Re: GZG DS2 Mikko: Genres for DS2.

>From: Mikko Kurki-Suonio <maxxon@swob.dna.fi>

>> It seems everyone is missing the point here.  I may be doing the >> 
same,  but at least I am missing the point in a different way!	

>No Tom, you got the point all right. 

Hey, all right!  Sometimes I amaze myself with my own adequacy.

SNIP
>
>"Dirtside II is a comprehensive set of *generic* rules for simulating
>science fiction battles in *virtually*ANY* background or 'future
>history'." -Dirtside II back cover blurb, presumably Jon Tuffley, >1993
>(emphasis added)
>
>Maybe it's because English is a second language for me... 
>
>-- 
>maxxon@swob.dna.fi (Mikko Kurki-Suonio)	 

My first language is gibberish, so we are even on that count.  Let me 
offer an analogy, if I may.  Long, long ago, I used to play a Superhero 
RPG called "Villans and Vigilanties".  The V&V system had all kinds of 
flaws (the tougher you were, the more likely uyou were to be knocked 
unconscious, for example....), but it was a more or less "generic" 
superhero system--although it was never billed as such.  Those were more

innocent days--that would allow you to re-create your favorite hero, if 
you so chose.  To make, say, the Human Torch you would give your 
character "Flame Powers"; these would allow him to burst into flame, 
fly, and throw fireballs around.  Simple, eh?  Compare that to the 
Champions RPG...in which you would but Flight, Power Blast, etc., and 
define them as bursting into flame and throwing fireballs around.  Which

is better?  V&V, which straightjackets you into what the writers 
percieve as proper "Flame Powers", or Champions, which allows you to 
define "Flame Powers" however you damned well please?

Okay, now that I have firmly defined *myself* as a geek of long 
standing....

DSII has already defined Mass Drivers for me, and I might not agree with

how.  And yes, I know that I can just change the names, but that does 
not really solve the problem, does it?

DSII is a good game.  It's a great game.  I have never played any 
microarmor game, SF or modern, that I liked as much.  But it ain't 
perfect.  It does not simulate all genres with equal skill, and 
certainly not without the use of House Rules that are of dubious 
acceptability.	I swear, GZG fanboys are almost as bad as GW fanboys....
 
Lighten up, everyone!

Hell, all I really want out of life right now is a fantasy system that 
will let me reproduce Glenn Cook's Black Company.  They make the 
Slammers look like a bunch of damned pansies....

You think good military SF is hard to find?   Try good military fantasy.

Tom Sullivan
"We aim to please, but we shoot to kill."

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