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Idea for war boardgame

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ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969

Hi! I've got a crazy idea for yet another game. I showed it to a friend and he thought it was brilliant.

There's an 8x8 board placed between the players. Each square has an Othello piece on it. The four rows near Black have the Black side up and vice versa This indicates which side "owns" that square. The board starts out empty.

The two sides use soldiers to do battle for territory. They each get four actions per turn, where an action is: move a reserve unit onto the perimeter of a board (to a square he controls), have a unit shoot, have a unit move, have a unit rotate its turret (it can only shoot at enemies it is looking at -- they have 90 degree fields of view), or have a unit take possession of a square it's sitting on.

Each side has 32 units:

20 soldiers: 1 hit point, does 1 damage, moves 2 squares per turn, has a range of 2 squares. Can attack one target per action.
2 cannoneers: a Soldier which does 2 damage but has movement 1.
2 snipers: a Soldier which has range 4 but has movement 1.
2 miners: a Soldier which cannot attack but can lay and defuse minefields. Units walking onto minefields have a 50% chance of taking 1 damage per minefield on the square.
2 engineers: a Soldier who cannot attack but can raise or demolish walls, as well as repair damaged vehicles.
2 grenadiers: a Soldier with hand grenades. He has range 1, but he can attack multiple targets in a given square with his grenade as it blows up the whole square.
2 martial artists: a Soldier whose great fitness gives him 2 hit points instead of 1. He uses hand to hand combat, so he has range 1.

As you can see, each type of unit (other than the basic Soldier) has an advantage of double X and disadvantage of half X.

Furthermore, there are vehicles:

8 Jeeps (capacity 4, 2 hit points, movement 4, does 1 damage)
5 Trucks (capacity 10, 3 hit points, movement 3, does 1 damage)
2 Tanks (capacity EXACTLY 2 -- driver and gunner, 5 hit points, movement 1, does 3 damage)

These vehicles can ferry people around, and destroying a vehicle destroys all its occupants.

Finally, there is terrain to consider. There are four hills on the board, and a unit on a hill gets its range increased by 1 if it's targeting ground-level forces.

Generally, if you're in range and the enemy is pointing his gun at you, you're automatically hit unless there is a hill other unit in the way. However, hits immediately behind a wall have a 50% chance of getting missed due to cover (flip a coin) by enemy units on the other sides. Finally, units get a chance to dodge missiles if the enemy is in their field of view -- a 50% chance of missing. If you're facing someone behind a wall, the chance of you getting hit is only 25%! Of course, if you're nowhere near a wall and are being attacked from behind, you're in trouble :)

What do you think?

Thanks in advance,

ACG

Gimmy
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

While there are many wargames out there, like warhammer 40K and stuff, yours offer simplicity.
the movment system, the states for each unit - short and simple.
here are some points for you to think about:
*rules for "grouping" - movment of a group of soldiers.
*test this game hard, to see if there are nasty combo's.
*think of another "race" to play with, mirror battles are usually boaring (apart from chess, where things are different)

Yes the game sounds good, but did you test it?
testing is one of the most important phases in development!

And with that said and done, I think this game will apeal to peoples who like wargames and simplicity (a hybrid of chess and wargame).
Hope I helped in a way... Gimmy.

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

I haven't tested it yet, but I'd like to.

It isn't a perfect mirror battle. Keep in mind that the battlefield starts out empty and people introduce units one at a time as they see fit anywhere on the board. It's not like in chess where there's a set starting arrangement. As long as both sides have the same number of each type of unit, they're fine.

Also, there is a way to link units together already -- everybody hops into a jeep and drives together to a certain location. That was something Stratego doesn't have.

ACG

Gimmy
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

ACG wrote:
It isn't a perfect mirror battle. Keep in mind that the battlefield starts out empty and people introduce units one at a time as they see fit anywhere on the board.ACG

It will be more interesting if the armies will have a different units, and some unique special powers.

ACG wrote:
Also, there is a way to link units together already -- everybody hops into a jeep and drives together to a certain location. .ACG
As I thought so, but what if my strategy don't include vehicles? and if the jeep is destroyed, all my soldiers in it will lost too. give some more options to the player.

Hope I helped... Gimmy.

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

They do -- there are seven different types of soldiers (I've added 2 martial artists: 2 hit points, range 1 instead of 2 because he uses hand to hand).

