Messages for 18 January 2001

Subject	[dq] DQ: GM Tools / Armies
From	RMansfield@aj.co.nz
Date	Thu, 18 Jan 2001 15:29:59 +1300
<br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">An idea I came up with for using lots of army plebs vs 'adventurer' fighters, that I thought was worth sharing.</font> <br> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">Close Formation Fighting</font> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">Description: For sword and shield by a group of fighters trained to work in unison.  Designed to be used by armies where low level fighters train together for months and have identical equipment and ranks.</font> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">1) Allows shield defence bonus to apply to figures immediately flanking bearer (so a figure may benefit from the shield defence of up three people).</font> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">2) Allows reserve fighter to pull back a  stunned or injured  figure and replace them in the front row.</font> <br> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">Specifics:</font> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">Fighters must keep in a line and shuffle to remain in adjacent hexes.  The whole line can shuffle sideways a hex without specific orders etc. They all have exactly the same initiative, which is the lowest initiative in the group -1. </font> <br> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">Each hex contains 2 figures, one front line fighter and their reserve ().   </font> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">Front Line: The front line figure's defence benefits from the close formation and from their shield mates.  Specifically a figure's defence includes the shield defence bonus from their own shield and the shield of the front line fighters in the adjacent flanking hexes in the formation (I use the shield bonus for ease of calculation).</font> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">Reserves: The reserve takes no offensive actions but manoeuvres to keep the line tight and to replace incapacitated front line fighters.  They can temporarily move into a hole in the line until the line next shuffles, and when the line shuffles they can drop back even if technically engaged (or the fighter shuffling into the hex can move back into the reserve position). </font> <br><font size=3 face="sans-serif">They can pull a stunned or injured front line fighter back a pace and replace them.  This later requires no action from the front line fighter but it takes a pulse.  </font> <br> <br><font size=2 face="sans-serif"> For very small entities (eg. goblins) I was using 3 figures per hex, 2 front line and one reserve.</font> <br> <br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">In the interests of more fun and mayhem for GM's, Rosemary</font>

Subject	Re: [dq] DQ: GM Tools / Armies
From	"Dworkin"
Date	Thu, 18 Jan 2001 18:47:46 +1300
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD> <META content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" http-equiv=Content-Type> <META content="MSHTML 5.00.2314.1000" name=GENERATOR> <STYLE></STYLE> </HEAD> <BODY bgColor=#ffffff> <DIV> </DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px"> <DIV><FONT size=2>Rosemary said</FONT></DIV> <DIV><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>An idea I came up with for using lots of army plebs vs 'adventurer' fighters, that I thought was worth sharing.</FONT> <BR><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>Close Formation Fighting</FONT> <BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>Description: For sword and shield by a group of fighters trained to work in unison.  Designed to be used by armies where low level fighters train together for months and have identical equipment and ranks.</FONT> <BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>1) Allows shield defence bonus to apply to figures immediately flanking bearer (so a figure may benefit from the shield defence of up three people).</FONT> <BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>2) Allows reserve fighter to pull back a  stunned or injured  figure and replace them in the front row.</FONT> <BR><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>Specifics:</FONT> <BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>Fighters must keep in a line and shuffle to remain in adjacent hexes.  The whole line can shuffle sideways a hex without specific orders etc. They all have exactly the same initiative, which is the lowest initiative in the group -1. </FONT><BR><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>Each hex contains 2 figures, one front line fighter and their reserve ().   </FONT><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>Front Line: The front line figure's defence benefits from the close formation and from their shield mates.  Specifically a figure's defence includes the shield defence bonus from their own shield and the shield of the front line fighters in the adjacent flanking hexes in the formation (I use the shield bonus for ease of calculation).</FONT> <BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>Reserves: The reserve takes no offensive actions but manoeuvres to keep the line tight and to replace incapacitated front line fighters.  They can temporarily move into a hole in the line until the line next shuffles, and when the line shuffles they can drop back even if technically engaged (or the fighter shuffling into the hex can move back into the reserve position). </FONT><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3>They can pull a stunned or injured front line fighter back a pace and replace them.  This later requires no action from the front line fighter but it takes a pulse.  </FONT> <BR><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=2> For very small entities (eg. goblins) I was using 3 figures per hex, 2 front line and one reserve.</FONT> <BR><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=2>In the interests of more fun and mayhem for GM's, Rosemary</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2>William replied</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="" size=2>I am dubious. While the whole 'shield wall' thing appeals it comes up short in that it penalises adventurer fighters who have a pretty dull time of it anyway. A hero should be able to cut their way through the plebes rather than just holding the line patiently waiting for the mage to fry them. This happens enough as it is. </FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2>In the interests of heroic endeavour :.-)</FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>

