Chainmail For Skirmish- Why Not?

[derv]

Apr 5, 2015 16:21:54 GMT -6 @gronanofsimmerya said:

CHAINMAIL is meant for armies, or at least war bands. One hero against a mob of orcs simply is not what the game is designed for, so you're trying to do something with the rules that they aren't intended for.

Apr 18, 2015 15:49:25 GMT -6 @gronanofsimmerya said:

CHAINMAIL is not really a skirmish game; it assumes formed bodies of troops. I think unless you have at least 50 figures on a side, you're going to get a very weird situation because you're using the game for something it didn't aim for.

Michael brought this point up in a couple of threads. Ever since, I've been thinking about it. I agree that you will get different results from the game when running large battles of formed units compared to small battles with a hand full of figures, but is this a problem? I guess if you're trying to recreate a historical conflict, you would also want to avoid over simplifying it with too great a figure to man ratio. Yet, if you're simply using the rules for a small scale ruckus between two warring rivals, I'm not sure I see a problem. The question I'm wrestling with really boils down to, why not?

I'm asking this question because every thing about Chainmails Man-to-Man system suggests skirmish rules. On p.25 it opens up by telling us, "Use this system for small battles and castle sieges." Was the inclusion of siege rules a mistake on the authors part? Because I'm not sure how else you would run it. Generally, your troops are not going to be in formations. They may be in small groups of like types, but they are not marching over castle walls or through the breaches. Troops will be battling one on one as they break through the castles defenses.

You are told to use the Man-to-Man system at 1:1 for castle sieges a number of times in the text of the rules. The order of melee includes examples where the defender gets first blow, i.e. "defender is fighting from above (castle wall, ramparts, etc.)". Page 22 contains a whole section on Siege. It starts by saying, "it is suggested that they be used in combination with the rules for man-to-man combat."

This section also includes a number of examples of situations that involve relatively small groups of figures:

"Bringing down the walls of a castle will be a long and perhaps perilous task, for the defender will have ample time to organize and conduct many forays and raids before defenses collapse."

"Siege towers will accomadate 5 assault troops on the drawbridge story and 3 on the top deck. Up to 5 figures per turn can climb the ladder from the ground, to the upper decks."

Moveable Mantlets: "Provide full cover for up to 3 footmen."

Ladders: "One man can carry a ladder.....two men can carry a ladder without penalty."
"Three men can climb from the base......during the turn."

I'm not bringing this up to be snarky. It may be that I misunderstand Michael's point or possibly I have a different understanding of what Skirmish means. This Wiki does a fair enough job describing what I understand Skirmish to mean. I'm not sure how Chainmail fails to meet the criteria.

[Deleted]

Skirmish rules are usually custom designed for ten figures per side or less. A set of skirmish miniatures rules is extremely different from a large scale set. Korns' "Modern War in Miniature" is a good example of skirmish rules; a turn is two seconds, an inch equals six feet.

The answer to your question depends entirely on what you mean by skirmish. "Small number of troops" is NOT the same as "small number of figures." Yes, you can put five figures on the drawbridge of a siege tower. That's not the same as fighting a battle with five figures period.

Note my comment... "50 FIGURES on a side." Whether you use the 1:20 or man to man system is irrelevant; it's the number of figures. Ten figures on a side and your battle will be over in about 15 minutes in CHAINMAIL. Perhaps that's what you want, but most skirmish rules sets are designed to make a battle of ten figures on a side take up the same amount of play time as a large scale battle in more usual rules.

If you find some skirmish medieval rules (they're not hard to find) you'll see how they differ radically from CHAINMAIL and similar rules.

[DungeonDevil]

I don't think so either. At best I'd borrow the term used for "The Sword and the Flame": semi-skirmish (kind of the "bastard sword" of wargaming rules).

