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Hi, Boyz'n'Gurlz!

A while ago I started with development for my very own post apocalyptic tabletop skirmisher in the style of "ThisIsNotATest" and "DarkAge".
But it'll come with an app that does most of the rules stuff for you... no calculating modifiers (yet there are some), no reading of 100s of rules pages. Besides that it will give you generated random events (Sandstorm, NPC-Interaction etc.).

My design goals are:
1) No own models (cuz there are plenty and you should be able to use the models you like... just like ThisIsNotATest.
2) Handcards that can change the cause of a battle.
3) Levelling models
4) As less rules as possible, to lower the bar for beginners

The analog part is playable already, I started with the digital part a week ago, and I came to the point that I want to kill the dice rolls and implement them completely into the app. So here is my question for you:

How much do you like rolling dices? Can you imagine that a wargame could be fun without dice rolls? And how do you see Tabletop Hybrids in general?

I look forward to your response and your oppionions.

So what's the attraction for your game?
What exactly is going to make me want to play it over AoS or Infinity or anything else?



Well first up you say there's no models - so that's a big lack of potential advertising for your system right there.

Second you say that all the dice rolls, rules things and such is all done by the app. So the player just inputs data into the app and the app spits out what that data means. At which point the player is likely going to feel like they'd rather just play an actual computer game rather than a hybrid where they've got to move their models on the table AND input all the data into the app.


It's one thing having an optional app for reference, but a mandatory app that is basically playing the game for you and when you've also no physical product for your product line as well I can't even see how you'd market it let alone what the market would really be for it.



Like I said its one thing to have optional components, its another to have mandatory ones.

I understand your doubts. And I share your doubts at least a bit, but the problem is that Games Workshop is THE gateway to wargames. And almost everyone who plays wargames is (or at least was) a GW customer. So I experienced that many people don't even consider playing another system because they already have too many models. On the other hand there are already more models than games on the market, so I don't see a real necessity for own models.

The App doesn't play the game for you. You still have to make tactical decisions, they're just not watered down by rules discussions and reading through books on the quest for that one rules section. Further an app is able to manage Inventories of every model without too many stuff on the table.
Sightlines, Movement, HandCards and Terrain are still all analog and another design goal is that you don't need to do stuff twice, so for one situation you use the app OR manage it analog.
You still have to measure and you still have to move your models and the app won't intervene.

If you ever played mansions of madness you have a rough idea what I want to do.

So what is the unique feature of After the Fall that (hopefully) makes you wanna play it?
It's a wargame with looting and levelling. In the Wasteland you can loot almost everything (even other models). With those ressources you can play your Hand Cards (the other uniquish feature) that work a bit like Hearthstone Cards (without the minions of course).
Besides that in many cases you will have more than just one way to win a game (through killing enemies) and there will be the possibility for winning a game without even one kill. At the end of the day the ones with the loot will prevail over the dangers of the wasteland.
And there will be a campaign mode, of course.

I have to say that the idea of some sort of tracking app to take care of the bookkeeping would allow for a more immersive game without the penalties of getting bogged down in remembering what effects you have and so forth. I think that it's a good idea.

It would also allow for a long drawn out campaign (for example, I have a friend who I see about once per month) without needing to keep a book with all the information in. load saved game, and now you have all your characters with all their afflictions and skills ready for the tabletop.

Including damage mechanics in the app will allow for a lot of immersion I think - where a traditional game might use a D66 table to determine where you got shot, how bad it was, what effect it has in game, and you would then have to remember the -1 movement for a gammy leg, and the fact that you're deaf, an all-encompassing app would not only work out from a much wider array of injuries how you got hurt, but also apply it for you every time. All you would need is a statistics page, with a summary under it of why your character has -1 movement and -2 perception.

I really like it. I might actually make an excel macro sheet (I don't know how to make apps) to make the between-game section of gorkamorka move more swiftly!

Thanks!

Exactly that.

You can go more into detail AND be faster than the average tabletop game. A game where you don't have to choose between quantity and depth in detail.

Almost everything can be done more time efficiently for more models: levelling, random events, individual model inventories and equipment, injuries and mutations... not to mention NPCs. Imagine you have a normal game suddenly invaded by a third party, that changes the winning conditions of the scenario. Of course, in the most cases that would be an invasion of tokens, but due to the fact that you can use any model you have in your closet, there should be a way to reduce that risk.

In my head it is a game I would really enjoy playing.
For now I work on the prototype to have a look how far away my head is from reality. The analog part is already finished and is fun. But I don't know how it works out with the digital part yer. Maybe it'll be the most non-fun game experience of my life. Although in 40k 7th I played melee fluff orcs (after reducing their overall morale in an almost fearless edition) and fluffy Thousand Sons (before the Rubrics update)... so my bar for the most non-fun gaming experience is very high.

Lord Royal wrote:
I don't think that this would be a problem, since RNG is a huge part of turnbased rpg video games and noone has a problem with them. And with an electronic component you can have more detailed HP, so a normal standard model could have more than 1 HP; a thing that isn't used due to avoiding to many tokens on the table. But with an app you don't have this problem.
So to say that kind of system would be a classical wargame to the point of an attack and than changes itself into (ie) Darkest Dungeon.

Even today there are people who use dice apps. But for the more suspicious folks it could be switchable in the menue settings between dice and diceless... that's a simple toggle switch. But the version with dices is (simply because there are more things to do) significantly slower.

And with games like blood bowl we can see that it at least works in the direction from analog to digital, but I don't really see why it shouldn't work the other way around, too.

I know there are a few tries who tried to accomplish that (Golem Arcana and the other failed one). But they had the huge flaw, that even movement was tracked, so you had to move your models twice (once in the app, once on the table). Through that the analog part was degraded into an overpriced gimmick... not to mention what ie. Golem Arcana needed besides that (those crappy scanning pens... cool idea but too complicated).
If you play a game with digital support you don't want it to be an obstacle, which was the case imao with those games.

