I was wondering what people might think of my current method of dealing with mass combat. First I decide the numerical values of each forces manpower and weapons. I do this by designating 1d10 per man in smaller skirmishes and 1d10 per unit of 100 or 1000 depending on size of the over all forces. Then decide weapons and armor more or less arbitrarily by saying x has real armor, lots of chain and some plate and at least leather while force y is a bunch of naked picts, force x (stahl) is way superior in armor, but weaponry is only a little better. I then modify the TN's for each side by this evaluation with a tn of 8 being average. In this example I would have the picts rolling against an ATN of 7 and the stahlners rolling against a 4. Then I let the commanders roll first strategy if they have time and then tactics. The successes dictate the max number of bonus dice available to each leader, then I have them roll leadership, the higher the margin of success the more of those dice they can add. Failures invoke minor penalties while botches also add dice to the enemies pool. then I have them roll against eachother each round that the PC's are fighting using the victors margin of success to dictate what is happening in the battle removing dice from one side or the other based on who is winning.
I imagine that one could then take this method and use it for each segment of the battle with each LT or sargeant making the tactics rolls..or when the pc's are in control they can decide what number of men/units (dice from their army pool) to designate in attacking or maneuvering etc, you could even adapt the terrain table for complex unit maneuvers like flanking or use them like counters, pay an army pool activation cost and then if you are successful in that bout you get bonus dice. And attacking from advantageous positions can grant bonueses just like individual combat. Plus one army pool for high ground etc.

anyways I was hoping that we could maybe use this as a spring board to developing a system or mechanic for mass combat. One idea I had frm just typing this would be to use the margin of success to affect morale of the losing side with loses in morale overcome by leadership rolls and bad morale would raise the TN's. Morale could be measured on a scale of 1-10 using a d10 on the table as a guide for each side. When the victors margin of success is above 4 then the losers drop a morale point unless the leader makes a leadership roll and the starting morale would be determined by the GM and would drop by 1 per every four or so in the margin and then when it goes below 5 the TN gets worse and if it gets to two the force flees. Or something like that.

Anyways, I say let the creativity flow...I cant wait to see what people have to say!

I have about 20 pages of Mass Combat stuff so far that I have been working on for TFOB. Some of it is kind of similar to what you've come up with, some of it a (very, in some cases) different slant.

Brian.

Ashren Va'Hale wrote: Anyways, I say let the creativity flow...I cant wait to see what people have to say!

Ben Lehman wrote: Brian, what is the present state of Mass Combat rules, given our discussion in that thread?