War Eternal: Basic Rules For the Hundred Years War/Joan of Arc Mega-Campaign

I’ve been pounding out the rules for combining The Hundred Years War, Joan of Arc and, occasionally, Pirates. I’m calling it War Eternal, as this is how it seemed to the people lived at the time.

I think I’ve gotten the rules to a place where I think we could run the campaign, but not at the place where they’re clear enough on the paper to share them.

I’ve had a few people on the JoA Discord server and the Kickstarter comment page ask me for more details, so I’ll try to provide it here.

The game takes place in two scales, which I’m calling the Theater and the Stage. The Theater covers everything taking place on the large scale, using a modified version of The Hundred Years War wargame rules. The rules are fairly comprehensive, covering not only the movement and raising of troops, but also covers diplomacy, razing territory, maintaining the costs of the armies, mutiny, and the fog of war.

The game begins in 1337, with players building forces across their occupied territories. As an example, here’s the English setup:

ENGLAND

1. Diplomacy Points: 5
2. Treasury Points: 10
3. England is a Centralized State.
4. Deployment
   1. In Sussex, Cornwall, Wales, Leinster, Saint-Onge, Bearn: 200 points in each fortress.
   2. Lancashire: 300 points.
   3. Yorkshire: 300 points.
   4. Essex: The Black Prince, John Chandos, 1000 points.
   5. Ulster: 1000 points.
   6. Aquitaine: 600 points.
   7. Ponthieu: 400 points.
   8. English Channel: 30 points.
   9. Irish Sea: 30 points.

Now, these points translate to points within Joan of Arc, which have been shown in some updates to the Kickstarter. On point 3, Centralized State means that England has a Parliament, which will affect the amount of income the player receives each turn. France is still Feudal, which means they could lose troops at random points who leave for crusade. The two sea spaces, English Channel and Irish Sea, will utilize Pirates of the Spanish Main, so the points work differently. Luckily, Pirates has both British and French ships, so it all works out.

As troops move into territories, they don’t automatically battle other armies in the province. Instead, both armies can occupy the same province. It isn’t until either side decides to attack the other that they come into conflict. However, if you collect income from a territory which has another army in it, that income is cut in half, so it behooves you to get those enemy armies moving along.

In Hundred Years War, they use counters, so the Fog of War is easy. The other player can only see what counter is on top of the stack, and can see how high that stack grows. They can also try to remember what armies they saw move into that stack of chits. In War Eternal, the two players know how many points the other armies make up (it’s hard to hide how big your armies are as they march across the countryside), but their exact composition is only seen on the spreadsheet each player keeps. Not until you face on the battlefield or use Espionage (explained later) will you be able to see the composition of the enemy forces. With this being with another player I trust (my brother), I’m not expecting him to lie or cheat on his spreadsheet. If you’re playing with someone you don’t trust too much, you might want a campaign manager.

Each turn, players will earn a certain amount of income based on the territories they control (indicated on the map), but, as said before, halved based on if there are other armies in the region.

You can build new armies based on your income, but the most you can buy at any time in any given territory is 1000 points. Moving troops around or adding those 1000 points to the armies that already exist in the territory builds up your larger armies.

You also will need to maintain your armies in order to keep them from mutinying. You can also disband the army, with failure to do so resulting in the army pillaging the region as they disband. Here you can see how much it costs to recruit and maintain the armies.

JoA Points	Recruitment	Maintenance/Disband
3000	–	6
2800	–	6
2600	–	5
2400	–	5
2200	–	5
2000	–	4
1800	–	4
1600	–	4
1400	–	3
1200	–	3
1000	5	3
800	4	2
600	3	2
400	2	1
200	1	1

You can also besiege fortresses, using the Siege rules from JoA.

The leaders will appear and insert themselves into armies once they historically appeared on the battlefield. They’ll arrive in the game in the same region (or as close to, of no allied army is present there) that they first were recorded in the history books as fighting in.

Leaders can be captured and later sold back to the players for ransom, or killed outright. The game also allows for the two players to reach a treaty where they do not attack one another for a certain number of years. This allows players time to build up revenue for their armies and make alliances with the powers surrounding the two Great Powers.

Our plan is to probably play through a single year of the war once a week or every other week, depending on the number of battles that need to take place at any given time.

So! If you have any questions, feel free to ask me in the comments below!