Adventure Maximus! and Risus: RPGing with my 5 Year Old

The Young Lord Shadowmoss, who recently turned 5, has been playing far more Minecraft than is probably healthy. So, Saturday afternoon I suggested we shut down the laptop and break out Adventure Maximus! to resume the adventures of his druid wolf-kin, Squiddy, and his great white shark companion (whose name changes every time, this time it was 'Jaws').

I'm not a fan of the game system (the rules could use some clarifying in my opinion), but the Young Lord likes the  pictures on the cards (as do I), not to mention he has a restaurant with a gargoyle chef and a trimera he befriended in the course of earlier adventures The response was enthusiastic, although it was another 30 minutes before he shut down Minecraft.

That was fine, because I hadn't thought about what to do for an adventure.Thanks to the restaurant, I've used special/rare ingredients as McGuffins many times now but I wanted to mix it up a bit.

This time around, Squiddy was hired by the Big Bad Wolf to clear his name. It seems 'grandma' had been trying to frame Big Bad for some unnamed crime that she had committed. Knowing Squiddy has been desperate to find a sword, Big Bad naturally offered one as a reward - I figured, correctly, that even if he didn't care one iota about the purpose of the adventure, he'd care about that sword. According to the Wolf, grandma was camped out in her cottage at the top of Big Rock Candy Mountain, and so Squiddy prepared for his trek.

I told the Young Lord that Squiddy couldn't possibly carry all of his gear up the mountain (over several adventures he's amassed quite a haul, everything from a pillow to a bow that turns any enemy that it hits into a bunny). The first order of business was preparing for the journey to grandma's house and role-playing packing for the trip- we reviewed all of the equipment and discussed the merits and disadvantages of each, before settling on a modest number of items: 1 range weapon (the aforementioned bunny bow), 1 melee weapon (the snail flail)  and 1 oddball item (gas gun).

Gear selected, he and Jaws made the journey - which I mostly hand-waived other than asking him what if anything he was doing along the way. It turned out, he was very concerned with finding food for Jaws. After some discussion, we decided a special delivery of sandwiches by the gargoyle chef was on the way.

It seemed logical to me.

Near the top of Big Rock Candy Mountain, Squiddy and Jaws, now full on sandiwches, were assaulted by animated snow men - six in all - hurling snowballs at them. Squiddy's first move was to spray the gas gun - missile weapons can't hit through the cloud. I told him right out that I was impressed by that tactical decision and he beamed, and then explained to me why I was impressed.

He was completely wrong, mind you. Still, it's fun to hear how his mind works. I always find the way kids his age rationalize things to be pretty amazing.

In the next round, he surprised me again and instead of jumping into the fight, Squiddy cast his spell to summon a creature to fight alongside him and some pixies showed up and joined the fray. The snowmen went down pretty easily between Squiddy, Jaws and the summoned Pixies..

Grandma, it turned out, was some crazy Ursula-from-The-Little-Mermaid tentacled thing (it's a boss monster in the game, but I forget the name and I'm nowhere near the box to go find the card) and she was pretty tough. When she refused to come quietly and confess her scheme to the law (probably because Jaws broke down the door instead of knocking), the fight was on.

Her first spell charmed Jaws into believing she was his friend. This was a tough choice as a dad, but it seemed the most in character for her - after all, Jaws was right up on her and a clear threat. (I refuse to fudge dice rolls with him either, rolling everything in the open. Call me a hard-ass, but I don't believe in just letting him win.)

Of course, that didn't go over without notice, and the Young Lord did not take it well. He was confused and seemed to think Jaws was now the evil grandma's companion, and I had to continually remind him that Jaws was still his companion, he just happened to like grandma too. In any case, he and by extension Squiddy were ready to destroy grandma now.

Her second spell gave her an extra pair of arms and an extra attack each round. I felt bad about casting this one, figuring Squiddy, without Jaws, might now be outgunned. As luck would have it, I rolled poorly for her attacks thereafter, only causing 1 point of damage to Squiddy.

Besides, I'd forgotten his Summon Creature spell, so, with the help of a summoned pirate and judicious use of his own snail flail, Squiddy put the hurt on grandma, brought her to justice, and claimed his reward.

He was justifiably excited - he earned that sword.

