War Engine

I've played a lot of RPGs in my day and very few of them include rules for mass combat, conducting sieges, or handling ship combat. As a GM this was always an issue for me because I like that stuff-a lot...

Those that did have such systems (typically sold separately) were either too complicated to run smoothly and quickly at the table or were clearly little more than janky afterthoughts that needed to take-up a certain amount of space to justify being sold in a box at the game store.

I wanted something lite, concise, and easy for people to pick-up mid-session at the table where need be. I didn't find it, so I made it. The earliest version of these rules was deployed in the early 90's and became part of my first game, Ashes & Empires. Variations of it appear in my subsequent games: Age of Blood & Iron and Days of High Adventure.

I present them here as a standalone system that can be plugged into any Medieval/Fantasy game that either doesn't have them or doesn't have very good ones. It can also be played as a tabletop war game in its own right that can be learned in a single sitting by a group.

This iteration utilizes (2) 6-sided dice to resolve all mechanics. I like the D6; its classic, keeps the modifiers nice and low, and everyone's got a set.