------------------------------------------- SUPPLEMENT EV: Battlefield Environments ------------------------------------------- In BrikWars, as in real estate, location is everything. Two squads of gunmen and a couple of tanks and helicopters shooting it out on a flat dirt plain is dull drama. The same combatants fighting in a packed public grade school or a packed circus tent is pure entertainment. Stage the same battle on the sinking Titanic and you've got the makings of an epic. An inspiring environment does more to create a compelling game than even the fanciest units or weapons, and yet so many players devote only the most cursory attention it. The following are a few things that add to the quality of a battlefield: MULTIPLE TERRAIN TYPES. The worthy battlefield mixes terrain types that give strong tactical leverage to different types of units. A highway through dense pockets of jungle with a bridge over a wide river grants specific zones of advantage and disadvantage to trucks, minfigs, boats, and planes. A forested countryside with clearings, cliffs, ravines, and a castle grants a range of opportunities for horsemen, archers, pikemen, and dragons. A sector of space with fields of asteroids, plasma storms, and a small sun offers a variety of roles for capital ships, frigates, fighters, Space Marines, and interstellar monsters. You should aim for sharp contrasts between high and low elevations, smooth and rough terrain, open spaces and dense cover, and flat areas and high obstacles. DANGER. The righteous battlefield contains elements of danger beyond the mere weaponry of the soldiers. Black holes, wild animals, molten lava flows, sea sirens, sleeping dragons, ancient curses, bottomless pits, poisonous swamps, and pockets of explosive gas are all fine examples. Many environments are inherently dangerous to minifigs who venture outside their bases and vehicles without the proper equipment, such as depths of the sea, outer space, Antarctica, or the heart of a nuclear power plant. PROFIT. The virtuous battlefield gives opponents something to compete for. Often these will give a military advantage to the player who captures them, such as natural strong points, deserted heavy weapon emplacements, or supply dumps. Some might be items that confer special abilities, like the Wand of Annihilation, or grant control over groups of neutral units, like the Alligator Crown. Other types of prizes grant no military advantage and are instead tied into the goals of the overall scenario, such as buried treasure, copies of secret plans, scattered jewels, or the severed head of the corrupt emperor. INNOCENT BYSTANDERS. The meritorious battlefield has a healthy dose of stuff that is just funny to blow up. Innocent civilians, priceless antiques, ancient monuments, fuzzy bunnies, weddings, kids in school buses, fast food restaraunts, herds of sheep, golf courses, boy bands, mailboxes, and Elvis impersonators are all fine examples. The list is endless. UNUSUAL OPPORTUNITIES. The praiseworthy battlefield has one or two strange features that might or might not be useful depending on the originality of the players. Large examples might include a geyser that shoots boiling water to a height of two Stories every other turn, the sluice gate controls on a giant dam, the main fuse box of an office building, the hydraulic lifts in the mechanic's shop, the gears inside the giant clock in the town square, and so forth. Small examples might include gas pumps, blacksmiths' forges, shopping carts, cast-iron stoves, fire hydrants, or manhole covers. The more minifig-usable objects you pack into a scene, the more likely it is that someone will find a funny way to employ them. MODABILITY. The laudable battlefield is made up of elements that soldiers can quickly modify to fortify their position and hamper enemy movement. Lush meadows can be dug up into foxholes and trenches. Explosions will turn cliffs and snowbanks into landslides and avalanches. Buildings can be reduced to rubble. Rubble can be piled into fortifications. Dams can be burst. Stairwells can be collapsed. Airlocks can be blown. Forests can be set on fire. Volcanoes can be set off. Icebergs can be melted. Let's discuss some specific battlefield environments in more detail. EV.1 Verdant Pastures -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The most common BrikWars landscape is a flat tabletop with a couple of green baseplates here and there, sometimes with a scattered assortment of one-piece trees and bushes. Even this most boring of all possible landscapes has aspects that can be turned to the clever soldier's