Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => Pikes, Muskets and Flouncy Shirts => Topic started by: SJWi on January 07, 2023, 05:29:50 AM
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Good Morning LAF-ers. I didn't know whether to put this question to the "period" board or under "Colonial", but decided here. Over the years I've been building forces of Conquistadors and Aztecs. Originally they were to help a friend with "Frostgrave Ghost Archipelago" but that never took off and in any event I'm not really a fantasy gamer. Thus I now have about 50 figures for each side, all based individually on 2p coins. Can anyone suggest a decent set of rules to use for this period that uses roughly that number of figures. I'm prepared to buy a few more if needed but not many. It really is a sideline for me but I am quite fascinated by the topic and have invested in a couple of background books to expand my knowledge.
Thanks
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With 50 miniatures for each side you can use variants of Lion Rampant and/or Pikeman's Lament like this side shows: http://devonwargames.blogspot.com/2022/09/tenochtitlan-large-lion-rampant-skirmish.html
There are a lot of pirate skirmish games out there for smaller numbers of miniatures. Maybe they need some homerules to take care of the power of fireweapons.
Some fantasy rulesets like Ghost Archipelago or Mordheim/Lustria have nice scenario ideas for fighting in jungle / ruin terrain
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Donnybrook works well
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I’m a big fan of Irregular Wars - it is a small battle set of rules very much set in this era and with a number of rules that are specifically aimed at European vs Native games. It has a number of lists to cover Conquistadors and Aztecs (as well as many lists covering all sorts of other areas of early colonial expansion).
It is a unit based game, but is based on Base Widths, so I think your 50 or so figures a side would work pretty well at 2 or 3 figures on a 50-60mm square base
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Chaps, thanks for the answers. I'm not the biggest fan of"Rampant" but happy to give it a go. I'm actually trying out Frostrgrave Ghost Archipelago this weekend.
Don't know much about Donnybrook. Can you expand on them.
I had forgotten about "Irregular Wars" I looked at them a few years ago but (a) I thought it needed a lot of figures and (b) I was put off by the multibasing.
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I’ll have a look this evening at the size of a conquistador force for Irregular Wars - but I expect it will be pretty compact
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Look forward to seeing your games and thoughts on rules would like to do similar so also keen to find a set of rules that would work for this setting.
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If you don’t like Rampant (which would have been my first suggestion), I would also recommend Donnybrook: very fast, very easy with some nice design ideas in the army lists.
The book is absolutely gorgeous, but sadly oop. I got the pdf (which saves you from the three biblical plagues of p&p, taxes and handling fees(.
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I’ve had a look at the Conquistador list for Irregular Wars, it would be just 9 stands if made up entirely of Spanish. Up to 5 of those stands of Spanish could be swapped for Indians, of whom you would get 1d4 of or perhaps 1d6 for a couple of options. IW uses a system of picks to assemble a force, and some of those picks are of fixed number (eg 1, others can be a random amount, 1d2, 1d3, 1d4 or 1d6 - so you are never quite sure how successful your Lord will have been at recruiting.
The Mesoamerican list (which includes Aztec) contains a lot more random sized picks, I’d think it would be something around 12-20 stands.
There are some 10 different native lists available covering the whole of the Americas
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Although Donnybrook is currently out of print, so might be difficult to track down a copy.
But, Clarence Harrison has just recently posted that he has a slimmed down "old school" style booklet that just has the basic rules (without all the army lists and background fluff etc) that's due out soon (in print and PDF). Not sure how soon, but the rules work well enough (and the out of print version included forces for the Scottish Darien adventure, almost similar to a Conquistador mission, apart from the outcome for the Scots)
The basic principle of the rules are that different troop types get different dice (so raw recruits will statistically achieve less hits than seasoned troops) and all activation is random (card-driven). Better quality units get less men. There are an assortment of special characters (who might help or hinder your units) such as officers, drummers, kennel-master with hunting hounds, local priests etc.
Good fun, easy to pick up the mechanics of the rules.
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Hi
There is Congo. There are ob lists available in french for it ( I can send them to you ) I have almost finished the cards and I'm more then happy about the result. Here some cards ;)
See you
Luis
(https://i91.servimg.com/u/f91/20/24/09/95/show210.jpg) (https://servimg.com/view/20240995/63)
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Many thanks for the clarifications. I'm in no great hurry as although some of my Conquistadors are ready for action, the Aztecs are still sitting in their gray primer. I've just bought some more in the recent Foundry sale and they are definitely a "1st quarter 2023 " project, together with my box of Wargames Atlantic plastic Conquistador reinforcements. I like the idea of Congo as I actually have a copy so no investment needed. A cut-down Donnybrook also sounds interesting. Maybe one for the shows later in the year. Also, "Irregular Wars" is tempting at only £12....
