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Hello friends... I have a question for the veterans and seasoned players:

I am looking for a rule-set (a game) to play a big mass battles, epic RPG. I want a game where generals make big diference, and big numbers of soldiers fight each other in epic battles. If the system include campaign rules, all the better...

The ideia is to introduce some friends to the wargames world, and i want to do it via an RPG where each of them will control a general, in a long campaign. Fantasy or medieval historical rules are prefered...

Oh, and the system must be simple, easy to learn and agile.

Right now, i only know warhammer 8th edition and Kings of War, the first is to cumbersome, the second is very nice, but i want more ideias...

Thank you in advance guys...

You could look into the AD&D supplement BattleSystem.

My vote's for Horde of the Things.

The cool thing about it is how generic it can be - if one friend wants a unit of archers, another wants a unit of musketmen, and another wants a unit of rocket-powered goblin launchers, each of those is simply a 'shooter' in the game rules.

You could also play large sized battles of Warhammer Fantasy (or anything) using the Mighty Empires rules

Make your own WHFB campaign!

I liked the ideio of using Hordes of the Things, but im facing a hard timing searching for the rules... Aparently there is a free PDF around, but the server put the link down. If you could tell me where i can find a copy...

Other system i ended up hearding about is "Fantasy Rules", but the starter cost 20 dollars, a bit hard for me to spare right now...

Brushfire can do that, as can its RPG Historia Rodentia.

Brushfire is meant more as a skirmish game, but it scales up nicely; and Historia Rodentia has rules for giving your PCs one or more NPC companions/squad mates.

As said above Battlesystem is pretty good. Also look into Songs of Blades and Heroes.

I would recommend trying to get the old version of Mighty Empires, the one that came with the octagonal card terrain pieces.

You put the cards together to make a world, and your players (as kings) then moved their armies across the world and discovered villages, cities, and fortresses, and fought battles.

The original rules (which were on the GW website as a download, and might still be, they're circa 1990, iirc) are built around a campaign element, and you can either fight battles with opposed dice rolling (quick) or via tabletop whfb game.

Rules from GW
https://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?categoryId=cat440006a&aId=1400005

And more info and pics of the pieces etc
http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/52/mighty-empires

+edited for links

Interesting idea. First of all, I'd scrap any hope of finding RPG rules within a miniatures game ruleset. You're going to need to invent the RPG elements yourself or -more likely- use a different ruleset for the RPG portion of the game. It is fairly easy to put role playing sessions in between battles and have the results of each affect the other.

As for "simple, easy to learn and agile" that's kind of relative, but I think that at this point you need to first decide wether you want a board game or a miniatures wargame.

If you want a boardgame style, then Mighty Empires, or any of several other world-conquring or mass battle board games might suit you.
Maybe adapt...
LOTR Risk: http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B00006653W/ref=dp_olp_collectible?ie=UTF8&condition=collectible
Battlelore? http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_minisite.asp?eidm=15&enmi=Battlelore

If you want a wargame, then KoW is probably your best bet for "simple". Hordes of the Things (HoTT) is reportedly also fairly simple, but you may want to find someone to teach you as I find the rules to be hard to grasp just reading the book.

Another game that is supposed to be fairly easy to grasp is "Pride of Lions". It's published by Ganesha Games, but doesn't share mechanics with their other "Song of BLades and Heroes" based games. http://www.ganeshagames.net/product_info.php?products_id=27

Lastly, consider the miniatures involved. Do you want to paint up miniatures for all your friends? Do they have the interest level to paint a huge 28mm army? If not, maybe it would be better to go with 10mm or 15mm scale miniatures.

You could also take a look at Savage Worlds, which is built as an RPG/minis game. Apparently it is supposed to handle skirmish as well as epic battles, with abilities for the PCs to handle extras (soldiers, NPC party members, etc.). The basic rulebook is about $10, and you can use any kind of world setting for them. They also have World settings and extra Companion books for if/when you could afford them.

-Vilegrimm

The ideia behind merging RPG and Wargame is almost like this: Players will control their own characters all along, there will be almost 2 types of scenes: diplomatic and battle.

In diplomatic scenes, each player roleplay its character in pure conversations (characters should have some "sheet", who would define diplomatic skills).

In battle scenes, each player control an army (in a tabletop wargame style), pretending to be his character who is the general/comandar/warmaster of some type of military force.

Obviously diplomatic scenes will affect battle scenes outcomes, as the other way around...

So, the system should be enough to simulate combats beetween armys, logistic details of campaigns AND diplomacy beetween forces...

I think i will have to merge some systems to attain that...

Historia Rodentia will cover all of that.

Cyporiean wrote:Historia Rodentia will cover all of that.