advantage. The little trees that are commonly seen on these fields can be chopped down or knocked over quite easily, with an AV of only 1d10. They make fine obstacles to impede the progress of ground vehicles, projectiles to be thrown by giant robots, or battering rams to be carried by groups of Troopers. If enemy minifigs are taking cover in a patch of vegetation, remember that trees and bushes can be quite flammable. Soil in the world of plastic bricks is extremely soft and fertile, judging by the quality of the plants that grow from it. Soldiers with shovels and spades can dig in the soft Dirt to create foxholes and trenches. Unfortunately, real-world considerations often prevent you from cutting holes in the baseplates or in your tabletop; instead, soldiers dig earth upward, creating piles of Dirt around the areas in which they are digging. These piles can be used for quick cover in a firefight. A soldier who has an appropriate shovel and spends a full turn digging can dig up one Blok of Dirt per point in his Power rating. Dirt has a 45 degree angle of repose - that is, a pile of Dirt will settle downward until its sides have spread one dot outward for every Brik of height upward. Black Blox are good for representing Dirt, but any color can be chosen according to practicality and availability. Explosions in soft Dirt will create craters. Just as with digging holes, when you can't actually dig downward into the surface, build upward around the edges instead. To determine the size of the crater, roll each stage of the explosion's Area Effect against the AV of the ground (1d10 for Dirt or Sand, 2d10 for Asphalt or Stone). If the initial Explosion Damage is less than the Armor Roll, then there is no crater. Otherwise, the crater extends outward until the Explosion Damage can no longer beat the ground's Armor Roll. For every two inches of crater radius, the pile of Dirt at the lip of the crater gains a full Brik of height. This can be a quick way to create large obstacles for ground vehicles, or to create a quick space in which Troopers can take cover. If a unit tries to fire a powerful shot straight through a Dirt embankment to hit targets taking cover behind it, use the Overkill rules (3.4.1: Overkill) and roll for each physical brick of Dirt that the shot has to penetrate. Destroyed bricks of Dirt are removed from the field, and if necessary, the pile of Dirt resettles after each attack. Prolonged exposure to water turns Dirt to Mud. Other liquids also work and may have entertaining side effects - Dirt saturated with gasoline will explode if exposed to flame! In order to create Mud, soldiers must be able to deliver a large supply of liquid - a mere garden hose or bucket won't do. A firehose, an overturned tanker truck, a toppled water tower, or a dammed river are all good places to start. If soldiers spend a full turn saturating a patch of earth, it turns to slippery Surface Mud. Surface Mud doubles the turn rates of non-treaded ground vehicles, and minifigs standing on Surface Mud must make a Skill Roll at the beginning of each turn - a Critical Failure means the minifig has slipped, fallen over, and splattered itself with mud. If soldiers spend an additional turn saturating Surface Mud, it becomes Deep Mud and incurs a -50% MP to any unit trying to get through it. Deep Mud has an angle of repose of 30° (two dots of spread per Brik of height), so soldiers that hose down a dirt embankment for a few turns can cause mudslides. EV.1.1 Lakes and Waterways ------------------------- Rivers and lakes are often used to break up an otherwise monotonous green-baseplate landscape. General rules for moving in water are covered in 4.1: Moving Around. In general, ground units moving in a body of water do so at 50% Move", if the water is shallow enough or if they can swim. Un-anchored units travelling in streams or rivers, in addition to their regular movement, are also moved a certain distance downstream according to the Current" of that patch of water. Walking units must make a Skill Roll against the number of inches in the Current" or lose their footing, at which point the units that know how to swim have a definite advantage. Objects and units that succumb to the current and are swept off the playing field can be assumed to have fallen off of a giant waterfall with no hope of survival. The depth of any body of water, and the strength and direction of whatever current may exist, is an arbitrary decision left to the players' tastes. It's easiest to just assign blanket numbers to all bodies of water according to the type of armies on the field - two Brix of depth and 3" of