Kick the Can 3

Have now played about 4 games of Renegade Knight, see link below:

Renegade Knight reprise

On of the ideas of this project was to develop a game for the 40K Universe that had the same feel as the original Battletroops Battletech game but with the emphasis this time being on player being the Knights. Techically I have swung the game 180 degrees in its emphasis.

In the original the game was from the point of the Infantry so their indivdual wpns were important and had to be catered for.

Playing Renegade Knight looking at it from the Knights/Mech warriors point of view, individual infantry wpns are unimportant the main worry is those wpn that can actually harm your knight, there fore most light wpns can be ignored for game purposes.

So rather than scaling up 40k to get it to work , perhaps I should be looking at Renegade  Knight and adapting them to allow attack by all arms.

Some of 40k wpns have been simplified for Renegade Knight using them as a base I should be able to do that for other arms.

To reiterate my explanition in that project Renegade Knight:

The rules in the book consist of 2 pages of modified stats , with an interesting activation sequence and a sheet for each knight with a grid for hit locations.

Now in my project on Renegade Kinght (includes som Battle Reports) I have created my own sheets for both the Armiger and Castallan Knights:

Now it should not be to difficult to draw up a similar set of grids Dreadnoughts ,infantry and conventional vehicles,  Dreadnoughts will be smaller versions of above, vehicles will probably need a side profile , with a divider on them for if fired on from forward or aft aspects rather than a seperate profile for aspects.

Infantry will have a diagram based on a squad in line based on 5 or 10 figure, Damage pts will be the squad strength with 2 pts for Marines  3 for primaris  etc. Ignoring parts of the grid if nos’s differ or for losing men, though in this case if a section is removed, mark of the outer parts of grid rather than the one hit to represent the squad contracting.

This included new wpns (which are being game tested) The formula appears to be half range and damage for Renegade with a similar reduction in armour penetration. I think I will eventually adopt that for a formal conversion for most of the 40k wpns we will us. One thing that will be added will be area effect wpn which will be looked at later in project.

An idea I have is to modify the way infantry are depicted in ‘Hammers Slammers’ with infantry being effectively one set of stats for the squad, so rather than fire individually they may have just two shots per squad, one for any antitank/walker wpn they have and one their infantry wpns combined probably with a max damage of 1 or 2 in Renegade Knight terms. this is to represent the effects of multiple non penetrating shots knocking off odd bits of kit not within the armour, for this I have to mind the Sherman trapped in a mine field at El Alamein and constantly shot at by multiple mgs, which although they didn’t penetrate and hit the crew, pretty much shot off everything outside the armour. This won effect will be modified by casualties dropping to no effect if sufficient figures are removed by fire.

Been a while since posted anything on this project, partly because I have go side tracked with playing Renegade Knight

See

Renegade Knight reprise

Do like the initiative system with this, particularly the use of card bidding for initiative. I think a similar system may get used for this whole idea, as on that there have already been requests for infantry etc. ( I accept 4ok deals with all arms) At some point I may need to sit down and work out how to convert Renegade to normal 40k stats and convert the damage to the chart. but will hold off till we have a few more games under our belt 1st, though I have just had an idea on how to do it.

Dumb systems

For most this part of the project will be a no no but hopefully I’ll be able to try the the remote idea mentioned in the updates.

This is for solo player and those who perfer to play big stompy robots and cant be bothered with the infantry thing. In this your player will be Knights and the infantry/armour that they face will played by a dumb initiaitive system.So let’s look at some of the ones I have experience with:

Pony Wars

This was a system brought out for the formentioned rules above, and revolved about players playing various U.S. Cavalry patrols in Indian country (in 15mm)The table(s) would ideally layed out as below with a fort and a number of Indian villages

Woods hills etc would be placed on the map to break up lines of site. Players would begin at the fort and would have various missions to retrieve indians , settlers etc from the varous table areas and be attacked by hostile indians who could appeat from either edges of table or any suitable area of concealment on the table (other than fort).

