Dragon Rampant; may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts...

[tomrommel1]

I use Dragon Rampant for my GoT setting and it works a treat ( you can have special swords made from Valyrian steel and other things) . you have to do your homework and invent special abilities or things to make it work in your personal fantasy setting. I think that is not a week spot in fact it is the reason I purchased it . It has a wonderful 1980th feeling about it ! Yes I am that old

[LCpl McDoom]

Edit Edit- but diffrent topic
 Dude hit it on the head when he chose 12 miniatures, it just looks right. Every sample army I have looked at seems to have the "correct" model count to what you would expect out of a fantasy battle system (...that wasn't raiding your wallet for cash.) And I can't stop, just played another game of this at my store today and was laughing at how easy and fun it was to have miniatures on a tabletop...

DR is different, in that it's counted in Strength Points, not figures. I was never a GW fantasy/fudgehammer fan, but I did acquire some of the figures and beasties to use elsewhere in other games. So now I can have a Horde of Undead shuffling skeletons with clubs and broken weapons, all 24 figures of them, but at 12 SP for the Horde unit. When I take losses I just remove two figures not one.

Better still is the ability to have Reduced units - so a Unit that has 4 Cave Trolls in it for the full 12 SP, may also be fielded as a Reduced unit as a pair of Trolls for 6 SP instead.

Dare I say it, but if you completely sever the old notions derived from GW that units equal the number of figures in a production carton taken off the shelf, you'll discover even more flexibility to how you can use these rules. DR is a very clever toolkit that allows you to design your own 'Codex' for a fantasy race/kingdom/superpower from your own thoughts and ideas 

[Elbows]

And I'd argue there is little in stopping you from paying, say 150% of the cost of a unit to run, perhaps 18 strength points?  I haven't played in a while, but I see no reason.  It would be fine with me if a 24-strength unit was assembled at twice the cost.  Less maneuverable and more loss if it doesn't activate, but harder to stop?

I like the idea of Strength points as well, I ran a Giant a few times as a single Strength 12 "unit".

[LCpl McDoom]

Now that is an intriguing idea - Super-size units. (Great Roster sheet btw)

Discussing DR aspects like this makes me want to break it out onto the games-table, but I have TMWWBK set up on that at the moment. Must resist... but too weak.... 

[Momotaro]

Here are some thoughts I posted ages back on Another Forum on the subject:

There's a spell that lets you re-roll a failed activation, and a couple of Leader traits that let you pass a single activation per turn automatically.

Wild Charges do not cost you your turn if the roll fails, so choose your units and position them with care.

Summoner lets you place reserved units up-table and where you need them - you just need to get the summoner there first.

Hatred is very cheap and grants your unit a Wild Charge. Put it on a unit with Wild Charge already, and you pass the activation test automatically.

If you find that bad Activation rolls are wrecking your game, you may consider allowing the first activation to be re-rolled if it fails, or making it an automatic success. Or use one or two lower-level captains like Black Powder and Warmaster, who can give orders and if the roll fails then the unit can't be ordered again and your leader than takes over orders.  Basically allow for a coule of fails a turn.

I'm thinking that ending your turn on a failed activation, combined with how tough spells are to cast, stops you spamming Wizardling on multiple units. Nothing like befuddling an enemy before you attack, or giving everyone a powerful ranged attack.

I agree that if it's driving you to distraction, drop the rule.

I also find that allowing another 8-12 points on the Fantasy abilities after you've spent the base 24 points on units and unit variations is a good way to go.  DR units are often more expensive than LR units.  Also remember that base attacks can represent magical abilities too - a missile unit may be a wizard and his students who can cast a hail of arrows at the enemy.

How does it work in The Men Who Would Be Kings?

[fred]

It was the 'your turn ends on failed activation' that put me off DR. With a couple of bad dice rolls you can end up doing nothing for a couple of turns, and if your opponent gets lots of activations off it can swing the game.

In TMWWBK failing an activation just affects that unit, your turn continues. And all units get a type of activation that they can always pass (move for natives, shoot for regulars).

With DR, with a failed activation, I'd probably mod the game, so that the unit does nothing, and initiative switches to the other side. And so on until both players have activated all their units in a turn.

[Elbows]

Regarding super-sizing the game, I think there could also be a consideration for the following:

Each "army" consists of several companies, a company consisting of between 12-18 points (decided by players).  So an army may consist of three or four companies, each with their own HQ.  This means that during a turn the players could either alternate companies (one at a time) or activation rolls are done by company and not army.  So imagine Player A has three companies - if he is doing all of his companies in one turn, he would simply roll activations for one company until it failed.  That company would then cease and he'd move onto his next company, or something to that effect.

