Alternate Activation or I Go You Go - Which is Best?
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- Опубліковано 23 лип 2024
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In this first in a series of developer logs, Matthew talks about activation systems, and whether Alternate Activation is really better than I Go You Go systems.
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#devlog #ravagedstar - Ігри
Something I definitely hate from systems like 40k is the alpha strike, we will always lose models that is true but when your opponent just deleted 2+ units from your army before you even have the chance to use them once is really demoralizing and not fun at all
THIS! I would love to see lower damages, lower APs in general for Ravaged Star. Have units hang around long enough to be cool while everything is getting whittled down until it finally crumbles.
Or maybe not universally low damage/AP, but those high numbers should feel really special, really unique, and maybe have USRs that specify how or when they apply. This is why I love the Anti-Armor USR. I like units feeling more paper-rock-scissors-y where they are meant to specifically counter other types of units, but don't have stats that make them ubiquitously powerful.
And it's always the big tanks that you can't hide so they just obliterate you big expensive tanks immediately.
I've not played much IGUG but every argument I hear about it is basically against 40k, and how much damage can be done in that first turn. I'm sure there are ways to plan around it a bit, but I expect the terrain would be a huge part of that?
@@derekgarcia3069 yes but some units are just too big to hide with terrain mostly your very costly tanks and APCs. But with the sheer damage output many armies have it's hard to contend in some cases.
@paulshealy1863 that makes sense. It's also not ideal to have to setup like that just to avoid loosing a notable chunk of your army turn 1.
The way to solve the chaff unit situation us use what Battletech did each players total number of unactivated units is compared, and if one player has more units that player activates two (or three if the difference is quite large)
This leaves the tactic of flooding the board with chaff units still viable without making big elite units useless
That's exactly how I'm doing it in the rules I'm working on.
That makes sense. Warcry was not built on the basis that one side would have a handful of models and the other would have more than a dozen. All the boxsets tailored to it have roughly the same number of models for that reason.
Kill Team solves this pretty well in 2 ways: 1st, chaff units have a 'group activation', where 2 have to be activated one after the other, and that pair will be very roughly equivalent in power to a single elite activation. 2nd, once all your team have activated, you can use overwatches, alternating with your opponents' true activations.
Onepagerules did alternative activation well, as they limit the number of total units you can have depending on how many points you play. It's to stop those spam of cheap activations like you just mentioned. For example in a 2000 point game, you can have a max of 10 individual units, and a max of 4 heroes, and those heroes count towards your max of 10 units. Also to stop spamming the same unit they cap it a max of 3 unit copies.
Does stop Horde armies though.
@@leesweeney8879 3x units of 20x models is still 60, but yeah, it can be limiting for armies like orcs
Kinda, not fully. You won't be able to take 120 models of one unit type, but you can take up to 60 of one unit type, then you could just take 60 more of a different but similar unit type. Which many Horde armies have.@@leesweeney8879
It also means that those playing with 10 activations are inherently at an advantage to those playing with less. Now, the significance of that advantage varies but it is nonetheless present.
I add Bolt Action style random draw to OPR. I also don't worry about group size, though each group wiped out is worth a point at my table.
It all seems to balance out in the end.
IMO, I've seen more games use alternate activation with Malifaux, Legion, Marvel Crisis Protocol, OnePageRules and to the extent such as Battletech. And it seems to be a tried and true method with keeping everyone engaged
I played Warhammer (Fantasy, 40k and AoS) for the last 25 years - I switched to Onepagerules and recently Bolt Action, and I think Warhammer with it's IGOUGO will not ever get me back at this point. Alternate activation is so much more fun for me. I had my first games in Star Wars Shatterpoint and Sharp Practice just the other day, those activation systems were a bit too random for my taste, but the dice bag from Bolt Action really is the most interesting to me.
I've played a lot of Bolt Action and I do like the system but I don't prefer it to be honest. I actually enjoy the CP-system a lot, and I like thesystem of phases of the turns. Still, Bolt Action is fun.
I combine OPR with random draw like Bolt Action.
But your opponent gets an extra point every time they wipe out one of your units.
So you can have lots of little units and dominate initiative, but risk giving your opponent too many points. Or you can have fewer bigger groups, trying to deny your enemy points, and making a few big moves.
Seems to balance out itself.
Also just ignore all the unit limit rules. Whatever group sizes you want are up to you.
I've been a fan of random draw mechanics since learning about the 1843 "black bean incident" as a kid in elementary school, so YMMV.
Look at how Conquest functions they managed to have it be strategic but also has a just enough randomness to make it interesting
I am a Fan of Conquest Games by para bellum and there activation system. It involves having unit cards for each unit and then creating a command deck to order your unit activations. Then each player activates one unit at a time after an initiative role. It really is a great game and teh models are improving a great deal.
Conquest really deserves more popularity.
I love the planning and mindgames of conquest, and would love to see it used more
I like the Pass Token system in Malifaux. Each turn you gain Pass Tokens based on the model differential so you can force your opponent to go as many times in a row as you have pass tokens. Since they're calculated at the start of each turn, if you kill a bunch of their chaff, you don't get as many pass tokens. Also, if they summon a unit, you get a pass token. It's not perfect but it helps balance the elite crews vs the chaff/summoner crews. The problem comes when you can generate pass tokens as abilities, that starts to break things - but as a base rule, they're awesome.
I like how OPR does it, for competitive play you have force organization rules that limit you from taking too many activations or the same unit too many times (normally activations end up being similar amounts), but if you don’t want to play like that you can ignore force organization, but this would be in a more casual setting so it’s less likely your homie would try to power game it.
My favourite activation system is the Frostgrave alternating style: You start with your wizard + 3 nearby models, then apprentice + 3 and then the rest. So both players are alternating, but going down a hirarchy. Also, if you spread to far, you don't get to activate your important models early since your heroes are out of position.
I really like the alternate activation system used in Battletech. It's made me think about how you could create an alternate activation system for Warhammer Fantasy, as I think that could be a really interesting way to play that game too.
Our group started playing ASOIAF 3 years ago and a big reason it has grown and remained the top game in our area is bc of alternating activation system of the game. It’s also a 1-2 hour game which is also a big reason.
I frickin love asoiaf. Plus you dont have to assemble or clean the minis. They are ready for priming right out the box!
I haven't played ASOIAF myself (it does look cool) but I will say that total game time is a HUGE factor imo. One thing that makes IGOUGO worse is how long those games seem to always be.
@@nurglerider781 I highly recommend giving it a shot especially if you have someone willing to try it out with you. The barrier of entry is reasonable as every faction has a good starter box. Our local group started with 2 guys and it just started catching on like wildfire as people saw them playing at the FLG.
Yes! I didn't realize how big of a difference a 1.5 hour game is vs a 2.5-3 hour game until I played OPR grimdark. ASOIAF looks like an awesome game, I don't know anyone who plays, but I ever do I'd love to collect some of those mini's and try it
Something I would suggest looking at is the Middle Earth Strategy battle game. Every round there is an initiative roll and each phase (move, shoot, fight) is I go you go per phase. So your opponent would move then you would then they’d shoot then you would and so on. Additionally heros could use limited resources to break that initiative in a limited area around them.
