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Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

I kind of wanted the basic weapons to be like they are like in Warhammer.. where you have a Hand weapon, great weapon or shield. So an average sword or axe has the same stats, but what will really set them apart are the magic weapons that can have lots of different properties. There will be a big list of magic weapons to choose from.

I also wasn't sure how to handle spears. You see some models with a spear and shield, others wielding them like it's a 2 handed weapon.. so that's how i came up with dual handed, you can treat them like a 1-hander or 2-hander depending on what your model has. I had another idea to make spears just be 1 handed weapons, but give them a 2" reach instead of 1" so I may go that route instead.

And yeah, heavy items take up 2 points of strength, mostly just armor and huge shields.. and there will be heavy weapons in the sci fi rules.

And you're right, when you fail a saving through will only lose 1 HP from an attack. Way back when, the original BWG rules had it be where you lose 1 HP per failed D6.. people didn't live very long

 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

So, I’ve been wondering if I’ve been going about the factions wrong. Just had a new idea to add more RPG-like alignments instead. We could use the standard D&D style alignments, so a character could be Chaotic Good, or Lawful Evil for example. The alignment of your gang leader will determine who can join your gang, so a Lawful Good leader could recruit anyone else who has either Lawful or Good in their alignment, or true neutral?

And then, we could just have a huge list of all available races and pretty much do away with set factions completely. But we could probably list recommended alignments for some races.

Just not sure if those alignments are copyrighted? I think Pathfinder and other games use them too so it’s not just a D&D thing.

I was thinking that would give players a lot more flexibility and let you build more unique gangs. What do you think of that idea?

 
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut






I'd say it depends on how well you can wrap the fluff around the mechanic. You're making a specific setting, so it might be difficult to blow things wide open to allow anything to go and keep it all under the same universe.

When I was toying around with how I'd make a kitchen-sink skirmish game I planned to make archetypal races and clarify how much wiggle room there was within each. For example: humans, elves, dwarves could have any alignment, but orcs and goblins could not be Good and/or Lawful. Undead could not be Good or neutral. etc. Then I'd base everything around the leader and would only allow selection from one degree away at most. So a good leader could never have an evil henchmen or a chaotic one could not have a lawful associate.
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Yep that's kind of what I was thinking too. Humans can be any alignment, other races would have 1 primary alignment and 1 secondary.. Like, Orcs would primarily be chaotic, so they can be Chaotic good, Chaotic Neutral or Chaotic Evil. Demons would primarily be Evil, so they could be Lawful Evil, Neutral Evil or Chaotic evil. Dwarves might be lawful, elves neural, halflings good.

There wouldn't be any kind of stat bonuses involved, it's just for who your leader can recruit. I could probably put together some icons so it's easy to match up which characters can go together. As long as your henchman or minion's character card has one of the alignment icons that matches one of your leader's, then he can join your gang.

I guess at the end of the day, it's still similar to faction restrictions, just each character gets 2 and there's more options to choose from.

 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Got some tweaks to the rules that I’m working on now. I think I’ll probably have them done next week or so.

I’m going to separate things a bit more, so I’ll have 1 PDF for the rules, then a separate PDF for Fantasy games, and I’ll be adding a new PDF for Steampunk & Western Gangfights. I’m also going to remove the Universal Skills section from the main rules, and instead include more genre specific skills in each PDF. Some skills will have the same bonuses, just get a more fluffier name. I think it will be better that way, so folks can pick & choose the settings they want to play and I hope to eventually have lots of different settings to choose from.

So the new Western PDF will mostly just be a lot of the equipment from Blackwater Gulch, with only humans permitted, and armor is not allowed. The steampunk rules will basically just allow you to play fantasy mortal races with the western skills & equipment.

I’m also planning to update the fantasy undead races and basically remove all of the different undead versions of the mortal races and instead have things be more specific. So Undead will get Vampires, Skeletons, Zombies, Revenants, Liches, Wights, Ghouls, Spirts and Abominations (ogre sized).

I’ll probably do the same thing with the demons, but I have to think of cool demon types to have. I’d like to be able to have 8-10 different types for each faction.

 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

While I've been putting together the Western & Steampunk rules, I decided I'm going to back track a little and change the way point costs and weapons are done, and make them the same as Blackwater Gulch. So, minion level characters will start at 50 xp, Henchman types at 75 and Heroes at 100. Also we'll stick to the 1 HP for minions, 2 HP for Henchmen and 3 HP for Heroes.. but armor or skills will let you increase them. Also, weapons & equipment will have levels ranging from 1-6 like now.