Loads of options to make the game something more fitting.  I like the idea of re-roll mechanics as well.  Each commander gets 3-5 re-roll tokens or something to that effect.

[WallyTWest]

With regards to retools- I love it when they cost points- it forces you to view them a resource and attach an abstract value to them- and I'm ok with it being a high cost- (even 1pt for 1 reroll if the math works out) you have to trade that stability for power.

Some better thought out fantastic abilities would be welcome- some stronger leadership traits- I wish there was a way to "boost" to 18 or 10; I like the idea of very large knight or infantry getting additional toughness- 150% seems to be about right from a math standpoint.

[Hobgoblin]

Wild Charges do not cost you your turn if the roll fails, so choose your units and position them with care.

That's a very good point. In the games we've played, there tend to be a fair few activation attempts per turn once the opposing forces close, because of all the bellicose foot, warbeasts and elite riders.

I really like the chance of turns ending immediately, as it makes manoeuvring much less predictable. I think it also makes the game faster and more involving. But I'm generally in favour of anything that breaks up the IGO/UGO turn sequence.

I'm thinking that ending your turn on a failed activation, combined with how tough spells are to cast, stops you spamming Wizardling on multiple units. Nothing like befuddling an enemy before you attack, or giving everyone a powerful ranged attack.

Good point!

I agree that if it's driving you to distraction, drop the rule.

I wonder if attitudes to this are determined by where you've come from, gamewise. My memories of Warhammer (for example) are long distant and seemed to involve an awful lot of games that had to be abandoned. But it was a given that you got to move all of your units each turn. I recall trying some alternating activation systems in other games that achieve the same thing.

But since I last played that sort of IGO/UGO game, almost every wargame I've played has been one that involves lots of unpredictability as to how much you can do in a turn (Hordes of the Things and Song of Blades and its kin). I much prefer that approach, and I think the resultant frustrations are a feature, not a bug.

To illustrate the contrast, I remember in Warhammer that it was easy to work out how many shots a defending unit of crossbowmen would get against an advancing enemy unit, even without pre-measuring. You can't do that in Dragon Rampant; you don't know whether your unit or the enemy one will be able to activate each turn, and there's the possibility that one of you might get successive activations to fewer or none.

That strikes me as a good thing - more unpredictability, more "fog of war" and more having to think on the hoof. Preset tactics are still likely to work, but there's that element of the best-laid plans going aft aglae that forces you to adapt and react constantly.

Also, I think a great thing about unpredictable activations is that you don't get all troops advancing at the same rate. That strikes me as a Platonic ideal that would be unlikely to materialise in practice. Instead, I imagine certain units jumping the gun, or holding back, or getting their orders wrong, or just being far more afraid than some of their peers. Dragon Rampant certainly gives you that effect, and you can end up with impetuous units (Bellicose Foot and Beast in particular) having far more activations than their less excitable peers. That strikes me as "realistic", at least as far as you can apply realism to hobgoblin berserkers or frothing-mouth wargs ...

Each to their own, of course! But I reckon unpredictable turns add a great deal of flavour.

I also find that allowing another 8-12 points on the Fantasy abilities after you've spent the base 24 points on units and unit variations is a good way to go.  DR units are often more expensive than LR units.  Also remember that base attacks can represent magical abilities too - a missile unit may be a wizard and his students who can cast a hail of arrows at the enemy.

[/quote]

Yes, the "Elbows variation" is a really good idea - not least because DR and LR can handle much bigger battles than the standard 24-point affairs.

[jon_1066]

A subtlety of the failed activation ending the turn is that higher activation units will tend to get activated even less.  So a 7+ unit is not usually going to be your first choice of unit to attempt to activate since it has a higher chance of failing.  This means the 5+ units will end up getting many more goes than those 7+ simply because the turn might end even before the 7+ get a chance to roll.  Only when it becomes critical that the 7+ moves does it become the first choice (or when you have activated everything else)

If you allow an auto re-roll for the first unit (or automatic success) you lose this effect.  Your 7+ unit suddenly becomes your first choice unit to activate.

[Argonor]

I much prefer that approach, and I think the resultant frustrations are a feature, not a bug.

It is a bug if it ruins the game for one side too often.

To illustrate the contrast, I remember in Warhammer that it was easy to work out how many shots a defending unit of crossbowmen would get against an advancing enemy unit, even without pre-measuring. You can't do that in Dragon Rampant; you don't know whether your unit or the enemy one will be able to activate each turn, and there's the possibility that one of you might get successive activations to fewer or none.

You don't need the 'end turn' to have that effect - if your crossbowmen or the attackers don't activate, there's stil unpredictabilty - even more so, as they don't get to try again quite as quickly as they might if the turn ends.

