Making a unit

Sorry about the long wait, I decided to wait until I had restructured the turn system. Also sorry about the accidentally early post, I hit enter by mistake when writing the title and ended up posting it too early.

First off I have posted all the photos and the videos I took of Campaign. Here is a link to the photos and here are the links to the videos, Video 1, Video 2 and Video 3. If the links do not work please let me know.

So lets start. I have been vary busy with the game as well as other thing. Lets see were to start, I made a order for some bits off Pendraken Miniatures. These were two packs of ten Dwarfs with guns, a pack of engineers, four Jeeps and two Tracks. That solves some transport problem, however it can take up to 21 days until the post it off. So it will most likely be a long wait until I have them.

I have been working on some more designs for units, manly ones I have not added yet. These were ruff designs for Elf ABRACU and Dwarf SRACU. I will not be posting these pictures let.

I managed to test the game by myself on Thursday with the altered turn action rule I was thanking about from when I was at Campaign watch a game of BattleTech. Instead of Player One moves his units and then Player Two (the way I originally had it), to Player One moves a unit then Player Two moves a unit, alternates between sides until all units that the players wants to move has been moved. While doing movement with this seems to slow things down, combat seemed more fair. I have decided to take on these new rules, which is the main reason why this post is very late. However I felt that I needed to do some work on the weapons. I have decided to do some major changes the Rapid Fire rule. All standard weapon can be used more then once in a turn, however their accuracy drops the more attack a unit does unless the weapon they are using has Rapid Fire. It use to be that only weapons with Rapid Fire could be used more than once a turn. Also for the test game I pulled together a roster sheet in Excel. The rooster does need some changes. But it is fine for now as it is only a ruff sheet for testing. The picture is from the testing.

Apart from point changes to weapon due to the rules change there has not been any major changes to the database. And the only change I have done to the rules I have posted is that Melee state with removed from unit as it is better to state that only SRACUs and infantry can make only make unarmed attack and then add abilities to change this when needed.

Lastly before we move on to this updates rules section, I have two bits of news to report. First of all I have found some nice Mechwarrior Terrain sets on sale on ebay. These the Wilderness Terrain set, the Reactor and Ruins set, the City Block and Ruins and the Manufacturing Facility set. These were all made by Gale Force Nine and are office Mechwarrior terrain. They also come with an excursive faction Mech and a pilot card to go with it. I am thinking on picking up two City Block and Ruins sets and one Manufacturing Facility next week.

The second big news, drum roll please...... I have been sculpting a standard Small SRACU design. It is almost ready for "first stage" casting. All I have to do is make some feet and weapons, as well as buying some Silicone Rubber. First stage casting, to me, is casting a basic template that I can make half a dozen to a dozen copy to alter for all the different version, weapons and poses. I will try to member to post pictures the sculpture in the next post. I have been many using Brown stuff (Milliput Terracotta) then green stuff (Epoxy Modeling Putty) as it is better for armoured surfaces as it can easily be sanded smooth.

Oh and if you have not noticed I am always adding more Labels to old posts to help find people find things as the blog grows.

Well I best get to this post rules section, Basic Turn Structure. Hope you all enjoy. Until next time some time next week.


Basic Turn Structure

During the game you take command of your force. Your opponent commands a rival force and your deadly opponents in the forthcoming conflict.
The units and scenery (the terrain) are set up on the tabletop/battlefield as appropriate for the mission you are playing. Missions are covered later on in the rules under the “Running a Game” chapter. There are many different types of missions, varying from the straightforward battle to a rescue mission, ambushes and daring raids. Depending on the mission being played, you can set up your units in different ways, but all games are basically played in the same fashion. Below shows how each game turn is structured.


Turn Order

Each turn is split up into eight phases. Each player takes it in turn giving each of their units actions with each phase unless otherwise stated. The first player must finish all their actions in that phase for a unit , if any, of the current phase before the second can start their actions for the same phase, and also the last the last player must finish the current phase before the first player can start the next phase. These eight phases are:

1. Initiative Phase
Both players roll a D10 each and add their TCV to their dice roll. TCV means Team Command Value and is covered later on in the “Extra Rules” chapter. The player with the highest result may choose to be ever Player One or Player Two. If there is more than two players then there will be more than just Player One or Two. The next highest will choose from whatever is left, and so on until there are no more players. If there is a draws, then it is determined by the players’ TCV. If there is still a draw after that then the players must roll a D10 roll to determine who is higher. Also all abilities and/or skills that state “at the beginning of a turn” takes place here but after the dice rolls.

