Chainmail Reforged

[jacar]

Hi all,

After a lengthy hiatus, I started messing with my reworked rules of the old combat system.
I've...
1) Added rules for integrating OD&D.
2) Simplified the post combat resolution for melee. It now is similar to another Gygax oldie "Cavaliers and roundheads.

Cleaned up some of the wording. It is still fairly rough but I think it is on the right track. I would appreciate some feedback.

Thanks,

John

Attachments:

[cooper]

Reading it now. Very cool. Thank you very much for sharing this! (I'd like you to take a look at mine down the thread if you haven't, titled "house rules".)

Cooper's d6 House Rules

Pg. 12: It seems like a needless change for dwarves to take 1/2 hits to being 1 class heavier. What happens if the dwarves are already armored foot? What's the next class beyond that?

Pg. 12: I disagree with what you believe the magic weapons do for elves.

which brings us to page 13, "magic weapons"

as you can see in chainmail pg. 38 Magic armor gives a -3 to your attack dice in man to man. So someone attacking a hero in magic armor would roll 2d6-3. The magic sword is the opposite of this, but with more variability it adds +1d6 to your man to man dice, so a hero with a magic sword would roll 3d6 on the man to man table. If this seems overpowered, read the rules on mounted troops in man to man. Being mounted grants +2 to your 2d6 roll which is very close to the statistical average of a 1d6 (which is 3, just like the magic armor).

The sentence in the orr. rules talking about "those elves with magic weapons" refers to man to man combat (also read the rules for Trolls/Ogres on pg. as it states that an elf in man-to-man combat can kill them in 3 hits (so too in the elf description it states they do double damage to ogres) or can kill them in 1 hit on the fantasy table "if they wield a magic sword" This obviously is referencing an individual elf as the fantasy table is for individual heroes and elves with magic weapons function as heroes!

Which brings us to magic arrows, which were shot by men like "Bard" in The Hobbit. They are fired in the man-to-man rules and automatically hit their target, unless that target is a hero or fantasy creature then it allows elves to fire on the fantasy table and kill things in one hit (like dragons). For a hero who can already fight on the fantasy table, it gives a +1 to their attack roll. Again, this is an individual elf firing at a single fantastic creature. If you still have any doubts read the last sentence of magic arrows, it says there is no return fire from the "target" singular, not targets. and it tells you to roll 2d6 (roll two dice) for your attack roll.

All magic weapons are designed for man-to-man. Heroes do not roll 4d6 in mass combat unless you're running mass combat at 1:1 scale, which is acceptable. They function just like "army commanders" which is +1 to the units they are leading on all attack dice, with the caveat that they do not suffer the fate of the troops like army commanders explicitly do, rather they remain alive to fight on the man to man table or fantasy table even if all the troops they were with are killed

arrow:
mass combat (doesn't exist)
man to man (auto hit)
fantasy table (+1)

sword:
mass combat (doesn't exist)
man to man +1d6
fantasy table +1

armor:
mass combat (doesn't exist)
man to man -3
fantasy table -1

[jacar]

Hi Cooper,

I skimmed your version and will comment later when I've time to read them. I think you probably missed an important point of what I am trying to do. I am re-writing the rules to make them more streamlined and less over the top. Many items are new or changed.

Elves getting the +1 for magic weapons on 1 die of there combat roll was a deliberate toning down with what they could do.

I eliminated the fantasy combat table all together as well as the MtM rules. They are both redundant for a DnD game. You have the "Alternate Combat Syatem (D20)" for all your small tactical needs. The D6 game is good enough for most massed combat games and the conversion rules are to get your character into the game seemlessly (I hope).

So, much of what you say would be true if I were duplicating Chainmail verbatum...which is not my intent.

P12 Dwarves (and others that are better or worse than the dice table can handle) can top out at 4-1 on the high end or 1-4 on the low end.

Fantastic combat...anyone can fight. Anyone can get wounded. Wounds "stick" in my version. So, a band of 12 normal men could fight a dragon at 1 die per 3 men and would probably route in 1 turn after the dragon hit them with the breath weapon.

So I hope you can understand my intent now.

John

[cooper]

I get what your doing now, a basic skirmish (mass combat) retelling of chainmail. I like the poor average and good offensive rating. Are you missing mounted troops though? Seems like a big deal. How were you thinking of incorporating them, given how confusing it is in chainmail for beginners?

Edit: there it is, I see it. Well the whole things seems very reasonable. A nice intro (basic) version of chainmail mass combat. Looks like a success! I can imagine people starting a battle a few minutes.

With the inclusion of heroes however, your mass combat cannot be more than 1:1 scale, as soon as you go to 1:10 or 1:25 however, the d&d characters will no longer function as they do in d&d.

But for a 1:1 skirmish game your rules look great. Really nice. Oh yeah, and nice title.

[jacar]

Regarding the scale, if you consider in the man to man game (D20) 1 round is 1 minute, you can reasonably assume that 1 character could kill 1 target per round. In a massed combat game, the round might be 10 minutes or more! So that same character could kill 10 men (or more) per round. In defending, that character probably can't be attacked by more than 3-4 actual men if he is in a formation and not more than 6 actual men if standing alone. So, with this in mind, characters could be viable with a larger scale (10 men per figure and say a 15 minute turn) and things would work out just fine for DnD scale wise.

Besides, lets face it. You play 0D&D for gaming reasons and not for realism! :-)

[thegreyelf]

Practical nitpick to cover your butt...you're technically not allowed to directly reference Dungeons & Dragons if you use the OGL. You should change "OD&D" references to "original fantasy games," or something similar.

[jacar]

Oct 20, 2010 9:51:02 GMT -6 thegreyelf said:

Practical nitpick to cover your butt...you're technically not allowed to directly reference Dungeons & Dragons if you use the OGL. You should change "OD&D" references to "original fantasy games," or something similar.

Apologies. I had no idea! I'll take care of that tonight.

Thanks,

John