Seconding this system.
Stargrave has alternating activations of groups of units, which has some of the benefits of both igoyougo and alternating activations. The priority of the groups being determined by which officer is leading them is definitely something that could be applied to an army scale game.
Hounds of War uses a alternate activation system using a deck of cards. At the top of each turn, commanders receive a number of cards equal to the number of units they command. They then assign the cards to their units giving them a small control of when they activate... Activating ace through king, suits of hearts, spades, diamonds then clubs. Any unit not getting a card doesn't get to go
Heavy Gear Blitz also does that!
Kill Team has group activation mechanic so you have to activate 2 of your chaff units one after another so you don't over activate your opponent.
Hey Matt, Fantasy Flight Games brought out a Horus Hersey board game a few years back. The activation system for that was each unit had an initiative value - space Marines =1, Terminators =2, Land Raiders = 3 and Titans = 4. There was an initiative track and each time a player activated a unit they moved their token around track the corresponding amount. Then whoever is behind on the track takes the next turn. Eg, if a player activated a Titan they move along the track 4. Then the next player keeps on taking actions until they are ahead. So they could move a space marine (1), another Space Marine (1) and then a Land Raider (3) for a total of 5. It is then the first players turn to activate a unit. This works very smoothly and allows the player to make tactical decisions - activate a single powerful unit or activate a few small units. (The same unit can activate multiple times in a row)
I used a system for Warcry when I wanted to play solo. I used playing cards, one side red, the other side black. Each figure was assigned a card, the cards were shuffled, and the cards determined which miniature was activated. Dead characters had their cards removed and the next round began after shuffling. This worked nicely for solo since I only had to determine what to do with the activated character. As a narrative, solo game I enjoyed it.
Very Insightful, thanks for the thought process. Yeah Alternatvive Activation works when the units are relatively of the same power level, it works for KillTeam. But for 40k it's not the same to activate a tank or I don't know an infantry unit. What I envision is to use a pool of command point, and you can use them to activate a unit, but everyone has the same number. That way you could even have elite units that cost 2 to activate. You could even activate multiple time the same unit with a penalty.
Following this with GREAT interest. I love you guys and wish you every success.
Great video and really looking forward to the rest of the series!
I think bolt action style random single unit activations would be cool if combined with simultaneous damage. So models are removed by both sides at the end of the turn. That way both players are engaged and get to use their all their toys at least once.
Edit: I’m looking through the rules, they’re looking good. I’m looking forward to the final version.
I think the game is coming along just fine The rules seem easy to understand and I have watched most of all the battle reports that you guys have done for the play testing and honestly can’t wait to get my hands on some of the models to paint and play the game keep up the good work
Lately I am really liking the mesbg activation style. Seems a good middle ground between the two systems with the phase based activations and the heroic shanenigans you can alter the flow of activation with.
I like how mythic battles: pantheon does it. Each player during their turn gets to activate a maximum of two characters and each of those get two actions, then there are restricted reactions during other players turn to keep you engaged outside of your turn. Obviously it would need to be scaled up but I also think it has one of the best combats for a dice rolling game as well
I agree with your main point - so much depends on the type of game, size of game and even genre you are playing.
As a grumpy old man, I must point out that Games Workshop has only been around for about half the history of modern wargaming. ;)
There are any number of different activation systems out there including:
Dice activation - WRG/DBX style Mass Battle Game: Players take alternate turns. Their armies are split into larger commands each controlled by a general or warlord unit. Each General rolls a die for the number of commands they can give to units in their command, with regular generals rolling an average die: 2,3
Dice activation Too Fat Lardies style - Chain of Command, Sharpe Practice: The starting player rolls and number of dice. The results of the dice determine what the player can do: 1 - activate a team of 1 - 4 men, 2 - activate a squad of 8-10, 3 - active a junior leader who can give 2 commands, 4 activate a senior leader who can give 3 commands, 5 - add 1 point to a dice that lets you do special actions, 0 or 1 6 - player turn ends, 2+ 6's player gets another turn.
Straight card draw - this is what Bolt action really is: One card of the appropriate colour for each unit is shuffled into a deck. Draw one card, the player with that colour can activate one unit as they see fit.
Card draw with Special Actions as used in The Sword and the Flame, Gruntz, and Wiley Games rules: One colour for each player, shuffle together and draw as above, but Court cards J,Q,K,A have special effects. E.g. Jack of your suit lets you activate one unit _and_ reload the same or a different unit.
Specific card draw Too Fat Lardies I Ain't Been Shot Mum WWII company rules and Bag the Hun Air combat rules: A specific card is placed into a deck for each unit. When that card is drawn, that specific unit can activate. Other special cards added to the deck may allow special effects like ace pilots to activate twice, or high firepower weapons like gatling guns or MG42s to fire again.
Break Cards: For any of the card draw activation systems, one or more cards can be added to the deck to determine when the turn ends and the cards are reshuffled. Break cards ensure any unit has the same chance of activating in a turn but not all units will activate. Some people like this, some don't. Jokers are common in systems using regular playing cards. Too Fat lardies use "tea break" or similar cards.
Initiative: A die roll or similar determines who moves first each turn. There can be modifiers to this role for a better than average general. Usually the rules allow the reacting player to carry out some sort of offensive action like opportunity fire. Other variations are possible as in the Soldiers Companion Colonial / VSF rules where the natives can seize the initiative by declaring a charge by a unit in cover, and keep the initiative by killing more imperialists in hand to hand combat than they lose warriors.
Chained activations: Determine who goes first. That player then activates one unit then rolls to activate another usually with modifiers to the roll. They keep going until they fail an activation roll and the other player takes over, the acting player moving back and forth several times.
Bidding: A weird one I encountered recently. Each player starts the turn with a number of activations, say 5. The player then bids using these activations to go first, but can only spend their remaining activations to do anything. E.g. bid 4 of your 5 activations and you will almost certainly go first but you will only activate one unit. Bid 0, you will move second but you will have all 5 to use.
There are many more but let me close with the granddaddy of all activation systems: Written Orders. These come in many different flavours but I'll give a simple and a more complex version. In the simple version, each turn the players decide what their orders are going to be for the _next_ turn. The current turns movement and fire are carried out, results determined and orders written for turn 3 and so on. Very popular for Age Of Sail Naval and Air Combat Board games where orders might look like 2LC3 - meaning move two hexes, turn to the left one hex side, climb one level and move three more hexes.
In the complex version, we're looking at the stereotypical, men in smoking jackets sipping fine brandy, Napoleonics Wargaming (Known to the snobs as "Proper Wargaming") Orders are written out in long hand describing the objectives for each command. The Battle then unfurls majestically as if on autopilot, the Grand Plan affected only by the vagaries of the movement and combat dice rolls. Should a supreme commander decide to redirect his troops, then an appropriately painted messenger figure must be sent across the board carrying those orders, and if he should make it through enemy fire, a roll is typically made to see if the new orders are understood and carried out.
Anyway - there was a lot of life before 40k and a lot of innovation since. Dig through history and check out other rules writers, the activation mechanisms are endless.
I think it’s sort of more important what twists you put on top of the core skeleton of the game rather than which skeleton you choose. That said, there’s a few concepts I think could be really good here depending on what direction you go.
