Greetings, /qst/. I'd like to play a game.Recently I stumbled across pic related, a science fantasy wargame someone has been cooking up, and has grabbed my interest for the past few days. While a Tabletop Simulator mod has been released, I have no one to play/learn the rules with. Would you all care to join me in learning how to play?>The border regions between The Ebon Forest and the Intermarine have always been sights of skirmishes and conflicts between the two rivals. This morning is no different, as two patrols of either side, each thinking that this stretch of dirt rightfully belongs to them, encounter one another. Soon, the sounds of early birds will be replaced with the staccato chatter of machine guns and snarls of bloodthirsty beasts, and the stench of burning flesh... Which army do you profess to be from? (I will take control of the one that you do not pic, don't worry when it is time for list building I do my own before I look at your)>Federal States ArmyHuman forces in Union uniform, with decent Infantry and a wide variety of Armor to play with. >Army of the Ebon ForestWolfmen in Strichtarn, what they lack in armored punch they make up for with ferocity of Tooth, Claw, and ATGMResources: https://firelock-team.itch.io/firelock-198x-09-public
>>6036802HOLY SHIT FIRELOCK>EBON FORESTDOG NIGGA TIME
>>6036802>Federal States ArmyDestroy the furry menace
>>6036802>>Federal States Army
>>6036802>Army of the Ebon Forest
>>6036802>Federal States ArmyHeavy Armor for the win
>>6036802>Federal States ArmyI AM A HUMAN SUPREMACIST!
>>6036802>Federal States ArmyTotal furry death.
>>6036802>Ebon ForestDog niggas, ww@?
>>6036802>Federal States Army
>>6036802>Ebon ForestDon’t know the war game but seems fun
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfqJ41UqxXU>6 Federalists>4 Ebon Forest>The rumble of human engines breaks the quiet of morning as an Intermarine column advances. Steely eyed men with blue uniforms and large beards keep a watchful gaze, fingers thumbing the safeties of their weapons as ash falls from their cigars. Dogfaces have been sighted in this sector, and they wont stand for it!You have chosen the Federalist States Army, known far and wide as the largest and best equipped group of drunks and convicts! This will be a 100pt match, a nice, small level skirmish to ease us into the system. While the FSA is quite versatile in the types of troops it can bring, at this point size you must make a continuous decision between Numbers and Firepower.Are you>A militia mob who's gone out looking for trouble?>A mechanized patrol?>An armored section?>[write in]After you make a choice you can freely suggest composition or simply keep you vote simple. You can browse troop choices in the PDF in the OP link.
>>6037038NOTE:As this is meant to be a simple, introductory game, advanced rules like artillery support or aircraft will be cut out from the game, so no need to spend valuable points on a manpads team.
>>6037038>A mechanized patrol?I feel like this option gives us a good chance to learn the mechanics while also allowing for more fuckups than the armored route
>>6037038mechanized Patrol seems like a good enough compromise between armor and infantry.
>>6037038>A mechanized patrol?
>>6037038>A militia mob
>>6037062>>6037064>>6037120>>6037373>Your scowl deepens as you listen on your set, doing your best to focus as your Appomatox barrels onwards, its tracks seemingly finding every pothole and loose rock on this blasted backwoods road. >The alert was sounded only minuets ago, a Lupar patrol sighted where their mangy snouts didn't belong. Sighted by a reservist group, your commander had almost dismissed them as drunks had two checkpoints not gone dark. >The militia had called in over the phone, of all things, and had only given the vaguest of intelligence before they hung up. Hung up! They had reported sightings of a few "infantry squads we think", and, supposedly, heard what *could* be a tracked vehicle. Maddeningly unhelpful.