This is partly because I want to update BWG to these new rules, but I don't want to have to reprint a whole bunch of character cards and/or force people to rebuy them or download & print & cut out their own. I think the points work good in BWG, why change em?

I was going to limit the levels of equipment to the character levels though.. minions can wield level 1 or 2 weapons, henchmen up to level 4, and heroes up to 6. Those higher level weapons will pretty much be the same as rare weapons now, usually enchanted stuff or complex guns.

I also wanted to change the point levels for characters because I want to update the campaign rules to allow you increase your attributes where basically every 5 points of XP gets you 1 new attribute point.

So hopefully I'll have that all updated and the new version released along with the Western & Steampunk rules probably next week or so



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh, and something else I was going to add to the new rules is damage types, usually for magic spells and DOT effects. I’m thinking of Flaming, Cold, Poison, Disease, Holy and Unholy. These types of attacks have extra strength against people who are susceptible to them (like holy weapons hurting demons more), or have an ongoing effect like setting you on fire. Standard weapons will still do standard damage like always.

For fantasy games you’ll be able to get have weapons & spells that can cause, or items that can resist those types of damage. And some of those will be in the new BWG rules later on too.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/04/26 15:23:16


 
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





Hi,
it's been a while now since the last rule update. I read that you planned to get the system working with the existing BWG cards.
Great (even if that means that I'll have to reprint all the fantasy cards I've created so far)!
I appreciate all the work you put in this subject and really would like to buy I printed copy, when the universal rules are done.
(Please do some vehicle rules too for WW2 or pulp or western coaches ...)
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Yes I’m working on the updated version now. I’m hoping I can get it wrapped up this week.

What I’m doing now is separating it into different PDFs. So, the core rules will be 1, the fantasy rules will be separate, and I’ll also have a PDF for western & steampunk rules too. I think that will make it easier to add on new ones, and eventually when there are a lot to choose from people can just download what they want. I’d like to do eventually do rules for world wars, modern day, post apocalypse, sci fi, etc. Not sure which I’ll do after the western one, will probably be sci fi just because there are so many sci fi minis out there.

I also plan to do the vehicle rules too It make take a while for those, because I’m afraid they will unbalance things too much, so they will need a lot of testing.

 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

So, just when I was about to get everything finished up, I decided to go back and change things around more with the character creation after I got some feedback. So now, I'm going to drop the base stats I have for different races now and instead there is a larger pool of attribute points for you to spend.

So all attributes start at 1, and Minions have 9 points to spend. Henchmen have 12 points, and Heroes have 15 points. The max you can have in any attribute is 3 for minions, 4 for henchmen and 5 for Heroes.

After you set your stats up, you choose your race. Each race will have a +1 bonus to an attribute, and that can raise it above the max.

I think doing it this way will give folks much more variety in their characters. It will probably take a little while to get everything rewritten, maybe another week or so since I have a lot going on at the moment.

 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA



After receiving a lot of feedback, we finally updated the core rules and Fantasy Setting Supplement to playtest version 1.2.

Click here to download the new rules now!

There are a lot of tweaks, grammar and spelling fixes. The major differences now is that we have switched to a level-based equipment listing, similar to Blackwater Gulch. Heroes may equip any weapons. Gang Members may equip items up to level 4. Henchmen & Minions may equip items up to level 2.

We've also added maximums to the attributes based on the character type. Heroes can have natural attributes up to 5, Members up to 4, Henchmen & Minions up to 3. Special skills, racial bonuses or items can raise your attributes above the max, however.

Which also brings me to the races. In the included Fantasy Setting Supplement, you may notice that we did away with the base racial attribute lists. Now, you may choose your own stats, and you character's race will grant him a +1 to a given attribute.

Lastly, the list of Universal Skills is not universal anymore. We've moved that over to the Fantasy Setting Supplement. Each additional setting we add later will come with its own list of skills. Many may be repeated, but we'll use different and more "fluffy" names for each setting, but there will be some unique skills too.

We hope you enjoy the new rules, and don't forget to follow us on Facebook for all the latest updates!

 
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





Will the new BWG-Ruls fit into this ruleset?
Or do I have to rebuild up all my Characters and reprint them again, if I want them to fight against vampires or demons?
And if you want the systems to be mixable then the level of blackpowder weapons should be lowered. (Pirates, gangsters Witchhunters, pulp heroes, cowboys ... they shouldn't need a special skill to be able to use them as a minion too)
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Yes the new rules are using the same exact rules as our new generic rules. It's kind of why I wanted to look into doing that box set that will nave updated cards for every character. I'll still have print on demand and free pdf cards though.