Clan wars had a pretty cool one where you rolled a d10 for initiative of each unit but could adjust that using certain factors such as the command rating of the leader of that unit.
The lotr minis game always felt like an improvement on the full army activation of 40k where one army moves, the other moves, then one army shoots, then the other and with various ways of interrupting that order.
I also think there’s potential for activation based on what class of unit it is - for example “fast attack” type units would have the most flexibility able to act whenever was most advantageous, while heavy support would be lumbering and predictable (weather or not that means being activated first or last would depend on the rest of the game rules, or maybe its like x wing where agile units move last and shoot first).
In any case, one design space that I think could be explored more is the concept of having a relatively straightforward turn system, but each player brings a deck of cards and those cards have your special or reactive abilities that would let your units do extra stuff when played.
Regarding the chess like activation, I think there’s a lot of potential there even for unit based games. I would look at working with the idea by having many of the better actions available to units put a “fatigue token” (or two) on the unit that prevents them from using those actions again until the token is removed. So it’s not that you *can’t* activate the same unit back to back, its just that spamming that will usually not be the most effective use of your turn. Removing the tokens could come from activating a different unit offensively to cover them, using the original unit defensively instead of offensively, character abilities, terrain, etc.
Or alternatively you could have almost an inverse of the previous idea. Perhaps each unit starts the game with one “blitz” token they can spend once to break the normal activation sequence but once it is spent it is gone forever. There’s lots of design space for defining how many and when you can use the tokens, if certain units get two or none etc.
So cool very appreciate this video it will direct shutdown discussions in the gaming scene between AA and IGYG. So well done in the context of game design. Thanks
I really appreciate this conversation on rules, as a budding game designer myself, I often ponder this dilemma as well. I also like your descriptions of other games that I'm not too familiar with. Thanks.
I was thinking about this, particularly from the idea of chaotic fog of war game design. Even with the bag approach, if someone builds a horde army, they are still at an advantage for alternate activations. So I was thinking that certain unit types such as "fast" units or "heavy" units could have additional tokens thrown in but for specific actions. If they've already been activated, a fast unit could only do a second move action or possibly a move and limited shooting. Versus the heavy being activated again would allow them to just shoot again. It gives elite armies more "control" than their horde counterparts without taking the chaos out of it. It wouldn't even require that much additional text for instructions. Example for a possible heavy rule: Heavy units provide two tokens into the initiative pool. When a heavy unit is activated beyond the first time, it cannot make a move action other than taking cover.
Tabletop CP tried it in Bolt Action for heavy tanks, second die with limited use
Seemed like a good idea imo
For algorithm reasons, you might want to tag in "devlog"
It's all about the feeling you're trying to put across to the player! But in general it's pretty clear that the industry as a whole is moving very heavily to AA, so unless you have a really good reason to not be AA, just go with the flow.
The Old world rules revealed yesterday confirmed igougo, and yeah, rank and flank makes total sense for that. Anything else? Probably not tbh.
But 40k not being AA has to be legacy issues.
devlog tag added. Why is that significant? I'm curious. :)
@@miniwargaming Devlog is what people developing a game tend to tag their videos with, that's all. This is more common to find video game devlogs, but there are also boardgame devlog channels.
So, if you were doing a devlog series, you MIGHT title is something like "Alternating Activations vs I Go You Go | Ravaged Star Devlog 1"
Thanks for sticking up for I-go-you-go.
When I was testing out my board game (Illeria), tried both. I ended up going with alternate activation (for the reasons most people like it better), but it was close. I found that I-go-you-go actually sped up the game significantly. I think it was a combination of the fact that you could do everything at once, you could plan all of your moves at once (rather than reacting to your opponent all the time), and you didn't need to mess around with counters or things to remember who has activated this turn. The new game I'm working on now will have I-go-you-go.
IgoUgo and Alternate Activation are the "granddaddies of them all" - whether they are useful, however, is debatable.
There are other systems, however, and they work equally well.
Take X-Wing for an example:
Each fighter has a single score determining when the fighter is going to move and when it shoots.
Knowing these values can make you go for pretty tactical decisions.
There are other systems as well .. If I may, I'd like to present two sysems I developed in my skirmishers:
In "Whack & Slaughter" you put each Hero's card into a stack. You place that stack with the cards face up.
The Hero whose card is on top may act - no matter which player's Hero it is.
First thing you do is, you place the Hero's card next to the stack, so you know, which Hero is going to act next.
Initiative in W&S thus becomes slightly chaotic with a little bit of control (after all there are at most 8 Heros on the table ..)
In "Duel" initiative becomes only interesting, when fighters are facing off each other.
Each player places one die hidden, then both players reveal. A lower score means, you may shoot first but are more likely to miss. A higher score means, you have a higher chance of hitting, but if the other player has hit you first, you won't attack at all..
So technically you are bidding for your attack bonus.
Initiative here represents the decision you make while going for your gun.
Another quite interesting approach has been created in 2 hour wargames, which you play with a regular deck of cards and you draw cards for everything.
However, once a joker is drawn, it has to be played as it finishes the turn immediately. No matter what was going on and who was left with soandso many units.
This can (and will) cause highly chaotic games, as you always have to take care in some way for the troops left behind, while you still have to look for those ahead.
In my eyes, an initiative system strongly depends on what you are going to achieve. (You already said so in the video..)
Chess works perfectly with alternate activation, but would be a major mess with IgoUgo allowing each player to move his entire army on his turn.
Most other wargames work quite fine with alternate activation systems.
Thanks for opening the discussion as developer diaries around game design is fascinating. My fav game is Advanced Squad Leader. It uses a hybrid activation approach where its I go you go at the turn level but within each turn there are active player components (prep fire, movement, advancing, advancing fire), passive player components (defensive fire) and mixed (rally, opportunity fire during movement, close combat). In this way, alpha strikes are avoided because the passive defender can fire during the movement phase, and both players are involved in each players' turns. While that rule system is way too complex to incorporate in full for a fun beer and pretzels game, the infantry side and philosophy could be leveraged in ravaged star. And it scales very well for small skirmishes up to battalions of grunts. Great vid, good luck with the launch, you guys are awesome
Great to see you Mat.
This is a discussion that is very close to my heart, and for what it they worth here are my thoughts from an amateur board / war / RPG designer…
For war-games alternative activation is great, however it tends to only really work better in war-games with very small model counts, and where as in your example you cannot ABUSE the system (with either lots of spam models, or a few incredibly powerful models that dominate when activated). It tends to need a lot more work in balancing to make it work.
The opposite end of the scale is the 40k / Warhammer ‘taking turns’ model. The big, BIG advantage of this system is that it is SIMPLE. It walks you through your turn in phases which is very helpful for learning and for structuring your thought process through the turn, and one person does all their stuff then the other person does all their stuff. Rick Priestly himself has said that this structure of the original Warhammer was INCREDIBLY underrated as though it has it’s faults it was easy to learn and easy to play as high model counts, and MADE SENSE to players (My turn, then your turn, then my turn etc etc..).
