[OFFICIAL] Where we're going from here...[LONG RAMBLE!!]

Hi everyone!

For the last few days I've been following with interest the threads
concerning speculation on the future of FT, with particular reference to
the Fleet Book and FTIII. I thought it might be of some use at this
point
to share a few thoughts with you all, and to gauge the reactions to
them.
Before starting, let me just explain a few things and set some
parameters
for the discussion to get things in perspective.

1) GZG is still a VERY, VERY small operation; even though I now have an
assistant (Dave) helping out with a lot of the actual miniatures
production, most of the running of GZG is still a one-man operation
(me).
We do almost everything in-house, from designing new miniatures through
to
mouldmaking, casting them, packing them and taking them down to the post
office. When I'm busy packing and despatching peoples' orders, the phone
is
ringing with customers asking "when's the next book coming out?"; while
I'm
trying to design new miniatures, everyone asks "when is my order going
to
be despatched?"; when I'm trying to write the next rules publication or
supplement, everyone asks "when are the new miniatures going to be
ready?"...... I'm sure you get the general idea.
Sure, we could rent a bigger workshop, take on a dozen staff and a
secretary [18 and blonde, please, typing skills irrelevant but must make
good tea and have really great legs... :)] and really go for it... and
probably end up down the tubes in 18 months with the bank, taxman and
creditors after us like so many, many other games companies that have
gone
this route.

What I'm getting at is there isn't time to do everything we'd like to.
Yes,
I'd love to put out three or four books and supplements every few months
like some publishers do; but then they'd be all written by different
people, and I'd be back to flying a desk like I used to years ago. I'd
rather go on trying to give you all what I hope you want, even if it is
not
quite as frequently as you (or we) would ideally like!

2) This has to be said: We ARE in this to make a living. Sad as it may
seem, we DO still have to exist in the real world for at least part of
the
time ("Reality is for people who can't handle Science Fiction...") and
the
bills have to be paid; running GZG has to allow me to put bread on the
table and dogfood in the bowls, or else I've got to give it up and
return
to being a wage slave again. 
KR (GeoHex) and I have both agreed in the past that neither of us will
probably ever make a fortune out of this business, because neither of us
are ruthless enough to try and shaft the punters and the opposition.
This
said, I can honestly state that I have never yot been forced to make or
write anything I didn't want to do or wasn't happy with, just because of
economic pressure; if we ever get to the point of churning out endless
substandard product (paper or metal) because we "know" that our
slavering
hordes of sycophantic followers will buy everything we tell them to,
then
we'll truly have sold out to the Powers of Gaming Darkness! 
If I can make a modest but comfortable living doing what I love (no, I
mean
games design...) then that is fine by me. 

3) The feedback and ideas from this list are invaluable to us, and we
really do consider the opinions expressed in it. The members of the FT
list
are probabaly among the keenest users of our games (FT in particular of
course) out there. However, please don't forget that the total list
membership actually represents only about 2% of the gamers worldwide who
have bought FTII since it was released! This means there are probably
almost 10,000 owners (hopefully players, though you can't be sure) of FT
who are NOT on this list and whose opinions we therefore cannot easily
canvass. The only time we hear the views of this vast "slient majority"
is
when the occasional member of them talks to us at a show, or takes the
trouble to write in. This is why it was particularly interesting to read
the reports of Jeff Gullion's thoughts as a US retailer - he sees the
people we don't, and what THESE people want from the game (and any new
add-ons) is not always the same as the FT list membership.
So, we tread a bit of a tightrope here - we'll never manage to give
everyone what they want all the time, so we're just going to have to go
with the best compromise we can!

OK, so where ARE we going from here??

Well, the Fleet Book is actually, really, truly under way now! (Shock,
horror...). I have a very good artist working on some line drawings for
all
the ships in the FT line (including the Kra'Vak and the Sa'vasku), and
am
starting the long job of designing the various fleet stats and actually
writing the book.
We won't make it in time for the Christmas market, but our target for
publication is as early as we can in the new year. Realistically,
whether
we make this or not will largely depend on the speed at which the art
gets
done (with getting on for 100 different ships to illustrate, its not an
overnight job...).
Two important things: the FB WILL use a new, revised ship design system,
and it WILL contain quite a bit of supplementary rules material designed
as
a "stepping stone" between FTII and the coming FTIII. I know that one or
two people have commented in the past that they would not want to buy
the
FB because they didn't use the GZG background, and therefore would not
be
happy with "having" to buy it just to get the rules updates. Well, the
best
thing I can say here is that the FB should not be looked on as just a
listing of "official" ship designs and stats - look at it as a
compendium
of all sorts of ship designs that you can lift out and drop into any
background you want, just by changing the names! Because the FB gives
stats
for an NAC Battleship and has a nice picture of the FT110 miniature,
this
doesn't for a moment mean that you can't take the ship diagram and stats
and use them for your scratchbuilt "Grobillian Slobnik-class
Hypercruiser"
if you wish.....

The new and amended rules that we intend to include in the Fleet Book
will
cover most of the modifications that we plan to make for FTIII, and we
hope
that these and the large number of pregenerated ship designs will make
it a
worthwhile purchase for most FT players.

Once the FB is out, we will be turning our attention to FTIII itself
(all
other work permitting, as explained above!). We don't as yet have any
kind
of projected release date for this, as it is all still in the relatively
early stages of testing.