And also the way that the weapons will work now, is all standard weapons go up to level 4, for level 5 or 6 weapons you take the basic one and you can enhance them with extra abilities, like silver bullets or poison tipped arrows.

And yes the stats for the guns will also be compatible with the other weapons in the generic rules so that if you wanted to make up your own games with like western gunslingers vs fantasy monsters, you can do that. On average, bows and more primitive ranged weapons are strength 3, while guns are strength 4, and when i get around to the sci fi rules most futuristic weapons will be strength 5. Armor and magic and all of the other generic rules will all work the same.

 
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





Hmm - are the latest rules online?
Because fantasy firearmes (Pistol, Blunderboss & Musket)
do all have a Str of 3. Shouldn't they count as guns then and have a Str of 4?
And what if I do have a minion and want him to get a pistol?
Level 5 seems to high for the pistol.

I agree that a minion doesn't have to have access to a Musket (or gun) but a pistol should be possible. Right now only gangmembers with a "Know How"-skill can own a firearm.

Or do I mix up things?

Another thought I wanted to share: When we played so far, we made up a houserule, which is inspired by "cutlass".
So, if your character is wounded by a ranged attack he has to take a morale roll imediately. If he's not successfull, he has to spend 2 Actions to run for cover in his next activation.
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Actually, I wanted pistols to be more of a rare thing for fantasy games.. but now that you mention it, it would probably be best if their stats were more in line with the western firearms .. I'll do an update and lower their levels a bit and also increase them to strength 4.

But, I don't know about the morale rule.. it might be ok for fantasy games where guns are more rare, but in a western or sci fi game you'll be rolling for morale after every shot.. that might get tedious after a while. Though, it could be a rule just for fantasy games?

 
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





While we where playtesting the moral rule worked fine.
You'll just have to test if you are wounded (lost one HP), not when you're hit and dodge it.
I think it fits to the other settings too. When you start bleeding you'll look for cover. Except.... if you are a zombie, then you just move on without thinking.

Back to the gun points. You should keep in mind, that the possibility to mix the genres might result in getting a gunslinger with cheap but powerful pistols against dwarf pirat that has no comparable ranged weapon for the same costs.

But on the other hand its just a few points difference. The game is fun anyways!
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





Hi,

it's getting quiet in here. I was trying to set up vehicle rules by myself, but I can't find a good way to represent the "Health" of a car compared to weak weapons. And if I create more powerfull weapons, it's hard to balanc them compared to knifes... I'm stuck...
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Sorry, been busy working on Blackwater Gulch at the moment, but once that's off to the printers I'll circle back around to get these rules finished up

I had a few ideas for vehicles.. where basically if something is classified as a vehicle, a weapon needs a high strength to "wound" it. Vehicles would have an armor value, and your strength needs to meet or exceed that to be able to cause any damage. So something like a basic wooden cart or stagecoach would maybe have an armor value of 5, a car would be 6, a light tank or armored car or mech 7, medium tank or mech 8, heavy tank or mech 9.

Most weapons won't be able to penetrate that, but heavy weapons will have strengths that go above 6.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh wait.. forgot, armor levels I mentioned above was an old idea that I had, but doesn't work as well with for our usual defense rolls.

The other method I came up with was to just have weapon strength cut in half if you attack a vehicle.. So, a strength 6 gun would only be strength 3 against a vehicle.

Or another method would be where different armor levels will lower the attacker's strength by a certain number. A wooden vehicle would have an armor level of 1, so you subtract 1 from the attackers strength. Cars would be 2, light mechs 3, medium 4 and heavy 5.

I kind of wanted to get away from having to do a lot of math, but I think that might be the best way to go. I haven't actually playtested any of that, so feel free to try it out and let me know how it goes

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/10/19 15:21:42


 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

So now that I’m finishing up Blackwater Gulch, I’m going to be swinging back around to updating the core rules to match in the next month or 2. The rules we currently have are still valid, they’ll just be cleaned up and more organized. And then expended upon.

What I’m hoping to do is have this be the main focus of the company (along with producing new minis for BWG). So right now my plan is to have the core rules as one big PDF, campaign rules will be a separate supplement just to keep things streamlined. For genres and settings, we’ll have Fantasy, Westerns, Horror with Sci-Fi, Pulp and others added soon after. Each setting supplement will basically just be a list of races, skills, spells and equipment. Our official game worlds will basically be combining a couple of different supplements, for example Blackwater Gulch 2nd Edition uses the Western & Horror rules, with a touch of Fantasy thrown in.