However, now that I think about it, I suppose that you could develop your own army, with each soldier based on the standard soldier with one range/speed/whatever doubled and another halved to compensate. But if that's the case, he may want to tell his opponent about the makeup of his army beforehand and each unit's capabilities (in a realistic war scenario, the generals presumably know about what exactly their enemy is going throw at them).

ACG

Sen
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Joined: 12/20/2010
Idea for war boardgame

He was referring to BETWEEN the armies, not WITHIN the armies.

e.g. Aliens vs. Marines - they fight in wildly different styles.

The difficulty being the balancing of the armies.

You could probably make a customization rule as well, so that each unit has a point cost and that you could comprise your army of whatever units you'd like to use up to a point.

While I agree with Gimmy that differences may make the battles more interesting and may take the game towards a more 40Kish type game, I was immediately drawn to the fact (from what I got from your explanation) that it WASN'T all different units that I'd have to learn / purchase / whatever.

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

That's a good point -- with only the seven types of pieces, where the six specialized units only vary from the normal Soldier unit in two ways each, this game should be relatively easy to learn. I really want to playtest it. If things get too complicated, then no one will want to play it. I already have plans for a cheat sheet showing what each type of unit can do.

The seven different types of units also make it so that players can have different strategies as well -- it's not like checkers, where all the pieces have the same functionality more or less. There will always be a common element (20 of the 32 pieces are ordinary soldiers) but players will always have to watch out for the unusual pieces.

Alternatively, I can require a player to play exactly 12 specialized units during the course of a game -- but it doesn't have to be two of each type. He could have 5 Miners, 2 Grenadiers, and 9 Snipers. That way, the distribution may change, so tactics can change (the player must declare the distribution before the game begins). But regardless of the distribution, the opponent will know exactly what he's up against. I'd say that's a good compromise.

ACG

erael
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

How do you win? What's the value of controlling squares other than bringing in new guys (only on the edges)?

Unless the answers to those two questions are really compelling, what's going to prevent this game from turning into one where the two players each set up deadly crossfires at their end of the field and then sit there? I see a lot of different units in the game but am having trouble visualizing how the game would actually play out...If you have any example of play and how the various units interact to create strategic/tactical tension that would be useful.

OutsideLime
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

Your game sounds very similar to one I've been working on for a while... I guess that happens to a lot of people here, especially when using the more tried-and-true themes. (Fantasy combat, modern military combat, dungeon crawler, etc...) Now I have to cross my fingers and hope you don't think of the same action mechanics that I did! My original proto was based on an 8x8 chessboard as well, and used Axis/Allies pieces... At first I had only soldier/tank/plane, but have since changed the gameboard entirely and increased the number of unit types to the point where it almost exactly matches your list.... Good luck with your game, I'll give you a look at mine once the ruleset is in a coherent draft!

~Josh

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

I literally thought of what I had maybe 48 hours ago -- I haven't fleshed it out yet.

The ultimate goal is to control the ENTIRE board -- and in order to claim a square for your side, one of your soldiers must physically go there to claim it. A World War I-style stalemate can develop. However, if that happens, neither team wins as no one will be able to claim more territory as no one will be able to move.

Another thing to keep in mind is that people WILL make mistakes which will lead to breakthroughs. A tentative mechanic involves a 30 second timer -- you have up to 30 seconds to perform all four of your actions (in wartime, you often have to make split-second decisions without thinking things through completely). If you don't finish your actions by 30 seconds, too bad -- it's the next guy's turn. If you finish early, the timer gets flipped back over and the opponent has the small amount of time you had to counter your moves.

Incidentally, I'm giving the Martial Artist 1 hit point and the ability to not be flanked (he's got very good senses and reflexes, so he can hear stuff coming and dodge stuff he can't see). The Cannoneer will turn into a Mortar: speed 1 (the mortar is heavy), but it can shoot over walls.

I've also removed the vehicles -- too confusing.

ACG

Nandalf
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Joined: 07/13/2009
Idea for war boardgame

It takes a big man to simplify his game... i am aweful at that, things seem to grow and grow, to the point it needs to be trimmed and leaves me wondering if i have removed the right bits.

i think you were right to decrease the martial arts guys hp to 1, but the mortar for the cannon is interesting; maybe have it randomise the location: ie 5/6 hits, 4- 1 square north, 3 - 1 square south etc?

this does seem like fun and i might mock up sup pieces and tempt my gamers into testing it;

oh as for the vehicles... go for an expansion!