Next we come to the Warmachine/Hordes model, which is taking turns, but each unit can activate in any order. This is an excellent system for tactics and strategy, BUT it is much more complex for casual players, as it is HARDER to visulise your turn and EASIER to make mistakes (Oh i’ve already activated the Iron Fangs so I can’t give them Butcher’s aura bonus!).
The big disadvantage of taking turns is that during one guys turn opponent can often feel bored and unengaged with the game, but with alternative activations that never really happens.
Finally we come to what I consider the ‘BEST’ system if you can pull it off which is the MESBG system of 'Intertwined Turns’, which is taking turns but with split phases, so I move then you move, then I shoot, then you shoot, then I fight, then you fight etc etc. This is a kind of best of both worlds system, but can also be a WORST of both worlds system as you don’t get the simplicity of full taking turns, nor the full engagement of alternative activations.
When you are thinking what to do, it can really help to go back to your design aims. If you want players to feel like their commanding big armies and throwing powerful magic, does Alternative activations really make sense? On the other hand if you want a deep tactical experience with some chaos involved then maybe drawing tokens from a bag to determine order could be an answer.
Alternative Activation is superior, though I also prefer it with "simultaneous damage" meaning every unit gets to act and all wounds/casualties are applied at the end of the turn.
The boost token are excellent. The token pulling is great in that you can potentially pull all your forces before your opponent (I know how unlikely that is 😂) but, if you pull a boost, you power up any one unit and then your opponent has to draw. Maybe add one more boost in some upcoming test reports.
Hello, first thing first , Bravo !
You Did a great job with the minis !
For the aspect of the rules, I must say that, on chest, alternate activation works because you MUST do something with the piece you wan't to play, and you can't do the same moove 3 times in a row,
On ravaged star, it could work too if, when you choose a unit, it must do somthing, like, at least, at the choice of the player, go to an objective, fire, go to close combat, or moove in purpose of doing one of thooses things.
By this way, no player could do what you discribed.
I liked the idea of the bag of token, because it brings the pur aspect of a battelfield on the table : no general can really choose what is going on the battelfield, and luck is the only thing that really matter.
But i would do it in a different way, like, activation of the units is alternate, but all "special" effects goes on random in the bag of token, like you can have a boost, but you also can have a nerf, and it goes on the unit you decided to activate, the terrain can have effects, and each turn or phase, you pick an effect in the bag, or whatever is independant of the will of the players.
Also, by doing alternate activation or activation by the bag of tokens, it keep the simplicity for bringing more player at the table witch is always more fun. It give's you also the possibility of making Free for all tornaments wich is incredible.
Excuse my English, I'm a little frenchy who tries to create is own card game, and which can say that seeing you creating your own wargame fill my heart with pur joy.
Wich you the best, keep going like you always did !
i prefer a bag of activation tokens, you fill the bag or bags with tokens equal to number of units and then you pull them one at he time till all are gone rinse and repeat, its super fun it works well (if you remember to put in all the activations)
I agree, with the caveat that the tokens have to be non-descript so someone cannot "feel" who they are pulling.
I don't know what rules you are using but a good tweak is to make each unit lost count as one VP to the opposing army.
Then you have to balance the number of units versus the number of potential points you want to risk.
Seems to work when I tried it with One Page Rules.
Great video, Matt!
I loved watching you guys play the demo game with the tokens in the bag. I feel it added something nice and different to the system.
My intro to Wargaming was AoS so I've always loved that activation system, with the double turn and everything. But my favorite activation system I've played is Frostgrave; were it's alternate activation but the Wizard, his apprentice and the captain can each bring along another 2 guys with them, but they act independently and can separate in a way that they can't activate together in a subsequent round.
Something I noticed GW getting into with the release of the translocation shroud is the idea of enhanced movement. Taking large, line of sight blocking terrain and enabling a model to move directly through it. Adding, removing, or modifying terrain-I think-is really the next 'stage' of miniature war games. You have an army and the board, and while they do interact the board never really changes. GW did dip their toes into this with wreckage, both in older editions of 40k and the current Horus Heresy, but it could be so much more. Think Baldur's Gate 3 or the Divinity series-games where altering the movement characteristics is vital to a strategic fight. Hard vs soft barriers that challenge both the player and AI on if they want to dedicate resources to going around versus directly through. Systems like this, unique to each army but shared in what they achieve, might add an interesting layer of strategy.
To alternate activation versus I go you go, I think that for a large-scale battle, it's better to follow a similar system to what 40K and AoS utilise. A big problem with initiative-based/alternating unit systems is that players can get sucked into the trap of 'reacting rather than responding', i.e., rather than responding to the overall enemy movement, they're reacting to the last action a particular enemy took. For more strategic players this might not be an issue, but for beginners it certainly can be. At the end of a turn in 40K or AoS, the opponent-with exception of course-has large made the majority of impact they'll have on your army. All through their turn you've been thinking about what to do next, how to counter their movements and actions WITH the context of how the entire army is moving-which impacts the actions you'll take on your turn. In my opinion, that enables a far more interesting and strategic game.
My main issue with 40K and AoS is how the most interesting unit in your army can be shot off the board on the first turn, before you've had a chance to use it. This can really kill enjoyment for the rest of the game, and makes those centerpiece models essentially have a target on them from the first round on. Not that they shouldn't, but they should be able to have an impact on the game without having to cower behind a building. Damage gates are an interesting way to solve that issue, but rather unfun and takes you out of the immersive roleplaying elements. Maybe something like armor plating that can be chipped away before the important bits below are exposed to direct damage? Some food for thought.
I play Star Wars Armada
And its a alternate activation game system for spaceships.
In the beginning there was no real issues, but after the introduction of more cheaper units such as flotillas .
Activation spam was a real thing.
So limitations was introduced for no more than two flotillas + they don't count when checking at the end of an round if there is any enemy/friendly ships left on the table.
Still after that, people still tried to out activate their opponent with having more Corvette units or the like in their fleet.
Then they introduced activation pass tokens, where the player with the fewest ships would get a number of pass token that was equal to the difference in number of ships between the two sides.
This meant that in a crucial turn the out activated player, could through carefull management of his/her pass tokens avoid getting out activated.
Once all pass tokens had been spend in one or more rounds, the player with more ships, could then for the rest of the game out activate the other player.
All in all I found this crucial change very good for the game, as two ship lists could be more competitive against Multi ship lists, and therefore it improved the balance of the game.
🤔🤔🤔
I like the random nature of a blind draw system like BoltAction as it provides the best balance between approaches. There can still be an element of spamming units for advantage but the draw reduces the impact on the table. The benefits of IGOUGO allows for army-wide control options like a command phase. Introducing a IGOUGO system for command actions (or even your chess example) on top of a blind draw system might be interesting to manage global effects. So long as the system is fun, I don’t really suppose it matters. Experimentation might lead to new innovations. Enjoy the opportunity!