Well that makes it sound quite intriguing. I might have to look into that.

Eldarain wrote:

Cyporiean wrote:Historia Rodentia will cover all of that.

Well that makes it sound quite intriguing. I might have to look into that.

Its a supplement for the Legend RPG by Mongoose Publishing, using the setting from Brushfire. Legend already has basic rules for dealing with large armies going against one another in addition to the standard adventuring party combat, for HR we expanded on that and increased the technology level to Brushfire's pseudo Napoleonic setting along with adding in rules for political/dipomatic situations and removing the magic system. All of Historia Rodentia's additional modules for Politics, Exemplarism (NPC Buddies), Tactical Abilities (Special Abilities like those models have in the Brushfire skirmish game), and Equipment (Firearms!) can be used without Historia Rodentia's setting should you not want to adventure in Brushfire's world.

We'll be adding in additional modules, and expansions for those modules and the setting in general in additional books early next year.

You can grab printed copies of both books from anywhere that carries Mongoose Publishing products, or get the PDFs from DriveThruRPG.

I'd also suggest grabbing the Arms of Legend book, just for more equipment options then what you get in the Legend core book and Historia Rodentia.

Wargods of Aegyptus by Crocodile Games (http://www.crocodilegames.com) might fit the bill; the leader of a player's army is basically a chosen warrior of their patron deity, and the rest of the army are regular people who flock to his cause. It's got a fairly robust campaign system, and the mechanics aren't too complicated.

There are two types of rolls: tests and saves. Tests are opposed checks, which amounts to "defender's stat+6-attacker's stat=target number" and Saves which are "get target number or less" on d10s. There's a fog of war element where action counters are secretly assigned to units at the beginning of the turn, and the players take turns activating units (their own or their opponents).

The only thing is that generally armies are not gigantic (certainly not as big as WHFB armies have gotten lately). A 1250 point army (which seems to be what most people play from what I can discern) will consist of about 40 miniatures, though there's no reason you can't play larger games. However, the generals of the armies are fairly powerful, and in campaigns they can gain more power, though it's by beating opposing generals in hand to hand combat, so if you've only got two players it could get one sided very quickly. The solution to that, though, would be to have a GM playing off-games and/or creating their own scenarios in which the player on the losing end can regain their strength.

+1 for Pride of Lions!

Cyporian: thank you, i will take a look at Legend, and HR (i like brushfire scenario enough to want to know more, but my group is not so open at all).

Ratbot: you made me very interested in that Wargods, the little i have read in their site just got me in the scenario, if the rules do what you say, i think i will be sparing some money very soon... Only one question: this is more skyrmish like?

It's more like Warhammer Fantasy several editions ago; there really aren't war machines or lots of gigantic monsters, and armies aren't necessarily super huge. My 2000 point Warhammer Skaven Army was something like 180 models. A 2000 point Wargods army wouldn't even come close to 180. There are ~2400 point sample armies in the back of the rulebook that have about 90 to 100 models.

Here's a picture of a game early on. Looks like it might be just after the first turn. At a glance it looks like it's 1250 to 1500 points:





EDIT: Cuz the picture seems to only work sometimes.

Maurice, nuff said.

m14 wrote:Maurice, nuff said.

And for those not in the historical gaming arena, "Maurice" is

"...a delightful combination of tabletop miniatures rules for historical and fictional battles, a limitless campaign system that requires virtually no math or paperwork, and a role-playing game in which the “characters” are officers, units, and armies, whose personalities you create, and whose fates you manage from battle to battle across wars and decades."

You might have to do a little work to retrofit the historical framework into a sci-fi or fantasy setting, but it is flexible enough to accomodate it. The gameplay is actually pretty easy, with a card-based activation system (command and control), plus those same cards are used to influence the outcomes of battles on the tabletop. I've played the game a couple of times (the tabletop miniatures game, not the campaign, etc.) and its a very good system. You can order an online pdf, but you also have to order the cards separately to get the 'advanced' cards, which are pretty necessary.

http://www.sammustafa.com/honour/maurice/

*edit: oh, and on the site, they do have a free 'lite' version for download, as well as a download of the basic cards so that you can get a feel for the game.

Ratbot, im impressed. Not only the theme of the game fits my needs (something new and not so strange, to keep my vet players interested), it also have the rules i want.

I only need to take a look on the rules system now, but the lack of some "lite" version is really a limitant, i just dont have the money yo buy the book right now :(

Cruentus and M14, im digging for that "Maurice", downloading the lite right now, maybe we just have to play storical after all ^^

Heh, if only it was last year right now, they were overstocked on the book and had it on sale for $10 USD (which is why I bought it on a whim). Still, who knows, it might happen again.