Adding a Risk like element....

[Theblackdog]

I tried making a system for stuff like this back in the nineties, but it always got too bogged down when you actually tried to use it, so I gave up. Maybe it would work for something like a forum battle though, since the time scale is different than games played in person.

The idea was that you took a map of territories like this, except built on a baseplate so you can stack bricks on it to show how the territories are built up. Territories might have all the usual wargamey bits, towns or forts or roads or weird terrain features, but the important thing to keep track of game-mechanics wise were Infrastructure (how many CPs of buildings and fortifications are present), Workers (how many minifigs are producing resources for you), and Investment (how much the people in that region support your cause). You also had little army flags that you could run around the map, but you didn't have to decide what kinds of units were in them until the enemy scouted them or they moved into a region where you had some Investment.

It was nice in some ways because you could avoid deciding what kinds of things were actually in any particular army or region until it was time to have a battle there - then you built the infrastructure according to how much Infrastructure you had, and laid traps and got advance knowledge of enemy positions and army composition according to Investment, and had workers and workshops to protect according to Workers.

It was a pretty clean little system in general but bogged way down when it got to specifics. But maybe there's some ideas in there you can play off of, if you really want to do an epic-style strategic campaign.

Why not just make the field smaller? You could reduce this scenario to a few minifigs per team, individual buildings on 32X32 baseplates as territories, and small vehicles (4-wide cars, motorcycles, horses, etc.) and simplify it greatly. The backstory could be something like a turf war between different crime gangs in a city: the gangs make money according to the number of Workers in the buildings they control, then use that money to hire more people and buy vehicles and weapons. But... if an area's investment falls too low, then all of the people you hired from that area (as opposed to the people you started the game with) will desert you unless you pay them more, and the workers in that area will start forming unions and demanding more pay (or, if the investment gets really low, rioting). I'd do it myself, but as I've said before I don't have a lot of baseplates or the money to buy them.

[tahthing]

I've got it!!!
you could have a war map in micro scale, and some thing to show your army, you can move though the map and concore places, you would have towns marked on the map and have a minifig scale town that represents all the towns for battles, you would move though takeing diffrent places.
i don't think brikwars is ideal for this though.

if you want a large campain war i think micro scale is the way to go.


im gonna try to set up a map to play on, and then ill work out some rules and then finaly build the armys and work out stats.

[birdman]

Campaigns don't work well with brikwars because brikwars is a small-scale game. sure, you can have huge battles using the brikwars system, but it's going to be really slow. campaigns would be even slower.

[Greenkey15]

Maybe you could use RISK pieces to show how large your force is? Each army could be worth 20 points, and you could auto-resolve using the classic Risk combat system to speed things up.

[IVhorseman]

Or one could just play risk!

[Greenkey15]

I thought more about this. There are several versions of Risk, yes? One includes three types of units: Infantry, Cavalry, and Cannons. Each infantryman can be worth 10 points to spend on one Minifig (you can combine these to make 20 points for use on one minifig), Cavalry could be used as 30 points for one Light Vehicle (size 2-3 inches, can make 2 vehicles), and Cannons could be used as 50 points for one Heavy Vehicle (3+ inches, can make 2 vehicles). You should have some pre-made stats for each vehicle or minifig. Your hero is your Sig-Fig, which you place on one territory and moves with your main army. You cannot get another hero in the large-scale game, but if he/she dies in battle you can get a new one in the large scale game, or just say he was wounded, but your medics took care of him/her and he/she is ready for battle by next turn.

(if you can't tell, I stole most of this from DOW: DC)

[Theblackdog]

I thought more about this. There are several versions of Risk, yes? One includes three types of units: Infantry, Cavalry, and Cannons. Each infantryman can be worth 10 points to spend on one Minifig (you can combine these to make 20 points for use on one minifig), Cavalry could be used as 30 points for one Light Vehicle (size 2-3 inches, can make 2 vehicles), and Cannons could be used as 50 points for one Heavy Vehicle (3+ inches, can make 2 vehicles). You should have some pre-made stats for each vehicle or minifig. Your hero is your Sig-Fig, which you place on one territory and moves with your main army. You cannot get another hero in the large-scale game, but if he/she dies in battle you can get a new one in the large scale game, or just say he was wounded, but your medics took care of him/her and he/she is ready for battle by next turn.