What I am hoping to do is produce a printed book including all of that, but it will probably be a print-on-demand book using Wargame Vault. Separately, I’m hoping to keep things moving with new supplements added hopefully weekly or at least bi-weekly. One for Blackwater Gulch each month, and at least 1 for other settings to support the generic rules. These will be new scenarios, new skills, character/gang/faction bios, stories, settings, etc. If all goes well, we hope to release them as PDFs but then also compile them in to books each each year, like a Gangfight Annual, for folks that prefer a physical copy. That will also be a Wargame Vault book… unless I can get to the point where I’m able to produce and sell a minimum of 1000 copies, that’s the only way to get a decent price. But what I really hope to do is turn SkirmishGames.com into a big compendium of rules and supplements that are always fresh and up to date.

So that’s where I’m at now. Hopefully in the next few weeks I will have all of the Blackwater Gulch content off to the printers, and then I can start updating the core rules and get started on the other things

 
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





Well BWG2 ended up being very balanced. So, do you still plan on having the core rules plus different settings? I still would invest in pulp and fantasy settings. And if you can mix the genres... perfect

(just asking, because of the "two month or so" *g*)
just kidding, I know you spend a lot of time on BWG, which makes me happy too.
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Actually... this is the next thing in my plans for global domination!

Right now I'm redoing the core rules to match BWG. Basically just removing the BWG references in the rules to make things more "generic" sounding. Then I will be updating the Fantasy setting, plus adding a generic "Wild Wiest" setting, that I'd also like to include a sci fi setting too.

What we are thinking of doing is setting up something like a Patreon campaign, where we can keep adding new content for this and also BWG hopefully on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. And people can subscribe for a low fee like $1 a month. The core rules would be free, but subscribers would get things like new scenarios, new supplements, fluff & background stuff, hobby articles, character bios, campaign stories, etc. But I still need to look into that more and see how to structure things.

Then if that works out, what I was also thinking of doing is collecting all of those articles into a book once a year as a "Gangfight Annual" kind of thing, so people who like to have a book instead of PDFs could order that print on demand through Wargame Vault.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/04/20 18:26:46


 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Going over the rules to prepare them for the 2nd edition. Should be able to have them ready soon now Still planning to have them be a free download, but I’m wondering if it might be worth it to try and do a small Kickstarter campaign for a nice hardcover rulebook like the BWG rules?

So what I’m thinking is the book would have the core rules + fantasy supplement to begin with. Possibly Sci Fi too if there is enough space. After that we could do other genres as stretch goals.. pirates, WWII, zombie apocalypse, etc.

Knowing what the costs were like for the BWG book.. I imagine I would need a minimum of $6000 for a funding goal (probably a bit higher).. and at a price of $25, that means I’d need around 250 backers. I think it’s a goal we could reach. Would take a while to put that together and get some new art done, but the PDF version would be out first.

 
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





If you do that Kickstarter, I would be more than willing to pledge
And if the quality of that book could match the 2nd Edition BWG ... great ! (I didn't like the booklet from the first Edition too much).

And if you want to catch more people you could maybe do something like the loot cards for the other settings, some predefined character card's, ...
That would give some sort of "this is a complete starter set" to the campaign. Minis are nice, but if you show that the system is generic, they won't be missed
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

That’s exactly the plan, it’s like you read my mind or hacked my emails!

Definitely going to be doing a KS, some time this summer. Maybe like August? It will be for just the book, no minis. The book will be all the universal rules, and then there will be a setting supplement for fantasy and for sci fi. Stretch goals will be to add content to the book and make it bigger and better like adding more setting supplements. Each supplement will have special skills, spells, equipment, scenarios and a bunch of sample characters. And I will be using the same printing company I used for BWG’s rulebook so expect the same quality Whole idea is you can play any genre you want with any minis you want.

Also planning to do loot card decks for each supplement, but they will have to be add-on stretch goals. Also thought of maybe doing multiple smaller decks of like 25 cards or so... Like an Elven Loot Deck, Dwarf Loot Deck, Orc Loot Deck, etc? You can mix them all together, or build a custom deck if you want to do a special themed game or something like that.

And then I want to change my SkirmishGames.com site around and have that be like a blog / news site, kind of like the Warhammer Community site, with hobby articles, gang building tips like how to take a boxed game like Zombicide for example and use the minis in it to create 2 skirmish gangs. And there will be new scenarios, character sheets/cards and stuff to download. But I want to get the new book out of the way first.

Also BWG will be fully compatible, it’s all the same rules. I was probably going to have the BWG book and loot cards as add on items in the KS too. Planning to make it just 1 pledge level for the core book, and then people can just raise their amount to cover other add-on items if they want them. I want to make it where setting supplements are like extra chapters in the book or free PDF downloads, but full game worlds like BWG or Mechadrome will get their own separate books.