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Hi
I have the same line and number of Aztec-Tlaxcalan-Conquistadore miniatures on the shelves and I intend to use En Garde for slightly smaller encounters. For larger games I might use Chris Peer's By the Sword rules, out of print now, but which had a specific topic supplement ( which I crave to have but missed at the time). Otherwise I will try maybe the new edition of Tribal. That would be better for near preconquest period, maybe less so for the Conquistadores. I don't think that Donnybrook would do: they are for late seventeenth century.
last, the Aztec pre-conquest warfare is very difficult to model with anything but a special set of rules.
Philippe
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Wait wait wait!
An afterthought... I happen to be into the preparation of a complete set of warbands for Flint an Feather. This is for Iroquoians indeed. But some points to consider:
- a focus on young warriors to be tested alongside veterans
- the fact that to take prisonners is much better than to kill them in the rules
- the weapons: mace, flint tipped weapons, shields, plus soft armour
- the possibility of adding late sixteenth century soldiers and the effect of surprise when facing firearms
- a warrior hierachy very similar to the Aztec, if you forget knights orders
Of course some rules would need some adaptation. But it might be worth a try.
Philippe
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I’ve always gotten the impression that the Aztecs generally greatly outnumbered Cortez’s forces. Maybe think about using colonial rules like The Sword and the Flame. I believe there may actually be a published variant for Conquistadores.
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I'm thinking of using the (fairly new) With Muskets, Pilkes & Drums by Partizan Press. I've been after the same 16th C Colonial themed rules/level for my Portuguese and Tupi in Brazil, and they seem to fit, imo.
It's a bit like Hail Caesar for smaller actions regarding the basing too - no set figure count, removal or base size but Small, Regular and Large. So any collection fits really. Also has emphasis on Aztecs and Conquistadors etc - it covers both Colonial and European conflicts in the 16th & 17th C. So there's specific rules for taking prisoners for sacrifice etc.
I was a bit peeved on discovering that both the new versions of Rampant and Billhooks would practically ignore early 16th Colonial, but WMP&D appears to be what I'm after.
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I’ve always gotten the impression that the Aztecs generally greatly outnumbered Cortez’s forces. Maybe think about using colonial rules like The Sword and the Flame. I believe there may actually be a published variant for Conquistadores.
The great majority of Cortez' force were Amerindian allies (Tlaxcaltecs, Tetzcocans, and Cempoala) who greatly resented the Aztecs (Mexica) and wanted to see them defeated. At the 1521 siege of Tenochtitlan there were 200,000 such native allied warriors.
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Martin, thanks for the info about "With Musket, Fifes and Drums". Have you actually played them? I nearly bought the author's "Back of Beyond" rules, whihc some of my mates did, and having played them wasn't terribly impressed. High production values but lots of loose ends.
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I haven't played them yet, they just clicked with me more than the other obvious contender of Pikeman's Lament.
I'm intending to base my Portuguese/Tupi etc 3 to a 40x40 base, so if I fancy I can expand the collection for Pike & Shotte - so was thinking of using 2 or 3 bases per unit. So if they're not to my taste when I play it wouldn't be a big deal. I'm resisting basing them in singles because I fancy some Diorama bases :-)
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I’ve always gotten the impression that the Aztecs generally greatly outnumbered Cortez’s forces. Maybe think about using colonial rules like The Sword and the Flame. I believe there may actually be a published variant for Conquistadores.
The link to The Sword and the Cross of Gold
https://www.angelfire.com/games3/jacksongamer/aztecs.htm
Very good for your accurate mixed aztec units, every type has their own melee stats. Same with Spanish.
This TSATF variation is especially good for large games (ten+ twenty figure aztec units vs 3-4 spanish 12 man units and 4+ indian allies units
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I’m surprised it was available for free. Or did you pay for it?
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I’m surprised it was available for free. Or did you pay for it?
Free
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SJWi, I would go with Rebels and Patriots.
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Vodkafan, I thought these were firmly set in the 18th century and Black Powder? If anything I would have expected a suggestion of "Pikemen's Lament" as an offering from the Osprey stable of rules. Indeed I seem to remember some home-brew Conquistador lists out there somewhere?
Thanks for the suggestion.
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The Chris Peers rules and the supplement " War in El Dorado" can be ordered here https://www.brigadegames.com/Chris-Peers-Rules--Sinister-Laboratories_c_593.html
For Mesoamerican warfare there is the "Civilizations Collide" free supplement for the skirmish system "Feudal Patrol". The supplement can be found here http://www.bucksurdu.com/feudalpatrol/free-supplements (with lots of infos here https://markamorin.com/aztec-conquistador-and-mesoamerican-hobby-projects-posts) and the rules themselves are available from onmilitarymatters.com. They seem to be out of stock at most other places (which is a small surprise as the rules and the necessary (I believe) card deck come at a hefty price (64$, and that's not OMM's idea).