Trying to create homebrew fallout warfare rules

[Bubbles]

Because I'm bored at school I've been trying to create a set of rules to use for skirmish sized fallout battles. I really want people to use all the different kinds of figures they've got so Im gonna have different factions with different attributes and whatnot but anyway.

Movement will be done in 6'' movements unless you have heavy armour or are a super mutant for example.

Their will be 2 phases. Movement and Shooting/combat resolution. In the first phase you move and if your assualting you move into the enemy. In the second phase if your shooting you pick a target within your range and shoot. You roll to hit then roll for damage. If your assaulting you roll to hit then roll for damage. Pretty self explanatory.

Weapons damage will be figured out by the calibre while the number of shots and range is determined by the type of gun. Also different guns can do different things for example a pistol only takes up one hand leaving the other hand free to use a knife or other one handed weapon. This means they can shoot in CC(but only one shot) unlike a rifle that cannot be fired in close combat but has a much longer range even if both weapons have the same bullet.

Close Combat Im still a little bit unsure about but there will be various factors that can affect how much damage a unit can do based on their weapons and the strength of the attacker.

You can suppress units by electing to fire on them. you only roll to hit not to wound because you cannot wound. if you succed in hitting the unit under fire gets one marker. once every model in the unit has a marker on them the unit is pinned. A unit that is pinned cannot move or shoot until it has passed a leadership check to unpin. Some weapons pin when shot at enemies without having to order suppression like grenades and other explosives.

Officers can issue orders wich allow units to re-roll leadership tests and stuff etc they can also give special abilities and stuff. NCO's don't give as many orders as officers nor do they give special abilities but they can be attached to most unit's.

Anyway I haven't really been able to think up the basics though and this is probably all over the place. I apologise if It doesn't make sense

[emperorpenguin]

I have designed my own Fallout rules too and would be interested to see which approaches you have taken to yours.
Best of luck, it's a lot of work but a great background to work with!

[Red Orc]

Is this very different to the basic Warhammer mechanic? It doesn't sound as if it is; roll to hit then roll for damage (never thought that really made much sense, who cares if a shot hits the armour of the thing it's firing at/is on target but doesn't penetrate?); the 6" move (why does the English-speaking world insist on doing games in inches? Don't we realise that the whole of the rest of the planet works in mm/cm?); 'leadership tests' etc.

What is it you want to do?

If your idea is to hold skirmish games, which I would class as being in the region of 5-20 models per side, you probably don't want to bother about 'units' being suppressed and whatnot, you want individual troops to have specialisms and each one to be an individual. Sure some might work together - either as fireteams or as gunner and loader or whatever but if you mean the same as I do by 'skirmish game' you're not looking at squad-level games. Unless of course 50 models a side is a skirmish to you, but I'd start classing that as a 'battle' I think!

Think about what skills/attributes you need - movement is one and you have that already; shooting - how does that work exactly? What about different skill-levels - how do you differentiate the veteran sniper from the raw recruit? Same for close combat - some troops are elite assault troops, others are more dangerous to their fellows than to the enemy. Do you use 'skill levels' (level 1 troops are straight out of basic training, level 5 or level 9 or whatever are the creme de la creme de la creme)? How do the dice work? What dice are using? D6, D10, or something else?

A suggestion would be having 'skills' - so shooting skill as an example - which is 1-6 (I'm assuming you're using D6s); a soldier with level 1 shooting skill would have to roll a 1 to shoot something, and a soldier with a level 5 shooting skill would hit on a 1-5. this could be replicated for other skills too. Basically soldiers need to move; shoot (straight - shooting can include targetting, or the two may be seperate, because sometimes you can see things you can't hit, or hit things you can't see); bash stuff (like the enemy, and sometimes doors); and not run away (or know when to run away at the right time).

They can all be handled by 'skills' as I suggested - a soldier with a move skill of 4, shooting skill of 5, combat skill of 3 and tactics skill of 5 would function very differently from a soldier with M2, S3, C5 and T2. One is a scouting crackshot, picking his way through the debris/tunnels/jungle to pick a concealed firing position where he coolly waits for his moment; the other a lumbering hulk that smashes stuff, a human tank crunching his way through the enemy before flying into a berserk rage.