Current" are fine numbers for a troop-heavy medieval battle, while two Stories of depth and 8" of Current" might be more appropriate in a battle between giant futuristic robots. If the bodies of water play a critical tactical role, then players may decide to make both the depth and current variable. For instance, a river might have a Current" of 2d6" and a depth of 1d10 Brix. Depth and Current" are rolled separately for every object and unit in the water, making it difficult for units to maintain any kind of formation as the waters become more and more turbulent. A trained Scout can be used to find the best place to ford any river; a Scout and any units that follow directly behind him always treat variable Depths and Currents" as if they had automatically gotten the luckiest possible roll (e.g., 2 on 2d6" and 1 on 1d10). At TL3 and 4, steam or combustion engines can be flooded if they are not specifically designed for submersion. If this type of vehicle enters a body of water deep enough that part or all of its Power Source descends below the water line, the engine is damaged. The vehicle takes one point of Functional Stun Damage directly to the Power Source (5.3.1: Component Damage) for every Brik of depth by which the Power Source is submerged. Theoretically, rivers and streams can be dammed and rerouted to create mudslides, swamplands, artifical lakes, flash floods, etc. The effects depend on the topography and composition of the surrounding landscape, and the willingness of the players to make up new rules on the fly. In general, there will be a gradual saturation of the landscape upstream from the dam and a dwindling of depth and current downstream. + Waterfalls + Geysers EV.1.2 Sand ------------------------- Sand, a common substance on beaches, deserts, and golf courses, works much the same way as dirt. Soldiers dig in sand twice as fast as they dig in dirt - 2 Blox per turn for every point of Power. Sand has an angle of repose of 30° (two dots of spread per Brik of height). Wheeled vehicles not designed for driving in sand may sink in and become stuck - if a moving vehicle ends its turn in sand, roll 1d6 to determine by how many Brix a vehicle sinks into the sand. If the sand comes up to the bottom of the chassis, the vehicle is stuck; otherwise, it loses that many inches of Movement on its next turn. The vehicle must then be dug or lifted out somehow. Saturating a patch of sand with water for one turn creates Wet Sand, which is more solid than regular sand. Normal vehicles can drive on Wet Sand without sinking or getting stuck. Wet Sand can be carved and shaped into any configuration the physical bricks allow, although even a single point of Damage will cause tunnels and overhangs to collapse immediately. Saturating a patch of Wet Sand for a turn results in Deadly QuickSand. A soldier walking in Deadly QuickSand sinks at a rate of two Brix at the end of each turn - up to his waist the first turn, up to his neck the second turn, and over his head the third turn. A soldier can try to escape from QuickSand by swimming to solid ground, or his buddies on dry land can throw him a rope. A soldier in QuickSand up to his waist swims at 2" per turn; if it's up to his neck then he swims at 1" per turn. If his friends on shore have tossed him a rope, they can keep him from sinking any deeper that turn if they have at least 1 Power, and they can pull him up by two Brix or shoreward by two inches for every additional point of Power after that. Larger vehicles in quicksand sink at a rate of 1 Brik per turn, and the amount of Power required to pull them out is multiplied by their Mass. EV.1.3 Swampland ------------------------- Swampland is considered to be entirely composed of mud. Any efforts to dig in swampland sink immediately back into the mud and are erased. Explosions going off in swampland do not create craters but spatter mud in every direction, to a radius of twice the Explosion radius. Besides making things dirty, this may totally obscure windshields (requiring 1 turn of windshield-wiping). Swampland may also cantain patches of quicksand (EV.1.1: Sand) and deadly sinkholes. Sinkholes have no specific location but are a random battlefield condition. Swamps can have a SinkHole Rating from zero (no sinkholes) to five (one big mega-sinkhole). Sinkholes swallow up everything that doesn't either have roots or a concrete foundation - units in trees or buildings are safe, but otherwise they're vulnerable to sinkholes. At the end of each turn, for every unit, vehicle, and piece of equipment in the swamp, roll 1d6. If the result is less than or equal to the