Forged upon an Anvil

Forged upon an Anvil is based on the concepts in the Forged upon Avalon rules by Warzan on BOW/OTT. The changes and development mostly concern moving the game away from its Chess and King Arthur inspiration and moving it towards what I consider to be fantasy elements. Changes have been made to the sequence of play, type of units, the combat resolution matrix and the unit’s abilities. At its core the rules retain their no dice roll and movement focused features.

Most notably the General has been dropped as its own unit and instead is a designation given to any other unit, making it possible for the General to by anything from an independent character to mounted on a war machine or on top of a monster. The Champion and the Druid has changed name to Hero and Wizard, which is in line with their designation in the early fantasy rules of the 1970s onwards. Furthermore, I have introduced a Monster unit to take Dragons, Demons, Hydras or any other huge and dangerous living creature into account. The Combat Resolution Matrix has been adjusted to the new unit types into account.

The Sequence of Play has been modified so that the bidding of command points start already in the setting up of the battlefield. This is to encourage players to place more terrain, and thereby make manoeuvrer more challenging. Although not written down in the beta ver. 0.1. of the rules, it might be interesting to try if putting down only 1 or 2 pieces of terrain should penalise the player on turn 1, by decreasing the number of available command points by 2 and 1 respectively. Command points from the setting the battlefield carry over into turn 1, up to 2 extra making the first turn possible total 12.

Initiative is now won by bidding how many command points one wishes to use. The lower bid goes first. This make it possible to use a wound dial, or similar device as a hidden bidding system. In essence it is the same blind bid controlling initiative. Furthermore, if both players bid the same number of command points, they bid again by withholding or lowering their bid. This forces them to priorities even more, and removes player always being able to have first mover advantage, as it is in Chess. If players run out of command points to bid, you just start over again until they bid differently. The rules doesn’t specify if a new turn should begin or not at this stage, as I have not made up my mind about if it matters.

The Combat Resolution Matrix is in most respects untouched, although a number of interactions have been changed. Of note is the distance of Bounce Back, which for all units have been set at 3”. In the table I have strived to tailor the different units to serve complementary purposes, although this is where I am the most unsure of what happens in actual play. The combat resolution mechanic needs playtesting in all its potential combinations. Especially the effects of interaction with different Stratagems.

In Forged in Avalon a number of abilities were presented as potential uses in the rules system. I have changed the name of these to Stratagems, as this is a suitable name for abilities employed by a general in combat. The Stratagems have also been expanded into two main types, those used once when a unit is deployed incurring abilities that last for the entire game, and the others which are used in play. The Deployment Stratagems are a method to specialize a player’s units into having specific battlefield roles or being deployed in a strategic manner. With these it is possible to create variants of the basic unit types, that hopefully will cover most fantasy troupes. The other Stratagems effect the outcome of gameplay. The include fantastical powers, tactics and ruses that may be used as game progresses. Two abilities grant the players the possibility to go beyond what units they have in their initially chosen armies. This might not be to everyone’s liking, and certainly also needs playtesting to adjudicate its viability.

These designer’s notes do now take up more words than the core rules of Forged upon an Anvil, which is why I need to close out now. Please give the rules a try and feedback what you think of them, and their viability as a fun and challenging game. Due to the current EVENT, my own possibility of playtesting them within a short time period is severly limited. Most of the rules require two players, and I doubt they would suit soloplay. So therefore my own venture to be Forged upon an Anvil will have to wait.

Happy Hobbying!

Peaceful Warrior