**********
EPILOGUE:

I was pretty drained after our game (it lasted less than an hour but if you have a 5 year old or thereabouts, or ever have, then I think you understand) but he then wanted to try Risus, which I've been trying to get him to try for months now.

I had to seize the opportunity and at least get character generation taken care of.

It seemed to me that the best way to get his character created in such an open ended system would be to guide him with questions to describe what he imagined his character was like and I'd deal with getting him to 4 cliches by asking as many questions as needed.

Here, verbatim, are the answers he came up with as he ran around the room and jumped on the sofa :

• 1/2 Stormtrooper 1/2 master wizard demon who casts crazy awesome spells and other weird stuff (4) 
• Protector of other demons (3)
• Swimmer (2)
• Gun collector (1)

You can see why the after school teacher pulled me aside the other day to ask if the Young Lord has a lot of toy weapons at home.

Oh, and the character's name? Demon Stormtrooper Wizard Man

Fire Team Risus

I've been messing around with the scenario generator in Platoon Forward again, and this time generated a Screening Mission. I decided to take 2 squads without an overall commander to see if World War Risus could handle something that small.

In the event, it can, but it wasn't terribly fun. Without a leader to roll extra dice for a given sides, whole turns went by without any action.

But still, there's nothing inherent in WWR that should make it work only for higher level games. Reading Beer and Pretzels Skirmish (recently acquired), I realized the trick would be to make the smallest element the fire team / 1/2 squad. This is also what Disposable Heroes / Coffin for Seven Brother does, by the way.

And so, I based my squads 3 figures to one base and 2 to another. The 3 figure base had the squad LMG, while the 2 figure base was the rifle fire team. It really didn't matter - the figures are irrelevant but I could have given +1 die to the LMG fire team base.

What I have is basically 1:2 ratio of figures to men, except when I don't. My MMG unit for instance consists of 2 figures and is 1:1-ish.

The replay was delayed a bit by the tornado that is Pumpkin. A secret weapon for the Allies, her destruction is somewhat indiscriminate. 

Here is part way through turn 1, after the fire team in the yellow house spotted the German blind, and revealed the blinds for the whole force: The .30 cal MG and the 2nd squad's fire teams have not moved yet.

I totally forgot to take additional pictures because I got caught up in the game. That doesn't mean everything was perfect though.

Each base has a Combat Effectiveness cliche, Leadership cliche and a Morale cliche.

Every base rolls Leadership for initiative which takes a butt-load of time, so there's something that needs to be done there.

On the plus side, you won't know which unit is going to act or in what order - always good in solo games. Also, there were fewer occasions where one side did nothing.

I adjusted the morale check a bit as I'm finding it as written to have more impact than i'd like. Units were taking a check every time they were shot at, hit or miss. Now, I take it only if the attacker scored a hit (whether or not it caused damage). The exception is when the target scores 2 or more successes than the shooting unit - no morale check is required in that case.

I also returned to removing 1 cliche die when hit regardless of how many successes more the attacker scored than the target. This extends the life of the individual units and in a small game like this, that's a good thing. Although i kept the automatic loss of Morale cliche die when a target was outscored by 2 or more successes.

Something I didn't change, but will next time, is the morale check results:

• 0 successes = fall back 2 moves, to nearest cover if possible, then pinned and lose 1 morale cliche die
• 1 success = fall back to nearest cover, if no cover within 2 moves, then pinned 
• 2+ successes = carry on

One final issue I feel merits addressing is what to do with units that have 3 or more pins on them. Regardless of their Combat Effectiveness cliche or Morale Cliche, at that point they are almost undoubtedly a write off.

A Bridge Even More Too Far : A World War Risus Session Report

I was itching to play some World War Risus, both for my own amusement, but also to post an example of play.

So, I used Platoon Forward (hereafter referred to as PF) to generate a scenario. My force, the US, would attack, with the objective was to occupy and hold a bridge. 

I placed that more or less central on the table, randomly generated the terrain using the method outlined in PF and then diced to see which side of the table was mine.

The scenario description recommended using my entire platoon. The remaining support was diced for per the scenario's description.

The Final OOB:

1 Platoon HQ
3 x Rifle Sections
1 x Heavy Weapon team
1 x Sherman

The enemy ended up with 4 Type A blinds and 3 Type C blinds. Blinds can be nothing or something. A is usually infantry, C is armor and such.