On the other hand, I've been eager to find time to be creative and adapt the skirmish rules from Paddy Griffith's Napoleonic book -- and even the WRG Fire and Steel booklet -- to suit Ancients/Medieval/Fantasy.

Many thoughts, sooo little time...

[derv]

It seems that the issue is more to do with the rules being satisfyng versus being satisfactory for this type of play.

Consider the possibility of a scenario involving a larger group of players, say eight, who each are the serjeant-at-arms in charge of a lance of as few as 8-10 figures who can be formed up how ever they wanted. The lances would make up a company. Each side would get a total of 32-40 figures, but each player would only manage 8-10 figures. Possibly one side must take a bridge or some other permenant objective that the other players must defend. We could also double the number of figures, but reduce the number of players by half for the same situation.

Would you consider this a skirmish? Could Chainmail's man-to-man system provide a satisfying game?

[cooper]

I think CM itself provides some decent clues. pg.6 mentions a 300 point army vs. a 350 point army as an example of play. On pg. 27 Gygax does say to keep in mind "traditional composition of historic forces" when building armies, so most 300 point armies will be less as archers, heavy foot and horsemen are more expensive and most cultures have a mix of soldiers. A "small melee" of CHAINMAIL combat on pg. 15 says, "10 heavy horse attack 20 heavy foot" (50 pts. vs. 40 pts).

Each side would get a total of 32-40 figures, but each player would only manage 8-10 figures. Possibly one side must take a bridge or some other permenant objective that the other players must defend. We could also double the number of figures, but reduce the number of players by half for the same situation.

40 figures per side is more than twice the size of the small mass combat example combat on page 15 of chainmail!

Replace chainmail's "man to man" with D&D and do you think having each player rolling attacks for 8-10 characters would be manageable? If there are any parries or short vs. long weapons you're looking at a player making upwards of 30 attacks in a single round. Personally, for such a large man-to-man engagement, I would use CM mass combat rules at 1:1 scale for that large of a skirmish, that way each player need only roll a single attack of like forces. One player handles the archers, one player handles the 8-10 lancers etc.

There is no intrinsic association with a combat resolution mechanic and its ratio. CM mass combat is used for mass combat because it is less granular than the man to man rules, not because there is something intrinsic to rolling d6's that require the rules to stipulate 1:20 ratio (shadowrun rpg uses d6 dice pools for example). So if you are running man to man, but want less granular rules, then you adopt the mass combat to 1:1 scale. It works fine. Just as you could run a 1:6000 scale "man-to-man" combat with 1 figure on either side. d&d/man to man combat rules are more complex and therefore used for "smaller scale" because each player, including the DM, is only dealing with a very small number of figures on the table 1-3 per player and can mentally afford to use more granular rules. If you're looking at 8-10 per player, then you should consider less granular rules, aka "mass" combat.

The question is not "how many men" but how granular one wants a melee round to be given the number of figures on the table. How many men the figures represent is irrelevant so long as both sides adhere to the same ratio of figures:men wether it's 1:1, 1:10, 1:20, or 1:1000. (caveat that miniature size and movement/time scale can become unrealistic if the miniature size and ratio are not in line with movement in inches per turn...which is the problem with dungeon exploration in D&D...)

[derv]

cooper your reference to p.6 "small melee" is an interesting one, especially since it's dealing with post melee morale.

I probably should have been clearer with my example. I'm using the term "lance" to refer to the smallest level of medieval military organization. Though, I have read some references to a further break down of demi-lance. The composition is not specific historically, but would be equivalent to the size of a squad. These groups could be cavalry, but they might be footmen or a mix of both also. Such small units combined would make up a company in larger conflicts. Individually, they are well suited to the sort of "forays and raids" mentioned in Chainmails siege section.

If one would run a small engagement along these lines with man-to-man, one of the figures in the lance would be considered the serjeant-at-arms and gain the +1 dice bonus of a Leader.

