Swedish search
During DZC 1 I held several tournaments and one type I really liked was the variation in DZC that came with the "pure" missions. Now that have changed as I think DZC 2 really need to have mixed objectives as Target's is such a fast mission. But back then I usually had the following missions (in no special order):
1. Target's of opportunity or Military complex.
2. Focal points or spearhead or Bunker assault.
3. Recon or swedish recon.
4. Hold ground or the Swedish hold ground.
5. Swedish Search.
The overall result was that players were forced to have a good balance in their armies. Sure, they could demo in some missions, but that would suffer a lot in others. You could have a lot of infantry, but those would have suffered in missions where it was a question to hold specific points. And so on. I really liked this. Many times, I changed nr 2 or 4 to a mixed mission with critical locations or focal points together with Mobile Hidden Objectives. But most likely you have noticed the important part:
"What is Swedish search?" No one asked.
"Tell me more about Swedish Search!" A person with no interest of it never asked.
"It sounds awesome as it is both Swedish and Search in the same mission!" A completely made-up person stated.
Well, since you are so eager, let me tell you about it.
In DZC 1 there was a Search mission coming with the basic rulebook. I stuck my head in the sand quite a while and thought it to be balanced. But it wasn't. 36 markers. Whenever a model move and can pick up a marker either by entering the building or moving over it you flipped it. And it could be a objective, which there was five of, for you to move off table. Problem is that it was very random which side found the objectives and getting it off was very roughly based on luck. It was a special mission and I understand why it got the boot with 2nd ed. Roughly one out of 16 times one of the player found all the objectives and it was just no coming back from that.
But it was pretty interesting idea. Back then I was otherwise playing 40k and there you had a constant fight over the last turn. DZC made the game about all the turns with very close battles coming down to the last die. You struggled in each turn to make the right choices. Of course there were missions like focal points that was only about the last turn and kill points. But Search was a good idea. It does keep the players highly invested in the movement phase the entire game. In the way you only get in Target's or Search. The premise was only extremely unbalanced.
What followed was a mission developed in many steps to ensure it got balanced and fun. But at the cost of being quite complicated. It is tournament-worthy if we consider the balance. But it is a bit to complicated for anything else but smaller tournaments where a organizer can be there and help with the rules at a much more detailed level than normal.
The mission set up:
- You have 36 markers. 9 in each quarter. Place one in each Garrison first. Then spread the markers out evenly among the 4 quarters. No marker in the open can be within 9" of another marker (3" from a building). Buildings that are in several quarters get a marker in the quarter it is the most in. Otherwise you can just balance it out.
- Set up is in readiness and corner.
- In DZC 1 the buildings were armored but that is not needed in 2nd ed. But it is a good variation. I do prefer armoured.
- There are 5 objectives that needs to be found and if you want more points you need to prepared them for them to become "Mobile Objectives".
- Use a deck of cards with 36 cards. 30 cards 1-10 and 5 cards 11-13 ("clothed cards" as we say directly translated from Swedish).
Now it gets a bit complicated.
The flipping:
To flip a marker a ground-model have to end their turn inside a building or on the marker. Start of next turn, after seeing who get priority, the player, that gets the first activation starts, take turns flipping markers by choosing a unit that can flip a marker and just flip the marker by drawing a card. The marker is removed but the card is kept (to see who have flipped most markers at the end of the game). The the other player choose a marker and flip that and it continues. A player may not flip any more markers that turn when:
1. That player does not have units on a marker anymore.
2. That player find a objective (Clothed card).
The other player then continue to flip markers until that player have met one of the two above conditions.
Note that if both players have infantry in a building the player that flip first can choose to flip that marker first. Thus the other player looses that chance. It doesn't matter who were first into the building.
The objectives:
The unit that found the objective holds it. It may not move as the objective is not prepared to be moved. The unit may leave the objective but any new unit moving onto the objective wilk start over next turn preparing it.
To prepare a objective to make it mobile, a model has to start and end their turn carrying the objective. The turn the objective is found it it count as the finder started carrying the objective as they did start on the objective (but didn't know it was one). The model may not shoot this turn. They can use their skimmer bonus, command cards e t c but may not shoot. If it dies another model must move to the objective, pick it up and try to make it mobile next turn - you can not continue preparing it and have to start over.
The exception is infantry inside a building. Infantry units can prepare a objective and act normal inside that building. They must stay in the building but may fight with other infantry inside a building, man the walls to shoot out and so on. But they may not leave the building this turn.
A objective becomes Damaged if a model carrying a Mobile Objective dies (a unit dying does not damage a objective not yet prepared to move).
The objective can only be destroyed if still inside a Garrisson that is destroyed.
Points at the end of the game:
*If a objective isn't mobile it is worth 1VP for the player that holds it.
*If a objective is mobile (it can never be taken off table) it is worth 2VP for that player.
*A model carrying a mobile objective and dies causes the objective to be damaged. It is thus only worth 1VP for the rest of the game.
*And then the player that flipped the most markers get 1 VP at the end of the game.
Remember that markers not yet flipped are left on the table for the rest of the game so you can continue to flip each turn even if there are no objectives left to find.
The result:
As you can see it is a bit complicated. But it is very exciting and highly rewarding. Since you are not allowed to flip more markers if you find a objective you will often find yourself with units on markers that you must choose to either stay in place or move to then next level not for the opponent to take ground and also you might not be able to use the models effectively if they are to far behind. You have a very basic but important decision to make; will you be more aggressive and flip markers more forward and then move backwards or will you start with your own markers and then move forward. Both strategies have their merit.
Also, the extra VP for flipping the most is a good addition as it keeps the markers usable the entire game. If the opponent find more objectives you will most likely already have flipped more markers. And as one player find a objective the other player's statistical chance of finding a objective increases a lot as they have more chances to find objectives.
And the non-mobile start of the objectives means that you can not just grab a objective and win. You have to stay in the fight and your models will take punishment as the opponent try to stop you from preparing the objective. In general we had in DZC 1 a solid statistical base of about 100 games that the player that wins generally loose the kill point game - you need to play the mission more than destroy. Will you switch and let a model with higher survival rate prepare the objective? Or will you need your tougher models attacking?
The game will basically follow the basic pattern of:
Turn 1. You place your models on markers.
Turn 2. One or two objectives found. You start to attack the units finding the objectives and start to prepare the objectives.
Turn 3 is the first possible turn to be able to start moving objectives around. But you still have to find new ones. You will without a doubt start invading each other's area. The objectives found now will be hard to get mobile.
Turn 4. Generally one player might have gotten a mobile objective now. But most likely you haven't found the last objective. So the search is still on.
Turn 5-6. The last objective has been found. And you are hunting the objective some player might have been able to make mobile.
The mission, when you have gotten hold of how it works, will feel very aggressive in the beginning as you dash for the markers and depending on how the game plays out you will have to revert your strategy. Are you finding more objectives than the opponent? Then you need to compensate for the most likely lost VP for not flipping most markers by making the objectives mobile but then you loose some important aggressive fighting power.
There you have it. A very special but very balanced mission that takes into consideration that the original mission was very random. Even if a player find all objectives, which is a statistical extreme situation, the battle rages on for holding the objectives and making them mobile. As well as the reward of destroying a model with a prepared objective, damaging it.
We have always found it to be exciting and balanced. But you need to get the hang of the mission for the set-up. And not miss any rules to make it one of the most original and fun mission in the DZC universe.
No comments:
Post a Comment