Toy Wars

Toy Wars

As the Power Storms continue to rage at the edges of reality, and many an able bodied man and machine has been tied up in keeping the world as we know it safe from the creations that invade us from beyond, a certain ennui has set in for those remaining at home - far from the front lines, hearing reports of heroics and bravery while everything remains safe and quiet for anyone not on the fraying perimeter, Living in an entirely different reality that seems sheltered and safe. To help combat these feelings of detachment, the Institute for Entertainment, in collaboration with the Institute for Defense, has developed a game that anyone can play against old friends or new ones, called Toy Wars. A battle of large scape scope, contained entirely within the fiction of plastic figures, that can be used to explore in a safe way the feelings of living in modern times, and might even produce data that can help out the front lines.

Setup

Everyone who plays Toy Wars will need the following:
* Set up a series of furniture and props that run from one of the entrances to your house to your personal computer chair/desk. The two ends of this Battlefield are the Attacker Base and the Home Base. You are encouraged to figure out the setting and themeing of your Battlefield - either it can be depicting some realistic landscape and terrain in miniature, or it's a 'shrunken inside a giant home' situation and the props you put up are literally what they are.
* Up to 6 mega-figurines (size range: comfortably fitting in one hand to being hefty even for both hands). Hero units, plastic electronic battle critters with vibrant and playful designs. (Editor's note: I am imagining Pokemon/derivatives for this setting but that's just a very good default. Toy Wars can just as reasonably have its own or any other existing mecha monster canon.) These will be the backbone of your army. They take orders from you but have their own intellect and can operate independently. They have specialized extraphysical powers - on the scale of being able to trade and tank blows with other toys, but not being able to harm a player or do any significant damage to a home.
* Up to 100 mini-figurines (size range: fingerprint to finger height). These fill out the rest of your army, and are much less intelligent, following the last basic command given to them by something higher in the chain of command. They don't have the capability of emitting powers on their own - instead, they are charged with and can re-use energies from a mega-figurine commanding them to reuse weak but numerous basic attacks and effects.

As any citizen of this setting should come to expect, purchasing the equipment necessary for Toy Wars will not be remotely a burden. You can order online on an Aethernet site, and Toy Wars retail stores will soon be setting up in all major and minor cities' malls in the upcoming weeks.

Example of how a mega-figurine team might be set up:
* A shy, nervous, puffball looking pink critter, who projects red hexashields outward in a dome, that stifle enemy AoE down to nothing but are quickly overwhelmed by strong direct attacks. Good for keeping an army safe.
* A burly, wide stanced sharp-edged purple scaled monster, with a build like a wrestler or sumo. Built to excel in melee, to charge and smash and ram and grapple. Has the downside of having to GET to you, but once it's in your face, you're in trouble.
* A yellow canine bristling with sharp plastic zig-zag edges and a lashing lightning bolt tail. Specializes in sending out forked lightning AoE and summoning thunder clouds for aerial denial. Scarily powerful against large numbers of mini-figurines, but a single tank or occulsion can drop its efficacy to a halt.
* A black and purple slender figure in plastic robes and hoodie with a feline snout and sharp claws: An assassin. Can cloak and backstab. While stealthed, translucent - clearly visible to both owners, but figurines can't use knowledge of where it is unless they perceive it themselves. Highly mobile and can break enemy ranks, but not especially durable if a full army turns its onslaught against it.
* A red and gold trim swaying eastern dragon with plastic puffs of flame drifting out of its nostrils: Simple ranged fire elemental DPS. Fire bolts, fire beams, fire walls for different scenarios. Versatile and midrange.
* An armour-snouted hunched sandy brown figure with drills for claws, a waterfall of armour and a tapered tail sticking out behind it all: Earth manipulation. Can drill at the table (the 'earth manipulation' generally takes place on a level of fictional reality one below yours, and won't literally tear tunnels into your tables and floors) to burrow and make a transportation tunnel elsewhere, or to raise walls, tear ruptures and send spiky chunky of rock flying. Very much about battlefield control, stunning attacks and re-arranging the topology.

Course of a Battle

When a battle request is made and offered, whoever's Home and whoever's Attacker go home and prepare, then visit the house where the battle is taking place. First, both players get to look over the terrain and make sure that everything is in order, then both players simultaneously set up their armies at opposite ends, take a look at each others' toys, and set up a countdown. Once the countdown is over, the fight begins - figurines from both armies activate with glowing eyes, eager and ready to do playbattle and receive orders.

There is a layer of AR, with holographic projections, to let you see statuses and resource meters and cooldowns of individual figurines as the fight proceeds, and your Aetherphone can give you a total fight overview with minimap and unit lists at any time. While the powerful attacks and defenses are flashy and dramatic, their power level is constrained enough that they're only actually making a mess of the world and smashing each other up on the fiction layer one below us - defeated toys will be treated as out of the battle and dim their eyes, but they're welcome to leave the battlefield and wait out of bounds for its conclusion.

The battle ends when one side surrenders or runs out of units - the attacker side can additionally win by making it to the home computer and capturing it by holding it uncontested for 15 seconds. (It's customary when this is done for the two players to sit down and the home player shows the attacker player some things about their Toy Wars plans or lore, to signify a capturing of information or resources.) Whatever happens, both players are encouraged to talk about the fight afterwards, how it went, what worked and what didn't, and put some 'lore' to the fight's existence, however silly or serious you want to interpret it (and there is absolutely no need for there to be one shared canonical timeline all Toy Wars players obey - but it is ABSOLUTELY expected that there'll be fan made settings that players can join and take inspiration from to explain the larger framework these battles are taking place in). And finally, if time and interest permits, it's encouraged that a new match be scheduled for the future, where the attacking player now has to defend, to continue the story.

Note that fights don't have to take place only with people you know. There are plenty of resources to help you find new friends local to you who'd be interested in playing Toy Wars, and there are even AI players set up by the Institute for Entertainment such that anyone can find someone friendly they feel comfortable playing against.

We hope that you enjoy playing Toy Wars and let all your friends know about your interest!