A card pack would be drawn from each move to either deploy player reinforcements, hostile reinforcement or random events etc,. In addition if a player went past a possible ambush point (moutain pass or cross a wood etc) a card would be drawn and if any

card had ambush on them they would be immediately bacon tree’ed.

On a hostile forces deployment a role would be made on a table would be consulted and would react on the result. Each move the same table would be used rolling on the relevant line which would have a list of possible situations depending if player forces were in sight or not, or if engaged on the result of engagement to again decide the non player forces reaction.

Above is a fairly simplified description but gives the gist.

Know it’s a system our group has considerable experience with having converted it for use in numerous genres, such as Starship Troopers and Hammers Slammers to mention two.

As a system it works well with opponants who have no centalised command as such such as bugs etc, or for situation where the opponent is marching to sound of guns such as responding to a sudden breakthrough.

Downside

Needs a lot of table space(though we have adapted it)

Doesn’t work well with opponents with centralised command systems,

Gears of War

This now out of print game for FF had a very innovative dumb system for running npcs and can play differently each time you try it.

Each npc type has a series of cards which are placed in a pack and played on the turn, on each card is that characters primary role that move and a secondary if that’s not possible. If that type of npc is not avail another card is drawn till and npc acts.

In addition the scenarios are in stages , on completing a stages the whole emphasis of the players game can change. Similar to some of the the data card ideas in GW.

Downside

This would take a lot of prep pre game to get it to run it , and probably a lot of changes to how the npc cards work with game experience.

You would pre-know what types of enemy units are likely to be involved, though to be honest this is likely in any of these type of games. Can be argued that the players intelligence sources have given them some idea of prospective forces. Though as you develop the game you will have extra unit cards which could become avail if you put in a stage where a random opposition could be drawn.

Minatgure Wargames

These had an interesting idea for solo play dumb games that had some innovating ideas. In a lot of systems as above, the random enemy has fixed entry points or possible hidden locations.

Using a random activiation system similar to Bolt Action , all the active player units are given a playing card/chit for activation, and either a activation packe  or bag is used for drawing activation. Added are a couple of cards/chits for enemy units, denoting arriving units. This can be varied to players choice or to match the no of player units avail and how tought the player(s) want to make it.

In addition a table is made with unit type , vehicle /walker/infantry etc along top and 1-10 on the side.

Depending on game table a no in cm’s /inchs is put in each box

You  put prospective forces in a box, put a playing card next to each. Then for npc reinforcements make a 2nd pack for prospective  reinforcements.

When a npc blank activation card is drawn, one of the above is randomly drawn, and then the diagram below is consulted

The drawn unit is placed at that distance approx from centre point, if it can be put in cover it is , if not as near to a peice of cover as possible to indicate an appearing target. They then activate immediately and in subsequent oves is added to the activation  pack/bag

Unit reaction once they appear was similar to the one mentioned in the Pony Wars system.

Played it a few times , the location of above needs to be amended if the players forces are moving from defined positions, as npc placement can be behind player forces.

Once you have drawn up the distance table and a table for reactions (I will post one) this doesn’t take much setting up and plays well based on the couple of times have run it( for Dredd and WW2 games).

Umpires

All but the Gears of Wars system do  work better with an unbiased umpire running the system though they are not necessary if you don’t have a willing sole to do it (usually Kevin on myself but we do like to play occasionally). Saying that to stop the players ganging up on Umpire ( there were some in one group I played with who were that childish) and to stop that 1 in a million chance ( and it does happen 9 in 10 times) of the umpires dice rolling being way better than the law of averages dictates( A doom game where the monster wiped out everyone in two moves , we didn’t even know dice had that many hits on them)so get players to do all the random die rolls and the ones for npc’s shooting then they can only blame themselves.