Subject	Re: [dq] DQ: GM Tools / Armies
From	"=?iso-8859-1?Q?Ian__Wood_&_Ellen__Hume=A0&_Adara_Wood?="
Date	Thu, 18 Jan 2001 21:53:59 +1300
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD W3 HTML//EN"> <HTML> <HEAD> <META content=text/html;charset=iso-8859-1 http-equiv=Content-Type><!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <META content='"MSHTML 4.72.3110.7"' name=GENERATOR> <STYLE></STYLE> </HEAD> <BODY bgColor=#ffffff> <DIV><FONT size=2>ah, but William, once you have ideas for unit formation tactics, then you have guidelines for how to treat them once they have broken formation.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2>And the best way to break a formation is, well, to break the [components of the] formation (one at a time if need be with something big and heavy). And the bset people to do that are those that not only take down troops, but also disrupt the ability of the troops to manoeuvre (by standing in the way - not something your average mage does a lot of).</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2>AND, now our swaggering hero is able to dispatch twice (or even thrice) as many each pulse, and they keep steeping up for more !!! "Bloody brilliant," says the average orc (fairly lazy and likes its food to walk to it).</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2>Ian</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2>PS - I am just reading a new analysis of some Napoleonic battles. It says that the effectiveness of cannon was overrated by 10 to 100 times in terms of injuries and death. Its most potent thing was against morale, as no one likes to look at the business end of a bloody big gun! Cannon fire may have accounted for 20 to 25% of casualties in those battles with lots of cannon, but were most likely to be below 10% (muskets = >80%, swords 5 to 10% and bayonets <5%). Cannons apparently accounted for less than 10% of injuries in the American Civil War, possibly because rifles were more dangerous than muskets. The point to all this is that blast mages should not take out large chucks of a good army. Most will miss - put a concentration check in there for being swarmed by people who want to kill you (several times if possible)</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2>PPS - Rosemary = I assume you can get two pony mounted hobbits in a hex ?</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2>cheers...</FONT></DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 solid 2px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px"> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><B>-----Original Message-----</B><BR><B>From: </B>Dworkin <<A href="mailto:dworkin@ihug.co.nz">dworkin@ihug.co.nz</A>><BR><B>To: </B><A href="mailto:dq@dq.sf.org.nz">dq@dq.sf.org.nz</A> <<A href="mailto:dq@dq.sf.org.nz">dq@dq.sf.org.nz</A>><BR><B>Date: </B>Thursday, 18 January 2001 18:57<BR><B>Subject: </B>Re: [dq] DQ: GM Tools / Armies<BR><BR></DIV></FONT> <DIV> </DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 solid 2px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px"> <DIV><FONT size=2>Rosemary said</FONT></DIV> <DIV><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=3><snip></FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=sans-serif size=3></FONT><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=2>* For very small entities (eg. goblins) I was using 3 figures per hex, 2 front line and one reserve.</FONT> <BR><BR><FONT face=sans-serif size=2>In the interests of more fun and mayhem for GM's, Rosemary</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2>William replied</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="" size=2>I am dubious. While the whole 'shield wall' thing appeals it comes up short in that it penalises adventurer fighters who have a pretty dull time of it anyway. A hero should be able to cut their way through the plebes rather than just holding the line patiently waiting for the mage to fry them. This happens enough as it is. </FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT size=2>In the interests of heroic endeavour :.-)</FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>