More Bugaphracts

Following on from this post.

Some quick changes and adjustments to the initial rules:

• In hindsight, soldiers counting for 10 in combat seems overtuned - I think 5 is better. 
• After a battle, corpses are converted into food equal to their daily food requirement while alive; workers give one, soldiers two, spiders twenty, etc. Just makes sense!
• Some troops can only eat corpses. Mosquitoes in the original post, Mandible Demons in this one. The supply rules make this slightly complicated in practice. Treat them as follows: Corpse Eaters consume no supply, and are either sated or starving, with starving being the default state. While starving, a corpse eater will always count as 1 worker in combat. When you win a battle, you may choose how many corpses to feed them and how many to take as food for the army. The [number of corpses you choose to feed them] / [number of corpse eaters] = how many days they will remain sated, during which they fight at full capacity. If they ever remain starving for a week, they will leave the army and might become a new bandit force in the area. 
• Special hex type: pesticide, inflicts 1 percent attrition per full day spent marching over it.  

Some Quick Factions

Black Ants

• The size and fortification of your nests can be increased to +8.
• Black Ant queens require 25 nectar instead of 50. 
• Black ant armies have +1 morale when defending a nest with a queen inside, and a further +1 if the size of the nest is 8.  
• Special Unit: Winged Princes/Winged Princesses. Your winged ants count as two workers in battle. Armies composed entirely of Winged Princes/ses have a resting morale of 10.

Red Ants

• Armies composed entirely of soldier ants can force march at double speed and have +1 resting morale. 
• Red ant armies can convert friendly workers into food at a one to one ratio. 
• Red Ant commanders can spend 50 nectar to cover the battlefield in berserker hormones. This adds a flat 10 percent to all casualties on both sides, regardless of battle outcome. 
• Special Unit: Velite. Costs 1 nectar to spawn, in the same way as a soldier ant. Counts as a worker for digging and building, but fights as 2 workers, and can force march twice as quickly as normal. Velites can join armies of red ant soldiers without cancelling their movement and morale bonuses. 

Slaver Ghosts

• Your commanders can consume 100 nectar to output pheromones that make their army appear as another faction's army on the strategic map. To switch or drop this seeming, the commander must consume another 100 nectar. The glamour falls away immediately when battle is joined.
• 10 percent of all casualties you inflict on your enemies join your army as zombies in the aftermath of a battle.
• All of your ants are immune to pesticides, and inedible to your enemies when killed in battle. You can still eat your own dead. 
• Special Unit: Mandible Demons. Spawned like workers are, and cost no nectar. Can't build or dig, and can only eat corpses, but count as two workers in combat when sated (see corpse eater rules above). 

BUGS

Unless otherwise noted, non-ant bugs are beast-like, and cannot be reasoned with or even spoken to. Workers carrying something else cannot carry any food. 

• Water Boatmen. Able travel on land normally, or underwater, where they are invisible to the enemy. They move twice as fast underwater, and become visible if they attack anything or when they surface back onto land. Juveniles count as worker ants. Adults are worth 10 workers in combat, eat 5 food per day, and can carry 100 food. 
• Dragonfly. Dragonfly eggs hatch into larvae, which are Corpse Eaters, count as 20 workers in combat, and wont carry food. If they are sated for a whole week, they will hatch into adults. Adult dragonflies count as 150 workers in combat, eat 50 food a day, fly, and provide a +1 morale bonus to the army they march with (this doesn't stack). Adult dragonflies found in the wild can speak and enter alliances, although they tend to be aloof, unfriendly, and mercurial creatures. 
• Bombardier Beetle. Juveniles count as soldier ants. Adults count as 20 workers each in combat, can carry 200 food each, eat 10 food a day, and have a powerful ranged spitting attack, which might open up tactical possibilities for a commander on the battlefield. 
• Termites. 'They're five times our size, and they spit acid from their foreheads!' Come in large nests, like ants do. Each counts as 10 workers in battle, and eats 2 food per day. Can burrow in wood like workers burrow in earth. Termite colonies can be engaged with diplomatically. 
• Mantis. Juveniles count as 50 workers in combat, eat 10 food per day, and carry 50 food. Adults count as 100 workers in combat, eat 25 food a day, and carry 100 food. Adult mantis can designate a single bug of similar size (adult centipedes, spiders, etc.) in the enemy army. Both are taken out of the fight for the purposes of the battle, and you roll a d6. 5 in 6 the mantis kills its enemy, 1 in 6 the mantis is killed. 
• Grasshopper. Juveniles count as soldier ants. Adults count as 20 workers each in combat, can carry 100 food each, eat 10 food a day, and can leap across the length of the battlefield. Armies composed only of grasshoppers can move at 5 times normal speed, although they cannot fly. 
• Pillbug. Reliable and beloved pack animals, with the mien of well-trained dogs. Juveniles are soldier ants who can carry 200 food. Adults fight as 10 workers, eat 5 food a day, and carry 1000 food. Both can sacrifice themselves after a battle to save a number of friendly ants; this is 20 for juveniles, 100 for adults. 
• Millipede. The Logisitician's best friend. Juveniles fight as 10 workers, eat 10 food per day, and carry 500 food. Adults fight as 20 workers, eat 20 food per day, and carry 2000 food. 
• Bees. Strange, fae dancers from the heavens of the upper air, infamous for their fearlessness and their barbed-stinger suicide weapons. Bees keep colonies of their own, up in the sky where you cannot reach them. They send delegations down to the flowers of the earth, which is where you may encounter a force of them. They might want things from you (typically they want wasps killed), and will pay for these services with huge bounties of nectar. You can never recruit bees. In combat they fight as five worker ants and fly. For every 100 bees in a conflict, roll a d6. On each 6, one large insect in the opposed army is destroyed by their terrible stingers. 
• Slugs. Cannot fight, but can be dismembered for 500 food. If you want to use one as a pack animal, treat it as an adult millipede that halves the speed of the army it travels with. Slugs are ancient and wise, and are known to curse those who harm them.  
• Snails. As a Slug, but if it gets dismembered it leaves behind its shell. The shell can be moved with at least 500 worker ants. If it is brought to a nest, it can be incorporated into the structure for +1 fortification, which can take you above +5. Snails are ancient and wise, and are known to curse those who harm them.  
• Earthworms. Occasionally found beneath the earth during nest excavation. Not dangerous, and provide 100 food each and tunnels of their own when encountered. 
• Assassin Bugs. A horror story, a psychic and pheromonal nightmare. Assassin bugs cover themselves entirely with the corpses of murdered ants, and weave strange spells that let them hunt their prey completely unseen. Assassin bugs are invisible until they attack - this is true both on the tactical and strategic maps. They only eat corpses. Juveniles fight as 10 workers, and adults fight as 50. They inflict -1 morale on enemy armies that fight them. They are mercifully rare. 
• Butterflies. Caterpillars count as juvenile millipedes. After a week they will turn into a chrysalis, which is immobile unless carried by 100 worker ants. After another week, and the butterfly will hatch. Butterflies can fly, and uniquely eat 1 nectar per day. If the nectar supply runs out they will leave. They don't fight in combat, but give the army that they accompany +1 morale. Butterflies are known as diviners, and will speak your fortune (as your favourite elfgame oracle spell) for 500 nectar. 

Still to come: Ant Commander traits, and a proper map and campaign. 

I just love insect guys :')