MacNam's Maulers

[macnam]

After some rooting through the old minis collection, I think I'll try this crew of grizzled mercs for my first game, using Cyclo Convict figs from the Scotia-Grendel Kryomek range:

MacNam's Maulers
Mercenary Veteran Crew

2 Veteran slots, 2 Regular slots - trade one Regular slot to upgrade the other to Veteran

Slot 1: Old Guard (2 man squad) - Johan & Titus MacNam
Quality: Veteran
Race: Human (w/Hunter X)
Adrenal Boosters, LRF Slugthrower (range 18, strength 3+1d6, RoF 3:1)
M 3 RC 3+ CC 3 A 3 S 3 DR 4 W 2
Berserk, Hunter X

Slot 2: Old Guard (2 man squad) - Cleopatra & Josephine MacNam
Quality: Veteran
Race: Human (w/Hunter X)
Adrenal Boosters, LRF Slugthrower (range 18, strength 3+1d6, RoF 3:1)
M 3 RC 3+ CC 3 A 3 S 3 DR 4 W 2
Berserk, Hunter X

Slot 3: Sniper (Assassin Hero individual) - Belladonna MacNam
Quality: Veteran (upgraded)
Race: Human (w/Apathetic)
Cybernetic Eyes, Hotshot Electrolaser Rifle (range 30, strength 6+1d6, RoF 1:1, Accurate, Non-lethal)
M 3 RC 2+ CC 4 A 3 S 2 DR 3 W 2
Aim, Crack Shot, Lethal (factored in above), Night Vision

Dirty Trick to be decided yet - Coordinated Attack and Keep Moving are very appealing in general, but others might be more situationally useful.

Five models, three units, total of 10 wounds and 15 actions per turn on the table to start. Probably not enough warm bodies to win some primary objectives and a bit vulnerable to mental attacks with no leader type. Also weak against very heavy armor, where the sniper is about all I've got. Should be interesting to see how badly Berserk backfires on me.

Tempting to do it as a "Two Man" crew with elite Old Guard instead, but I think the Sniper Hero brings enough to the table to make up for missing out on two more Dirty Tricks and having utterly (rather than mostly) obscene squad units.

[dijit80]

I've thought of building a very similar crew, which I'm painting up at the moment. Instead though I took a sergeant instead of one old guard squard and didn't up grade the sniper to vet (though with exactly the same kit). The sergeant has either the assassin, blooded warrior or brute trait (not decided yet), with a pike and mono wire weapon (plus something else, again not decided yet, maybe a grav belt). The idea that the sniper takes down any nasties as the sergeant moves in covered by the old guard, though as you say maybe not enough warm bodies. I'll post them when I've got them all painted and worked out ready to hunt Mr Itisky.
Duncan

[verminousfang]

That looks fun, but are you worried about suppression fire? Without a sergeant, you don't have the "get up and shoot" order, and also no command to boost drive.

[macnam]

Aug 7, 2010 23:44:03 GMT -5 verminousfang said:

That looks fun, but are you worried about suppression fire? Without a sergeant, you don't have the "get up and shoot" order, and also no command to boost drive.

Might be an issue, haven't had a chance to play them yet and see. I'm not convinced you need a "leader" fig in every force, but I may be wrong. Of course, suppression tactics are where numerical advantage and LRF/HRF/area weapons really shine, and as I said the lack of warm bodies in this force compared to some builds may be fatal. OTOH, I'm not exactly bad at inflicting suppression myself once I'm in range - one activation of an Old Guard unit can apply up to six doses of 3-point suppression bursts, which is quite a bit of pinning.

Worse comes to worse, there's always the Stand and Take It Dirty Trick. Suddenly freeing an Old Guard unit that you thought was suppressed could be game over for the bad guys. I could also shift the Sniper's Hero type to Natural Leader - she'd be slightly less of a murder machine but with a higher drive she could take Hunter/X instead of Apathetic, and careful positioning would let her keep everyone in LoS and range for the leader tricks.

[verminousfang]

Thanks, you will let us know how it performs, right?

