Company Rules and Knightly Orders
Author: Mr_Wayne © 2007
Before you read this, bear in mind that this is my first composition of a set of House Rules. All questions are welcome, but I might not be able to answer all as they might pose too technically difficult.
Here goes nothing. Happy reading.
Company Rules and Knightly Orders
The basic idea behind these rules is to give very large armies the feeling of being real battles instead of little skirmishes. As it is now, Chronopia is a skirmish game where a few miniatures battle it out against an enemy force of likewise size. When I read the background fluff in the rulebooks, the battles described are vast, with thousands of warriors, whole companies marching out and heroes joining together to fill the empty pages of the history. I miss that and want to fight like that on the tabletop
So I began to think of supplement rules to use when fielding a very big army of about 4000p and more. The major issue is that there is nothing that rewards players using the “weaker” trooptypes such as Macemen, Swordsmen, Followers and other basic infantry. There is described everywhere that the core of the armies are the infantry, but when I look on the armylists that players show me they are full of very specialist warbands, such as Iron Guard, Ogre Heavy Infantry, Cursed and Dark Eyes and the Elven Houses specialists. Sure, I’m convinced that these warbands have a representation on every field of battle, but not in numbers that compares to the basic grunt.
This is the lists of what I consider is Basic Infantry:
Firstborn:
Swordsmen
Macemen
Longbowmen
Crossbowmen
Devout:
Swordsmen
Greatswordsmen
Risen (every race with any weaponry)
Elves:
Militia
Axemen
Swordsmen
Spearmen
Archers
Blackblood:
Goblin Swordmasters
Orc Swordsmen
Orc Archers
Orc Assault Warriors
I call this rule The Companies.
When these enter the field of battle, they do so in Companies. One company is between 3 to 4 warbands large. Every warband in a company operates individually. Every warband always has the maximum number of soldiers, not including specialist such as Greatswords, Axemasters et.c. - all those are optional purchases. A company only contains one type of troops – one company cannot contain 2 units of Orc Swordsmen and 1 unit of Orc Archers. For every company your have in your army you are entitled to one extra Individual.
Example: I field an Firstborn Army containing 4 units of Swordsmen, 3 units of Macemen, 2 units of Black Sisters and 1 unit of Iron Guard. For that I am entitled to a total of 12 Individuals ( One for every warband = 10 and two more for the Compaies of Swordsmen and Macemen ).
Another thing I miss is the ability to field units of real heavy cavalry, and the idea of a group of Repulsar Knights clashing with members of the Obsidian Guard or the horrible thought of the Deathseekers joining together to wreak havoc among the terrified enemy. The thunderous charge of the Mounted Knights or a warband of Dragonbane Knights leaping over a wall of elven spears straight into the advancing enemy.
All these are Individuals and they are knights in one sense of the word or another.
This is the list of what I refer to as Knights:
Firstborn:
Mounted Knight (4-6), two of these may be Mounted Axemen.
Repulsar Knight (3-5)
Devout:
(These are not knights, but they are powerfull and are social and live in groups)
The Tormented (3)
The Damned (3)
Elves:
Dragonbane Knights (4-6), one of these may be a Dragonbane Warkiller.
Obsidian Guard (3-5)
Blackblood:
Orc Kutara Lancer (4-6), two of these may be Double Mounted Kutaras.
Ogre Deathseekers (3-5), one of these may be a Troll Deathseeker.
I call this rule The Knightly Orders.
When fielding an army of over 4000p you can choose to buy these Individuals as members of their own little Warband. You can buy a maximum of one warband of Knights for every Company you field. They must now obey all the rules governing warbands, and only the designated Leader may use the Commanding Prescence SA. They do not take slots for Individuals and in addition this kind of warband does NOT generate one Individual, but instead adds a -1 to the total number of Individuals allowed to be fielded by the army. If one type of Individual is choosen to be affected by this rule, then ALL Individuals of that kind in the Army must be included in the warband. If this kind of unit becomes paniced or gets wiped out, all other friendly warbands within LOS receives a permanent -3 to their LD. This modefier disapears if the affected warband breaks another warband and sends them into panic.
Example: I field an Firstborn Army containing 4 units of Swordsmen, 3 units of Macemen, 2 units of Black Sisters and 1 unit of Repulsar Knights. For that I am entitled to a total of 10 Individuals ( One for every warband not including the Repulsar Knights = 9, and two more for the Companies of Swordsmen and Macemen, and -1 for the unit of Repulsars ).
The main idea is to speed the game up a bit, but such large battles are still whole-day affairs. The mounted troops (let´s say the Dragonbane) are in my opinion real killers as they easily wipe out entire warbands and are so incredibly mobile. But if they get swamped up by a punchsoaking company of FB Swordsmen or such they soon get ineffective. Add a unit or two of Black Sisters going in to finish them off and you have lost a really expensive warband and send ripples of unease through your main army in the form of the -3 LD modifier.
The fast and powerfull units are to be gamewinners, but they are likewise a big problem should they be fielded unwisely. They can win the day and lose the day.
Comments
First version from 24.03.2008. Last Version from 24.03.2008.