Does anyone have any experiences of multiplayer games?

[kerrygray8]

Has anyone tried playing Rogue Stars with 3 or more players (all-vs-all)?  I see the errata document has a brief bit about how this could work, but I'm just wondering if anyone out there has tried multiplayer yet?

I've been pondering how best to play the game multiplayer whilst keeping all players involved and this obviously revolves around the initiative / activation / reaction mechanism. Some options are:

1) When a model fails to activate the nearest enemy can try to react (as per the errata doc - could possibly lead to very localised activity with more distant models (and human players...) having to wait a long time to do anything?)

2) When a model fails to activate the opportunity to react passes from player to player in turn with each failure (e.g. Player A fails one activation, Player B may choose any one model to try and react; Player A then fails another activation, Player C may choose any one model to react; etc)

3) When a model fails to activate, ALL opposing players may react (probably means a lot more changes of initiative but might also keep things frenetic and engaging for 3+ players)

Any thoughts or experiences from the gaming table?

Cheers!

[Tanin]

Try this.

Each reacting player roll a d20, adding and subtracting their squads Reactive, Non Reactive and quality bonuses (i.e. Veteran, Elite, etc). Highest dice gets to attempt to react. For speed I would suggest one roll per group of fails (player rolls 3 activation dice but fails 2 so winning reactor gains 2 reactions) rather than rolling for each failed dice.

[Hobgoblin]

Has anyone tried playing Rogue Stars with 3 or more players (all-vs-all)?  I see the errata document has a brief bit about how this could work, but I'm just wondering if anyone out there has tried multiplayer yet?

I haven't tried multiplayer with Rogue Stars, but I have done a lot of multiplayer ASOBH, which has an essentially similar reaction system.

1) When a model fails to activate the nearest enemy can try to react (as per the errata doc - could possibly lead to very localised activity with more distant models (and human players...) having to wait a long time to do anything?)

This is the system I'd use - nice and neat, without extra rolls required (unless two opposing figures are equidistant from the failing models). One thing to remember: the squad takes the reaction, not necessarily the nearest figure. So, if you have your figures strung out across the board but also have one closest to the failing figure, you can react with the one farthest away if you like. That stops the activity from being overly localised. And as having a figure close to the enemy is risky, there's a built-in risk/reward aspect.
 

3) When a model fails to activate, ALL opposing players may react (probably means a lot more changes of initiative but might also keep things frenetic and engaging for 3+ players)

I've used this in ASOBH. It was fun, but it does get quite messy sometimes. I think that might be more the case in Rogue Stars. But it's worth trying out. If all the players know what they're doing, it could work OK.

I think number 2) might just be a bit too fiddly ("So whose turn it it now?"). My preference would definitely be for 1 - especially as the closest figure may well change over the course of a turn (as the result of combat or reactive movement).

[Tanin]

Although I see the merits of using the closest figure for speed I have found that the third player can be sitting idle for an extensive amount of time with the activation turn over passing between players one and two.

This can and has led to the first two players nearly wiping each other out and over an hours worth of play before player three gets to act and just mopping up the two weakened forces.

[Genghis]

I'd argue against the closest player getting to react as that would favour short-range/melee focused characters over those that like to keep their distance.  I've not tried it, but my initial thought would be to have both players roll for reaction, with the highest scoring getting to actually react (assuming they pass the roll).

Another aspect of multi-player games that I've not seen discussed yet is how to handle who gets initiative, and whether you add all other players' stress/pins/wounds for seizing the initiative?  For the latter aspect, I think total all opponent stress/pins/wounds & then divide by number of opponents.

As for who gets the initiative, I think that would have to pass in a consistent order (player A, B, C, A, B, C, etc) using the standard rules.  Any other form of competitive roll off between the reactive players would potentially leave one player out of the game for too long, especially if they're stacking up stress from reactions, but never get to clear it because they don't get to be the active player.  Thoughts? 

[Tanin]

In the multiplayer taking the initiaitive would work as normal. Firstly the reaction winner could take a TN16 test rather than a reaction. As you are trying to steal it from the active player it would be modified by his stress, etc.

For the 'free' roll generated by OOA and Critical Failures I'd say dice off but could see an argument for the OOA roll going to the side that put the figure OOA.

[kerrygray8]

Some interesting thoughts - thanks )

I guess the only way to know for certain is to playtest, but sadly my opportunities for doing so are few and far between (maybe 1 or 2 miniatures games per year if I'm lucky...........most of my gaming friends prefer RPGs when we get together....).

