AT 43, a Self Playtest

While not feeling the greatest, but not too bad overall, I decided to play a little practice game of AT 43 at roughly 900 points to test out the game. You know, run a turn or two to see what I could learn. I shall share it with all of you. In some cases I use the wrong terminology for various things but that's ok since terms like Armor being called Protection are pretty much the same thing.

NOW UPDATED WITH COMICS!

I used a 36" by 17" battlefield with 8" deployment and no special missions.

First to build my forces!
2 Fire Toads + Sgt upgrade for 415.
And 2 Squads of Steel Troopers, 6 man squads. Triple Lens Helmets, Missile Launcher in each squad. Captain officers. 245 each.
905 points. We are using the M.Ind platoon pattern so we have to follow that Sub Faction's specific rules for building units and their bonuses and drawbacks. (Which won't come into play for this tutorial game.)

Looking back, I did this WRONG. You may only have one 5 rank officer in your entire army, and only 1 rank 4 officer in each platoon. (You have to fill out every slot in a platoon before starting another one.) So I should have had 1 less 40 point Captain, and instead would have had a Lieutenant which was 15 points cheaper, giving me a 890 point army. Oh well!)

That's the UNA. The Therians are a bit more expensive:

The Therians will go Web Strider Platoon. LP costs drop by 1, but they have morale now.
3 man Assault Goliath Squad with Relay: 380
A slightly different Goliath squad would bring me up to 760. So I can't cheese out with 2 super elite squads unless all I want on the field is 2 man squads of effectively terminator units.
2 squads of minimum sized Storm Golems with Sonic Guns, Relays, and Overseer Alphas. Brings me 10 over but frack it. Its a training game. (And I now realize the UNA was 5 over anyhow.)
No Golgoth Striders for the Therians. Don't have the points.

EDIT: Another thing I forgot! To use the Therian LP reduction due to my platoon choice! It wouldn't have done much given I rarely used any Overseer Routines that cost 2 LP or higher, but it is something I forgot to do. I will have to keep this in mind for the real game the Wednesday after next!

TIME TO PLAY THE GAME!

