And Now For Something Completely Different

I've probably used this title more times than Monty Python, but it fits. I flit around from project to project and idea to idea like a crazed butterfly. Anyway, here is my latest "project."

The Inspiration

Well, it is summer in Florida. Which means it is HOT! Too hot for LARPing. So I'm looking for something to fill the void. I'm thinking I can find a game that my LARP buddy and I can play in lieu of sparring.

Idea # 1

My friend is a big fan of the Polish Winged Hussars and I'm an Austrophile. It would be cool to get Polish and Imperial armies and pit them against each other.

Even though these two powers did not fight each other when the Winged Hussars were at their peak, we could create an imagi-nation type of war.

Idea # 2

But if we're going the imagi-nation route, why not go whole hog into fantasy? Actually, something like Warhammer Fantasy could be a lot of fun. Empire vs. Kislev would seem appropriate.

The Set Up

Neither of us played Warhammer in the past, and I really have no interest in getting sucked into it. But perhaps I could find some rules that would allow us to create Warhammer-like armies.

My idea is for a game that will fit on my coffee table. A 2' x 2' board would be perfect. I plan to draw a grid on the board so we don't have to fiddle with rulers.

I don't plan to use miniatures - too much prep work. I'll probably make counters. To keep things simple, I would like to have a single counter per unit. I'll create markers to indicate casualties.

Rules?

Not Warhammer. I took a quick look at Warmaster because it uses bases, but it seems too fiddly.

What about my MicroBattle rules? Well, I designed them for fast play solo battles. For face-to-face, they may be TOO fast play. What else?

My next thought was...

HOTT has a number of traits I like:

• Each base is a unit. 
• Pretty simple and quick game. 
• Flexible in terms of developing armies.

I've dabbled with HOTT before, using a PDF version. But I finally ordered a hard copy.

I also thought about the Portable Wargame. For face-to-face, however, we may enjoy rolling more than 1 die per combat. This thought leads me to Command & Colors.

 I could pick up Battlelore.

But I owned 1st edition and found it a bit fiddly. Furthermore, the board is bigger than 2' square. 

However, I remember back in the day before Battlelore that there were some fantasy variants of Battle Cry. I even found one.

This gives me a good start on creating my own variant. I can also use ideas from the Portable Wargame. I started jotting down rules ideas.

An Experiment

I decided to experiment with some ideas. Rather than pull out a board, I decided to go electronic.

I picked up a pack of paper armies from Wargame Vault. Human vs. Undead.

Here they are in action on an Excel battlefield. Humans are on top and undead on the bottom (except the cavalry is human)

I'm using shields as casualty markers. I made some shields as markers for Battles of Medieval Britain and liked how they look. I think they make sense as casualty markers - routing troops drop their shields as they flee.

Here is the end of my mini-battle. The human cavalry cause 3 hits in one round, wiping out the undead warriors.

A promising test.

Some Design Ideas

Just a few thoughts after my experiment.

Activation

Commands & Colors uses specialized cards to determine activation of units. I don't really want to mess around with cards, however, so I'm considering different activation systems.

My first thought was to use pips, like DBA and HOTT. It's still a possibility.

For this experiment, however, I tried something based on Song of Blades and Heroes. I divided the armies into commands. I then rolled activation per command, using the SoB&H method. It seemed to work. I'll have to play around some more with it.

Combat

Combat comes straight from Command & Colors. I need to play around with the number of hits and the number of combat dice for the units.

One thing I missed, though, is saving rolls. MicroBattle uses saving rolls to negate casualties and I kind of like them. I'm thinking of adding saving rolls. If I do, I'll have to alter the to-hit targets and possibly the number of hits a unit can take.

The Future

We'll see how far I get with this project. Stay tuned!