(if you can't tell, I stole most of this from DOW: DC)

Here's the problem: how many "battles" are in a standard risk game?

A lot.

Risk games already take hours, but if you acted out every battle on the tactical scale they would take even longer.
I can't see this happening, except maybe in an LUG with a lot of members or in a college dorm.

[Fromagier]

i have returned and after reading through a few off these posts and you guys have some very good ideas
i think i may use this for a forum battle (eventually)
i will post some pictures of both armys even though the photos i have on hand are a few months old, scince the time they were taken a few men have be replaced, and some of my vehicles either have be modified beyond recognition or destroyed by my dogs

[pesgores]

Or one could just play risk!

Risk is a great concept, but the combat engine sucks.

I do not see why we can't make a Campaign.

You could use a strategic map (as suggested before) and then, when two opposing armies enter the same territory, a battle starts, with different objectives for each battle instead of just "conquest" and if your army is defeated without losing all your units, those units would be controlled by the winner.

Because during a war, armies do not grow in personnel. Only if the population keeps joining the army, but think of any of both WWs. In the beggining, a 15 year old could be training to join the army. 3 years later, he would actually join his nation's army and then die.

[Greenkey15]

In reply to theblackdog, there is an AUTORESOLVE function, meaning you carry out the regular RISK combat. BRIKWARS would only be played in the Epic Massive Battles, as it would take less time and be more fun than just rolling dice over and over again. It's more of a supplement to RISK than to Brikwars.

[RJ]

maybe you could have a map and a small flag to mark territories

you could build a battlefieild for each country/territory

every time someone wants to attack make a battle

this is best for forum campaigns as this would take ages

This idea is mine - eventually ill make a forum campaign in BlockWar BC, BlockWar AD, BlockWar I, BlockWar II, BlockWar Etc.

[jifel]

maybe you could have a map and a small flag to mark territories

you could build a battlefieild for each country/territory

every time someone wants to attack make a battle

this is best for forum campaigns as this would take ages

This idea is mine - eventually ill make a forum campaign in BlockWar BC, BlockWar AD, BlockWar I, BlockWar II, BlockWar Etc.

Not for every Country, but maybe one with terrain for Ice, trees, dessert, and city, that you could put terrain in for whatever country it is. but yeah, having about 10 members, each with their own unique army. When two members meet, get someone with most of the parts for both armies host the battle.

jifel

[RJ]

when i said countries you could have two of the same battlefield just with a couple extra rocks or somthing

this could work like SW: EAW just without the buying system

[More Dakka]

You could have cities and such, but if the territories are as large as one would expect in a large-scale campaign, you could just designate territories specific terrain types and signature features, which you can use to add flavor to the battles in that territory, for example: this territory is foresty, so add trees everywhere that impede vehicle movement, and this one was bombed, so we'll have lots of craters and half-destroyed buildings.

In terms of benefits for holding specific territories, extra CP don't work all that well for the reasons stated, they're meant to be used to make opposing forces even, and the forces you fight with in any given battle only represent a fraction of those in the territory, unless the map is extremely detailed. Instead, you could make a few territories key victory points, directing players to take certain parts of the board, and make some strategic points that do something else, like a cybernetics factory letting them field fancy tech in battle. If you plan to have special characters (maybe even using the experience system in the pre-2001 campaign book), you could let them be taken as prisoners that you can later rescue by invading the provinces they're held in. The whole point of a campaign is to give the game continuity and flavor, so work that for all it's worth.

[MattL]

What if, the points where the baseplates met, would be the borders. Then there'd be an excuse for it being too small. After the border battle, you could have a battle in a town of the invaded country, and then go to the border of the next country.