Have had quick look at Kill Team, rules and feel it may have mechanics that I can upscale for Kick the Can (John watch this space)

I will continue with the dumb system review later in week,  but one idea that has to tried is either Skype which I dont have or via blue tooth connection (anyone who is an espert on this please comment), is the Knight mech view is filmed using a cell phone at it head height, and the player who sits of sight of main table, gets the film on a tablet.

Been a bit busy , having a phased return to work, which has meant my extra spare time has been taken up painting minis for this and other projects, which has not left much time for rules reviews.

But with the Release of Kill Team my whole plan now maybe under review.

From bits I’m picking up which I’ll confirm after I have a copy on 28th, the new initiative system for  it seems very similar to the old Battletroops (without the yucky wierd hex points)

Now if anyone has seen Justins and Johns Blog, game is pitched way below the level of Imperial Knights, but we are gamers!

My guess is the main stats (will look later today on the new Website for it)

for wpns remain the same, and probably rate of fire being the main change, so amending the wpns for Knights/etc should not be to much of a chore.

This though could leave to an alternative idea to the base idea of project, but bring it closer to the original ‘Kick the Can’ for Battletech.

You have multiple players playing Kill Teams allied against one player with an Imperial Knight or Dreadnought sized unit (for smaller games) played by a willing volunteer/victim . If you have room with back to table.

Then with modern tech, the players on table use a mobile phone camera to record the views from the head of the Knight/Dreadnought for play back to player with a map of table.

The original game used the Fasa inititive system of role for initiative, and the each player alt moving a unit, with all firing being done effectively simultaneously at the end of the move.

To give the Mech players the feel they were working on sensors and cam feeds in the cockpit,( played by members of the old Mechwarrior UK)we sat them with their backs to. the main table, with a normal battletech type map and Battletech models, their infantry opponents (show participants) playing on main table.

The game worked well, and the only problem we had was that some of the participants were so good at hiding figures in terrain, we had to stop the game at one point so we could find and retrieve figures left when player left the game!

Unfortunately we have not got the room for that option, I’ve never been a fan of IgoYougo as an initiative system, one bad dice roll for initiative at start, and on that critical move of 1st contact half your force can get blown away, plus in larger games apart from the odd defensive dice role you can spend a verry boring and frustrating half hour watching your carefully painted minis go the way of the Dodo!!!

So what are the alternatives?

Roll for Initiative each Turn

A simple one is die for initiative each move, unfortunately that can become equally frustrating because you win initiative one move and go 1st, but the next move lose it and go 2nd, effectively giving your opponent two turns of turning your whydidyou bother minis to chutney!

A quick fix for this is allow the movement to be dictated by the initiative, so deciding on going 1st or is more about out manouevering your opponent you get the best firing posions/cover etc, for the simultaneous fire phase.

Not a bad system , but it complicates any sort of ambush situation.

Alt activations of units.

Many games go for the role for initiative and alt unit activation.

As with IgoYougo the problem with this is you move ‘your how quickly can I get rid of these usless buggers minis’ is they get into position, cant fire/etc as the enemy is out of range/hiding, so your little minis have to sit and watch the enemy close to efective range or charge range whilst counting the local pidgeon population!

‘Sarge I can,t only see the white/red/green of their eyes but can the no of veins in them , and that spear. tentacle whatever is getting awfully close!’

Good for the old boyzone stories but trust me yout little minis would be blazing away like crazy at this point in any real life situation!

Random Activation,

Completely randomise it with the chit on a bag method, gives a lot of fog of war but can still end up with your ‘Why did I choose this stupid hobby’minis being made a smear on the table as non of your chits are in the bag, or all your opponents are in the bag , yours have all activated, and spent the whole move feeding those bloody pigeons, as still non of his units are in range but will be when they activate!

Card Activation

Still alt acivation of units but player at start of move, selects the order he wants to activate his units, then the card is revealed and the unit activates. Dropfleet is more advanced version or this in that depending on unit strength, both players play the card, and the one with lowest strength goes 1st.

Star Wars legion has a variation of this with the addition of random activation, after selecting an order card.

