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So! I was the one that opened my mouth, so I guess I should be the one to kick things off in regards to organizing our ideas.
As usual, I'm at work and away from all my usual resources, so lemme go ahead and ask you guys... out of the ITS System, and our of the YAMS systems, what are the games that you've played that have scenarios and missions that you enjoy and have fun with? If we're going to be building fun scenarios, a good place to start with is what is already fun.
I personally find Asymmetrical Games more interesting than others, like when you have one team on Defense and the other on Offense. Usually in the sense of breaking into a facility and stealing something, or getting a VIP from one side of the table to the other. Weird scenario rules are also fun as well. Like one side having a scary number of TAGs... but they have to get their pilots to the TAGs through ARO's and sniper fire in order to use them. Or having stationary turrets (360 Visor, Total Reaction, Combi/HMG/Whatever) that can be hacked and used or destroyed by either side.
I also think it would be fun to aim for scenarios that play to certain unit strengths. Aquatic units, Zero-G, Mountain Terrain... things that all these odd units have that never really seem to get used all that much. The problem with -those- sorts of things is that they can skew things when a faction doesn't have those fancy traits, and they seem to depend much more on tables and terrain than they do the actual rules.
The brain will start working once I get some more coffee in me, but some of ya'll have been awake a lot longer than I have, so let's hear what everyone has to say...
"-and all that time in Paris, when you were wallowing in debauchery with your doxies, tarts and pirates... you were trying to convince me you were a disgusting, swinish, lecherous, drunken sot... Well I want you to know it worked.
I like the idea of one side controlling multiple sentry REM but need to put them on power grid to get them on line. The opposition is what exactly trying to do? Evacuate the prisoner? Steal data from the central computer? Put listening device inside of a certain building?
How many turns?
I'd rather drop the idea that the scenario needs to be played in three turns, but there should be incentive for aggressive player to try to end the game earlier and both players need to play equal amount of rounds.
Limitations
Penalty to discover, impersonate, infiltrate. Something to consider.
I would look into buying the Campaign Paradiso book. I saw battle reports of a couple of their scenarios and they looked really awesome. There was even a scenario that required both player to cooperate at one point (both sides had to complete a certain objective by the end of their first game turn or else both sides would lose. The places you had to complete the two objectives were about 3" from each other)
Like watching other people play video games (badly) while blathering about nothing in particular? Check out my Youtube channel: joemamaUSA!
BrianDavion wrote: Between the two of us... I think GW is assuming we the players are not complete idiots.
Rapidly on path to becoming the world's youngest bitter old man.
Campaign Paradiso as a campaign was tepidly received I think, but It did provide an excellent blue-print for campaign play. So I second DWombat. It is a good book to get. (I still need to get a copy of the human sphere too. I gave away my rulebook as a Christmas gift to someone to get them playing...)
YAMs gives nice variety, but sometimes it gives one side a really easy time of it, and the other side a series of difficult missions. Some way of eliminating that would make YAMs much better, IMHO.
ITS scenarios are 1 turn too short for my taste. If some of them were adapted for 4 turn play, that would be cool.
Multi-terrain seems to be the least used skill, except in my group, since we started with tables that had hills/mountains and forests and rocky areas. Mandating certain types of terrain on the board for a given scenario, or at least recommending them would be cool.
Asymmetrical scenarios would be much fun, but I have no idea how to go about balancing them. The problem with both YAMs and ITS is that sometimes it feels as if you are more or less ignoring your opponent.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2014/04/24 08:44:30
Knight wrote: both players need to play equal amount of rounds.
That's not actually all as fair as you might think.
Depending on whether you add the turn of the 2nd player or remove the turn of the 1st player (as compared to the present ITS situation) you end up giving either player 1 or player 2 much more control over when the game ends.
As it is, it's pretty fair in that a retreating player 1 can't actually do much anyway with the extra turn he gets over player 2 and neither player can end the game more abruptly.
I agree that the Paradisio book was a little limp. But it had a lot of fun ideas in it. I enjoy it for the fluff and the ideas, but I'm much more interested in the other planets other than super jungle time.