Also, Hunter seems a little limited, unless you know your opponent's make up before the fight (which just seems dirty to me, but I won't begrudge anyone else that idea, as long as the gaming group is OK with it), or if you have so any opponents with different make ups that it's bound to pay off. Such as a large tournament or a campain. Have you considered Inspiring instead? With such a small crew, even a little boost to drive might be critical.

[macnam]

Aug 8, 2010 21:04:28 GMT -5 verminousfang said:

Thanks, you will let us know how it performs, right?

Performs horribly, will probably never field this force again. The damage from LRF slugthrowers is so low that even armor 3 targets in the open laugh at them. Only real use is suppression, which seems a bit weak for what's essentially a submachine gun. Small arms fire in general seems too low, or average armor too high, resulting in too low a casualty rate and too dominant a role for heavy weapons and high-damage melee types. The range on the sniper is also pretty pointless, since too many scenarios make it impossible to exploit.

Not really enjoying the game mechanics in general now that I'm getting some play time. Kind of slow for a skirmish game, and way too many "can't succeed" or "can't fail" situations coming up. The lack of any kind of overwatch mechanic also looks really worrisome to me - I can't believe AE WW2 doesn't have a rule for covering an area to interdict movement, and if so, why isn't it in Bounty, which has a whole section on close-quarters starship boarding actions where covering a corridor or hatch is standard tactics?

Also, Hunter seems a little limited, unless you know your opponent's make up before the fight (which just seems dirty to me, but I won't begrudge anyone else that idea, as long as the gaming group is OK with it), or if you have so any opponents with different make ups that it's bound to pay off.

Reread how Humans work. They specifically select the victim for Hunter/X in the Deployment phase, whether your opponent "begrudges" it or not. You'll always get some benefit out of it, although a very heterogenous group will limit it some. It's more useful than you think.

Have you considered Inspiring instead? With such a small crew, even a little boost to drive might be critical.

Why? It might help resist suppression or mental attacks a little, but I'm getting killed by heavy weapons and melee more than anything. Routing's not a major issue - my maximum permanent Drive loss is a whopping 3, which drops the Old Guards to DR 1 - and to get to that point, there's only one man left standing anyway. The Sniper is Apathetic and doesn't even care that much. You might force me to zero with temporary penalties or Inspire Terror, but by the time that happens, I'm probably cose enough that all you'll get out of it is a Berserk Old Guard in the face.

The crew doesn't work, but it's weapons, not morale that are the issue.

[verminousfang]

Reread how Humans work. They specifically select the victim for Hunter/X in the Deployment phase, whether your opponent "begrudges" it or not. You'll always get some benefit out of it, although a very heterogenous group will limit it some. It's more useful than you think.

Fair enough, it seems like I've missed a lot of text in my first few readings.

Sorry to hear that you're not enjoying the mechanics. I haven't had a game yet, so that's why I was wondering how your crew performed. Although, my thoughts on LRFs was that they'd be only really useful in suppression. Have you considered swapping out the LRF with either a slugthrower rifle or a particle beam rifle (or one on each squad)? The particle beam is as strong as any of the HRF choices, at any rate.

[macnam]

Sorry to hear that you're not enjoying the mechanics. I haven't had a game yet, so that's why I was wondering how your crew performed. Although, my thoughts on LRFs was that they'd be only really useful in suppression. Have you considered swapping out the LRF with either a slugthrower rifle or a particle beam rifle (or one on each squad)? The particle beam is as strong as any of the HRF choices, at any rate.

That would be the way to go, but I'm playing with the models I've got, who are obviously armed with SMGs. I'm going to try one more game in the current configuration and see if I can apply enough suppression with the slugthrowers to let the sniper score kills safely, followed by a push to close range and either a massed melee assault or a hail of LRF fire. It might work, since the problematic parts of the opposition have been rotten at suppression themselves. Of course I'll have to snipe the opposing leader to death ASAP to eliminate Get Up & Shoot, but that's generally a pretty good idea anyway.

Hopefully I can get a scenario that encourages a little more movement too. The heavies that were slaughtering me should be less effective with fewer chances to stand and shoot.

