Uncivil wars: Give me your wishlist for a modern 28mm ruleset.

[Bushbaby]

As said before, I am a game developer and since started with 28mm moderns, I immediately started on my own ruleset. So far I have done three game tests (you can find two of them as AARs in this subforum).

The game is intended for small scale actions including no more than 10-15 figures on each side, with or without vehicles. Right now I collect modern africans, but imagine the rules to work with Vietnam and WW2 as well.

I am trying to create a set of simple, but versatile rules with the following foci:

1. Ease of play. A good flow without constant rulechecks and reading tables.
2. Action oriented. Reduce waiting for the other player/players to finish.
3. A solid morale system mimicing battle stress and psychological responses.
4. Some pre deployment decisions like ambushes, minefields, recon and such.
5. And most importantly... (always the most difficult part) a gaming time under 4 hours!

Now I ask you, my fellow gamers to provide me with your wishes, ideas and tips.

What rules would you like to see in a new set of rules?

(What rules would you NOT like to see?)

Best,

Bushbaby

[Iron Mike 73]

Sir Bushbaby,

Sounds neat---will have to review the AARS ASAP>

I recommend some way to introduce unforseen events---I really like what Force on Force does with their Fog of War cards.  Although sometimes those cards can completely upset a game's balance.

Also like a way that things can go wrong for an individual---gun jammed, twisted an ankle, radio on the fritz, etc,.  Just to keep players from always knowing their guys will always do exaqctly what they want and nothing will go wrong.

Good luck!

Mike P

[Rob_bresnen]

I think this is a niche in the market which has not yet been filled to my satisfaction (although Black ops is promising).

The key point you have layed out are a good start but to be honest they are true of any wargame rules. What you need to be thinking about is what elements make a modern wargame different to say a WW2 or earlier rules. it is in these differences that the game will need to stand out in order to 'feel' right.

Black Op's has a 'computer game' feel, drawing inspiration from Splinter Cell and the likes. It is less 'real' and more Hollywood. On the other side of the spectrum Force on Force, Skirmish Sangin and The New Two Fat Lardies game that is in the pipeline concentrate on getting the 'feel' accurate- as realistic as they can. It depends how you want to go with this, but I would suggest that a middle ground might be good.

I would like a points based force selector that was flexible enough to build everything from an African militia to a special forces team. Things like drone strikes, air strikes, cas evac, helo-insertion, radio communication and jamming, IED and defusing bombs, off table mortars, light vehicals like technical and lighter armoured vehicals and civilians would be a good start. Various types of weaponry and body armour would be a must too, obviously.

I like to photograph my games too, and so I like games where on-table markers are kept to a minimum, as it seems to be the fashion at the momnet to scatter teh table top with markers for everything and I think the detract from the 'realistic' feel of the game.

[tomcat51]

The problem with modern warfare is it can be quite unbalanced. I'm not sure anyone adequately models asymetric warfare where an insurgent force that is little more than an light infantry unit faces off against the technologically superior forces of an industrialised nation. Maybe Two Fat Lardies new game? Haven't played it, but if you could capture that feel an make it so the insurgent force stood a chance I would be impressed. Maybe objective based gameplay with the insurgents needing to kill a lower number of their opposition to achieve victory.

[CarlLeyland]

I think that modern warfare of this sort needs a campaign mechanism so that one sides objectives may be totally different to the others. For example a militia force may perceive getting a few shots off at a patrol and living to tell the tale as a minor victory?
Just a thought, it would also add background to encounters.

[Elbows]

People here have hit on a lot of good points.

As a guy who likes to fiddle with and make rules, I like a particular style of game: non-tournament with a heavy dose of chance.  People either want to play Chess (an evenly matched strategic game w/ little chance involved) or they want a story game (chance, disaster, luck, laughs).  I think making good rules will come down to the design decisions.  Whatever you make, some people will dig it, others won't find it their cuppa.

1) Tournament style w/ aim at even and balanced strategy?
2) Fun/story/scenario based w/ emphasis on the luck (both good and bad) found in almost every operation?
3) Modern forces vs. modern forces?  Or modern forces vs. asymmetric opponents? (ie. terrorists, rebels, guerrillas?)
4) Do you want realism or hollywood? (ie. does everyone die, or do forces suppress, withdraw when defeated etc.)