This is just an example but I think it demonstrates the minimum number of skills you'll reasonably need.

Hope some of that was helpful.

[Bubbles]

I kinda mean A sotr sized game with 20-50 models per side.

To make things a little easier I'm also gonna have a Chart like SOTR to make it quicker.

I was origionally going to have each model as an individual but could be clumped together to form units, the guys would all have the same stats in a unit but would be able to do things seperately if you catch my drift, but I thought it might be a little to confusing but what do you reckon.

skill level would only be used for firing and assaulting. Movement Im not sure about having a skill level for. More heavily armoured guys can't move as far and I reckon snipers should have an ability called Lightfoot or something meaning they don't have to take checks for dangerous terrain but can only move 4'' if passing through dangerous terrain or something.

D6 is my preffered option but we'll see.

[Red Orc]

Just because movement doesn't seem like it should be a skill (after all we can pretty much all move) that doesn't mean it can't act like one - but it doesn't need to. Just read 'skill level as 'statistical measure' if you like. They're the same thing. Likewise what I've called 'tactical skill' in my example, which in 40k terms would be Ld I suppose - a stat related to morale, nerve and battlefield sense. It might not be a skill but it could function in the same way as other more combat-orientated skills - whether you're testing to see if the guys run under fire, steel themselves to charge a defended position or realise the fuel cache is booby-trapped before blowing themselves to hell, there needs to be some kind of stat for that.

But the point was that (however you actually work them, mine was just an example) you need 4 stats - movement, shooting, thumping, and a stat related to intelligence/discipline. That I think is the minimum you need for any combat simulation. You can have many more - conceptually, a trooper could have lvl 5 in shooting with a laser-rifle but only lvl 2 using a rocket-launcher; he just never got the practice because it was someone else's job, but now Big Steve the Rocket Guy (lvl 4 with a rocket launcher) is dead and Sniper Dave (who also has lvl 5 'concealment' and lvl 4 'sharpshooting') must do the business with the rocket launcher to blow the fuel dump. Of course, if John the Bomb (lvl 4 'demolition' skill) were still alive he could probably blow the fuel dump, but would stand a better chance of being able to set the charges if 'Radar' McNulty could successfully use his lvl 4 'communications' skill to send a false signal to the enemy guards and get them looking in the wrong direction - where Sneaky Pete (lvl 5 'concealment' and lvl 4 'assassination') and 'Tank' Townsend (lvl 5 'unarmed combat') are lying in wait in the bushes...

... but they can be boiled down to the four I mentioned earlier for maximum simplicity. Can't actually think of anything that doesn't fit in that framework. What do soldiers do? They move, they shoot, they hit things, they try to make their brains override their fear... that's the main outlines of a battle-game, I think.

Never played SoTR so have no idea how the table works, but never mind!

And I can see if you're going for 20-50 models per side that units definitely make sense. In which case command structure is going to be important, which I guess is where your NCOs and officers and their orders will come into play. Again, rank (though we think of it as positions) is in effect a stat or skill: a trooper is lvl 1, a corporal lvl 2, a sergeant lvl 3, a lieutenant lvl 4, a captain lvl 5... at each stage, they get more ability to command.

Perhaps a trooper only commands himself, a corporal can command 4 troops including himself, a sergeant 9 including himself, a lieutenant 16 including himself, a captain has 25 troops including himself. Another way of looking at that is that every unit of 4 troops needs a corporal, every 9 needs a sergeant, etc. Or that you can't get a corporal 'upgrade' until you have 4 troops, or a sergeant upgrade until  you have 9...