>You open a map and, while looking for where you will most likely trade blows with the enemy, go over your Platoon in your head to see what you can bring to bear...You are in command of a FSA Rifle platoon, consisting of your Appomattox (pic related) and three "Grumble" wheeled APC's each carrying a squad of State Grenadiers. At least one Militia squad will meet you at your destination. This brings you up to 65 points, with another 35 yet to be decided. Each of your APCs has room for a weapons team of your choice, or even a squad Desanting (riding on top of) at the cost of the APC not being able to fire its weapon until they disembark (Squads are considered to be the size of two Teams for transport). Another Option is to forgo extra weapon teams in order to bring up something heavier. Intelligence for the situation in incredibly questionable, the AEF while infantry focused does have tracked vehicles, but that could mean anything from a dinky universal carrier to one of their rare tanks. What could be brought to bear?Options:Squads:Grenadiers (line inf) - 10ptsMilitia - 5ptsTeams:Mortar team (anti inf) - 10ptsATGM (anti armor) - 10ptsRecoiless Rifle (general purpose) - 15ptsRangers (scout snipers) -15ptsVehicles:Bantam IFV - 20ptsDuck Light Tank - 20 ptsRunner ATGM carrier -20 ptsMore options in the manual but these seem to be the best ones for the theme
>>6037447You will also have to give yourself, your platoon, and your sections names and callsigns, of course. This has nothing to do with game play but everything to do with flavor. Copied from the manual:Sections:>Standard practice for the FSA is to name each section with a male given name, always starting with a vowel (O section could be Olli, E section Elmo...) with U usually reserved for the command section. The command element is listed at the top of the list, before the operational sections. The F.S-A. prefers triangular (that is, “three-section”) platoon organization, so typically only Aart through Olli is used for the unit's main elements, while Isaac designates ad-hoc attached elements.Callsigns>Federal soldiers are known for their gallows humor and have a flair for rhyme and alliteration. Their nicknames are as clever as they are vulgar, and the sounds they use are short, blunt, and fierce. An ideal Federal call-sign list draws references from things such as the nose art of the Vietnam War or the slang of the American western frontier. A Duck commander could name his ride the “Jackalope”; a fresh squad may well be the “Nosepickers” or “War Tourists”Names:>The names of the Intermarium are inspired by those of West Germanic languages, chiefly Dutch, with some smatterings of German, Belgian, English, or even Scots. In some places names are tinged with affectations of Nordic languages like Danish or Norwegian. A surefire sign that you are a real dyed-in-the-blue Intermarine is duplicated vowels (a “dipthong”) in the first name, such as “aa”, “ee”, or “oo”.
>>6037447The possibility of an enemy tracked vehicle necessitates at least a squad of anti-armor.>Recoiless Rifle>Mortar Team>Grenadiers4 squads of infantry backed by, a mortar team to dislodge entrenched snout demons and a recoiless for breaking barriers or any armored furball that might show.
>>60374472x Mortar team (anti inf)Grenadiers (line inf) - 10ptsMilitia - 5ptsI think the existing APCs should be sufficient to deal with an enemy tracked vehicle. I would focus on more quantity of units to allow casualties due to dumb mistakes due to this being our first time
>>6037519>I think the existing APCs should be sufficient to deal with an enemy tracked vehicle.Grumble APC's look to be equipped with a 7.76 MG and a 40m HE grenade launcher, sooo...I doubt that. Though I probably should give a rough overview of your force capabilitiesMilitia equip. with surplus SMGs and 73mm RPGGrenadiers equip. with Battle Rifles, squad MG, and 85mm RPG. Mortars can fire Frag and smokeRecoilless can fire HEAT, Incendiary, smoke'Assault Dismount' special rule held by all inf except militia. >If this infantry unit is embarked or desanting a vehicle (not aircraft), when that vehicle enters close combat in the ManeuverPhase, the infantry may immediately declare an Assault Dismount. Replace the vehicle with this unit, then move the vehicle’s frontal arc into basal contact with the infantry’s rear arc. The enemy unit that triggered the dismount then suffers from the vehicle’s covering fire and gains 3 pin.
>>6037519seconding
>>6037478changing choice to this
>>6037478>>6037519>>6037568>Your are in command of a fairly typical Mechanized Rifle Platoon, all things considered, save for what would be a third weapons team replaced with a rifle squad. Lacking room to put them, those poor sods in your last section have been taking turns riding on top of their Grumbler. Your two remaining Weapons teams consist of a Mortar and a Recoilless Rife. Good for fending off the infantry attacks you were expecting, but now with enemy vehicles in play you'll have to make sure your RR stays alive long enough to get its job done. There is the Militia squad as well, but frankly they may as well be as useful as a fart in the wind. Speaking of which, your coming up to the rendezvous right now...
