For our monthly Saturday gathering at Talitas Mexican restaurant, I decided to stage another playtest of the skirmish rules, "Song of Blades and Heroes." These are actually a set of fantasy skirmish rules that I feel are easily adapted to Dark Ages. I drew up a troop list with three 300 point commands (SBH's recommend size per player) on each side. The Vikings were approaching a Pictish village to raid and pillage, but the inhabitants have been warned and are lurking in "ambush." Actually, my first title of the scenario was The Ambush, but the outcome would make it too ironic.
One Pictish Warband, composed mostly of militia spearmen, with a few javelinmen, and led by the religious leader Oengus Finechta hid behind the walls of a farm on the edge of the village. In SBH, there are two main characteristics of figures: Quality, which is the number on 1d6 they must roll or exceed to act; And Combat Value, which is the number each figure adds to 1d6 when in combat. The militia of Oengus' warband were all Q4 and C3. The other two Pictish warbands lurked at the edges of a pair of woods bordering the road the Vikings would have to take to the village. The chieftain, Gest Gurthinmoch, had his Hearth Men around him -- 3 noble warriors (Q3, C4) and 4 younger warriors (Q3, C3). Another village leader, Udrost Tavae, led 6 militia spearmen and 2 militia javelinmen (both Q4, C3, but Javelinmen with Long Range).
The lead Viking command was headed by the longship captain's nephew, Conal Bloodsword. He led a force of 3 Viking archers and 3 Viking Raiders (both Q4, C4, except the archers had Long Range and the Raiders Heavy Armor). Following him was the overall Viking commander, Wulfgar Wyrmsson, surrounded by 4 picked Huscarles. These elites had Heavy Armor and were Q3, C4. The rearguard was Wulfgar's trusted helmsman, Hrothgar, with six more Viking raiders (as above). As they neared the village, Wulfar brought his command alongside Conal's, and they moved forward like an armored fist towards the Picts.
The Picts in the woods broke out and closed quickly, but ended up striking the Vikings piecemeal. The chieftain's warband faced off against the Vikings led by both Conal and Hrothgar, being caught in the front and flank. Disaster struck when Gurthinmoch was strucked down early and many of his men fled. Meanwhile, the Oengus' Picts hurtled the wall and advanced to the aid of their chieftain. Wulfgar left his subordinates to deal with the other Picts and charged towards this new force. Oengus tried to lapp his men around the smaller Viking force's right, but the Huscarles cut through his front so quickly the tactic didn't work. Meanwhile, Udrost Tavae's spearmen closed in on the two Viking commands mopping up the forces of his chief and scored the only successes of the Picts. Several Vikings fell to Tavae's men, but in the end, they were outlcassed and outnumbered, and driven from the field. When Oengus was slain by a Viking axe, many of his men fled, as well. With all Pictish commands in retreat or decimated, the village lay open to the Viking plunderers, and soon succumbed to their assault.
So, in our second game, once again, the Vikings slaughtered the Picts. This was an entirely new group of playtesters, and they felt strongly that the Picts had little chance in this game. The fact that most were combat value 3, and the Vikings 4 (with Heavy Armor), essentially meant the Picts had to outroll the Vikings by 2 to have any effect. Their conclusion was that the point system did not accurately reflect the chances of poorer quality troops against better ones. Next game, I will bring the combat values up to generally equal -- but keep the Viking Heavy Armor -- and see if that makes it more of a contest.
Other than that, we did make two changes to the rules on Group Moves. I removed the upper limit of 5 figures on group size, and allowed the entire warband to move together, if it wished. I also allowed the Leader to move with a group, if he chose. In this case, the group activated at with the Leader's Quality number, or that of the lowest quality with the leader's +1 bonus. Since no troops were two worse than their leaders, this meant, in effect, a group led by the Leader simply used his Quality. This seemed to work well and didn't cause any problems.
I did not use a "zone of control" like I'd contemplated and the rules author had suggested on the Song of Blades yahoo group. Instead, I enforced more strictly the rule that figures must move in a straight line -- they cannot "hook" around the end of an enemy battleline. This seemed to control some of the excesses of our first playtest.
I still enjoy how the rules play and work. It takes no time at all for players to pick up how combat works, and only a couple turns to understand the concept of activating units, losing initiative, and so on. We will continue to try these rules out for at least one more game. Every player has said they enjoyed them, and that's the ultimate goal, isn't it? For the players to have fun?