Demifate Land Combat Rules

cVW Land Combat - "Demifate" rules system
NB - this is a prototype still!

Aspects

An Aspect is a phrase that describes something unique or noteworthy about whatever it’s attached to. For a military unit, they might represent its designed role, equipment specialisation, side effect of training doctrine, combat losses, or more. An Aspect might also be tied to a situational effect such as suppression, concealment, intelligence status or minor mishaps in the field.
For the player, Aspects are the main means of interacting with and influencing the battle. As with the original Fate system, Aspects both tell those involved what is important about the scene and help to reinforce character (in this case unit) specialisation.

Rolls, Outcomes and Stats

All dice rolled are 100.
There are no stats. unit specialisation is provided by Aspects, and all rolls are flat 1d100 unless specified otherwise below. Everything else relies on actions, and clever use of the Aspects in play.
There are no set outcomes for any roll, and both players and GMs are encouraged the eyeball the result, but rolling higher is better. Generally speaking a result below 20-30 will be a failure, a result above 70-80 will be a success, and results in between will partially succeed.
In order to avoid godmodding as much as possible, the result of a roll is to be written by the player who was targeted. When writing effects (especially for successful attacks), more (and more creative) description is better - it gives friends and enemies alike more information to work with and makes battle scenes really stand out. Better description might give players or the GM a hook to create or employ an aspect of their own.

Using Aspects and Refresh

An Aspect may be used in one of two ways:
1. Rerolls
If a specific unit has comically failed to do something it should by rights be good at, or if you tried to press a clear advantage and got worse than nothing as a result, you can invoke (spend) an Aspect to try again at a situation with a slight bonus. Roll 1d100+10, and keep the result if it is higher than the original roll.
2. Opposed rolls
If an enemy attack looks to be successful, and you have an aspect that applies defensively to the situation, you may invoke it to immediately roll 1d100. The incoming attack is mediated by an amount equal to the opposed roll - if the opposed roll equals or exceeds the original attack, it is rendered entirely ineffective and counts as a miss/failure.

Unlike with Demifate Naval Rules, aspects can be triggered repeatedly but are limited in their frequency. All players should decide together what rate of aspects /turn is appropriate - this is the refresh rate.
You cannot exceed the refresh count of aspects triggered per start of your own turn - while it may be tempting to make all attacks flawless, it is useful to keep something back in case your opponent has a stroke of good luck at a critical moment.

Terrain Aspects and Map

Terrain will also have aspects - an open road might be exposed, an urban slum might be close-quarters or difficult to navigate, a hilltop might give good visibility but also be an obvious lookout spot. Aspects for the map should be placed in a key or on a seperate document, in order to avoid cluttering the map image or being swallowed up by unit tokens, but also be legible enough for someone to look at the map and rapidly work out what kind of aspect they could use in a given area.
Map design can be whatever works in the moment, square/hex/zones/movement, but testing has so far occurred with irregularly sized zones that follow the terrain (think area movement board games, or the shapes of individual provinces/regions in Paradox games).
It is typical to let units move 2 squares per turn, or move 1 square and take 1 action, within reason. Exceptions can occur, and should be coordinated with the opponent to make sure everything stays fair. Units can see as far as the terrain reasonably allows, and attack as far as their equipment permits them, but it is strongly recommended t put a soft limit on ranges to avoid a battle devolving into meme-level sniping from opposite map edges.
[NB - AIRCRAFT AND ORBITAL SUPPORT HAVE YET TO BE TESTED!]

Counters

Every unit capable of independent action on the battlefield (here called units, but sometimes called maneouver elements) is represented by its own counter. These can be fancy and based on in-universe iconography, bespoke art/models of vehicles and portraits of officers... but a colour-coded box with a nameplate fills every requirement for most purposes.
If multiple units of the same type are on the field (such as an infantry company containing a bunch of rifle platoons or squads as seperate units), it's advised to number each unit so they can be told apart in the prose as well as specified for actions on the map. Things may get confusing otherwise.