>>6037647(So after starting this whole thing I realized that A: the rules say that we should alternate deployments, which would take to long, and B the game places huge emphasis on both sides not knowing what the other is bringing, which would be impossible to do in this format. Thus, I have made the decision that the side I will be controlling will deploy first so that you can deploy in reaction, and while I get to "see" what all your units are they will still be treated as unspotted for game purposes)>As you pull up to the beleaguered militia band, ready to give them an earful about poor phone etiquette, but that can wait till debrief. Firstly, you grill them on what they know, and just about the only good news is that they've been keeping an eye on enemy movements and have more to tell you. Draging what passed for their Sergent over to a map, you quickly get him to spill what he knows>The enemy is about platoon strength, and rapidly approaching your position, with not one but TWO vehicles supporting their advance. They are approaching a crossroads, what you assume for now to be their objective. >You notice, however that they have deployed over a wide front, perhaps you can take advantage of this?>barking orders over the comms, you force tears down the road to contest the AEF incursion. This is a take and hold mission, where both sides will seek to capture each point. The game ends if a side has more held objectives that the enemy at the end of round 6, has all three objectives at the end of any round, or kill all enemy TACOMs. The Dogfaces have deployed into three groups, no doubt seeking to take all three positions at once, ensuring a quick victory. Objectives can be taken or contested by any unit within 6 inches.Your deployment zone is 12 inches from your board edge, indicated by the white line. How will you deploy your forces, commander?
>>6037692I have not played this before so I must ask, how do you measure troop movement per turn if there is no square or hexagonal marks on the map. Will probably sound dumb but whatever.
>>6037715Thats a good question, and after googling answers I found you can impose a grid onto the table, each one is 2 inches by 2 inches here, for reference the unit model sizes are 40x40mm for the infantry and 40x60mm for the vehicles.
>>6037721>>6037715
>>6037725I suppose that I am supposed to draw on the image and send it back to you so that you know where I would place my pieces? also what's the range of the mortar and recoilless rifle?
>>6037738The Mortar and Recoilless have ranges of 16 and 24 respectively (you can find every units stats in the OP resources link). As for you telling me where to place the units...that's a good point. I just thought you all would tell me "Place 3rd squad on the east road" or something like that.
>>6037765okay, sorry, I overlooked that info and just jumped in.
>>6037725okay, this probably sucks but tell me what you think.dark red is mortarcyan is recoilless rifledark blue is appomattoxgreen is grenadiersyellow is militiaI'm not sure if I got anything wrong so tell me if I did. I didn't check with the grid map so it's the rough placement ofpieces.
>>6037831this is my first time playing strategy board games and I will probably make a lot of mistakes and what not but whatever
I'm posting on phone so can't modify the map or anything, but I think we should counter the three-prong approach of the dogs by keeping our forces concentrated. Which means either diving into two groups or keeping everyone together. In either case, the southern objective on high groubd is the most important
I just woke up and am leaving for work™ soon so I won't have time to edit the map, but I'm with >>6037902 on this. We should force concentrate the left side of the map and take those two points. Preferably we deploy the mortar, recoiless rifle and two infantry to take and guard the central point while the three APC's loaded with the militia and our remaining Grenadiers push up the left road and hopefully rout those three infantry units. The onus will then be on the snouts to push us out, and the only way those vehicles get anywhere in a timely manner is on the central road, where our we can pour enfilade fire from both south and west on them.
>>6038226I'll just agree with this one
All good idea, and will be implemented, but a word on terrain obstruction:Most terrain features have an occlusion type, that being how tall they are relative to everything around them and to infantry and tanks, who also have Height stats, where Infantry are 1 and most vehicles are 2. Light Forests have an Occusion of 2, so to see over them one would have to have an height of 3. Placing the recoilless rifle at the summit of that hill would put him at height 4 (1 naturally, +3 for terrain) able to look over everything save the two stretch of woods at the second level of the hill, meaning he has blind spots to his left and right. The mortar team is indirect, so it does not need line of sight so long as one other unit does. There are more rules for things like terrain shadows and seeing into terrain, bu they are too long to post here.
>>6037902Yes, concentrating our forces will be a good idea because we can easily wipe out one of their squads and then move on to the other two once we've taken a point.>>6037725QM, could you the x and y axis on this? X being numbers and Y being letters?
>>6038230Don't worry, you'll pick up tactics as we go.>It looks like you've (almost) beat them to the punch. While they are rapidly closing onto the objective, you've managed to place two of your dismount groups on the hillside, soon to lay down fire on any dog that dares stick their muzzle into the kill zone. While you'd like to say all you have to do is hold until the cavalry arrives, the increasing traffic on the chatterbox lets you know this isn't an isolated incitent, and the rest of the local forces are rapidly getting tied down elswhere. >As you suspected, they're trying to cut this vital highway so Division can't reinforce their forward positions. Which means this is a prelude to something big...>With a last wave to the dismounts, you turn back into your command vehicle, ordering the rest of your platoon down the road towards the oncoming storm...And while absolutely confident that you can crush the small force on the left flank, you know this won't be an easy fight.Your forces are deployed and awaiting orders. A note on movement: Each list has a set number of command, generated by you TACOM. For this list it is 3. Command tokens can be spent on a number of things, such as fire support and airstrikes, but for this simple mission they can only be used to move your forces. You can only move a piece by spending a command token, but since moving even your small force around would be impossible with only three there is something called a Brigade move. A brigade move is where a unit moving with the Brigade special rules can move other nearby units along with it.Your Appomattox has Brigade (3, 12"), which means that every time you active this guy three other models within 12 inches can move as well, provided they also end the movement within 12". Shooting does not cost Command Tokens, but some weapons have limited ammo.