Campaigns could be very fun, though if your aim is 10-15 miniatures per side that's an awfully small engagement to really generate a campaign.

With realistic modern rules you can use a whole host of unique challenges/situations

-Does one side have to follow strict rules of engagement? (ROE)
-Does one side have to protect civilians?
-Does one side have questionable supplies/ammo/materiel
-Does one side have access to high level intelligence, drones, satellites, intelligence services

Things I'd like to see in a modern 28mm game.

1) I'd prefer a slightly larger force, maybe platoon strength (25-40 figures, maybe light vehicle support etc.).
2) Lots of considerations for the engagement
3) A large gulf in skill levels where suitable
4) Neat rules for radio communications and requesting support
5) Environment/weather rules which affect the game
6) A dangerous environment for non-asymmetric forces (booby traps, IEDs, ambushes, etc.)
7) Mechanics where the professional army must make efforts to recover downed soldiers
Actual mechanics for medics/first aid kit during the engagement
9) Card or chart driven random events (nothing ever goes according to plan - the most famous fights/engagements were often where something went drastically wrong)
10) I like games with occasional hidden objectives (one side may not know the victory condition for the other side)

A lot of potential for some really intriguing modern games.

[ichwillauch]

I like the ideas presented here in this thread very much.
An idea for organizing a modern combat campaign might be:
The Setting: some tropical islands, low tech, several players.
Every player is controlling a faction (the president, leaders of the government army, government secret service, pirates, rebels, mining company, smugglers, drug dealer etc.) and has a secret campaign goal (like Junta Boardgame), for example winning the next election (by buying a lot of votes) to become the next leader of a group of islands or getting the biggest swiss bank account ever.
The income of every player is generated with the help of specialists that run the business (drugs, taxes, mining, tourists etc.) and some part of his income must be spent to protect every specialist and for military bases to attack other specialists. The list with all specialists and their individual level of protection is given to each other player. The level of protection will limit the access on the army lists for the defender, so the attacker has an idea what he might need to win the mission.
Now players can think about planning an operation (spent their own money) to neutralize the other specialists. A player must run down a complete plan for such a mission (maybe a gamemaster is needed), writing down the rules of engagement, explaining how his hit-team is moving from his main base to the island he wants to attack, how the hit-team is moving on the island, what he thinks he need to win the fight and finally how he wants to retreat and return to his home base and how he wants to recover wounded. So he buys not only the manpower and transports he must also spend money for communication, extraction points (maybe more than one, always have a “plan B”), landing zones, local intel, local supporters, backup, medical support, etc…
… and everything is not only really expensive but will generate Intel points that are given to the defender. Intel points are rumours that have reached the defender that a mission is planned against one of his specialists. From the intel point list the defender can see how much an attacker has spent on communication, manpower, transport and intel but he can’t see the details. With this information and the sum of all intel points the defender can now decide if he wants to buy additional manpower to protect his specialist or he can lay an ambush, prepare a trap (there is no specialist it’s a secret agent to be placed deep inside the enemy organisation and trained to sabotage future missions) or he can block extraction points etc..
The mission itself could be card driven with random event cards on one side and on the other side cards for each mission that were added by the attacker to the stockpile (access of local supporters, medical support etc.) and by the defender (blocking extracting points, blocking communications etc.) Here I would like to point to gaming mechanism like ACW Longstreet.
For the future of the campaign game (if I am on the lucky side) I can spend my earned money on additional specialists to get even more money, increasing protection levels to defend my remaining specialists, buying votes for the upcoming election, getting access to more troops and/or mercenaries, buying high tech equipment or I am forced to launch desperate operations and to make unholy alliances with other players if I think I am going to loose the campaign.
So the idea is to go for a very complicated campaign system and a more simple combat system for the missions.
What do you think?

[juergen c. olk]

As long as its simple so my friends can play it,we are all older ,and less inclined to spend time reading a lot of rules,or should I say me reading and teaching them.

[horridperson]

You started with flow as a design goal; Awesome  .  Fluid, intuitive rules with, "under the hood" mechanics with crisp solutions during game play are best to me.  I agree with juergen c. olk concerning simplicity;  Players should be wrapped up in what the mechanics are simulating not the mechanics.

