Mass Combat: Manticore
Heroes on the Mass Scale from Pyramid #3-84 allows us to convert characters and monsters into mass combat units. I've never tried that before, so let's try creating a unit based on the manticore.
1. First step is to determine the TS multiplier based on the type of campaign. We will treat this as a "realistic campaign", so out multiplier will be x0.1.
2. Active Defense. The manticore has Dodge 10, so we subtract 8 and multiply it by 2, getting 4.
3. Affliction. We have nothing here.
4. Attack. Here we take the best attack skill minus 5. That's Brawling-16 minus 5 = 11. Then we take the secondary skill Innate Attack (Projectile)-16 and subtract 10, getting 6 as the result. Then we add Accuracy +2, since the manticore has a ranged attack. That's 5. The manticore is capable of multiple attacks, since it has Extra Attack 1, so we add another 5. The spikes have RoF 6, so we add 1. The total value for attack is 11 + 6 + 5 + 5 + 1 = 28.
5. Damage Resistance. The manticore has DR 2* (tough skin) all over the body. Since this is limited DR, we add +1 per 5 character points. That's 6/5 = 1.25 that is rounded up to 2. The protection is uniform, so there's no need to multiply it by 4 and then divide it by 2. So, the total is 2.
6. Fatigue. FP-10 = 3.
7. Health. HT-10 = 3.
8. Hit Points. sqrt(HP-10) = sqrt(14) = 3.74 = 4.
9. Move. Best Move - 5 = 8.
10. Will. Will - 10 = 2. Plus 1 for Combat Reflexes results in 3.
11. Special Classes. The manticore has a ranged attack and flight, so it is an Air Combat unit. It has Stealth-14 and Move 9 on the ground, so it qualifies as a Recon unit too.
12. Transport Weight. This is a single-unit element, so its transport weight is equal to its SM, which is 2.
13. Mobility. Slow Air and Foot.
14. Optional Features. The manticore has Night Vision 5 and Infravision, so it is a Night element.
15. Quality. The manticore has no gear, so it has Poor Equipment Quality. However, its average combat skill is 16, so it is a World-Class Troop Quality element. World-class troops give +150% to TS.
So, the total TS is (4 + 28 + 2 + 3 + 3 + 4 + 8 + 3) x 2.25 x 0.1 = 13.
The manticore is a monster, so it is a TL 0 element. Typical monthly pay for TL 0 is $625 (not that far from TL3's $700). Thus, the base cost to maintain is $625 * 13/10 = $812 rounded up to $900. Multiplying it by 5 gives us the cost to raise = $4,500. Now we should apply all the modifiers to these costs. -25% to both costs for Poor equipment. World-class troops add an additional +250% to raise and +60% to maintain. Night gives +20% to both. Thus, the final cost to raise is $3,105. The final cost to maintain is $1,395. Let's round them down to $3,000 and $1,000, respectively.
The final element statline is the following:
Element: Manticore
TS: 13
Class: Air, Recon
WT: 2
Mob: SA
Raise: 3K
Maintain: 1K
TL: 0
Uh, what? Flying Beasts in GURPS Mass Combat have TS 1, Raise 120K and Maintain 40K. Yeah, I think it would be a better idea to leave this article to hero characters only. To be fair, the article states that in the introduction: "Additionally, while these rules can be used to create non-Hero elements, the TS values will not be exactly the same as Mass Combat."
I think the numbers in the system are a little off. Looking at your basic soldier who has 10's in everything and a spear doing 1d+1 thrust, He gets 5 for having skill 10 and 9 for doing 1d6+1 impaling, so in a "normal" campaign he has TR 7. Even in a gritty campaign, he gets TR 1.4, so he's approximately half of a unit of medium foot. And this guy is a pretty bare-bones mook.
ReplyDeleteAs another note, I think you're counting the combat skill 16 twice. The "World-Class" rating is based on average combat skill, and that's already added 15 to the base value. So you shouldn't be increasing troop strength beyond what it already is, though you SHOULD be using the increased cost. The +150% TS is for modifying existing element types. That gives us a TS of 5.5. Which is still too high, but its better.
Thanks for pointing out this system though, and analyzing it. I wonder if getting different ratios would fix it?
You might have a point about the World-Class rating! As for the different ratios fixing the system - I doubt that. Element statistics seem to be closer to art than science.
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