What Happens When the Weather Turns?

Optional weather rules for The Barons’ War

What happens when the retinue you’ve carefully chosen arrives for battle in pouring rain? Or your crossbowmen take up a good position, only to find that fog has hidden everything they hoped to shoot at?

Mort Schmidbauer suggested, in the Facebook group, adding an optional Weather Generator alongside the scenarios and deployment maps in The Barons’ War. I thought it was a cracking idea, particularly as we already have weather rules in Death & Taxes, Exhaustion in Outremer and fog in the forthcoming The Measure of Lords.

I’ve used those as the starting point for the rules below. I’m curious to see what happens when the weather starts interfering with plans you’ve already made. You might be happy to push a Group towards an Objective in the heat, but rather less pleased when the enemy arrives and your Warriors are still recovering from the effort.

Mort also suggested night fighting, which I’d like to return to separately. For now, these are optional playtest rules for Second Edition. Choose a condition or let the dice decide, and give it a try in your next battle.

Weather Generator

Both players must agree to use the Weather Generator. After choosing the scenario and deployment map, but before deploying any Warriors, choose a weather condition or roll 3d6 once and consult the table.

Use one weather condition for the whole battlefield.

• Weather affects both retinues, including Groups which arrive after the battle has begun.

• Its effects last for the whole battle unless stated otherwise.

• If the scenario includes its own weather rules, use those instead of the Weather Generator.

Restricted Shooting

Some weather conditions restrict shooting to Short Range.

• Weapons with separate Short and Long Ranges may only shoot at Short Range.

• Weapons with a single range retain their normal range.

• These restrictions apply to all Ranged Attacks, including Shoot Back, Reaction Shooting and shooting granted by Abilities or special rules.

Check range for each Warrior as normal, using the maximum range permitted by the weather. A Warrior can only shoot if an enemy is within that range and Line of Sight.

An enemy Warrior can only be removed as a casualty if at least one shooting Warrior has both sufficient range and Line of Sight to them.

Reaction Shooting: When shooting is restricted to Short Range, check the range and Line of Sight of each defending Warrior before the Charging Group moves. Only Warriors with an enemy within the permitted range and Line of Sight may generate Attack dice. Reaction Shooting is still resolved at Long Range, as normal.

All other requirements for Reaction Shooting continue to apply.

Weather and Movement

Where weather reduces movement, first calculate how far the Warrior could move for the chosen Action, including any modifiers for Armour and Mounts. Subtract the weather penalty, then apply Terrain effects to the remaining allowance as normal.

Weather penalties cannot reduce a movement allowance below 0″. All normal movement restrictions still apply, including any requirement to finish in Coherency.

Mild

Fight the battle without any changes due to the weather.

Cold and Sleet

Shooting is restricted to Short Range during Rounds 1 and 2. From Round 3 onwards, shooting is unaffected by the weather.

Rain

Shooting is restricted to Short Range throughout the battle.

A Warrior performing a Run Action reduces its Run allowance by 1″. Other movement is unaffected. Rain does not change the classification of any Terrain.

Snow

Shooting is restricted to Short Range throughout the battle. Snow also reduces movement as follows:

Apply only the reduction for the movement being performed. A Run Action is therefore reduced by 2″ in total.

• For a Charge, reduce the Charging Group’s Movement allowance by 1″ before adding Strength of the Charge. Use this reduced Movement when checking potential Charge range and when making the Charge move.

• When determining whether the defending Group may use Reaction Shooting, use the Charging Group’s reduced Movement allowance. Reaction Shooting is permitted if the Charging Group cannot reach its target using this reduced Movement alone and must rely on Strength of the Charge. All other requirements for Reaction Shooting still apply.

• Where a Shoot Action allows Warriors to move before shooting, reduce their movement allowance by 1″. For example, Bowmen who would normally move 3″ before shooting may only move 2″ in Snow.

• These reductions also apply to Actions granted by Command Actions, Abilities or special rules.