I also used the PF guidelines for determining leadership ability and translated those into World War Risus cliche dice.

I decided that the German platoon commander would have a Leadership to match mine, so 4 dice, with the stipulation that any successes the German Commander rolled could be used by any German unit on the board, regardless of LOS (since to start with, the commander wouldn't even be on the table).

The set up:

The brown in the foreground are fields and an orchard. I wasn't keen on using the rubble, but I rolled up 2 buildings for that section, so I had to make do.

I diced for my troop locations (not part of the scenario but a preference I have):

Turn 1

US - 2 Successes to Germans - 1 success.

I decided to distribute both successes, 1 to 1st section (my right) and 1 to 2nd section (my center).  

1st section rolled 1 Leadership success, which gives them 2 total.

With orders to advance to identify possible enemy movement in the woods opposite, they made their way into rifle range.

Here I decided that to spot a blind, they had to roll their CE, and with 1+ success they would succeed. In retrospect, I think I'd prefer to use the Risus target numbers.

In any case, they failed.

2nd Section also rolled one success 1 success (with only 2 cliche dice for Leadership, that was pretty good) + 1from HQ, so they moved up to the bridge. [I SHOULD have had them try to spot the blind, but for some reason didn't]

Meanwhile, the 3rd section, out of sight of HQ, had orders to advance to the edge of the orchard and try to ID any enemy by the house opposite. 

They rolled 1 success and advanced towards edge of field, but didn't quite reach it and were thus still concealed themselves.

The Sherman rolled 2 successes (the crew had a Leadership of 2 cliche dice, so that was awesome), and advanced parallel to 3rd section. The extra point was wasted.

The bazooka team scored 1 success and moved towards the road, using the ruins as cover.

The Type A blind in the woods had a clear shot at S1, and so I decided it would reveal itself. 

I rolled on the table in PF, and it turned out to be an infantry squad. 

I rolled for their Leadership and got 2. They rolled and scored 1 success and opened fire on 1st section with three successes!

1st section rolled and scored 1 success. With 2 less than the Germans, they lost 2 dice from their Combat Effectiveness cliche, and automatically lost 1 from their Morale cliche, before taking the Morale check. They scored one success on the Morale test which meant they were forced back and pinned.

I decided the Type A blind behind the wall would reveal itself as well (if it was anything), to get a shot at my section approaching the bridge:

It too was an infantry squad, although with 3 Leadership cliche dice.

Their Leadership roll scored 2 successes, so they opened fire; 2 successes.

My 2nd section rolled ZERO in response and thus lost 2 CE cliche dice and 1 Morale cliche die. The morale check could have gone worse, I suppose, as they fell back pinned, like 1st section.

At this point, I didn't think any of the other blinds needed to be revealed, since if anything, it might help my cause to know what remained.

At the end of turn 1, I had two sections reduced to Combat Effectiveness of 1 die, with Morale down to 2 dice each. 

This isn't a good way to start.

Turn 2 and 3
My troops made no progress and in fact, lost a bit.

1st section unpinned and began to move for cover behind the farmhouse, but didn't quite make it. 2nd section could not unpin and kept their heads down while the squad leader shouted for them to get up and make a run for cover.


The bright star in an otherwise dark void, 3rd section advanced to the orchard's edge to fire on the German's behind the low stone wall. Unfortunately their shooting was ineffective, while the same could not be said for the German squad, who, on their half of the turn, returned fire, and forced 3rd section to fall back pinned, and lose 1 die from their Morale cliche.

My bazooka team dove for cover behind the ruins, and the Sherman got stuck in a rut in the fields, as it did not change position.

At the end of each of these turns, using the table in PF, similar to Mythic GME, I asked, "Will the Germans reveal any blinds?" and set the possibility to Very Unlikely. I rolled a 4, which meant, no.

Phew!

Turn 4

I decided I would try to gain contact with 3rd section and the tank (I kind of abandoned hope for 2nd section and I was just trying to preserve the 1st section) and began to move in that direction.

1st section managed to get behind the farm house, finally, but the other two sections were hugging the dirt.

At least the Sherman's crew finally took some initiative and advanced to the edge of the field. With only 1 success scored, that was all they could do.

