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Post by Dave King on Jun 16, 2011 15:57:28 GMT 10
Hey Dredlings, Posted up some suggestion changes to the rules you may like to comment on below. Things like a streamlined magic system and movement rues and new abilities- plus I threw in a ranked base suggestion that, though not in the first edition, may find itself in a scenario expansion bookie. www.daveking.com.au/articles/skirmish/Skulldred_suggestions.pdf |
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Post by Stavros Banjo on Jun 16, 2011 18:56:59 GMT 10
Ooooh nice ;D Liking the knock back & thrown back combat ideas. Will definitely be giving those a try in my next game. The revised rules for magic are also looking good. The use of chain cards & mystic sacrifice are great additions. I can see the rank bases working & will certainly speed things up if you want to play bigger battles. I doubt I'd ever use it myself as my games seem to be getting smaller these days. Good idea though. Really like the creepy models nudging forward at the end of the player's round. I've now got the urge to create a new warband full of evil, insidious little buggers creeping around the table - great addition! My only niggle with the rules, and it's so petty I'm almost embarrassed to mention it, is with the term "pivot". I much preferred "swing around". Pivot suggests rotating on the spot rather than moving around your opponent. Other than my tiny "pivot" gripe, I'm still struggling to find anything I don't like about the rules. Keep up the good work. Much appreciated, as always  |
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Post by Dave King on Jun 17, 2011 12:54:46 GMT 10
Love to hear how the tests go with those changes.
Re: Swing around- in my book, there is no such thing as a tiny comment- its little niggles like that that can add up to an annoying game.
When you draw, its called 'upper hand'. The attacker always gains upper hand- which you can either use to step away or swing around. Yeah, that sounds better- your right.
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Post by Stavros Banjo on Jun 17, 2011 21:00:00 GMT 10
When you draw, its called 'upper hand'. The attacker always gains upper hand- which you can either use to step away or swing around. Yeah, that sounds better- your right. Don't you just hate those annoying people that are impossible to please  Nope, 'swing around' isn't working for me either now. It suggests that you quickly turn around as though you're checking what's behind you. The only other descriptive term I could come up with is 'circle around' but that doesn't sound as dramatic or swashbuckley enough. I know, I should get a life & stop worrying about such trivial things. Hell, they're your rules, you call it whatever you want ;D Had a quick, small game last night just to try out some of the new suggested rules. The chain of command works well & led to some very tactical positioning to take advantage of it. Unfortunately my musician suffered a well placed arrow between the eyes, breaking the chain, and things went horribly wrong from there on. A valuable lesson learned about relying on the command chain a little too much, methinks. The 'thrown back' rule came into play a few times too but the distance didn't seem to be enough to really differentiate it from a 'knock back'. The difference in base size between my normal & larger models isn't enough to make a noticeable difference when it comes to how far the loser is thrown back, kind of losing the dramatic effect the rule is aimed at creating. I tried allowing the winner, if larger in size, to throw the loser back two base widths instead, which seemed to work better, for me anyway. I should imagine that a hulking great Norse barbarian would send a lowly goblin rolling back quite some distance when he twats it around the head with a war-hammer. I didn't try out the new magic rules but like the idea behind them, sort of. The use of portals is a brilliant & something I've not seen before in any other game. My only reservation is that by introducing cards you are adding to the paraphernalia you need to bring to the table. Too much of this & you could be in danger of losing the 'pick up & play' aspect that first attracted me to the rules in the first place. I've given up playing several rule sets over the years as it becomes a real chore sorting out all the cards, tokens, markers, templates, roster sheets etc. before a game. Also it ruins the look of the game when there's stuff like that littering the table. I'm not suggesting Skulldred suffers from the same problem, far from it. I love the character cards, skull tokens & the few other tokens used, but I wouldn't want to see any more cards or tokens appear that weren't absolutely necessary. Currently the rules state that purchased spells (cards) are placed next to the character card so the opponent can clearly see what they're up against. Why not just write the info on the character card itself with the hit dice cost to cast in brackets? When casting spells, instead of stacking up spell effect cards, couldn't some form of dice pool be used instead? I'm not totally against the use of cards, and it's just my own personal opinion, but it's more stuff to have to print out & carry around & more table clutter to deal with. Sorry if any of the above sounds negative. It isn't meant to be. |
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Post by Dave King on Jun 19, 2011 19:36:38 GMT 10
I totally agree- the more I play the more abstracted the magic feels, too pure game tactics- not reallly story focused. Its not a card game.
I teleported a wizard into the heart of battle and rather than feeling the folk around cower, its was really a case of... oh, okay, what cards has he got left? Hmm, nope thats okay, I can ignore him.
I like the idea of non wizards being able to have a spell or two in their pocket too.
The portals really work, and add lots of tactical play enough. The idea of buying different powers of spells, and being limited to your magic dice is one that's attractive. Each wizard has different abilities then, some damagers, some healers, etc. Adds richness.
One system I like is a wizard places his magic dice in actual dice on his card or keeps track of them with a pencil. Each spell cast has a difficulty rating. You toss dice to cast a spell, picking how many you want to gamble. Dice are discarded after casting. They act like magic points. The hits can be used to rate how powerful the spell is.
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Post by Stavros Banjo on Jun 19, 2011 20:45:33 GMT 10
Each wizard having different abilities would be a good way to go. Not only adds flavour but would seem a more logical approach as not all magic users would study the same arcane arts.
A wizard placing his magic dice in actual dice on his unit card certainly appeals to me more than having to mess about with a handful of magic cards. Also love the idea of picking how many you want to gamble when casting a spell to determine how powerful it is. If dice are discarded after casting could they then be regained, maybe with some form of the 'mystic sacrifice' rule?
The idea of non-wizards having a spell or two sounds good but are you looking at them having actual spells or rather spell casting magic items/artifacts? If you used magic items rather than actual spells then you've got the options of them being dropped, found & passed around, which could be fun.
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Nope, 'swing around' isn't working for me either now. It suggests that you quickly turn around as though you're checking what's behind you. The only other descriptive term I could come up with is 'circle around' but that doesn't sound as dramatic or swashbuckley enough.