Of course that the hit algorithm is simple and transparent is oblitaroy, so that you can at least follow the math in the protocol.

PS: I write my bachelor in game design about that topic.

I'll reply here as it's more relevant to this discussion than the other one!

I agree that you can keep track of a much greater quantity of variables and inject a lot more interesting features into a digital game than you can with cards, paper and dice. The issue is that dice are such a part of the gaming process. They make you feel like you are influencing the outcome in some way. I would much prefer to throw the dice for my unit of lootas vs the almost-dead knight and see my chances dwindle or soar as I roll to hit, to wound, and they roll their saves. It adds an element of suspense.

In 7th, I played 4th edition orks regularly against a competitive elder player - he was probably the best player in the group, though don't tell him that! I know what it's like to go through a game where the enemy just point-and-clicks your stuff away. so many rerolls it wasn't worth the dice, just assume they all hit, followed by the inevitable "Ignores cover", meaning that the orks died.

It wasn't fun when I felt like I couldn't do anything about it.

if you condense your whole number-generation, which is most of the tabletop wargame if we're honest, into punching the attacker & target into an app and pressing a button to see if it dies, then you are moving more towards the wrong end of immersion. The rolling is the bit which matters, if you take out rolling, you're left with movement phase, push a button, remove models phase. I don't think it has a place in conventional tabletop wargames like 40k.

Now, you referenced RNG being used in RPG video games, but let's just step back and remember the timeframe here! Let's use skyrim as a comparison - it's an RPG, with lots of RNG. If you sit down and play for 2 hours (and can prevent yourself just grinding away at a blacksmith stall), you can get a lot done - a colossally large amount. in 2 hours of playing a wargame, you might just be getting to the end of a smallish dungeon, which you steamed through on skyrim and can barely remember now, only half an hour later.

Flipside - if you take a basic dungeon from skyrim and turn it into a board game - how long would it take to complete?

I honestly think that you could do a lot worse than to reserve the app for tracking and wound purposes - basically to keep track of what could easily be immensely complex charts and tables, which would stall even the most devoted of RPG gamers, but leave at least some element of dice rolling. Keep the basics in the hands of the player, and keep the boring bit (tables & bookkeeping) in the app.

 some bloke wrote:
In 7th, I played 4th edition orks regularly against a competitive elder player - he was probably the best player in the group, though don't tell him that! I know what it's like to go through a game where the enemy just point-and-clicks your stuff away. so many rerolls it wasn't worth the dice, just assume they all hit, followed by the inevitable "Ignores cover", meaning that the orks died.

It wasn't fun when I felt like I couldn't do anything about it.

I think that's a problem that counts especially for 40k. That's due to the old fashioned way of I-go-you-go (I can activate all my models before you can do anything against it). And the fricking power spiral. I had games where I lost the majority of my army in the first player's turn. That has nothing to do with dice. 40k 7th was a hell of a mess and nower days I can't understand why I was playing it.
The big issue is, that you can't do anything while your opponent is doing his (or rarer her) turn. Overwatch was a small concession but at the same time it nerfed the already unefficient melee. What 40k needs to avoid that issue is some kind of action that you can perform to interrupt the opponent's turn. Or you just use alternate activations (I activate a unit, you activate one, I activate... and so on...). And you have to be careful with one-shot-one(or more than one)-kill weapons with ranges that exceed the "I can reach you"-distance. In my last days of 40k I wrote an own codex for Post Apo Wasteland Factions (Plural) for 7th. Games in that codex where always unbelievable entertaining. They were a bit like hobo fights. But everytime the were thrilling to the max. And that was due to overall underpowering the firepower and reduce the max range on 48" for heavy weapons and 24" for everthing else... while the avarage was 12-18". Through that even a ranged combat army had to move and actually do something else than just rolling buckets of dice. I found out this rules of thumb:
1) the average range of all weapons shouldn't be greater than the distance a model can overcome during two turns in average.
2) The overusage of instakills is a poor way to show off.

7th's Eldar were the exact opposite. Almost everything in 40k 7th is the exact opposite.

 some bloke wrote:
Now, you referenced RNG being used in RPG video games, but let's just step back and remember the timeframe here! Let's use skyrim as a comparison - it's an RPG, with lots of RNG. If you sit down and play for 2 hours (and can prevent yourself just grinding away at a blacksmith stall), you can get a lot done - a colossally large amount. in 2 hours of playing a wargame, you might just be getting to the end of a smallish dungeon, which you steamed through on skyrim and can barely remember now, only half an hour later.

I referenced it being used in TURNBASED RPGs like Darkest Dungeon, Pokemon, Final Fantasy or games like the digital version of blood bowl.
Of course it is used in Skyrim, too. There's RNG even in Candy Crush. RNG is in almost every video game. But you can't compare a first person realtime shooter with RPG-elements to a boardgame.

After I had few responses from both sides of the analog/digital spectrum... the digitals tell me to kill the dice, the analogs to keep 'em. I will definetily implement a toggle switch and let the players decide, how to play each game.

Don't get me wrong. I understand the importance of rolling dice and I didn't want to kill them at all. But from a designer's point of view at least on the paper the diceless variant is way cleaner. The element of suspense is a big point, but I'm sure that it can be achieved in another way.

My goal is to be able to have a game in 15-30 minutes, 45-120 for bigger games (possibly with more than two players). Rather having 2-3 games in an evening or have the choice to do something else than to have one single 5 hour marathon in which you can declare a winner after 2 hours... the avarage 3000 Point 40k Beer'N'Bretzels Matches in my experience. Sure, they changed it to the better, but didn't ever play AoS or 8th so I just can speak about 3rd-7th.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And if I finally figure out how to code an AI that plays the game, I can have the best balanced analog game ever.
Another thing that would be possible is data tracking. Every player could upload his game protocol to a website. On the one hand to show off on a highscore list on the other hand that data is pure gold for balancing. #LiveUpdates

I like your sentiments on weapon ranges and power, I agree totally - 40k seemed to always be about weapons firing further and harder, but without the scale of the table changing! I feel that you could easily "tweak" 40k by making rapid fire pathetic at long ranges and really good at short ranges, so people have to move to work it. but that's digressing.

