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Now that I'm getting to know the place again, it's time to get a thread going on my fantasy/historical miniatures rules, Conqueror: Fields of Victory.

I created this at the (apparently defunct) Warseer forum more than a decade ago when word got out that WHFB was about to enter its 7th Edition. I really like 6th, felt it achieved about the best balance one could expect of GW, and having already gone through transitions from 5th to 6th (and 2nd ed. 40k to 3rd), I wasn't willing to retool again.

Thus, Conqueror was designed to seamlessly integrate GW-type fantasy armies as well as ancient to early modern historical armies. It started out as a design thread and just kept going, lots of good suggestions, people playtesting mechanics and that sort of thing. It is now in its second (or revised edition), which came out in 2018.

Conqueror is generally IGO-UGO, but uses an integrated turn sequence to create a simple but realistic flow of activity. This makes it a bit more of a wargame, and I borrowed some mechanics from historicals to give it a bit more flexibility. For example, there are the traditional column and skirmish formations, but also a square, which allows units to face all directions at once (useful if one is outnumbered). Cavalry units that are being charged can make a leadership test to countercharge - they don't move, but get their lance bonus.

Perhaps the biggest enhancement is in movement rules, which I streamlined. There is free measurement (no guessing!) and when units engage in melee combat, there is a procedure known as "centering up" which ensures the maximum amount of figures are in contact. Unlike WHFB, victory in melee combat is determined by casualties inflicted, and the "rank bonus" only comes into play when checking morale.

Attacks are resolved simultaneously, which speeds up combat resolution and is more realistic. Some units (cavalry with lances) gain a damage bonus when charging, but the chief advantage is that charged units have to test morale first, making them more likely to break.

Now lets on some of these features in more depth.

Morale

A lot of games downplay it, but historically, units run away far more often than they stand and die in place.

One of the challenges in miniatures games is reflecting changing morale states without cluttering the tabletop with various markers. When I set out to design Conqueror, that was a paramount concern - I wanted to maintain a clean, aesthetic tabletop.

To do that, I created three morale states plus a status (more on that later).

We're generally familiar with normal morale and with routed, and these are easy to indicate, however I wanted to create an intermediate state where a unit is starting to break but is still able to fight. That is disordered, and to represent it, one marks the unit with a little bit of cotton, showing the dust rising from troops shifting their feet and the jostling in the ranks. (This is a historical fact, and one way armies deceived each other was to fake disorder in the ranks by having the troops deliberately kick up dust.) Disordered units take a -1 modifier on all morale and leadership tests.

This is more realistic and also allows me create a wider range of morale scores, creating more diversity of potential unit types. It also creates tension, because a unit in disorder is now clearly about to run. Can they hold for another round of combat, or not?

I also created a concept called shaken, which is caused by the unit taking casualties. The point at which a unit is shaken is determined by their morale rating. High morale units can take up to 50 percent losses without becoming shaken, while low morale units can only take 10 percent. Shaken units have a -1 modifier on all morale and leadership rolls. There's no need to mark shaken units - their depleted ranks (and off-table dead pile) tell their story.

What this means is that prolonged combat wears out units, and commanders have to balance pushing home the attack vs breaking the unit. At the same time, it offers some great battlefield moments when a militia unit stands in defiance of heavy losses.

Morale is rated from A to E and I used letters because it gives more flexibility than a single digit. As you can see, morale is pretty straightforward, but provides a lot more flexibility and realism.


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Combat

Combats in Conqueror are quite different from WHFB. For one thing, there is no "toughness" stat. This has been combined with armor to create a single "save." Thus, unarmored models are typically removed as casualties. Certain creatures have an inherent save (such as dwarves). The save stat is modified by AP, which reduces it. For example, a model with a 5+ save is hit by an AP 1 weapon, thus it only has a 6+ save.

In another departure from WHFB, both sides shoot during the same player turn. The moving player shoots first, followed by the non-moving player. What this does is eliminate the need for "overwatch" or "reaction fire" since it is built right into the turn sequence. Other than bows, most weapons and artillery may only fire once per game turn, and while the rules specify that this happens during the owning players shooting phase, there is an option to allow players to choose when they fire. For example, a cannon expecting to be charged, may well decide not to fire during its own shooting phase, waiting until the enemy are upon it before firing.

While this may make shooting seem overpowered, successful hits are reduced by half (rounding up). This is done to emphasize that pre-modern missile fire was used to harass and disorder units, not wipe them out. Thus in Conqueror, missile troops will typically target units hoping to force a morale test or eliminate high-value targets.

