Let’s Write Some Rules

[Thuseld]

On the blog I am starting to record my process for writing a set of rules. I might just be crazy, but I think I want to give it a go and homebrew something a little more complex than a set I wrote a couple of years back for low literacy kids at my school.

I was sitting, trying to decide which miniatures to base up in multi-figure bases for Horizon Wars (instead of repairing my damaged stands that the kids at school were too rough with). I ended up with a Ferret, some AMX tanks (can’t remember which ones), some pickup trucks with figures shooting from the back, and an assortment of random Sci Fi figures from various manufacturers. I pondered. I thought. Finally I decided to just leave it as I really wanted to make a rag-tag militia but also have them fight like one. Horizon Wars doesn’t really have a built in mechanism for that (other than just knocking stats down, but that doesn’t feel right. It just makes them more squishy/less offensively effective). I got thinking about some of the offerings from Nordic Weasel Games, but I don’t really have any of his rules that are geared towards multi-figure stands. Wait, isn’t Laserburn an NWG game? I have had it for ages but haven’t used it because it calls for so many stands of infantry and vehicles. Could I just use Starport Scum, or Blast Pistol, or Clash on the Fringe and just fudge it so the stand of figures counts as the one character? Not sure.
What do I want? 

Simple combat mechanics but still a handful of cubes (polygons)

Minimal book keeping.

Morale.

Some sort of troop quality system that links into morale.

I might steal the Battle Rating (BR) system from the Battlegroup rules. This is the mechanic whereby your army has a numeric value (BR), and after unit loss or objective loss you pull chits. Each chit has a number, and once you hit your BR the game is over. You have lost.

 

Well, this might be the only post I make about this because it might all flop.

Experiments here: http://inexperiencedmodelmaker.blogspot.co.uk/

Tranquil Stars updates: https://tranquilstars.wordpress.com

[ian pillay]

If you can find copies of them you should check out hellfire and hell by starlight both sadly out of print these days, originally published by Wessex Games. I stumbled across my copies on eBay a few years back. Both have some great ideas for low level scifi as you have suggested. Hellfire has a neat reaction / moral system. as you take causalities your troops begin to behave differently.
You can glean a flavour of the rules from the science fiction science fantasy society https://www.sfsfw.org

Hope this gives you some ideas to tinker with.

Tally-Ho! Check out my blog at…..
http://steelcitywargaming.wordpress.com/

[Thuseld]

First Playtest of the combat mechanics. The first test of combat mechanics went surprisingly well. I liked it all but there is some food for thought.

Experiments here: http://inexperiencedmodelmaker.blogspot.co.uk/

Tranquil Stars updates: https://tranquilstars.wordpress.com

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