For many years I have been searching for the Holy Grail of a small skirmish game (fantasy or sci fi) which works well multiplayer, allows players to design their own forces and has a decent campaign element. As kids 25 - 30 years ago my friends and I played Necromunda and Mordheim but the games quickly suffered from power imbalances between gangs and these days my friends and I don't want to sit around for 30 - 60 minutes doing nothing whilst other players take their turns!

However, I think I may be able to 'sell' 2 or 3 of my gaming buddies on at least a couple of trial games of Rogue Stars....maybe it will be perfect for us )

For the record, I have previously failed to entice my friends into playing Flintloque 3rd Edition, Song of Blades and Heroes and Brink of Battle.......

[Tanin]

For fantasy small scale, if you have not tried it, I would try Frostgrave. Each player yas a warband of up to 10 models. The activation is done in three groups, so everyone uses their wizard and upto 3 others within a specified distance, then their apprentice and upto 3, lastly any not activated go.  Down time is about 3-5 minutes in a 3 player game.

It has progression, both with xp and equiptment and allows for a lot of customization. Also it handles multiplayer with ease.

Lastly, if like myself, you are a role player first, there is always AD&D 2nd ed Battlesystem Skirmishes. Long out if print but avalible through both ebay and amazon.

[kerrygray8]

I did indeed try Frostgrave, but my little group were a bit put off by the lack of advancement available to most of the warband.

Back to Rogue Stars multiplayer...... I'm assuming that if a player passes, initiative should always go to the next player on their left? Potentially this might result in some players not having the initiative for quite a while, but I guess this should balance out over time.....?

I'm thinking for example that something like this could happen: Player A has initiative; then Player C steals initiative; Player C passes initiative to Player D; Player A steals initiative; Player D steals initiative; Player D passes initiative to Player A; Player A passes initiative to Player B.

In other words, it has taken Player B ages to get initiative, but perhaps it is reasonable to assume that this is due to a mixture of bad dice rolls (failures to steal initiative) and bad decision-making (trying to react instead of steal?).

My gut feeling is that this would balance out over a long-ish game or over multiple games?

[Genghis]

Hmm, I'm not sure if that would lead to some players getting stacked up with stress and unable to react at all, hampering their ability to steal the initiative; they're then reliant upon the player to their right getting the initiative & then surrendering it.

How's this for an alternative: Upon initiative transfer, initiative always goes to the player to the left of the active player.  If initiative transfer is due to someone stealing the initiative, and that someone is not the player to the left of the active player, then the player who made the steal the initiative role gets to remove all their stress (as well as the formerly-active player).

I guess either system would need playtesting to see how they work in the real world, but my system would stop people being side-lined for too long, and would also do something about controlling the large amounts of stress that could accrue over many turns of being reactive.

[Comstar]

How we do it... and i'm sure this was picked up else where online and is very simple.
No worrying who is nearest and keeps the flow of the game going.
Oh and sorry for thread necromancy!

After a failed activation roll each of the other sides (only done as three player but could potentially be with more) get to say who on there side they want to react with or to try and seize the initiative.
The highest dice rolls that succeed win and go in highest to lowest order.

So for example a very unlucky player number one try to activate his trooper number one.
He rolls three D20's and fails all three rolls of which one was a 1 a critical failure!

In a three player game the two opponents say what they want to do and roll to see what happens.

Player two wants one of his troopers number two to move up and thump the unlucky trooper one in the face!

Player three wants to try and seize the initiative!

So player two rolls three dice (his squad has the tactical discipline of opportunist giving +1 to there reaction rolls).
One of these is a different colour for the critical failure earlier on with the plus two to the roll.
He gets 3, 10 and 14 on the odd coloured dice so a 4,11 and 17.
A TN10 is required so two successes.

So player three rolls (Player one has six stress tokens) needs to get a TN16 with a minus six to this for player ones stress.
So a 10 or more is required to seize the initiative and he gets 5, 6 and 11 on the odd coloured dice so this becomes a 13.

So what happens is this case:

Player two gets to move with his trooper two towards player ones trooper one.
Then Player three seizes the initiative.
Unfortunately player two would of got the third reaction but the turn has now gone to player three!
Clear all of the stress on player one then player three continues with his activation's.

Two of the gaming groups that I belong to use this system and it really works, so give it a try 

Cheers Matt

[nandrin]

For many years I have been searching for the Holy Grail of a small skirmish game (fantasy or sci fi) which works well multiplayer, allows players to design their own forces and has a decent campaign element.

Why not try Pulp Alley? It is great for multiplayer, story driven, easily adaptable for SF or Fantasy, has a campaign modus, and you can build your own forces. As a long-time RPG-player, I find it one of the best tabletop games with roleplaying elements available. You can download the basic rules for free and give it a try.

http://store.pulpalley.com/product-p/f100.htm

Regards,
nandrin