Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!...the Masai!

Moderators: Vis Bellica, Laffe

Rolf
Posts: 230
Joined: Fri Sep 06, 2013 5:20 am

Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!...the Masai!

Post by Rolf »

Gents,

Sharp Practice stops at 1865 …but it can go further! I’ve been using a few rules sets for Darkest Africa gaming and Sharp Practice was one eagerly anticipated for adaptation to this genre.

I’ve gathered some thoughts on this and popped up the first of a few posts on the subject of adapting Sharp Practice to gaming in Darkest Africa, specifically East Africa in the 1880s-90s.

I kick it off with a general discussion.

Cheers

R

https://agrabbagofgames.wordpress.com/2 ... st-africa/


Image
Last edited by Rolf on Fri Jun 03, 2016 12:37 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Archdukek
Posts: 5741
Joined: Tue Sep 03, 2013 11:49 pm
Location: Linlithgow, West Lothian, UK

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!

Post by Archdukek »

Great stuff Rolf. Looking forward to the next episodes already.

John
User avatar
sjwalker51
Posts: 904
Joined: Thu Sep 05, 2013 3:01 pm
Location: Sheffield, South Yorkshire

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!

Post by sjwalker51 »

Seconded :-)
User avatar
vlad48
Posts: 276
Joined: Sat Sep 07, 2013 8:21 pm
Location: Vancouver, BC

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!

Post by vlad48 »

Thirded! Great work.
Rolf
Posts: 230
Joined: Fri Sep 06, 2013 5:20 am

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!

Post by Rolf »

Thanks Gents,

Hope there are some useful suggestions to kick around in this post and the next...

The Masai I hope will show that a relatively 'simple' army can still be interesting in SP if used in its historical context....

Cheers

R
User avatar
vlad48
Posts: 276
Joined: Sat Sep 07, 2013 8:21 pm
Location: Vancouver, BC

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!

Post by vlad48 »

Hi Rolf,
For many of us it will be difficult to offer useful army-specific traits for units, like the Masai, except for those well-steeped in research.
But even general gamers can see some overall issues to thrash out.
Top of mind are mechanics for balancing modern firepower (shoot-shoot activations at 48" for breech loaders - zounds) versus spear or ancient firearms.
So 2 ideas to get more discussion going.
1. Consider smaller unit sizes for well-armed "Imperials" (not hard too imagine under-strength squads in these climates); perhaps units of 4 or 6 men for regulars instead of 8.
2. as mentioned on other threads, firing deductions for smoke for units that simply stay in place and blaze away. Once a unit fires for 2 or 3 consecutive actions without moving or "resting", place a cotton smoke marker to designate the penalty.

As in Zulu encounters there should be consideration for indigenous forces going to ground (greater saving rolls but at the cost of a major reduction in speed).
Looking forward to lots more as things get rolling.
Rolf
Posts: 230
Joined: Fri Sep 06, 2013 5:20 am

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!

Post by Rolf »

Hi Vlad,

To your points.

1. Consider smaller unit sizes for well-armed "Imperials" (not hard too imagine under-strength squads in these climates); perhaps units of 4 or 6 men for regulars instead of 8.

2. as mentioned on other threads, firing deductions for smoke for units that simply stay in place and blaze away. Once a unit fires for 2 or 3 consecutive actions without moving or "resting", place a cotton smoke marker to designate the penalty.


Simon Walker has some interesting ideas on this and agrees with much of what you say...actually he's already covered it. Essentially, smaller units will be more brittle and harder to control so I think there is potential for this idea. Basically just leave the fisticuffs above/below 50% rule the same as the standard group numbers and you're good to go.

Smoke is an interesting one. I suspect Rich has ideas about units firing multiple times from the same static location and probably this figured into his original thinking. For the moment I would go with his ideas in the rules i.e. 'smoke breechloader p.49' ideas and probably building off that would be the idea....or at least use that as the basis for a tweak here and there.


R
Rolf
Posts: 230
Joined: Fri Sep 06, 2013 5:20 am

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!

Post by Rolf »

Gents,

..the Masai in Sharp Practice!

This post in this small series looks at portraying the Masai using the new version of Sharp Practice by Two Fat Lardies.

It incorporates the new concepts of deployment points, ‘national’ characteristics and other unique elements of the Masai people and how Sharp Practice with its many interesting concepts can be used to reflect their unique attributes.

Check out the Masai for Sharp Practice here.

https://agrabbagofgames.wordpress.com/2 ... ice-masai/


Cheers

Happy W

Image
Nosher
Posts: 97
Joined: Tue Sep 03, 2013 11:07 pm

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!...the Masai!

Post by Nosher »

This looks really promising.

The only issue I can see is that at 97 points (even with smaller units of 6 'white men') you will be facing an awful lot of shooters.
Archdukek
Posts: 5741
Joined: Tue Sep 03, 2013 11:49 pm
Location: Linlithgow, West Lothian, UK

Re: Sharp Practice - Darkest Africa!...the Masai!

Post by Archdukek »

Fascinating stuff. However, the points values seem very high. Did you use the Sharpulator or some other system?

John
Post Reply