Again with this system the problem is you end ip with your smear on the table minis, can sit dumbfounded as the enemy unit that was just out of range move upand convert them plastic/lead dust whilst they do nothing.

1st Sight System

This a system favoured by two hour wargames , it uses an alt activation, but with twist, all units/ figures have a skill level 1-5

The initiative goes to the player with the highest role, but only those players with that initiative level can activate(and any unit they may command) units/figs with a higher initative can still activate , but the player activates 1st and then activates all their unit’s with initiative to that level.

This allows units with better initiative/moral to activate 1st.

So what is different ?

The basic element of this system written by a vet, is the idea of their base set of rules called chain reaction.

Basically you acivate unit and move it, the moment your unit comes into sight of your opponents line of sight, a 1st sight test is taken, both side roll dice based on various modifiers suchvas level of cover etc, the winner shoots 1st, then based on the result the units taking fire result fired on can either go to ground, run to cover. or die,where the shooting stops, but if the unit survives and is ok , it shoots back, then the original unit reacts as above, and if ok fires back, this continues till the result forces one side to go to ground , break or are destroyed.

This is carried over to normal shooting if in your activation you fire at an already spotted unit, the same reaction test is taken and the firefight continues untill it reachs its conclusion.

As a system it takes a bit of getting used to but it does work,

It does allow for some of very cinematic moments, We tried a Western game playing the scene from ‘A few dollars More’.

Two level 5 heros walking down a western st, about 10 level 3 bandits try to ambush them, The bandits rose from hiding to shoot, a 1s1st sight test was taken and 70% of the time the heros shot 1st, and either killed or forced the bandit to go to ground, and even if they didnt they still won the firefight, and it ended with 10 dead bandits.

The basic systrm has been used with supplements for:

• Wild West ‘ Six gun Sound.’
• WW2 ‘Nuts’
• Aplocolpse ‘All things Zombie’
• Weird War ‘ War. Without End’
• Sci fi, 5150

The down side of the system is it promotes defensive playing styles as opposed to the more agressive styles of many of the other systems.

The plan is to modify 40K base initiative modified by one of the above initiative systems, Unlees I get a willing volunteer all the players will pilot Knights with tge Necron being run by a dumb system. Thr Next part will discuss some of the options for that.

Terrible War has broken out on the Imperial World of Cesse Pitte,

A unknown Necron Hive has awoken and is trying to drive the new Imperial Residents off what they believe is their real estate,

‘Bloody Squatters! ‘ high Lord Apostrophe, shouts (a translation error from Necron to High Gothic), I want them removed!

The Imperial Commander of the Vast Imperial Army Garrison on the planet Low Marshall Ivor Mallet (descendant of Colonel Alvis Mallet legendary commander of the mid 3rd Milleniums ‘Mallets Manglers’)

Answered this with now legendary ‘Bolts’ (another translation error from the ancient inglesh). Many believe he meant give them Bolts.

Calling for reinforcements, elements of the Raven Guard, Grey Knights and the Knight of House Terryn answered and led by the Low Marshall who had all the cunning of his legendary ancestor, the Necrons have been fought to a bloody stalemate around the Hive city of ‘Dung Heape’.

Mallet has been made aware of a way to quickly end the stalemate, a lightly defended area of the city has come to light , an undefended gap between 2 Necron units, each one believing the other idiots were covering it.

So Mallet has decided that a small Force of Knights led by the redoutable King Tybolt may be able to force their way through and fall on the Necrons rear and catch them with their carapaces in the wrong direction.

By shear chance Necron Lord Waziramonitago, had led a small force into the area on a Widget hunt, and is trying to delay the Imperials long enough for 3 and Fourpence to arrive ( plus shoot the translator!

I have done a Warren and John, and set out a games table for inspiration, its subject to change, as I brought Renegade Knight, and now have the Magnawotsit to add to table when built

As you can see I have placed plenty of cover for the Infantry to hide, and open passages for the Knights to traverse, I,ve put two Armigers on board to show scale.