Very true that you referenced turn based RPGs, I missed that for some reason! I think it's important though to remember that video games have a plot, which you play through from start to finish, and that tabletop games tend not to - so the videogames are sped up by RNG, both by necessity and to let you progress through. If you take one of your turn based games and converted it to a turn based wargame, with measuring etc, I would suspect that it would take days to play through!

I think that you could temper the detachment of just pressing a button by using an animation for the roll, so that the roll itself takes time, but you cut out the counting dice, rolling on tables etc., this would speed things up, but keeps people engaged in the actual act of RNG, and keep the anticipation.

I genuinely do like the idea of a digitally augmented tabletop wargame, I just think you need to find the right balance. If you move everything to digital except the act of moving models, then you might as well move that to digital as well and make a digital wargame.

That's the plan. There will be some response. I thought of an animation of the model. There will be some kind of character creation tool that shall enable you to mimic the models on the table and those will be animated in addition to numbers rolling over the screen representing the dice roll.

And it's my goal aswell to approve that no part of the game make you feel that the models are unnecessary. That's why movement, terrain, handcards, secret victory conditions, sightlines and measurements stay completely untouched. At no time the app "knows" where your models actually are on the battlefield and how the battlefield looks like exactly.
In the next days I will do some mock-ups that explain that proparbly better.

Lord Royal wrote:
That's the plan. There will be some response. I thought of an animation of the model. There will be some kind of character creation tool that shall enable you to mimic the models on the table and those will be animated in addition to numbers rolling over the screen representing the dice roll.

And it's my goal aswell to approve that no part of the game make you feel that the models are unnecessary. That's why movement, terrain, handcards, secret victory conditions, sightlines and measurements stay completely untouched. At no time the app "knows" where your models actually are on the battlefield and how the battlefield looks like exactly.
In the next days I will do some mock-ups that explain that proparbly better.

With handcards and the separation of the board and the app, I think that you will have a fairly good balance for your ideas. I think that the key will be in making sure that each "roll" still takes time, which it sounds like you've got covered!

I look forward to seeing how this develops!

Thanks. I'll do my best.

There are some news:

I decided to implement body zones.
After a hit is confirmed but before damage is dealt, the app rolls with a D20 on the following table:
1-3 left leg
4-6 right leg
7-13 torso
14-16 left arm
17-19 right arm
20 head

Each body zone has its own hit point bar (in addition to the model's overall lifebar) and if it's gone the zone is crippled (a little bit like it's done in Fallout 3) which has additional effects depending on the particular zone.

Legs - for each crippled leg -50% Movement and is knocked prone
Arms - for each crippled arm -50% Base-Accuracy
Head - additional damage equal to 50% of the target model's overall max HP
Torso - no effect

The max HP of each zone are 25% of the overall max HP, except the torso, which is 100%.
Non-humanoid models (ie. vehicles or nasty tentacle monsters) will have different zones and effects, of course.

There will be possibilities to choose a body zone instead of a random one. And there will be skills and weapon abilities that will boost that aswell.

What do you think? Too much?
And do you think that this should be implemented in addition or INSTEAD of critical hits and misses?
And what do you think of ammo and fuel shortages for every vehicle and weapon so that a model has to loot from time to time to fill up its stock?

Your idea for the app will allow you to put a lot of detail into the damage mechanics, and easily keep track of the results.

As movement is going to be one of the things which is done in an analogue manner, it may be worth trying to avoid any modifiers to it - I know that the logical response to being shot in the leg is to move slower, but this will result in bookkeeping - you will have to go to each characters stat page to determine how far they can move each turn. If this is an inherent part of your game system (which it might well be) then no problem, but if people are going to have to reference the character sheet just for the movement stat then it might get missed - it's not something the app can control. Perhaps go for reduced carrying capacity, or something.

I don't think that you can get "too much" detail on the damage system of something which is computer controlled - this is the whole benefit of making something computer aided, it allows you to automate the bookkeeping side of things - you can have 3 turns of -1 to hit because you're dazed, less carry capacity, and -1 to hit with your right hand, but only against short opponents, and it can all be kept track of easily without any player input or bookkeeping - use it!

looting things is an option, and if the system keeps track of what is left on each corpse, and you make a corpse marker system, then you can implement the looting fairly easily I think. Keeping things sparse will encourage decision making - unlimited ammo encourages holding down the trigger, and the only decision is what to point at. There's never been a game where putting in the cheat code for unlimited ammo (IDKFA ) made the game more engaging.

So my opinion is that you should go all-out on the bookkeeping side, and make a game which would be unplayable without app support - then use the app support to make it both quick to play, and very engaging.

 some bloke wrote:
Your idea for the app will allow you to put a lot of detail into the damage mechanics, and easily keep track of the results.

That's true. But an app is no guarantee to not overdoing a game.

As movement is going to be one of the things which is done in an analogue manner, it may be worth trying to avoid any modifiers to it - I know that the logical response to being shot in the leg is to move slower, but this will result in bookkeeping - you will have to go to each characters stat page to determine how far they can move each turn. If this is an inherent part of your game system (which it might well be) then no problem, but if people are going to have to reference the character sheet just for the movement stat then it might get missed - it's not something the app can control. Perhaps go for reduced carrying capacity, or something.

As you have to know the model's MV anyways for moving models manually. The MV is shown next to the model's icon alongside with size for sight purposes and the lifebar for... obvious purposes.