So a suggestion here would be: a single grunt trooper has a tactics score of 1; if a unit has 2-8 troops, one gets a 'corporal' upgrade (one trooper gets lvl 2 'tactics' as a command/leadership/cool bonus); if the unit has 9-15 troops, one gets a 'sergeant' upgrade (lvl 3 tactics); if it's 16-24, one is a Lieutenant (lvl 4 tactics) and if the unit is 25+ one gets a captain upgrade (lvl 5 tactics). That lvl 5 skill could be used in a variety of ways; the unit could have 5 actions that turn, or a 5-in-6 chance to activate, or it could be a morale level, or it could represent the intel the unit has about where enemy positions are, or the technology the unit has to find boobytraps. Many many things that stat could relate to...

Anyway; I hope some of this is helpful.

[Bubbles]

You are obviously very practiced in making rules I see good sir. I was going over my mental notes and noticed that I did indeed have a movement skill but it was based on the size of the troop. Like NCR troopers can move 6'' coz they're regular size but a BoS guy can only move 5'' because he's pretty bulky and unwieldy. Bigger troops would never be able to move as efficiently over difficult terrain either so they would suffer a minus factor to this. Size isn't always a bad thing tho because it means they can carry around bigger guns without sufferenig more minus effects on movement.

The chart in SOTR makes trying to figure out what to roll for wounds and damge sooooo easy. The table in Sotr has the weapons from weakest to strongest vs armour form weakest to strongest, its done in an orderly fashion so that you check what strength your weapon is and the armour of your enemy and their you go. Im probably not explainging it well.

The tactics skill is also very good idea combining their leadership, battlefield sense and other whatnots into one category, you should write a sellable ruleset my good man

[Red Orc]

 

I like pretty numbers...  

I guess what I really like is the idea of using numbers to represent real-world things. A battle game is a modelling of events using numbers, and I've being working on that since about 1984 when me and my mate wrote our own fantasy battle rules because we couldn't afford Warhammer.

Taking apart what things are and working out how numbers can represent characteristics - strength, speed, reactions, intelligence, the ability to stay calm or to see hidden things - is interesting. When you think of everything in terms of a probability - what's the chance of a trooper shooting that sentry? Now what's the chance of a trooper who's a trained sniper shooting that sentry? What if the sentry has armour on, can the sniper still kill him?; what's the chance of seeing the wire leading to the detonantor? Now what's the chance of a detonation expert seeing the wire? etc - then the idea of expressing things in numbers becomes clearer (anything; friendliness, health, size, ability to hold your breath underwater, how much you like pizza, it can all be expressed as a number).

I have no more idea what to do with the numbers than the next person (who has a 2-in-6 chance of knowing what to do with the numbers   ) but I do find it helpful to do those kinds of breakdowns of what can be measured by profiles/statistics in game terms. So I'm maybe not going to be much help when it comes to actual game mechanics; my usual fallback position is 'throw a die testing against skill level' as I think that's the simplest; if you're level 1 at knife-fighting and you're throwing a d6 you're not going to be able to stab the other guy very often; if you're level 5 at knife fighting you're going to be landing blows most of the time. That's about as simple as you can get it, I think.

[Bubbles]

Alright so I've been thinking about the various factions I wanna have in the game.

NCR- They're gonna be pretty standard, they prefer ranged combat and will get torn apart in CC. Unlike some other armies they're pretty organized so they will benefit greatly by sticking near officers and such.

Legion- Kick ass in close combat. They don't have such a great tactical structure because they rely on experience not tactical finese. Basic troops are inexpensive but they're higher ups are the ones doing more damage and therefore very expensive. A higher ranked unit doesn't run when a lower ranked unit walks by.

BoS- Power armour and Laser rifles, pretty self explanatory. heavily armoured carrying high powered weaponry but one BoS Knight (around coporal or sargeant) will set you back the same as an NCR squad. They're are very individual and all capable of tactical thought.

Raiders- I haven't really put much thought into the raiders as They would really be an AI thing but you could probably play them. You gotta roll to see what weapons you got. Could mean your whole army has pool cues or plasma rifles.

Emperorpenguir let's have your opinion you've got your own rules whaddaya think so far.