2. First Movement Phase
During this phase units can make up to two move actions, if they are able to do so. Player One chooses one unit and moves it first. If Player One has more units than Player Two, they may need to move more than one unit, as described in the Unequal Number of Units. Then Player Two moves one unit. If Player Two has more units than Player One, it may need to move more than one unit (again see table below). Movement alternates between sides until all units that the players want to move has been moved. The unit must make all its move actions for that Phase while being moved.

3. First Strike Phase
During this phase units can use any Quick Actions in this phase. Also units that made a Charge Move Action that was unhindered by terrain and the unit did not make any turns it the move, they can make one standard melee attack ageist their target in this phase. This is classed as a Quick Action. Player One chooses one of their units that can make a Quick Action. If Player One has more units that can make Quick Actions than Player Two, they may need to make Quick Actions on more than one unit, as described in table below. Then Player Two does the same. Movement alternates between sides until all units that the players want to make Quick Actions have acted. A unit can only make one Quick Action a Turn.

4. Shooting Phase
During this phase units can make any number of range attacks. Player One makes their attacks first, then Player Two and so on. Player One chooses a unit to declare fire first. If Player One has more units than Player Two, they may need to declare range attacks for more than one unit as described in Unequal Number of Units. After all the range attacks that unit is going to make, Player Two then chooses a unit to declare fire with. Again if Player Two has more units than Player One, they may be required to declare range attacks for more than one unit (see Unequal Number of Units). The act of declaring range attacks alternates between players until
all fire has been declared.

5. Second Movement Phase
During this phase units can make up to two move actions. Remember Units cannot make more move actions than half (rounded up) their Output value during the whole turn. This runs like the First Movement Phase.

6. Melee Phase
During this phase units can make any number of melee attacks or one ram attack. This runs like the Shooting Phase, but its Melee Attack then range.

7. Support Phase
During this phase units can make one support action unless otherwise stated. Support actions are only gained from skills, powers and special abilities. Player One makes their actions first, then Player Two and so on.

8. End Phase
This is a clean up phase, where action counters are cleared, Courage tests are made and recovery attempts are made. There is no real order in this phase, however if there is more than one


Unequal Number of Units

The Movement Phases, First Strike Phase, Shooting Phase and Melee Phase require each player to alternate moving or declaring attacks with his or her units. When both sides have an equal number of units, each player simply takes a turn moving or declaring a single unit’s action, then the other player declares movement or attack for one unit, and so on. If the number of units on each side is not equal, however, this procedure must be altered. If, prior to any pair of movement or attack declarations, one team has at least twice as many units left to declare for as the other team, the team with twice as many units declares for two units rather than one. If one team has at least three times as many units, it declares for three each time, and so on. However if a player does not what to move or declare attacks any more during that phase they may declare so and then the other play may move or declare attacks with the rest of their forces if they wish.


Action Costs and Counters

Before we move on to the next chapter Movement, it is best that we cover Action Costs and Action Counters. Each time a unit makes an action, that action has a cost of call Action Cost. Before the unit makes an action, the player must places a number of Action Counters equal to the action’s Action Cost onto the unit. Before placing counter, if the number of Action Counters will be more than unit’s pilot’s Reflexes value, then the pilot must take an Endurance 5 test for each counter over there reflex value. If they fail any of these rolls, the counters are not placed onto the unit meaning the action does not happen and it cannot make any more actions for the rest of that turn. Endurance tests will be covered in the Extra Rules chapter. If the action happens then if there is more Action Counters on the unit then it’s Output value, then the unit will take D6 damage that ignores armour for each Action Counter over its Output value. During the End Phase, remove the unit’s Output value in Action Counters from the unit.

Campaign 2010, 8th and 9th of May

When should I start….. Campaign is a Wargames convention that happens in Middleton Hall at thecentre:mk. Thecentre:mk is a large indoor shopping centre (Mall for the reads from the USA) of Milton Keynes and was if not is the large indoor shopping centre in Europe. It happens every year on the weekend of the first full week of May.

I was originally going to Campaign to look for M.S. Wars and for some “Hammer of Thor” Heroclix stuff. However, the weekend before, I decided to bring some of my old gaming stuff that I do not use anymore to the “Bring and Buy” stand. The “Bring and Buy” stand is a stand that they always have were you can bring your old stuff, they will sell it and take 10% commission from what you sell. I brought a lot of my Games Workshop stuff, only keep my Tau, Space Marines, Chaos Space Marines and The Lost and the Damned (Tau based) forces for Warhammer 40,000, Chaos and Undead for Warhammer and all my Necromunda and Inquisitor. I also kept any Imperial Guard I had to be use in Necromunda for as Goths in M.S. Wars.

