I have to warn you that this is largely theoretical, I haven’t had the chance to give it a go yet, but then again there’s always the hope an idea in a comment can point me in the right direction before I spend days heading in the wrong one.
Of course ‘solo’ rules aren’t always necessary, some times a game can be fun with you simply playing both sides, and that can often lead to more interesting situations than you playing against a poorly implemented ‘AI’ opponent.
I’ve often thought that a game should be built for solo from the ground up rather than have a system tacked on… but now here’s my early notes for a tacked on solo system for Chob-Noggoth:
Firstly make a warband for you to command, anywhere between 1 and 20 Fingers strong. Then collect a number of tokens equal to the number of Fingers you are playing with. Set up the battlefield, and then distribute the tokens and any Shrines as evenly as possible across it.
Select a battlefield edge to be your starting edge, and then deploy your warband within 3” of it.
You are then ready to play.
When playing Rogue you won’t roll for the round order, and instead will always use the Rogue round order (I’ll add in more round orders later, but just want to make sure the solo system works first):
– Activate Tokens
– Player Moves
– Player Actions
– Enemies Move
– Enemy Actions
– Divine Intervention
– End of the Round (Morale Checks)
Resolve Melees (opposing models in base to base contact) immediately as they pop up.
To ‘win’ in Rogue Play you need to clear all of the tokens and any enemies, and still have members of your Warband in play.
Activating Tokens
All tokens are activated that are within 3” of any of the members of your Warband. When a token is activated it is discarded and you make a roll 2D6 on the table below to determine the token’s effect (I don’t have all the results yet, any ideas let me know in the comments):
1: Monster! – Randomly Generate one.
2: Loot!
3: Veteran – 1: Brawler, 2: Skirmisher, 3: Hunter, 4: Mage, 5: Warmachine, 6: Player Picks.
4: Potion!
5: Good – 1: Brawler, 2: Skirmisher, 3: Hunter, 4: Mage, 5: Warmachine, 6: Player Picks.
6: Random Event
7: Bad – 1: Brawler, 2: Skirmisher, 3: Hunter, 4: Mage, 5: Warmachine, 6: Player Picks.
8: Potion!
9: Good – 1: Brawler, 2: Skirmisher, 3: Hunter, 4: Mage, 5: Warmachine, 6: Player Picks.
10: Loot!
11: Veteran – 1: Brawler, 2: Skirmisher, 3: Hunter, 4: Mage, 5: Warmachine, 6: Player Picks.
12: Hero
I’ll have to write up tables for the various items to loot, the different potions you can get your hands on, and random events. Alongside an enemy Hero generator.
I think there will also need to be a spawning mechanic for when enemies are discovered. You don’t want an enemy Hunter or Warmachine to spawn directly next to your Berserker you ran up to activate tokens with. As they wouldn’t stand much chance.
I’ll also need a rough AI for controlling enemy movement and actions, generally with AI in solo games you get two types of enemies – zombies and turrets, zombies move towards their (usually closest) enemy and attack them repeatedly until someone dies. Turrets stand and shoot. Those two archetypes do match my ‘classes’ well enough. Only skirmishers will be different, but they’ll just be shooting while they charge in. I think Mages will always be casting spells, because that’s more fun.
As I said, just early thoughts so far, but I’m looking forward to trying this sort of thing out. Having a little band of weirdos and going on adventures in Chob-Noggoth and everything getting completely out of control, does sound like a fun time.
Of course then I’ll need an RPG style progression system… but let’s do one massive hurdle at a time.
Deathzap 