I don't think that you can get "too much" detail on the damage system of something which is computer controlled - this is the whole benefit of making something computer aided, it allows you to automate the bookkeeping side of things - you can have 3 turns of -1 to hit because you're dazed, less carry capacity, and -1 to hit with your right hand, but only against short opponents, and it can all be kept track of easily without any player input or bookkeeping - use it!

looting things is an option, and if the system keeps track of what is left on each corpse, and you make a corpse marker system, then you can implement the looting fairly easily I think. Keeping things sparse will encourage decision making - unlimited ammo encourages holding down the trigger, and the only decision is what to point at. There's never been a game where putting in the cheat code for unlimited ammo (IDKFA ) made the game more engaging.

As I said, it's very easy to overdo even a digital game. Many values that are difficult to keep an eye on, many intransparent mechanics that don't work together well, to many ideas and the like are indicators for a so called feature creep.

So my opinion is that you should go all-out on the bookkeeping side, and make a game which would be unplayable without app support - then use the app support to make it both quick to play, and very engaging.

Overall you're right. I can go into detail without losing too much streamlining potential but there's a limit.

Here's a small update and a rule summary...

Each Round is devided into the following phases:
Maintenance - where you draw new hand cards, bring reserves into play and certain random events are triggered
Initiative - Each player rolls a D10, the highest number can choose whether to go first or decides, which enemy model has to be activated first.
Activation - Each player (in initiative order) activates a single model. Repeat this till all models are activated. Each model has 2 actions.
End - Discard unwanted Mission Cards, check for VP, manage lingering effects like bleed or burning

Each model has following profile values:
Mv - Movement in inch per action
Acc - Accuracy, a bonus on ToHitRolls (d10)
Def - DefenceValue, that reduces incoming damage
HP - HitPoints
Sz - the model's height, that indicates when a model treats a certain terrain piece as a sightblocker or not
Sv - Survival, an overall Bonus on interactions
Sq - Squad Size, the maximum number of models of the same type that the model can linked with during its activation

Each weapon has the following values
Rng - range in inches
WM - weapon modificator on the bearer's Acc
AP - armour penetration, that reduces the target's Def
Rate - the number of attacks the weapon can perform during an action
H - hands indicates whether the weapon is one- or two-handed

Actions (as mentioned every model can perform 2):

Move - move upto your Mv

Attack - Attacks a model in range... depending on your favoured settings, the app or you rolls a D10 and adds following modifiers: -1 for every full 6 inches between attacker and target
+1 for every point of your modified (by the weapon) Acc
Every 10+ is a success.
(if I implement BodyZones, they should accure here as mentioned in an earlier post)
Every success generates damage that is reduced by a percentage value depending on the target's Def (ie. Def 2 means that the damage is reduced by 20%)

Aim: +1 on the next ranged attack during the running activation

Interact: with a loot token or another interactable object on the battlefield. It can mean that you move heavy things or pick a lock or hack into a computer relais

Special Action (can be performed once per activation, but is otherwise a free action) Only one of the following can be used
Dash - Move 1 inch
Go Down - model gains a prone token (giving it +1 on ranged attacks and -1 Size, -1 on Melee Attacks, -50% MV and Melee attacks against a prone model gain +1)... standing up is a standard move action.
Others - depending on the model's special rules (ie. Medic)

Activate a Squad:
If your model's Sq is higher than 1 you can choose to activate additional models during that activation. You can only squad activate models that share the same Keywords and that are in a 3" formation.

Dying:
If a model loses all its HP it is knocked prone and has to roll in each End-Phase if it eventually dies. If it dies it is replaced with a loot token of the same size (the bigger the pile, the more to find).
During campaign play a model isn't dead yet at this point, but it suffers permanent injuries that CAN lead to the model's death.

That are roughly all rules already... nah, forgot the terrain... but that's a story for another time.

Sounds like a good basis for the game.

One point, which may or may not be an issue, is:

Lord Royal wrote:
Initiative - Each player rolls a D10, the highest number can choose whether to go first or decides which enemy model has to be activated first.

Depending on whether your models can perform buffs, or if you have armies akin to vampire counts where the leader needs to do things first to keep stuff going, allowing your opponent to select an enemy model to activate first can really screw you over.

ways this could go wrong:

1: you've set up an ambush, and then your opponent tells you to activate your ambushing model first - ruining the ambush
2: you've got a model which can light up a target, but your opponent tells you to activate your sniper first, meaning you can't use them together this turn.
3: You've got an assault unit and a shooting unit, but they make you use the assault one first, spoiling the shot.
4: You've got an assault unit, but there's someone in the way of your charge, but you can't move them out of the way first.

I would be inclined to simply go for whoever rolls highest chooses who goes first. throwing your opponent out of sequence could really hurt their turn.

Otherwise, I like the design you're going for, and look forward to hearing more about it!

That's true. But I forgot one of the most important actions your models can perform...

Sentinel - Give up 2 Actions to gain a sentinel counter. With a sentinel counter you can perform one single action during another model's activation (friend&foe).

1&2: I want ambushes and other nasty tricks to be two edged knifes.
3: You can choose in that case either to use the assault model or the shooting model to do different stuff that round (like looting, doing some VP by interacting with an Objective etc.)
4: You can move through your own models (assuming that they step aside if your damage train comes by) and don't need to move in a straight line (while charging for example).

Especially in cases where a big basher glas cannon teleports onto the battlefield that gets an enormous damage buff if it's the first model that is activated that mechanic generates huge suspense... at least in the analogue version.

My idea was "high damage high risk".

But you're absolutely right, I will definetely think about your suggestion.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Okay... Terrain

Every terrain piece has a Sz value. A model with a Sz equal or lower treats that terrain piece as a sight blocker. Every terrain is treated either as no cover, light cover or heavy cover. After a successful hit roll a cover save is made. It is a miss chance of 25% for light cover and 50% for heavy cover and occurs if that piece of terrain is in the line of sight between attacker and target. The attacker can ignore covering terrain that is within 2 inches.

Further each terrain piece may have one or more properties which are:

Concealing - The terrain piece is a general sight blocker but models in it can be seen. (used for ruins and smoke)

Impassable - no model can move through or into this terrain piece. Flying models can move over it though, if their movement doesn't end in that terrain piece.