[emperorpenguin]

Well for what it's worth

My rules are skirmish sized, with every model acting individually. Typically sides are 6-12 models in size. I have given every single type of model its own SPECIAL scores and these are used as the basis of all dice rolls. It's a d10 system with low rolls being better, you are trying to roll equal to or less than your relevant SPECIAL score.
Strength is used in melee, Perception for shooting, Endurance to track damage, Charisma for leadership, Intelligence for repairs, Agility is movement and Luck is used in random encounters.
I've lists for the following factions: Brotherhood of Steel, Caesar's Legion, Chinese Remnants, Enclave, Mercenaries, New California Republic, Raiders, Super Mutants, Vault Dwellers, Wastelanders.

My action sequence works the same as yours. My weapons are characterised by range/rate of fire/damage. Criticals damage body parts ala VATS. Real bottlecaps are scattered across the table and can be searched for loot but will sometimes be a booby trap or allow a creature to ambush a model.

[Infojunky]

Ok, Fallout the miniatures game.... I get it.

Wanting to write your own rules, I get that too.

Here is a little bit of Background; In the olden days Fallout was based on SJG's GURPS, at least through early development. Then it was the SPECIAL system, which one way or another frames all of the games in the Fallout Series. There have been a number of goes at a Tabletop RPG, wander around the net and you can see them. A good place to start is The Vault.

I would look around and see how other people have done it and see what you like, I personally use Savage Worlds/ Savage Showdown with a Fan Conversion I picked up off the net. Though GWs Necromunda also kinda works too

But I digress, for writing your own set of rules it helps to have an idea of what your core mechanics are. What do you expect out of your little guys going to do on the table. Figure out you mechanics 1st, then you can go back and add fluff like perceived differences in firearms.

The Biggest bit of advice I can give you is Write an Outline ! ! !, throw every idea you have at it, fill out as much of each item as you can, then you can sort out what works or not. It also allows you to see where your holes are at. (Most word processing programs have Outlines as part of their core functions)

[Ramshackle_Curtis]

 the 6" move (why does the English-speaking world insist on doing games in inches? Don't we realise that the whole of the rest of the planet works in mm/cm?)


Im in the UK and Ive written NUclear Renaissance, which is a post apoc skirmish games, done in cm. The amaricans and canadians work in inches though!

[Bubbles]

I live in Australia and we use cm but me personally prefer Inches i'll probably do the flames of war thing. inches or cms. I've been thinking about the xp uprgrading system and I've never really liked the Idea of units being upgraded over battles but Im thinking of being able to create your own hero. Choose their background ( Vault dweller, tribal etc) Choose what they are. (male female, human ghoul etc) and give them different perks. over the battles they will upgrade and you advance them but its not needed if you can't be bothered fielding a hero.

I'm not really aiming for an RPG more a wargame with a very fallout feel but it seems a little bit unlokely but might just degenrate into a sci-fi wargame

[Infojunky]

the 6" move (why does the English-speaking world insist on doing games in inches? Don't we realise that the whole of the rest of the planet works in mm/cm?)

I work in CM and am an American, just the people around me give me blank looks.

[Infojunky]

I'm not really aiming for an RPG more a wargame with a very fallout feel but it seems a little bit unlokely but might just degenrate into a sci-fi wargame

I pointed at the RPG side as a lot of older RPGs are skirmish games with a few added bit added on. So I tend to look at them in a reductionist kinda way. It really sounds like you are riding that line between RPG/Wargame with your stated choices. There are a lot of games that live in that zone, Warhammer40k:RogueTrader, Necromunda, and the number of gang based games from there.

But as I said you need to define what is and isn't in.

Like with a 6 inch infantry move you are seemingly precluding the use of vehicles, this is even more indicated if you are using 28mm+ figures.... With the same breath I can also probably state that there is no need for complex range mechanics as your engagement zones are so tiny (assuming a game played on the kitchen table with 28mm figures with a one to one figure to ground scale{with these parameters even the 4 x4 table is small}). I might be off base, but just giving things I have discovered tromping over this same ground.

[emperorpenguin]

Outside of Fallout Tactics, the only combat vehicle ever seen is the Vertibird, so I don't think a lack of vehicles will be a problem in his game any more than in mine.