I have been playing Flames of War using Bolt Action Activation Dice and true Overwatch and Opportunity Fire. By true Overwatch I mean a unit is designated as being in Overwatch at the beginning of the turn and does not move, but can fire at any time during the turn, simulating actual battlefield tactics. This has also been designated "Hold Fire" in other rule sets that use order chits. By Opportunity Fire I mean that units that haven't fired yet can fire at a target that becomes visible when your opponent moves. The unit firing Opportunity Fire either uses the stationary Rate of Fire (from FoW) if it hasn't moved or the moving RoF if it has moved or you plan on moving later when activated. These rules prevent units from moving from cover through open terrain to cover, or to run around the your flank without possible repercussions. I use the dice to show the status of the unit. "I Go You Go" acts like your opponent is asleep during your turn. If you use "I Go You Go" I believe you must have some sort of Reaction or Opportunity Fire.
Also, you may want to consider different Rates of Fire for moving and stationary units and/or different hit rolls.
There is the initiative track system. Whoever has the lower initiative, activates a unit, and increase their initiative by the cost of that unit. If they are still the lowest initiative, then they go again. That way if you choose you activate spam minions, you won't actually force your opponent to move their important units until you cross their initiative value. Chad Jensen did this in Fight Formations and then in Downfall. Mind you these are board games, not miniature games, but you could very easily adapt it. Now, you could have the initiative cost be for example tied to the point cost, but that seems fiddly; rather something like based on unit type, so minion 1 point, regular 2, elite 3, monster 5, and general 7 initiative points.
Inferno (Global Games) did something like this. With a small number of figures per player it worked great. There are many things I didn't like in Inferno but the activation system was really interesting.
The way to fix the alternative activation being spammed with small units is have a pass option so you activate a unit or pass when both players pass the turn ends
In the alternate activation (non-randomized, straight-up 'you go, I go' and so on) what you could do to counter the spam issue is that each player has an equal number of activations per turn irrespective of number of units. For instance, you each have 10 activations base and that never changes (very back-of-the-napkin here). Alternatively, each player could get equal activations, with the number of activations per round being pegged to the number of units in the player army that has the most units (i.e. Army A has 12 units, Army B has 7, each round, each army receives 12 activations).
From there, you could either let people activate units more than once (that could even be a stat, determining how many actiavtions each individual unit is allowed to receive per round). Or, conversely, all units could only be activated once, but you're allowed to use the extra activations to 'pass', so you can't be spammed. Might even make it more strategic of what you move, when to pass, etc. The activation stat allows for interesting rules, in fact, as you could have a mediocre unit that allows for 2 activations per turn, but if you choose to 'super' activate them, they lose the ability to activate again that round but are able to do a special ability or get a stat boost.
As a fan of Gwent, I love bluffing mechanics. Being able to pass or not pass and leaving the opposing player guessing (and vice versa) is such a fun element in that game. Can't think of it just now, but incorporating some sort of bluff mechanic (maybe each side has to preselect activations) could be a lot of fun! In the preselect model, you could even have like a once-per-round swap out, adding another element of anticipation into the game.
Good luck, love the channel. I'm in Toronto and have always wanted to come out. I'm a huge 40k setting fan and have been meaning to get into the hobby (hard to find the time). Genuinely inspired by you all out there living your dream and making a living off your passion!
Hope some of this helps!
Gotta give the shoutout to Saga and Chain of Command, both games where players take turns rolling a handful of dice to determine their order pool that they then use to activate various units, with some form of performance penalty to activating the same unit repeatedly on the same turn. In Chain of Commands case the order dice roll even goes so far as to determine when the round will end (which effects things like artillery bombardments and smoke to clear) and can also trigger random events such as shifts in the weather. Very engaging systems that keep you thinking on your toes and can allow for some cool emerging narrative!
I like what I see so far. The only other game I can recommend with alternate activation that seems interesting is "This is not a Test". Where your 2 actions can be one if you fail your mettle/morale test.
Firefight?
I played Reality's Edge and found the randomness of that system so annoying that I didn t want to play anymore.
Check the old Rackham's Confrontatión (3.5). They used alternated activation but with cards and if you had high discipline you could hold more cards than the opponent before having to reveal and activate one. Besides, you could activate 2 at same time for comboes. So that army composition counts but it does not interfere too much with the plan of a good general.
I definitely agree with you about there's no best activation system because it depends on your goal for the game which system is best. I honestly really like the way things work in Age of Sigmar. I like that it's you go, I go, but the priority mechanic allows for skill expression in regards to whether to take the turn or give it away. I also like how the system changes to alternate activation in combat. Seems like the best of both world in my opinion.
AoS is a great system. The only change I’d like to see tested is making shooting alternate unit to unit like melee.
Summoner wars had an interesting way to do it. Players take turns, and a turn has a series of phases: draw, summon, play event cards, movement, attack, build magic.
Draw: draw cards until you have 5 in hand.
Summon: spend magic points to summon creatures. (Magic points are generated by killing enemy units and discarding cards.)
Play event cards: play event cards from your hand. Think of these as stratagems.
Movement: move up to 3 of your units.
Attack: attack with up to 3 of your units, they don't have to be units you moved this turn.
Build magic: discard cards from your hand to generate magic points (these points are used to summon more creatures)
Because you can only move and fight with a limited number of units each turn, elite teams still feel elite, and horde teams still feel horde, but neither player has unfair ways to over-activate the other. Probably not the best system ever, but it was pretty fun and worthy of a mention.
I like killteam, and alternate activations feels good. They used some great mechanics to mitigate over activations via chaff, and turn 1 alpha strikes are much more limited now.
the game i'm working on, players will have to purchase slots for the units they want to include in their force, only requirements being that there must be a leadership slot for the leader, and 2 slots for objective control units. initiative is determined by a roll off to see who controls the 'first action unit', then an initiative to determine which order all the other units on the board do what they're going to do, determined by which action was selected for that unit to complete before after initiative is rolled.
me and my sister tested this, and it alone turned out to be kinda fun in and of its self :)
I love the alternate activation of dropfleet commander. Basically, you build your fleet in battlegroups and you can have a maximum of 6 battlegroups in a standard game. In those groups you can choose a few of different groups of ships which each have a number associated to them refering how cumbersome they are to command. Bigger ships have a higher number.
Before each turn you stack a deck with cards of your battlegroups and both players show their first card. The player with the lowest command value (those cumbersome numbers added and if groups are not in coherency you add one for example) choose which player goes first to activate that group.
It is the best version I've ever tested and if 40k had a similar system I might start playing it more often than once per edition.
Since you are reading every comment just wanna say it has been so amazing to see MWG evolution over the years and just wanna say amazing stuff you guys rock! Rule side wise yes alternative activation just gives so much strategic depth to otherwise straight forward games
Ever thought a system of I GO-You Go like Conquest or Confrontation? In Which you pile up your unit cards, so you know what comes next but you don't know about the opponent sequence. It might still feel a little about Bolt Action with if the opponent has more units it can activate more times, but if the armies have a relatively same size a difference of one detachment, usually regulars, might not affect that much?
The situation you describe as the idealized alternate activation - without rounds or turns - is actually the system used by Star Wars Shatterpoint. Even if you’re not interested in the game you should check out the rules. They are free online.
Its not a full minatures game, but for the game that it is, memoir 44 has an interesting mechanic of having cards which tell you which part of the board you can make moves - with the card itself telling you how many units you can move
The game I'm working on now, Early Imperial Romans on the Frontier. Uses alternate activations, and yes on your turn, you CAN activate the same unit several times, it just costs more and more, and they become more and more tired, and fragile. But if you want that one unit on the other side of the table, it can be done.