Ok.. My therians get 5 Leadership Points per turn, my high officer UNAs get TEN. This is calculated by number of units (squads) you have and the Leadership value of your army's highest ranking officer. The UNA has 3 units, and a Captain with Leadership 7.
I'm already seeing how your army commander needs to be an expensive one. Even if its just for LP and Authority stuff. And a couple backups when he dies. Their stats are pretty much the same as their troops though.
Therians roll a 5 for Authority, UNA a 1. UNA Officer Authority is 2 higher than the Therian's, but the Therian is still higher. Neither one secretly spent LP to jack up their roll beforehand.
Therians choose to activate a unit first since Fire Toads have 2 very large laser beams on them and I only have 1 Squad who can safely make them go boom. My first unit in the queue is the top Storm Golems.
Storm Golems move 18 cm. Then I will shoot.
They choose to shoot the Fire Toad hiding behind a nanogenerator and a squad of Steel Troopers.
Range is 5, but a single Steel trooper is in the way so he gets hits allocated first.
All 6 Therians can see the target. I'll shoot the nanoblasters first since they probably cant hurt the Toad.
Accuracy 3 minus Range 5 = -2 on the universal chart.
I need 5s to hit.
All miss.
But they have 1 reroll each!
2 hits!
Except the Steel trooper is smaller than the toad so all shots hit it instead.
Penetration 5 to Armor 11 is -6.
Autofail.
Now the Sonic Gun which will also shoot at the Toad. Its Accuracy 5 so I need 4s to hit, but no rerolls.
3 shots.
2 hits!
There is cover in the way, so the Toad gets a pair of 5+ saves.
No dice both shots are clean.
Penetration 8 to armor 11 is -3 or 5+ to damage.
Nothing.
The Therian spends an LP to give a Take Cover drill to the squad. It now gains bonuses to its cover save.
Its now the UNA's activation.
They chose the Fire Toad unit.
Right now both toads cant see the same unit unless I move them.
For now I move the trooper toad up and the Sgt behind. Ill fire both Light Laser Cannons at the unmoved Storm Golem unit.
Hmm.. the Golems are far enough away from cover that I won't consider them by it.
Range 5 with an accuracy 8 gun is a value of +3.
I need 3+s with a reroll for each gun.
2 hits.
Penetration 14 vs armor 6.
That's a +8 on the universal resolution chart. Autokills.
Next Therian unit.
The just damaged Storm Golems.
The unit's overseer spends 2 LPs to give the unit Hyper nanonucleus, allowing them to reroll failed damage tests on their penetration rolls.
They move up and shoot the Fire Toad. Again only the Sonic Gun can hurt it, so lets roll that beautiful bean footage.
Range 3 Accuracy 5 equals +2 (Even if I am doing it backwards. Its effect minus target, in this case Accuracy - Range.) on the resolution table or 3+ to hit.
One hit.
Id say the low walls provide cover so lets roll it.
It blocks. The Therians are not doing well so far.
Back to UNA.
Steel Troopers unit goes. Southern group.
Their jerkass pompous Captain tells them "Over the wall! Let's show these Morphos how we do it in the UNA!" Going over the obstacle cuts their movement in half, or 7cm.
They get 4 shots on the Storm Golems at range 3.
Accuracy 5, so a +2 for 3+ rolls. I am getting used to this universal table of resolution already. 1 chart for all your shooty woundy killy needs!
Except they have Triple Lens helmets and add +1 to Accuracy, so its a +3. No difference on the chart though.
3 of the 4 units capable of shooting hit.
Penetration 5 vs Armor 6 is -1, or 4+ to wound.
All 3 wound. Let's see if they make some cover saves at 5+
Nice. They made 2, and 1 Storm Golem is back into nanoparts.
Given the Platoon Pattern I took, that unit will have to make a Morale test next time they activate as they are a 1 or 2 star infantry unit at 3 men or less. For this, its the unit's Leadership - a fixed Difficulty of 8. For my Platoon its a Leadership of 8, or a 4+. If it would fail, it would be disorganized and needs 2LP spent to let it do ANYTHING. If it fails again, it routs and runs off board.
Back to the Therians and the Assault Goliaths are up. They move 18 and shoot. Like all units they could choose to shoot then move or move then shoot.
As the Goliaths are considered to be the same size as the Golems in front of them they decide not to fire as they don't want to hit their fellow troops. Shoulda given the Golems a Knee to the Ground drill which would have let the Goliaths shoot over them.
Oh well. I am already learning a ton about how this game works. And I am impressed.
The UNA moves its other squad of Steel Troopers.
With all their LP to spend, they think about taking Overwatch, but given the Golems on the north area are fully in cover they know it would be folly. Why would the Golems even move causing Overwatch to activate? So they shoot.
Like always you measure range unit leader to unit leader. Its range 4.
4+s to hit, 5 guys. Because the Missile Launcher guy is totally useless against these Therians. Its a Lock Shot weapon and thus only good against Walkers and vehicles. But it always hits on a 3+ in this case regardless of range. As casualties are removed by taking out the model closest to the shooting unit, we should probably move the Missile Launcher in front ASAP.
1 wound. Take Cover increases the Golem's Cover Save from 5+ to 3+
And they make it.
The UNA spends an LP to give that unit Take Cover themselves.
And that's a basic turn of AT-43.

Sadly our little one turn explanation didn't have any damage rolls against the walkers, which can take damage points to multiple locations, nor did it have any close combat. We skipped objectives and such as well since there were none. But it mostly works the same. That is AT-43 in a nutshell. As the game continues my Combat Drills stay in play until the unit is activated again unless specified otherwise. Also given the insane number of LP the UNA has to spend, they will pretty much win Authority every turn by spending 5 LP. His rank (4) plus 1. Hell, in this case, he doesn't even need to do that! With the Therians having 2 less Authority to begin with, the best they can effectively have is an 8 on their roll (Authority of 2 plus max roll of a 6.) while on pure rolling and Authority alone, the UNA Captain gives them a 10. But he will spend 5LPs a turn since he has less to do with his LPs than the Therians with their Overseer routines (which as far as I understand can be used by any unit with an Overseer in it) do. Also note that the Goliaths have a Relay which since they cannot have an Officer of any kind (known as the aforementioned Overseers), they need the Relay in order to activate without using up an LP. No officer? Spend more LP.

It looks like I forgot to use my Triple Lens Helmets a couple times too! That's what this project was all about. Learning the game a bit. Reading through the rules for a few minutes a night before or after bedtime is one thing. Actually PLAYING them is another!

I should explain the Universal Table of Resolution though. If your Action Value - Difficulty (Hey, the actual terms the game uses!) is -6 or lower you automatically fail. If its -5/-4 its 6+ to roll. -3/-2 is a 5+, -1/0/+1 is 4+, 2/3 is a 3+, 4/5 is a 2+ and 6 or higher you automatically pass.