Chapter Eleven: Armies
A turn spent trying to run this many units individually could take hours. Organized into Squads, there's a much greater chance of players reaching the second turn.
|Elements shown: LEGO, Mega Bloks, Little Armory
|"None of us is as dumb as all of us."
|- Despair, Inc.
BrikWars is well set up to send pairs, handfuls, or full half-dozens worth of individual minifigs and vehicles into tactical skirmishes. For more epic toy campaigns, with units numbering in the dozens or hundreds, handling every combatant individually can slow a battle to a crawl. Instead, it's best to group units together into Squads. A Squad moves together, takes its Action together, and attacks and defends together as a single coordinated unit.
Besides improving command efficiency, Squads enjoy a number of other advantages. Attacking and defending as a single unit, a Squad can pool and combine Damage, Momentum, and Counters in a way that its individual units can't, and it can coordinate Skill-based movement like Sprints in order to stay in formation. A Squad also enjoys Safety in Numbers, allowing it to distribute incoming attacks away from its most critical or vulnerable members and soak them up with more durable or expendable ones. And because a Squad is treated as a single unit, many types of bonuses that are normally limited to an individual can be expanded to apply to a whole Squad.
But the most important advantage of organizing units into a Squad is not that it allows them to be directed to horrible deaths with greater machine-like efficiency. It’s that, as they are inevitably slaughtered, they can know that they died as meaningless entries in an org chart rather than as people.
While groups of foot soldiers are the most common, any types of units can be grouped into Squads - Squads of horsemen or assault helicopters operate by the same rules. A Squad is much simpler to handle if it's composed of identical or similar units (a group of knights all on horseback, or a squadron of starfighers), but heterogeneous Squads are just as common (a catapult and its defending crew, or a necromancer and his summoned undead).
The Squad Plate
|"All for one, and one for all!"
|- Alexandre Dumas
The constructible nature of brick warriors makes them easy
to group into quick formations just take all the Squad members
and stick them to a shared baseplate.
The Squad Plate, in effect, combines a number of lesser units
into a single super-unit. Instead of having to move Squad members
around individually, players can now pick up the Squad Plate and move
them all at once. Instead of handling the Squaddies' attacks individually,
players roll Attacks for the Squad Plate all together. Players measure Ranges to or from whichever part of the Squad or Squad Plate is most convenient, and instead of having
to touch individual Squad members to objects they want to act on, they
touch the object with the Squad Plate and all the Squaddies gain
access to it implicitly.
In the best-case scenario, a Squad Plate should be an appropriate size for its Squad. As
a very general rule of thumb, there should be a 2x4-stud area for
each minifig on foot, for example, or 4x8 for each rider on horseback.
These numbers can be fudged quite a bit, however, depending on the
sizes of available plates in the players collections, and
whether the troops need to be arranged in some specific formation.
|If players don't have appropriate plates available for their Squads, they'll have to decide who is or isn't in a Squad by mutual agreement rather than by putting them on Squad Plates. In cases like these, Range can be measured to or from any convenient Squad member rather than to the plate.
Units can create, join, leave, or change the formation of a Squad Plate at any time during their own turn. On other players' turns, units aren't able to create or join Squads, but they may be able to leave the Squad Plate as part of a Response Action (for example, if they're forced to Bail out of the path of an incoming attack) or as a consequence of opposing players' actions (usually because they're Knocked Back by an Explosion or Collision).
Squad Movement and Action
A Squad moves as quickly as its slowest member, and is as maneuverable as its least manueverable member. A standard Squad of minifigs has Unlimited Maneuvering, while a Squad of Vehicles or riders on Horseback measures its movement with Forward or Stationary Maneuvering (9.2: Standard Maneuvering).
If a Squad Plate moves through an impediment that inflicts a Movement Penalty or slows it to Half Speed, then the entire Squad suffers the effects until it clears the obstacle, not just the Squad members directly affected.