• The Warrior’s printed Movement characteristic is unchanged.

• Forced Back and Flee distances are unaffected.

Example: A Group of Warriors has a Movement allowance of 6″, reduced to 5″ by Snow. They declare a Charge against a Group of Bowmen 5.5″ away. Because the Warriors cannot reach the Bowmen without using Strength of the Charge, the Bowmen may declare Reaction Shooting, provided they meet the normal requirements. Check their permitted shooting range and Line of Sight before the Charging Group moves, then resolve the attack at Long Range as normal.

Fog

Shooting is restricted to Short Range while the fog remains.

At the beginning of each round, before rolling for Initiative, one player rolls a d10 for the whole battlefield. Compare the result with the table below.

• If the roll succeeds, the fog lifts immediately. The shooting restriction ends for the rest of the battle. Do not make any further fog rolls.

• If the roll fails, the fog remains. Check again at the beginning of the next round.

Fog does not otherwise change Line of Sight, movement or Command Range.

Extreme Heat

Warriors fighting in extreme heat take longer to recover from their exertions. A Group can accumulate more than one Weary token during the battle.

Whenever a Group would become Weary, give it one Weary token, even if it already has one or more. There is no maximum number of Weary tokens.

Effects of Weary Tokens

A Group suffers a −1 penalty on all its d10 rolls for each Weary token it carries. This includes Attack, Defence and Shield rolls, as well as Morale and Order checks.

A Group with two Weary tokens therefore suffers a −2 penalty; a Group with three suffers −3. Weary tokens do not affect d6 rolls, including Strength of the Charge.

Gaining Weary Tokens

Add Weary tokens at the normal times.

Each cause adds a separate token. A Group that runs as its second Action gains one token when it declares the Action and another when it finishes the Run.

Commanders and Command Groups do not become Weary as a result of issuing Command Actions to other Groups. The normal limit of two Actions or Reactions per Group per round still applies.

Removing Weary Tokens

Resolve Housekeeping in the normal order. A Weary Group making a Morale check to reduce its Morale Penalties applies the penalty from all the Weary tokens it currently carries.

At the step where Weary markers are normally removed, remove one Weary token from each Group. Remove this token whether or not the Group passed its Morale check. Any remaining tokens carry into the next round and continue to apply their penalties.

If another rule would remove the Group’s Weary status, remove one Weary token instead. The Group remains Weary until its final token is removed.

Example: A Group begins the round without any Weary tokens and takes a Move Action. Later, its Retinue Leader successfully Orders it to Run as its second Action. The Group gains one Weary token when it declares the Run and another when it completes the movement. It now suffers −2 on its d10 rolls. During Housekeeping, it removes one token and begins the next round with a −1 penalty. If it gains no further tokens, it removes the remaining token during the next Housekeeping phase.

Let me know how you get on

I’m particularly interested in Extreme Heat. A Group that Runs as its second Action gains two Weary tokens but only removes one during Housekeeping. Keep pushing it like that and the penalties soon pile up. The Retinue Leader can carry on shouting Orders, of course. He’s not the one having to carry them out. What I want to find out is whether this makes you think twice about pushing a Group again, or whether the penalties become so severe that the Group has little chance of doing anything useful.

The shooting restrictions need a few outings with different retinues too. Bowmen and crossbowmen will have to get closer, particularly when facing an opponent who has brought considerably fewer missile troops. I’m interested in whether that changes how you approach the scenario, or simply leaves your Bowmen wishing they’d brought swords.

If you try these rules, let me know in the comments which weather condition you used, the scenario and what was in each retinue. If you had to stop and agree what a rule meant, tell me what was happening. That gives me something specific to look at when I return to the rules.

And thank you again to Mort for suggesting this. I’m looking forward to hearing how you get on.

Download the Weather Generator

The complete optional playtest rules for The Barons’ War Second Edition, including the weather table, conditions and worked examples.

DOWNLOAD WEATHER GENERATOR

PDF, 3 pages