Over a Mug of Ale [For A Better Age]

This is my first shot at mass combat, so I was expecting to miss stuff and make mistakes. Any feedback that the group can give is welcome. I looked over the various combat formations, and chose Close as the best bet for defense if the archers have to go to melee weapons if the canibals get past Bjarn's force. I didn't see anything that would benefit me for ranged attack at all.
 
Sherwood said:
This is my first shot at mass combat, so I was expecting to miss stuff and make mistakes. Any feedback that the group can give is welcome. I looked over the various combat formations, and chose Close as the best bet for defense if the archers have to go to melee weapons if the canibals get past Bjarn's force. I didn't see anything that would benefit me for ranged attack at all.
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Like I said, Close Formation is good. In this instance it grants you two benefits--+1 to your Parry DV and +1 to your Attack--but under other circumstances it might not be a wise choice. It makes you more vulnerable to ranged attacks, and it doubles your enemy's magnitude against you, causing your associated Bonus/Penalty to get worse. This isn't a problem for you, since this Bonus/Penalty caps out at +3/-3, and you've already hit that.


Well, had hit that. Their shrinking Magnitude in the wake of your attack actually reduces your Magnitude Penalty by 1.


And yeah, there aren't any real formations that benefit ranged attacks. This is because, in mass combat, ranged attacks are Very Good Things. A ranged attack forces a targeted unit to test for rout. This can only be done to an enemy once between their actions, but once their DV refreshes they're fair game for it again. Ranged is very useful.
 
A note for everyone's convenience: To use Charms that affect multiple individuals in mass combat, the Charm must be capable of targeting a number of individuals equal to the targeted unit's Magnitude. For example, to use Iron Whirlwind Attack against a Magnitude 6 unit, Iron Whirlwind must be capable of striking 6 individuals as limited by the Charm's description.


This does not extend to Reflexive and Supplemental Charms, which can be used regardless of Magnitude.
 
We can fit 8 special characters, right? So I could have the Militia and Valhal leaders as heroes and/or relays (heroes in case of needing someone to stick pointy metal in a mortal, I suppose). There's plenty of characetr-space, anyway.


Will I be able to stock up reflexive attacks with Final Sunset Stance for mass-combat use? I'll leave that to Archivist's decision, I'm really not sure what makes sense.


Can I use Heavenly Guardian Defence and similar defensive Charms freely?
 
MorkaisChosen said:
We can fit 8 special characters, right? So I could have the Militia and Valhal leaders as heroes and/or relays (heroes in case of needing someone to stick pointy metal in a mortal, I suppose). There's plenty of characetr-space, anyway.
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Yeah, you're fine. Just remember that once you hit Magnitude 3 and beyond at least half of your special characters will need to be Relays if you don't want to suffer communications failure.

MorkaisChosen said:
Will I be able to stock up reflexive attacks with Final Sunset Stance for mass-combat use? I'll leave that to Archivist's decision, I'm really not sure what makes sense.
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Most Charm use is ST fiat, and what makes sense. It'd be hard to justify activating Graceful Crane Stance to have your army march across a tightline over a chasm (though not impossible, this is Exalted), but most offensive Charms are a-okay.

MorkaisChosen said:
Can I use Heavenly Guardian Defence and similar defensive Charms freely?
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Unless Archivist decides otherwise, there shouldn't be anything stopping you. One of the examples given in the core involves using Adamant Skin Technique.


If you want to do a glance-over of Charms in mass combat yourself, it can be found in Core Book, pg. 162 under Other Unit Rules.
 
MorkaisChosen said:
My interpretation was that the Close Formation double-magnitude thing is against ranged attacks only, so it's risk-free at the moment.
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Just amending what I was saying earlier to Sherwood:


This is right, I am a giant idiot who cannot read a simple paragraph. I was thinking about Skirmish Formation, not Close.


That is all.
 
Let’s just try to address everything here.


First I would like to say I have made a mistake. It would seem you actually get your armor bonus to your units soak, and you get to use you weapon for damage. For Maiden’s and the Varajtul’s warbands I did their actions the same as we have been doing it, but from this point forward we can do it correctly. Sorry for the inconvenience, still learning the frustratingly difficult to read mass combat rules.


Also could I please ask everyone to post the speed of their actions? Especially when it’s a weapon they are using. That saves me the time of having to look up the speed of each action all the time.


To address Morkais’s questions…


You have no problems with getting relays for Bjarn’s unit. Volund Bearskin, Lunis, an officer from the mercenaries, and Sharp Snowflake can fill those roles.


I see no problems with Final Sunset Stance and Heavenly Guardian Defence. As long as they can be used in justifiable manner I am generally going to ok the use of any charm. If you think a charm might be questionable, feel free to ask.


Also Bjarn’s unit is going to need to make a Route check for entering into melee. Difficulty 1. His unit has Morale of 2 (which you would roll with). Though he loses one dice for that roll due to having a Magnitude of 4, and only having 3 Drill. Naturally there are ways you can add dice to your Morale roll.


Bjarn will be able to use the bonuses with Grimcleaver for his units next action. But not this time due to my goof up.
 
Sorry about the weapon speed; I was going to use my charm again, but then realized I needed to flurry to do damage, so I forgot to put it in the post.
 
MorkaisChosen said:
OOC
Actually, a question: when does DV penalty take effect? If I flurry simultaneously with his attack, is it easier for him to hit?
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Penalties don't take effect until after your action.
 
