Art De La Guerre

[garyp]

Hello to All - new to game and forum - general philosophical question in lead up to our first game which I know will be asked by a lot of players in our group:

Why are the base combat factors so low - 0,1, or 2 unless I am misreading - which seems to make the dice roll potentially very swingy - like LH vs LH in DBx games - its a bit of a lottery.

I note that "average dice" is a suggested optional rule - and would seem to even out the potential results - but note several posts here that generally do not support it.

[belinconnux]

Hello garyp.
First average dice. Some people like other hate ... it's not so simple because average dice gives avantage to elite and armor generally.

For low factor, when I suggest you to ask Hervé
_________________
Hasta la victoria Siempre!
Peter Lord dobeul impact

[danikine74]

soon you can also add some +1, +2... up to you to manage them for not depend only on the dice rolling

[belinconnux]

Yes but something is true : dice is very important.
So try to avoid deuce combat and try to engage combat with bonus (minimum +2). Is you can't try a prier ...
_________________
Hasta la victoria Siempre!
Peter Lord dobeul impact

[Hazelbark]

About 5 years ago I would have been in favor of average dice for the reasons you say. I then was playing a different game.

I have changed my mind and I think the instability of a 6 vs 1 is important.

Historically generals had a great deal of uncertainty. Many players prefer certainty in the game. What I find is superior players want certainty in outcome because it allows them engineer a victory and avoid a defeat. The result is the player who better understands the mechanics and perhaps strategy triumphs.

Even still, in ADLG, a simple +1 advantage is combat is a 58% chance of winning. That is a pretty big advantage considering the remaining 42% is split between losing and drawing.

I have seen some wild luck, but I find in ADLG a single unexpected catastrophic series of rolls does not reverse the game sufficiently. Usually the following turn returns to normal distribution. LI and LC may go poof. But most other units only take 1-2 hits per melee.

I think the wilder luck options makes a tenser game.

[danikine74]

i do agree

[garyp]

Thanks All - after pondering this a bit more last night I think my original thought process was in fact flawed - basically it seemed that the "luck/random" part of the combat result (in the range +5 to -5) was significantly greater than the "tactical" factors that the player actually engineers by troop match ups and supports and such like in the range maybe +2/3 to -2/3 and often evens or just +1 to -1?

But as pointed out above, in fact the outcome of the dice is often quite narrow - 17% evens, just under 50% in the range +1 to -1, and 67% in the range +2 to -2.

So only 33% of dice will give a result of +3/4/5 or -3/4/5 - which of course will significantly increase the impact of your great play or alternatively negate or even overwhelm it and turn your winning manoeuvres into a loss! But such is the nature of battle I guess.

[belinconnux]

I'd often seen bad series of "1" in combat. I remember nine "1" in ten draw ... and I was the one who drawn
Another time I drawn five 5-6 in seven combat.
So luck is an important factor inAdG. But look : there is very little people who wins tournament and they aren't luckier just better.

But remember
"Each bad situation could be reverse by a 6 - 1! "
_________________
Hasta la victoria Siempre!
Peter Lord dobeul impact

[hcaille]

Another important thing :

A player can always complain having bad die roll instead of having to admit it's battle plan was not so good ...

[chris6]

Indeed! Thats the most important aspect!
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[belinconnux]

[belinconnux]

OK lost a game with my son 1hour ago

First my ally decide to observ the battle but not to fight ...
then I'd never draw more than "2" for command dice.
Finally my dice killed me all along the game.
My poor son did'nt dare draw his dice.

An avantage : a short game!

So I remember now : I'm agree with garyp : base combat factor are toooooo low!
_________________
Hasta la victoria Siempre!
Peter Lord dobeul impact

[stuuk]

We have recently been playing with a D4 for melee only.
Everything else remains D6.

Elite +1 if you roll a 1 or 2. Poor/Mediocre -1 if you roll a 3 or 4.


We found the original D6 melee combat to be a bit too random for our tastes because the basic factor of troops is generally quite low. Also average dice roll average, on average which wasn't so great.
The D4 means that the potential range is 3 pips instead of 5 pips.

[belinconnux]

another possibility is to draw 3 D6 ans discard the low and the high.
This a quite good method.
_________________
Hasta la victoria Siempre!
Peter Lord dobeul impact

[garyp]

Interesting idea to use a d4 to limit the impact of the dice on the combat outcome.

After more contemplation about the low base combat factors and the possible results on the d6 I guess that a 33% chance of a +/-3 or greater swing due to the dice is actually quite high.

Stuuk - have you found that this slows down the game much as I am speculating that you will now have longer sustained combats?