Strategic Campaign Rules

[LordVanquish]

Some friends and i wanted to play a ground based campaign. We had in mind that everyone has a base and you  have to destroy the bases of the other players to win. Every region you controll would give you money to buy new troops or repairparts for the damaged ones and so on. Now my question are there rules for this in existance? We planned on using the strategic operations repair and salvage rules, but are there any rules for things like troop movement, artillery bombing mining, raiding supply convois and things like that?

[Colt Ward]

I would say it depends on how granular you want to get.  You might look at the Battletech Strategic Game from Combat Ops, it was a very rough concept but it had point values for determining values.  If you wanted to play out the battles, Alpha Strike might be your best bet.

[Von Ether]

We planned on using the strategic operations repair and salvage rules, but are there any rules for things like troop movement, artillery bombing mining, raiding supply convoys and things like that?

I personally call that set up a Map Resource Campaign rule set. Where there's a mini-game where players examine a map of territories and then make moves on the map to collect the resources on  those territories. Where players clash, the mini-game is put on hold until the players can duke it out with their mech on the tabletop.

As far as I know, there's no such system in place. I had a friend try to put something together like that, but RL got in the way.

Both TW and AS have things like the Warchest Track System and AS even has Expanded Salvage and Repair rules to provide a campaign of interlinked scenarios with lasting consequences for your force. But most of the math relates back to making the bonuses for winning battles and capturing objectives (which could represent factories or ammo dumps) into a very abstract supply/logistic scoring system.

That's because the long-standing tradition in both Total Warfare and Alpha Strike has been more of a battlefield salvage economy. Things like factories and mining outposts are just objectives on the board. The real monies are made from repairing or selling the trashed mechs and equipment left behind by the loser.

I think the tradition got started for two main reasons:

There was the background of 3025, which was feudal. During wartime, most of the immediate logistics seemed to come from what landed out of the dropships. And after a planet was occupied, the liege lords handed out the tracts of land, but the vast wealth and infrastructure was kept out of player's hands.  The focus of Total Warfare for the 3025 period is also on the lance, so that's a bit personal for a planetary invasion --  but perfect for scrappy merc organization.

Then for the actual tabletop, the salvage economy is simply some quick math and guidelines on how to sell wrecked gear. Something that can be done solo and kept on scrap paper until the next go around, and all that sweet look is thanks to your opponent's defeat.

I'm not saying that a Map Resource Campaign rule set wouldn't be cool. We were thinking of either having a "Star League had fallen" set up where Mercs, Pirates, Warlords and ronin Star Leaguers all fought for control of a planet OR just make all the players Periphery Pirate scum fighting their own little bush war over needed planet.

If your crew comes up with something, post here, I'm sure several people would love to check it out.

[pheonixstorm]

Some friends and i wanted to play a ground based campaign. We had in mind that everyone has a base and you  have to destroy the bases of the other players to win. *snip* We planned on using the strategic operations repair and salvage rules, but are there any rules for things like... *snip* and things like that?

troop movement

This is more strategic level and could be played out more along battleforce or at least going over the movement rules etc. Really though what you will need is a map of the world with a good measurement system in place. Know what forces you and your enemy have. How are you moving your forces around? Are they transported by DS or walk/run? Have a ruler handy and measuer the distance from point A to point B then look at how fast your mechs can travel. Strat Ops should have a list of sub-orbital times (I know I saw it in some recent BT book anyway)

artillery bombing mining

Artillery is in Tac Ops I think, but attacks against mines, cities, factories... all can use the same structures for one thing or another. For mines look up the construction for a Castle Brian. You may need to change the CF a lot but I am sure you can use it to collapse tunnels etc during a bombing or artillery campaign. That or you may need nukes/orbital fire.

raiding supply convois

This one doesn't take a lot to figure out. Pick your opponent, pick a map, and decide if your player(s) know its route and schedule. If all they have is a vague idea make some dice rolls to see if they can intercept.

Every region you controll would give you money to buy new troops or repairparts for the damaged ones and so on. Now my question are there rules for this in existance?

This could probably be handled using the land rules in AToW. Pick a title and split the world up into any number of provinces and assign it to a particular title. Some regions may be worth more than others.

Overall pretty much everything you want is already in the various books, you just have to dig for it and put it all together and tinker with it enough so that it fits the game you want to play.

Also, why would you have to destroy the other bases to win? All you really need to do is capture the base/region then leave a large enough garrison force to hold it until you can send reinforcements if someone else decides to attack it.

What kind of units do you plan on using? Strictly mechs or going the whole combined arms theory? If you are using infantry you can build up a militia in each region and use the mercenary rules in FM:Mercs revised or Interstellar Ops beta (if you don't have FM:Mercs) to track payroll costs.

[LordVanquish]

thanks for the answers

@phoenixstorm: those are some good advise but unfortunately not the ones i was looking for.

first we want like a medium scale campaign but play every battle in TW rules (yeah we are some crazy nerds with lots of freetime) :)), but to speed everything up we divided in two teams so we could play more battles simultaneously. The Units would be all ground unit types + aerospacefighter, so no space combat, dropships, atmospheric drops,....

as we did not find an appropriate ruleset we started houseruling something but we didn't get very far yet. Our idea so far is that we have a hexmap for the strategic  (each hex equals about 5km) with different terrain types witch will have different effects. But that was when the first problems occurred. Should wheeled tanks be able to enter woods? usually in light wooded areas there are some small woods with some space in between. and given enough time even a wheeled tank could make it through a wood because the crew could get out and clear the path.