The squad on the German left scored two successes. So I asked the all knowing table if they would move. I though that was very unlikely, but the dice felt otherwise. 

I asked if they would fall back and got a no, so they advanced towards the bridge (about half-way), which put them in firing range of my 2nd section in the center.

They did no damage, but forced a morale check, which the 2nd section failed, leaving them double pinned at the table's edge.

The squad behind the wall opened fire on the tank (this was more to test that rule a bit, than for a good decision) in hopes of driving it back but failed.

Turn 5

I'll be honest, things were looking bleak.

Section 1 did nothing. Section 2 failed to unpin. Section 3 at least unpinned but had nothing left for any other actions.

The Sherman finally got off a shot at the Germans behind the wall, but, despite rolling 7 dice, scored only 1 success. The Germans handily avoided any damage and even passed their morale test (with 3 successes!).

The squad on the German left finished moving to the bridge.

New German forces arrived in the center (they should have arrived last turn): a squad and a Panzer IV.

At least the new German squad had a Leadership cliche of only 2 and did nothing. The Pz.IV took advantage of the road and advanced to the bridge to support the German squad already there.

Meanwhile, the German squad behind the wall figured it wasn't safe there anymore and abandoned their position, intent on putting the house between it and the Sherman.

Turn 6

Section 1 and Section 2 again did nothing, the bazooka team advanced into the ruins, albeit too late, to try to get close for a shot at the Panzer.

Fortunately, the Sherman opened fire on the Panzer and scored 4 successes to zero! Using the rule the one-shot kill rule for vehicles, I re-rolled those 4 dice and scored a 13 (>=10 was the target) and the Pz.IV was destroyed!

Still, there would be no joy in Mudville.

The Germans by the bridge scored 2 successes.

First, they opened fire yet again on the 2nd section, who had been busy dining on delicious French soil. With only 1 die left in Combat Effectiveness, they were done for the day.

Then, using the 1 success from initiative, plus their remaining 1, the Germans fired a second time (each successive action of the same type in the same turn costs 1 additional success), they opened fire on the 3rd section hanging out near the edge of the orchard.

Outscoring them 2 to 0, Section 3 was destroyed.

The other other German sections moved. I decided for the heck of it to reveal the remaining blind, which mercifully, was nothing.

Down two sections, with the third badly wounded, and the German troops at full strength, save for the Panzer, I ordered my forces to fall back. 

1 German squad is behind the house.

Mission Failed!

World War Risus is Available

My Risus-based wargaming rules are available in a more organized form finally.

You can download the PDF and review it to your heart's content.

No exploration of including standard Risus PCs in a battle have been included, but my inclination is that this would not be difficult, at least if you don't mind a Pulp-y feel.

Here are some first thoughts on it:

• Treat each character as a unit. 
• They don't take morale checks.
• They can use any cliche, appropriate or not, for initiative and combat, including using different cliches each turn. 
• All damage is recovered when the battle ends. 
• They attack enemy units at the lowest level possible (if you're smallest unit is the platoon, then when the PC attack's, they attack the whole platoon). So yes, Bob the Hairdresser can take out an entire platoon.
• They can use the team-up rules from Risus.

Rising Sun: Operation Watchtower: The Brush Patrol

Last night, I decided to play the 2nd scenario in Rising Sun: Operation Watchtower from Britton Publishers using World War Risus.

Historical Background

While the first scenario was the ill-fated Goettge patrol, this one was a lot less grim:

 "To verify the strength of the Japanese in the region, another patrol is sent out on 19 August. This patrol is led by Captain Charles C. Brush, and although its primary mission is reconnaissance, it has sufficient combat power (64 Marines) to take care of business. As it makes its way toward Koli Point, it stumbles upon a large party of Japanese laying communications wire."

Set up

In game terms, 2 weak platoons of 2 sections of US Marines each are moving single file down a dirt path, and come across a 2 section platoon of Japanese. 

To simulate the single-file requirement, i decided that the 1st US platoon would start on the table but the 2nd could only move on once the first had left them enough room. This would entail using some of 1st platoon's HQ for its own actions, something I've had do to very infrequently in previous games of World War Risus.

There's a moment when the Japanese don't realize that the approaching soldiers are American before the fire fight begins. In game terms, I decided I would roll a Japanese unit's Combat Effectiveness, and on any success they would id the Americans and could attack the following turn.

