I recently resurrected a letter from Terry Sirk dated January 1993 in which Terry outlined a medieval jousting game. Way back in '93, upon receipt of the letter, Brian Dewitt and I had toyed with the ideas presented, but had dropped the procedures and never fully carried through on them. Since we're now entering upon 1999, it's probably time to look at the system again.
The Jousting Game (JG) pits one knight against one knight, both singly mounted. In reviewing other hand-to-hand jousting and dueling procedures which have been presented in the various wargaming magazines, I noted that most of them set out a matrix of choices for the individual combatants.
For example, I could aim my lance at the opponent's head, while using my shield to protect my body, or I could aim for the other guy's body, while keeping the shield high to protect my head. And my opponent made similar choices. Then the choices were compared, the dice were thrown, the efficiency of the attack determined, and injury to the participants calculated.
The Sirk JG takes a slightly different approach. Here, it's all done with numbers. Each mounted knight starts with 100 Activity Points (AP), and uses them in several ways as he heads for his opponent. The two participants start out about 13 inches apart, ride toward each other, and when they make contact, determine the impact on the opponent.
- First, each knight uses his AP points to 'spur' his horse. This translates itself into the distance that the participant moves forward, representative of the speed of his mount. You'd like to get the horse moving rapidly, but you can't afford to spend all your points on speed alone. The maximum distance to be covered per round of movement is 8 inches, the minimum can be one inch. These movement rounds continue until the parties make contact.
Second, each rider now uses some of his AP points to 'control' his horse, and ensure that the trusty steed doesn't buck or lurch at the contact point. A bucking horse reduces the efficiency with which you impact the opponent.
Third, the remainder of the points are assigned to three areas:
- (a) Your basic strike points, the strength with which you strike the opponent
(b) Your basic defense points, the protection given by your shield against the opposing strike points
(c) Your 'reserve', which, if the opponent's strike points outnumber your shield points (thus permitting him to get inside your shield defense), gives you a wee bit of resiliency to ward off the blow.
Example
As an example, Fred Haub took that mighty knight of the realm, the Earl of Froth, and matched him with my own hero, Sir Douglas. We placed the men 13 inches apart, starting with 100 AP.
Then we each chose our 'spur' points in secret. I devoted 15 AP toward spurring Sir Douglas' mount, while Fred did the same for his Earl of Froth. The number of spur points was added to a percentage dice throw to determine the distance moved.
Note that in the chart below, high numbers are good... the greater the number of spur points added to your dice toss, the higher the net dice throw and the greater the distance moved.
- 01 to 33 Move 1 inch
34 to 66 Move 2 inches
67 to 100 Move 4 inches
Over 100 Move 8 inches
Despite our 15 AP allocations, we each tossed abysmally low... Froth moved forward 2 inches, while Douglas moved 1 inch. We were still 10 inches apart, and ready, therefore, for another movement round. Both of us allocated another 10 AP for spurring, tossed the dice and again the tosses were low... this time we each moved 2 inches. At this rate, with our fleet steeds supposedly flying toward each other, we'd use up all of our AP in spurring and not have any left for the contact phase.
It took 4 rounds of movement, but the knights finally made contact. The Earl had moved 9 inches, while Sir Douglas had moved 4 of the original 13 separating them.
Contact
When contact was made, Sir Douglas had spent 25 AP in spurring, while the Earl had expended 35. Sir Douglas thus had 75 AP left, the Earl had 65.
Now we allocated 'control' points to maintain control of our horses... no bucking for us. I had Douglas allocate 20 AP for this, and so did Fred for the Earl of Froth. Now we each tossed a 10-sided die and multiplied it by a factor of 4. The objective was to have enough control points to top the modified die roll. If you didn't exceed the modified roll, you lost even more AP.
My die roll was a 7... 7 x 4 equals 28, and so since I had only allocated a control expenditure of 20 points, I lost more AP. In fact, I lost twice the difference... 2 x (28 - 20), or 16 points. Fortunately for the Earl, his 10-sided die roll, when multiplied by 4, came out under his allocated control points of 20. He lost no additional points.
At this point in time, our AP totals were:
| Points | Sir Douglas | The Earl of Froth |
|---|---|---|
| Initial value | 100 | 100 |
| Less, spurring points | 25 | 35 |
| Less, Control points | 20 | 20 |
| Less, bucking horse | 16 | 0 |
| Remaining AP | 39 | 45 |
But now we each received a 'strike bonus'... remember way-back-when, when our heroes had rocketed toward each other to make contact? Sir Douglas had gone 4 inches of the total 13 inch distance... this gave him an AP bonus of 2 x 4, or 8 points. He now had a new AP total of 39 + 8, or 47.
The Earl had gone 9 inches of the 13 inch distance... his bonus was 2 x 9, or 18 points. His new total was 45 + 18, or 63 points.
What was happening here, was that these last AP bonuses depended upon our relative speed at the point of contact. The Earl had outdistanced Sir Douglas, hence received a bigger bonus.
And so here we were, at last in contact, and we divided our remaining AP into three categories:
| Points | Sir Douglas | The Earl of Froth |
|---|---|---|
| Remaining AP | 47 | 63 |
| Less, offensive points | 10 | 38 |
| Less, defensive points | 20 | 20 |
| Less, reserve | 17 | 5 |
The first category, the offensive one, represents our 'strike power'... the impact of the lance. The second defensive factor is the shield 'protective power', and the reserve is just that, a reserve.
Now we compare allocated points. Sir Douglas struck with 10 points, while the Earl defended with 20. The Earl had successfully deflected Douglas' strike.
The Earl struck Sir Douglas with 38 points... and Sir Douglas only had a 'shield' value of 20 points. Not good for Sir Douglas. Sir Douglas' shield ate up only 20 of the Earl's 38 points, leaving 18 in excess.
Sir Douglas had one backup, however... his reserve. Here, he had allocated 17 points, and we compared this to the excess of the 18 points of the Earl. Unfortunately, Sir Douglas' reserve couldn't quite hack it... here, too, he was outnumbered.
The result... Sir Douglas was unhorsed, and lost the combat.
He had a weak strike, he had a weak defense, and he had a poor reserve.
If he had had sufficient reserve points, then even though he had been whomped by the impact of the Earl's lance, he would have kept his seat and the combat would have continued for a second round. We would have reduced each party's AP for this second round, and again allocated points for offense, for defense, and for reserve.
If both parties remain for a second round, then, for the second round computation, reduce their first-round AP totals by:
- 10 points if the opponent was not successful in the strike
20 points if the opponent did strike successfully
We tried a couple of other matchups, and in one of them, Sir Douglas, refreshed and ready to go again, was pitted against the Earl of Ipswitch. Alas for Sir Douglas... he was dumped on the ground again.
Note that the entire joust can be carried out without figures... all you need is a pad and paper and a pair of percentage dice.
The game is an exercise in decision making... you'd like lots of 'spur points' to get your horse to go faster to get the speed bonus in combat. You'd like a lot of 'control points' so that you don't lose AP if the horse bucks at contact. And then with your remaining points, you'd like a lot of offensive points, and many, many reserve points if you get struck and try to keep in the saddle.
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© Copyright 1998 Wally Simon
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