Up to now, I wanted to use this design system for some sort of RPS relation between types of unit for an axis an allies similar combat system:
Archery: Attack first, defender choose the target of the attack.
Infantry: Attack second, the attacker can only chose the opposing infantry as target. If there is no opposing infantry, you can target any unit.
Cavalry: Attacks third, the attacker can chose any target on the battle field.
As an option, infantry and cavalry force the target to counter attack, preventing it from attacking another unit.
Now there was many problem with this system that created situation where some units were useless, too weak or too powerful. I'll spare the details and explain the second system idea.
I intended to use either 5 or 7 large unit token organized as 2 rows to represent army formation. So I decided it could be interesting to make the rows matter. Here are the new unit functions:
Archery: Attack first, can target any row, the attacker decides if he attack the front or back row, but the defender select the target.
Cavalry: Attack Second, they can target up to a range of 2. (if in back, can attack front, if in front can attack back and front. The cavalry can select any target they want.
Infantry: Attack Third. Infantry can only attack the row in front of them, so if they are in front they can attack the front row. But infantry can block units attacking the row they are located in. So if archers in the back row get's attacked, the infantry can block the attack if they are also in the back
With a system like that infantry is more useful because a unit like pikemen could protect another unit from a cavalry charge, while with the first system, the cavalry would simply never attack the pikemen.
If also gives a bit more control on the archery unit, because even if they cannot select their target, they can select which row they want to attack. It prevent having a situation where a unit immune to range attack would take and negate all the damage.
What do you think? Is it too heavy to manage?