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

Here are the latest rules. Enjoy!

Rules for War Game

NUMBER OF PLAYERS: 2
AGE: 10 to adult
DURATION:

COMPONENTS
1 8x8 game board
1 rule booklet
1 privacy screen
1 set of Black army pieces
1 set of White army pieces
1 8-sided die
60 minefield tokens
60 wall tokens
1 30-second timer

OBJECTIVE
To march your army across the board and occupy the corner nearest your opponent.

SETUP
Before play begins, each player announce which classes of specialists s/he is going to use for this particular game and how many s/he will use of each class. The specialist units consist of Mortars, Snipers, Martial Artists, Engineers, Miners, and Grenadiers. Each the player must use 12 specialists, distributed however he or she sees fit. A player may use at most 6 of any given type of specialist.

Next the players set up their army, consisting of the 12 chosen specialists and 20 ordinary Soldiers. Place the board diagonally between the two players, with the corner marked with a hill facing each player. With the privacy screen in place across the center of the board, each player sets up their army units in the 28 spaces of their half of the board. The units start out all facing forward (arrow pointing at the opponent). Not all 32 units need be deployed at this time – some may be kept in reserve as needed. More than one unit may occupy a given space, and not all spaces need be occupied.

Finally, the players remove the privacy screen and roll the die. If the number comes up odd, Black starts. Otherwise, White starts.

GENERAL PLAY
Each player takes one action on his turn – but he has only 30 seconds to perform this action. One time has elapsed, it is his opponent’s turn. The opponent flips over the timer and then takes his turn.

An action consists of ONE of the following.

1. Add a reserve unit (if the player still has reserves) to the board. Reserve units start out on the corner nearest the player and have their arrows pointing forward.

2. Have a unit aim its weapon at a target by turning his head to look in that direction. The direction the unit is aiming at is indicated by the arrow on that unit’s token. The little letter on top of the token, indicating the type of unit, should always be positioned so that the opponent cannot see it. A good way to handle this would be to hold the letter steady and rotate the octagonal base so the arrow points the right way.

3. Have a unit perform a special activity. For instance, a Miner may spend an action laying a minefield in an adjacent square.

4. Have a unit attack an enemy unit, provided that the enemy is in range, in the unit’s gunsight, and there are no obstacles (for instance, hills or enemy units) between the unit and its target. The player declares his attack by announcing the target and telling the opponent what type of unit is attacking him (as in Stratego).

5. Have a unit move into another square. A player may have any number of units in a given square. However, he may not share a square with an enemy unit. A moving unit automatically rotates its weapon to point in the direction of travel.

FIELD OF VIEW AND DODGING AN ATTACK
A unit may face one of eight directions and has a field of view of 90 degrees. That is, if he is aiming his gun north, he will be able to see enemies from his northeast to his northwest. Seeing an enemy can be quite useful as it gives the soldier the chance to dodge an attack. If someone shoots at him from behind, however, there isn’t much he’s going to be able to do about it!

If an enemy in a unit’s field of view fires at him, the player rolls the die to determine whether or not the unit was able to dodge successfully. If the resulting number is less than or equal to twice the distance from the enemy, the enemy has missed. Otherwise, the enemy has hit and the unit has been eliminated.

CASUALTIES
Destroyed units are taken off the board and placed in a casualty pile. A player can look at his opponent’s casualty and reserve piles whenever he or she wants.

EFFECTS OF TERRAIN AND OBSTACLES
There are several little hills on the board. If a unit on top of a hill is firing at a unit on the ground, the unit on the hill gets to add one to his maximum range. For instance, an ordinary Soldier will be able to shoot objects three squares away instead of just two. If two units which are both on hilltops attack each other, no one gets a bonus.

During the course of the game, players may try to construct walls between them and the
enemy. A unit standing immediately behind a wall is given a chance to avoid enemy fire, even if he is not facing the enemy. The player rolls the die. If the number is 5 or less, the enemy has hit the wall and the unit has survived. Otherwise, the enemy has avoided the wall and the unit is in trouble (though he is entitled to a dodge roll if he is facing the opponent behind the wall).