Also, I think a great thing about unpredictable activations is that you don't get all troops advancing at the same rate. That strikes me as a Platonic ideal that would be unlikely to materialise in practice. Instead, I imagine certain units jumping the gun, or holding back, or getting their orders wrong, or just being far more afraid than some of their peers. Dragon Rampant certainly gives you that effect, and you can end up with impetuous units (Bellicose Foot and Beast in particular) having far more activations than their less excitable peers. That strikes me as "realistic", at least as far as you can apply realism to hobgoblin berserkers or frothing-mouth wargs ...

Same as above - with different target numbers, poorer troop types are still prone to activate less often.

I haven't purchased TMWWK, but I think that when you look at LR - DR - TMWWBK you see the same ruleset (and, maybe, the mindset of the author) undergo a development. From LR to DR the most interesting change is the 'Strength Points' approach, instead of fixed unit model counts (I don't know if the concept is used for some kind of stuff in TMWWBK, but I think that, for instance Elephants, and maybe vehicles for later periods, might benefit from it), and then the overall inclusion of unit leaders and ditching of the 'end turn on failed activation' rule in TMWWBK.

It is a development I would have preferred to have happened during game design and play-testing BEFORE the actual publishing, but I guess Osprey's production deadline had to be met, and that it as not viable to have as many playtesters as some other game designers have by inviting the whole community to take part.

My overall approach to rules is that I have to be able enjoy playing a game RAW.

I often mod games I like playing if I find that something might be improved; a good example is God of Battles which I really enjoy playing, simply because of the way the game plays, but I would still like to alter some details to allow for more variety in scenario types, - but if I have to mod a ruleset right from the start, just to want to play it, it is a flawed design in my book, and I move on. With the Rampant rules, I even gave them a couple of extra chances, but they failed me over and over.

And, by the way, there is also some unpredictability built into the turn structure of GoB, because of the Alternate Activation sequence, and the use of 'Stratagems', I am not advocating frictionless games, and certainly not IGOUGO (one of the things that always put me off Warhammer was the turn structure where you could spend half the game or more just sitting on your backside while your opponent pondered about how to wheel that particular unit to be in position for that essential charge), I just think the friction should add to the gaming experience, not ruin it, as we have experienced it to do one time too many.
I/we simply not enjoy games where randomness gets the better of tactics time and again.

If it does not do so for you (or if you enjoy it when it does, as your post seems to suggest), so much the better for you, and, by all means, keep enjoying you games - my post was not so much to discourage anyone from playing the game, as to give a second opinion. Every set of rules has its strengths and weaknesses, and we all emphazize different aspects when gaming, thus what is a big issue for some becomes a minor thing to others, and vice versa.

[jon_1066]

...

It is a development I would have preferred to have happened during game design and play-testing BEFORE the actual publishing, but I guess Osprey's production deadline had to be met, and that it as not viable to have as many playtesters as some other game designers have by inviting the whole community to take part.
 ...

I just want to pick up on this.  The rule change from Dragon Rampant to TMWBK is not I believe due to greater play testing.  Lion Rampant had been released for a considerable time and many suggestions were incorporated into DR that had come from people playing LR in a fantasy setting.

The difference with TMWBK is that shooting is becoming more dominant so a failed activation becomes more damaging to an army since it gets shot to bits.  This is less an issue in LR and DR since ranged attackers are rarer and less deadly.  So on a failed activation your troops still get to defend in melee and generally mix it up with the opponent.  ie it was an intentional change due to changes in the other rules not from inadequate play testing.

[Hobgoblin]

It is a bug if it ruins the game for one side too often.

Sure - although I must have played something like 20 games of LR/DR, and all were gripping to the end.  I honestly can't recall a game being badly affected by poor rolls - they always seemed to even out. We tend to play a lot of units with Wild Charge, though, which gets the action going pretty intensely once the sides close.

You don't need the 'end turn' to have that effect - if your crossbowmen or the attackers don't activate, there's stil unpredictabilty - even more so, as they don't get to try again quite as quickly as they might if the turn ends.

That's true. For me, I think the key thing is the potential for swings in the initiative, so that one player isn't twiddling his thumbs for a considerable time.

I haven't purchased TMWWK, but I think that when you look at LR - DR - TMWWBK you see the same ruleset (and, maybe, the mindset of the author) undergo a development. From LR to DR the most interesting change is the 'Strength Points' approach, instead of fixed unit model counts (I don't know if the concept is used for some kind of stuff in TMWWBK, but I think that, for instance Elephants, and maybe vehicles for later periods, might benefit from it), and then the overall inclusion of unit leaders and ditching of the 'end turn on failed activation' rule in TMWWBK.