The heart of the game is of course melee combat, and as mentioned above, combat is conducted simultaneously. The advantage of being the charging side is that they test for morale second and certain weapons (notably lances) are more effective when charging.

The melee combat in Conqueror is bloody. The units are rating on a scale of 1 to 6, and elite units (for example) will hit militia on a 2. The margin of casualties determines who won the combat the loser must make a morale test with a negative modifier equally the excess wounds they took. Thus if an infantry unit takes 6 wounds while inflicting only 1, there will be a -5 modifier.

The lethality of the combat in turn encourages different formations. For example, above average troops like high elves will typically fight on a broader front, to maximize their weapon skill. The more engaged, the more kills they can achieve.

Poor quality troops will fight on a narrower front to limit losses and also to maximize their rank bonus. The side with greater depths of ranks gets a +1 morale roll modifier for "outranking" the other, which conversely suffers a -1 penalty for being "outranked." There are additional modifiers for being engaged in the flank or rear. Ranks have a minimum width of four models.

During playtesting and development, the test case for combat was elf vs goblin. In WHFB, the superior stat line of the elves doesn't amount to much in combat. That is why GW had to create special rules like spears in three ranks in order to make elves worth their points.

In Conqueror, the elves have a decisive edge, hitting goblins on a 3+ while the goblins need a 5+ to hit. The point values reflect this advantage, so goblin armies typically have considerable numbers. This is why the square formation is important - the elves can form a hedgehog if need be to stand off enemies that surround them.

It is also why elves may choose to fight in seven- or even eight-model frontages.


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I will stop here for now. If people are interested, I will explain further.

You've tempted me with this post, so I've ordered a paperback. Sounds extremely interesting.

Question - are there formal army lists, or is it more "here's what an elf looks like, here's what a spear/great weapon looks like, combine them together and that's an elf unit"?

 Rihgu wrote:
You've tempted me with this post, so I've ordered a paperback. Sounds extremely interesting.

Question - are there formal army lists, or is it more "here's what an elf looks like, here's what a spear/great weapon looks like, combine them together and that's an elf unit"?

Great question! One of the deficiencies of the original version was that it did not come with army lists.

The revised edition does. While you can build your own units from scratch, I provided a wide sample of armies to choose from, including orcs, goblins, elves, dwarves, dragons, lizardmen, elves, undead and so on. Lots of flavors of human as well.

Basically, you can do any WHFB army you want. If I didn't list it, you can just build your own, even creating your own fantasy race if you like.

One of the reasons I started this thread was to provide a space for people to offer suggestions or get help in making custom units. Thank you for your interest, I think you'll find it an easy, intuitive way to play fantasy battles.

Got the book, looked it over. Looks good! I think the amount of special rules is a little low but that just means thinking really deeply about what matters for a given unit.

One thing I don't understand is how "customizing units" works. You give the price for a unit of, for example, 10 infantry. And it says that for up to 20 models, additional models cost half as much, and then say 1/10.

May be that I was reading it too late at night, but something doesn't grok.

If a base unit is 100 points and I want to add 2 models, is that 120 points? Or 110 points because the additional 2 models cost half as much?

Also, just thinking about WHFB Dark Elves. Paying 10 points per unit for Callous seems a good representation, and maybe Ferocious? Specifically Witch Elves will want Bloodthirsty, for certain. Not sure what to do with Hydra, as off the top of my head there was no sort of regeneration special rule beyond a spell.

 Rihgu wrote:
Got the book, looked it over. Looks good! I think the amount of special rules is a little low but that just means thinking really deeply about what matters for a given unit.

One thing I don't understand is how "customizing units" works. You give the price for a unit of, for example, 10 infantry. And it says that for up to 20 models, additional models cost half as much, and then say 1/10.

May be that I was reading it too late at night, but something doesn't grok.

If a base unit is 100 points and I want to add 2 models, is that 120 points? Or 110 points because the additional 2 models cost half as much?

Also, just thinking about WHFB Dark Elves. Paying 10 points per unit for Callous seems a good representation, and maybe Ferocious? Specifically Witch Elves will want Bloodthirsty, for certain. Not sure what to do with Hydra, as off the top of my head there was no sort of regeneration special rule beyond a spell.

The special rules section is small because I tried to make the primary differences between units expressed in the stats. My overriding question when building the rules was simply: do I really need to 'break the rules' to do this?