A Squad can move through spaces that don't have room for it, if there's enough room for the Squad's individual members to pass through (for instance, moving through an archway wide enough for each of a Squad's minifigs, but too narrow for the entire Squad Plate itself), but a Squad can't end its turn in a position where it doesn't fit. If a Squad is going to be stuck in a position too small for it, the Squad can either disband into individual members, change the shape of its Squad Plate to fit the smaller space, or wait until a later turn when it may be able to clear the obstacle all at once.
A Squad is most effective when several or all of its members take the same Action together for a single Combined Action, although members of a Squad are still allowed to take individual Actions with no penalty. This allows a Squad to treat its members' successful Combined Actions as a cumulative effect, combining (for instance) their Damage from successful Attacks, their Momentum in a Collision, or their Size for the purpose of handling large objects. Importantly, any bonuses from Bennies, SuperNatural Effects, or unit Specialties that affect a Squad as a whole can only be applied to a single Combined Action or movement, not to any separate Actions or movement that Squad members may take individually or in separate combinations.
If a Squad uses its Action to Sprint, it makes a single Sprint Roll with the lowest-Skilled Squad member, and the result is used as the Sprint Roll for every member of the Squad, allowing the Squad to stay in formation. (If a Squad uses its Action to Bail, on the other hand, then all Squad members roll individually.)
For other types of Actions, each participating Squad member makes a separate Skill Roll. Often, these rolls can be combined - if a Squad of ten minifigs of identical Skill d6 fires at a target with ten identical rifles, they can simply roll 10d6 and count the number of successful hits. All that matters is how many hits occur, not which specific minifigs were the ones responsible.
One of the biggest advantages of forming a Squad is that it makes it much harder for enemies to focus Damage on any single unit. The drawback is that targeting a Squad as a whole is much easier than targenting individuals - as long as an attacker can target any unit or object within the Squad, or even the Squad Plate itself, it can make an attack on the Squad. Furthermore, since Squad Plates are generally larger than minifigs, opponents making Ranged Attacks on the Squad will often get an Attack Bonus for Target Size (5.1: Making Attacks). (Close Combat Attacks are still based on the Size of the individual units within the Squad, however.)
Whenever a Squad is hit by a single attack or other source of Damage, the Squad's player may assign the Damage to any unit within the Squad he wishes.
There are exceptions to this rule: an attacker can Single Out a specific unit or units within a Squad if striking the target would be an Automatic Hit (for instance, if the target is Disrupted, involved in a Grab, or otherwise immobilized) or if the target units are at least twice the attacking unit's Size. Moving targets any smaller than that are too difficult to distinguish in the chaos of battle. A Rat (Size 0") could Single Out a Peasant (Size 1") in a Peasant Squad; the Peasant could Single Out a mounted Knight (Size 2"); and the Knight could Single Out an individual Giant of Size 4". Otherwise, Damage done to a Squad is distributed among its members according to the defending player's preference.
There are many instances in which a Squad might be hit by multiple attacks at once - the collected attacks from an enemy Squad, a group of enemy units attacking in cooperation, the concentrated firepower of a multi-payload weapons platform, or any combination of the above.
When this happens, the attacking player makes all their Attack Rolls first, and the defending player distributes the successful hits among his or her Squad members. The distribution should proceed as evenly as possible - no Squad member can take a second hit until every legal target has had its first - but otherwise, defenders can favor whichever units they want when choosing who takes which hits.
|Remember that minifigs can't be hit by more than three Close Combat Attackers in the same turn. If a Squad is hit by enough Close Combat Attacks to exceed this limit, the minifigs will have to be passed over after the third attacker when distributing successful hits. Those hits must either be distributed to larger targets, or lost without effect.
