Big Ass Games and CAs

[gull2112]

I have a question primarily for the jersey boys who routinely play 3 player games. What would be the effect IYHO of capping a player's CAs at four. No matter how big your army is you can only exercise so much control. The points formula works for 1500 to 2000 point armies, but not really very well beyond those limits, from what I can derive between your session reports and others comments. Actually, when playing 1500 point armies I find the loss of the fourth CA really painful, so maybe even just having four CAs be the allotment always granted. This would have really large armies become very unwieldly, which is as they should be. To counter that, a player who is facing two 1500 point armies with a 3000 point army, would probably build a more leviathon and elite based force (Lots of colossals and ogre mercs, Longbeards, Deathknights, Elder Blades). I think it would be lots of fun and makes me wish I had two other opponents to Duke it out with on this scale.

Maybe I'll just play a 3000 v. 3000 game on a standard sized board where, in the interest of having the most points contact the enemy soonest, a player would want high point units. Hmmm. 

[gornhorror]

What about this?  Having one command action per 500 points up to 2000.  Then, one command action per 1000 points after that? 

[RushAss]

I like subtracting a CA once a player hits 4000 points, but I think 6 CAs is fine for 3000 point armies.  We haven't really noticed a significant problem until somebody is playing a 4000 point army against a team of two 2000 point armies.  7 CAs at that level feels fine for me.  Brook's solution basically says that a 3000 point army would receive 5 CAs and a 4000 point army would receive 6.  That's not too far off either and I'm sure that could work out well, but the thought of playing a 4000 point army with only 4 CAs is rather daunting.  Especially if you are facing a team of two 2000 point armies that get 4 CAs each.  Yuck.

Concerning points density, we've found that at the 3000 point level expanding the map to accomidate for a 10 unit wide deployment zone works really well.  We've also played 4000 point games with that battlefield size, but they can get to be quite dense at that point so we've lately been expanding them out to allow for a 12 unit wide deployment zone.  This is still denser than a 2000 point army deployed 7 wide, but it's not that much of a difference.  

[gull2112]

Just for discussion purposes, what would it be like having a 2000 point v 3000 point battle if the CAs were capped at 4?

Furthermore, to simulate a large unwieldly conscript army facing a smaller professional army, How about the larger army having a 250 point core based requirement? Or maybe a 1500 v 2250 point battle with the different core requirements and 4 CAs each?

Obviously, which faction was used would matter more, so it would be an interesting variation to select the kingdom's scenario first and then double blind choose the army (knowing your army size).

[Kevin]

You're going to love when the Persia faction finally comes out!  You get to trade CAs for more army build points!

[gull2112]

You're going to love when the Persia faction finally comes out!  You get to trade CAs for more army build points!

[like]

[elgin_j]

Just for discussion purposes, what would it be like having a 2000 point v 3000 point battle if the CAs were capped at 4?

That would actually be really interesting, I suspect.  All things being equal the larger army should always win and, in historical examples, when smaller ones have dominated it has usually been as a result of blunders by command of the larger.  Capping CAs (or equalising them) would be an interesting way to play that out as if the larger army player makes a mistake they won't have the CA agility to recover quickly.

Perfect thing to try out when the vassal module kicks off.

[gull2112]

I agree with the vassal proposition.

The only issue I see with the capped command actions is that it could end up that a player just plays with an equal size army and then calls up the rest as reinforcements, rather than try and wield the whole effectively at one time. I don't know if that would work out though. But the reason I increased core minimums is because otherwise the player would just buy a 2000 point sized army and fill it with expensive troops, which isn't the unwieldly army effect I was going for.

[GoIndy]

Coming in late...but whatever, since I'm one of the Jersey guys.

It only really matters when the army has been decimated.  So for 5 turns and we are trading blows, it doesn't feel in any way excessive.  It's when it gets done to 6 units a side (I obviously made that number up) that it starts to weird out.

If the team of two guys have 3 units apiece, everything seems fine.

If the team of two guys has 1 unit and 5 units versus 6....this is where it gets weird.  And here's the problem, this happens WAY more often than what you would think.  The guy with 1 probably failed a rout check, or had a unit underperform, or the enemy had a guy or two way overperform, causing in essence the whole line to go kaput.  We've all played the game...it happens.  The odds of having one guy on the team underperform and one guy overperform happens MOST of the time.  (Like 3/4) 

So what happens....

The guy with one unit in essence has a super unit.  He'll be carding the nether hells out of that clown.  The guy with multiple units will be sort of be  card deficient, as he has 5 times the units to card.  The guy playing the big stack will have his spread out as normal.

I'm thinking we allow allies to have our CA's...that'd do it all good.  Me:  "Hey Brook, take 2 of my CA's...I doubt my wildmen archers need more than 2 anyway"...Brook:  "About time...hack"

[gull2112]

Wasn't it discussed somewhere to rule that you may never have more command actions than units? Though one thing that I don't like about the BG rules system is that your army gets more easy to command as it gets whittled down. Your army should be tougher to control as it falls apart.
How about this:
You may never have more command actions than core units. To a minimum of one.
On second thought, that's too futsey. I mean futsey in the sense that it can affect how a player fights with his army and makes core too premium.
You could divide the numbr of units in the initial army and divide that by the number of command actions with any remainder going last and then lose a CA everytime you lose a group. So if you had a 2000 point army and eleven units the groups would be 3,3,3,2 and seven units would be 2,2,2,1.

This might need to be playtested.

[RushAss]

This might need to be playtested.

Ahem. 

Are you trying to tell us something Mike?