The primary example I used was High Elves, who had a special rule for every unit. This was because the GW engine doesn't provide sufficient differentiation if you just go by stats. I can get deeper into the weeds if folks are interested, but by changing my engine to make MS and saves more contrasting, I found few if any rules were needed.

As for the points values, it's two ways of saying the same thing. For additional infantry models, you pay 1/10 of the price of the unit (so 10 points each). Once you get to 20 models, you cut that in half, so they are 1/20 (or 5 points in your example).

This is because models not in actual combat have less effect on the game. They boost the units ranks, provide resilience against being shaken, but do not make attacks unless the unit is hit from behind, or has taken heavy losses.

There are several ways you can do Dark Elves, and I think you're on the right track. For the hydra, the question I'd have is what is are its salient features? Regeneration is just another mechanic for saying "very hard to kill," and there are a couple of ways to get there without adding to the length of the rule book.

As you note, there is a spell that does the same thing, so paying 10 points to allow the unit to cast that spell on itself each turn seems a good way to do it.

I'll need to play a few games to really get a grasp on how the stats play into each other. Having a basic idea from reading is one thing - experience is another!

I just looked at the base sizings again, and noticed... cavalry are 20x40, monsters are 40, and chariots are 40x80. These are unusual to me, as most of my cavalry are 25x50, monsters are 50, and chariots and some monsters are 50x100. How much will that impact game play? Should I treat basically everything as having the Wide Base rule and reduce points by 10 for those units?

Maybe my final question for now - is there any way to bring truly huge bases into play? I have a Dread Saurian from WHFB and that thing uses a sheet of paper for a base.

It may be something that's just entire outside of the scale of what *should* be handled in this game. Which is extremely reasonable, just curious on your thoughts as the designer.

 Rihgu wrote:
I'll need to play a few games to really get a grasp on how the stats play into each other. Having a basic idea from reading is one thing - experience is another!

I just looked at the base sizings again, and noticed... cavalry are 20x40, monsters are 40, and chariots are 40x80. These are unusual to me, as most of my cavalry are 25x50, monsters are 50, and chariots and some monsters are 50x100. How much will that impact game play? Should I treat basically everything as having the Wide Base rule and reduce points by 10 for those units?

Maybe my final question for now - is there any way to bring truly huge bases into play? I have a Dread Saurian from WHFB and that thing uses a sheet of paper for a base.

It may be something that's just entire outside of the scale of what *should* be handled in this game. Which is extremely reasonable, just curious on your thoughts as the designer.

Those measurements probably came from after-market bases I use. Standard GW measurements will also work.

The idea behind the game is to try to keep things consistent, and also to let people use what they have on hand.

I worte Conqueor when WHFB 6th ed. (which I really liked) was about to be replaced. Having been through that cycle with 40k, I decided to sell of my books immediately (before knowledge of 7th ed. was widespread) and then built a set of rules that I'd never have to worry about going away.

My Christmas vacation is at hand! This is traditionally the time when I get some gaming in and also do some game design work.

I think Conqueror is pretty well developed, and my next project is to develop a set of siege assault rules because who doesn't like attacking a castle?

The idea is to focus purely on the assault itself. Let's face it - a siege that ends in surrender or honors of war is not really fun to play out with miniatures.

As of now, I've got five scenarios under consideration:

Sortie. The defenders launch an attack designed to either break the siege or destroy equipment crucial to the attack on their position.

Over the Walls. The attacker seeks to take the fortification through sheer strength of numbers, using only ladders and missile fire.

Take the Gate. The attackers have sent a battering ram against the main gate, seeking to force and entrance while also attacking the walls with ladders.

Siege Tower. The attackers deploy one or more siege towers in an attempt to take the walls.

Into the Breach. The attackers have secured a significant breach in the walls. It could be through undermining or bombardment, and the defenders must hold his vulnerable point while defending the rest of their position.

The final scenario will require an actual breached section of walls to play. I already own a castle and have started on the breach, so that will be an ongoing modelling project.

As my previous post indicated, I'm going to also use this thread to continue design work on Conqueror. The game actually started as a thread I posted 17 years ago (almost to the day) on Warseer talking about how to "Build a Better Warhammer."

After lots of discussion, draft rules and playtesting, the first edition of rules came out. One deficiency was the lack of army lists, and combined with formatting and spelling mistakes, this convinced me to do the revised edition some years later.

My daughter (who did the cover art) has expressed a desire to improve it (she's in art school now) so that opens the path for a "Revised Second Edition." All of which is to say, if there are things that interest you that you would like to see included, this is a great time to let me know.