Anybody else have any fun with this tidy little ruleset?
I've played through two missions with my first Pact, and it's an extremely fun and elegant little system. (Videos to follow on The Joy of Wargaming later this month.)
Here, three of my heroes approach a dark altar, having slain one giant rat via magic. A second one approaches from the upper left corner.
Four heroes get four actions, a free move and three chances to succeed at actions (move, attack, search, cast a spell, etc.) all with a standard target number of 4+ modified by the usual situational modifiers. One action uses a d6, one a d8, and one a d10, so you can prioritize based on importance and order. Take an action to attack, and if successful, the target rolls a defense die which amounts to a 4+ save modified by class and armor and cover. Very easy. Very intuitive.
It's designed for a full campaign lasting around seven games, with the usual power-ups. The enemies come in four classes, all of which get that free move. Then they scale up from a single d6 action, to a pair of d8s, three d10s for the strongest minions, and then finally a Big Boss who you only fight in the last of seven missions. With each mission you fight stronger and more numerous enemies, but your characters level-up, providing a nice progression as you learn the rules. The bad guys have a simple AI that serves as a good base on which to build - you ain't stupid and neither are your foes. The author trusts you enough to sketch out a few basic rules and then basically says, "Look, it's complicated. Do what makes sense." It's a really casual and friendly approach to the game, and it comes off as encouraging rather than lazy.
Most of what it does is standard wargame stuff. The missions are full fights, search and destroy, escort missions, and so on. It's all pretty vanilla fantasy, with a DIY approach where the author encourages you to sort your own stuff. You got winged figures? Goes without saying that they can fly, and the author doesn't. I'm probably going to give my skeletons a +1 to their defense rolls when attacked by bladed weapons, just out of that D&D nostalgia.
So why is it so much fun? I don't know. It's just a compact system that fits everything together in a tight little package. It's simple enough that you can throw any figure at it and bolt on all kinds of additions without having to worry about 'balance' or 'fairness'. Some might consider it a bit on the light side, but for my money it nails exactly what I want out of a solo wargame experience.
Two questions for those who have played it:
1. You can mix and match actions, right? I can see where you might have to take all four actions with one figure before moving onto the next, but I've been playing so that figures swap around. My fighter might move and slash a foe threatening my wizard so that the wizard can move away, and then the fighter moves before the wizard casts a spell. That sort of thing.
2. When a wizard - sorry, Mancer - casts a spell, he uses the die type of that action. If he uses a d10 and successfully casts a spell, then any dice rolled for the spell effect also use a d10. So for the Mage Bolt, you get four magic bolts each of which requires an attack roll. If I used a d10 to cast, then I also use a d10 for those attack rolls. Is that right?
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April 23, 2024, 01:14:28 PM
August 09, 2020, 07:28:24 PM
