Home Rules, Period Additions & Optional Systems for All the King's Men |
This page is dedicated to new rules ideas and special cases that can be added to the All the King's Men game. The main rulebook provides a foundation for fighting horse-and-musket battles with toy soldiers. It can't cover every contingency or situation, though, which is where this page comes in.
The following entries are proposed new rules. They're completely optional, so you can pick and choose from them as you please. In many cases, inspiration for these variants is a military period in and of itself. Different eras are characterized by different technology and tactics, all of which can be emulated with systems to capture the military flavor of the time.
Many of these rules are still works in progress. Feel free to try them out and send your thoughts or contributions. If you have any of your own ATKM home rules, feel free to send them and we'll look at adding them to this page.
Ken Cliffe
ken@allthekingsmentoysoldiers.com |
General Errata
This section is dedicated to some gut check ideas I have about the rules, and I want to try them out. They're mostly revisions of the existing rules.
• Change the +4 defensive bonus that skirmisher and artillery units get in open formation when under fire, reducing it to +2. It seems like these units are a little impervious to fire for their headcount, so a decrease of their defense bonus might be in order
• I find myself wrestling with the "Overriding the Deck" optional idea on page 13 of the rulebook. From time to time, a player can be forced into showing a lot of his hand in a turn when cards of his color keep turning up, one after another. The existing rule of ignoring the latest card drawn at the expensive of a command point might be costly for only a small return.
Perhaps try this, instead:
For each point of a general’s rating (1-3), he can ignore the latest card of his color that’s flipped. So, he can do so anywhere from one to three times per turn. The next card is turned and play proceeds normally. The only card of your color that can't be ignored is the 2.
If multiple players team up to command an army, use the score of their highest rated general to determine how many cards their army can ignore per turn. Any player on a side can invoke a deck override.
• The chart for determining the forces in your army on p. 10 of the rules doesn't really give an appropriate representation of troop types and how many of them might be in a battle. I failed to account for probabilities in the dice rolls. Use this chart instead:
Roll Unit Type
2-6 Infantry
7 Cavalry
8-9 Skirmisher
10-12 Artillery
General Periods
Skirmishing Cavalry: In various periods and armies throughout the horse-and-musket era, some cavalry units are trained to operate independently, much like foot skirmishers. They're typically defined as "light" cavalry. These mounted troops spy on enemy movements, protect supply lines, guard their armies' flanks, and even snipe at the opposition.
Skirmisher cavalry units are usually composed of 6 troops, an officer and an ensign. They're generally treated like dismounted skirmisher units, with some exceptions.
• Cavalry skirmishers operate in loose formation at all times. They can move up to 24 inches in an activation.
• Mounted troopers can radiate as far as 12 inches from the officer and/or ensign at the center of their unit.
• Cavalry skirmishers can initiate melee. They get 1/1 dice against opposing units of all kinds. Enemy infantry does not seek to form square against skirmisher cavalry that charges.
• Cavalry skirmishers can fire up to a range of 6 inches.
• A unit might even be capable of skirmishing mounted and dismounted. Simply trade out figures on the table between riders and footmen, as appropriate. Mounting and dismounting are each considered a formation change, so must occur at the end of movement in an activation. Horse holders and riderless horses aren't required on the table when these units dismount. Horses are assumed to be present until the unit "changes formation" again. All normal skirmisher rules from ATKM apply to these soldiers when they dismount.
Woodland Indians (by Matthew Grove and Ken Cliffe): Woodland Indian units in North America's horse-and-musket period are always dismounted skirmishers. While a skirmisher unit has a standard 6 soldiers and 2 command, Indian war parties can vary in size from 6 to up to 12 warriors. Members of a war band can extend up to a 12-inch radius from the leaders of their group. A war party "officer" is called a chief, while a war party "ensign" is a brave. A chief figure may be adorned with tribal regalia, while a brave is a hero of the band and his miniature may bear a captured enemy coat or weapon.
Indian movement and firing ranges are unique. They can move up to 18 inches (always in loose formation). They can fire only 12 inches, however, due to limited availability and skill with muskets, and because they use other weapons such as bows and tomahawks.
Unlike other skirmishers, Indian war bands can initiate melee against most targets. They cannot do so against cavalry units. Indians in melee roll dice according to their current color, rather than red as ordinary skirmishers do. Of course, Indians roll green dice for initiating hand-to-hand combat.
Indian units are treated as militia.
Since Indians are never truly under a general's command, no command point needs to be spent to activate a band when it's currently yellow or red.
At the beginning of each turn, an Indian war party is assigned two green counters rather than the usual one, representing warriors' eagerness for a fight. The first of those counters is removed when the unit is activated or suffers any casualties in fire. If the unit loses a melee while it still has two green counters, both are replaced by a single red counter.
If a war party wins melee against a foe (whether the Indians initiated the attack or not), the band's counter automatically changes to a single green counter. It doesn't downgrade to red like all other units do. This change of rules represents' Indians revelry after a successful hand-to-hand combat, when they scalp enemies and collect trophies. (The exception to this rule applies when an Indian unit is already disordered in a turn when it's the target of melee. See below for the results of that circumstance.)
A war band's greatest threat is posed in melee, specifically in an attack that the party launches. When Indians initiate melee, they get a +2 bonus. So, if 8 warriors stage the attack, 10 dice are rolled.
Since a war party is militia, yellow dice are rolled for its defensive rolls in fire and melee attacks, even when the band still has two green counters assigned to it.
If a war band ever suffers casualties once it is disordered in a turn, it flees the field altogether, regardless of how many warriors remain in the party. These casualties may be suffered when the unit is targeted by fire or charged for melee. (Winning a melee under these circumstances doesn't restore the unit to a green counter.)
If a brave or chief is ever made a casualty, the party's color rises no higher than yellow or red at the beginning of each new turn, as normal in the game. A general cannot restore these positions in a band like he can in one of his conventional units. If, however, a war band wins a melee while it has no brave or chief, a replacement emerges amid the victory. If both brave and chief are missing at the same time, a chief is restored first.
American Revolution
American Forces — In early 1778, von Steuben trained the Continental Army in proper drill, right down to making and receiving bayonet charges. That finally made American infantry a contender against the British army. Up until that point, Continental infantry can almost universally be regarded as militia rather than regulars. In the early part of the war, perhaps only special American regiments might be regarded as regulars or guard, such as skirmishers, artillery and some infantry.
American Civil War
Repeating Rifles: With the advent of the repeating rifle, units armed with them are able to deliver increased firepower. If such a unit fires in an activation without moving or changing facing or formation, a +2 bonus is gained. So, if a unit fires and claims the extra two dice, it isn't allowed to move or change formation or facing in the same activation. Essentially, a unit that stands still and focuses exclusively on firing in an activation delivers a horrifying barrage.
