Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => Pikes, Muskets and Flouncy Shirts => Topic started by: Captain_Hook on November 27, 2012, 02:16:02 PM
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I have the LotHS rules (yet to play them), and I was wondering if anyone had a chance to compare them to Black Scorpion's Cutlass rules? The Legends rules look to be a fairly straight forward set of rules, but they look to be very generic. Thank in advance for your response.
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I had a game of LotHS and it was alright if somewhat lacking in dynamism and some odd things reared their head such as the musket troops finding it easier to harm stuff by clubbing their opponents rather than shooting them which the chap with the musket armed crew was a little peeved about. He damaged nothing at all at range.
Like all GW games it involves a lot of dice rolling with not much happening as every success seems to be countered by another roll. None the less we struggled to a result (I won) eventually but, given a choice I wouldn't play these rules again.
The Black Scorpion rules I haven't tried but I did watch the video on Beasts of War where the designer explained them with examples of play. I wouldn't touch these unless I was paid, and it had better be a decent amount too. Every single rule seemed designed to prevent you doing anything, even moving (see as everyone trips and falls...). There's no ship rules and no swimming rules either, bit shit for a game of pirate rules.
The cover's nice.
That wasn't a help was it? Well, it might help you to not waste money.
For pirate games I suggest the old free Wargames Foundry black powder rules (I have a set I can mail you if you can't find them on the web) or a quick adaption of some of the wonderful FIW rules currently available, This Very Ground or Muskets and Tomohawks are both very good, or really any number of other rules that cope with hand to hand and black powder weapons.
LIMEYS AND SLIMEYS By Bill Abrams is an excellent set of ship to ship rules which you can tack on to anything really.
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I quite like LotOW (which is basically LotHS with a different hat on), but I do have to say that it IS rather hard to shoot things sometimes...
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I shall be using the Muskets and Tomhawk rules with a new set of playing cards for different Pirate/Sailor types.
Eric
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I had a game of LotHS and it was alright if somewhat lacking in dynamism and some odd things reared their head such as the musket troops finding it easier to harm stuff by clubbing their opponents rather than shooting them which the chap with the musket armed crew was a little peeved about. He damaged nothing at all at range.
Like all GW games it involves a lot of dice rolling with not much happening as every success seems to be countered by another roll. None the less we struggled to a result (I won) eventually but, given a choice I wouldn't play these rules again.
That just about sums them up perfectly. The fun with these rules is the campaign system allowing your pirates to improve and amass riches etc through linked scenarios.
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The cover's nice..
That it is! :-*
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I agree about LotHS - it's good, don't get me wrong - but it lacks "something" . . . . .
Cutlass is clunky at best, and awkward to play - plus it get's really overbalanced quickly. If one player wins a few games, his "gang" improves - and then he generally keeps winning . . . . .
On a tangent note - Freebooter's Fate is the best set of rules I've yet to play/read - albeit with a narrow focus.
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The Black Scorpion rules I haven't tried but I did watch the video on Beasts of War where the designer explained them with examples of play. I wouldn't touch these unless I was paid, and it had better be a decent amount too. Every single rule seemed designed to prevent you doing anything, even moving (see as everyone trips and falls...). There's no ship rules and no swimming rules either, bit shit for a game of pirate rules.
The cover's nice.
I did try them, and though the system looks nice when reading it and there are some ideas in it I like, the gameplay is frustrating and you'll probably end up making a lot of houserules to try to salvage something of the game.
Things we will modify
- range of fire weapons. Tha range is partly dependent on the skill level (this I like), but the ranges are just too long, even at low skill levels. Pistols fire up to 16" (low skill level) which is plain silly when you take the base move range of 4" into account.
- the 'stunned' rule. You stun when failing to sprint, inducing penalties. All penalties stack, so stunned + injured characters are severely penalised. Of course being stunned, you are worse at tests so you injure more easily. You have to roll to remove stun at the end of the turn (which can be up to 16 rounds !), with a 50% chance to remain stunned. It's not so much a 'stunned' as a 'crippled' rule. We'll probably make it a special action to auto-remove stun. My opponent had half of his models stunned in the first turn (due to some awful die rolls when sprinting) and only one model was able to become 'unstunned' for the entire game.
- the reaction system will need some tweaking. You can try to take over the iniatiative of the other player on certain events. To be able to do this you need to roll (losing an action in the process, even when failing to gain initiative). When failing the model is 'surprised' and can no longer react. So you can have a model that's being shot at (but the attacker misses his shot). The target can now try to react to gain initiative. If it fails to react, it's surprised and loses the ability to react, meaning that the model is now effectively a sitting duck. As long as you keep shooting at the same 'surprised' model (or rather, shellshocked it would seem), there's no way to take over initiative.
We didn't get to the campaign rules, they look ok, but so did the rest of the rules so no real reference.
To be honest, I had the impression this game wasn't properly playtested. It's also entirely possible that we interpreted some things wrong, but I really don't think so.
Next up will be LotHS or else Gloire with the pirate supplement.
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I did pick up a copy of Muskets and Tomahawks as a whim, but didn't consider using them for a pirate game (hmmm). It does seem as though LotHS may be a good set of rules at a games day convention. I've got a bunch of figures to paint, so I doubt I'll need to make a decision on what rules to use any time soon. Thank you for the quick responses.