 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Getting some price quotes for printing. Here's the current plan..

Hardback rulebook with minimum 98 pages (need to print in multiples of 16). Fantasy and Sci Fi generic setting supplements will be included. I'll do other supplements as stretch goals in the KS campaign, planning Pirates and Zombie apocalypse. Open to suggestions for others The idea is regular settings will be in the core book and/or PDF downloads, while full gameworlds with minis like BWG and Mechadrome will have their own separate books, but still compatible. Rules are all the same.

I'd like to do multiple loot card decks for each setting. Planning on smaller decks of 25 cards, but themed. So like there would be an Elf Loot Deck, Dwarf Loot Deck, Dragon Loot Deck, etc. You can mix em all together, or build themed decks if you want to play a special kind of game with more fixed rewards.

Still lots of planning to do, but things are coming along nicely. Hoping to try and get a preview PDF done within the next couple of weeks, before I start production & packaging for the new BWG minis.

 
   
Made in de
Fresh-Faced New User





Sounds good to me. I think you catched the main themes, except one: Pulp! Think about Indiana Jones, mad scientists, funny looking (but deadly) robots, Chicago Gangsters and private investigators…
And PDFs are really nice to store, but when it comes to play and you have to lookup some things, smartphones and tablets are failing due to the PDF format. For that purpose an App would be nice. Or even better: A hardback rulebook

   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

We’ll see how it goes when I do the KS. What I would really like to be able to do is have a nice & big core rulebook with separate chapters covering a bunch of different settings or eras. I’d like to do a Pulp setting too Anyway those chapters would be enough to get you started and playing. Separately, I’d like to do full sourcebooks for each one too, maybe even multiple books if it's warranted. So you get the basics in the core book and if that’s the only book you have, you can still play, but the sourcebooks would have a lot more info and stuff like premade characters and minion teams, plus several small decks of loot cards for each. And then of course we’d still have the separate gameworld rulebooks for BWG and others that we want to make minis for. If anything doesn’t make it into the core book, we could release other settings as a basic PDF later on, and then a separate book if there’s interest.

I’d love to be able to do a gang builder app. No clue where to start and I imagine it would probably be pretty expensive. So I think that would only happen if the Kickstarter went nuts and brought in tons of cash. Not holding my breath It’s basically gonna just be a campaign with 1 funding goal for like $25 or $30 for the core book and then a few add ons for loot decks. Want to keep it really simple and affordable. Hoping the lower cost will bring in lots of backers, since I will need to print at least 1000 copies.

 
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Things are progressing nicely. I’ve decided for now to just have sci-fi and fantasy supplements as part of the main book. I’ve also moved a lot of skills over to a “universal skills” list that is available for all settings… and then each setting supplement will have a list of extra skills you can use. Same deal with equipment.

In fantasy I have several different schools of magic (like fire magic, ice magic, death magic, etc). Sci-Fi has psychic powers but also technology that works the same way as spells, like calling in air strikes or having little attack drones.

I decided on the format for the Kickstarter. It will be for the main book, just 1 simple pledge. For stretch goals we will do decks of loot cards as add-ons, mixed in with goals to add different settings to the main book so it will get extra free content. Planning on Pirates, Zombies and Steampunk. I’m not going to do whole separate books for settings at least not now, mostly so the campaign will be more manageable and won’t drag on forever. But we’ll see how things go and could always plan that for future campaigns.

I’m hoping to have an updated rulebook PDF in the next month or so and if all goes well the campaign would be happening in August. Before it launches though I want to try and put together a good How to Play Blackwater Gulch video, that I can also use in the KS to show people how the rules work.

 
   
Made in us
Fixture of Dakka





West Michigan, deep in Whitebread, USA

Sounds intriguing!



"By this point I'm convinced 100% that every single race in the 40k universe have somehow tapped into the ork ability to just have their tech work because they think it should."  
   
Made in us
[DCM]
Dankhold Troggoth






Shadeglass Maze

I am definitely interested although even more for the scifi part, for me personally. Single pledge level sounds fine!
   
Made in us
The Last Chancer Who Survived





Norristown, PA

Working on the updated PDF version now.

Been wondering lately though.. would it be better to have the free rules not be a PDF, but instead a big website, where for example each different section of the book would be a web page?

Thinking it would be easy to embed videos and stuff like that, and it would also be responsive meaning it would look good on all devices. PDFs are so teeny on a phone.

Maybe that would be a good way to have the 2 different versions? Free basic rules as web pages, and a printed book sold separately that has more content to it?

 
   
 
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