On the first day I browsed around with the £50 birthday money I had. I ended up buying with it:

• A ton of “Arkham Asylum” Heroclix figure as there was no “Hammer of Thor” Heroclix stuff at all sadly.
• A pack of Natal Native Horse from a 10mm Zulu miniatures to be used as Horseback infantry for M.S. Wars.
• Four small 1:144 tanks to be used as Light Tanks for M.S. Wars
• A ton of plastic plants and some resin alien plants for terrain.
• Some MechWarrior Helicopters.
• A Pack of BattleTech Gnome Battle Armour miniatures to be used as Powered Armoured infantry for M.S. Wars.
• A Vanilla Latté
• A Pack of three Pens
• A Sugar Free Easter egg for £1 for my mum.

Ok the last three was not at Campaign, but was brought at or on the way to have Coffee with my mates, who join me at Campaign afterwards for a couple of hours. Me, Rich and Jake had a demo of Magic: The Gathering. Both myself and Rich had played Magic before and had our own deck at home, but Jake wanted to know how it was played. Rich won the game like always and we got to keep the Demo packs we used and same common cards from their free cards box. I got the Black demo pack and three other cards, 2 x Akrasan Suire (a white card) and 1 x Tanglesap (a green card). There were many games being played, from major Tournaments for games like Flame of War and DBMM, massive participation battles between Lizermen and Undead , small demos of games like Warmachine, too club made games like Lego Star Wars. At one of the tables there was a 10mm World War II game. I had a chat with them about 10mm models and they pointed me to a site called Pendraken Miniatures. At about 5pm I collected what money I had made so far as I was going to be picked up by Rich sometime between 5:30pm and 6pm to go to my birthday party. I had made just over £80, after their 10% had been taken off. I decided to pop into a computer game store to pick up Final Fantasy XIII as it has dropped below £30. I also ended up buying Dead or Alive 4, a battery pack for my second X-Box 360 controller and a wireless Nunchuk for my Wii. I ended up spending over £60, damn it. That was it for the first day.

The second day I planned on going on demos, but sadly all the games I wanted to try where ever very busy or the staff were busy selling stuff or demoing other games. I manage to get a game of a World War One aerial combat game and to watch Battle Tech and Warmachine being played. Watch BattleTech being played give me a couple of ideas. I did talk about focusing on the smaller S.R.A.C.U.s already in the last update, but there is one other change I might be do. I will talk about it in the next game update. I also spent the left over money on:

• Some more Heroclix Figures.
• MechWarrior: Technology Guide.
• And two books on the Roman Empire for my mum

I also managed to take some pictures and video of Campaign. I am posting a picture now and then setting gallery for the full set at a later date as this is taking too long to write to wait until I have done the gallery to post this. I collected what I had not sold and the money I made at the end of the second and last day of Campaign 2010. I manage to earn £140 more, which most has been banked. Sadly I still had a lot of stuff to bring back. I might be able to great rid of my Warhammer 40,000 Elder stuff, but the rest will ever have to ever want until next year or me getting around to post them up on e-bay.

Well over all it was a good weekend and I am hoping my game will be ready for next year to test at the event.

The New Mobius Campaign

Sorry for the long wait, been busy with Campaign, my birthday party, tidying my bed room and playing Final Fantasy XIII. While, I have split this post into four parts: Campaign, Updates, Rules and Story.


Campaign

A full Campaign review will be added later ever here or on my other Blog Neoscream's Log. After watching some of the games, Battle Tech and Warmachine mainly. Some new ideas have come to mind. The main one is that the smaller SRACU will play more of a mass role while the larger ones will take more of a power house role. I also brought a load of terrain bits and some models to use as house back infantry, powered armoured infantry, more tanks and helicopters. Plus I gained a link to 10mm website called Pendraken Miniatures, which I plan on making a order for some Jeeps and some Dwarfs with guns soon as the P&P is cheep at the moment. Sadly there are not many pictures of the models they do so I will not know what they look like until they arrive.


Updates

With the rules I have posted on the last post, I have changed Bikes to Mounts and moved them to Infantry as well as adding a new race that I forgot about.

Goths
These are huge humanoids that stand around 6 meters tall making them Size Class 1. Because of this there is only one on a base.

Mounts
This is not a race, but a special type of infantry unit. These are infantry riding beasts or things like motor bikes. They can also require several ranks it other Tech groups like Ground Vehicle for Bikes. There are normally Size Class 0 with one or two mounted units on a base depending on the mount.