Rough - Each move action that is drawn through that terrain cost
2 points of movement.

Dangerous - If you move through that terrain make a Sv-Check at the end of your movement. If failed you suffer damage. (I don't know how much yet)

Floors - Used for houses and ruins with more than 1 floor... obviously. Per floor in difference to your target you reduce the Sz of all terrain pieces in 6" for -1. For every full 5 sizes (that's sounds weird, but I hope you get what I mean) a model can attack other models in melee, that are up to 1 floor above its level. For Example, a Rad Collossus (Sz 10) can beat up the poor raider on the balcony in the second floor.

Model restrictions - Some terrain pieces count for certain model types as impassable. So the first floor (and above) of a ruin is impassable for vehicles for example. And only models upto Sz X are allowed. Just use common sense and a little bit of imagination. As long as it feels right for all players everything is just alright.

Some terrain pieces (ruins for example) can have different zones that have different properties. Again use common sense and talk to each other how a certain terrain piece works.

Terrain is analogue only and won't be supported by the app. If you attack a model, there will be a button for determining the cover of your target.

Okidoki, that was the rough summary of the rule part. Here it's now 2:00AM... time to sleep.

Coming next: A summary of 9 factions.

How does the "Sentinel" ability interact with standard activations? is it for use only in this game round, or the next, or is it until it is used?

If it is for the same game round, that would work as it's basically halving your actions to not go first, but it will only ever really be used by ambushing units or units which don't want to go first.

If it is for the next round, then it will likely never get used. A unit which wants to buff won't forgo all actions (including buffing) this round to ensure it buffs next round, I feel.

I honestly think that allowing your opponent to select your first unit is an unnecessary mechanic which could have a lot of negative interactions, particularly if you wish to expand beyond your original factions - it will be another rule to have to consider. Synergy is an easier thing to accomplish if you don't allow your opponent to interfere too much. Some special abilities could prevent a unit from activating after the unit which inflicted it, for example - you see the opponent lining up a combo and bam, freezing rifle slows down that hard-hitter and gives you another units worth of trying-to-get-away.

Sentinel tokens last till the beginning of the model's next standard activation or till it is used. I think it is very important that there is some kind of mechanic that allows you to interfere. It is right that it isn't used much, but there are some occasions where this is gold. If there is a template weapon that you can dodge through a sidestep for example or a melee train approaches you that was out of reach of you pistol during your last activation. It is simply an additional decision you can make. And decision is core for tactical consideration. "If you do this, you can't do that."
There is no tactical depth if you don't have to "pay" for a decision. That's why I think the overwatch mechanic of 40k is very lame. Dark Age had a very similar mechanic and it was one of its core mechanics that loosened up the initiative order. That gains even more meaning if you have a game with more than two sides.

The "picking" is originally from (again) Dark Age. And there it works very well as an element of suspense. That's why I never thought about the flaws of that mechanic but what you suggested is absolutely true... it isn't really needed.

Factions... YAY!

Arkers - They live in underground facilities (the so called Arks) and wait for the apocalypse to end and to finally arise and rule over the wasteland again. They are preservers of old forgotten knowledge and high tech (blasters, shield generators, stealth fields, robots and the like... all those pretty cyberpunk toys). Most of them have cyber implants and have a deus ex like appeal. Their poster boys are the Sleepers, their soldiers; mighty almost invincible one-man-armies, that are equipped and armed to the teeth with implants and nano tech. They are very expensive units and often cost as much as your opponent's whole army, but they have a special ability (overcharge) that allows them to be activated more than once during a round. They are very fun to play... but also the definition of glas cannons.

Collectionists: The holy church of collectionism sees itself as a group of chosen ones which survived the apocalypse as a kind of divine test. They think that everything belongs to them and that everyone that has not the same opinion have to be vanquished. They are clad in the heaviest armours you can find.
There Speciality are Technicians that can built positionial beacons that benefit other Collectionists around them. For instance a magnetic shield, teleporters, cloaking, aiming computers, mini gun turrets and the like. They are very slow, but beware their insanely hard punch.

Raiders: No Wasteland would be complete without the scum that feed on the rubbish that lies around everywhere. They are cheap, they are bad equipped, but they have some tricks to compensate. They are divided in a vast number of small gangs that are often lead by a warlord and his household. They are exceptional good at finding stuff, that might help them to survive.
But don't underestimate them as their specialists can be very hard hitters. Their funniest toy: the boomer, a guy that mined the battlefield with explosives. Its unique weapon is the Red Button... BOOM!

Mutant Horde: I like mutants and I know that you do, too. Everyone loves mutants. They are much like the Raiders but worse equipped. But their lack of tech is compensated through their mutations. You can specialize them in almost every way. They have toys like the colossal RAD Giants (I use Hobbit Trolls for them), that are walking meatgrinders or the bestial Ferals, that bite and scratch and slash faster than you can recognize.
Like the Raiders the mutant hordes are organized in many small clans, and each of them have their own characteristics and specialities.

Road Marshalls: You know the Main Force Patrol from Mad Max (the first one)? Combine them with Judge Dredd, add some Nazis and you have the Road Marshalls, the Wasteland „Police“. But they are not a part of a forgotten government. They obey THE LAW, a book of Dos and Don’ts that is written by the Lord Marshall a legendary jerk that tries to force his distorted opinions upon everyone else. They are pretty well equipped (not as well as the collectionists or the arkers though) but their „super power“ is their almost unlimited conviction that THE LAW is actually the law.… not much more is known… as I haven’t done them yet!

Savages: Tech brought the apocalypse… hence tech is evil. Consistent? For them: Yes it is!
The tribes of the savages fight with bows and spears, and while every one else is using motorized vehicles they prefer to ride into battle. Besides the later mentioned Hazards they are the worst equipped faction of Aegurio, but they know their land like noone else. Rough terrain? You call that rough? At least they don’t. They like to ambush their opponents to make up for their disadvantages. They are lead by medicine men and shamans that have supernatural powers… like the Marshalls… not done yet.