I just cam across Ravaged Star thanks to Midwinter Minis. This makes me think all the way back to the GW video you did a long time ago calling GW out for its pricing and supply issues against smaller independent retailers and how MWG would have to go in a new direction. New direction solved! Create own wargame that is in direct competition with GW! I will 100% be a supporter. I wish you guys all the best and I hope this game will help to break up GW's monopoly in the mini wargaming space.
The Issue I've always had with the 40k style I go/you go game is that it ends up too much just waiting for my opponent to tell me how many dice to roll. There's not enough interaction. What I enjoy about Star Wars Legion and Star Wars Armada is that I never have more than a minute or two where I'm not interacting with the game.
The problem that would inevitably occur if we switched to I go you go is that game times would at least double. This would make competitive games pretty much impossible as far as large tournaments go. I play 40K and Kill Team. Kill Team uses the I go you go system with only 10 models at most on each side. Most games of Kill Team I play still take about 2 hours. The first turn Alpha Strike problem in 40K right now has everything to do with lack of line of sight terrain. If your stuff is hiding, your enemy can't shoot you. This is supported by the current win rates amongst 40K factions on the competitive scene.
I think MESBG does this so damn well and different with the priority roll off then with all the crazy things you can do with heroic actions, such a cool system
I love this game dev diary kind of content. It would be great to see more of it!
I've had an idea for a while, though not really developed it much, where you work in phases (ie. command, movement, shooting) but in each phase players take their turns. So in the command phase, one side does their commands, then the other player does theirs. Same with movement, one side moves, then the other. etc
I'm guessing this would make a slower game, as your making one set of decisions at a time, and having to react to the other sides movement as well before making the next set.
I've also thought about an invisible line moving left to right one turn and right to left the next, and whatever unit the line touches first gets to activate. I think switching back and forth like that, along with objective based gameplay, would keep people from bunching up their units at one side or the other, but would allow for some strategic placement of units based on the activation line.
I have a buttload of ideas, but many might be crap. They just float around in my head, so it's nice to get some of them out in the real world.
sounds exactly like the Middle Earth SBG ruleset (which is amazing) :)
Arena Rex has a great activation system. Player rounds are asymmetric despite model count being the same. A gladiator can either be Ready, Fatigued or Exhausted. At the start of a turn you remove a Fatigue token from one of you models, they can't activate this turn. Then you may activate any other Ready Gladiator. You get a free move, then Fatigue to perform an action or Exhaust to perform two (or a big action). Ready models can also use a Reaction in the opponent's turn at the cost of a Fatigue. Only once all your models are Fatigued/Exhausted do you have what is called a Clear Turn, where you step down each level of Fatigue one step, mount/dismount models and can perform a special bonus ability called a Tactic. So even in a 5v5 game you could just switch between two models each turn while your opponent might heavily exhaust all their models and have more Clear Turns. You could easily apply that to units/squads, maybe have units able to provide continuous effects while inactive such as Guard, Suppressing Fire, etc.
Can't wait to check out your game! I've jumped into AOS and 40k lots of times, full of excitement...only to then get that awful feeling watching my opponent have to stand there for 45 mins while I shoot every one of my units and he can do nothing about it. Alternate activation with a twist is definitely the way to go. Firefight is an amazing system as is Conquest, Last Argument of Kings. The simple idea of units appearing out of the fog is genius. There has to be some mechanic like that at the game's very core.
A computer game series, "The Banner Saga" uses a system with alternate activation where there are no rounds, but each unit, after going, gets added to the end of the initiative. Additionally, unit damage potential is tied to their remaining HP (not unlike how a Warhammer regiment's damage potential is tied to how many units are left in it). While this was somewhat novel and tactically interesting, it was also incredibly frustrating and led to counter-intuitive gameplay.
Killing an enemy unit was actually disadvantageous because it meant the remaining enemy units could all still take turns just as frequently (if not more frequently). If you have 2 units and your opponent has 6, your two units get to go every 4 turns, and if you only have one unit left it goes every other turn. Consequently you're encouraged to ignore badly damaged units and whittle down your opponent's entire force before finishing them off at the end.
That said, if what you want is a game that encourages a player to use a small number of highly elite units, this system would encourage that. You get no action economy advantage at all out of superior numbers. A larger force just means more tactical flexibility in terms of positioning concerns like flanking, important map locations, bottlenecks, etc.
I prefer alternate activation but I prefer it done by phase. So using 40k as an example, you would alternate activations for the move phase, then shooting, etc. Obviously this means changing things like charging to prevent shenanigins. But the method used by games like Grimdark Future where units alternate activation and do all "phases" or actions are fine but in my experience generally result in just playing whack-a-mole between opponents. You CAN have an overall strategy but it usually isn't going to play out because you end up having to just react constantly. Having said that, I'd rather have GDF's methodology than IGOUGO. In fact the ONLY reason my group is playing 40K 10th rather than GDF is because there are other factors of OPR rulesets we don't like.
Your point of damage being done at the end of an alternate activating turn is a superb mechanic that should be used in every alternate activation game.
In addition I have to say that your example of alternate activations in Wary Cry, while a problem, I think is less about the game system and more about the player and just how much of a competitive jackass they are. The person you played would never be an opponent again for me. If you need to win so badly you'll game the game system you aren't worth playing against.
Finally, while I generally dislike the tokens-in-a-bag or card deck draw systems of unit activation they do meet a design goal that I think a lot of people miss because they care more about "balance" (a completely unrealistic expectation imo) than they do about having exciting/interesting games even if it means they lose. A slightly adjusted version of the famous G.K. Chesterson quote about Croquet; "You will never truly love playing the game until you love being beaten at it."
Whatever it's flaws (and of course it has flaws) alternate activation is a superior system simply because it engages both players more evenly, thereby ensuring both have more enjoyment.
The main factor of why i like Alternate Activation is the fun factor. you mentioned with larger wargames it does slow it down with alternate/simultaneous. However no one i've met really enjoys the fact that you can lose minis first round and not get to do anything with them. That's not fun, especially something like a psyker or vehicle. Most alternate games it's very hard to kill a unit in 1 activation.
Alternatively activations or something like the end stage of Alpha Strike where the damage to both sides are applied at the end.
You know, I recommend checking a videogame called Valkyria Chronicles. The game is played in a battlefield with many units, scouts, troopers, tanks, etc... and has that "true line of sight" element to it since you dont move on a grid, the game uses a IGYG kinda system, in which the player goes and then when you are done the enemy does its thing, but it also has limits on what units you can activate per turn. I would love to have a system similar to that.
To explain a little, you gain CP's at the start of your turn, about 5, you can spend 1 CP to activate a unit, this unit then can move and then perform an action (attack, heal, etc), and then you are done. From here on you can use the other CPs to activate other units in the same way, however, selecting heavier units like Tanks cost more (2CP's) and selecting the same unit reduces the max movement they can get (which only resets at the start of your next turn) and some weapons use ammo that regenerates 1 per turn (like grenades) so you cant just spam grenades/missiles/mortars and have to wait for the next turn to get a partial refill.
