Battle for Kydea: Miniaturized or tabletop gameplay

As I developed the first round of Battle for Kydéa figures and rules and backstory ideas, I wanted to be sure to keep actual game play as accessible to as many people as possible. I quickly recognized that most players wouldn't have access to as many LEGO action figure parts as I've personally amassed, which is why I developed a whole slew of substitution suggestions for the figures.  However, I then started thinking in smaller terms, determining the smallest number of the simplest parts that could possibly be used to host a successful and fully-featured Battle for Kydea game.  Described here is the ultimate answer, the most extremely miniaturized, micro-scale form of the game, allowing multiple large armies to be played with just tiny System pieces on a single baseplate!

For folks who like videos, I've put together this:

• Video - Battle for Kydea: Miniature gameplay setup

Once again, substitutions are encouraged. If you're short on one type of LEGO piece I suggest, see what other parts you can use instead.

Above you see the four standard unit types, left to right, Scout, Warrior, Lifter, and High Priest.  A Scout is distinguished by the transparent piece on top, which represents its targeting laser.  The Warrior has no decoration as it's the most common, normal unit, with no special abilities.  The Lifter has an opaque flat piece on top to signify its broad stance & heavy armor, or the heavy cannons on top.  The High Priest gets a 1x1 cone (opaque or transparent, doesn't matter) to show its towering height and to represent its tall, spikey "antenna" array.  Now let's look at the same units with armor on them:

You'll noticed in the full blown unit detail descriptions that only 2 point and 4 point armor pieces are officially used.  This keeps things very simple.  In micro scale, the gray round 1x1 plates or dots represent 2pt armor pieces, while the black ones represent 4pt armor.  As a unit takes damage, armor gets removed, just like in the full-sized game.  Line of sight also works just like it does with the big figures, except you have to get closer to the playing surface if you want to verify sight lines with your own eyes!

The miniaturized game also makes it much easier to build obstacles and cover, and you can get very creative if you like.  You can design a battlefield that occurs across a gulch with cover on its banks, but no way to cross except for a single bridge.  Simulate a wrecked city with basic bricks like I did.  Play around a mountain range. You decide!  Just be sure to leave enough room to move your micro-units around with your full-sized human fingers!

The only one detail that has to be altered for miniaturized play is movement.  First, units have to move by studs, not measured distances.  I suggest a conversion of 5 studs per movement speed unit.  Thus, a unit with movement speed 2 can move 10 studs in a turn.  I also strongly suggest limiting everything to forward/back and horizontal shifting only, with no diagonal movement.

If you have other miniaturization ideas, please feel free to comment, or if you create your own mini-sized battle arenas, take videos & post them up on YouTube!