Mars: Religion and Magic (Background)

Horus. Wikipedia.

Hare for hiding,
Falcon for seizing
Jackal for its mate,

Dragon for might,
Beast for endurance,
Serpent for mysteries.

Worm hates them all.

-- Martian Proverb



The Free Human cities and the Brutes share a common religion - the worship of the Animal Powers that can grant success or failure in the harsh Martian wastes.

For every species, every place, even every stone or cloud, there exists a governing spirit.  Some receive only local veneration, such as the spirits of city, of clan or of ancestors.

More universally recognized are the seven Great Spirits, which possess wider power over Martian life: Hare, Falcon, Jackal, Dragon, Beast, Serpent, and Worm. Each merits their due, even Worm the Destroyer.

The Great Spirits are sometimes associated with the different Martian races.  The triad is a sacred number on Mars, representing wholeness and balance.  There are two triads of Spirits, considered generally benevolent.   Hare, Falcon and Jackal originate from Earth, and share an especial closeness with Humans.  Dragon, Beast, and Serpent are all scaled, and may originate from the Brute's original home-world.  As they seem to watch over Brutes especially.  The Ancients, however, have only a single totem creature, Worm. Worm breaks the pattern of completeness.  Some whisper that He devoured his two unknown Brothers, and drove the Ancients to madness.  Until the return to life, Mars will know no healing. 

The nomadic tribes (Brute or Human) worship and venerate the Spirits either individually or following the heads of their family lineages.  Mystics, shamans, and other dedicated religious specialists also exist, following a variety of traditions.

Humans of the Free cities often anthropomorphize the Spirits, representing them as animal-headed or featured gods. A formal priesthood, centered around cult images and temples serves the needs of most of the populace.  Individual magicians work alongside this formal structure, focusing on magic use of the Spirits' powers.

Outsiders disagree on how far the Ancients recognize Spirits. Their iconography and behavior suggests that if they do, they venerate Worm exclusively.  Their slaves often share worship and beliefs with free populations, but darkened or perverted in some way. 

Each Spirit governs certain traits, reflected in its followers, shaping their behavior even on the battlefield, and unleashing miracles and magic.  However much the ignorant Colonists deny such things, Mars' spirits do not sleep quietly.




Chinese Hare. 1333. Wikipedia.

Hare

Hare embodies swiftness and deception. A trickster god, he melts into the dunes and the scrub, leading pursuers to misfortune. Always mercurial, worshipers invoke him with trepidation.

Brown Falcon. Wikipedia.

Falcon

Birds of prey soar on the desert thermals, seeking prey.  When Falcon's keen eye spies a weakness, he swoops, seizing and rending with his talons. When danger strikes, he flies mocking out of reach.



Ethiopian Wolf. Wikipedia.

Jackal

The wild canids of the Martian wastes travel in pairs or packs, and range in size from tiny scavengers to rangy predators.  Whether he manifests as a married pair, or a pack of kinsmen, Jackal's strength lies in his coordination with his fellows to bring down larger prey and defend his own.



Komodo Dragon. Wikipedia.

Dragon

The great lizards of the Martian desert wait in the sun, lazy-seeming and slow until they strike.  Then they spring, clutching prey in their indomitable jaws.  Few escape their bite.

Rhinos. Wikipedia.

Beast

Herd-beasts and herbivores wander the Martian wastes.  Beast survives where others cannot, and his sun-scarred hides shows the scars of failed attacks.

Red Milk Snake. Wikipedia.

Serpent

Secretive Serpent is master of magic.  When he bites, his venom destroys larger foes; when he goes to ground, none can find him in his holes; and when he dies, he sheds his skin and lives again.

Earthworm. Wikipedia.

Worm

Worm burrows in flesh and rot.  He causes disease and madness, feeding from the suffering of others. At best, he may bring renewal by destroying the weak and ending life.  But on Mars, the balance he might serve has become skewed, and Worm's is now the descending spiral.

Geek Notes

Because of Mars' deep ecological crisis, a religious system based on the Animal Powers seemed an appropriate way to show the deep reverence its peoples have for continued life and wise adaptation to the desert. There is an obvious Native American feel, with a strong African element, but I do not intend it to parallel any particular earthly culture.  The Free Human cities are part of the same religion, but with a Egyptian sort of twist to their iconography.  (Worm makes me nostalgic for old World of Darkness, but honestly, what other animal better embodies corruption?)

Game mechanically, the different Spirits will be the basis of Doctrines for the armies.  Potentially, it gives seven different "spell lists" for the Brutes and Free Humans.  I also intend the Worm to be an option for the Ancients, too.

Asymetrical Scenarios and the Defender's Advantage

The Problem

Infantry scenarios present a serious difficulty for the game designer.  In such warfare as we are trying to simulate, the defender possesses a natural advantage in weaponry and tactics.  From Verdun's trenches to Monte Cassino's slopes, to Normandy's hedgerows, the machinegun and the mortar make a mess of attacking infantry. The problem is particularly exacerbated in asymmetrical scenarios, where there is an attacker and a defender, each with a different victory condition. A successful attack requires superiority of numbers, of tactics, or special equipment (most notably the tank). One truism of warfare admonishes the attacker to gather at least a 3:1 advantage at the point of attack.