Also, there are stratagems, this stratagems cost CP's too, you can use them to heal, or refill ammo, or increase attack/accuracy/etc. When you decide the turn is over (either you ran out of CP's or you just dontwant to spend more) you simply pass the turn and you keep the CPs not used for your next turn, but there is a max limit too, so there is a limit you can stack too. You can spend little for a more explosive turn later on, or spend all you can, or a mix and save some for stratagems, etc.
And also, you determine "commanders" which give you 1 extra CP per turn each while they are active on the field, but if they are downed you lose that extra CP per turn.
Its an interesting system that i wish was at least partially implemented in some board games.
I like the alternate system. You've mentioned MCP , they are really good at balancing their games. 2 rules in particular that would work with your boost system are
1) If you activate the last unit of the turn, then you automatically go last starting next turn.
2) if you have less units to activate you can choose to pass to your opponent until you both have the same number of units to activate.
I do like like the randomness of the draw and I would probably have random events added to the bag for my games. Something that would add a new objective to unit effects and or environmental effects. I know a lot of people won't find it interesting but I like the idea of a specific table of environmental effects depending on the actual terrain you setup. ie if your battle takes place in a jungle then only jungle effects will happen. I'll keep that for me lol
I like how Zona Alfa handles alternating activations. The player with more units has less actions that the unit can do (i.e. 1 activation) whereas the player with less more elite units gets more activations per model (i.e 3-4)
I would be curious about a different type of alternate activations where it’s done by phase. So I move my whole army then you move your whole army etc.
What were your thoughts on incorporating a IGOUGO system but using something like a semi customizable card deck for reaction (and maybe some lore flavor text) and combining the two systems to give it the “it’s always your turn feel” , did it came up as too convoluted during the play test , or alternate activation seem more proper for the amount of models on the standard game mode?
is it feasible to have both? could it be a strategem costing points, with lowest point total choosing activation type for the game? would alternating group activation ever pose a strategic advantage over IGO alpha strike? seems like it could if the same group could be activated multiple times in a row.
7:08 interesting idea that.
I can imagine a scenario where one player is spending all their turns making a particular unit run away and the other player has to choose to chase after it with a single unit or has to let it get a bit away, but is encircling it with multiple units.
Also you can have legitimate guard units who stand around doing nothing, until they have to, rather than the feeling of wasting their turn and potential by being forced to take a turn with them but not doing anything with them.
Bolt Action taught me that a randomized activation system takes the game to a new level. It makes you prioritize your actions and plan more. I've been experimenting with using Bolt Action's activation system in 40k.
my absolute favourite activation system is Bolt Actions one. Whilst i completely agree with what you commented as the downsides of the system. I think the downsides are, kind of countered, by a couple of things.
-Ambush: you can set a unit to ambush, which means in a future turn, you can interrupt an opponents action which a fire action from the ambushing unit, either damaging and pinning the unit, or i think the player as the option to go down as a reaction to opponent fire, therefore effectively cancelling the move they were making. Yes this means having less orders in the bag, but it also means you have a unit ready to fire as soon as an opponent moves.
-Down: You can react to opponent fire by going down. Yes this takes your dice out of the bag, but it makes your squad very hard to hit, meaning they live to fight another turn
-Snap to action: If you allocate your order dice to a commander model, you can snap to action and activate additional units nearby. The better your commander, the more units you can activate. Yes again, this takes your order dice out of the bag, but if youve been having bad luck and not getting many activations, when you finally draw your dice, all of a sudden you could be activating 2,3 or 4 units etc.
So yes it is very luck based, and you could have situations where you just dont get an activation for ages, but i do feel it has good mechanics in place to "balance" it.
Also i feel like it keeps both players attention in the game. If the game is just i go, you go, players can zone out, not really pay attention. But if you have a system where you could always be in a position to do something, Infinity is an excellent example. Then both players will hold their attention longer
Matt, I heckin' love your shirt! :D
I really like your token pull system. It reminds me a lot of BattleTech's initiative deck, where you trade activations back and forth like regular BT, but you draw randomly from a deck of cards that represent various mechs in your list. It solves BT's solved initiative problem where you always activate certain kinds of mechs in a certain order (disabled mechs, tanky mechs, then weak mechs) by forcing you to deal with the chaos of the battlefield.
2 most important things in my opinion are some kind of alternating activation and universal rules like GWs old USRs. Forgive a chaos player saying this but the chaos of each faction having its own names for the same thing is headache inducing for no gain
For real.
“I’m putting these guys on the table with warp strike!”
“What’s that?”
*checks book* “it’s deep strike. But chaos.”
Bruh.
This is GW trying to claim every Word they can as theirs alone no one else can use it.
Like the crap with Space Marine.
I am intrigued by the system that Ravaged Star uses, not 100% sold on it but im close.i do really like the miniatures, especially the Gorkog
I don't know if it has too much control but the way Parabellum's Conquest system has unit activation seems nice for Ravage a Star. I like how in Conquest you build a deck based on the unit cards of your army then your opponent draws a card then you and it has the "priority system" of some skirmish games. I personally do not like dice bag drawing because a side could have 1 player draw 3 of their units for every 1 of the opponent's units they can't anymore. I do like how the boost system affects units and it could affect a deck building & drawing the card a boost could work like the CP system. You have 3 boosts for the round when you pull a card you can boost it to gain X rule, if your opponent is winning you get an extra boost token, and if you develop defensive boosts you can spend 1 boost to try to protect a unit. Granted you are determining the order of activation with the deck building (unless you shuffle the cards like it is MtG or YuGiOh) and might limit the amount of random/narrative fun you are trying to have. Anyways thank you for the video & Ravage Star and I hope you enjoy Halloween.
I hope someone has reminded you of the Blood and Plunder alternate turns. The type of "bidding" to see who acts next might work well for your balance of control v excitement.
Don’t know if it’s the right answer for Ravaged Star, but I LOVE the X Wing activations where you have to guess your opponent’s moves and reactions, then play it out by skill of the unit. Would love to see a Battlefleet Gothic of Ravaged Star lore use that system!!
Have you guys ever looked at Warcaster: Neomechanika? They do an alternate activation system, but army sizes are generally smaller and you never run the risk of your unit just not doing anything because you can resummon any unit. But, that's very tied to their overall narrative.
What do you think about a card/deck based system? You could have a deck of cards that represent activations as well as boosts/reactions and the like, and each player draws a certain number of cards or have a certain hand size, and you can make it alternate activations - but, since it's based on what you draw, you're more limited to what you can activate, but you still have some choice as to what to activate and how to activate them based on your hand. I think it's an interesting thought experiment for an alternate activation that's limited but still tactical. I think you would just have to make sure that you both have a similar deck size (and maybe that's the "points" for army building, too?) - and you could even have the opportunity to double activate units based on the cards that you've put in your deck. Oh, and maybe, if you don't have that unit on the field anymore, you can still play the card in some way as a boost or special action for a different unit? This is all just off the top of my head.
Infinity does an interesting IGYG system in that the opponent can interrupt your movement turn and shoot you which keeps the both players engaged at all times.
Never played, but was impressed with their system. I think it somewhat forces "urban warfare" (the infamous shipping crate battlefield, lol) as you need lots of LOS blocking.