Awesome. That does, of course, mean that I won't be hitting his lower DV... except I get that wonderful Speed 3 attack for Flashing Draw Mastery.
 
Gross, how did I double post and not realize it?


Character actions should be more character-y soon. New PCs are like new boots, you have to break them in.
 
Just for future referance. I would like to keep rules discussions in the OOC thread. I would prefer if you guys did not pad out game threads with such things considering you get Experiance by the page in this game. If you have a question at the end of a normal post, that will generally be ok. But I would like to not see full on rules discussions in the game threads.


Also if you have a question please do it in the OOC thread. I check all thread pretty much reguarly considering I get a email every time a thread is posted in. So that shouldn't be an issue.


So to pull the latest rulesy problem we might have from the Bjarn's Raid:


"I don’t believe that Ping damage applies if the charm user of Pasiap Still Stands (p. 54 Scroll of the Monk) reduces the number of dice to zero. It does Not use the term Soak in the description. On page 150, it says under Applying Hardness and Soak, “Essence can overcome soak, but it cannot generate damage where it does not exist.†So I believe he can avoid Ping damage this way. If not, here is the Ping Damage rolled up. Either way he is basically spending motes to continue receiving a beat down from Bjarn."
 
Oh, I hadn't thought of that problem with the XP. I'll remember that in future.


The intepretation there seems reasonable to me, it just means Bjarn's going to have to pull some slightly more impressive stuff to land enough damage to eat all his motes. It'd be much less fun if it didn't, anyway...


One slight correction: Bjarn's first attacks are at speed 3, as it's the first tick on which he acts after Join Battle is rolled- FDM says Thrown, but it's Martial-Ready for MA, Archery and Melee. Also also, the shiny new Dawn Anima gives a -1 external penalty on attack rolls, which I don't believe you factored in (not that it matters at this point).


I'll get a post up later.


EDIT: One other question: does a free reflexive attack (such as one stocked with Final Sunset Stance) cause onslaught if used on the same tick as other attacks? Strict RAW says no ("only against the attacks of an individual flurry"), but I just thought I should check.
 
Archivist said:
"I don’t believe that Ping damage applies if the charm user of Pasiap Still Stands (p. 54 Scroll of the Monk) reduces the number of dice to zero. It does Not use the term Soak in the description. On page 150, it says under Applying Hardness and Soak, “Essence can overcome soak, but it cannot generate damage where it does not exist.†So I believe he can avoid Ping damage this way. If not, here is the Ping Damage rolled up. Either way he is basically spending motes to continue receiving a beat down from Bjarn."
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This Charm DOES overcome Ping Damage.


Remember, ping damage is your minimum damage. This Charm reduces damage dice prior to their rolling. So by the time this Charm would be used, you would have already calculated your die pool, and either be rolling [Essence] dice of damage or more.
 
Yep. Keikan's definitely interfering with this duel. Most likely to try to attempt to tag Bjarn out of the duel so he can get back to leading the army, hopefully to intercept the other cannibal force before they wreck the boats.
 
Archivist: You seem to have nudged the Speed ratings too far ahead again. Unless otherwise noted Charms are speed 6, you bumped me 7 ticks forwards. Doesn't make much difference right now though.
 
MorkaisChosen said:
EDIT: One other question: does a free reflexive attack (such as one stocked with Final Sunset Stance) cause onslaught if used on the same tick as other attacks? Strict RAW says no ("only against the attacks of an individual flurry"), but I just thought I should check.
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I would say no. By the rules it seems that only the attacks used together count for onslaught. On page 147 in the core book it states "Onslaught penalties apply only when defending against the character that imposed them and only against the attacks of an individual flurry. If an attacker acts a second time before the defender’s DV refreshes, the onslaught penalty is reset to 0 at the start of the second series of attacks." So I'm going to have to give a no on that.


Also I have updated the tick counter for the duel to include Keikan in the battle, and I corrected Bjarn's speed to that of a 3 tick action. Thanks for pointing that out for me.


Wuffy: Last time I checked 6+6 = 12. Jorik used his charm on tick 6 (a speed 6 action as we both agree), therefore moving 6 ticks down the Tick Counter. Looking at the example they have on page 140 in the care book, this seems to be how it was intended. Or am I missing something or messed my math up somewhere?


Also thanks Tableface for confirming what I suspected to be true for the damage reduction there. Just like to get a second opinion on these things.
 
Crap, my bad.


See bad to look at charts when tired.


Sorry, I was counting six and talking about acting on that last tick... Erf, my apologies.
 
"This way, dissident." is now one of my favourite sayings.


It's probably because Autocthonia is communist and all, but I can't help but picture a Russian accent.
 
I try and imagine someone from eastern Europe(Russia is manifest destiny eastern Europe, not Asia) speaking in broken English when I write Chain; at Least that is the plan.
 
Just so everyone knows. I will go ahead and do attacks and roll damage for NPCs to keep combat going (though it really saves me time when you roll your own attacks and damage). But I will usually leave it ambiguously if an attack actually hits and do damage. This is to allow you guys to use Perfect Defenses, stunts, and other defensive measures to negate the damage done to your characters. I just expect you guys to roleplay in if your character does actually get hit or if it misses in your post. I choose to do it this way considering this seems the quickest way to run combat (the biggest game slower) in a pbp system with Exalted.
 
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