Also there has been some major changes to the database and the pilots table has been updated to Mobius SRACU standard. The picture above is the current look of the Army listings.


Rules

Now it is time to add some more parts of the rule book to the site. The characteristics of Pilots and Units. I was going to do these as two updates but as I did not update last week I will do them as one post.


Characteristics - The Pilots

Pilots of any mecha universe have wildly varied martial skills and physical abilities. Some are faster than others, some are stronger, some are more determined, some are better shots, and so forth. This tremendous variety is fully represented in the game in the form of pilot stats. The pilots skills and Special Abilities will be covered in later chapters. This first part of this chapter concentrates on the pilots states. Each pilot is defined by a set of stats namely: Melee Attack, Range Attack, Command, Endurance, Reflexes, Morale and MP. Descriptions of the different states are given below.

Melee Attack – Melee Attack is a measure of close combat ability – how good the pilot is at hand-to-hand fighting. A good swordsman or a skilled Martial-Artist would have a high value compared to a un-trained pilot, for example. An average value is 8. When a rule states Attack values it is talking about both the Melee Attack and Range Attack value.

Range Attack – Range Attack shows how good a shot the pilot is. When you shoot a gun the chance of hitting a target depends upon your Range Attack. An average value for this is 8. When a rule states Attack values it is talking about both the Melee Attack and Range Attack value.

Command – Command shows how commanding, charming, intelligent, respected or feared by others, raw courage and the self-control of the pilot is. This pilot with the highest Command is normally the leader of the team/force. This is normal the Ace, however the skill “Officer Training” can change this. The average value for this is 1.

Endurance – Endurance is a measure of how tough, physically and mentally the pilot is from withstanding heavy blows or pushing their body to its maximum. If the pilot’s Endurance drops to zero they become Unconscious. Most pilots have an Endurance value 1 but veteran pilots can have a value of 2 or more.

Reflexes – The Reflexes value represents alertness and reaction speed. It determines how many actions a pilot can make without pushing and how fast they can react. An average value for this is 3 for a standard human.

Courage – The ability to stand in the face of fear and terror. This is how brave the pilot is.

MP – MP is shot for Mental Power. Not all pilots have this state. This is used for special powers. This state is currently not in use.



Characteristics - The Units

Units have states just like pilots but these states represent the technical level and have well the unit was build. Some are faster than others, some are more durable, some are stronger, some are easier to shots, and so forth. This second part of this chapter concentrates on the units states. Each unit is defined by a set of states namely: Move, Accuracy, Armour, Size Class, Strength, Output, Defence and DC. Units also has Abilities, but these will be also covered later in the rules. Descriptions of the different states are given below.

Move (Movement) – Move or Movement as it is sometimes called, shows the number of inches a unit can move on standard move action on a standard terrain type for they move type. Most units can make more than one move action a turn the number of move actions a unit can make is determined by the unit Output. The average for this value is 4.

Accuracy – Accuracy represent how accurate the targeting system of the unit is. This is a bonus and penalty to the pilot’s Attack values. This also includes any bonuses or penalties from the unit’s size as well. The average for this value is 0.

Armour – Armour is how much damage a unit can ignore. The range of the value of armour is from 0 to 6. The average for this value is 2. There is a table to go with this but I cannot fit it here.

Size Class – Size Class shows how big the unit is. This is also used for some terrain like buildings for elevation. These are mainly between 0 and 3 for standard units. The table on the next page shows the maximum real world and figure sizes for each Size Class up 10. The average for this value is 1.

Strength – Strength simply shows how strong a unit is. Strength is especially important when you fight in hands-to-hand combat and ram attacks because the stronger a unit is the more damage they are able to do. The average value for this is about 3.

Output – Output is many actions a unit can make in a turn without taking pushing damage. A unit can make up to half rounded their Output value up in move actions. The average value for this is about 3.

Defence – Defence represent how hard or easy it is to hit unit. This is add to the attackers dice roll and not their Attack values. The average value for this is about 0.

DC – DC is short for Damage Capacity. This is how much damage a unit can take before it becomes out of action. Hitting 0 or less DC does not mean that the unit has been destroyed. The average value for this is about 20.

Melee – Even thou it is listed with the abilities, it is not a standard ability. It is an indicator that states if the unit can make unarmed melee attacks or not.


And that is it for this week. I should be back to normal tomorrow. Until then see you all. Oh and the Campaign report will be be coming up sometime soon on ever this blog or on my other Blog Neoscream's Log.