It did give a good idea on how to set up some interesting games, and it is a good starting point for getting ideas and the like.
I was working on a low-points game scenario where one side has to escort a high value target across the table, though it is difficult to get deployment quite right. We've been keeping SWC very low for it, but it needs some more tweaking. It is fun though, I'll get the full writeup posted up here when I'm not stuck at work.
"-and all that time in Paris, when you were wallowing in debauchery with your doxies, tarts and pirates... you were trying to convince me you were a disgusting, swinish, lecherous, drunken sot... Well I want you to know it worked.
Ironbovin (who rarely posts here) and I have been trying our hand at Paradiso. We are completely unable to complete mission 102, even though we tried it 3 times. If the terrain isn't balanced, then the dice gods were just mean, so we'd never make it across the board. Twice. In Zig-zag.
Then last week we decided to skip it and try mission 103. I just played "go fetch" with a Fugazi remote and basically scored my points on that and a Jotum camping on the central objective. Getting first turn and rolling like a lucky motherfether was just too good. Anyone else have that experience?
GamesWorkshop wrote: And I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you meddling kids!
Red Harvest wrote: Campaign Paradiso as a campaign was tepidly received I think, but It did provide an excellent blue-print for campaign play. So I second DWombat. It is a good book to get. (I still need to get a copy of the human sphere too. I gave away my rulebook as a Christmas gift to someone to get them playing...)
YAMs gives nice variety, but sometimes it gives one side a really easy time of it, and the other side a series of difficult missions. Some way of eliminating that would make YAMs much better, IMHO.
ITS scenarios are 1 turn too short for my taste. If some of them were adapted for 4 turn play, that would be cool.
Multi-terrain seems to be the least used skill, except in my group, since we started with tables that had hills/mountains and forests and rocky areas. Mandating certain types of terrain on the board for a given scenario, or at least recommending them would be cool.
It would be interesting to see how general meta would react on 4 turn shift. There are certain things that I like with three turns, but certain new aspects of thinking might have pushed people away from what I've found rather dull way to play. Stop that HI link team or TAG.
Terrain abilities are neat, my games should have more of it.
Yeah, it seems like you have a lot of units with Mountain Terrain and Jungle Terrain and Zero-G and all these specific, interesting terrain perks...
...and then we go fight in the city again.
And really, the only problem with those sorts of situations is that it is dependant on your playing area, not your scenario. I tend to prefer the city-fighting sort of games... after all, when I originally picked up that first old cartoony rulebook, you had tons of awesome art showing special forces duking it out in the middle of neon lit futuristic battlegrounds. So it kind of sets the tone.
For my local crew, we've taken up the idea of trying to randomize terrain a bit. This is dependant on our abilities to create terrain obviously, but if part of the mission system at the start of a game was to roll on a chart to determine the board 'set up', that could possibly inject some of that in there. Have a list of terrain types... which is what...
Aquatic
Mountain
Jungle
Zero:G
...that's it right? And have a handful of terrain you use for each type. Maybe for Aquatic designate a swath of the board a beachhead, or a dockyard, and throw down a blue sheet.
I think the larger problem with the non-city terrain is that it isn't as clear cut. You know when you get cover behind a car or building, and line of sight is drawn easier. There isn't a lot of guesswork and arguing there. But if you have a model moving through a bunch of those plastic aquatic trees then the arguments start.
And personally, I find a lot of Jungle terrain a pain in the ass to move models through. Warhammer used them like Templates. You basically had your 'treeline' and you could move the trees and stick you troops into the template, and bam, you have cover. And that doesn't really jive with how Infinity works. Maybe Jungle terrain would be used more if we could figure out a way to make jungle terrain that was easier to move models through, while still looking good and providing cover/concealment for our dudes. I know the Acontecimento (did I finally spell that right?) players would really appreciate it.
"-and all that time in Paris, when you were wallowing in debauchery with your doxies, tarts and pirates... you were trying to convince me you were a disgusting, swinish, lecherous, drunken sot... Well I want you to know it worked.