SinkHole Rating, that object sinks one Brik downward into the swamp, and must keep making SinkHole rolls as long as it gets "sink" results. On the following turn, minifigs can pull themselves out, losing 1" of Move" for every Brik of depth; vehicles must be pulled out as if they were sinking in quicksand. Any unit or object that sinks completely into the mud is lost forever. Scouts moving at half-speed can be used to find safe paths through sinkhole territory. The Scout, and any minifigs and vehicles following directly behind him, are then protected from quicksand and sinkholes during that turn. Some types of animals are naturally immune to the dangers of swamps (frogs, alligators, some insects, etc.). Especially foul patches of Swamp can also have Poison Points (3.4.5: Poison). Any cut or scrape can become a source of life-threatening infection. Any minifig or non-swamp animal that takes even a single point of Damage (beyond what is absorbed by a Shield or other separately-purchased armor item) adds the Swamp's Poison Points to their own Poison Ratings. Regular Swamps should generally have a low number of Poison Points, such as 1d6-5 or 1d10-8, but magikally-enchanted or biologikally-engineered Swamps can become very deadly indeed. EV.1.4 War Zones ------------------------- After armies have been fighting over a patch of land for awhile, they tend to start messing it up in an effort to confound their enemies. Foxholes and trenches are followed by BarbedWire, LandMines, and all kinds of other nasty tricks. BarbedWire becomes available in TL4 and can be stretched over great distances, costing 1CP per 10". Minifigs and animals encountering BarbedWire are significantly hampered if they attempt to cross it, losing 1d6" from their Move" on the turn they attempt to cross. If they fail to cross the wire, they may try again on the following turn, again losing 1d6" of Move". Multiple layers of BarbedWire have no cumulative effect. Fully-armored minifigs (PlateArmor or equivalent) only lose 1" when crossing BarbedWire. BarbedWire has an AV of 1d10; an individual line can be severed by cutting, shooting, or crashing vehicles through it. If the wire is severed, tension causes the wire to spring back in either direction. The unit at the point of severance is safe, but all other units within 5" of the wire must roll 1d6 to see if they are struck by the snapping line. Any unit that rolls higher than the number of inches between himself and the wire is hit for 1d6 damage. Explosions generally have little effect on BarbedWire, but can be quite successful at destroying the posts to which the wire is tied. When dealing with MineFields, it is impractical to map out specific locations for each LandMine. Instead, players who want to bury LandMines simply designate a certain plot of earth as a MineField. The cost of the MineField is determined by its Size" (the number of inches across the field's widest point) and by the power of the mines (MkI, MkII, or MkIII Explosives - see 2.2.4: Explosives). The CP cost of a MineField is equal to its Size" multiplied by the cost of one Explosive. Every turn that a minifig or animal travels through a MineField, it must roll 1d6. If the roll is equal to or lower than the number of inches it travelled within the MineField, the unit has set off a mine and takes damage as if it had been hit by the equivalent Explosive. Vehicles will always set off a mine when traveling through a MineField. As with SinkHoles, Scouts moving at half speed can be used to find safe paths through MineFields, even for vehicles. EV.2 Urban Blight -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Urban warfare has gotten a bad rap lately since somebody decided that mass trauma, chaotic looting, and horrific casualty rates were politically incorrect, but warlords once considered it the sweetest of all types of combat. Since the very invention of civilization, military forces have delighted in storming carefully-constructed cities and wreaking havoc. Whether it's the Vikings trashing the English shores, barbarian hordes making names for themselves in the destruction of Rome, the ancient Hebrews genociding first and asking questions later, or football hooligans banding together to smash the underpinnings of European society, nothing says fun and excitement like burning buildings and dead civilians. Besides the plentiful opportunities for mayhem, urban environments offer a huge variety of tactical options for the creative commander. Buildings and infrastructure have all kinds of exterior nooks and interior crannies in which to take cover or lose pursuers. Moving around