Best Ruleset for Various Skirmish Wargame

[nb246]

I have to say, as well, that Song of Blades and Heroes is a GREAT ruleset for any
genre and period. Very inexpensive too. For me it has been worth every penny.
It has gotten my daughter back into miniature gaming!

[Mr. Peabody]

The more I hear about 'Song of Blades', the more I realise I'll soon have to give it a go.

I really enjoy Chain Reaction 3.0 -especially for shooty games where gritty realism is expected. Your Star or Leader really has to (gets to!) lead your group in order to keep them from remaining pinned down by opposing fire. It is hard to tell what might happen next when playing with this system until you get some experience moving and working with fire-teams. Until then you are just another Whiskey Charlie with a gun. Aside from some fun and functional special abilities and skills, the potential for character development is limited to combat related skills and such.

I have also played a lot of Savage Worlds for great campaign skirmish games with lots of RPG style development of my minis. The Savage folks have really tried hard to integrate minis gaming with RPG gaming and the result is pretty awesome. You can really create some seriously unique characters & still have them function on the table in a fun, fast and simple manner.
While Savage Worlds Showdown is free, Savage Worlds RPG & all the cool extra tool-kits (pulp, space, horror, etc.) are not.

Both Savage & Chain feature good initiative systems that keep the action interesting and all players involved.

Recently I have been impressed by Uncle Mike's Strange Aeons. Again, not a free option. This is the first I-go-you-go, D6 only game to get my attention in a long time. Lots of fun and I suspect there is potential to work it into other genres and eras.

Thomas

[Gluteus Maximus]

The more I hear about 'Song of Blades', the more I realise I'll soon have to give it a go.

I don't think you'll regret it. I've tried SBH, the Arthur & Merlin supplement, Fear and Faith and Song of Drums and Shakoes and all are very enjoyable easy to learn and quick to play rules.

For the combination of value and quality the system offers, you really can't go wrong 

[Crudeboy]

I've admittedly been a little skeptical about Ganesha Games' stuff, for honestly no good reason. Now, however, I'm browsing through their catalog and my interest is definitely piqued.

[Sangennaru]

I've found a sample pdf, with a few pages, and the game looks pretty good... but i have to try it, somehow...


do you use 15mm figures? I was thinking to try, cause i have several ranges of them!

[Argonor]

The rules contain to sets of measurements - one for 20 mm/1:72 and downwards, and one for 25 mmm and upwards.

I think a LOT of fun can be had using smaller scales, as you can cram more into the gaming space without losing the posibility of tactical manouvering.

[Argonor]

Oh, I almost forgot:

Try it. You won't regret it. Unless you're in the habit of regretting being hooked on gaming 

[Sangennaru]

ok, i gave a look at all the review and some pdfs, and i have to admit that the game looks really promising, i will try it for shure!

but it seems that the ranged combat is, as always, just a complement to the melee. Is there some patch for a good ranged combat? what about flying lead?

[Argonor]

Flying Lead is much more ranged combat oriented - with longer ranges for firearms.

[Sangennaru]

While Savage Worlds Showdown is free, Savage Worlds RPG & all the cool extra tool-kits (pulp, space, horror, etc.) are not.

hum, are the RPG related to the wargame? can they be used to develope a hybrid?

[Rich J]

Flying Lead adds the stuff you need for a 'default' shooty game ... the biggest tweak apart from the ranged combat which is different to allow you to 'model' suppression etc it that I took the weapon out the overall combat score - in SOBH the combat score is a composite of ability/weapon/armour ... in FL an average human 'grunt' will be combat 2 (special forces/heroes will be 3 or 4) and the weapon and armour added on after that ... so an average character with a drum fed LMG will be combat 5 on the whole while firing ... get into hth and he will be back to a 2 plus any specials etc ... this will be the default system for the shooty genre of games and lots of people are retro fitting it into HtH based games.

Rich J

[Mr. Peabody]

hum, are the RPG related to the wargame? can they be used to develope a hybrid?

They are almost identical. You will find it effortless to incorporate the RPG elements into your Showdown games. You may well find this unbalances you games as player abilities make short work of 'ordinary' opponents, but then again that might be your plan. No harm making the opponents less-ordinary too!

[Sangennaru]

I have a question about the SBH ruleset: if you choose to use two dice, you win and use both for attacking a foe, what will happen? does it counter-attack you twice, or once? or do you choose the best roll from two?

[Argonor]

You get an action for each success on your activation roll.

You then make an opposed roll to attack - you can never make more than one attack per turn per model - but you can use an exttra action to aim (ranged) or power/focused attack (close combat), which gives your opponent negative modifiers to the opposed roll. If the attacker rolls highest (including modifiers) he wins, if the defender rolls higher, he wins; then combat effects are applied depending on the difference rolled and/or if the winner rolled odd or even number. Only in close combat can the defender hurt the attacker (clearly).

[Rich J]

There is a special ability that allows the character to attack more than once in a turn which is very useful