Also, "cheer leaders" were a problem before. Not sure now, but similar to the problem Matt mentioned for Warcry.
Disagree. Reactions in Infinity are a joke. I never played a game before were you can alpha stike an opponent so hard in the first turn, and I played this game on a high turnament level. The second flaw with the reactions is that the opponents can use it to slow down your turn and do time play in games were you have a stop watch.
Infinity is a good example of an alternate activation system but with game limitations (army unit cap) to prevent that from spiraling too much.
Thank you!
I have the idea of a very small game that uses AA, with no rounds. You can activate a model multiple times in a row, but each time it gets a malus token. To activate a model, you use the system found in the boardgame Ark Nova: 5 cards on the table, each one is an action. When you use a card, you put it on the left and move the other cards to the right. The actions have more power the more they're on the right. The malus token from multiple consecutive activations will affect this power. One of the 5 actions is a team action, which activate a team ability and removes all the malus token from the whole team; you do not activate a model when you do this action.
With 40k you roll to see who starts to set their units first and then roll to see who goes first…what happens is both sides try to hide all their units…b/c if they don’t theirs a good chance they could get shot off the table before they are even used…that leaves the person in turn who has to go first…with a move phase and little to no shooting…leaving you exposed for your opponents turn…essentially in a 5 turn game..one player is only getting 4 turns of shooting. I like the idea of having the number of units being set up by the person who has the fewest…making the more hordy army have to maybe set up 2-3 units at a time per opponents 1…I also like the idea of an initiative system like in D&D vs the YGIG…of one side moving and firing everything. The initiative allows one unit to move and fire and then the next unit and so on down the line…then the next turn…initiatives are rolled again for remaining units. As to playing what is fun too you as opposed to what the game dictates…40k’s objectives and secondary missions almost force you to play multiple small mobile units that have scout, infiltration or back line denial and trying to stay in cover holding objectives. The game is more about scoring points then battling armies….the purest form of 40k seems to be around narrative missions…for ex. defend this outpost while these people are being evacuated while opp. is to break through and capture/kill said evacuees.
Is it possible to still get the veil touched or get them again in the future? I missed out on the valkyries
Yes. Everything from the first campaign is available in the second campaign.
Oh thank goodness, thanks very much! @@miniwargaming
Nice to hear someone say this. I really like I go you go, it feels relaxed and strategic. I don’t get that “it’s your move” rushed feel. I also like how it facilitates asymmetry, I love seeing my flood of conscripts get waded through by a handful of custodies
I agree, on the surface, it's easy to throw out IGOUGO and adopt Alternating Activation (AA), but you make some good points. I used to play Bolt Action and felt that it was TOO random*. I agree with the feel-bads of having your opponent get the Alpha Strike on you turn one; can't always recover from that. Good point on your Warcry example; having cheap throwaway units to pad your list so your good units get the advantage against your opponent when they run out of deployment activations.
I like "momentum" mechanics; some way to calculate success of each player through the turn so that the player with more momentum gets to go first the following turn.
Another work-around for the IGOUGO/AA is Initiative stat as found in Star Wars X-Wing, where each Pilot has an initiative number. It's been awhile, but it's like movement goes in order from lowest to highest and shooting goes from highest to lowest... So maybe in a 40k-like game, each unit/character has an Initiative number, do the same thing; move from low/high, shoot/assault from high/low?
* regarding Random: my thoughts on game theory is a balance of "did I bring the right Army/Deck to the table, did I make the right decisions given the game-state, and how random are the dice rolls/card draws?" If there is too much Random in the game, then my army/deck choice and decision-making is moot. I will rarely win and probably not have fun and stick with the game. The randomness of the Bolt Action dice pull activation felt too random for me, and not in a way that "balances out" over the course of a game. In the same way I don't like the swingy-ness of dX weapons in 40k. Ork heavy weapons getting dX shots, fluffy! Flamer weapons getting dX auto-hits? Better than templates! But there are now dX weapons all throughout 40k across all the factions. Not a fan.
So many times in 40K i have seen the person who goes first, shoot and kill 2-3 units of his opponent. or kill a character/centerpiece and i was left with the thought/feeling : i wonder if it was reverse would the result have been reverse too ? it would also be interesting to see some statistics about player goes first wins or looses. as in how important is it to go first compared to winning ?
One thought i had about you go i go 40K system.. what if the player who looses the diceroll for who goes first, gets a 4-5 up save for all his units in the opponents first turn ?? or a variation of this ?
I just want to say first off that i love what you guys are doing and i wish you the best!
As far as my opinion on an activation system is concerned i have played a few games 40k, AoS, OPR, Bolt Action, Polyversal and Heavy gear blitz. I left 40k because of the expense and the imbalance of it all.... I transitioned to Heavy Gear Blitz and i absolutely love the system as a whole but sisnce we are focusing on activations the game has alternating activations with groups of units not just 1 unit at a time (between 4-9 actions split between models) you roll for initiative and then each player alternates in activating combat groups while the passive player(s) can use their models actions to react to anything the active player is doing.
I would say the game is fairly balanced even when you rry and break it with many small or low quality models to stack larger groups so if one person brings 2 combat groups of 9 models each and you brought a total of 8 models the other player has more models on the table but you should** have more elite or better equiped models then your opponent and it juat changes how you need to play your force.
The other game i have played recently that surprised me and my opponent was Polyversal. The activation system is done with an initiative roll like normal but if you roll higher than your opponent you take the difference between the rolls and the winner can activate that many units so if i roll 6 and my opponent rolls a 4 i can activate 2 units before we roll again for initiative. Each player also chooses orders that unuts they control will be doing before the round begins face down so it adds what i think is a layer of strategy and simplicity in how you take your turn. I will say that polyversal plays really fast compared to most other games if not all ive played.
My preference at the end of the day would be alternating activations with a heavy emphasis on reactionary play to at least give the inactive player the ability to use all of the units they have. If i were to go back to igougo then adding in a reaction system similar to heavy gear blitz would appeal to me so alha strike wasnt as devastating.
Polyversal is a great game.
I really like the roll 3 dice, you know if you hit and for how much damage.
Alternative activations feels more balanced and allows both players stay engaged rather then either playing taking what feels like an hour turn each.
Mage Knight (the classic tabletop war game) had an excellent system that brought out the best of both worlds. Players had full turns in the style of "you go, I go". But there were strict activation limits, so you could only activate up to X amount of units per turn. That alone wasn't a radical new idea, of course. But the real secret-spice of the system was that everything that activated could not activate again next turn - unless you "pushed" them. Pushing a unit both hurt them and meant they absolutely could not activate the following turn; they must remain still and pass. These things combined gave Mage Knight a very chess-like feeling even though it wasn't using back-and-forth activations. Moving units meant really commiting, and the strategy to trap units or force them to push with area denial and threats was paramount. Why settle for activated/not-activated when you can have a third higher risk option? 😎
I agree with what you stated. Can your game eventually have different types of play meaning a set of rules for mass battle and another for smaller skirmish play?
Any thoughts on Warcaster's alternating activation (one unit and one solo) or Frost grave (Wizard and their models, Appreciate and their models, then remaining models)?