Aspect Sheets and Creating Aspects

Aspects tied to the unit are decided and locked in prior to joining the scene - these will always be available to the unit's player and will never depend on situation or circumstance.
A unit being brought into the battle should have 2-3 Aspects created for them, such as:

• Doctrinal role and their assigned purpose in battle
• Key advantage or strength, or an unusual secondary feature
• Key weakness that goes beyond that of their assigned role
• If a commander, major NPC or PC, their personal quirks or combat style

The template Aspect Sheet for a unit type should look as follows:

Name
(Aspect)
(Aspect)
(Aspect)

For each individual unit, a Consequences counter (see below) should also be prepared:

(unit name + number) Consequences:
-
-
(unit name + number) Consequences:
-
-

In-game, any action taken that changes the state of play can create an aspect. This includes:

• Switching to a specific, distinctive combat strategy with flaws and advantages;
• Passing a roll to improve their situation, such as repositioning undetected or scaling a cliff to reach a vantage point;
• Changing weapon specialisms or specifying a type of ammunition now loaded;
• Launching drones, buoys or loitering ammunition for combat or utility purposes.

NB - Aspects, especially situational ones, should be generated often and expire when not relevant. Reading the flow of battle and making the most of opportunities as they appear is good tactics, and it helps tie the narrative of battle to the rules of the events occurring.

Protection, Damage and Consequences

Optional Rule - HP & Armour break As per ships in the naval rules, a unit may have approximately 100 points of plot armour (explained as a combination of shields, protection and evasion). Lighter units may have less, heavier and more resilient units may have more.
For every attack that doesn't fail, subtract the number rolled from the remaining plot armour of the attacked unit (so an attack roll of 57, which players agree is enough to land, would also reduce protection by 57). Any roll passing the 0 threshold doesn't carry over into automatic damage, for fairness's sake - except with a big enough crit or the right kind of Aspect invoked, armour break will negate the remaining damage and give the defending unit one more chance to avoid taking Consequences
If numerical protection is not being counted, units should take damage when a successful enough hit persuades them to - agree between players what a good roll looks like.
When an attack hits and causes sufficient damage to require narrative outcomes, a Consequence is taken. Consequences are special Aspects that represent battle damage incurred. Each one can be used as per any normal negative Aspect. Consequences can include combat losses, heavy suppression and going to ground, a loss of confidence advancing after being ambushed, damage to specialised equipment, low ammunition, or more.
After two Consequences are taken, further damage will remove the unit from battle as its combat effectiveness disintegrates.
Ideally, a Consequence should be reflected in the unit's subsequent actions whether it is invoked or not - losing combat capability will affect how a unit rationally approaches their situation (or induces a less rational response if they are running scared).
Additionally, a Consequence can be social as well as physical or mental, if the players are negotiating with an enemy or choose to seek a peaceful resolution but the demifate rules are still in play. It is recommended to note in the unit sheet which Consequences are social rather than combat related, but otherwise the same rules apply and an enemy can be defeated (persuaded, brought to treaty, surrender, evacuate, etc) socially. This can apply to honour duels between officers too!

Support Systems

Not everything is solved through direct application of armaments. Stealth, advanced sensor suites, EWar, drone management, command/control systems etc can all be utilised in the right situation.
Generally speaking, no matter the system, the mechanics are similar. Using them as that unit's action will create a directly addressed Aspect for protecting allies or targeting enemies (as appropriate).

Actions and Turns

At the start of combat, everyone involved rolls 1d100 for initiative. Players then take turns in high-low order.
A turn is one discrete action each unit can perform. Examples include:

• Firing weapons or making attacks;
• Electing to move two zones rather than 1;
• Recovering from the immediate effects of a debilitating Consequence;
• Using support or auxiliary systems;
• Long discussions or speeches.

Speech is a free action, so long as it's fairly short.
Each unit owned by a player acts within their turn, and all actions requiring rolls (including attack rolls) are resolved in bulk at the end of their turn. This is to ensure play stays fairly straightforward and streamlined even through multiple actions.
Making multiple posts to react to multiple invididual actions is useful, but larger or more involved battles can rack up the word count quickly. It may be better to post all your turn's responses to enemy actions together, seperated by paragraph, and then collect your own actions in the next post. Longer posts can otherwise consume the session time entirely if everything is required to appear as one essay-length post.