Open Field Combat

[Teldurn]

For those quests that have a board with lots of open space, say for instance a large forest, how do you handle monster placement? Do you treat it as one gigantic room and place all the monsters at once that are in line of sight to the players? Since the original board is fairly insular (narrow corridors, confined small-to-medium sized rooms), combat is pretty straightforward - go down the corridor, open door, fight. Rinse, repeat.

But how do you do it for large open spaces where all the monsters are visible right from the beginning? Seems to me that's a quick path to a Hero slaughter!

[Gold Bearer]

I'm going to be bringing monsters in from the edges of one, two, three or even all four sides of the board for a couple of quests like that. They start their turn next to a square at the of the board and start from there. There could be a certain amount decided from the start and a set amount come in every turn, two turns, three or whatever, or there could be a random amount coming in every turn for a set number of turns. For an open area with enough objects that obscure their view they could just be activated when they're first seen.

[Teldurn]

Take, for instance, this wilderness geomorph set from Heroic Maps.
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/1 ... Wilderness

There isn't really much of anything there that would obscure line of sight from one end of the map to the other. How would you use that? Say your Heroes start at one corner of the map and you have monsters sprinkled throughout the map. Do you as the EWP just place them all on the board as soon as they enter the map and then rush them all at the heroes on your turn?

[knightkrawler]

I guess I'd handle that with some kind of spawning mechanic if the battle is central to the quest or the monsters are too many. Like maybe that the battle is over as soon as there is no monster in sight anymore, otherwise the spawning takes effect again. That's just one spontaneous idea.
I plan a project of converting the D&D 2003 boardgame quests at some point because I love the floor tiles that came with it. There are open spaces and rules for fliers and whatnot. The things you can do... Look at clmkay's Tavern quest he posted recently.
Also, I have taken it into my list of things to do to write up skirmish rules if need be.

[Teldurn]

I guess I'd handle that with some kind of spawning mechanic if the battle is central to the quest or the monsters are too many. Like maybe that the battle is over as soon as there is no monster in sight anymore, otherwise the spawning takes effect again. That's just one spontaneous idea.
I plan a project of converting the D&D 2003 boardgame quests at some point because I love the floor tiles that came with it. There are open spaces and rules for fliers and whatnot. The things you can do... Look at clmkay's Tavern quest he posted recently.
Also, I have taken it into my list of things to do to write up skirmish rules if need be.

I'd love to check out your skirmish rules whenever you get around to it. In the meantime, I'll look into clmkay's quest. Thanks, kk!

[The Road Warrior]

I guess it depends on how big the open area is that you're planning on using and what task you set for the Heroes during that quest. Those tiles are 10x10 but if you're planning on using a few of them together to make a larger map then that's potentially a lot of distance for the monsters to travel before they can attack the Heroes.

For example it would take a chaos warrior 3 turns to get across the board from the NE corner to the SW corner of a 10x10 tile. If the Heroes are armed with crossbows there is every possibility that he will never get close enough to attack! On the other hand a goblin could cross the board in 2 turns but is much weaker.

I would be inclined to place all the monsters onto the board as soon as the Heroes enter it. If the monsters are placed intelligently it could lead to an interesting tactical battle.

Alternatively a spawning mechanism like knightkrawler suggests could work well depending on what the Heroes objective is. I always planned to start a quest pack with the Heroes travelling across an outdoor tile towards the doors of a Dwarf city and have them ambushed by Skaven that spawn every round from holes in the ground. The quest ends when the Heroes get inside and shut the doors. I think it's something that's kind of missing from the outdoor tile in Against the Ogre Horde.

Take a look at Carag 8 peaks. I think that has a quest with a large tile that takes up half of the board. I can't remember the mechanics of the room but it might offer some inspiration.

I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

[knightkrawler]

As for movement, the bigger the open area is, the more important and balancing it will be to implement some rule of initiative instead of fixed monster movement. Or introduce dice (+/- fixed modifiers) for monster movement, too, which could be interesting. But initiative would be my priority for skirmish rules.

[Teldurn]

As for movement, the bigger the open area is, the more important and balancing it will be to implement some rule of initiative instead of fixed monster movement. Or introduce dice (+/- fixed modifiers) for monster movement, too, which could be interesting. But initiative would be my priority for skirmish rules.

But doesn't the existing turn order (first players to the left, then zargon goes last) already count as initiative?

[The Road Warrior]

But doesn't the existing turn order (first players to the left, then zargon goes last) already count as initiative?

Yes, I think so. I think it would be cruel to take this advantage away from them if they are going to be facing a very large number of monsters.

Random movement for monsters would take away another one of the Heroes advantages in this situation. With fixed movement the Heroes know exactly which squares the monsters can and can't reach on their next turn. It's up to them to make the best of this advantage and maneuver themselves to pick off the monsters in small numbers. Of course a poor movement roll for one Hero could really screw him over....

I think it really depends on what you are trying to achieve with this kind of scenario.

[knightkrawler]

I was thinking of something along the lines of a slight upping of luck as a factor. Like when you move to attack a specific type of monster you first have to roll 1 combat die to determine who actually gets to attack, because the monster is so awesome. This springs immediately to mind. Also,
- rage attacks with double movement for specific monsters (boars).
- Swarm rules (areas of effect).
- Mob attacks (there are already some awesome ideas in this forum).
- Throatslitting in passing by.
- New kinds of traps (completely coincidental mechanics for rocks and running and sticks and stumbling).
- More offensive and defensive (battlemage/shamanistic/animistic) spells.
- Getting out and back into line of sight.
- Obstacles and barricades; trees, columns, chasms.
- Different levels (hills and walls) for line of fire.
- New line of fire rules for really good shots.
As I said, all kinds of things jump at the dedicated skirmish rule writer once they put their mind to it.