The example scenario I gave above was an attempt to blur the lines of what most would consider a skirmish or large scale battle. It certainly could be played with fewer players and fewer figures. But, would Chainmail suffice for this purpose or not?

[chicagowiz]

The only way you can know derv is to set it up and play it. See what happens. See if it fits your definition of "I'd like to do this."

In my experience, I've played in large Chainmail games where there were ~ 200 figures a side (Kevin Cabal's "Cleansing of Tyrn Gorthad" that we've chatted about on this board some), and I've played in a game where there were 10 figures a side. Admittedly, the second one was experimentation and us having fun, and it worked fine. Much better than rolling dice for 100 individual combatants, that's for sure!

[Deleted]

Apr 24, 2015 23:07:10 GMT -6 derv said:

It seems that the issue is more to do with the rules being satisfyng versus being satisfactory for this type of play.

Consider the possibility of a scenario involving a larger group of players, say eight, who each are the serjeant-at-arms in charge of a lance of as few as 8-10 figures who can be formed up how ever they wanted. The lances would make up a company. Each side would get a total of 32-40 figures, but each player would only manage 8-10 figures. Possibly one side must take a bridge or some other permenant objective that the other players must defend. We could also double the number of figures, but reduce the number of players by half for the same situation.

Would you consider this a skirmish? Could Chainmail's man-to-man system provide a satisfying game?

That's more figures than I'd consider a skirmish. That's pretty much how we used to play.

Go look online for "medieval skirmish rules" and you'll see the difference.

[Deleted]

Apr 24, 2015 23:26:28 GMT -6 cooper said:

40 figures per side is more than twice the size of the small mass combat example combat on page 15 of chainmail!

That is an example of one melee in a battle, not the entire sum of forces.

[derv]

I’ve used Chainmail in the past for small conflicts, partially because I did not have a huge mini collection to test the rules with and partially because of time restraints. For the most part, I stuck to the RaW. I haven’t had as much of an interest in the Man-to-Man combat system and have generally gravitated towards the Mass Combat system for resolutions. But Chainmail recommends using Man-to-Man for siege and that is what I’m trying to work on at the moment.

As I said else where, my games tend to be more clannish, i.e. small warbands and small strongholds. So my objectives for a rule set are that they be flexible enough to handle a variety of circumstances within a campaign. For the most part, Man-to-Man makes sense for much of this, but there will be occasions where the Mass Combat system will still be useful too.

I’m fond of Chainmail and it’s connection to OD&D and would like to maintain that connection in my campaign, but I’m also considering some other rule sets that are actually pretty complete for those purposes as well. The two that I’ve recently been reading over are, Knights & Magick and Knights & Knaves. Both are flexible systems and exhaustive in content . They are worth looking into if these things interest you. I had also considered Delta’s BoW, but it would have to be augmented with house rules from other sources for siege. Dan wants to work on these elements in the future, but it doesn’t seem to be any time soon. Besides the fact, I’m just a little hard headed in not wanting to depart from Chainmail.

To make Chainmail more flexible one can take some hints from U&WA under Naval Combat: Boarding. For skirmish sized conflicts it becomes necessary to have a Leader figure and to treat each additional figure or a very small grouping of figures (max 3) as a unit. Your Leader(s) need to have a leadership quality score that will establish Command Control distance. Morale rules must also be used in a more flexible way. For very small conflicts, I’m not sure that the Post-Melee Morale will be applicable or should be used. Simply sticking to Excess Casualty checks should be sufficient. Adopting the suggestions on p.26 for morale seems reasonable. Certainly if the Leader is cut down, a morale check must be made immediately and if the troops remain stable, a new Leader established at that time, whether of lower rank in the chain of command or from the rank-and-file rising up for the occasion.

One additional factor that I use for 1:1 is a ground scale of 1”= 10 feet, instead of 10 yards.