The big problem with non-city terrain in Infinity is that the rules for it are really barebones and kind of bad. You have weird cases like Tikbalangs not being all that great at moving through jungles, Geckos not being able to move in 0-G terrain, HI and MI don't gain any benefit if they specialize in terrain that is predominantly very difficult. The system isn't super well thought out in that regard. You end up with a lot of jungle-fighting units who can't navigate the base level of jungle any better with or without the special skill and TAGs gain little benefit from the rule unless the terrain is very low level.
Basically, to get things to work as intended you need to houserule your own terrain types and difficulties instead of using the book's.
And then there is the problem with LoF blocking and area terrain. The second someone brings an MSV1 to a fight in area terrain (or an MSV2 to thick jungle) you basically have a lot of open, easy firing lanes. So you either need to supplement heavily with urban terrain anyways (and moving through special terrain is a death sentence, even if you have the movement skills for it) or you need to rule some kind of hybrid between area terrain and representative (i.e. like being able to gain cover from trees, even though few model trees cover enough of a mini to grant the cover bonus when in contact).
If you want to get the most out of terrain in Infinity, then you basically need to house rule a system in to it. Because a good chunk of models that currently interact with it using special skills gain limited to no benefit from it and utilizing it for defensive purposes in an environment with visors is a death-wish.
I kind of hope 3rd Edition has more than the current tacked-on system, since Infinity has a lot of interesting potential biomes to play around in. Maybe we'll see an improved system crop up in Acheron Falls since a lot of extreme planetary biome sectorials are popping up in there. But for now, if you want to use funky terrain, then save yourself the headache and house rule it.
- 4 missions
- You can use a Spec Ops in each mission, paying the appropriate cost.
- MEDEVAC and CASEVAC rules also pertain to Personalities
- When beginning to play the campaign, you choose a vanilla faction (for example Haqqislam). In the course of the campaign, you can switch to one of the Sectorial Armies. That decision cannot be later taken back.
- At the end of the game, you roll CASEVAC and MEDEVAC for all your units that have fallen in battle, when applicable. If a unit fails both of them, you subtract it from the AVA of the unit until the end of the campaign. AVA: Total is treated as AVA 6 for the purpose of the Campaign. This rule does not apply to REMs but does apply to TAGs. If you make the switch to one of the Sectorial armies, the AVA is upgraded to the amount available to the Sectorial Army, minus any casualties.
-If you had participated in any other Campaigns of mine, your Spec Ops gains the Veteran special rule, granting him access to V:NWI and SSL2, free of charge.
- Objective points gathered in game turn into Experience points on a 1 to 1 basis. You can buy both new skills for the Spec Ops as well as the Command specialties.
- Mercenaries can be used by all the Human Sphere armies (Tohaa and Combined Army cannot use Mercenaries, unless otherwise stated in the mission). There are following story-based restrictions:
ALEPH: no Avicenna, Bashi Bazouk, McMurrough, Miyamoto Musashi, Señor Massacre, Yuan, Caterans.
Armies with Highlander units: No Druze Shock Teams, no Scarface and Cordelia
Yu Jing: no Kempeitai as mercs (unless playing other Yu Jing), Señor Massacre, Yuan.
PanOceania: no Valerya Gromoz, Caterans
Armies with Hassassin Units: No Druze Shock Teams
Additionally, after each mission you will have the chance to recruit additional mercenaries from other factions. If you are actually playing the faction from which the mercenaries come, they increase the AVA of their parent units. If those mercenary units have not died during the mission, they can be recruited again in the following missions. If they have not been recruited, they cannot be recruited later on, however.
-If the Spec Ops dies, the new one starts the game with half the points of his predecessor. Additionally, he does not draw on the AVA of his parent unit.
MEDEVAC:
CASEVAC: You have to make a normal roll, depending on what models were active at the table at the end of the game. If the model was in the Unconscious state, you roll on the MEDEVAC table. If your model passed into the Dead state, you roll on the CUBEVAC table. You roll for CUBEVAC only if you have a Cube. If the Model is in the Unconscious state and does have a Cube, if you fail the MEDEVAC roll, you can do a CUBEVAC roll afterwards.