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Captain Hook
Have you played M&T IF ,NOT try it...we have fount the rules quick, furious and fun. It was made for pirates... If studio tomahawk are reading this please think about a subset..ideas will follow on my blog...
Eric ....just starting out on the pirate adventure
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Using M&T for pirate gaming is very intriguing. How would you adapt M&T for using with pirates? I haven't played the rules, but it seems like there is a lot of emphasis on troop types: regulars, irregulars, militia and Indians. How would you break that down among a pirate group?
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Hi Captain Hook
As you say the basis for the M&T rules are the troop types - these drive movement, morale, number of troops in unit etc...
I would look at creating a range of new classes for the Pirates - Boarders, Shore Parties, Sailors and Gunners.
The M&T rules allow you to create variations in troops eg Indians can be standard, or braves or savages - I would do much the same for pirates. Some units can be better in melee versus others etc.
More leaders/heroes can be used and if necessary I will give them their own Forward boys cards.
Combat would remain the same - hard to hit, lethal and brutish
Eric
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Weird...
I had no problems with Cutlass. In fact, I liked it a load better than the GW LotHS game.
While no ship on ship fighting, I thought the rules were much better.
THAT being said, I like Freebooter's Fates a bit better than Cutlass.
*beer*
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Okay, time for a feline to be chucked amongst the feathered vermin..... Have you tried Freebooter's Fate? Designed for skirmish games (6-10 figures per side) on a 4x4 table. Not many scenarios in the book, but you can make them up. Don't want to use their beautiful miniatures?...proxy your own.
I really love this game and have demo'ed it at 3 shows now (including Salute this year with the guys from Freebooter Miniatures).
They have released one expansion, with a new faction (Amazons)and new characters for the original factions (Navy, Pirates, Assassins, Goblins), and are currently Beta testing a new faction (Voodoo Cultists).
As yet there are no rules for ships, however .... it's possible that this is somewhere in the pipline (if not, some fans have used the card based combat system to make their own).
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I watched the You-tube video on Freebooter's Fate, and the card based system has me interested. I play Sharp Practice rules by TFL, and I like the cards, versus the you go/ I go format. How would Freebooter's Fate work with multiple players on a side, say 4 to 6 bands of pirates playing against each other?
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It works fine for multiple players. You just sort out the initiative order at the beginning of each turn.
Each player activates 1 character in turn until all characters have activated.
The USP for this game is the combat play. Attacker and Defender have 6 cards depicting body locations, generally the Attacker will get to select 2 locations, the Defender 3. The attacker reveals his cards and the defender reveals if he has blocked them by choosing the same locations. It works the same way for both melee and ranged attacks.
Once you've hit a location, it's the normal routine of strength of the weapon vs toughness of the character, plus a fate card each ( cards numbered 1-10 used instead of dice for this game). If the Attacker's total is higher he causes damage equal to the difference between the 2 totals. Draw another Fate card and if it is equal to or lower than the damage caused, it also causes a critical hit in that location.
Each of the body locations affects one of your stats, so taking a critical hit will affect how well that character runs/ attacks/ defends/ etc. Causing a critical in an arm, will negate any weapons carried in that hand (crucial when facing arquebusiers).
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Freebooter's Fate is really well done.
Also look at Flagship Games' Pirates! -- These are my 'go to' rules...
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I get the impression, whether deserved or not, that LotHS and Cutlass are somewhat similar in overall play.
What sets Cutlass apart from the former is they use different sized dice for various troop ratings, and they have rules for fantasy pirates, like Ratmen crews, Elves, etc.
The above is based upon inquiries I've made about Cutlass.
There doesn't seem to be a lot of info, or rave reviews about them, so I haven't sought them out as a must buy.
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I've read a few descriptions of how the Flagship Game's Pirates plays out in ship o ship combat, but how does it play in a skirmish on land?
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I'm not 100% sure, but seem to recall it is pretty much a naval game, with ship to ship, and boarding actions only. Possibly some rules for naval bombardment too.
If I recall the review correctly, there isn't much in the way of rules for land battles.
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I have grown tired of the LOTOW rules set...and when I had my LOTHS book (someone lifted it...) I found it was even MORE limiting/limited...but I suspect with a plethora of house rules it could be fun.
I'll be looking into these other rules sets for sure.
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I've heard that the LotR, and LotOW rules are a bit better, and that some people have even considered using aspects of those to bolt on to the LotHS rules, but don't recall any specifics on what they liked more about those, or why.
That would be interesting to know, since perhaps with a few minor modifications LotHS could be made to be a lot better.
I was really disappointed with the LotHS naval rules.
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I can't speak to the High Seas variation, but I tried Lotow once - and that was about seven times too many. Sure, the rules "work" but you can eat shoe leather to survive, too.
As to pirate rules, I'm still searching (co-wrote, sort of, the rules for our giant game we did but those need some tinkering). Did try the Flagship rules in one game but that game just fell apart (more the fault of the person running than the rules but the rules didn't pull me in.)
If you are going for a small scale game, they should be pretty easy to come up with. Ours had to accommodate up to 32 players so that was different kettle of boiling rum with rotten fish in it.