# Strike Point totals at the turn limit - The precise calculation of Strike Points matters very much for Rep and XP rewards in a campaign. As such, the following clarifications are in order: - If a force has an Advisor or Hostage attached to one of its units at the end of a game (after all Turns have been taken, not by failing a Strike Test), then the opposing force gains an additional Strike Point. This applies to both Advisor or Hostage characters added during force building, and to ones granted by a scenario, such as *Rescue*. - If a force is wiped out, that is 4 Strike Points, and a good reminder to check whether they still hold any objectives (they probably don’t!). This may seem silly, but I have played a game where at no point were any Strike Tests taken, and at the end of the last turn, one side was wiped out to a man. - If you are 2 or more Strike Points above your opponent at the end of the last turn, factoring in all of the above, you *do not need to make a strike test*; to do so would only give your opponent 1 extra Rep for having “won by a strike test” despite it actually being a timeout victory. - **However**, you may, under those conditions, *choose to* take and voluntarily fail a strike test if you see that doing so would protect your commander. Obviously, if your commander has already fallen as a casualty, then this is not relevant. An example of the above: > At the end of turn 6 in a Rescue scenario, the defender still holds the captive Hostage character. At no point during the game did anyone have enough strike points to call for a strike test, but now, at the end of turn 6, we must evaluate strike point totals. > Miraculously, both sides have zero casualties. So there are no strike points from casualties. In fact, the only strike points are the one that the attacker gets from the scenario (“Attacker gains a Strike Point after Turn 6 if the Captured Merchant is attached to a defender’s unit.”) and the strike point that the attacker gets from the defender having a Hostage attached to one of its units at the end of a game. > So the strike point totals are now defender 0, attacker 2. The attacker *does not need to make a strike test*, but they may *choose* to do so. If they choose to, their commander can voluntarily fail it (per the rules in *No Peace Beyond the Line* p202), and ensure that the attacker’s commander is not captured. But conversely, if they do so, the defender then gets the +1 Rep for having won a game by a failed strike test. > If they do *not* choose to make a strike test, then their commander may be captured, but the defender does not get the +1 rep from winning via a strike test. # Commander capture & spending Rep to escape - When a commander has been captured and must roll to escape, they have the Rep from the battle that they just fought available to them to spend to escape. # Decisive Victories - Anyone who has chosen a battle opportunity and has no opponent, either due to an opponent being unable to join the battle during the week, or due to no player’s name being placed next to them, will receive **2** Rep and XP, plus modifiers, rather than the 5 in the base rules. - We felt that 5 was so far above what you could win in a typical battle that it rewarded *not playing* more than playing. Two is the median Rep won in our record-keeping. # Commanders - Dutch commanders get, as their “Free Special Rule”, *Strict* instead of *Sailors*. - This is because most of the core units in most of the Dutch factions (and in the case of some factions, *all* the core units) already have *Expert Sailors*. Therefore, giving the Dutch commander *Sailors* is tantamount to giving them no special rule. # Tactics - Undisciplined Louts: this tactic has emerged as a dominant strategy, and so to mitigate it, it now reads as follows: > Your opponent must roll a d10. On a 7+, they must test for each unit in their force as per the Drunk scenario rule as explained on p. 143 of the *Blood & Plunder* rule book. - There are additional tactics we have made, to expand the list and make it less repetitive, and also to expand the options for use at sea. XXX TODO # Delayed sea theatre - Without taking the Ships 1 Resource, no player has access to actual ships in their force, and can only use boats: canoes, piraguas, longboats. If everyone agrees, all battle opportunities for the first two turns can be set to automatically be land battles. If anyone disagrees, then theatre is rolled for all battle opportunities from turn one. Tabletop Simulator also adds some friction to sea battles, so players should consider whether they feel comfortable with Tabletop Simulator enough to handle this at the start. # Bounties - Players may post a bounty if they want. The form of this is a condition (“If you take Lourenço Machado’s *Hidalgo* fighting man as a casualty”) and a reward of Rep from the posting player’s cache (“I will give you 1 Rep”). - They can also revoke a bounty they have posted if they no longer feel it is relevant. They cannot revoke it in the face of someone collecting it, though, of course! # Additional factions A number of unit types are not playable in the base campaign rules, because they do not occur in any of the factions available for campaign play, such as Coromantee Warriors, Jamaican Privateers, Pnieses, Vrij Compagnieen, etc. As you can see, many of these are fun unit types! So to remedy this, we have added house rules on [[5. Additional Factions|additional factions]]. If a player wishes to play any of these, they should get consent from the other players. # Pirate nation - The Pirate nation introduced in *Raise the Black* is available for play when additional factions are allowed. - Every playable faction within the Pirate nation has one option for Force Type: *pirate*. - Anyone who is not of the Pirate nation who defends against a Pirate nation force and wins gets +1 Rep. (Maybe? Maybe not. We’ll have to experiment.) - A pirate nation commander must choose whether to use the English or French national commander bonuses, as described on *No Peace Beyond the Line* page 197. --- Fragmentary ideas: - Voluntarily failing strike tests requires you to _have a chance at a strike test_. Maybe we can add a rule where you can withdraw even without one, for a rep hit? - Should there be a commander trait you can take that means you always have at least one tactic pick?