If there are targets the attacking player would like to Single Out with specific attacks, then those targets are handled first. First, the attacking player delivers the attacks on Singled Out targets that are Automatic Hits, since these require no Attack Roll. Next, the remaining attackers make all of their Attack Rolls and count the successful hits, assigning as many of the hits as they like to the targets that can be Singled Out. If there are any hits left over, or if the attacker declined to Single Out any targets, the defending player then distributes the remaining successful hits among the defenders. The defender's distribution of attacks must still be even, taking the Singled Out attacks into account - if the attacker loaded two attacks onto one of the Singled Out units, the defender can't distribute a third attack to that unit until every legal target has at least had its second.
Regardless of who is handling the distribution, Damage is rolled as hits are assigned. All Damage from multiple simultaneous attacks is cumulative. When a unit is destroyed or killed, it is no longer a legal target, and further hit distribution can skip over them.
|If there are a number of victims with different Damage levels to keep track of, it's good to have a pile of extra dice lying around to use as temporary Damage counters for each of them until the turn is over.
Some sources of Damage are location-specific, or have additional location-based effects after the initial Damage has been distributed. A nearby Explosion might go off, causing Damage and KnockBack to everything within its Explosion Radius. A massive laser blast might have enough Overkill to take out a series of Squad members along its line of fire, or a rocket-boosted bulldozer might be Plowing Through an audience of monster truck fans. In cases like these, the specific locations of the Squad members is very important.
The defending player is not able to simply claim that all the Squad members were hanging out on an unaffected area of the Squad Plate at the time - that would break the laws of Koincidence, which can only ever increase destruction, not avoid it. But Squad members are well-known for making crazy leaps in order to take bullets for each other, and it's hard to keep track of individual soldiers in the heat of battle. The defending player can grab sturdier or more expendable units from any part of the Squad Plate and Swap them with the targets of the Damage, claiming either that they jumped to the rescue just in the nick of time or that the attackers just weren't paying enough attention to who was standing where.
Any pair of Swapped units must be of equal Size. Even the most inattentive enemies will notice the difference between a minifig and a battleship. They must also be mobile - units that are Disrupted, Grabbed, or otherwise immobilized stay right where they are and take their lumps.
Squad Close Combat
Ranged combat between Squads is relatively simple - players measure the Range between Squad Plates, make their Combined Attack Rolls, and distribute Damage from the successful hits accordingly. But much like Close Combat between individual minifigures, Squad Close Combat is a more involved process.
Levels of Engagement
In Close Combat, a Squad has two possible Levels of Engagement, depending on whether it has brought its Squad Plate into contact with the opponent when it first engages.
If a Squad is close enough for some or all of its members to strike an opponent, but has not brought the Squad Plate into contact, then the Squad can make a Skirmishing attack. Only the Squad members and opponents who are close enough to strike or be struck with melee weapons are involved in a Skirmish Close Combat, although the Squad still takes its Angry Inch all together. This is especially useful for Squads with longer Two-Handed Weapons that want to keep opponents at arms' length, or Squads with mixed melee and ranged units who want to keep their ranged units out of direct contact with the enemy.
A Squad can Swap its members around at the beginning of a Skirmish (whether attacking or defending) to best position themselves, and at the beginning of each turn that the Skirmish continues. Oherwise, the Squad members are stuck in their positions until the Skirmish ends.
If a Squad brings its Squad Plate into contact with the opponent, on the other hand, then it has entered into Full Engagement. The Squad and the opponents are considered to be all mixed up together in a grand melee, and all members of the Squad can participate in the Close Combat, regardless of their relative position to the opponents. Because they are all mixed up together, any Ranged Attacks fired into a Squad that is Fully Engaged will also hit whatever opponents they are Fully Engaged with. The various involved players take turns distributing successful hits to their own involved units as if they were all part of one giant Squad, skipping players when necessary to maintain an even distribution (no player's unit can take a second hit until all players' units have taken their first hit, and so forth).
Any unit or Squad that's involved in a Full Engagement cannot use Actions to target or focus on anything outside of the Full Engagement, unless it first successfully Withdraws. It can still defend itself normally if it's targeted by Skirmishing attacks from outside the Full Engagement.