Raid on the Trade Post

The ruler Bayan Kahn has slowly been expanding the borders of his kingdom. He’s recently set his eyes on the land beyond the gyepu in the west, a territory where there has been relative peace and open trade agreements for some time. It is also an area whose rulers have grown lax and Bayan Kahn considers ripe for plunder. Now, before the harvest season, is his chosen time. In advance to his invasion, he has sent out a number of small diversionary patrols to the south of his encamped army, to harass the enemy and draw them out into the open.

Your particular group of raiders are charged with attacking and securing a Trading Post situated on a ford of the river. The ford is the only crossing point below where Bayan Kahn’s army is encamped that might allow the enemy to flank his forces.

Raiders:

3 LH- (mv 24” chg 30”) leather, shield and sword (9 pts) one leader with +1 dice bonus
2 LF archers- (mv 9” chg 12”) leather, composite bow (10 pts)
3 LF- (mv 9” chg 12”) leather, shield and sword (3 pts)

Leader: Asudai (quality: 12)
LH: Bataar, Jochi
LF archers: Chimeg, Nergui
LF: Hutga, Odyal, Jetei

Defenders:

6 HF- (mv 9” chg 12”) chain, shield and spear (12 pts) one leader with +1 dice bonus
4 LF crossbow - (mv 12” chg 12”) leather (10 pts)
Waist high walls = soft cover -1 to missile dice scores

Leader: Hajnal (quality: 12)
HF: Jeno, Jutka, Toloi, Rezso, Peterke
LF: Domo, Kublai, Ferke, Lazlo

Command Control: roll 2d6+4 for the leaders quality or use Charisma score. This is the range in inches that his troops must be to follow orders. Otherwise, they will remain stationary or avoid contact by backing away.

The river may be crossed at the ford only. Figures must stop before entering and it takes a full turn to cross. No charge moves possible.





Here in the distance the great Bayan Kahn sits with his retinue watching over the playing field. This is actually a set my son painted up, so I wanted to include the elephant and chariot in the pics.



I'll try to post a brief play report later with some thoughts.

[derv]

I won't bore you with a detailed run down, but I will tell you it was an interesting game. The inclusion of command control makes for some fun decisions.

The ford in this scenario added alot of challenge for the raiders. If their cavalry would have gotten a foothold on the other side, I think they could have created problems for the defenders of the post. Instead, the player held back his cavalry and advanced his footmen who were immediately charged by the defenders HF. The raiders were able to pick off a number of figures with their greater ranged composite bows who they kept behind cover, though. The one horseman the raiders advanced across the ford ended up getting unhorsed and stunned for 3 turns. He was subsequently killed the following turn. Ultimately, both sides ended up checking morale due to excess casualties. The defenders remained stable, but the raiders failed their check and retreated.

Overall, the game took about an hour to play out with some futzing around time included.

[derv]

I should elaborate on how Command Control could work for larger scenarios.

In the scenario above, I simply had each side with one serjeant-at-arms in charge of an 8-10 man lance. The leader must maintain the proper distance to his troops in order to maintain control. This is determined by his leadership quality. For a serjeant-at-arms, I determined that to be 2d6+4.

Now imagine running a slightly larger scenario with 2-3 lances, each with a serjeant-at-arms. Who's directing them on the battle field? There's a chain of command for this. So, now you might include a lieutenant with a leadership quality of 2d6+12 who must maintain that proper distance with his serjeants.

Finally, we might want multiple companies each run by a lieutenant who has to answer to a commander. The commander would have a leadership quality of (1d6+12)x2. He must maintain this distance with his lieutenants.

A break in the chain of command would trigger morale checks or immobolize certain units unless rallied by a superior officer.

Ideally in this sort of game, the lances or companies would be run by different players with one player acting as commander on each side.

[chicagowiz]

Apr 26, 2015 15:07:17 GMT -6 derv said:

I had also considered Delta’s BoW, but it would have to be augmented with house rules from other sources for siege. Dan wants to work on these elements in the future, but it doesn’t seem to be any time soon. Besides the fact, I’m just a little hard headed in not wanting to depart from Chainmail.

