to bring it.
The game revolves around individual vehicles and their crew detecting, tracking and engaging the enemy using a "Time & Motion" mechanic that is governed by the weapon platform performance and crew expertise. The crew is modeled as a whole, not role playing for each member. Better crews sense the enemy, track and fire more quickly than poor crews enabling them to perform more actions in the same amount of time.
Scale will be 1" = 25 meters. Each turn has 5 phases with a turn equal to about 5 seconds. Using the small time increments makes opportunity fire and interaction workable without using structured turn sequence, interrupts, exceptions or other artificial game mechanics. It's been played at about a half dozen conventions and players come up to speed after 5-6 turns with a brief 10 minute introduction. The game uses historical data (accurate depending on sources of course) for turret rotation, movement and rate of fire, no abstractions.
The terminology, nomenclature and mechanics of the game are mostly taken from real tank manuals and training materials. It's not based on any previous game designs. Many of the concepts are new to players but they are real life concepts, not game mechanic abstractions.
The gunnery system uses a formula that includes initial range estimation error (better crews estimate better and there are range finders), bracketing the target, muzzle velocity, maximum ordinate and error budget factors that determine the accuracy based on the average dispersion from the aim point measured in mils at the target range. It is given in 100 meter increments. These have been compared to historical data and compare pretty favorably.
However, this is all transparent to the player with only a few modifiers or exceptions. In addition to giving you an idea of the % chance to hit a 2 meter by 2 meter target you can also visualize the expected results of the shot. When it is time to shoot the player puts a clear transparency with gun sight cross hairs (using historical German and Russian gun sight reticles) over the desired aim point on a scaled image of the target vehicle in the aspect it presents on the playing surface (therefore no modifiers needed for hull down, target size and aspect).
One die roll randomizes the mean point of impact distance value and one determines the vector/direction. If the result of the rounds dispersion from the aim point is not over the scaled image of the target it is a miss. If the vehicle is hull down and the round hits the hull down obstruction it is a miss too. This will give an exact hit location based on a scaled image of the target, no additional dies rolls needed. If you are close enough you can target and expect to hit weak areas like hull mg locations and turret rings. Of course they can also be hit randomly too. So can tank commanders that have their head sticking out.
The game is not just an exercise in die rolling. The player has a choice of how to engage the target and amount of aim time to fire. However, there is a trade off. Longer aim time allows better accuracy but also more time for the enemy to get the shot off at you. This gives a good fog of war and randomness as the enemy does not know exactly when you'll get your shot off or start/stop moving. When tracking and aim time has been satisfied you can elect to hold your fire and "Track" the target waiting for it to stop, present its flank or ambush it and then fire without a delay when it is in a more vulnerable position.
Using the "Time and Motion" mechanic there is no need for random activation and command interrupts. Any action like movement, turret rotation or gun fire can be detected by the enemy and he can attempt to react to it by moving or engaging. However, detecting and reacting to a threat on your flanks when you are buttoned up may take a number of game phases which is unknown to the enemy. This gives unexpected and somewhat random results that most players are looking for in a game. Players need to pay attention throughout the game since there is no waiting around for your turn or to be randomly activated. You snooze – you lose. Too bad.
Determining the armor thickness based on the targets aspect, vertical and horizontal angle (compound angle) is normally not real playable in a miniature or board game as there are so many variables. At Conquest Avalon I'll be trying out a free app called "Armor Inspector". It is a program for a cell phone, iPad or laptop that will accurately give compound armor values for any location on a tank and the turret direction aspect in relation to the hull in a 360 degree aspect. It will also show behind armor systems and crews that will be damaged by a penetration. It figures compound angles so shows shots that ricochet, one of the features I really like. Play testing has shown that the compound armor values do not matter for the majority of the shots but when they do it is significant (and sometimes entertaining with unexpected results) so I think is worthwhile using. Video Link:
YouTube link
I know, it doesn't look like a stock T-34 but it's the best video in English. There are better videos but they are in Russian and you can search them out for yourself. It works fine on my system.
Treadheads is a detailed and WIP game and players will have questions. We'll be using the free Aurasma Augmented Reality app that will enable a player to point his cell phone or iPad at an image that is linked to a particular part of the rules on the Aurasma server. The image will "trigger" a 20-40 second video (of me of course, but just my voice) explaining that part of the rules and give an example. This will help players come up to speed more quickly and spectators can use it too. I'll have the trigger images and app download instructions and Quick Start rules posted by Friday. Link: aurasma.com
We'll also have some sound effects on the table using miniature Bluetooth speakers.
Thanks, I hope to see you there.
Wolfhag
solve the rotation problem with magnetic flight stands?