Hunks: They are a human sub species that are adapted to the harsh environment of Aegurio. They are significantly larger than the average human. Just imagine them as small Hulks (the Marvel one). Not what you call smart, but a brute force in the daily struggle of survival. They are organized in small families and often don’t give a feth about the normal „Hoomies“ but you can find them from time to time working as bodyguards for a trader convoy. If you pay them they are the most loyal mercenaries you can get and proparbly the ones with the hardest punch. Besides that they stay in their isolated villages but if you threaten their youngsters you better run fast and far.

Traders: You can’t decide which faction you like the most? Well, than… take Traders. They are all kinds of people that are clad together by money and wealth. They are lead by a CEO and organized in companies (the economic not the military ones). Many of their core troops never participated in an actual combat they prefer to pay others for that job. And money can be a big motivator. In Gameplay terms that means that they can buff their allies that also means that they are rarely seen without allied forces.

Hazards of the Wastes: The Wasteland and everything in it, which wasn’t mentioned earlier. Just imagine something nasty. You can find it in this faction. Zombies, Collossuses (I use the Glottkin), Giant Insects and even weather. With the Hazards you slip into the roll of an evil deity that controls the battlefield… well, not always… because your troops tend to disobey your orders, as they are animals and brainless husks. In a campaign your goal isn’t to win games but to destroy the efforts of your opponents.

To be continued… more factions are coming… I’d like to have some aliens but don’t want to specify on certain species… don’t know how to manage that yet.

Reference the "picking" thing, if you want to have the tactical decision of "do I go first, or let them go first" to have a little more carrot than stick, then why not allow the player who wins the roll off to either go first, or to assign a sentry token to one of their units and allow the other player to go first - if the sentry tokens are wiped when you activate the unit, it won't have a huge impact, but it will represent your army biding its time a little.

The factions you've got sound good, if a little stereotypical. Stereotypes aren't necessarily a bad thing - these factions have already stood the test of time, so you know that they will work as a core, and you can be experimental with your additional factions. Have a think on how each faction interacts with each other - who are rivals, who are allies, and why. Fluff is always important, and if it doesn't reflect in rules at all, then I feel it detaches one from the other.

Example: the Collectionists think themselves superior to everyone, so have no allies per se, but can ally to deplete enemy ammo - and have no morale issues with their allies being slaughtered because it's just saving them a job later. whereas the raiders will likely ally with anyone because they're just dudes surviving, and aren't inherently evil, they're just ruthless in survival.

Looking forward to seeing more of this develop!

Playing as the hazards of the wasteland sounds quite cool, basically playing as the entire world against the enemy - I do wonder how you can put a victory condition in against the weather though! I'm assuming that the weather will be a special rule type thing, and the main army will be animals and monsters and such.

 some bloke wrote:
Reference the "picking" thing, if you want to have the tactical decision of "do I go first, or let them go first" to have a little more carrot than stick, then why not allow the player who wins the roll off to either go first, or to assign a sentry token to one of their units and allow the other player to go first - if the sentry tokens are wiped when you activate the unit, it won't have a huge impact, but it will represent your army biding its time a little.

That's an awesome idea! I will steal that.

Yapp, I know the factions are wildly stereotype, but that was kind of the point. If you are allowed to use the models you like, you have to take the models that already are in existence. The result is a generalization. I see the problem, but I try to compensate by creating freakish Subfactions within the Stereotypes. Like the Norsk Wheels, a Raider clan of wasteland Vikings that believe in the power of the sky gods or the Dead End Kings a mutant gang of telepathic nightmarish creatures. My design pattern is "search for cool models and pack a story ontop".

I have an ally matrix already... at least as concept. The Collectionists for instance can allly with Arkers (as they hope to get some of that tasty tech and don't dare to simply take it) and Road Marshalls (which they use as Deputies. as they have similar views on the rest of the wasteland dwellers they rarely get a problem with each others). If the times are hard you can find even some Raiders alongside a knightly drove that are used as meat shields.

The hazards are still very conceptional waiting for their first playtests. In my Codex: Wastelands for 40k 7th I learned how cool it is to fight against the table itself... I had a rule for npc critters, that were attacking eveyone in reach. To play hazards could feel like being a dungeon master. And I'm not quite sure if they need winning conditions at all, as they just want to screw everyone else.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Small add:

New special action (that can be performed by any non-VEHICLE, non-BEAST model):
set fire - costs 1 action, place a Fire Token in 3".

Fire Tokens (2" in diameter): Models that are at any point of their activation within a fire token have to perform a Sv-Check or start burning. In the EndPhase every Fire Token has a small chance to either create another token in contact (use a scatter roll to determine the direction) or to extinguish.

Burning is an ordinary DoT effect at the beginning of the model's activation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And some subfaction fluff fitting the fire tokens:

Combustionists (Raiders):
In the wasteland things like hope and belief in a better future are long gone to ashes. But where is no hope religion can be a persistent plague. Dozens of sects and cults have many followers in the barren lands of the wastes and the most dangerous one is the Cult of Cinder. Those insane (calling themselves Combustionists) believe that the sinful nature of man is the only thing responsible for the tragedy of the apocalypse.
Humans are rotten to the core far from any salvation. And there is only one solution to repent the sins of the past: The cleansing rage of fire.
Aspirants are baptized in flames and hardened through so called pilgrimage to find divine salvation through the tarmac of absolution. The Cult brings a merciful end to all sinners by one of their many flame weapons and mobs of fanatic psychos which are lead by the fiery speeches of the Ignition Fathers from the molten temples into the wasteland to bring final peace to a dying world.

