ULF ENOK NORD
Generalist & Narrative designer
First strike
First strike is a skirmish miniature wargame, inspired by Warhammer 40k Kill team.
The game is an agent based Pvp game in which you an your opponent control opposing strike teams as both of you try to take control over key objectives on the map.
(at the bottom of this page you will find my favourite Agents, I recommend reading them as those are the ones I am most proud of)
Factions
This has three factions (only one of which are finished at the point of writhing this), they are as follows
The police force, a strike team made out of tough soldiers with a decent amount of soldiers.
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The fire rebels, a strike team of fast but fragile revolutionaries
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Arc industries, a mega crop that higher mercenaries to fight their battels and take care of their special interests.
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Combat
In strike team agents will be fighting each other over objectives. There are two ways to fight range weapons and melee weapons.
For range attacks an agent checks if they have vision on the opponent then checks if they have a range weapon with in range. Then the attacking agent compeers their marksmanship skill against the targets evasion skill and then roll a d6 check according to the table.
This mechanic represent one agents shooting vs the others evasiveness, this gives me as a designer two ways to shift an agents abelites. If I find they survive to much I could lower evasion and if I find that they to much damage I could lower marksmanship.
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Melee combat works similarly. For melee combat to commence, an agent need to see the enemy and get close enough for their melee weapon to reach. After they can commence a "combat" agents in combat can be the target of range attacks and can't take a move or dash action (Combat can be broken by a retreat action). When the combat has started both agents check their weapons initiative, the one with the highest initiative attacks first. Then the agent checks if their weapon is with in range, if it isn't they can't attack. If the attack can be preformed you roll a to hit check (1d6) for each of the attacks on the weapon. the checks difficulty is decide by compering the agents fighting skill. Then you make an armour save (described later), resolve damage then the other agent gets to take their turn in melee.
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​After an attack lands ranged or melee, you make an armour check, which is rolling 1d6 for each attack that landed and compering the weapons strength against the targets armour. A success on this roll means dealing full damage with the weapon and a failed check means dealing reduced damage.
The idea with this system, is that it wants to systemize the dramatics of combat. A shooting attack isn't one person shooting at another while they stand still. it is two soldiers shooting at echoer during a fire fight while the other tries to take evasive manouris. Melee combat is two despite soldiers using their skills to to parry and attack at the same time.
The armour mechanic works as it dose due to mechanical needs, In other system armour saves completely remove damage, which I personally find unsatisfying. In this system any attacks that land will do damage. Which for my personal tastes feels better.
These mechanics where inspired by Warhammer fantasy 9th
Range attacks
Melee attacks
Armour save
Downing
The game takes the fundamentals of how kill team works and tweaks some of its mechanics to create a game is more a back and forwards.
There are two mechanics that works towards a slower game play style, the main mechanic is downs.. In First strike when your agent is reduced to 0 Hp they get downed instead of killed. Downed is a state in which the agent loses most of their proficiency in actions. They have half movement speed, to hit on most of their attacks go down, and they lose objective control. To recover from this state an agent can take the recover action for all their action points or be helped by another agent. When an agent is downed they gain a wound. If they gain more wounds their Will stat the agent dies.
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This mechanic increases the time to kill, and creates small mini objectives during the match. As a downed agent is an easily picked of target that grants a massive swing of value, protecting it might become the main priority or it becomes a necessary sacrifice.
This mechanic was inspired by Warhammer Mordheim
Strategy cards
The game is played in rounds during which players take turns to activate agents. Strategy cards is how you decide which player get to active a agent first. This is done by both players picking a strategy card, from their hand, then compering the cards initiative value. The player with the lowest initiative goes first.
So why would you play slower initiative cards? That is because strategy cards have two aspects to them. They have an initiative value and an effect.
For an example the Police forces' Grind warfare strategy card has an initiative of 3 and the effect "All your agents heal 2D3 each"
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This mechanic has several fun strategic implications. Such as, if you know that your opponent wants to go first and you know they have a super fast strategy card, it might be valuable to allow them to just go first, by playing a slow card that has a strong effect. This will not only give you the strong effect, but also burns one of their fast strategy cards. Leaving them in a situation where they can't stop you from going first in a later round. But this strategy could also be countered by them knowing you will pick a slow card, by them picking a card which is just faster than your card. To not get into the problem stated before, but if you can foresee that you can counter by playing a fast card and steal the initiative
This mechanic was inspired by Star Wars: Shatterpoint
My favourite agents
Here are 3 of my favourite agents which I have made for this game. I should note, they are some of the more wild characters.
Jonas boom
Fire rebels
Jonas boom is a captain for the fire rebels strike team, He specializes in explosives. He places mines all over the map and if you utilizes the fire rebel motivation mechanic, you can have other agents preforming the same actions.
His game plan is to cover important locations with bombs and threaten an explosion. Effectively locking down objectives. It is a slow game plan as it requires time to set up, But it can be speed up by consuming
​ motivation and having other agents preform explosive actions.
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This puts Jonas boom in a bit a dilemma, he needs fast agents to place bombs effectively. But he also need agents which can afford him the space to place bombs and agents that can give him resources.
For opponents the question becomes what agents to focus and what locations on the map that can be given up.
Experiment 999
Police force
The experiment 999 is a massive monster, it is a barely sentient amalgamation of flesh and technology, seeking something to destroy.
As such you have almost no control over the creature, instead you play it like a hazard for your opponent. The experiment 999 has an ability called "Violent charge" this ability is a triggered action which means you can't activate it yourself, but must wait for your opponent to cause a trigger.
Violent charge's trigger is that an enemy agent gets with in 6' (inches) of this agent. If that happens this agents charges the offending party and, if close enough, traps them in melee. (this effect can not trigger during this agents activation)
The experiment 999's melee capacities is some of the best in the game. But it lacks good movement to catch up to enemies. That is were this ability comes in. By placing the experiment 999 by important objectives, bottlenecks or combat zones. You can make it function as a landmine, where if the opponent gets to close they get trapped in a once sided 1v1. A fun consequents of how this agent functions is if enemy agents are with in 6' (inches) as it ends its turn any movement they take on their turn causes them to trigger the chare. A real Jurassic park "don't move" situation
The moon peddle warrior
Fire rebels
The moon peddle warrior is a man who wields the mighty and ancient blade "moon light" (a stolen experimental weapon from Arc industries). The moon peddle warrior has spend years (days) to master the art of the blade, his master (mediocre) swordsmanship is revered by all. As with a single slice of his weapon he can cute pure steel in half as if it was butter (this is the swords doing).
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The moon peddle warrior is one of my favourites due to how goofy they are. A goofiness which persists into their gameplay.
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The Fire rebel strike team has a mechanic called Motivation. Motivation is a resource which can be used by captains to activate powerful abelites.
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The moon peddle warrior, has 5 abelites which uses motivation.
1, warrior poets mediation, this is an action in which the moon peddle warrior starts residing terrible broken Haiku to himself. This grants him motivation, as he is feeding into his warrior persona.
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2,3,4 and 5 are attacks. They are powerful slices which the moon warrior can preform by using up his motivation. The attacks are as follows
The rush of a summer breeze, diagonal slice - He runs around swinging his sword wildly hitting everything with in 3' (inches) of him.
Fall's endless rippling rain, thrust - He inexpertly stabs his opponent with his sword 6 times.
Winter's calm cold death, Horizontal slice - He activates the swords extended mode and swings a horizontal slice. Due to the extended mode he reaches further with this attack than normal.
Springs joyful leap, vertical slice - He leaps to an opponent then slices them.