Story background:
A small strike force is sent to infiltrate the Lumière de l’avenir space station. The mission to neutralize a corrupt O-12 diplomat quickly turns into a political disaster, when the official turns out to have been Sepsitorized. Before his death and the destruction of his Cube, the Strike Team manages to download a set of coordinates. High Command, trying to sweep the scandal under the rug, feeds the strike team to the wolves – the Commander is court-marshalled and imprisoned in a high security prison orbiting the planet Paradiso. The Commander manages to escape the facility with the help of the Nomad Nations.
The Commander then deploys on Paradiso, where, supported by the Black Hand, but working at his own accord, he spearheads a strike against a Data Bank of the EI, located in the unhospitable Niemandszone, south of the ruins of Ravensbrücke. The data acquired at the facility speaks of a large concentration of enemy forces near Chengling, a city on the frontier administered by Yu Jing. Further analysis of the data is stopped cold by the arrival of a QRF of the CA. Only a timely arrival of a detachment of PanOceanian Knights from a nearby Monastery saves the Commander from certain defeat. The knights and the Commander, after defeating the EI counter-attack, manage to exfiltrate to Strelsau. The acquired data is sent to O-12 and the closest Yu Jing consulate. The Commander, equipped with the location of the enemy, moves out toward Chengling. The Brother-Captain of the monastery pledges some of his men in support.
The Commander arrives in Chengling in the nick of time. It turns out the Combined Armies had already started their attack. A bloody battle between the strike force and the rearguard of the CA ensues. In the course of the fighting, some POW are released from the clutches of the EI. A grim picture of a yet another Paradiso offensive starts to form from the data packets intercepted during the EI retreat. Chengling appears to be an important avenue of attack for the EI, as not far from it there is an ALEPH Data Node. Destroying it would have fear reaching repercussions for the allied control of Paradiso.
The last mission sees the Commander lead his ragtag group of grizzled veterans, reinforced by the POWs and survivors from Chengling, into a high security complex. After managing to circumvent the various traps and security measures, he eventually enters a Safe Room, a prison for a very interesting individual. By deciding the fate of the Prisoner, the Commander has a chance to influence the future of Paradiso and the entire Human Sphere.
Spoiler:
Mission 1 – Infiltration
- Welcome, gentlemen. Let’s start. Our target is a diplomat, enjoying some downtime on-board the Lumière de l’avenir. The boys at IntelCom say that he is to be terminated for lobbying – a short burst of laughter erupts from the audience. The Commander continues, unfazed – As we all know, in the Human Sphere, lobbying in itself is not a criminal offence. However, we are being told there’s something more here than meets the eye. It turns out that Ibrahim as-Saud, our target, had been responsible for termination of biometrical control procedures at all the outposts at one of the blockades. “Mechanical failure” was reported. The incident occurred more than 72 hours ago, and the biometric scans have still not been resumed. Mr. Saud is also the one responsible for breaking off of the negotiations with Ambassador Dia Mareeta – a flash of irritation can be seen on the Commander’s face – An event which disrupted the exchange of information between our friendly powers – a short pause – We all know that we definitely should not trust the aliens, but the eggheads do insist that the obtained data, even despite all the censorship and omissions, is still very valuable. The Old Man, God keep him safe, has seen it fit for Mr. As-Saud to become a lesson. Right now, Alpha is disabling the security systems of the station and disconnects the life support. As-Saud is located in the Safe Room, accompanied by other civilians. We are to get there and eliminate him. His Cube must be destroyed. Other civilians are not our concern, but the mission does not allow any collateral damage. Any questions? – the room is silent – Great, let’s get to work, then.
- May 18, 2189, Briefing room on-board the Rabbin bilgelik, Paradiso System
POINTS:
The strike force sent to the station is small and travelling light. Both players use 200 Points to build their army. They can also use a Spec Ops, paying the normal cost for him. He starts the game with 10 EXP points.
DEPLOYMENT:
The scenario takes places on-board a space station, where O-12 and other Human Sphere officials are having a meeting.
The Safe Room is located in the middle of the board. It is a square room. Its walls are 8 inches long. It is of infinite height and blocks Line of Sight. The doors, when opened are Wide Access Markers. Infiltrator/Impersonator/Mechanized Deployment units cannot deploy inside the room or within 8 inches from it. The Doors to the room are initially closed. They are located in the middle of each of the walls. They are opened with a short movement skill.
