diceless combat feedback

[Malagar]

hey hello,
As you might know, im working on my first "real" ccg at the moment. So Fhizban (my co-designer) and I have decided for a diceless combat sytem (this was also mentioned in the Archon of War thread a while ago). We would appreciate your feedback! Instead of comparing attack with defense values, we decided to split the attack values into different tactics. this adds lots of diversity to the game. ok, lets see:

1. There are four attack values: Charge, Melee, Skirmish and Ranged.
2. When attacking, you choose one of the four to attack with (charge and melee is only available in close-combat, while the other two are available in missile combat, skirmish can be used in CC as well as in MC).
3. your opponent now chooses one attribute to defend with. the available choices depend on the attribute you have chosen (i explain that later in detail, but in short: you can only counter Melee with either Melee or Skirmish etc.)
4. now you and your opponent sum up your units total by adding the attribute values of all troops together.
5. the player with the higher result wins the battle and deals the difference in damage to its opponents unit.

thats the basic, now to the meat of the system.

all four "combat tactics", have advantages and disadvantages. choosing the right tactic at the right time is key to win combat.

1. Melee - the basic tactic. Only use in Close-Combat. If you win a melee combat you deal the difference of totals in damage to your opponents unit. Has no specials besides that it can be used to counter three tactics (charge, melee or skirmish).

2. Ranged - Only use in ranged-combat. Again you deal the difference in damage. The only special thing about ranged is that you must use it in missile combat (thats both a + and a -).

3. Skirmish - Now it gets interesting: Skirmish may be used in close- as well as in missile-combat. It is the most versatile of all combat tactics. when you are using skirmish, your opponents results is treated like he is using skirmish too. Skirmish is quite weak and makes it very difficult to actually defeat an opponents unit. instead of dealing damage, for each point of difference you "recoil" (turn face down) a troop card of your opponent. only when you recoiled as many troops as possible, the excess points can be used to deal damage actually. recoiled troops recover again during the next turn. note: your opponents damage points are also treated like he is using the skirmish tactic!

4. Charge - Like melee, you can use charge only in close combat. Charge is most powerful when your unit moved before it attacks, but you can choose it otherwise too. Charge is treated just like melee combat, any excess points after comparing combat totals, deal damage to your opponents unit. Now, the special thing about charge is, that its attribute rating on all your cards get +1 ,when using charge in the same turn your unit moved.

So, you first move and then attack using the Charge tactic. Any Charge value of 4, doubles up to 8. This makes this combat tactic very powerful. The disadvantage is, that you have to move in order to make it effective and - not all cards feature a charge attribute. As you cannot "split tactics" in a unit, it could be that only some of your cards are able to deal damage. Imagine a unit of 2 cavalry cards and 3 infantry cards charging: Only the cavalry cards have a charge attribute, so the infantry wont deal damage this turn (but, they are legal targets for your opponent still).

Okay thats all. Quite a long post. What do you think? is the system interesting, is it balanced? Do you think especially Skirmish and Charge are balanced? is Skirmish too weak, will Charge be used too seldom?

Thanks for any input from your point of view!
-Malagar

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[jorch72]

will Charge be used too seldom?

Would depend on how many units actually have Charge.
Question, why not do it like in Warhammer 40K, where each unit decides what unit it's going to attack and how (some charge, some normal)?

[Malagar]

maybe my post was not clear about this point: actually they do

your army is made from cards, the cards are seperated into units (stacks of cards), each unit (stack) can decide how to attack by choosing one of the four strategies. say you have three units on the table, one of them could charge, the other shoot in ranged combat and the third attack in melee (provided there is an enemy at their position).

we tested the system again yesterday and it works out quite nicely