I finally got another game of A Clash of Rhyfles in recently. It’s been a few months, which made this a great test case. I did not have time to reread the rules or even skim them, nor did my opponent. So, how bad was it? How hard was it to remember the rules?

Not terrible, actually. We got 95% of the infantry rules just fine, with some need to remember how grenades and such work. The tricky part was tractors and stepping through their process, but we did that just fine in the end as well. Both of us avoided crewed weapons altogether.

I want to pluck at those last two, though. See, the game works really well as an infantry combat game, but the moment I have to add in the crewed weapons or tanks I groan a little. It’s just more stuff, and harder to recall than I’d like. I’d love if the game had a pass to streamline them. Having to remember the positions and what they do is ultimately cumbersome. I made my own QRS, which I need to clean up for release, and even then, the time it takes to relearn the rules is a pain.

I’m sure if I bothered to play more frequently, it would be no issue. It doesn’t help me thinking I’d rather they were just a single unit, not multiple positions. I’m not sure I’d lose anything from the game if the crewed weapon could only move, aim, and fire. It has a bunch of other small things, like swapping the barrel and risking overheat, but none of that really matters to me in practice and just makes me less likely to take them at all.

As for the game itself? It served to highlight two major conclusions for me. Suffice it to say that in this match we had one major point of conflict where we should have had two, and it resolved really quickly because it was just one firefight between 4-5 models on each side. This happened for two reasons:

1. We took tractors, which ate a lot of our points and left us with only 6ish infantry each.
2. The small board meant there was almost no maneuver before we were flatly in a firefight.

On point 1: we just really wanted to use the tractors! They’re fun and cool looking. Neither one did anything of significance all game and both of us agreed that if either player had skipped their tractor and brought no anti-tractor weapons, they’d have won easily.

On point 2, firefights in the game have multiple routes to resolution, but this one resolved after my opponent got a good grenade off, causing my boys to hit the dirt. This was enough of a delay that I couldn’t get to the objective and he secured a definite lead. Up to that point I was trying to close in for an assault and just not making it happen due to poor rolls. With another firefight on the board (point 1) this would have been less of an issue. On a larger board, though, we would have had room to breathe and maneuver. A flank would have been possible. Instead, on the 2×2′, you basically cover your whole frontage just fine and it becomes a question of which side will break first, rather than a question of how your forces maneuver around each other.

My conclusions are twofold here:

1. Don’t bring tractors to 300 point games. Bring 400 points so you can afford them properly without sacrificing more valuable infantry maneuver.
2. I’m playing on a 3×3′ board next time.

I still like the core systems of the game. It still feels worthwhile. But that 2×2′ board feels overly restrictive, which is a darn shame. I hate to break away from a system’s intended playstyle so early in my career with it, but my games of Quar have been very hit-or-miss and I think a lot of that is in the lack of breathing room on the board.

To be clear, I still think this is a great infantry combat game and painting Quar is super fun. At this point, I’d recommend getting into it (assuming it appeals) with the intent to mostly play infantry engagements. It produces a fun time, even on the 2×2′ board. Between the hobbying and the fun back and forth of the relatively short games (1.5 hours in my experience) you could do far worse. Jury’s still out for me on how I really feel here. I’m just not getting enough games in, but I find myself looking forward to the next one and even wanting to paint up another force.

We’ll see if that overcomes my Halo obsession enough to make it to the surface this Summer. It certainly won’t beat my intent to paint up a new Desiderium army.

Observe the sands, for they guide. All else kills. Arut’gal, gui’a. Vut mat.