The USMC objective is to eliminate the Japanese patrol before it exits the board. The Japanese goal is to get at least one unit off the table, regardless of condition. For MicroMelee, the game is limited to 4 turns. Having no idea what that equates to in World War Risus, I opted for 8 turns.

Since the whole thing takes place in thick jungle save for a winding dirt path (it's really hard to do a winding path with 2' x 3" strips of balsa) I just opted to leave the trees off the table entirely. 

This would prove to be a wise decision, as documented by the photograph below:

Pumpkin feigning surprise that I'm taking her picture.

Each base represents 1 section, while each lone figure represents a platoon HQ.

I gave all units +2 dice when receiving fire as if they were in hard cover. 

The Game

The Japanese won the initiative and the lead section identified the Americans right away, and so they could attack/react on the 2nd turn.

I was able to advance my 1st platoon up and out of the way on turn 1, except the HQ was blocking the 2nd platoon when the turn was over. 2nd platoon wouldn't be on the table until turn 3.

By then, the Japanese had one unit nearly off of the table, and only poor activation rolls kept them from exiting for a few more turns.

Shooting was largely ineffective due to the thick vegetation. 

Scoring any damage was neigh impossible, but I also tested my new modification for requiring a morale check any time a shooting unit scores a success, even if the target scores more successes.the morale check came into play. Unfortunately against my own Marines - one section failed their morale check, rolling 0 dice. They lost a morale die, were pushed back and pinned. 

When I finally scored a hit on one of the Japanese sections, I thought I might be able to stop them, but it wasn't to be. Every time a Japanese unit took a morale test they passed by 2 dice or more! 

The game lasted 6 turns before the first Japanese unit made it off table. 

Thoughts 

I really like World War Risus - as a solo player, it provides plenty of monkey wrenches to inhibit bias. It also provides some interesting decisions when it comes to allocating successes. Most of all, I can actually remember the rules since I wrote them.

Pumpkin expresses her dissatisfaction with the Marine performance by beating the officers with a tape measure.

Tinkering with World War Risus

I am approaching the completion of the 1st ready for public viewing draft of World War Risus. But, what kind of solo wargamer would I be if I didn't constantly tinker with rules?

Last night, I wanted to try out some modifications to World War Risus, including using the Deadly Combat rules in the Risus Companion and some kind of "lucky shot" rule (not the same Lucky Shot rule from Risus itself) that would allow an AFV to be knocked out of the fight with one attack.

Deadly Combat did make things move a little more quickly in the damage department - it does away with both adding pips (per Risus) or counting 5's and 6's as I had written the rules originally. Instead, highest die wins. If it's a tie, the side that rolled the least dice wins, else it's actually a tie. 

Simple enough, but as written, World War Risus gives a bonus for outscoring the target by 2 or more successes (2 CE dice are lost, as is 1 morale die BEFORE the required morale check is rolled, which can result in a further loss of morale). In the heat of battle, I forgot why I had included that rule to begin with: I wanted a way to speed things up just a bit.

Using the Deadly Combat rule would do that anyway, as more attacks would result in damage, forcing more morale checks, so the "2 or more" rule would not be unnecessary.

An American (minor) Victory:
They didn't secure the bridge in 8 turns,
 but the Germans were whittled down to a StuG and an HQ unit.

As for a lucky shot rule, there were two now:

1) For an attack that succeeds in damaging an AFV (i.e. causes the loss of CE cliche dice), roll a number of dice equal to the number of the attacker's successes minus the number of the target's successes. If the total rolled >=10 then the AFV is destroyed. 

2) Infantry Rifle units and HMG/MMG units may fire on AFVs. If the attacker scores more successes than the target, the target takes a morale test. 

The first allows for an infantry anti-tank weapon or an ATG to take out an AFV in a single attack, provided the attacking side scores at least 2 more successes than the AFV. In the playtest, this situation never occurred. The bazooka team was firing at the front of the StuG where the armor is thickest and had little chance of success.

There is a Lethal Risus rule over on Risusverse that is expressly written for one shot kills. If the attacker's total is at least double the defender's total then the defender rolls their cliche vs a target number (TN) 10. This would probably work well if I was still using traditional Risus combat.

The second item addresses something Stu Rat mentioned in the comments on my previous post on World War Risus. 