So, why change FT at all? Well, I think most members of the list will
agree
that there are some things that need changing, and even if these are
relatively few in number they will have a major impact on certain
aspects
of the game.There have been a few adverse comments regarding the idea of
a
new design system, most notably that it will invalidate all existing
ship
designs. This is true, but it is an inevitable result of the need to fix
one of the most important problems with the old FTII design system - the
Battery Mass issue. Whatever mass values we decide on for beam batteries
in
the new system (and we are still testing this), as soon as we change ANY
mass value from FTII we automatically invalidate the ships designed
under
the old system. So, having accepted this, we are proposing a radical
overhaul of the design rules to improve them wherever possible,
including
removing the odd effects of the artificial "break points" between size
classes and closing many of the loopholes that are so exploited by the
powergamers and the minimaxers. It won't be perfectly balanced (no
system
ever will be, IMHO, unless you play chess) but we hope it will be a lot
better than FTII.
Several list members have commented more than once that their biggest
problems stem from HAVING to play with the dreaded minimaxers and
ex-Warhammer Weenies simply because they are the only opponents
available
in their area. We hope that tightening up the design system will help to
cut down on such problems without taking away the fun of doing your own
ship designs - it just MIGHT get some people to think more about fleet
tactics than just how to get the most for their points....

Allan (I think) commented that the system being playtested for FTIII
ship
design was mass-only, and dispensed with points altogether. This is only
partly true; we have been TESTING a mass-only system, yes, but have by
no
means finalised what to use; the new system will PROBABLY still use
points
as well as mass in some form at least, although points may be more
directly
related to mass than they are in FTII.
Perhaps the biggest single change in the design system is that different
thrust drives will take different mass amounts, unlike the old FTII
system
of including drives in the 50% of mass for "general bits". Most of the
testers so far seem to like this idea, and it actually gives the player
more freedom in his ship designing.
All the ships in the FB will be rated under the NEW design system,
because
there is no point in producing the FB using FTII designs a few months
before FTIII comes out! (OK, so some companies would do EXACTLY
that...).
However, rest assured that the FB will include all necessary rules to
fully
use all the designs given.

Moving on from the design system to discuss the rest of the proposed
changes, we don't believe we are doing anything that will affect the way
that FT plays on the table. The order writing, turn sequence, firing
mechanisms, damage resolution and movement systems will all be
effectively
unchanged from those in FTII/MT (the "basic" FT movement system WILL be
retained, but SUPPLEMENTED by the "true vector" system as an additional
option, to be used if and when desired according to what kind of game
style
you prefer).

There will be some new weapon systems (offensive and defensive) in
addition
to all the original FT/MT ones. We are testing some new armour rules,
where
armour basically becomes like additional hull boxes (bought with mass at
the design stage) that absorb some damage that would otherwise start
degrading the hull and systems. This makes armour "feel" different to
screens, which we think is a good thing. As Allan mentioned, we ARE
proposing a maximum screen level of 2 rather than 3, as this has the
important effect of reducing the "invulnerability" problem of big ships.
This is something that has been discussed on the main list several times
recently, and most comments seem in favour of this move.
There are also proposed changes to the layout of the hull boxes (and
hence
the threshold points) which are a result of removing the artificial
class
break points between Escorts, Cruisers and Capitals; again, these are
all
still under test.

You may well be thinking "so, if I buy the FB and already have FTII and
MT,
then I'll have all of FTIII anyway, so I won't need to buy FTIII when it
comes out?"
Well, yes and no. You'll probably have most of the rules variations,
true,
but we hope to put a LOT more into FTIII by the time we get it to print,
including a campaign system, some scenarios, more background (don't
worry,
not TOO much)
and of course lots of new art and pretty bits. Oh, and maybe even a
counter
sheet for little stuff like vector markers, missiles, debris etc....
We hope that FTIII will be a sufficiently attractive product in its own
right that you'll WANT to buy it. However, if you REALLY don't want to
then
we promise not to a) excommunicate you forever from the GZG Gaming Hobby
(TM), b) force you into the games store at gunpoint and pry your wallet
from your dying fingers, or c) cause your existing copy of FTII to
dissolve
in your hands.....
In other words, keep on playing FTII for as long as you like if you
still
prefer it, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise!

FTIII really MUST come if we are to keep the game progressing and
improving. We have reprinted the FTII rules three times now, for a total
of
over 10,000 copies over six years, and can't really justify another
simple
unaltered reprint. I am very flattered by the comments which say it
can't
really be improved much, but I think most of you will agree that there
are
aspects that need attention. We certainly DON'T plan to fix anything
that
doesn't need fixing, and we are as keen as you are (more so probably,
because our livelihood depends on it!) that anything we do makes the
game
better, not worse.
We sincerely hope that when FTIII comes out (as with the FB), many of
you
will want to buy it and will enjoy playing it as much as you've enjoyed
FTII.

One important aside - a number of the changes we are proposing to use in
FTIII (such as the combined use of "cinematic" and vector movement) have
already been incorporated in the forthcoming EA sourcebook rules to the
Babylon Project; once it is out, those who buy it might like to give us
your reactions to it as a "taster" for FTIII!

Well, there it is. A long ramble that I hope has explained a few things,
maybe quashed a few rumours and hopefully whetted your appetites.
Now I just wait for the hail of reactions.... :)

Jon (GZG)

PS: for those of you who play DSII and SGII, we WILL be working on more
material for them as and when time permits; BDS (Bugs Don't Surf) WILL
see
the light of day as soon as we can. Oh, and between everything else,
we're
also considering a FANTASY version of the FMA system (provisional title:
BLOOD AND THUNDER) which will be playable at any level from man-to-man
skirmish right up to mass-battle and with any scales from 6mm to 25mm;
it
will have a simple sub-Tolkein generic fantasy setting, (unlike most
Fantasy miniatures rules, it will be 90% rules to 10% background rather
than the other way round...) - you know the sort of thing:
"Elves are pointy-eared tree-huggers; Dwarves are short, hairy and
beerswilling; they don't like each other..". What more background do you
NEED...?  :)