>>6038449Done, was actually thinking about doing this earlier.Just a reminder: The grid is just their to help judge distances, each cell being 2" by 2". All forces may move freely across the board according to their move stat.
>>6038633I'm not sure about the intricacies of the tank movement but I think it would be good to move the recoilless rifle forward a bit
>>6038676just to see the enemy vehicles
>>6038676It is a bit more complicated than infantry, yes, but not that much. Vehicles get various bonuses and penalties depending on the terrain they are moving over. For instance, Paved roads give a x2 modifier to vehicles traversing them, so our convoy can go 16". Furthermore, if a wheeled vehicle begins and ends its movement on a paved surface, it can preform a Road Dash, letting it move a number of inches equivalent to its Quality stat (2 in this case), so our lead APC can put himself comfortably in M-4 should you chose.As a drawback though, wheeled vehicles pay more of a penalty off-road than tracked ones do. And all vehicles pay a movement penalty for turning, 1" every 90".
>>6038676>>6038684Do you mean to the hill crest? or slightly further?
>>6038724a little bit past the top of the hill and to the left, just to get the full line of sight for the enemy vehicles. I don't know if that's a bad Idea (if the vehicles will shoot at him) but it's the only way to suppress their movement. if getting a rifleman to come with him would give extra fire support for something like that, I would say to also move a rifleman with him but I don't think that it works like that just from the small bit I've read
>>6038728Will do, but a few things first. If you move past the hill crest you wont be able to see over the trees to your left, and you RR has an identification range of only 24". Does that change your answer to where you want it? Also, roll a d6 against me, winner decides who moves first.A note on turn phases, as they go in this order:>Support/Upkeep phaseIn this phase players can choose to call in support missions, as well as preform upkeep such as adding or taking away tokens, ect.>Fire phaseWhere the fun stuff happens. players take turns having one of their units fire until all units who can (or want to) do so>Movement phase Players take turns spending Command Tokens to move their forces>Identification phaseCheck LOS and what units spotting ranges are to see who gets identified by the enemy>Close Combat phaseWhere you remember the basics of CQC>Victory Condition PhaseCheck mission objectives to see if anyone wins this round.Sorry for taking so long to respond, I'm checking rules as I go.
Rolled 4 (1d6)>>6038734Did they change how dice rolling works on this board? rolling.
>>6038734I will stay just at the top of the hill ,I suppose. other people can move the apcs and things (I'm not sure about how I would best move them and other people seem better in that regard.dice+1d6
>>6038736*by stay at the top I still mean move forwards, just to the top only
>>6038736>dice+1d6goes in the options field of the post form, dont worry took me a couple tries to figure it out my first timeNext update wont be for a while, as Im off to bed for the night.
Rolled 5 (1d6)>>6038741thanks bro
>>6038747I do feel like the movements should be decided after other people vote where to move the other squads
>>6038806and just in general where they would move things, what they might choose to attack. I am quite fallible
>>6038735>>6038747>Federal Player: 5>Ebon Forest Player: 4Federal player wins, and gets to decide who goes first. Since this was not specified, I will let the next poster decide. either way I had already decided what the Lupar's first move will beFederal Move: RR team moves to secure the heights. One of Three command tokens spent.Ebon Forest's move: 3 units on the right flank BRIGADES forward 6"To save time, creative writing will wait till end of phase. Suggestions on this welcome, and will be taken into account.
>>6037038fun fact the feds geneticicly are incapable of lying in lore
>>6039020really? where does it say that?
>>6039038in the development discord they've mentioned it all peoples of the setting have some funky stuff about them santagracian's from the atom baronys for example are immune to cancer along side being just generally fucking nuts though that might be cultural
>>6039049>DiscordI don't touch that on general principal, so that explains why I haven't seen it.