Finally, enemies may encounter minefields. ANY unit moving onto (or through) a square with a minefield must roll the die. If the die roll comes up 6, 7, or 8, the unit steps on a mine and is eliminated. Otherwise, the unit survives that particular minefield. Squares with multiple minefields require units crossing them to roll the die multiple times: if any of these rolls come out 6, 7, or 8, the unit is eliminated.

DESCRIPTIONS OF UNITS
Each army has several different types of units, to be deployed at will. He starts out with 20 Soldiers and 12 of the six specialist units. The units are described below.

GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF A UNIT
Unless stated otherwise, all units have a range of 2 (that is, they can attack targets within two spaces of them horizontally, vertically, or diagonally in a straight line). They have a movement value of 2 as well: that is, they may move up to two spaces DIAGONALLY ONLY during an action, and they may not walk through walls. They may only target one unit in a square at a time (they may choose the target from those in the square).

The Soldier
The basic Soldier unit has precisely the abilities described above.

The Mortar
The Mortar unit can fire projectiles over obstacles. Enemies facing a Mortar cannot use a wall, other unit, or hill for cover: the attack takes place as if the wall were not there. The problem with Mortars, however, is they may hit the wrong square if they miss!

If a Mortar misses, roll the die. A 1 means the Mortar hit the square directly above the target square. A 2 means that it hit the square to the upper right. A 3 means it hit the square to the right of the target square, and so forth clockwise. If the new target has any units in it, one of those units, chosen at random (roll the die) must dodge the Mortar or be eliminated. You’ve got to love friendly fire!

The Miner
The Miner unit is unarmed. However, as a special ability, he can lay one minefield in an adjacent square or remove one minefield from an adjacent square. He can still be blown up if he walks onto a square with a mine.

The Sniper
The Sniper unit has a range of 4 – he a very good shot and as a result is difficult to dodge. Enemies a dodge a Sniper’s bullets as if the Sniper were half the distance from them. The Sniper, however, can only move one square per turn. After all, if he’s lying prone on the ground with his eye in the gunsight, he won’t be able to get up in a hurry.

The Engineer
The Engineer unit is unarmed. However, he has a special ability. He can spend an action either building a wall or demolishing a wall in his current square. This wall may be horizontal, vertical, or diagonal. Horizontal or vertical walls are placed across the square (the Engineer can choose which side he winds up on). Diagonal walls are placed along one of the edges of the square.

The Grenadier
The Grenadier unit uses hand grenades. He only has a range of 1 – after all, he has to physically throw it. Then again, grenades explode. ALL units in the target square will be attacked by the grenade blast and will have to dodge as if the Grenadier attacked them.

The Martial Artist
The Martial Artist unit is very dextrous and good at hand-to-hand combat. He only has a range of 1, but he can move very quickly – up to four spaces per action.

Good luck!

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

Incidentally, I've thrown in a variation of your mortar rules. It uses a d8.

1-5 -- mortar is on target, target must dodge as usual.
6 -- mortar is slightly off target, other unit in square must dodge (chosen randomly). If only one unit is in the square, it's considered a miss.
7 -- mortar is off target, automatic miss
8 -- mortar is WAY off target and lands in another square. Roll a second d8 to determine where. If the new target square contains one or more units, one of them is chosen randomly and must dodge.
1 -- misses north (away from the firing player is defined as north in this context)
2 -- misses northeast
3 -- misses east
...
7 -- misses west
8 -- misses northwest

Thanks for the idea!

ACG

The increased inaccuracy is, I believe, a reasonable tradeoff for being the only unit which can shoot over an obstacle.

Nando
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Joined: 07/22/2008
Idea for war boardgame

ACG wrote:
1 -- misses north (away from the firing player is defined as north in this context)
2 -- misses northeast
3 -- misses east
...
If it were me, I'd probably go with 'long', 'long-left', 'short', 'short-left', etc.

Ska_baron
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Idea for war boardgame

Only an incidental comment on an otherwise nice looking, simplistic, engaging war game. For some reason while reading over this the guy that kept sticking out in a WW1/WW2-ish setting was the Martial Artist... Maybe just switch it to an Assassin? I'm just too much of a theme-ist maybe...either way the mechanics are pretty cool looking =)

ACG
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Idea for war boardgame

The problem with the Martial Artist is that I needed an occupation which (at the time) allowed for 2 hit points. But now that I think about it, an Assassin will be fine. He's probably going to have quick reflexes and a dagger, so he'll do what the Martial Artist does now.

