Domains at War: Battles!

First, let me say that I’m super thrilled to finally have my copy of Domains at War. I’d been anticipating this for a long time, and I think it’s the only rulebook I’ve ever sat down and read in one sitting. I am wholly delighted with your product, as I hoped I would be.

I’m very excited to flood your forum with questions once again!

  1. If casualties are determined based on UHP lost at the end of the battle, and a unit receives healing, does that prevent the losses? IE: I have a unit of trolls. My trolls get flanked by heavy cavalry and take 10 UHP (and pass their morale checks for taking 1/3rd of their UHP in damage) and then the battle drags on for 9 more rounds, so the trolls are only down by 1 at the end. Does that mean I lose almost none of them?

  2. Under the viable targets for melee attacks, it says I should attack someone who wasn’t attacked this round if possible. I’m assuming that that “if possible” only refers to if multiple targets are threatened? IE:

My unit, Troll A, is threatening Elven Longbowmen A and B. My unit Troll B is threatening only Longbow B. If I activate Troll A first, he can attack Longbow B. If I then activate Troll B, he can still attack Longbow B, because that’s his only eligible target. Had I activated Troll B first, Troll A would’ve been forced to attack Longbow A, because he had a choice.

  1. So, as I understand it, there’s no upper limit to how many units can be in a division, but there is a limit to how many units can be useful within a division, correct? IE: A general might assign 30 units of trolls to his warchief commander, but if that chief only has 5 Leadership, then 25 units of trolls will simply stand around on any given turn. Even fewer, if the chief wants to activate trolls who get disordered or go out of range.

  2. Also, “A general performs all the functions of a commander” means he commands a division, right? So an army with three divisions will have one general and two commanders?

  3. Can voluntary and involuntary retreat stack?

IE:

A unit of loose foot humans are flanked by some trolls and take 4 damage. They choose to retreat 2 hexes (their full marching speed) to reduce that to 2 damage. 2 is still more than half their UHP, so they check shock. They get a 10, modified to 5 (-1 light infantry morale, -2 disordered, -2 below half) which means they flee another 4 hexes backwards, meaning that they moved 6 hexes on the enemy turn.

  1. Units can’t retreat through units normally. Can a unit retreat through threatened hexes?
  1. If casualties are determined based on UHP lost at the end of the battle, and a unit receives healing, does that prevent the losses? IE: I have a unit of trolls. My trolls get flanked by heavy cavalry and take 10 UHP (and pass their morale checks for taking 1/3rd of their UHP in damage) and then the battle drags on for 9 more rounds, so the trolls are only down by 1 at the end. Does that mean I lose almost none of them?

APM: That’s correct. Casualties are assessed at the end of the battle.

  1. Under the viable targets for melee attacks, it says I should attack someone who wasn’t attacked this round if possible. I’m assuming that that “if possible” only refers to if multiple targets are threatened? IE:

My unit, Troll A, is threatening Elven Longbowmen A and B. My unit Troll B is threatening only Longbow B. If I activate Troll A first, he can attack Longbow B. If I then activate Troll B, he can still attack Longbow B, because that’s his only eligible target. Had I activated Troll B first, Troll A would’ve been forced to attack Longbow A, because he had a choice.

APM: That’s correct.

  1. So, as I understand it, there’s no upper limit to how many units can be in a division, but there is a limit to how many units can be useful within a division, correct? IE: A general might assign 30 units of trolls to his warchief commander, but if that chief only has 5 Leadership, then 25 units of trolls will simply stand around on any given turn. Even fewer, if the chief wants to activate trolls who get disordered or go out of range.

APM: That’s correct. But remember that a general IS limited in how many division commanders he can have in his army. So when an army gets too big, it can become a command-and-control nightmare! For a historical example, see the Battle of Gaugamela, in which a large portion of the Persian infantry stand around and do nothing for most of the battle!

  1. Also, “A general performs all the functions of a commander” means he commands a division, right? So an army with three divisions will have one general and two commanders?

APM: That’s correct.

  1. Can voluntary and involuntary retreat stack?

IE: A unit of loose foot humans are flanked by some trolls and take 4 damage. They choose to retreat 2 hexes (their full marching speed) to reduce that to 2 damage. 2 is still more than half their UHP, so they check shock. They get a 10, modified to 5 (-1 light infantry morale, -2 disordered, -2 below half) which means they flee another 4 hexes backwards, meaning that they moved 6 hexes on the enemy turn.

APM: Yes they can stack. A unit’s Marching speed does not represent its full movement capability. A unit doing both a voluntary and involuntary retreat is in considerable disarray and moving at something more like a vaguely chargish speed…

  1. Units can’t retreat through units normally. Can a unit retreat through threatened hexes?

APM: Yes, it can.

Now that I’ve handled the questions, let me say “thank you very much for your kind words!” I hope you get a lot of use and enjoyment out of it.