Thought you might want to check this out - Delta's Siege Rules/Scenario: deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2012/07/siege-on-borderlands.html

It's fairly adaptable to other situations.

[jacar]

I don't see why the Man to Man rules wouldn't work as a skirmish game. DnD, after all, is a detailed skirmish game anyway. The MtM supplement is more of a "recordless" version skirmish game. You get hit, you die. It should make for a quick game with few figures per side. I do think the massed combat game requires at least 50 figures though in order to be at least somewhat meaningful. 100 figures per side for a decent game for two players.

[Deleted]

Since CHAINMAIL already has rules for army commanders, why did you add your own "command control" rules?

[coffee]

Apr 24, 2015 19:52:20 GMT -6 DungeonDevil said:

I don't think so either. At best I'd borrow the term used for "The Sword and the Flame": semi-skirmish (kind of the "bastard sword" of wargaming rules).

On the other hand, I've been eager to find time to be creative and adapt the skirmish rules from Paddy Griffith's Napoleonic book -- and even the WRG Fire and Steel booklet -- to suit Ancients/Medieval/Fantasy.

Many thoughts, sooo little time...

Griffith's rules are good.

There's also Donald Featherstone's Skirmish Wargaming, which presents general rules and then scenarios adapting them for different periods.

[derv]

Apr 27, 2015 5:13:45 GMT -6 chicagowiz said:

Thought you might want to check this out - Delta's Siege Rules/Scenario: deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2012/07/siege-on-borderlands.html

It's fairly adaptable to other situations.

Thanks chicagowiz. I've seen that pdf before. And you're right, it would be fairly adaptable for most situations.

What I'd like to see is some BoW rules for siege engines and creating breeches, as well as sapper's and counter measures. I figured I could just use what's in Chainmail for this, but then why not just use Chainmail?

Actually, what I was really thinking, since you posted pics of that castle you bought, was that you're probably in the midst of creating some home brewed BoW rules for siege right now and I just have to buy some time

[derv]

Apr 27, 2015 17:25:26 GMT -6 @gronanofsimmerya said:

Since CHAINMAIL already has rules for army commanders, why did you add your own "command control" rules?

I'd say, instead, that I adopted and adapted the command control rules for the circumstance. They're not really "my own".

Those rules are presented to us for Chainmail's Man-to-Man in U&WA p.31-32.

I modified the distances for command control simply because I reasoned we were dealing with a larger, more open environment then what's found when boarding a ship. Also, my scenario above was only dealing with "Leaders" (lowly serjeants). Though, I could see expanding it to include a chain-of-command that included commanders.

I found it to be a fun mechanic for the game. It forces a player to be cognisant of where all their troops are in relation to their leader (or commander). It also forces a player to expose his leaders to some risk in order to be effective. I can imagine creating some real twists to a game by including piss-poor leaders

[chicagowiz]

Apr 28, 2015 14:50:13 GMT -6 derv said:

Apr 27, 2015 5:13:45 GMT -6 chicagowiz said:

Thought you might want to check this out - Delta's Siege Rules/Scenario: deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2012/07/siege-on-borderlands.html

It's fairly adaptable to other situations.

Thanks chicagowiz. I've seen that pdf before. And you're right, it would be fairly adaptable for most situations.

What I'd like to see is some BoW rules for siege engines and creating breeches, as well as sapper's and counter measures. I figured I could just use what's in Chainmail for this, but then why not just use Chainmail?

Actually, what I was really thinking, since you posted pics of that castle you bought, was that you're probably in the midst of creating some home brewed BoW rules for siege right now and I just have to buy some time

Well, you'd think so, but I've been so d**n busy, I haven't yet. I'm probably going to use Delta's rules and riff off of them. Or use Chainmail. Depends on the scenario and situation.