First

[abbysdad]

Movement is key in Bounty. Heavies tend to be very limited when it comes to that. Also, you're crew looks like it could do a fair job on the non killing scenario objectives in the cases of salvage mission or take the bridge.

I've never seen a game of Bounty take longer than 45 minutes. And that's when I'm teaching the people the rules the first time through. What is the slow step in your games that is bogging down?

AE-WW2 does not have an over-watch mechanic. The integrated turn (I-go-You-go) activation tends to negate that, if some one pops their head out and charges into the open, you activate a guy with line of sight to the model and take him out. The key is to watch your order of activation. If you wait to activate models in a key position, it will keep your opponent pinned down.

Some sneaky players base their minis so that they are in partial cover to help facilitate this tactic (I'm looking at your tollbooth sniper Neolis! ;D) so that opponents forget about them and move into line of sight by accident. Very handy to do that with snipers.

Thanks for the comments and the posts. Looking forward to hearing more about your crew.

Cheers,

Chris

[macnam]

Aug 11, 2010 20:47:37 GMT -5 abbysdad said:

Movement is key in Bounty. Heavies tend to be very limited when it comes to that. Also, you're crew looks like it could do a fair job on the non killing scenario objectives in the cases of salvage mission or take the bridge.

That's exactly the idea I was building toward - my "heavy" is a sniper with a potential 3 shots per turn, hitting on 2+, 1d6+6 minimum damage, and ignoring 2-4 points of cover. Theoretically I should be able to "play it safe" by ducking in and out of line of sight and shooting once, or drop two-three targets in a single volley of shots. In practice, it hasn't worked for me yet, and I don't really expect it to. It seems to be a "looks good on paper" thing.

I've never seen a game of Bounty take longer than 45 minutes. And that's when I'm teaching the people the rules the first time through. What is the slow step in your games that is bogging down?

Movement and activation sequencing decisions, mostly, although calculating armor saves also seems to slow people down more than I'd have expected.

AE-WW2 does not have an over-watch mechanic. The integrated turn (I-go-You-go) activation tends to negate that, if some one pops their head out and charges into the open, you activate a guy with line of sight to the model and take him out. The key is to watch your order of activation. If you wait to activate models in a key position, it will keep your opponent pinned down.

I've gamed alternating activation systems before, thanks. That's why I know you cannot get away without an overwatch mechanic in a game like this. No matter how your activations fall, you're going to get situations where a model should be able to "cover" an area to prevent movement shenanigans. Whether it's something relatively minor (eg a model running across an alley in front of enemies who are "frozen" by the turn sequence) or obviously absurd (eg high-speed elite melee specialist trotting 18" down a corridor with no cover and clubbing the enemy at the far end before they can blink), there ought to be an option for covering an area. Suppression doesn't cut it because it can't be applied to a model outside of LoS.

Now, it's easy to go overboard with overwatch and make it so strong as to paralyze movement, as 2nd edition 40K players will attest. It's not especially difficult to write a mild but useful version for AE Bounty, though. For ex:

Overwatch: As its activation, a model may turn to face any direction and then expend all its actions to go on overwatch. A model on overwatch may interrupt the activation of a model that is in its line of sight by making a ranged attack against that model. This interruption can occur at any point in the triggering model's activation, and can take place part way through a given action. For example, if an enemy spends an action to run past a 1" wide open doorway that is in line of sight of a model on Overwatch, it can be fired at in the middle of its movement action, depriving it of cover. Similarly, a model that starts in line of sight and spends an action to move around a corner can be fired at before it leaves view.

This ranged attack consists of either a single shot from its weapon (for weapons with a RoF of 1:1 or lower) or shots equal to their weapon's RoF (for weapons with RoF of 2:1 or more). Phact (or other models with similar multi-weapon use rules, such as duelist heroes) can fire with multiple weapons as normal. All normal rules apply to this attack, and in addition the RC score of the firing model is penalized by +1. Weapons with Reload may fire during Overwatch but the APs required by the Reload trait must be spent in a later activation before the weapon can be fired again. Grenades cannot be used for Overwatch. A model remains on Overwatch until it makes a ranged attack, or until it is engaged in melee combat, or until the beginning of its next activation, whichever comes first.