isn't limited to running on the sidewalk - troops can climb the sides of buildings, leap from rooftop to rooftop, sneak around in sewers, carjack vehicles, jump out of office windows onto the tops of moving trucks, or hop on a train. Similarly, urban features can just as easily be used to impede movement or even as unconventional weapons - enemy advances can be stalled by creating traffic jams, knocking down bridges, putting giant craters in the road, or detouring an irresistable ice cream truck to drive past the enemy commanders; they can be halted permanently by derailing a train into them, collapsing a cathedral on their heads, or instigating a nuclear catastrophe at the local power plant. The civilian populations will often have good booty that clever warlords will want to plunder as soon as possible, especially once the emergency vehicles are deployed in response to all the damage the troops are doing. Ambulances are full of medical supplies, police cars have trunks full of riot gear, and fire trucks have the ever-popular water hose. If the city happens to have a military base, there will be a whole arsenal to loot if you can get to it before the local military mobilizes. Construction equipment just screams to be put to alternate use. Loaded delivery vehicles are universally exciting, since a large enough amount of anything is guaranteed to cause trouble if properly employed. Gasoline tanker trucks are a special favorite. EV.2.1 Plumbing ------------------------- Regardless of the historical age, one of the most important considerations when building a city is supplying water to the populace. In ancient times this meant that cities had to be founded near rivers, springs, or wells; these were soon supplemented by new techniques of irrigation and the construction of aqueducts. Modern cities are rife with pipes and plumbing, with extensive sewers, ubiquitous fire hydrants, and occasional fountains, water towers, and waterslide parks. + Water mains/plumbing + Sewers + Fire Hydrants EV.2.2 Power Sources ------------------------- + Power Lines, Power Plants + Fuel Stations + Gas lines + Medieval power: Windmills, waterwheels + TL3 Power: Boilers + Modern power: Nuclear plants + Future power: Radiant energy receivers, matter-energy conversion plants EV.2.3 Traffic ------------------------- + rules for motion of independent traffic + foot traffic, vehicle traffic, train traffic EV.2.4 Structural Collapse ------------------------- + how structures collapse + how much damage they cause EV.2.5 More Good Things to Include ------------------------- + Building Complexes + Back Alleys + Garbage Dumps + Construction Sites + Airports/Train Stations/Docks/Spaceports + Temples/Museums/Antique Dealers/China Shops + Malls/Grocery Stores + Prisons + Police/Fire Stations + Theme Parks + Zoos/Stables + Parks + Banks + Schools/Colleges + Restaraunts/Bars/Hot Dog Vendors + Highway Interchanges EV.3 Interiors -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Furniture + Wetwalls, airducts, wiring, plumbing + furnace, fuse box + Motion Detectors + Automatic Defenses + Proximity Grenades + Office fixtures: Cubicles, desks, mail carts, elevators + Industrial fixtures: conveyor belts, machinery, robot arms, molten metal + Grocery Store fixtures: stacks of groceries, ATMs, shopping carts, stockroom, escalators + High School fixtures: books, desks, lockers, sporting equipment, pool, ballfield, computer lab + Dungeon fixtures: secret passages, labyrinths, traps, monsters, treasure + Starbase fixtures: airlocks, turbolifts, greeblies + Load-bearing structures + Spaceships + Biological Interiors EV.4 Dense Vegetation -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Rainforests + Vines + Poison Plants + Tree canopies EV.5 Atmosphere -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Gas Giants + Clouds/mist/fog EV.6 The Sea -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Sailing + Islands + Reefs, Sandbars + Current, Waves + Galleys, Galleons, Battleships, Aircraft Carriers EV.6.1 Weather ------------------------- + Lightning + Wind, hurricanes, tornadoes + Waves + Rain EV.7 Under the Sea -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Submarines and underwater domes + Steam, superheating EV.8 Ice -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Melting + floating + Slipping EV.9 Volcanoes -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Caldera + Lava Flows + Crust EV.10 Outer Space -------------------------------------------------------------------------- + Gravity + Ion Storms + Black Holes + Planetary Bodies + Suns + Asteroids + Space Monsters