The one thing I want to see more than anything in tabletop systems these days is the death of absolute, "I go-U go".  Initiative should be something that can be lost/seized during a turn that keeps the outcome uncertain and tension high. 

[Bushbaby]

Much interesting input! Thank you!

I did a last playtest a week ago (five player game), with fast game play (under 4 hours (must be considered good in a five player game)) and almost zero discussions or arguments concerning the rules. The players think that I shouldn´t change anything from now on. I agree with them on the basic mechanics, but the rules needs more fine tuning.

I have developed three rules that I contribute to reducing the number of sighs and arguments to zero.

1. A time limit for each turn. Depending on the skill level of your team, you are assigned seconds of gameplay to move your figures and issue orders. A team of 5 special ops characters gets around 5 minutes, while 10 militamen gets the same amount of time. This is to reflect how training affects decision making in battle stress. It also keeps down waiting time considerably and no one complained about having to wait for their turn. At the same time, all players had enough time to finish issuing orders for the most part, but it still kept the pace up in a good way.

2. A character standing next to a piece of terrain is ALWAYS considered to utilise that terrain to its maximum potential considering cover and protection. Before this rule, players spent 15 minutes trying to place their characters in the optimal angle.

3. A player declares field of vision for his characters when asked to. This means that when finished moving, let´s say behind a corner of a house, the player explains where the character may fire and from where he may be fired upon. This also helped a lot with reducing arguments.

The only problem is that since I was there, all players had a living Uncivil Wars-wiki at the table (me). The more I develop the rules, the more situations they need to cover. This is in one way troublesome, since they now encompass ten pages (maybe it isn´t that much? I haven´t read any other rule sets). On the other hand, the basic rules are pretty basic, it is the number of different combat events, vehicles, items of equipment and weaponry that creates the extra pages of rules. I believe the best way to create rules that fit both casual gamers and advanced ones it to have a system of basic, easy rules, and a set of advanced rules that are optional and could be added or ignored.

As additional and optional rules I have rules for the following:

Rain/weather/night
Ambushes
Booby traps
Civilians
"Leave no man behind"
First aid and casualties
Drugs
Discipline
Psychology (how stressful events reduces combat effectiveness and may lead to mental breakdown, and how leaders influence followers)
Supressive fire (part of the psychology section)
Weapon mishaps (missfire, jam and so on)
An advanced system for vehicle damage.
Helicopter rules and around 10 vehicles from technicals to BTR-80s and t-55s.
Damage on buildings
Rules for vehicles ramming other vehicles, buildings or pedestrians

BUT...

A good game consists of two parts. 1) the rules. 2) the mission/set up

The rules are actually the easy part. To create a believable mission that is both balanced and intriguing is the hard story teller/game master part. There are two ways to go:

Either assign one player as the game master and provide that player with an aid to create good missions, or to create a system of auto generative missions where all players partake in deciding the objectives and are assigned points for troop composition, weighted for attacker/defender, ambushes, booby traps and the such. As of now, I have created the missions for the players. I would actually opt for a system where one player creates the mission before (because it is very time consuming if you want a good mission) with a point system to balance it up.

Event cards:

A good mission don´t need random event cards because it have random events incorporated already. A boring mission may need them, but I have not felt the need to complicate things further in any of may games. Enough fun/strange occurances took place just by playing a good mission with the basic rules.

Initiative:

I actually felt no need for a system of initiative. The gameplay was intense, thanks to the time limit and not in any way predictable. I might look into it if the need arises.

Campaign game: (Ichwillauch´s idea)

Then there is the option of a campaign game play where your actions from one game affects the next mission. I love that idea Ichwillauch and have already started on a system like that. Like a grand strategy game between the tactical encounters. The question is how many players actually plays these kind of games where you meet the same players for a series of games in the same setting over the span of days, weeks or months? Because creating a game like that is like creating a whole new ruleset (and it takes months).

[Elbows]

I think the Beginners and Advanced idea is sound...works for a lot of games.  Particularly if you include a couple of beginner scenarios to get people into the flow of the basic mechanics, perhaps adding mechanics as your pre-planned missions expand.

I think a Game Master isn't a bad idea, but perhaps keep it optional as a lot of games are played between two people.  It helps with arguments, planting secret things on the board, and accomplishing hidden objectives.

I still prefer different methods of initiative, but it ain't my game!  Sounds good, do you have any pics from the game?