The Communal Angry Inch
Unlike minifigs, a Squad in Close Combat only takes its Angry Inch once, at the beginning of its first Maneuver (or Counterattack, for defending Squads). (Squads that elect to Ignore their opponents do not get to use their Angry Inch.) Rather than moving units around individually on the Squad Plate, the entire Squad Plate takes its Angry Inch in formation. If there's a unit in the Squad that isn't capable of taking an Angry Inch, whether because it's using its Action for something other than Close Combat or because it's a type of unit that can't take Angry Inches, then the Squad may not take an Angry Inch.
While a Squad and its opponents can easily use Angry Inches to move from Skirmishing range into a Full Engagement, the reverse is more difficult. Squads and other units can only use an Angry inch to to disengage from a Full Engagement as part of an attempt to Withdraw. Otherwise, some part of the Squad Plate must remain in contact with the opponent or opponents.
Squad Close Combat follows a sequence similar to minifig Close Combat (5.2:
|Order of Attack for Squad Close Combat
The Close Combat sequence for Squads is similar to that for individual minifigs. Take each type of Maneuver one at a time, don't use any hand or weapon more than once in the same turn, and whenever one side or the other dies, stop.
Rather than handle Squad members' maneuvers one at a time, Attack Rolls and Parrying Rolls are combined as much as possible for efficiency's sake. As long as a group of units has the same Skill die and weapon type, it doesn't matter which specific units hit or miss; only the number of successes matters. They can make their rolls all together in a big pile of Skill dice.
Skill Rolls for Bailing are handled individually. In Squad Close Combat, unlike in minifig Close Combat, Bailing happens before the active units attempt their Close Combat Maneuver. Because attackers aren't targeting specific units in Squad Close Combat, a defending unit's Bail Roll does not have to beat an attacking unit's Attack Roll in order to be successful. Instead, units attempting to Bail out of a Full Engagement are successful as long as they manage to land completely outside all of the Squad Plates involved. Otherwise, they are Disrupted, helpless, and still a fair target for the effects of Close Combat Maneuvers.
|Resolving Counters in Squad Combat
In Squad Close Combat, Close Combat Maneuvers, Counters, and Counterattacks are executed in groups rather than individually. Resolving these in proper sequence makes them much easier to handle.
When members of a Squad make an Attack or Counterattack, they all make their Attack Rolls, and the defending player distributes the successful hits among the legal targets (all of the targets within the attackers' weapon ranges for a Skirmishing attack, or all of the units involved in a Full Engagement). Damage and other effects are rolled as the hits are distributed, removing targets from the legal distribution pool as they are destroyed or killed. All Damage from the Close Combat is cumulative until the end of the turn.
When members of a Squad make a Grab or a Shove, the defending player distributes them among the legal targets. The effects of the Grabs and Shoves, as well as any attempted Counters, are only resolved once all of them have been assigned, because the cumulative Size of units participating in Grabs and Shoves affects the final rolls. Successfully Grabbed units, along with the units Grabbing them, are moved to the nearest edge of the Squad Plate between them. Successfully Shoved units are Knocked Back from wherever they're standing.
When Skirmishing, but not when Fully Engaged, it's also possible to attempt a Combined Shove to push back an entire Squad rather than its individual members. In this case, the Shoving unit or units total the sum of their Effective Sizes, and the target Squad does the same, and the Shove is handled as though between two units of those respective total Sizes (8.2:
Basic Weapons). Remember that a smaller unit can't Shove a larger one, and a larger unit gets +2 to a Shove for ever inch of Size advantage. If the Shove is successful, the target Squad is pushed back the appropriate distance. Otherwise, all the involved units are now Fully Engaged.
Imperial Rome has no tolerance for hippies.
|Elements shown: LEGO
|Combined Rolls Example: Smiting Hippies
|Example: Squads of five pikemen (Skirmishing) and ten swordsmen (Fully Engaged) are attacking the three remaining members of a Squad of sign-waving hippies.
