Thursday, July 5, 2012

Idle Thoughts 3


Movement
Use sticks or some other measuring device like a ruler or tape measure, with short, medium and long moves. Lengths are 3, 5 and 8 inches. Movement is in a straight line. The one exception is movement on roads follows the road. Facing can be changed before and after each move segment. Firing can be done before or after any move segment.

Movement rates clear terrain                        rough terrain
Line infantry      1 medium (5 inches)           1 short (3 inches)
Light infantry     2 short (3 and 3 inches)      2 short (3 and 3 inches)
Regular cavalry 1 long (8 inches)                 1 short (3 inches)
Light cavalry     2 medium (5 and 5 inches)  2 short (3 and 3 inches)
Foot artillery     1 medium (5 inches)            Only on roads

Terrain
Units must stop when they reach a terrain feature. That ends that move segment even if the unit didn’t move the full segment. If the unit has another move segment it can then move through the terrain feature. All movement that starts in terrain features uses short segments, even if part of the move ends up being outside the feature. Foot artillery can only move through terrain features on roads.


There could be variations due to terrain type, unit type, presence of some sort of guide with a unit, etc..

Some of my thinking behind this: It's fairly simple, but still flexible. I think it simplifies terrain effects and avoids requiring calculating remaining movement rates or fractional moves as you move through different terrain, allows light troops to be more flexible and quick in rough terrain or getting around obstacles. Units like regular cavalry can be fast at the expense of maneuverability.

5 comments:

tradgardmastare said...

Interesting idle thoughts of late from you sir. Keep up the musing...

tradgardmastare said...

Interesting idle thoughts of late from you sir. Keep up the musing...

Jim Wright said...

How about movement of 3", 6", and 9" being even multiples of 3. I think this would make life easier in the long run.

Jim

Fitz-Badger said...

Thanks for the comments, guys.
Jim, maybe I'm just too enamored of Fibonacci numbers? ha ha
(it so happened I had a stick lying around that was just a fraction over 13 inches. I could then add the next Fibonacci number, 13, for extra long distances, for fast steampunk vehicles, for example...)

Fitz-Badger said...

Also, the actual numbers and units are not important. This method (which I stole from the "Song of ..." family of rules) means you don't have to bother with units or numbers, no fiddling with fractions or measurement. If I wrote this up as a set of rules for actual people I would not include the numbers and units beyond suggestions for them when making up your short, medium and long sticks. Once you have your sticks all the rest is in terms of those sticks. :)