Town garrison/militia, and WFB

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satakuua
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Found Return of the Lichemaster, and leafed thru it. The "massed" battle reminded me of a scenario I ran which had the characters use 3rd edition Battle rules (stats mostly) when fighting off Skaven surrounding a burial mound. So this is, kinda, to expand on that.

The gazetteers list population centre garrison and militia as either excellent, average, or poor. I guess these would correlate quite well with knights, soldiers, and militiamen (in the Empire)? Or is there more depth to them than that in some of the 2nd edition sourcebooks?

Old World Bestiary gives soldier Johann Schmidt as the average grunt. On Battle terms two attacks is nothing average, but this is not an exact science. So Johann would be a M4 WS3 BS3 S3 T3 W3 I3 A1 as that is the average in Battle. Poor quality (militia) would, I guess, be somewhat akin to human levy with the weakened WS, BS and I of 2. Those changes would make big enough a difference in Battle to make up for the difference in attacks, at least lessen the impact of the loss. Not that interested in knights as if them bastards show up my players' characters do not have much say in the proceedings, they just do not have that kind of authority.

Running things with Battle can be quite damn deadly, the smoke from burned fate points in the air, but in some rare cases I do like it. (Giving PCs Battle wounds based on the adjusted conversion rules found in the 1st edition of WFRP does help a tad, though. At least it can give them time to think about escaping the killing floor.)

Have any of you guys done bigger fights in Battle?
Knight of the Lady
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Nah, if I would try to work a major battle then I would probably use the "Field of Glory II" computer game is make a resolution to the battle and see how it would turn out. The advantage is that the game is on the computer, so less work for me, while at the same time its turn-based and has a hot-seat function so that I can play both sides, and create my own scenarios for the battle we're doing, and thus simulate the commanders' style and plans.

Of course I'll have to find good stand ins for Orcs, Elves, Dwarfs and so on, but I find this to be a minor problem compared to how much more easier the game would make things for me as a GM.
satakuua
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Have not heard of Field of Glory series. Have to check it out.
Knight of the Lady
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satakuua wrote: Sun Apr 21, 2019 9:21 am Have not heard of Field of Glory series. Have to check it out.
Please do. Beyond its utility for simulating major battles in RPGs its a good game on its own. There's a "Field of Glory I" that can be downloaded or bought somewhere, even if I don't have it myself, and a "Field of Glory II" that can be bought on Steam.

"Field of Glory I" has stuff for both ancient times and the middle ages while "Field of Glory II" so far only has stuff for antiquity, but new material is likely to be released.
Theo
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If I were running a larger skirmish or battle - next time I see that coming up is when/if my players storm Castle Wittgenstein with the outlaws :) - I'll probably be using a more abstract mass-combat system. My favourite so far is GURPS Mass Combat - I've already done a conversion of it to my BRP-based rules. It resolves the "big picture" fairly quickly but has openings for heroic actions by the PCs influencing things and perhaps even turning the tide.
Knight of the Lady
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Theo wrote: Sun Apr 21, 2019 1:40 pm If I were running a larger skirmish or battle - next time I see that coming up is when/if my players storm Castle Wittgenstein with the outlaws :) - I'll probably be using a more abstract mass-combat system. My favourite so far is GURPS Mass Combat - I've already done a conversion of it to my BRP-based rules. It resolves the "big picture" fairly quickly but has openings for heroic actions by the PCs influencing things and perhaps even turning the tide.
Yeah, that's probably the downside with using "Field of Glory" for doing the battle. Its difficult to incorporate the players' actions into affecting the battle.
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Hyarion
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I would not use WFB directly for any large scale battles other than as a narrative description of how units move or behave on the battlefield. Mechanically, it is irrelevant. Narratively, it should be decided by A) Where the GM wants the story to go B) the quality of the preparations the players have made C) the outcomes of heroic actions taken by the heroes.

I have used the numerous skirmish scenarios for various editions of WFB (mostly 5th/6th/The General's Compendium) as a narrative setup for encounters. I use the setup and enemy forces as described in the scenario (all run as individual mook NPCs) and then replace the other side with the players. Then it is played out using normal WFRP combat rules with one major exception, instead of using initiative separately for each character, I roll initiative for each side.
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Theo
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Knight of the Lady wrote: Sun Apr 21, 2019 2:07 pm
Theo wrote: Sun Apr 21, 2019 1:40 pm If I were running a larger skirmish or battle - next time I see that coming up is when/if my players storm Castle Wittgenstein with the outlaws :) - I'll probably be using a more abstract mass-combat system. My favourite so far is GURPS Mass Combat - I've already done a conversion of it to my BRP-based rules. It resolves the "big picture" fairly quickly but has openings for heroic actions by the PCs influencing things and perhaps even turning the tide.
Yeah, that's probably the downside with using "Field of Glory" for doing the battle. Its difficult to incorporate the players' actions into affecting the battle.
If you want to go even simpler, Pendragon has very simple rules for fighting skirmishes (less than about 100 people on each side) and battles (larger than that) that put the PCs' actions front and center. Basically you make a couple of tactics rolls for the commanders, play out a round of more of fighting for the PCs and extrapolate the bigger result from that with some random modification. (The 5th edition Pendragon Book of Battle has a more involved system for playing out battles, but it still stays strongly focused on following the PCs and their unit(s) through the battle.) Of course, many of the details might need to be reskinned since Pendragon tends to assume high-medieval knightly battles.

Edit: the time I would use a tactical miniatures game to play out a battle is when/if the PCs are actually in command (or the players temporarily play the commanders). Assuming of course that's something the players would enjoy.
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Orin J.
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Between the field of glory and pendragon's options it sounds like the dude's set for however much influence the players need to have on the battle.

That said, i've never had to handle these sorts of things because my group's always contributed in the manner of "fire a few shots off and flee the field the moment things look like they might get bad". Dirty tomb looters, no bravery in 'em.........
satakuua
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Orin J. wrote: Tue Apr 23, 2019 8:25 am Between the field of glory and pendragon's options it sounds like the dude's set for however much influence the players need to have on the battle.

That said, i've never had to handle these sorts of things because my group's always contributed in the manner of "fire a few shots off and flee the field the moment things look like they might get bad". Dirty tomb looters, no bravery in 'em.........
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Seagoat777
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I've ran a couple of skirmishes and battles involving the party before, both in 1e and 2e.
Firstly, the party were not in command, although they tended to ignore the chain of command and do things their own way :shock:

The battles were abstract, and whilst I relied on dice rolls for some specific outcomes, I had planned the major outcomes of the battle before starting.
For the specific area where the party were fighting I described what they saw, and asked them what they wanted to do, and used a few "general" rolls for their combats and actions. Depending on their success or failure, I modified the swing of the fights either side of them so after a few turns they were either winning overall and gaining the advantage, or losing overall and having to consolidate and fall back.

All that was the easy bit. The problem with the PCs was they would fight to the last, and were set on doing their utmost to slaughter every single last combattant on the other side, gong so far as deciding to chase / track the retreating foes. I found ending the battle was the difficult bit.
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