People like to survive and will do what they can to drive off the enemy, even if it's an AFV that they can't damage directly with their weapons. It seemed to me that they're just hoping to cause the AFV's crew to second guess their course of action and perhaps panic. In World War Risus, that's a morale check. 

This happened twice during the playtest, and both times the StuG made its morale check successfully, despite being down 1 die due to a previous hit by the bazooka team. 

I don't think that's any reason to condemn the rule - the saves were quite lucky. More importantly, I liked that my rifle unit had a chance to do something useful against the AFV, while the bazooka unit tried to maneuver close enough to take another shot.

Finally, it occurred to me that a unit will more than likely be reduced to 0 CE dice before their morale is reduced to 0. That means a unit generally has the will to fight right up until they can't.

I'm not sure I like that. 

So, the next time, I'll require a target to take a morale test anytime an attacker has at least 1 success, regardless of how many successes the target has. Another alternative might be to have the morale check not count successes, but roll against a TN 10 instead.  

I'm OK with either, because unlike Combat Effectiveness, there's no Risus "death spiral" inherent in the morale cliche; a leadership roll can improve morale.

World War Risus : Some Thoughts and Pictures

World War Risus had its first real outing yesterday.

My prior games have all been played with top-down flats on my desk with rather uninteresting meeting encounters, simply to test mechanics; this time, i broke out the toy soldiers and an honest to goodness scenario. Using the table layout from this Tabletop Teaser from 1978, I decided that my objective was to capture the bridge, not blow it up, which meant dislodging the opposition, with 8 turns to do it.

I played on my bed and surprisingly, Pumpkin was OK with this.

At first my intention was to play a fast game using Featherstone's simple WWII rules from his War Games: Battles and Manoeuvres with Model Soldiers, but it seemed like I should give my own rules a chance in a real game.

As I saw the scenario, I had a weak company consisting of a company HQ, two platoons, a heavy weapons section (bazooka) and an MMG section. The enemy would have 1 AFV, 1 scout vehicle w/MG and 1 weak company consisting of 1 company HQ, 1 Wehrmacht rifle platoon and 1 SS rifle platoon

All but the company HQs and the SS platoon were rated 3 dice for all three cliches. The SS platoon had a CE of 4 and a Morale of 4, while the HQs were 4 all the way across.

According to my World War Risus rules, each platoon should have had a separate HQ, and each section should have maneuvered individually. 

However, perhaps because I was in Featherstone mode when I set everything up, I continued to think of the platoons as single maneuver elements of 5 figures each, rather than as 3 elements + HQ element. 

This sped up the game a bit because it eliminated 3 sets of Leadership rolls per platoon (1 for the HQ and 1 for each section, normally), as well as movement and individual actions for 3 elements per platoon. It also felt and looked "right" to me.

I just really like my trees.

What I realized, after I was done playing, is that, mechanically, for those following along at home, I was basically playing a World War Risus platoon HQ with 2 sections, with 2 company support sections.

A brutal melee handled very close to standard Risus, meaning either side could lose a point of CE each round.

But the more I think about it, the more I realize, I'm not sure it matters either way. They could have been squads, but I thought of them as platoons without individual platoon leaders represented, but they could have been two companies of a battalion for that matter. Just like Featherstone and other old school rules (as I mentioned here).

I've thought about this and it seems to me that just treating them as units, without worry to organizational level, makes it feel more game-like. It's one of the things about G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T. that I like - that sliding-scale zoom (I keep meaning to play a WWII version of G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T., note to self).

This was also the first outing where I worried about movement distances but that was easily resolved using Featherstone's simple WWII rules.

Armor rules, which I had barely thought about yet, were quickly determined using THW's Nuts! 2.0. With the values there for front, back and side armor, I determined that a bazooka was +1 die weapon against armored vehicle, while a StuG got +3 defense dice for attacks from the front, +2 dice on the side, and +1 die for the rear. 

The scout car would get +1 defense die because I assumed it was moving quickly unless otherwise noted and that a rifle platoon could attack a scout car by targeting the occupants, whereas the bazooka section could target the car itself or the occupants.

One of several attempts by the bazooka section to knock out the StuG. Only one hit made it through, although it did reduce the effectiveness of the StuG a bit.

