As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, there are no dice to be found anywhere in Horus Heresy. There is no CRT, no modifiers, no table look-ups. Combat is resolved entirely through card play.
Today I’ll take a closer look at how that works. But first, a few bits of nomenclature:
Combat rank: Each combat unit in Horus Heresy is mounted on a base. The base has a number of ‘points’ on it that indicate the unit’s combat rank. Subtract any damage points indicated by a damage marker to calculate the unit’s current Combat Rank. In combat, you will draw a number of combat cards equal to the total combat rank of your units involved.
Heroes: These are the ‘special characters’ in the game — 5 on each side — who are the larger-than-life figures involved in the titanic struggle. Having a Hero present in a combat allows you to draw 2 of the special “Hero combat cards” to your hand in addition to the number of ‘regular’ cards allowed by your total combat rank.
Damage value: A number found in the upper-left corner of a combat card that indicates the amount of ‘normal’ damage it inflicts in combat.
Shields: Shield symbols are displayed in the left-hand column of most combat cards. They indicate the amount of ‘normal’ damage the card can block. Shields can also be expended to block combat card special effects.
Special effects details
Special effects: Combat cards also display text instructions that indicate possible special effects they may trigger when played by the active player. Special effects may require the presence of specific unit types in the combat before they can be triggered.
On to the nitty-gritty. Combat is played out in a series of “iterations” where players alternate taking the role of Active Player. The number of iterations in a combat is stated on the Order card that initiates the combat. Co-existence battles, which are triggered during change of initiative, last up to 8 iterations.
The Defender in the combat (i.e. the player who did NOT initiate the combat with an Order) decides which player is Active in the first iteratation. This is an important advantage because the number of combat cards that the active player can play is limited to the sequence number of the iteration. In plainer English: In the first iteration the active player can play 1 combat card; in the second iteration the active player can play 2 combat cards. And so on – up to 8 iterations.
In an iteration, the Active player plays a number of cards up to the iteration limit. These cards both deal ‘normal’ damage AND produce special effects (usually). The Passive player may counter by playing cards for their ‘shields’ to either block normal damage or cancel special effects.
The card-play limits and player sequencing mean that before the first combat card hits the table, big decisions are already underway. It’s a straightforward concept, but there’s a lot of that “wheels within wheels” stuff to consider. Do you have 1 or 2 high-damage cards that could deal an early knock-out? Or maybe you’re out-numbered but have a deadly special effect you want to play before scuttling away in a retreat?
There are a huge number of possible variations in most combats — anything with more than 7 or 8 cards per side can get really wild. After the second iteration, large amounts of normal damage can hit the table. Special Effects can also screw up the best-made plans, particularly the effects that cause a portion of the enemy force to rout out of the battle.
Any time after the first iteration of a battle, the active player can elect to retreat from combat rather than lay down combat cards. This is the standard survival technique for vastly out-numered forces. The only problem is that when a force retreats from combat, it’s marked with a Routed Activation marker. Unless some extraordinary circumstance intervenes, routed forces are out of action for a long time.
Units in areas marked Routed can’t be ordered to do anything. They can defend normally, but otherwise they’re of little use until two Referesh phases have passed. On the first Refresh, their routed marker is flipped to Activated. On the second Refresh, the Activated marker is removed and they can be ordered normally.
There are only five Refresh phases in the game, so you can see how this might gum things up a bit. In later stages of the game it’s not uncommon for players to elect to go down swinging rather than Rout their forces out of action for the rest of the game.