Yet, it is also a powerful convention of the beer and pretzel wargame that players will meet with equally-pointed lists.  Anything else doesn't seem fair or fun. 

How can the game designer reconcile a natural "defender's advantage" with war-gaming conventions?


Previous Approaches

Flames of War takes place on a 15mm scale: it can have lots of armor without being out of scale. In asymmetrical scenarios, Flames of War reduces the defender's advantage by temporarily halving the defenders force.  Its defensive scenarios usually require the defender put half of their force into reserve.  For the critical first few turns, therefore, the attacker has a numerical advantage. Over time, as the defender's force enters the board, the attacker's advantage degrades.  Thus, the defender plays with a standard list, but with (effectively) a reduced force.

Warhammer 40k negates the defender's advantage largely by increasing the game's level of carnage.  Cover is not particularly effective in 40k, and there's no mechanism for suppression. So there is less of a defender's advantage than in a more "realistic" game. Moreover, all 40k's scenarios are symmetrical.  When both players must move, there is no defender to benefit.

I'm not happy with either of these solutions. 

Asymmetrical Lists?

I propose breaking with wargaming convention and requiring each player to prepare two lists for each game: an attacking list and a defending list.  Both lists must have the same core. The natural scale for my game (dang, it needs a name, doesn't it?) revolves around the platoon, so the core will be a platoon, usually of three squads.  The attacking list will have a large addition of points, which it should spend on aggressive equipment, such as vehicles, additional troops, and so forth.  The defending list will have a smaller allotment of additional points, which it should spend on defensive equipment - machine guns, fortifications, etc. The final ratio will give the attacking list about 150% to 200% more points than the defending list.

In an asymmetrical scenario, one player will use their defending list, while the other attacks.  (In tournaments or other such games, the players can randomly determine who attacks and who defends.) 

In a symmetrical scenario, both players will use their attacking list.  (In symmetrical scenarios, both players must maneuver and leave their fortifications, so they will need attacking equipment more than defending equipment.)

Thinking About Scenarios and Objectives

Scenarios

Most war-games have scenarios, game variants players can select, that have differing victory conditions. Sometimes these conditions may be as simple as a time limit and a tally of kill points. He who kills the most wins. Most scenarios are more sophisticated, dictating deployment zones, turn limits, special conditions and so forth. The heart of most modern scenarios are objective markers.

Objectives

Objectives are token which one side or another must capture in order to win a scenario. Usually, they are slightly larger than a typical infantry base. They are also typically different than normal terrain -- no matter what awesome stuff players model on the base, it doesn't block line of sight or act as terrain. I've seen games use objectives in a number of different ways:

Sudden-Victory Objectives

If a player captures one of these objectives, then they win (usually at the start of the next turn).  Flames of War uses sudden-victory objectives in all its main scenarios. The objectives are usually asymmetrical -- player A must capture player B's objectives.  Player A must defend their own, but can't win just by holding it. 

This system can produce any number of interesting scenarios.  For example, the basic Flames of War "Free for All" scenario consists of two A objectives and two B objectives, on opposite sides of the table. Player A must capture the B objectives while defending his own A objectives.  More complex variants of this set-up add reserves, ambushes, and so forth.

Sudden-victory objectives are particularly good for asymmetrical scenarios with an attacker and a defender.  In many Flames of War scenarios, such as "Hold the Line" and its variants, the attacker must take objectives to win, but the defender has no corresponding objectives of his own.  He must defend objectives for a number of turns. 

Point-Based Objectives 

In this variant, control of an objective generates points, and the points are needed to win.   The current edition of Warhammer 40k's objectives do not trigger victory or defeat until a particular turn. At the end of the game (which is randomly determined), both players tally the number of points they have generated to see who has won.

Warhammer 40k's scenarios generate between two and five objectives, which players alternately deploy on the board.  Normally, players end up with a board that looks like Flames of War's free-for-all, with two in each player's deployment zones.  But it can also produce some strange set-ups.  Sometimes one player will put all the objectives in their enemy's deployment zone, if they have a very aggressive army they don't want to split.  Sometimes, there will be only two objectives -- a scenario my local group calls "roll dice and draw" because of the difficulty of capturing such a well-defended point.  And sometimes an odd number of objectives will favor one player over another mercilessly. 

The objectives need not always be worth the same number of points.  In the I-95 gamer's "Domination" scenarios or Warhammer 40k's  "The Scouring Scenario", each objective is worth a different number of point -- how many may not be revealed until it is captured.

In some scenarios, an objectives' points may contribute each turn to a tally.  If a player reaches a certain tally, then they win.  I-95's "Domination" scenario uses these mechanics.  So too does Flames of War's multi-player Battalion-level scenario.