SPECIAL RULES:
The Y2,1K Virus: Alpha Strike Team has infected the life support system with a virus. The whole board is treated as having Terrain:Zero-G rule. In this scenario, Zero-G is treated as Difficult Terrain. .
Enemy at the gates: There are two Access Consoles on the table. They are located in the middle of the board, on the 24 inch line, 8 inches from the left and 8 inches from the right table edge. In order to enter the Safe Room, a Specialist needs to activate the console in base-to-base contact. Only then can the doors be opened. Additionally, the Access Consoles allow purging of the virus from the system and bringing back of artificial gravity. This means the Zero-G rule stops to apply. The virus can be uploaded again to turn the whole table into a Zero-G environment once more. This can be repeated an infinite number of times.
The doors to the room are opened with a short movement skill, when the model is in base contact with the door. After opening of the doors, you randomly place 4 Civilians inside the Safe Room, using the following rules : roll 2 dice – the single digit of one of the dice shows the direction of scatter, the single digit on the other shows the distance. The “1” on the template points twice toward Player A’s table edge, and twice toward that of Player B. While rolling for the dispersion, you have to remember that the Civilians cannot land outside of the room, shortening the distance results if necessary .
In order to find out which of the Civilians is the Target, you are required to perform a Discover WIP roll. A successful roll calls for an another dice roll, and a result of 1-5 on the second roll means that the Discovered civilian is The Target. The Target can be different for the two players. It can also be the same for both of them.
Friendlies on site: Causing the death of a non-Target means that the player responsible immediately loses the scenario and gains no Victory Points from the encounter.
Specialists: In this mission, Hackers, Engineers, Forward Observers, Doctors, Paramedics and Chain of Command units are considered Specialists. Unless specified otherwise, Repeaters and G:Servants can be used to perform the mission objectives.
MISSION OBJECTIVES:
„Bravo in position”:
Changing of the gravity level on-board the station. Done by a Specialist performing a WIP roll, in base contact with an Access Console. Points can be obtained only once, but by each of the players – 1 Victory Point
„System Override”:
Allowing the Safe Room doors to be opened. Done by a Specialist performing a WIP – 3 roll, in base contact with an Access Console. Points can be obtained only once, by the first player – 1 Victory Point
„Breach and clear”
Throwing a Smoke/Flash or E/M grenade into the room – 1 Victory Point
„Terminate with extreme prejudice”:
Killing the Target in Close Combat – 4 Victory Points
„Cut off the head and the body dies”:
Killing the enemy Lieutenant (Unconscious is enough) – 1 Victory Point
„Putting on white gloves”:
Have less Unconscious models on the board than the enemy, calculated at the end of the game – 2 Victory Points
END OF THE MISSION:
The mission ends after 3 turns. If any of the players is in Retreat!, the mission ends that game turn, after both players have played their turns.
CAMPAIGN RULES:
The Spec Ops uses the advancement rules from Campaignaradiso. If he dies and the MEDEVAC and CUBEVAC rolls are failed, the next Spec Ops has half the EXP points of the fallen one. The EXP points can be used to buy new skills for the Spec Ops or new Command and Control options. Models that exit the table due to Retreat! Rules, do not have to roll for MEDEVAC or CUBEVAC, they are considered alive and well.
- Dear viewers, Marlene has some breaking news for you! The Lumiere de l’avenir space station has been brutally attacked by terrorists! The only reported casualty is Mr. As-Saud, a philanthropist, businessman and politician, sponsor of the newest season of Myrmidon Wars: The Second Conflict, as well as many secret governmental projects! Marlene regrets to inform you, dearies, that Mr. As-Saud’s Cube is reported to have been destroyed in the attack. You probably remember the attack on the Storage that occurred last week – these two events coupled together mean that Mr. As-Saud will not be returning to us in a Lhost body anytime soon. What a shame! However, there are some good news as well! The terrorists responsible for this perfidious attack have already been apprehended by O-12 Gendarmes and are transferred to a high security location. Do you want to know more?