>>6039078ah fair, pretty much all you really need to play the game proper is in the rule books but there's occasionally some little tidbits about setting linguistics or such that gets mentioned there
>>6038967>Since this was not specified, I will let the next poster decide.Have the OPFOR go first, so we have more time to react to their movements
>>6038967>>6039956The lead enemy vehicle moves down the road and takes cover behind a copse of trees. While you are at a higher elevation to see over that particular terrain feature, since it is beyond 12" and the enemy unit is within 6" of the far edge of the woods. it is considered to be out of LOS by its 'Terrain Shadow'. You still have two Command Tokens left for this turn, and the enemy has an unknown number remaining. Do you>Move either your mortar or one of the dismounted Grenadiers? In what Direction?>Move your group of ACPs up to the other objective?>spend one of your Command Tokens to pass, and wait to see what the Enemy does?
>>6040031Move our group of APCs up the road toward the other objective
>>6040255The mechanized platoon barrels up the road, desperate to get to the objective before the Lupars.>Enemy movementPerhaps hearing your approach, the enemy forces on the left flank duck into the crop field. While unable to provide hard cover, it does obscure them from being spotted. And one group seems to be setting up at the fields edge...(1/2)
>>6040329You still have one Movement remaining, and three possible units to use it on, the mortar team or one of the two flanking Trooper squads. The mortar as of right now has a rage up to about halfway through that orange house to the right, for reference. >Move the Mortar Team (where?)>Move the left Grenadier (where?)>Move the right Grenadier (where?)>Pass Turn.
>>6040329Whoops, forgot so specify that, yes, those enemy units DID indeed preform a Brigade move. My bad.
>>6040337If no one has any objections, I'd like to move the armored group slightly to the right so they are fully behind the cover of that dark green thing
>>6041157I do allow placement suggestions if you all want pieces moved around slightly.However, that terrain type is called "Broken Ground", and is meant to represent very rough but open terrain or, most probably in this case, an irrigation ditch. While it provides cover for squads and vehicles within it and causes movement penalties, it does not actually block line of sight, so moving them all to the right would be pointless for that reason, but if you still want to move it I'll do so (note that the lead apc can get a bit closer, as pointed out in >>6038719 so you can get that one APC that veered off to the Obj back on the road to the north if you really want to commit to charging their position. But right now both lead APC's have weapons range on the lead enemy unit in the field with their weapons, though since it is not identified you would have to Blind Fire, which means hitting on 6+ on a d6)As a colorblind guy myself, I'd rather it be marked differently, but that's a conversation with the game author.
>>6041183Oh, in that case nevermind.Instead, can we use a movement token to have the state grenediers inside the APCs dismount?
>>6041575Mad a long post about how loading and unloading only happen at the start and end of the movement phase but then I re-looked at the rules and was completely wrongYour leader can only Brigade once so you can only dismount one infantry this turn, who can move, but take into consideration that mounted units can still fire small arms while inside a vehicle, while also benefiting from their armor (though if the transport goes up in flames, so do the mounts). Transports also have designated entrance points, in our case they load and unload from the rear arc. I was going to save this for the next movement round, when some units have fired and revealed themselves, but you have a couple options here: You can have a stand up firefight with the enemy, your transports and dismounts trying to out shoot the enemy squads, safer but may take a few turns. You can floor it towards them, taking advantage of improved close range accuracy and your "Assault Dismount" special rule, though this may put you in range of counter fire. Or you can leave one or two squads on the objective and then drive the rest of your forces to help your right flank.
>>6041664I wont spoil what is waiting in the grass, but the standard Lupar infantry stats are pic related.
He everyone, QM here.It has been over 8 days since the last post was made, and I can only asume that this is because of lack of interest on the players part. I don't blame you all for this, and looking back at my post I feel like I was trying to lead the players into certain answers, or that most of my answers to your questions were "No, you can't do that" or "Thats a pretty bad idea". Is this accurate?Furthermore, if I were to try and finish this story line in another thread, what kind of format would you all prefer? The same as this? A more vague text base quest where you're not worrying about every little placement? Or should I go insane and try to emulate the famous "ASHEN DAWN" quest format, with each anon taking control of a small unit? I'd first ask that quests DM if its ok to ape that styleEven if you do not wish to continue, I do genuinely thank you for playing with me.
>>6048259I'd like to see a continuation of this. I think the low player interest is a number of things, first is strategy quests are always small, second is this is an unfamiliar ruleset that we have to get our heads around, and third is there's not much of a story to care about, at least not yet. Thanks for running in either case anon, and I'd be up for playing again if you want to continue it. Format would be up to you, maybe something a bit simpler than this and slowly introduce more complex rules, or something completely different, your choice. I think a lore primer would help for player retention too.
