Miniatures in RQ...regarding scale

Don Allen

Mongoose
I want to use miniatures for battles in RQ but there really is no rules for their use in the book (that I could find). I am using one of those wet erase mats with squares on it. What do you use for scale on these mats? A human character usually moves 4 meters per action I guess but if fatigued (wearied) it goes down 1 meter (to 3). Do you use each square as 2 meters? Do you use the lines on the mat to represent halfs?
 
Don Allen said:
I want to use miniatures for battles in RQ but there really is no rules for their use in the book (that I could find). I am using one of those wet erase mats with squares on it. What do you use for scale on these mats? A human character usually moves 4 meters per action I guess but if fatigued (wearied) it goes down 1 meter (to 3). Do you use each square as 2 meters? Do you use the lines on the mat to represent halfs?

I would just use 1 square=1m. KISS rules (keep it simple stupid) :)
 
I was thinking doing that but then the miniature size becomes really abstract with the average mini being approx. one square tall that. Just seems weird to have 3 foot tall men and such running around :)

Maybe I will increase the fatigue percent penalties 5% but get rid of all of the movement penalties for combat purposes. Then I will just make each square about 5 feet and make most creatures move 3 squares per action.

Still not sure about this though. Mongoose playtesters, how did you do this in your games?
 
1 sqaure =1 meter would be the simpliest.

If you are worred about scale use 1 square=2m . Most creatures move an even amount anyway, so you will only need to use a "Half sqaure" for special cases.

If you want to move a half sqaure, jut put the charactrer on the line instead of in the square. We used to do that with some aircombat games with hexes, and i worked just fine.
 
If you use standard 25-30mm scale minatures, a square = 2 meters gives the best result. It also stops characters from "running of the mat" so to speak.
 
For meters I usually go with 1 square = 2 meters also. In feet we change it to 5 feet. Sometimes if I have a planned out chase or something we might change it to 1 square = 4 meters or 10 feet if the game uses feet.
 
I have always used the 1 square= 1,5 m, because many supplement and rules from the us are based on feet.. 1 Square= 5 feet, and 10feet araound 3 meters... :)
 
Lakritsploppen said:
I have always used the 1 square= 1,5 m, because many supplement and rules from the us are based on feet.. 1 Square= 5 feet, and 10feet araound 3 meters... :)

1,5 meters are more accurate, and was used in Drakar och Demoner once upon a time. However, for those unused to the metric system, 2 meters are easier to handle. And it is a more even number and as such is easier to count distance with. In the end using half meter precision is rarely needed in RPGs.
 
Here is a stupid idea... get a different mat! LOL

Actually, why not use an acetate overlay (or a piece of acrylic) and print the scale you want to use? I run Twilight 2000 and it uses two scales, men and vehicles. I just printed the 2-miter scale at 1 inch (yes, I am in the US, we use British Imperial measurements... funny, huh?) and then 1/4 inch squares so that the 1 inch also represented 8-miter squares. You could also just use quad graph paper. Point being, print out 1.5 centimeter squares, tape the back into a mat sized piece, lay an acrylic sheet on it and the scale is unimportant. Change the sheet under it if you need a different scale.
 
By the way... want a really great set of minis? Cheep as Chips and good detail! Italeri makes some great plastic minis in the 1:72 scale (25mm). I use the Greek Infantry for the Lunar Army.

Just a side note... kind of on topic... :D
 
My preference is 15mm... where 1/2 inch(12.6mm)=1.5m is just about dead on!

I use carboard heroes and sparks-fonts. I like the sparks because if I want, I can go down to 10mm, too.
 
We had always just used 1" hex mats and used a scale of 1 hex = 1m. The scale of the miniatures was not that important to us. All we really needed was the proportional distances.

Why would you ever use 1.5m as a base? Just seems odd to use a 1 and 1/2 meter scale when a strait 1m would be much easier.
 
Lord Twig said:
We had always just used 1" hex mats and used a scale of 1 hex = 1m. The scale of the miniatures was not that important to us. All we really needed was the proportional distances.

Why would you ever use 1.5m as a base? Just seems odd to use a 1 and 1/2 meter scale when a strait 1m would be much easier.

Because 1.5m is the standard for many sci-fi games. Including Traveller. Why? It's almost 5'. (4' 10.5") So for typical "5' squares" fantasy maps, 1.5m is close enough.
 
AKAramis said:
Lord Twig said:
We had always just used 1" hex mats and used a scale of 1 hex = 1m. The scale of the miniatures was not that important to us. All we really needed was the proportional distances.

Why would you ever use 1.5m as a base? Just seems odd to use a 1 and 1/2 meter scale when a strait 1m would be much easier.

Because 1.5m is the standard for many sci-fi games. Including Traveller. Why? It's almost 5'. (4' 10.5") So for typical "5' squares" fantasy maps, 1.5m is close enough.

Yup. Also, once you are counting sqaures instead of meters is doen't really matter what each sqaure is. Yopu can use 1.414m squares and it is still easy to game on.

THe only real problem was the same the is in all "Sqares" base maps. Diagonal movement.

And at the time 1.5m caught on it was a lot better than the 10ft/3m squares that the fantasy RPGs were using.
 
In 24 years of roleplaying using miniatures, I have never used hex sheets for movement or combat.

Never.

If the miniatures are close together, they can physically interact, if they are far apart they can't. If there is line of sight for a missile attack then fair enough, if not then tough.

We handle movement by moving figures at relative speeds, so a Centaur would move faster than an Attack Slug. Any problems or differences of opinion are solved by the simple mechanism of "who shouts loudest and longest wins".

It works for us.
 
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