That's a really interesting point. I haven't really been following TMWWBK (I love the Kipling story, but it's a miniature project too far ...).

It is a development I would have preferred to have happened during game design and play-testing BEFORE the actual publishing, but I guess Osprey's production deadline had to be met, and that it as not viable to have as many playtesters as some other game designers have by inviting the whole community to take part.

Given the success of the LR/DR rules, though, I wonder if you've just been extremely unlucky. I once introduced a friend to SoBH. While the game turned out fine, we each had something like four turn-ending activations in a row. The game was vikings vs orcs; we each had a leader and wanted two or three activations to get a group activation going. But each time, despite both leaders being Q3, we got only a single success (not enough for a group activation) and so discarded the single action to try the next time. It was bizarre, and I've never seen it happen before or since (we rationalised it as the chanting of war-cries and the gnashing of shields). But it was entirely unrepresentative of how the game usually runs.

It's worth pointing out, though, that LR was a success in its own right before DR, so the system was widely played and enjoyed before the launch of DR. Many of our DR games are more or less LR games, as we don't tend to go overboard on the fantasy rules.

My overall approach to rules is that I have to be able enjoy playing a game RAW.

Same here! That and "time to table" are the key things for me (the latter being the only point against the excellent Mayhem and Havoc).

I often mod games I like playing if I find that something might be improved; a good example is God of Battles which I really enjoy playing, simply because of the way the game plays, but I would still like to alter some details to allow for more variety in scenario types, - but if I have to mod a ruleset right from the start, just to want to play it, it is a flawed design in my book, and I move on. With the Rampant rules, I even gave them a couple of extra chances, but they failed me over and over.

I haven't tried God of Battles. What tends to put me off games is any kind of proprietary "world"; I like context-free games like DR, SoBH and HotT, where the background is be dictated by the miniatures to hand rather than by any arbitrary constraints. I liked Warhammer much better when the "fluff" was limited to scenario-specific stuff against a background that was only very vaguely defined. So "Blood Gorged" and that kind of thing tends to raise my hackles - no doubt somewhat unfairly!

And, by the way, there is also some unpredictability built into the turn structure of GoB, because of the Alternate Activation sequence, and the use of 'Stratagems', I am not advocating frictionless games, and certainly not IGOUGO (one of the things that always put me off Warhammer was the turn structure where you could spend half the game or more just sitting on your backside while your opponent pondered about how to wheel that particular unit to be in position for that essential charge), I just think the friction should add to the gaming experience, not ruin it, as we have experienced it to do one time too many.

Couldn't agree more! And yes, that experience of Warhammer is exactly what I remember (dimly) from games of Third Edition. I think Warhammer was at its best in its first and second editions, where the games were generally skirmishes. And the strength, I think, was really in the scenarios rather than the system. I've played versions of the Ziggurat of Doom with SoBH, and it's a brilliant - and brilliantly simple - scenario.

If it does not do so for you (or if you enjoy it when it does, as your post seems to suggest), so much the better for you, and, by all means, keep enjoying you games - my post was not so much to discourage anyone from playing the game, as to give a second opinion. Every set of rules has its strengths and weaknesses, and we all emphazize different aspects when gaming, thus what is a big issue for some becomes a minor thing to others, and vice versa.

Yes, entirely agreed! I was really posting to provide a third opinion (embracing the unpredictability rather than enjoying it with caveats or not enjoying it at all).

One point I wanted to make on the original post: if you have movement trays set up for ten figures, why not just count a couple of command figures as doubles? That way, you can keep track of the strength points without any bookkeeping. So, if you have a leader and a champion, each is worth two command points, with the eight troopers representing one each. If the unit (somehow!) is reduced to three and still viable, then you can just use the leader and a trooper.

[mellis1644]

I know it is not necessarily a problem if you get to play a lot of games, but when you get together maybe only once or twice a month for a single game, it becomes a nuisance, which is why we moved on. I have had a couple of good games, but I think the game needs to get rid of the 'activate, or lose the rest of your turn' rule (and be more like TMWWBK), to be honest. Well, maybe in a later edition... 

I would not expect an later editions of Osprey rules. But why not just change it in your games to be like than. Dan even says his rules are not set in stone. I know some people hate the fail and lose your turn so in that case, allow every unit an activation each turn, or allow a number of failures before you lose your turn. As long a both players agree I don't see the issue with that type of change at all

These are really simple mods and although they change that aspect of the game I don't see them effecting everything else. It's not like I expect these rules to be massive competition rules etc. They are for fun and friendly games IMO.

Well just my though.

[sunspear]

Elbows-I think the "companies" idea is a great one, it allows you to scale up easily and gives the feel of large battles with multiple war leaders.