Some more subfaction fluff:

Dead End Kings (Mutant Horde):
The few scattered remnants of the past are dangerous but yet desired places. The abandoned buildings, ruined factories and ancient dead cities in the vastness of the wastes hold big treasures though most of the wastelanders try to avoid those sites. May it because of RAD (not radiation... Random Alien Desease...) contamination, danger of collapse, the possible presence of enemy gangs or the simple fact that you cannot survive long enough to settle here with limited supply and defence.
The most common reason however is another one even if noone would admit it. Stories told by the camp fire at night. Stories of unspeakable terrors which lurk through the darkest and most godforsaken corners of the rotting remains of the once blooming past.
Lunatic laughter and whispered chants in unknown tongues howling over those nightmarish places and barely visable things
flit through the endless darkness. Dreadful creatures, stuff of dark legends, the dead end kings.
Virtually every inhabitant of the great expanse from the menial mutant to the most powerful warlord knows those legends though only few believe in them. They are dismissed as spine-chillers to scare off children though not only children are scared by them.
And their fear is more than justified, cause the dead end kings are far from being a simple myth. They are described as gruesome grotesque parodies of human beings, whose flesh is pervaded by horrific mushroom-like tumors with mouths that are contorted into a scornful and crazed grin.
Pity the wretched that get lost in their sinister realm as they are haunted by maniacal whisper and are lured deeper into the bowels of the underworld. The smartest ones choose suicide before they can experience what happens if the voices ever catch up.
The legends tell tales of a cyclopean city in the darkest chasms under the wastelands, where ghoulish towers protrude into nothingness like the worm-eaten teeth in a jaw of a fallen god.
There so it says he holds court. He who is the inexpressible King of all Kings and a constant of raging madness wrapped in yellow, the ruler of the sleeping Carcosa.
That is the true reason why no dweller feels comfortable in the old cities cause every ruin could be a secret entry to that hellish homestead.
However if black stars obscure the nightsky and the sun forsakes the sands of the great expanse for days, strange vehicles are emerging at the dunes seemingly uprisen from the feverish dreams of an insane artist.
In those long nights the creatures come to the surface to loot for their King. In those nights nothing is safe in the wasteland... may it be alive or dead.

Special rules (not tested, totally overpowerd but psychic powers aren't done yet):
- every model is a dreamer (psycher) and generates brain (ressource for psychic powers) though they can't cast spells
- every character is a telepath though
- every model can cause panic (the voices), Special action: models in contact have to pass a Sv-Check or have to perform a single move action to get away from them as far as possible... critical miss causes the model to immediately end its activation... critical success causes the model to pass every following panic test automatically by gaining a rigid Psyche token that lasts till the end of the game.
- the game starts at night cause every King is light-sensitive and has dark vision (ignores the flaws of night combat, -1 on initiative and Acc at daytime)
- if the battle is played in the shattered lands (cityscape) the King player shuffles three additional ambushes into his card deck, which work like precise deep strike
- if the battle is played in any other landscape the King player can't use ambushes at all.
- vehicles enhance the panic's range

Effects at night:
Assuming every model has some kind of small torch or lantern under its belongings, night has no effect in 6 inches around a model. The range penalty on the hitchance is heightened and there is a maximum length for lines of sight depending on how dark it actually is. If a target is in cover that length is even shorter. So better keep it close and personal at night. Assuming that every vehicle, bike and similar model is equipped with some kind of stronger light source they can lighten up an area in 18 inches to ignore the mentioned effects as a special action.

I try to write at least 3-5 sub factions for every faction (except Hazards) and they will all get thematic special rules. Speaking of that... I forgot to mention the special rules of the combustionists:
- fire tokens that are generated through a combustionist model (may it through a set fire action, flame throwers or molotov cocktails) have a higher chance to spread and a lower chance to extinguish
- models hit by a combustionist's flame weapon, burn for a longer duration and suffer more DoT
- every living model can be ignited voluntarily as a free special action to start burning and enter a rage mode which doubles its melee attacks that have a chance to set enemies ablaze (notice that they burn longer and hotter... Combustionists are far from being immune to fire... they are wasteland emos that use petrol cans and cigarette lighters instead of razor blades) You can see them as a whole army of those burning psychos from borderlands. Better bring the fire brigade if you ever face that foe or hope for a rare cloudburst as they ignite the whole table.

Lord Royal wrote:

That's an awesome idea! I will steal that..

Happy to help!


As for the stereotypes, there really is nothing wrong with not having 100% of your game be 100% unique and brand new. It'll be a lot easier for people to relate to it if they can say "oh, like the guys out of fallout?" or "like the guys from mad max?" Your unique selling point is how in-depth you can go with your app-assisted game system, it'll be easier to show it off if there's less thinking needed to get to grips with the general theme and factions.

Going all-out on uniqueness is something which is generally too risky to be worth it. Even Avatar, with it's whole invented world, ecosystem, language etc. follows more or less the same plot as Pocahontas. It's cowboys and Indians, but blue. yet it was still heralded as something unique and amazing.

If you're after another faction, how about an anti-race to the Arkers? So the arkers were the ones which went into hiding to outlast the apocalypse, and locked away a treasure trove of ancient technology, which presumably was only known to them. Meanwhile, another sect of their order either didn't go into hiding or their arks failed, and they instead developed their technology, using the scrap of the ruined world around them, making their tech more powerful but more unpredictable than their time-capsuled counterparts. It's also 4G ready.

I went through my production plan and moved the sub factions into next year anyways. I wanted the setting to be very generic for the exact reason you mention.

Even the alien beings should be generic af. There's a faction generator planned for the future. A tool that will allow everyone to make their own units and factions updated irregularly with new mechanics, they will even come with precalculated guideline pointcosts for test games. The custom factions could be oploaded to a cloud and can be used by the community. It'll be some kind of modding tool. Made by the community tested through the community for the community. But that is something for the further future. Maybe not so far, as I could need that right now or even sooner XD

About the anti-arkers: You kinda described the Collectionists. At least they use the same equipment just not that common and somewhat dated in comparison to the Arkers version that were further updated in their long abscence. Or do you mean "Arker-Orks"?
Some kind of robot race could be nice, too... a sub faction of the arkers that cannot ally with them, cause they are basically Wall-Es on rampage.