Making their Attack Roll, the Roman Squads roll one pile of five dice for the pikes, and a second pile of ten dice for the swords, counting the number of successful hits from each weapon type but with no other concern for which hits came from which specific Squad members. The Squads roll two hits with the pikes and six with the swords.
Once the hits are counted from each set of attacks, the hippies roll a pile of three dice for their attempt to Parry with their signs, with no concern for which successful Parry was achieved by which hippie. They take a -1 Skill Penalty for being Outnumbered, and only one Parry is successful.
The attacking player chooses to deliver the pike hits first, doing two dice of Damage apiece, and the sword hits second, each doing one die of Damage.
The defending player gives hippie #1 the sole successful Parry and the first pike hit. The attacker rolls 3 Damage (thanks to the Parry); hippie #1 survives. The defending player leaves a die with the three facing upwards next to the hippie, to keep track of the unit's total Damage until Close Combat is resolved for the turn.
Hippie #2 takes the remaining pike hit. The attacker rolls 8 Damage for an immediate kill.
Hippie #3 takes the first sword hit. The attacker rolls a 1, Critically Failing and causing no Damage.
With two hippies remaining, the defending player gives the second sword hit to hippie #1. The attacker rolls 2 Damage. Combined with the earlier hit from the pike, this is enough for a second kill.
Only hippie #3 remains, and the defender gives her the next two sword hits. The attacker rolls a 2 and another 2 for a total of 4. It's enough to match the hippie's Armor but not exceed it; the hippie gets one hand chopped off, but survives the attacks.
Although the attacker still has successful sword attacks to deliver, hippie #3 has reached the limit of three Close Combat attacks on a single minifig. The remaining sword attacks go to waste, and the hippie survives to protest for another turn.
11.2: Minifig Specialists
* work in progress
The Cannon Fodder
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:0 Specialty: Inconsequential
Skill:d6 Move:7" Armor:3 Specialty: Disengagement
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialty: Pathfinding (d8), Tracking, Stealth
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialty: Trick Shooting (d8)
The Heavy Infantry
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialties: Shield Wall, March
Skill:d6 Move:4" Armor:5 Specialty: Compensating
Skill:d6 Move:4" Armor:3 Specialty: Horsemanship
Skill:d6 Move:4" Armor:3 Specialty: Piloting (d8)
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialty: Gunnery (d8)
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialties: Stealth, Sniping
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialty: Field Training (d6)
Skill:d8 Move:7" Armor:4 Specialties: Stealth, Sneak Attack
Skill:d10 Move:7" Armor:2d6 Specialty: Heroic Ego (1 Feat)
While not Heroes in their own right, there are certain minifigs that
are possessed of a stubborn mindset that leads them to push themselves
and their comrades harder than most would find sensible or even conscionable. While this
results in abilities slightly improved from those of their peers,
it is these minifigs' special pigheadedness, rather than their other skills, that
qualifies them for promotion to Officer ranks.
In most regards, an Officer is nothing more than a slightly-improved
minifig with a couple extra decorations. He has a Skill of d8,
a Move of 6, and Armor of 4. His one unique advantage
is his Command training, which allows him to push subordinates to all-new slightly-improved levels of performance. When at least one minifig with the Leadership Specialty joins in on a Squad's Combined Action, he raises the Skill of all participating units by one die size, up to a maximum of his own Skill die size. In a Combined Action, an Officer with Skill d8 raises the Skill of Incompetent units from d4 to d6 (although they still retain their Stupidity (10.1: Minds)), and the Skill of regular minifigs from d6 to d8. Meanwhile, the Skill dice of other Officers and Heroes in his Squad remain unchanged at d8 and d10, respectively, because he can't use Leadership to raise Skill dice to a level higher than his own.
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialty: Inspiration (d6)
The Great Leader
Skill:d6 Move:5" Armor:4 Specialty: Megalomania
11.3: Military Careers
* work in progress