Questions to GASLIGHT Rules owners

[Fjodin]

I dont own GASLIGHT rules yet, but I am collecting minis for it
I prefer 15mm minis but to use them as 25/28mm (on separate bases). Could someone explain me some things:
1) How many groups of infantry/cavalry do you usuallu use for standart battles?
2) How many infantry in 1 group (I saw that you use 10 rifles and 1 nco. For cavalry - 4 sabres)?
3) How many infantry groups do you use (I saw that most use 3-4 groups)?
4) Can infantry behave as individual or it must be in squad?
5) What is the role of standart bearer? And how many of them should be in army
6) Is there are any buglers or drummers?

I hope you'll help

[mysteriousbill]

For the first battle they recomend one vehicle, one hero, and one unit. Most units are 10 man (Infantry or cav) because you have to roll less than to make morale.

I've regularly run games with two infantry, one vehicle and one hero per player (the poor Infantry tend to die quickly).

More than that you might want to try Battles by GASLIGHT.

Three things

1. The truly weird thing is that you have to roll under the number to hit. With a shoot of nine at long range (which halves the score) you need to roll less than a 4.5 to hit (a 4 or less). With a shoot of ten you need less than a 5 to hit (also 4 or less). That less than rule can throw regular gamers if you are not careful about it.

2. Give the Infantry and Cav some kind of an anti-vehicle weapon. Even if it is only a one shot fire-bomb in the hands of the sarge. Otherwise you kill off the Infantry and have the game reduced down to the vehicles chasing each other around the board.

3. Killing a vehicle is very difficult. Many of the penetrating hits do only superficial damage. I play it that if your SRM is +0 or better a penetrating hit goes to the Catastrophic table instead of the Penetrating Table. That way you can actually kill the bleeping armored landships!!!!

[Bullshott]

For 2-player games you can get away with just the standard GASLIGHT rules - I have played games using the standard rules with 2 players each using about 3 x 10-man troop units, 3 vehicles/conveyances (1-man steam-tech transports like impervious suits) and a couple of independant Main Characters. However, for much more than this, easpecially with multi-player games I would recommend getting the Battles by GASLIGHT supplement too at some stage.

The Battles by GASLIGHT supplement has better tables for vehicle damage and uses tables for calculating damage effests of units firing (rather than rolling a handful of d20 in the standard ruleset).

@ Fjodin - PM me with your email address and I'll mail you the playsheets we use for the BLAM VSF games here in the UK. The playsheets incorporate the vehicle damage table and the combat table from Battles by GASLIGHT, together with various house rules we use to clarify gaps in the rules, etc.

Bullshott

[Fjodin]

2 Bullshott - done

2 mysteriousbill - thanx for helping!

I own many 15 minis, but onle 1 mini of each kind. I mean: 1 prussian rifleman, 1 gunfighter, 1 civilian etc. But 4 bedouins (repainted QRF Spahis from Franco-Prussian Range).

So I want to start collecting the army. I've just painted the russian officer and 2 riflemans. And I think to by 3 rifle units.

So For 1 unit I need 10 rifles and 1 officer? What about standart bearers and drummers. And if I want to add dragoons, how many horses do I need in 1 unit (10?)

(OW! I also own 2 gatlings! So If I get some artillery crew, I can make some Daka-Daka-Daka!)

[mysteriousbill]

A unit would be just ten riflemen with a leader of some sort included in the 10. Officers would be seperate heroes but they do add bonuses to morale for being close by.

[Fjodin]

And what about standart bearers and drummers

[Mors]

I've not played GASLIGHT yet but been reading the rules a lot this week, there are no rules for standard bearers / musicians from what I can recall so they would just count as ordinary troops, but they make the units pweety 
More

[Jonas]

And you have to make up the stats for your men yoruself and stats/abilities for special weapons, so if you like you can just make up your own rules for standard bearer and musicians.

[Froggy the Great]

How's it play with fewer units and more heroes?

[Dewbakuk]

Plays quite differently. You'd be better off with "To be Continued by GASLIGHT" or just giving your characters hit points. 2-3 characters should be able to hold their own against a unit, somtimes they'll get gunned down by the massed fire, other times they'll shake it off.

We did this for the VSF Stargate game. Thunderchicken may chime in at this point to explain any mods he did to the rules.

[Red Orc]

... The truly weird thing is that you have to roll under the number to hit. With a shoot of nine at long range (which halves the score) you need to roll less than a 4.5 to hit (a 4 or less). With a shoot of ten you need less than a 5 to hit (also 4 or less). That less than rule can throw regular gamers if you are not careful about it.
...

I've never understood this. I got into a very heated argument with a gamer once who basically insisted this idea was crazy and no-one would ever go for it. Odd, but we used to do it all the time back in the day making skill rolls on a d%... Runequest, Call of Cthulhu, hell I think even AD&D worked skills like this. It just represents the possibility that's all... 2-in-8 or 4-in-6 or 7-in-10 is easier to work out if you need 2, 4 or 7, rather than 6, 2 or 3, isn't it? And then again, your 'skill level' let's say can be used as a direct stat to make comparisons... level 1 you need a 1-in-6, level 4 (woo hoo!) you need a 4-in-6...

Or it really just me that thinks this is both logical and much, much easier?

[Thunderchicken]

2. Give the Infantry and Cav some kind of an anti-vehicle weapon. Even if it is only a one shot fire-bomb in the hands of the sarge. Otherwise you kill off the Infantry and have the game reduced down to the vehicles chasing each other around the board.

That's a good point and it happened a fair bit when I first started playing GASLIGHT. Malamute will back me up on that one!

Froggy, as Dewbakuk said To Be Continued by GASLIGHT is better for Hero heavy games. They are written with Pulp in mind but easily adapted for VSF. Put very simply main characters have hit points, extras dont and each weapon has a variable D6 damage capability. When a main character is hit they can make a save roll and if they fail that they can absorb some of the damage. If an extra is hit and fails to save it's off to the pearly gates. The rules are great fun and Dewy and I made them even more fun by taking morale checks away from the main characters. The peeps who played the Stargate game at BLAM looked like they were having fun      

[surdu]

3. Killing a vehicle is very difficult. Many of the penetrating hits do only superficial damage. I play it that if your SRM is +0 or better a penetrating hit goes to the Catastrophic table instead of the Penetrating Table. That way you can actually kill the bleeping armored landships!!!!

This was done intentionally.  Look at the battle between the Monitor and Merrimack during the American Civil War.  They blazed away at each other most of the day, cracking plates, etc., but both limped away after the battle. 

If you want to kill vehicles faster, use the Battles by GASLIGHT vehicle damage chart.

[The_Beast]

We tend to find Start and Sustain dice far more problematic than weapon fire. 

That said, more than once, a HEROic test has done the deed when mere lead could not. Very cinematic, no?

Doug