ScrapYard Armory

I’ve played quite a few games of A Time of War.  Granted I use it solely as a infantry skirmish ruleset.  The finer point of roleplay (or roll-play as the case may be) are lost on a simple wargamer such as myself.  Regardless there is quite a lot to enjoy from A Time of War.  Who wouldn’t want to command a squad of Blazer wielding 31st century soldiers in a fight to the finish against your buddy?

I’ve been struggling with an issue with the core mechanics.  It seems to come up in almost every game and for the longest time I couldn’t quite put my finger on it until now.

Movement is too darn fast.

Why bother staying at range when you can easily race into medium or short range, negating the effectiveness of long range rifles and the lot.  I’ve seen the most average of stat’d soldiers cover massive distance in a single turn and still have the spare actions to pop off a shot.  In a nutshell the games I’ve played just don’t seem to be very “shooty” which is a shame considering the backdrop of the BattleTech world.

To start off I have to make the following assumption.  Weapon ranges are ok.  With this in mind lets evaluate movement rates.

There are three items that affect movement rates in A Time of War.

• Attribute: Reflex
• Attribute: Strength
• Skill: Running

Reflex and Strength are attributes that all characters have.  The average joe is assumed to have a score of 4 in each while an exceptional individual can max out at 8 each (10 for clanners, but lets not go there right now).

The running skill is an added bonus, which maxes out at 10, that affects running and sprinting and can add up to 10 meters of movement per turn.

So how fast can a foot soldier move in the 31st century?

A Foot Platoon of about 2 dozen persons in the BattleTech board game moves 30 meters in a 10 second turn or 3 meters per second.  Not a bad pace while hauling around a full military kit in combat boots across unpaved terrain while shooting and being shot at.

How does this match up with real world examples?  Surprisingly well actually.

• From Yahoo answers the average human walking speed is 3.5 miles per hour or 1.5 meters per second.
• The average human running speed is around 10 miles per hour  or 4.5 meters per second.
• The current olympic record in the 100m dash is 9.58 seconds or an average speed of 10.4 meters per second.

To put a personal spin on my analysis I crunched the numbers for my own running speed at various distances.  I’m by no means an olympic athlete but I do consider myself above average in a foot race.

• 5km in 20 minutes or 4.1 meters per second.
• 800 meters in 2 minutes or 6.7 meters per second.
• 400 meters in 56 seconds or 7.1 meters per second.

Please note that these times are my personal best under ideal conditions.  I wear light running shoes for my 5k road races while my 800m and 400m times were on a fast track (the surface is a bouncy rubber which helps return energy to the runner with each step) with proper track shoes with spikes.  Hardly representative of a combat situation.

A Time of Running

Here are the average and elite movement rates using the A Time of War system ordered by speed.

•   1.6 m/s  Average Walking
•   3.2 m/s  Elite Walking
•   3.6 m/s  Average Running
•   5.2 m/s  Elite Running
•   7.2 m/s  Elite Running with max running skill
•   7.2 m/s  Average Sprinting,
• 10.4 m/s  Elite Sprinting,
• 14.4 m/s  Elite Sprinting with max running skill

Just to recap here are those values in a table.

Ok then, I’ll grant that an elite runner in the 31st century can run as fast as the fastest human being alive today…  He just can’t do it with combat boots, carrying a gun, gear, ammo, grenades and doing it over real terrain ( not a track designed to be run on ).

To put that in perspective, an Elite Sprinting with max running skill could run the 100m dash in an astonishing 6.9 seconds (remember that the Olympic record is 9.58 seconds).

The ScrapYard Movement Modifier

So whats a 31st century tactical infantry enthusiast to do?  For me, I’ll be reducing all movement by one third (multiply by 0.66).  I’ve yet to extensively test it, but (while using a very simple formula) it seemed to produce the best looking movement rates when compared to quartering or halving.

More playtesting is sure to be in my future.  I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comment section below!