For movement points we thought of half the walking/cruising mp and similar modifiers for terrain as in TW (like -1 for light woods).

Supplies like spare parts or new units would "spawn" at the base and you would need to transport/move it to the front lines.

We also changed the "money for every region controlled" to "money for special facilities". The special facility we came up so far:

Cities: Money + may not be bombed/fired at with artillery because of ares convention. (so really hard to conquer)

Refinery: Fuel source for ICE and Fuel Cell engines

Mine: Money + maybe some protection against artillery

old Factory: Just to make it easier for the techs to repair vehicles


But there are some unsolved problems we encountered:

artillery: rules for just bombing an hex held by the enemy without engaging, how to determine hits, how to deal with units that are currently in repair, ...

mines: you should be able to place mines in a hex, that would give you some minefields to place in the defence but how to deal with the mines if the enemy has taken the hex?

stealth: should there be the possibility to engage stealth mode when all units in a company have stealth armor?

things like that is what we are currently working on, any suggestions?

[pheonixstorm]

Artillery fire at hexes. Check out Tac Ops for arty rules.

Don't over complicate this. Between what I posted and the three rulebooks (TW, TO, and SO) you should find everything you need, just look hard enough ;)

[Archangel]

Just a warning - the more players you have and the more complicated you make it the longer each turn is going to take.

[idea weenie]

as we did not find an appropriate ruleset we started houseruling something but we didn't get very far yet. Our idea so far is that we have a hexmap for the strategic  (each hex equals about 5km) with different terrain types witch will have different effects. But that was when the first problems occurred. Should wheeled tanks be able to enter woods? usually in light wooded areas there are some small woods with some space in between. and given enough time even a wheeled tank could make it through a wood because the crew could get out and clear the path.

For movement points we thought of half the walking/cruising mp and similar modifiers for terrain as in TW (like -1 for light woods).

Supplies like spare parts or new units would "spawn" at the base and you would need to transport/move it to the front lines.

We also changed the "money for every region controlled" to "money for special facilities". The special facility we came up so far:

mines: you should be able to place mines in a hex, that would give you some minefields to place in the defence but how to deal with the mines if the enemy has taken the hex?

stealth: should there be the possibility to engage stealth mode when all units in a company have stealth armor?

things like that is what we are currently working on, any suggestions?

For vehicles through impassable terrain, I'd cut the speed to 1/3 or even less.  This gives a good reason to have engineering vehicles, to make roads for your vehicles (and Mechs, and infantry) to use.

For long-term movement, I'd use the walking/cruise movement rate, not the running.  At strategic level your pilots are going to have a difficult time keeping their balance for that amount of time.  Vehs might get an advantage since they can change crews.  So if a Mech unit has done a forced march, it will have a piloting and gunnery penalty based on the number of turns it was moving.

Also, make the hexes and times proportional, so 1 MP on a BT map will move 1 hex, and 1 MP on a local or strategic map also covers one hex.  I.e. 1 MP in 1 BT turn is 30 meters in 10 seconds, so for 1 hr a hex would represent 10.8 km, and for 8 hrs a hex would represent 86.4 km.

Good idea for spare parts spawning, but you will need to keep the people/facilities safe.  An enemy artillery unit in range will give you problems.  (Imagine a stealth armored Long Tom unit that only fires 2-3 shells at a time, then shuts down to hide.  Add in a stealth cargo vehicle to keep them resupplied to give one side a lot of trouble.  The have to hunt down the artillery unit, but if they can capture it fairly intact they now can use it.)

Very good idea about special facilities being valuable, rather than territory.  This gives the civilians somewhere to run as both sides fight, and if one side destroys a facility it is lost for the rest of the game, affecting both sides (so you may see scorched earth tactics initially, but then neither side can get close to the other without setting up supply bases).

For enemy units in a minefield hex, just mark that it has been mined, and that enemy units can remove mines at (slow) rate.  Engineering units remove them at (faster) rate.

[MAD-4A]

we did a couple like that with other rules (Napoleonic, Warmaster etc..) the real problem in those was: we kept the armies as a vague point value & you purchased what you want before each game. each section gave so many resource points. once someone got over 1/2 the board everyone else was like "never mind you win" so no final climax. I was wanting to do a BT myself, I suggest, since mechs are suppose to be hard to come by, don't allow new mech purchase (or high end book vehicles - like the Schrek or Sturmfeur). Get some cheap vehicle minis (like GHQ Tanks - http://www.ghqmodels.com/) make some rules for them (crap local built militia units - nothing bigger than an AC-10 & little or no energy WP). the new territory only allows more purchase of these & basic militia infantry (no laser, A-M or jump units), and some can go to mech repairs, but you have to have the mech (intact CT is all that's required) to repair. The only mechs are what you start with. If a CTs IS is completely destroyed then the mech is gone, otherwise its salvageable buy whoever held the field. this way even if someone takes most of the map, he only gets a bunch of militia infantry and crap tanks, the others can still win if they have a large mech contingent still intact. & that can swap back & forth (as it should in BT) with one group taking an area, dropping a few mechs & dragging them back for salvage.