Quick reflex are important because of another change to the game. Instead of having turns, both players think of actions (once one player thinks of an action, the othe rguy has 5 more seconds to think of one). Each person takes one action.

The actions are resolved in RANDOM ORDER -- flip a coin to see who goes first. Talk about confusion on a battlefield -- it shows how chaotic war is. Think of it this way: you've got two guys who already have guns pointing at each other, and both of them choose to fire. If we used a turn mechanic, the first player to play woudl tell his guy to shoot and would probably win! This way, we have no idea who will win, and there is no "first player". The 5 second rule is there to make sure the people think quickly -- once someone has committed to an action, battlefields require split-second thinking. If the other guy can't decide what to do quickly enough, the first guy gets to perform his action and the second guy can't.

The Martial Artist/Assassin now has the following trait -- any action involving a Martial Artist/Assassin comes first because he gets initiative due to high dexterity (to use the D&D analogy).

Incidentally, I've added another type of action -- if there is more than one person in a square, they can rearrange themselves in the square without changing their aiming directions. This can allow a weaker unit to be covered by another friendly unit in his square.

Finally, if two or more people are lined up in a row (either in the same square or in different) and someone tries to shoot the first guy and misses, now the guy in the BACK has to dodge as well if he's in range of the weapon that missed the first guy. If that's a friendly unit in the square next door, too bad: friendly fire.

ACG

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

Thanks for your help!

I've made a few more modifications.

1. The Grenadier can throw grenades over walls and other units, another advantage (and probably one of THE most common uses of a grenade). To offset this, it has a timed fuse and detonates during the player's NEXT round -- a disadvantage. If the target wants, the target can throw the grenade back AT him while it's ticking down as the seventh and final type of action -- provided that it doesn't blow up before he can throw it (remember the random turn order). It's the classic D&D question: run, or stay and fight?

2. Both players can think of ideas until both of them have committed to one. This gives both players the same amount of time to think about it. If someone plans something quickly, the opponent won't have time to react! I don't have to pay for a 10 second timer.

3. The Martial Artist has been turned into an Assassin.

So that's it: seven possible actions: add reserve, aim, move, shoot, special action (Miner or Engineer only), throw a ticking grenade (requires grenade in square), and reorder people in square (requires multiple people in a square). Of these, by far the most common will the four simplest ones -- the first four. Seven possible soldier movement types. Relatively simple and easy to pick up -- I may have to simplify it depending on how other people think think. But it's only five pages of computer printout, plus a cheat sheet indicating the advantages and disadvantages of the specialty units.

I can't wait to test-play it. My guess is that it will take a long time to play -- lots and lots of actions. I'll cross that bridge when we come to it and maybe add a time limit.

ACG

ACG
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

Hi!

Here are the latest rules for the game based on some quick test playing against myself. This is the simplified version, with only one type of unit -- the Soldier. I was amazed how short the rules became with only one type of unit! Two pages! No messing around with mines, grenades, and walls! This is probably simple enough for a mass-market game!

Rules for Introductory Soldiers

NUMBER OF PLAYERS: 2
AGE: 10 to adult
DURATION:

COMPONENTS
1 8x8 game board
1 rule booklet
15 Black Soldier unit tokens (with arrows)
15 White Soldier unit tokens (with arrows)
1 black-and-white Reversi piece
1 pad of paper
1 15-second timer

OBJECTIVE
To march your army across the board and occupy the corner nearest your opponent.

SETUP
Place the board diagonally between the two players, with the corner marked with a hill facing each player. Each player then arranges his or her army in the five rows of the board closest to him, in the shape of a triangle. Start the timer to begin the game.

GENERAL PLAY
The game consists of a series of rounds, during which each player has 15 seconds to commit to an action by writing it down (or indicating it in some other way) and placing the record of the action face down in front of him or her. A player may change his or her mind and switch to a different action if time permits. A general must make quick decisions on a battlefield to avoid losing control of the situation.
***
An action must be ONE of the following three choices.

1. Move and Aim. Move a unit up to two spaces (diagonally only – parallel to the lines of the board) and have him aim his weapon at a target by rotating the arrow to point in the desired direction. He may not enter, or pass through, squares occupied by an enemy unit, and he may set himself up anywhere in the destination square.