Two paragraphs, no more shenanigans, and a lot more tactical depth to the game since you now have more constructive options.

[abbysdad]

Thanks for the reply.

There's some very helpful information in there for us game designers.

If you get a chance, please let us know what is it about calculating the armor saves that is slowing down play. Our goal for Bounty is keep this fast paced and simple but still provide a lot of tactical options. If you observe something that is not working that way, post it on the forum. Maybe there's a simplifying statement or a clarification we can make in an OTW to help.

Try out the Overwatch feature as you described it and let us know how it works in your games.

I'm interested to see the result.

All the best,

Chris

[macnam]

Aug 14, 2010 21:13:35 GMT -5 abbysdad said:

If you get a chance, please let us know what is it about calculating the armor saves that is slowing down play.

Lengthy response:

I may be misreading the effect, but it seems to me that the combination of addition and subtraction is the sticking point. One person is rolling a die (or dice) and adding a fixed number for damage, after which the other player is subtracting armor (and maybe cover as well), calculating the result, and rolling a save. There's a definite moment of delay as people do the math in their heads and verbally confirm the required saving throw number, and often a doublecheck as people remember things like Crack Shot or aiming bonuses. It's not much of a slowdown in any given attack, but over the course of the game it adds up, and it sure feels slower than (say) 40K despite involving far fewer overall dice rolls.

If I could suggest a possible (albeit large psychological) change - unless I'm mistaken, the statistical results of the process wouldn't change if you made this an opposed die roll. That is, for each hit scored, the attacker rolls his damage die/dice and generates a total, while the defender simultaneously rolls one die and adds his armor and applicable cover. If the attacker gets the higher total, wounds are scored according to the attacker's total. With a 2d6 heavy weapon the attacker will roll multiple dice as usual, but the defender never gets more than 1d6 (which would be his "saving throw" die roll in the rulebook mechanics.

There are still two sets of die rolls, but they're happening at the same time without needing any subtraction (which is a slower process, mentally, for most people). There's also more of a sense of being involved in the process for the target, since there's no delay to see how bad each hit is before rolling a save. Games with lots of opposed die rolls (eg StarGrunt) always seem to keep people's attention more focussed than ones with "stage" rolling (eg 40K or Bounty).

Also leaves you some design wiggle room to have defenders with super armor (perhaps vehicles) rolling multiple dice and attackers with really heavy guns rolling 3d6 or more. Haven't looked at the AE WW2 vehicle rules but that seems like a better way to simulate heavier gear than just adding a much larger fixed number to damage or armor. More variable allowing for fluke hits but also getting a better bell curve on results.

Try out the Overwatch feature as you described it and let us know how it works in your games.

I'll try, but to be honest, I think Bounty is crashing & burning at the local store, which is going to make further testing difficult. You're getting bumped out by interest in Malifeaux and a resurgence of interest in Hordes/War Machine. Perhaps I can run some games at the local club's monthly events, but I can't justify spending a lot of my limited time on the rules that my circle of friends have given up on. Rather save my arm-twisting allowance for starship and superhero gaming.

Unless, of course, Darkson would like to pay me for the work. I do rules editing and proof work as well as contract painting and custom terrain building, you know.

[macnam]

Incidentally, the Maulers now have a web page, at least temporarily:

paintedterrain.com/AEBountyCrew.aspx

Minor change to the sniper, who's now running Hunter X instead of Apathetic. I can't survive quality mental attacks anyway and my crew's small enough that losing DR from the Old Guards being wiped out still won't rout her till she's wounded, so I'd rather have better attack power against specific alien types. Belladonna's usually one of the first three models to die anyway, and that makes DR issues meaningless.

[Cilionelle]

Hey macnam, we tend to play Bounty with the way you suggested anyway, with the attacker rolling for damage and adding things together, and the defender adding up armor and cover and their die roll and comparing the totals. It works well. Being an AE-WWII player too has helped the learning curve a bit, so either way for me is now quick. But I see where you're coming from.