[wellspring]

When creating strategic rules, keep in mind that play will necessarily be unbalanced at either the strategic or tactical level. The whole point of strategy is to set up combat as a series of tactical encounters that are as unbalanced in your favor as possible.

Also, this all means different things to different people. When I've had this talk with b-school academics who study strategy for a living, they often disagree about what the word "strategy" even means. In wargames, for some players it will mean "very large tactical" or operational-level game. Others take it to mean that you play a general officer and worry more about supply, logistical train, administrative and traffic control issues-- but you're still counting individual mechs and moving them around hexes. For still others, you're playing a political leader determining objectives, assigning resources, and maintaining your own authority.

None of these options lead to the same game-- especially not when you try to mush them all together into one ubergame where you're juggling public opinion, staffing policy, and also deciding whether you'll fire both medium lasers or just one in this activation. Part of being a general means you stop trying to be a lieutenant, and part of being a Premier means that you stop trying to be a general. Historical examples abound of where someone tried to do just that and did spectacular damage as a result.

One approach to try is the "narrative strategic combat" style. Have an economic model, a wartime production model, and a political model for each faction. Each player, wearing his hat as Premier, sets economic and political policies or (acting as War Minister) works within a preexisting policy framework to achieve national objectives. Play at that level is balanced, and you're free to play as ruthlessly as you want to unbalance tactical situations for your troops to give yourself the biggest advantage. Game actions progress in "phases", an abstract measure of time that represents time before the strategic picture changes. One phase per month is pretty ok for busy adult players.

Each player has the option to declare one battle per phase to change some element of the strategic picture. This can represent either a typical battle or a turning point. Historians often use an encounter like 73 Easting to illustrate the progress of a larger conflict. And they love Historical Turning Points (hey, that's catchy), which are typically battles that mark a major shift in how things are going. Either the battle itself changes the outcome of the war, or its unexpected-at-the-time outcome illustrates a larger shift. Examples include Gettysburg, Kursk, and Tukayyid.

The idea is while the larger strategic picture is filled with unbalanced encounters not suited to the table-top, there are moments where things hang in the balance. For example, take a hypothetical civil war in Ambigua. The scrappy survivors of the overthrown Republic are in full retreat, while the People's Revolution rushes in with copious foreign support to secure the capital and solidify their power. In this Ambiguous example, the People's player declares a battle for the capital while the Republican player wants a battle to save his retreating forces. The players (or controllers) have to set up two balanced tabletop scenarios, setting forces, objectives, and outcomes in proportion to the larger strategic balance. The player with the least forces in the battle at the strategic level gets to choose between more play balance on the tabletop and higher stakes in the overall strategic picture.

So the first battle is a city fight. If the Republican player wants higher stakes, he can accept a very lopsided battle between his few remaining Mechs and the People's Revolution's most elite Mechs, backed by copious vehicles and infantry. His goal is to hold them for a set number of turns. If he wins, he keeps the city-- the overall force is holding out despite overwhelming odds. If he loses, the People's Revolution storms the city and the remaining defenders are annihilated. Let's say the Republican player chose instead for an even battle. In that case, it's a Mech vs Mech battle of both side's elites. That the People's Revolution will storm the city is given, so this represents a side battle between their advance guards as the Republic fights to preserve what forces it can in the retreat. Closer odds, lower stakes.

Meanwhile, for the other battle, the People's Revolution player has the disadvantage (not having enough forces in contact with the Republican force). He can choose between a conservative even-odds battle where he merely slows down the Republicans, or go heavens-to-Gretsky and risk confronting a larger but retreating force in the hopes of breaking their morale and causing mass desertions. Either way you shift the story somewhat, but men who desire great rewards must dare great risks.

This approach tries to self-balance. Some people hate playing in walk-overs, and so people in that situation can choose to play it safe on the tabletop with equal forces (still fun) and win at the strategic level. Players willing to be Bambi won't have a great chance against Godzilla, but if they do win, the strategic gains are sufficiently impressive to change the whole picture. Besides, people don't want to fight in the Battle of Who Cares Box Canyon. They want their victories and defeats to mean something. BT tries to do this (unsuccessfully IMO) by keeping the overall force sizes very low relative to the populations/economies/territories they're fighting over. I do this by declaring that the battles are historically important in advance, and why, and then deciding who happens to be there for the fight. That's counter to the merc approach of tracking a single unit through a campaign, but a sufficiently motivated storyteller could arrange for it to be your favorite Sisters of Mercenary unit that just happens to be at every key battle. Just like real Stackpole.

Notice how the bridge between the strategic and table-top levels is slathered in a thick dollop of intuition, BS, and handwavium. This is intended: that's why it's called narrative strategic. It requires that players be friendly and collaborative, but I really don't see why anyone ever plays in a group that isn't like that.