The StuG also got +2 dice for its gun when attacking (MMG or main gun wasn't relevant to me). 

At this point, I thought, "Hey, I could still win this."

I have no idea why I thought that; that LMG team is part of an SS unit firing safely from cover in the village (the rest of the figures fit in the house).

Using the cliches as I have for infantry, it means it takes 3 hits to knock out an AFV, but I  kind of like that (at this scale, assuming a company battle, it's probably a troop of tanks). Still, I may look into the Lucky Shot rule in the Risus Companion (I think it's in there) just to make single shot knockouts a possibility.

After the StuG unit eliminated the last of my remaining rifle unit on turn 8, the company commander ordered the bazooka section to fall back. The day was lost.

World War Risus: Part III - Initiative and Activation

(this is the third part of a mini mini- series)

Activating a Unit:

I like wargames where it's not a given that your force will do exactly what you want when you want it. It also seemed to me that knowing how much, or even whether, a unit can do anything should be less of a function of who's turn it is, and more of a function of the unit's leader.

When i first started down this path, i was thinking of something like Donald Featherstone's 10 figure companies, where the company HQ and platoon HQs are abstractly part of the group.

In my case, I was imagining 9 figure platoons - 3 figures per section, without any specific representation of the HQ. But that didn't really jive with my design goal, which was to achieve a game where leadership plays an important role.

And so, the platoon and company HQs found their way onto the table, with the same 3 cliches as the squads.

After several test games, I found myself bouncing back and forth between two methods of activation: one is a variant of the "pips=commands" approach using successes instead of pips (call this Method 1), and the other is what I describe as top-down-distributed-success (Method 2).

In Method 1, only a portion of a side's units will even get a chance to act in any given turn, barring some fantastic dice rolling. In Method 2, every unit rolls its leadership dice, so although they may not all get to take any action, the odds are higher that any given unit will do something. It does, however, take more dice rolling to determine who will do what.

Initiative:
Either way, at the start of a turn, both sides roll for all of their company HQs. The side with the most total successes goes first. Keep track of the successes rolled by each company HQ as they need them for activation.

Method 1:
A company HQ can use the successes for its own actions (see below or it can activate one platoon HQ or one squad in line of sight, per success. A platoon HQ may be assigned more than one activation. It is possible some or all platoons will not be activated.

For each activated platoon HQ, roll the platoon HQ's leadership cliche and count successes. They may use the successes for their own actions, or activate as many squads under their command  as successes. If there are more successes than squads, more than one activation may be given to a squad. It is possible some or all squads will not be activated.

At the squad level, roll the squad's leadership dice and the number of successes dictate how many actions the unit can take. It's possible that an activated squad still doesn't do anything.

Any unit that receives more than one activation, completes the 2nd activation only after both sides have finished the 1st activation for all units which were activated. Those with 3 actions, wait to complete the 3rd action only after both sides have completed all 2nd activation, and so on.

When all activation are completed the turn ends.

Method 2:
A company HQ can use the successes for its own actions or distribute the success to any friendly unit under its command.

Each platoon HQ rolls their leadership cliche and counts the successes, including any it received from the company HQ, and can use the successes for its own actions or distribute the successes to any squad under its command. 

At the squad level, roll their leadership cliche and count the successes, including any it received from the company HQ and/or the platoon HQ. The successes are used for the squads actions and cannot be distributed further.

When all units have completed their activation, the turn ends.

Actions and their Cost:

Actions include: Move, Shoot, Rally, Close Assault, Spot (for artillery). More can obviously be added.

Each turn, the first action of a given type, e.g. Move,  costs 1 success. 

Successes not used are lost. There is no saving of actions for later.

Example:

My US MMG section with the By the Book NCO, rolls their 3 leadership cliche and gets 3 successes. They opt to move, and then fire at an enemy unit. The 3rd action is unused.

Each additional attempt of the same action during a single activation requires 2 successes be spent, not one.

For example:

My US MMG section with the By the Book NCO, rolls their 3 leadership cliche and gets 3 successes. They opt to fire 2x and have used up all three successes (1 for the first shoot action, and then 2 for the second shoot action)

World War Risus - Part II

Welcome back, soldier.

Here we're going to talk about using the cliches in a game. Think of this as a working draft, rulings not rules, etc.