So, we got halfway through the example battle before tragedy struck, but it generated two new questions.

  1. Can Readied attacks allow for melee attacks “through” allies? That is, the text states that a reaction attack can be made as long as the reacting unit is either being attacked or adjacent to the unit being attacked, but not that the reacting unit actually be threatening the attacker’s hex.

My instinct is that this feels very strange and that I must be missing something; my player argued that it could represent that unit moving forward to defend their comrades.

  1. Does a Loose unit’s voluntary damage-reducing retreat provoke an advance from Irregular units? I’m assuming it does.
  1. You were correct and your player was incorrect.

After you determine eligibility to perform a reaction attack, you then follow the steps in the attack sequence starting with Declare Method of Attack. The requirements in that step will preclude a melee attack against a target the unit does not threaten.

  1. Yes. In fact, this is one of the best tactics to use when dealing with beastmen…
  1. Yes. In fact, this is one of the best tactics to use when dealing with beastmen…

Oh! Never considered that!

The introductory scenario, which pits the Aurans versus the Beastmen, should give you a sense of how things work. Beastmen are faster, stronger, and tougher than human troops - so you only can beat them by exploiting their command and control flaws. It’s worth playing that scenario a few times to get the hang of things.

It was actually while playing that scenario that questions kept arising!

Out of curiosity, what was the rationale behind the rules for ranged units? That is, why are they limited to only attacking the nearest eligible enemy, and why can’t they fire into melee? I recognize that few commanders would be callous enough to risk friendly fire, but incredibly callous commanders are a hallmark of fantasy!

Can the victorious army collect monster parts, and if so, is this factored into the collected wealth?

Given that an orc’s monthly wages are only 6 or 9 gold, this would represent a substantial boost in spoils of war for my party that just defeated a half-thousand beastmen. (Even if most of them were merely routed, that’s still an easy 2-3k extra)

  1. Whatever we say about callous commanders in history, player-commanders are always more callous. A tactic that is rare and borderline will become commonplace.

  2. The tactic would rarely be useful. Given the arc of plunging fire, the configuration of typical armor/shields, and the formation of fighting troops, arrows fired from behind friendly lines into a fight would disproportionately strike the unshielded rear of the friendly units, and not the armored and shielded front of the enemy.

  3. It makes the game less fun if you allow callous fire-into-melee. Rather than reward proper tactics (firing missile units before melee to soften up and disorder the opposition), it rewards high-HP units that charge right into the enemy and then attrit them with missile fire on top of that.

What a delightful question! No, monster parts are not already factored in. I would say that you could collect monster parts, yes, although I don’t know if I’d allow full value. Some of the corpses will be rotten, mangled, or ruined; others will be messed up by soldiers unskilled in the monster-part collection process; the market price might go down from flooding it…

THIS CALLS FOR GAME MECHANICS!

Can Beastman prisoners be ransomed in the same way as normal ones?

That is very much up to you and your campaign setting. Within my own campaign setting, they are sold as slaves.

I’m really curious to see what you come up with for this one- I’ve sat down a few times with the intention of coming up with a house rule for this, but I keep coming back to the central question:

“What historical analogue can we approximate monster-harvesting by? It’s not like we can open a history book and see that in battle, 80% of spartans would return home with a box of livers.”

Japanese samurai and the taking of enemy heads?

Bumping for mechanics

I started by taking the value of an Orc Infantry’s equipment, then assuming he’d drop everything but his armor if he routed, and then assuming the entire unit routed and multiplying the proportion of the unit that’d escape with their leather/scale mail on their backs (Presumably if they’re routing they don’t have time to strip). That gave me a really high number, so I went ahead and cut it down to 60%, assuming that all non-PC equipment follows the terrible-equipment chart.

That STILL gave me a number was was twice as high as their monthly wage. This gave me the real number I was looking for- For light infantry, roughly 50% of their GP value that they bring onto the field actually turns into loot for the commander. For heavy infantry, it’s closer to 60-70%, which seems reasonable- Them flashier, more expensive stuff is both more resistant to being trampled and much harder for soldiers to pocket without adding to the loot pile first. (I’m assuming that ‘unauthorized’ looting was at least semi-rampant, and the general’s 50% share isn’t actually 50% of what was found.)

Thus, assuming that looting and durability are roughly equivalent issues for monster parts as for spears and rotted leather armor, I’ve decided to give players 1/2 the harvested value for units with less than 2 HD, and for units with 2 HD or more it’s assumed to be folded into the loot received from them. (Because if you’re not taking the unicorn’s horn, then it beats me what the Unicorn carried onto the battlefield that was worth 800 gp when it was slain)

This, 90 slain orcs will yield 45 orc fangs, or 450 extra gold. The other 45 fangs are presumably either destroyed in the fighting, or looted on their own initiative by soldiers.