Lord Royal wrote:
I went through my production plan and moved the sub factions into next year anyways. I wanted the setting to be very generic for the exact reason you mention.

Even the alien beings should be generic af. There's a faction generator planned for the future. A tool that will allow everyone to make their own units and factions updated irregularly with new mechanics, they will even come with precalculated guideline pointcosts for test games. The custom factions could be oploaded to a cloud and can be used by the community. It'll be some kind of modding tool. Made by the community tested through the community for the community. But that is something for the further future. Maybe not so far, as I could need that right now or even sooner XD

About the anti-arkers: You kinda described the Collectionists. At least they use the same equipment just not that common and somewhat dated in comparison to the Arkers version that were further updated in their long abscence. Or do you mean "Arker-Orks"?
Some kind of robot race could be nice, too... a sub faction of the arkers that cannot ally with them, cause they are basically Wall-Es on rampage.

I thought that the collectionists were a religious sect, and that the arkers were basically locked in a time-capsule for >insert however long since the apocalypse here< years. It would be odd that the collectionists would have older technology than the arkers, to my mind.
I wasn't thinking arker-orks, but more the contrast between scientists (arkers) and mad scientists (anti-arkers (new name needed)). essentially; if the arkers were sat waiting for X hundred years, but what would have happened to their "forgotten" technology if they had instead been developing it in the war-torn aftermath of the apocalypse? Presumably the arkers will emerge with clean, efficient and ruthless tech which has been preserved and is exactly the same as before the apocalypse. Technology presumably will have taken a step back (gunpowder and axes more than cruise missiles and drones) which is why you are suggesting the collectionists seem old-fashioned compared with the arkers. But what if an arker group had emerged a lot earlier, and started to improve their weapons? the new arkers would be faced by their own technology, plus a hundred years of development for use at war.

Perhaps have this as a background thing? one ark which went horribly wrong, and now there's a rogue scientist selling dangerous and often experimental weapons to any faction brave or stupid enough to try and use them? Perhaps a universal special character to buy for any army? or perhaps it's people who've raided arks and butchered the tech?


All just ideas, feel free to use or discard them at will!

Ah, ok. Now I get it. The Arkers are "awaken" for quite some time now. So some Arker weapons found their way into the collectionists arsenal as some kind of holy relics. From time to time a sleeper (their vanguard troops) was sent out to check the situation, but not all returned to report. That's why there's already Arker tech scattered over the wasteland. So there are plenty of possibilities to implement some kind of heretic arkers sub faction. For example a sleeper that became the leader of a Raider gang.
But if you're looking for mad scientists you could enjoy Frank N. Stein's army.

Created by that guy (Doc Stein):


And his creature The FrankenOgre (working title... since 2015):


It's one of the planned mutant sub factions. And they'll get some kind of Creature Construction Kit... but they have a relatively low priority recently.

I think those anti-arkers could be a sub faction aswell.

Okay, I thought a little bit about other factions that can't be created out off the other ones:

As Aegurio once was a member of a galactic federation (one could say imperium), but noone really knows if its reign came to an end or if Aegurio just got abandoned for other reasons. So there's plenty of space for human aliens. Those could technologically be beyond Arkers or even far below... or superhuman space soldiers if you want to find out, what happens if a 40k space marine would ever get lost in a mad max movie... *cough*
In the first place I though about some kind of rogue traders.
What do you think about space pirates?

Lord Royal wrote:
Okay, I thought a little bit about other factions that can't be created out off the other ones:

As Aegurio once was a member of a galactic federation (one could say imperium), but noone really knows if its reign came to an end or if Aegurio just got abandoned for other reasons. So there's plenty of space for human aliens. Those could technologically be beyond Arkers or even far below... or superhuman space soldiers if you want to find out, what happens if a 40k space marine would ever get lost in a mad max movie... *cough*
In the first place I though about some kind of rogue traders.
What do you think about space pirates?

I think that, fluffwise, space pirates are less likely to get involved in a post-apocalyptic world. The materials involved is making spaceships are probably worth a lot more than those they might scavenge on a dead/dying planet, and with lower(ish) risks. I don't think that landing on a planet made entirely of dirt, rust and war would be high on a space-pirates priority list.

What about regular pirates? sort of a sub-faction of the raiders, with a penchant for boarding actions, cannons and sea-shanties?

If there is a galactic federation who might claim ownership of the planet, any actual force they would send would almost certainly overwhelm the occupiers of the planet (imagine tyranids, but if they all landed at once). Perhaps a scouting / probing force, which could even be automated? coming to see if the planet is inhabitable again (which is why everyone wants to destroy them!)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
New thought - stranded space pirates!

Either marooned on a "dead" planet after a mutiny or crash landed after a battle, a band of renegades and aliens who are carving out a territory whilst trying to fix their spaceship.

It would give you the fluff needed to explain why space pirates would care about this dead world.

Or, put a "vault" legend in and have treasure hunters seeking it.

Also Or, have the pirates trying to find somewhere to bury their treasure, and then have another race (like a private company with its own army and its own standpoint on the laws of war) chasing the pirates. Pirates have already buried the treasure (if they had it at all) and the private company is trying to find it, and killing anyone who stands in their way. They could be the "East Federation Trading Company", if you like to include references!

Yea, I meant stranded...
It's the only reasonable way to get to Aegurio.

And yapp, I already thought about a "vault" and a team of highly specialized experts... maybe 4... one of them should have some kind of psychic power and they should have a crappy robot as a side-kick... jokes aside. Borderlands became some kind of freakish pillar of the wasteland subgenre in the last years. One could say: The trope is strong with this one. So it HAS to be there in any way. I just don't know how (and if) it works out in a skirmisher game with free model choice. And if it's wise to have a similar faction type twice (Arkers & Vaulthunters)... but on the other hand... VAULT HUNTERS!!!