THE EMPIRE STRIKES OUT

 This weeks Wednesday's we played a learning game of Sword and Spear Ancients and Medieval rules. This matched the Imperial Romans against the Celts. The rules threw a lot of new concepts at the group, and it took a bit of time for us to catch on. First is the Activation Systems that uses player specific colored dice randomly drawn in batches. In our case this was 11 dice at a time with 36 dice available. The side that gets the most dice in a draw has the initiative during the phase and goes first. Dice are then rolled and assigned to individual units to activate. Dice rolls too low to work, typically 1s and 2s are discard and 6s give a benefit to movement, or to combat, with the option being up to the player at the time of use. Units are then moved from lowest value up, so 3s, followed by 4, etc., initiative players first. Combat, be it shooting or close combat is resolved immediately. A unit in close combat without an activation die forfeits its activation options and receives an undrawn die from the bag to note this. There are plenty of details I left out, but this was a real key to game play. 

The second concept was all combat is using opposing die rolls. You create a die pool from your base combat ability, any movement and terrain effects, and any skills that the unit's possess. These are rolled and match up in descending order. Any unequal dice are match to a virtual 2 that can cause no damage to the opponent but can prevent damage to the shortfall side. An equal roll is no effect. A higher roll causes a check to see if it caused damage, this is typically a 4+ save, A roll that is double or better automatically causes damage. There are a number of skills that can modify dice rolls and effects, but this is the basics. 

Once we got the hang of how all this worked the game moved along at a fairly quick pace. The final outcome was a draw, and everyone seemed to have a good time. I am sure these rules will be played again in the near future. I was rather involved in the learning process, so I nearly forgot to take pictures. Here are the few I did take. 

The Game in Action About Mid Battle. Celts on the Left, Romans on the Right. The Blue Dice You See are the Activation Dice for that Contingent of Romans. 

My Celtic Cavalry Pouring in on the Roman Rear. Entering the Table was as Far as I got Before Real-World Issues Required me to Leave.