NASAMW
Big Battle DBA Tournament
Rules & Scoring System
By David Schlanger
NASAMW Assistant DBA Umpire
Big Battle DBA has become a favorite of
many players at NASAMW Conventions, as participation has consistently risen
since the original release of Big Battle rules in DBA 2.0. Running Big Battle
DBA tournaments efficiently and effectively is more difficult than regular DBA,
and puts more pressures on tournament organizers. For a successful BBDBA
tournament, it is important that the majority of games be resolved in a timely
manner. Therefore, Bob Beattie, NASAMW Umpire for DBA, appointed a committee
consisting of David Schlanger (chair), Mike Demana, Roland Fricke and Dave
Zecchini to recommend changes. These are all experienced DBA Big Battle players.
They consulted with other players and have suggested the following changes for
tournament play. These changes have been approved by the DBA Umpire and will be
used in NASAMW sanctioned tournaments during 2004. At the end of the year they
will be evaluated.
The NASAMW Special Tournament Rules Text
takes the best of both DBA 2.0 and the amended DBA 2.1 rules for battlefield
size, deployment, and victory conditions in an effort to allow for balanced and
timely game play in the tournament environment. These alterations to the Big
Battle DBA rules are not intended as a criticism of the normal rules of Big
Battle DBA, which is an excellent game in its own right. These Tournament Rules
are solely for the purposes of running efficient and timely tournaments using
Big Battle DBA at NASAMW conventions.
The deployment changes revert to the
BBDBA 2.0 deployment language with the addition of the 1,200 paces restriction
from 2.1. The remaining changes in the 2.1 deployment rules have been found to
unbalance the game for tournament play by favoring high aggression combined arms
forces, and slow down tournaments by consistently placing the defender in a
conservative, reactionary posture. They also encouraged extreme terrain choices
that could severely slow play. Also, we have eliminated the 0-2 element exchange
for the defender because of the advantage of placement of the last defender
command.
The victory condition changes are a
compromise between BBDBA 2.0 and 2.1 that closely follows the model of the
regular DBA victory conditions. There had been significant resistance to the
C-in-C command breaking or the C-in-C element death always resulting in a loss
of battle as in BBDBA 2.0. However, under 2.1 the C-in-C death never resulting
in loss of battle caused game length problems and odd instances where all three
commands could be broken and the battle not "officially" lost. The
NASAMW special tournament text solves these problems, while keeping as close as
possible to the original vision of DBA.
The battlefield size increase from 48
inches to 60 inches has been tested at the last two major NASAMW conventions and
is the preferred board size by most NASAMW Big Battle DBA players.
Finally, the NASAMW Big Battle DBA
Scoring System is presented. This scoring system was implemented to help
differentiate between finished and unfinished games. It allows a tournament
organizer to quickly and easily assign point value for battles. The system was
designed to encourage quick and attentive play. In order for the system to
function properly all games should be played out until victory conditions have
been reached, or official time has been called.
NASAMW BIG BATTLE
SPECIAL TOURNAMENT RULES TEXT
BATTLEFIELD SIZE AND TERRAIN: The width
of the battlefield size is increased to 60 inches.
DEPLOYMENT: The defender places the
terrain and the invader chooses which long side will be his base edge, the
defender taking the opposite edge. The defender deploys 2 commands including
that of his C-in-C, then the invader deploys all his commands, then the defender
deploys his remaining command. Each element not in a BUA or camp must be within
1,200 paces of its command's general. [The defender may not exchange 0-2 element
pairs of its elements.]
WINNING AND LOSING: An army whose
cumulative total of lost elements at the end of any bound other than Scythed
Chariots, camp followers or denizens is at least half its original troop
elements and has also lost more such elements in that bound than the enemy, or
an army whose C-in-C's command is demoralized and has lost more elements than
the opponent, has lost the battle.
NASAMW BIG BATTLE DBA
SCORING SYSTEM
Victory Conditions Met
Winner: 100 points minus Loser
points total.
Loser: 2 points for each enemy
element killed or fled off map.
1 point for each enemy element demoralized.
4 point for taken and occupied camp serving one command.
8 points for taken and occupied camp serving two commands.
12 points for taken and occupied camp serving three commands.
Victory Conditions NOT Met
Each player/team:
2 points for each enemy element killed or fled off map.
1 point for each enemy element demoralized.
4 point for taken and occupied camp serving one command.
8 points for taken and occupied camp serving two commands.
12 points for taken and occupied camp serving three commands.
Point ranges
Winners (51-100 points)
All others (0-49 points)
Maximum point total for non-winner is 49 points.
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