The time as come for this year’s X-Cam! This campaign will run from now until 1 August, or we have a winner (whichever comes first!)

Here are the rules:

Registration

First, post in the official registration thread on the forum. You must declare your faction of choice at time of registration. For ease of organization, a player can only register a single faction in the campaign.

Reporting Games

Once you have played a game for the X-Cam, feel free to post it in its own thread in the forum; pictures and fluffy battle reports are always welcome! However, to make sure that your game is counted in the standings, one of the players must make a post in the Stat Board thread. In the post, make sure to specify the two people who are playing, the points, and the amount of Recon/Strategy/Control points acquired by each player.

Game Setup

Make sure to read this section carefully, as there have been a few changes from last year, plus this section tells players all they need to know to play a game that is compatible with the campaign (note, these rules are mostly from Craig’ Gallant’s blog; I’ve made just  few modifications):

In the X-Cam, players undertake missions.  Each mission is a game against an opponent or opponents.  There are three basic types of missions:

• Recon Mission: Players engage in small battles to gain Recon points. Recon points represent ‘intelligence’ your forces have gained about the Command Area, enemy positions, and assets.
• Strategic Missions: Once you have enough Recon points you may spend them to challenge other players to larger battles to gain Strategic points.  Strategic points represent your offensive position in the area.  The more Strategic points you have, the better positioned you are to make a critical strike and establish control.
• Control Missions: Players that have gained a strong strategic position are now ready to coordinate large engagements, such as Stronghold Assaults and Force Superiority battles, to gain Control points.   Control points represent how much dominance your forces have in the area.

Recon points and Strategic points are simply a means to an end.  Throughout the X-Cam players will gain and spend these points.  You will always be returning to Recon missions to gain back Recon points, and spending those points on Strategic missions to gain Strategic points.  These, in turn, are spent on Control missions to gain Control points as well as to improve your situation in lower-priority battles.

Unlike Recon and Strategic points, you don’t spend Control points.  Control points increase your rank, give you access to more powerful abilities, and most importantly: The first player to gain 3 Control points will win the X-Cam.  If two (or more) players both get to 3 control points within a week of each other, they fight a large scale Grudge Match scenario to break the tie.

How you play:

1.      Challenge an opponent to a mission. You may only choose a mission that you can afford based on your current status in the X-Cam. (see mission costs)

2.      Roll scenario on the table for the chosen mission and choose a table/terrain type.

3.      Determine Attacker and Defender based on scenario and mission rules.

4.      Bid to alter Force Point Level.

5.      Bid to alter terrain on the battlefield.

6.      Spend Recon and/or Strategy Points based on mission cost and bids.

7.      Build your forces.

8.      Play the game.

a.       At the end of each round, but not at any other time, check to see if one of the game ending conditions defined in the scenario has been triggered.

9.      Determine the winner based on scenario victory conditions.

10.  Gain Recon, Strategy and/or Control Points based on scenario rewards.

11.  Report your results.

Terrain:

Dystopian Wars allows for fighting in all three ‘battle spaces’ at once. Players should decide amongst themselves which spaces they would like to include in each game based upon the forces they have available and their own tastes, and design the table accordingly. Most missions support land tables, sea tables, and mixed tables wherever possible, although some may only allow one type or the other.
There will be 2d6-2 (re-roll once if the result is 0) terrain pieces deployed for each game. Once the number is determined, roll 2d6 to see who goes first and alternate choosing BUT NOT PLACING pieces from your local collection of terrain. Players then alternate placing terrain from this pool (note: you are NOT limited to the pieces you selected for the pool) by rolling a single d10 near the center of the board. The die result is the rough percentage of distance towards the table edge, in the direction of the pointy top of the d10, where the piece chosen will be placed. On the result of a ‘0’ the player may choose to put the piece in the center of the table, at the table edge (along the line indicated), or not place the piece at all, thereby removing it permanently from the pool. If any piece would end up overlapping another (where it doesn’t make sense), or within 6″ of another piece, simply move the new piece the minimum distance required so that it is outside of 6″.

Spending Strategy Points:

 –Altering the Force Point Level–

Each mission has a default point level, but players may spend Strategic points in an attempt to alter this level.  Each player secretly records a number on a piece of paper.  The number can be positive, negative, or zero and represents an increment of 50 by which you are trying to shift the default Force Point level.  After both players have written down their numbers they are revealed and added together.  The result is how much the point level shifts to a maximum of 200.   Example:  Bill and John are about to play a Recon Mission.  Bill writes down +3 on his paper.  John writes down -2.  The players reveal their papers and add them together: +1.  The game is played at the default level +50.  Bill has spent 3 strategic points and John has spent 2. REMEMBER: All strategic points spent are lost, REGARDLESS of how much the point level is actually adjusted.

–Altering Terrain Placement–

Quite often knowing the local terrain can mean the difference between victory and defeat. In any battle where the terrain is determined randomly, each player may opt to secretly bid Strategy Points towards some control over the battlefield. Each player writes down a number of Strategy Points they are spending on controlling the location of the battle. These numbers are then revealed and compared with each other. The winning player consults the following chart and may claim whatever advantages their bid has earned them. Regardless of who wins or loses, all points that were bid are lost.

–Benefit of Owning Control Points–

Players with Control points have impressed their commanders and can now call upon expanded resources.  For every Control Point you possess, your Force Card hand is expanded by 1. This means that if you have 2 control points, your maximum hand is now 7, and you will always have at least 3 (as when you lose your last squadron you’ve lost the game, no matter how cool you are). You may NEVER draw more than 5 cards at a time (ie: you will start the game with a maximum of five cards).

Recon Missions:

You need more information on what is out there.  Deploy forces and scout the area.  Report back with your findings.  You must get home with the information at all costs.

Strategic Mission:

Control Mission:

Missions

All missions are per Craig’s original post on his blog:

http://mcnerdiganspub.blogspot.com/2011/05/dystopian-wars-x-cam-rules-and-missions.html

Good Luck and Good Hunting!