Modified Square Bashing outcome suggestions

[martin goddard]

Here is a suggestion for quickening the SB pre game.
It still uses the army book.


A "quick start"   and  "Full start"  ?

A quick fix might be this:-

1. Do a piggy hase to 40
2. Winner must attack.
3. Each 5 or part thereof (e.g 7 = 2 outcomes) of difference matters. Each one is an outome.
4. This gives the winner rolls on the Outcome chart with +6.  ie  2D6+6= scores 8 to 18. Avoiding all the bad things.
5. The loser rolls on the outcome chart with 2D6-2. Gives scores 0-10. Scores of 1,2 = no outcome. Might hit some bad things.


e.g. Winner gets to 40 and loser gets to 23. Difference =17 = 4 outcomes.
Each player will roll 4 times.
Winner must be attacker.
Winner rolls 7 = 13 on outcomes.
Winner rolls 9=15 on outcomes
Winner rolls 5=11 on outcomes.

Then defender also rolls 4 times
Loser rolls 7 =5 on outcomes
Loser rolls 4=2 on outcomes
Loser rolls 11=9 on outcomes
Loser rolls 3=1 on outcomes and is ignored


This would use piggy and existing outcomes both.
A quick but temporary solution to the pregame.


martin

[Camulogene]

Great! Looks excellent.

Thanks Martin, we'll give it a try for our next SB game.

Pierre

[martin goddard]

Yes please Pierre.
It needs trying out.
it "looks" fine, but  you can find out.


martin

[SimonC]

Here are some (my) observations

Currently the game favours the defender. I think that is fair to say. The attacker mostly likely has to capture 3 objectives , and even if the defender sacrifices a 'soft' row 6 objective it's still quite a tall order. Part of the problem is the events. Currently it is possible for the defender can get a good set of events and defend. This suggestion based of attacker getting good and defender getting not so good events mitigates this. But the outcome is that it will make attacking easier (perhaps no bad thing) but I'd be interested to see if this goes too far the other way.

For me, what is missing is the army design influencing this process. For instance an option may be that each cavalry or tank adds a +1 to the chase result, each 'infantry' MG adds -1. Normally if you want to attack you want the maximum 'level of attack' and if you want to defend the converse is true.

You could make design choices that give you better odds of achieving your desired result . For example if you take 6 tanks and get +6 each roll you are maximising your attacking potential.

[Sean Clark]

Sounds like some sensible ideas Simon.

I know what Miles says in that in Civil War Battles you can weight dice in the events you want to achieve. In 15 days to war, you are looking to score the higher events, which you can do by rolling over to the next day - which I always try to do. Realistically though yiu might get 3 chances for this by stacking dice in your favour. Of course this leaves the other 12 days more to the vagaries of luck, which you'll win some and lose some.

Regarding the chase, if you build an army for defence, you can easily try to lose the race by sticking after each dice roll. A problem will arise though of your opponent does the same thing! One of you will then end up as the attacker, most likely with very little difference in your scores.

Interesting discussion. Simon C....bearing in mind what we have now and Martins proposed quick play changes, what would your thoughts be on how to do it?

[martin goddard]

All good notes. Waiting for some good folk to try it out and report back.


martin

[Nick]

Some interesting ideas. I do see the benefit in being able to have a more favourable chance of ending up as the attacker if you have deliberately selected an attack minded force.

Nick

[SimonC]

I'm on holiday this week , but I'll write a script to automate testing when I get back

[Moggy]

Hi

From my limited viewpoint (only played 1 game) I think possibly you could do the piggy chase by using the number of each type of unit to replace the fixed 16 per week (48 for the total in the chase). Maybe 1 per reserve infantry (2 for a regular or professional), 2 per cavalry, 3 per armoured car/tank (not sure on this as some armies cannot have either),1 per MG , 1 per Art .

In that case my Italians from last week would total 34. If then you added or subtracted the difference between the lowest army status values between the armies (in the case of last weeks game 12) I would have ended with 22 dice total. From what I recall from John's army he had 29. Or if done the other way and added to the lower status army he would have had 41 to my 34.

This would encourage use of the lower tiers of Armies and possibly discourage the Elite forces.

I also feel the tables could do with a little work. On the first round I rolled 3. This lost me a unit from the game (not into reserves). It only takes a few of these rolls before most armies are totally non-viable, especially in attack. Maybe make it a once only event.

Apart from that the chase was quick enough and enjoyable with enough suspense and swinging back and forwards. I think removing it or significantly altering its basic premise may prove detrimental.


Cheers


Derek

[Sean Clark]

I remember playing a game with Martin against Stewart and someone else where we had very few troops on table at the start. We lost heavily but enjoyed the challenge of trying our best!

[Moggy]

I don't have a problem with removing to the reinforcement area but its removing from game that is the issue.

I have just done a quick fly through the Army list book.

On 2/3 results 16 have remove a unit from game and 16 have remove to reserve. There is a scattering of other results as well. Thats roughly a third in each instance.

I am just observing that getting a few daily "wins" and rolling poorly on the results table could leave an Army forced to Attack while losing a significant proportion of the Army making any attack fail due to lack of troops rather than any mistakes/poor dice rolling/bad tactics of the player. Not what I would call winning!


Derek

[John Watson]

That's war for you, Derek.
John

[Smoking gun]

True enough John but if that's your only game in a month it's disappointing to say the least.

Best wishes,
Martin Buck

[martin goddard]

Just some input to the conversation.

My advice is to consider carrying over wins to a following day.
That way the  result with a  +6 is between 8 and 18.
This avoids all the bad results (intentionally) and gives access to some very good  results and attack points.
This is the intention of the carrying over.

Scoring a 2 or 3 on 2D6 is a 1/12 probability.
Happening twice is 1/144.
Of course it can happen, just as that triple 1 or triple 6 on 3D6 that can happen in games sometimes.

If you want to insure against this happening you might have a unit or two of reservist infantry which cost 21 points per unit.
You could then "sacrifice" a unit if this happens.

martin

[SimonC]

My advice is to consider carrying over wins to a following day.

I my experience this is the norm. Its rare to see anyone rolling on the base table (for the reasons above)