(this is the second part of a mini mini- series)

Using the Cliches

General note:

In order to keep things moving, especially since I almost always play solo, rather than summing up cliche dice when they are rolled, I opted to count 5s and 6s (this idea is borrowed from Risus Skirmish, but also lines up with more traditional wargames). 

A 5 or 6 is a "success."

Let's start with the easiest use of cliches (as in, easiest for me to decide upon). Please note, this is out of order in relation to some concepts - don't worry, in the end, I'll make it all nice and neat and presentable.

Ranged Combat:

The attacker must have Line of Sight (LOS) to the target.  Units have line of site to the far side of a terrain object but not through one. Other units, friendly and non-friendly, block LOS. (Pretty much taken from Risus Skirmish, which I believe gets this from Crossfire)

Roll the Combat Effectiveness cliche (CE) of the attacker adding weapons modifier dice if any.

The target rolls their CE + cover modifier (if any) + armor modifier (if any)

Compare successes, if the defender wins or it's a tie, the target then rolls its Morale cliche:

• If no successes, it is forced back 1 move and is pinned.
• If 1 or more success it carries on normally

If the attacker has more successes, the defender loses 1 die from its CE cliche, regardless of how many successes the attacker rolled - which is pretty much inline with standard Risus.

The target then rolls its Morale cliche:

• If no successes, it loses 1 die from its Morale cliche, is forced back 1 move and is pinned.
• If 1 success, forced back 1 move and pinned.
• If 2 or more successes, carries on normally.

Shooting Modifiers (infantry):

• +1 - better weapons - MMG/Lt Mortar
• +2 - HMG, Artillery, Flame Throwers, Infantry anti-tank weapons

Defensive modfiers:

• +1 - Concealing cover - woods, rough ground 
• +2 - Heavy cover - building, ruins, thick woods, etc. 

Optional, and recommended, rules: The above work OK, but they can take some time to play out even a small combat. The rules below speed things up considerably.

If the shooting unit exceeds the target's successes by 2 or more then the target loses 2 CE dice. This makes some weapons, like HMGs and artillery, much more dangerous.

Also, one thing I've noticed in my play testing thus far has been the general lack of impact of the Morale cliche, so, if the shooting unit's total exceeds the target's successes by 2 or more then the target automatically loses 1 die from its Morale cliche (and then uses the new value to roll its Morale cliche test as above).

Melee:

****This is in need of more testing but here it is for now****

Occurs when two opposing units are in base to base contact.

In order to move into melee, the active unit must score at least one success by rolling its Morale cliche. If failed, no movement occurs and no further actions can be taken this turn.

If a unit is being charged, it also rolls its Morale cliche dice and if no success, falls back one move.

If contact is made, Treat as a normal Risus combat between two characters, using the CE cliche of both sides. There are no modifiers for cover for either side. 

The losing side is removed from the table(CE is 0. In a campaign game, there may be survivors, they may have fled, etc. In a one-off, dead dead dead.)

Wounds/Damage/Loss of Morale:

If a unit reaches a CE of 0 dice  it is no longer combat effective. It may be that everyone is dead, or just a few are, or that they're exhausted from the experience, shell shocked, etc. It is removed from the table

If a unit reaches a Morale cliche of 0, the unit will flee the field or surrender.

Cliche Dice Recovery

Unlike in Risus, units do not automatically gain all of their cliche dice back when the combat ends. This is a wargame and, generally speaking, the whole thing is a series of combats. 

CE dice represent permanent loss for the duration of the battle, with the following exception: if the winner of a melee lost any CE dice during the melee, they may regain 1 CE die at the end of the turn (as opposed to just the melee).

Morale dice can be regained if a unit leader spends an action rallying the unit. (Spends an action? You'll have to wait until next time)


Recovering Morale Dice

Roll the Leader's cliche dice, if they have any success, increase the Morale cliche by one die, not to exceed the value the unit began the battle with.

Optional rule:
Roll the Leader cliche vs the unit's Morale cliche. If the Leader cliche scores more successes, the unit gains back 1 Morale die, not to exceed the value the unit began the battle with.

Or, use the optional rule above, but allow a unit to increase its morale beyond the value it began the battle with to allow for a truly motivational leader.


Next Time, the thing that gave me fits but I think I have resolved to my satisfaction: Activation.