Painting and rule changes

Wargaming continues to take a back seat as pretty much every day I am driving to the house and spend my time painting rooms (not models alas). This gives me plenty of time to think about and ponder the mech rules. However, the downside is that when I do manage to fit in a quick game, I often have new rule changes I want to test, which is slowing down the progress of my mech campaign.

A random mech photo made to look cartoonish.

Rule Changes…

I have tried various activation methods over the past few weeks while developing some simple mech rules and may have now settled on a playing card-based activation system (I hope). In this activation approach, the cards are shuffled, and each mech is assigned a card. Activation begins with the mech holding the highest card and continues in descending order until all mechs have been activated. Mechs that are attacked but have not yet had the chance to activate can take defensive countermeasures to reduce the effectiveness of combat, but must sacrifice their card and be treated as activated. The main drawback of  the cards is they do clutter up the tabletop. To address this, I might create numbered counters to draw from a bag or look to purchase some very small playing cards to use instead.

A test game using the card activation.

Another rule change I tried out previously which has returned, is the critical system failure check. This check occurs whenever a mech takes a hit. A D6 is rolled and if less than the total number of hits accumulated, the mech has a critical systems failure and is eliminated. The mechanism adds a greater level of uncertainty to taking hits where a well aimed shot can eliminate a mech.

A mech now with 4 hits passes the critical failure test. Requiring a 4 or more for the number of hits a 5 is rolled.

Painting…

Returning to the topic of painting, I am halfway through painting the house and one of the rooms completed is my wargaming room. A photo of which can be seen below.

The wargames room painted and waiting to be filled with shelving units loaded with models and terrain.