"Anyone seen the new Sharp Practice yet?" Topic

Keen to know what people think.

I got my PDF this morning – not read through in detail but it look a really great set of rules.

There is lots of period flavour and great distinctions between capabilities of units/armies.

The core rules (firing, movement) are very intuitive and the command and control is great – gives many alternatives and decision points.

I also like that you can add as much or as little characterisation to leaders as you like (the more the merrier for me!) so you can either play a straight game or almost "RPG lite".

The force builder system and scenarios are a great addition over SP1 and loads of free additional pdf army lists coming. Plus pint sized campaigns!

IMO another cracking set of rules from TFL which will give a fast, exciting game which will keep all players engaged all the time.

In my mailbox but I haven't had the chance to read it yet. Hopefully tonight.

Yes. I am multiplexing between TMP and reading the new rules as I write this.

It looks like a great evolution that adds some key Chain of Command force selection and deployment concepts to make it easier just to set up and play a game.

Rick

Haven't bought my copy yet but they ditched the event card deck, which I think is good. And adding the CoS deployment/jump off point is great.

Just skimmed through it today. Fantastic product. But no picture of Richard Fondler??? Come on Rich!!

Ummm it does have a card/deck (or casino chips) draw system.

Just got my PDF copy.
Looks fantastic. Lots of explanations of how everything works.
Army lists for 5 different period starter armies plus troop unit rosters listing what they are allowed to do.
Optional card or poker chip draw system.

Wow :)

But not two card decks like the first edition.

And watch the YouTube videos.

Read it. Now of course painting. And later offering something for those who do not want painting or can't wait…

The rules are brilliant, simple enough with the expected from him ( them) depth and authencity / tactics associated to 2flardies.
Now pretty much having the speed and potential inbred variety of M&Tom (which one can use mixed in for added scenarios).

This from a staunch big battles megalomaniac who is now compelled to have games with a few scores ( well one cannot change that much) figs too.

What period lists are included? Indian mutiny?
Mike D

Peninsula Napoleonic (Can't have Sharp without Sharpe!)
ACW
AWI
French Indian War
Indian Mutiny

But remember loads of lists already written which will be freely available very soon.

Just took a quick look at my pdf, looking forward to trying them out. Look like I will be using them for my 40mm F&I War.

He explains how characteristics are done. You can easily do your own. As it was before, it is a tool.
I for ex will have all lights be able to skirmish and not field bits of units but even if, say 1 for 2 scale, companies etc.
Nappies and AwI.
Just made my own cards too.

Got mine but cannot get the PDF to print….GGGrrrrr

Someone soon might do a nice QRS for it. Did a provisionnal one with cut and paste, as PDf writer is MIA as of now and I am too lazy to type everything.

I watched the videos, and my main question was unanswered. I saw the pictures of the forces in the first video, and they had figures mounted 4 to a base and also single mounted figures. Do the shock points apply to one base, or to groups of bases? How do you handle kills on multi-based figures? Does the firing happen by figure, or by stand? Really interested in these, but the videos told how the firing worked, but not how the outcome worked.

Multi based figures are just a way to move several figs in one gesture; nothing to do with the game.

the unit is the group. 6-12 figs initially. It shrinks with casualties and takes shock points.

you fire by group, broadly speaking each fig one die, and more dice per group for a number of reasons, leaders, volleys etc.
It gives hits, each transformed with D6 in nothing, shock or kills, applied to the target group or formation of several groups (then spread among the groups).
ok?

That helps, thank! Sounds like i probably will buy it.

I have not found were they explain how to purchase leaders if you don't use one of the pre-designed force lists.

Richard had to explain it in the Too Fat Lardies Yahoo Group. Basically leaders cost 3,6, or 9 points for level 1,2 or 3 leaders.

There is no omission on Leaders at all. Leaders are in the Generic Support List which all forces use. They cost a number of points, so you can have lots of Leaders, but that will leave you with less points for troops.

The whole point is that the system allows you to choose how many Leaders you want, but you need to decide the best balance.

Rich

Rich,

I may be wrong (as I often am) but I can find nothing in the rules that say that.

I do like the rules and will be using them once I update my armies to 25/28mm. Due to eyesight issues anything under 20mm just looks like a colored blob on the tabletop.

Generic options are those available to ALL armies, hence leaders are placed there. Each base army has a set of leaders as per the lists. If you need more buy them from the Generic.

Yeah, seems quite straightforward – you set your points limit with your opponent (generally by picking a core force) then agreeing a number of support points on top of that to give you the size of game you want – the player with the smaller points core force makes up the balance with extra support points. Then spend those points on troops from your list, and/or leaders and other items from the general list – easy!

tberry, the cost for leaders is in the generic support list on page 80.

I believe, based on the support list on p. 80, that it works out to 3 points per status level. So a status level I costs 3 points, a status level II costs 6 points, and a status level III costs 9 points.

How is activation done?

" How is activation done? "

Each leader is activated by card or chip drawn.
The leaders then activate units.

The rules are excellent. We played a game at our club the first weekend they came out and now everyone wants to play them! A definite improvement over SP1 bringing in a lot if the best ideas from other TFL sets like Chain of Command.

I am still trying to figure out the point costs to create lists, however. The implication of the generic support list (and you're right it's never explicitly stated) is that leaders are 3pts per status level.

What I can't figure out--and what I really need to figure out to create lists of my own--is how various unit characteristics affect the cost. For instance if I want to add the "aggressive" characteristic to a base unit of regulars how much does that cost? I *think* it's one point per characteristic but I am not really sure. So if a base unit of regulars is 6 points it would be 7 points to upgrade to aggressive regulars. If anyone can confirm or clarify it would be most appreciated as I can't find anything about it in the rules other than trying to reverse engineer the given lists.

It's not an implication.
It says on page 79 that each level of support costs 1 point.
So something from list 3 costs 3 points. Which includes upgrading a leader 1 status level.

Sounds like we need a SP2 equivalent of the COCulator.

Ask and you shall receive. The Sharpulator is here.
toofatlardies.co.uk/blog/?p=5789

I just saw this on the TFL blog and was going to post it ,but you were far ahead of me, Thomas! Thanks for putting this up.

I got my hard copy in the mail yesterday along with the tokens, chips and cards.