Oathmark: Battles of the Lost Age Anybody playing?

[Tim Snoddy]

Had a first game of it yesterday and found it simple, fast moving and fun.  If you have any figs lying around you should be able to get them on table without a problem if prepared to do a bit of “counts as”.  Designed for single casualty removal but multi basing is not an issue if you mark casualties.  Not huge depth to the tactics but certainly not a game of pure chance either.  You activate units alternatively with your opponent but a unit failing to activate can still take one action to move or shoot but not charge.  Despite being advertised as mass battle the scale is 1/1 so it represents mass skirmish, a few hundred combatants a side.  Units fight one on one, no multi unit combats are possible.  I think this is a key design decision and really speeds play.  Much easier to hit the flank of an enemy unit than in most games but not as devastating either.  You only ever roll a max of five dice in combat.  You can theoretically cause 16 hits but in practice it is hard to even get 4 o 5.  One base mechanic I did particularly like was the two morale breaks and you are out.  Any time a unit takes casualties it has to test morale.  The first failure makes a unit disordered which gives it a negative modifier to just about everything.  It can rally by successfully activating but if it fails a second morale test whilst disordered it is eliminated regardless of how many troops are still alive in the unit.  This causes a “cascade of panic”, all friendly units within 8″ must also test morale.  This rule served to really concentrate minds on how to force morale tests on enemy disordered units and how to avoid them with your own disordered units.  I played Dwarf V Goblin and it illustrated the goblins command and control problems, and iffy morale very well.  The real meat of the game is in the unique kingdom builder and campaign system.  Those prepared to invest a little time being richly rewarded.  What is anyone else making of it?  Any criticisms or things that put you off

[Tony S]

Although I don’t play fantasy very often, I do admit Oathmark is looking mighty attractive to me right now. I got the rules, and read through them, and am quite looking forward to trying them out. I’m glad to hear you liked them. Overall the rules seem very clean.

Actually the biggest thing that intrigued me when I first heard about it, was the ability to use any race in any army! The ability to pick any units your want – Goblin riders, elven archers, dwarven spearmen – is interesting indeed. As you say, it seems easy to use pretty much any figures to have. My Carthaginians are going to make an appearance – as well as some LoTR units.

That’s why my favourite historical army is Seleucid, a veritable cornucopia of, well, everything!

Anyway, Oathmark is absolutely on my list to play when the club can finally get together. A couple of us have already drawn up our kingdoms. Looking forward to it!

[Phil Dutré]

Read the rules but haven’t played them yet.

I felt a bit disappointed though: Oathmark can’t seem to decide whether it’s a unit-based or a figure-based game. Units have a fixed footprint (good!), but then combat is based on individual figure die rolling and individual figure removal (aren’t we past that 🙂 ?).

The proof of the pudding is in the eating though …

[Tony S]

I hear what you’re saying Phil (BTW, love the old Yaquinto counter as your icon) but most “old school” rules mechanisms don’t bother me as such.  Except order writing.  Order writing brings back ‘orrible ‘orrible memories of WRG and TTG.

 

I think it depends on how the older mechanisms are applied – for example, the brand new Infamy, Infamy rules (or SnipSnip or Kenny as some have dubbed them) have figure removal.  Oathmark also caps individual figure die rolling at five, which is a good design choice in my opinion.  And perversely sometimes I find some of the older style of rules to warm the nostalgic cockles in my heart, such as the average die in Honours of War from Osprey.

 

But I know about as much as you, as I haven’t played them yet either.  As you say, I’m eager to try a taste of that pudding!

[Who Asked This Joker]

Oathmark has a 5 figure frontage.  Each figure has a number of attacks so you roll 5xnumber of attacks against a target number.  Very simple combat mechanics and no saves.  I’ve only read through the rules once but am quite happy withwhat I’ve seen.  The default unit size is quite small at just 10 figures per infantry unit or 5 figures per cavalry unit.  It is figure removal for casualties which I applaud.  It can be played with as few as 30 figures.  No special gizmos or special dice are needed to play.  It is one of the more promising rules sets I have seen on the market today.  Very straight forward and approachable.

John

"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."

--Abraham Lincoln

[Phil Dutré]

Tony S wrote:

(BTW, love the old Yaquinto counter as your icon)

 

One of my long-term plans is trying to mod that game into something more modern using miniatures.

[Tim Snoddy]

I have got half a dozen or more games under my belt now and have to say this rule set is definitely growing on me.  It is light, movement is a breeze, die roll modifiers are few, but there are a lot of tactics.  When you get to activate there are often tricky questions on what to do for the best or the situation most deserving of mitigation.  All the troop types seem to have their uses and all have flaws.  On the down side there is a lot of luck, more so than most games I would play but being easy and fast to play I can live with that.  As ever you wonder if points for some units can possibly be right.  Archery can seem overwhelming when the dice go the archers way.

[Mark C]

picked up erehwon and oathmark  at the same time.. Oathmark instant Narnia feeling playing in 15mm but seems i’m to only be able to get fauns from splintered light so very expensive shipping for me…getting centaurs and miniotaurs from ralptha europe guess elves will be my fauns for now…

erehwon easyer to pick up and play had a brief dabble .. oathmarks a bit more intimidating larger numbers and 5×5 ranks where as erewhon is a muddle of group

any how gonna be test same armies for both games in the coming future..

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