Oddball Objectives

Finally, there are funky objectives. Saga (which usually doesn't use objectives at all) has a cart scenario, in which one player must intercept and kill a moving cart.  The cart is thus a kind of objective. Similarly, Warhammer 40k has a scenario where players fight over a moveable objective, like a free-flowing king of the hill.

Objectives can also combine with other types of victory points or conditions, such as points for killing enemies, time limits, and so forth. 

The Manliest of Pastels

 

Here are some close-up shots of the Free Martian test army. I pulled an older digital camera out of storage, hoping it would focus better on small objects than my general-purpose cell phone. It does, provided I don't get it too close to the target model. (You can see the offending shots below.) 

In painting the Free Martians, I chose a color pallette away from the medium greens, blues and reds you normally see in wargames. I chose brighter colors like purples, light blues, and yellowish greens.  (Only the command group has a conventional-looking red.) 

South-west art often features such bold, bright colors.  To someone used to life in the green-grey East Coast of the US, such colors seemed garish to me.  Then I moved to Tucson for a few years, and I realized that against the red-brown landscape and blazing sky of the southwest, such strong colors looked really amazing.  They matched the landscape.  So I have tried that sort of pallette out on my Martians.

The standard ray-beam cannon.

The alternatate "anti-tank" cannon.

A hunter with a "grenade launcher."



 

A hunter with a ray beam gun. He got too close to the camera.



The standard lancer. I am least happy with the green color. It was going to be orange, but orange is a pain to paint.

A shieldsman.

A shieldsman "sergeant" with a ray gun. One of the blurrier shots.

 

The command group in standard wargaming red. Boring but there are only 3 of them.

Out Sick

"I think they are out to get me."

I'm ill, so I've not had a chance to write anything new this week.

Roman the Skies

Zoom!

I intend to build vehicles for my test armies. For the Free Martians, I want a flying ship.  One of the classic Martian images consists of a skiff or skimmer or ornithopter.  Since I'm using ancient models as my Martians, a classical ship seems the most appropriate base.

For this project, I purchased two model ship kits, Academy's "Roman Warship" and Zvezda's "Niña."  I intend to use the hull from the Roman ship as my base model.  I will then use the masts and sails from "Niña" as my vehicle's wings. Each ship cost about 30$ online.

The Academy ship.

The Zvezda ship.

My first step is to make the ship compatible with a Games Workshop aircraft base.  I have several of these for my Warhammer 40K armies, and they are sturdy and attractive.  As you can see, the base has a cross-shaped section, onto which the aircraft sits.  The only odd thing is that the curve in the base bends the opposite way you'd expect. 

A GW aircraft base.

So I assemble the lower part of the ship: the keel and rower's space.  (I'm not going to assemble the oars.) I cut a hole in the keel to accommodate the flying base, and reinforce the interior with a plug of green stuff.  I wet the end of the flying base, and press it into the green stuff for the correct shape.

Here is the underside, with the base hole carved.

Here it is from above, with the green stuff blob visible.

Now I can rest the ship on the base, or remove it if I need to. I assemble the upper decks of the ship.

The ship on its base.

Now I take out the Zvezda sails from Niña.  I envision the final craft looking like a dragonfly or ornithopter.  Anti-grav holds up the keel, and the sails adds propulsion or maneuvering.  I really like the Niña's Lateen sails.  They look Middle Eastern, and add an Orientalist touch reflecting retro setting.

I mount the masts to the sides of the ship, at an angle.  One is larger than the other, so the final vessel will be asymmetrical.  I hope it will look cool and not goofy, but danged if I'm going to cannibalize two 30$ Niñas.

The ship with side masts.

The ship from another angle.

 The sails themselves are an extremely thin plastic, which is slightly flexible. I don't know whether it will hold primer without cracking or flaking.  So I intend to leave the sails off until the rest of the ship is painted.  I test them out for size but do not attach them.

The sails.

 Here is the resulting ship, on my gaming table for scale.  I will post more as I complete the project.

Zoom!

Martian Tactics

These pictures should illustrate the Free Martians' typical tactics.  They have three troop types: Lanceatores, Venatores, and Scutatores.  I've painted them green, purple and blue, respectively.  The Lanceatores have long-ranged, high RoF fire, but are not very mobile. The Venatores have medium-to-short ranged guns, and are highly mobile.  The Scutatores have stronger energy shields and melee weapons.

In the attack, the Lanceatores lay down suppressing fire from a distance.  The Venatores close to firefight distance, while the Scutatores flank for the kill. 

This picture shows an attack by a Martian squad on some colonials.  The Lanceatores are left in place behind.  The Scutatores and Venatores are in a manuevering group within command distance of the Sergeant:

A squad attacks.

 This picture shows the same tactics employed by a platoon.  In this case, the Venatores and Scutatores are more separated, each led by their own Sergeant:

A platoon attacks.

This final picture represents a defense.  The Venatores fall back towards the main line while giving harassing fire against the attacking Colonials. The Lanceatores add their fire, while the Scuatores wait to perform a counter-assault, if necessary.

The Martians defend.

 

Now, the tricky bit will be write rules in which these tactics are both possible and effective.