2. Aim and Shoot. Have a unit pivot in his square (rotate his arrow) and attack a target. A target may be attacked if any piece of it is along that unit’s line of sight (represented by the arrow), it is in range (2 spaces, with a diagonal step counting as 2), and there are no obstacles (hills or other units) between it and the attacking unit.

3. Shoot and Move. Have a unit fire in the direction he is currently facing and move as in the Move and Aim option. He may not reorient his weapon during this action.

Note that a unit may forgo one of the two halves of an action: for instance, he may choose to move but not fire if there is nothing to shoot at.
***
After 15 seconds, the actions are performed. If a player failed to commit to an action, that player skips his turn and the opponent performs his action without any opposition. If both players have decided on an action, the actions take place IN RANDOM ORDER – the players flip the Reversi chip to determine whose action is performed first. If it is obvious from the nature of the actions that the order won’t matter, the players need not flip the chip: they just perform the actions simultaneously. Note that one player's action can prevent the second player from performing part of his action!

Once the actions are resolved, the round ends and the players begin thinking about their next action.

LINE OF SIGHT AND DODGING AN ATTACK
If an enemy in a unit’s line of sight (represented by the arrow as the unit has his eye in his gunsight) fires on him, the unit can see the attack coming and has a chance to dodge the attack. The defending player under flips the Reversi piece to determine whether or not the unit was able to dodge successfully. If the Reversi piece comes up white, the enemy has missed. Otherwise, the enemy has hit and the unit has been eliminated.

If the attacker is not in the unit’s line of sight, the defender never sees it coming and as a result has no chance to dodge. He is hit and eliminated.

Line of sight goes on indefinitely, until it is blocked by an obstacle or unit. Contrast this with an attack range, which has an upper limit. A unit is visible if any piece of that unit’s token lies on the defender’s line of sight.

Note that if other units are in line directly behind the target (from the perspective of the attacking unit) and are still in a position where they could have been attacked had the unit in front of them not been there, they must face the bullet in turn if it does not hit the unit in front of them. This can lead to all sorts of issues with friendly fire.

EFFECTS OF TERRAIN
There are several small hills on the board. Units on hills can add 1 to their maximum
range if they are attacking units on ground level. However, a move onto a hilltop costs 2 spaces as it is difficult to climb a hill.

CASUALTIES
Destroyed units are immediately removed from the board and placed in a casualty pile. A player can look at his opponent’s casualty pile whenever he or she wants.

Good luck!

ACG

Hedge-o-Matic
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Idea for war boardgame

Funny how between your first and second versions, a ton of complexity crept in. I think that the draw of your original rules set was their elegance. Do they cover every situation? No, ASL does, and look where that got them: almost nobody plays anymore. I'd really advise against continual "complexification" as a result of people's requests, or noting that the rules don't allow this or that military option.

The more complex you get, the more you will converge on every other wargame out there.

I agree about the Martial Artist, by the way. Not in-theme.

ACG
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Idea for war boardgame

That's it, then. We're down to three versions now:

1. The simple version of the game. Everybody shoots in one of eight directions and there's only one time of unit.

2. The latest version of the "simplified" game: one unit.

3. The complex version of the game, with lots of units.

I'm guilty of test-playing it myself as a gamer and trying to gear it towards gamers as a result: a useful lesson to learn :)

ACG

ACG
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Idea for war boardgame

Thanks again for your help!

The simplified rules again, with one type of soldier, are so short they can fit on one page. I'm stunned. The difference between the simple rules and the complex rules now are the extra types of soldiers available -- all of the complexities (minefields, walls, etc.) only come into play when extra soldiers are in use. The main difference now is that each person has two actions, instead of four, per turn and an action can be one of move, aim, and fire. Goal is to eliminate all the enemy units.

I may put back the adding one reserve unit at a time in the complex version. That makes the game quite slow. But it allows for a very special kind of unit: the Paratrooper. The Paratrooper can be dropped ANYWHERE on the board, but he has "summoning sickness" in that he can't do anything for the first two turns (he's falling straight down and even an idiot can see him coming).