- Fragment of the News Segment of Channel 10, May 19, 2189
If it proves interesting for the community, I might translate the rest of the Campaign. We will see.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2014/05/23 21:32:21
Rescue the Delegates A bomb has gone off at the O-12 United Conference. Your army believes your opponent's army caused the explosion. The battle is on going, but you're also tasked with getting the O-12 Civilian delegates out of the danger zone. The more civilians you end up with synchronized in your deployment zone, the less likely your side will be seen as the one who caused the explosion. Why do you get some points for taking down the other side? Because the winner of wars tends to be the one who writes the history books.
5 civilian delegates exist on the board. The center civilian is Hostile, all other civilians are Neutral. Max game length: 3 turns.
Civilian Placement in the Rescue the Delegates Mission
Objective Points:
+1 point for each delegate you have in your deployment zone
+2 points if you have more delegates than your opponent
-1 point for each O12 banned weapon fired in the zone of control or at the zone of control of an O12 civilian (i.e. virus ammunition)
-3 points for killing a delegate
+1 points for killing 50% of your opponent's points and not put your opponent into retreat.
+2 points for killing enough models to put your opponent in retreat
This is the sort of scenario I wish CB would put out. Rather than making them super complicated (seriously - I read the Flee or Die mission and my brain nearly exploded), just something small or simple.
The idea behind it is awesome and ties into the fluff with objective rules. Basically, you're trying to frame the opposing faction for an O-12 conference bombing. You get points for rescuing civvies (hooray Counter Strike memories!), and lose points for using O-12 banned weapons within their Zone of Control.
I don't even think the mission needs the bonus points for damaging your opponents army. This scenario doesn't need it. People will try for the civvies anyway for the points, and you'll be fighting them to get the same civvies. The end result invariably go to who is the more efficient killer since they will be getting the civvies. A great point he raised is it allows players to create situations where the other player is put in a bad situation, like deliberately CCing a model with an EXPCCW that is near a civvie to make them lose points if they use it.
^ My Combined Army would have a hard time trying to justify participating in that scenario. I suppose we could always say we're planning on shoving a Sepsitor in their face after we get them out of the danger zone. Having moles in the O-12 council would be pretty tasty
Like watching other people play video games (badly) while blathering about nothing in particular? Check out my Youtube channel: joemamaUSA!
BrianDavion wrote: Between the two of us... I think GW is assuming we the players are not complete idiots.
Rapidly on path to becoming the world's youngest bitter old man.
There's still a fluff basis - the O-12 is trying to get the Combined Army to sign their treaty. Just unsuccessfully.
But yeah, it was definitely written for human/human engagements. But replace a few civvies with Combined and you've got a good basis for a Combined/O-12 diplomat meeting, and good reason for both sides to bomb it.
There's also plenty of human factions that would have a hard time with the objective. There's not one single Haqqislam unit without a banned weapon, thanks to the light shotgun tax, plus all the viral and EMP shenanigans they like.
But it's just an excuse to actually put meaningful civvies on the table and have a fun scenario around them.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2014/07/04 04:32:13
-Loki- wrote: There's still a fluff basis - the O-12 is trying to get the Combined Army to sign their treaty. Just unsuccessfully.
Well of course they are. The humans keep wondering why our "diplomatic corps" keeps crashing down through the ceiling, shooting everyone in the room, setting demo charges, then activating their jump packs and departing as the place burns. Truly they don't understand the fine art of negotiation.
(in case you're wondering about this, look up the unit description for the Rasyat)
Like watching other people play video games (badly) while blathering about nothing in particular? Check out my Youtube channel: joemamaUSA!
BrianDavion wrote: Between the two of us... I think GW is assuming we the players are not complete idiots.
Rapidly on path to becoming the world's youngest bitter old man.
"-and all that time in Paris, when you were wallowing in debauchery with your doxies, tarts and pirates... you were trying to convince me you were a disgusting, swinish, lecherous, drunken sot... Well I want you to know it worked.
aradiso. If he dies and the MEDEVAC and CUBEVAC rolls are failed, the next Spec Ops has half the 