I've also debated adding the Tactical Nuke, but decided against it. The Tactical Nuke blows up everything in a 3x3 square centered on the unit (suicide), and the central square can no longer be entered for the duratino of the game (radiation). The catch? If someone shoots him, he goes off where he gets shot! If he's surrounded by friendly units, we've got a problem :)

COMPONENTS
1 8x8 game board
1 rule booklet
15 Black Soldier unit tokens
15 White Soldier unit tokens
1 black-and-white Reversi piece
1 pad of paper

OBJECTIVE
To eliminate all of your opponent’s units.

SETUP Place the board diagonally between the two players, with the corner marked with a hill facing each player. Each player then arranges his or her army in the five rows of the board closest to him, in the shape of a triangle.

GENERAL PLAY
The game consists of a series of rounds, during which each player commits to TWO actions (to be performed in sequential order) by writing them down (or indicating them in some other way) and placing the record of the actions face down in front of him or her. A player may change his or her mind and switch to different actions while his or her opponent is still debating what to do.***
An action must be ONE of the following three choices.

1. Move a unit. Move a unit up to two spaces (diagonally only – parallel to the lines of the board). He may not enter, or pass through, squares occupied by an enemy unit, and he may set himself up anywhere in the destination square.

2. Have a unit aim his gun. To do so, he pivots in his square (rotate his arrow) to point his weapon at a target. A target may be attacked if any piece of it is along that unit’s line of sight (represented by the arrow), it is in range (2 spaces, with a diagonal step counting as 2), and there are no obstacles (hills or other units) between it and the attacking unit.

3. Have a unit fire his gun in the direction he is currently facing.
***
Once both players have committed to actions, the actions are performed in alternating order – the players flip the Reversi chip to determine whose first action is performed first. If it is obvious from the nature of the actions that the order won’t matter, the players need not flip the chip: they just perform the actions simultaneously.

Once the actions are resolved, the round ends and the players begin thinking about their next action.

LINE OF SIGHT AND DODGING AN ATTACK
If an enemy in a unit’s line of sight (represented by the arrow as the unit has his eye in his gunsight) fires on him, the unit can see the attack coming and has a chance to dodge the attack. The defending player under flips the Reversi piece to determine whether or not the unit was able to dodge successfully. If the Reversi piece comes up white, the enemy has missed. Otherwise, the enemy has hit and the unit has been eliminated.

If the attacker is not in the unit’s line of sight, the defender never sees it coming and as a result has no chance to dodge. He is hit and eliminated.

Line of sight goes on indefinitely, until it is blocked by an obstacle or unit. Contrast this with an attack range, which has an upper limit. A unit is visible if any piece of that unit’s token lies on the defender’s line of sight.

Note that if other units are in line directly behind the target (from the perspective of the attacking unit) and are still in a position where they could have been attacked had the unit in front of them not been there, they must face the bullet in turn if it does not hit the unit in front of them. This can lead to all sorts of issues with friendly fire.

EFFECTS OF TERRAIN (OPTIONAL)
There are several small hills on the board. Units on hills can add 1 to their maximum
range if they are attacking units on ground level. However, a move onto a hilltop costs 2 spaces as it is difficult to climb a hill (place the unit on the target square after both moves have been performed.

Good luck!

That's it!

For the more complicated game, here are the nine different types of special units (the Suicide Bomber may be dropped as not politically correct)

Unit Advantage(s) Disadvantage(s)

Soldier None None

Mortar Can shoot over obstacles Inaccurate

Miner Can lay and defuse minefields Is unarmed

Sniper Has double range Has half speed

Grenadier (1) Weapon can attack multiple targets in a square
(2) Weapon can be thrown over obstacles Has half range

Engineer Can build/destroy walls Is unarmed

Assassin (1) Dodges 75% of time
(2) Attacks first 75% of time Has half range

Suicide Bomber Unit can attack multiple targets ONCE... ...as unit must sacrifice himself in order to do so

Machine Gunner Weapon can fire multiple shots in an action Cannot move

Flamethrower Units behind each other may both be attacked Can only fire every other round

I may remove some of these extra types.

ACG

FlyRice
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Idea for war boardgame

Your game sounds nice. although it looks like it's gone through a lot of changes since your first post. So there are two versions of the game? Have you been able to play against another person? I have a similar concept for a board game that I had to create for my Game Design class. It has different unit classes as well, but it is played on a 16x16 grid. It turned out really good, but it sucks because I've lost to my friend all three times that we played. :p Good luck with the rest of your game.

FlyRice

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