Re: Battle at Camelot Comics and Games--After Action Report

On Mon, 22 Nov 1999 RWHofrich@aol.com wrote:

> In a message dated 11/21/99 8:02:25 PM Eastern Standard Time, 
> oglover@museum.vic.gov.au writes:
> 
> > > -----Original Message-----
> >  > From: RWHofrich@aol.com [mailto:RWHofrich@aol.com]
> >  > Subject: Re: Battle at Camelot Comics and Games--After Action
Report
> >  SNIP
> >  > I can't speak for the others, but mine boils down to the
following:
> >  > 
> >  > 1.  Basic non-familiarity with the system, which includes 
> >  > figuring the odds, 
> >  > especially with secondary die rolls involved.
> >  
> >  Ah, the beauty of this game system is that you apply a little more
"real
> >  life" approach to the game! Rather than calculating the odds based
on
> >  matematical considerations try considering Troops to Task and
relevant
> >  weapons etc. I think you'll find a more enjoyable game too.
> 
> Actually, because of the wide range of weapon systems available, if I
could 
> figure the odds a little better, then I could actually decide what the

> "correct" weapons were for the task at hand (for example, my IFV
designs 
> generally have a GMS and a direct fire weapon--deciding which to use
can be a 
> pain sometimes, especially when the gun is a DFFG and the range is
medium).

So you stop the game, whip out your pen/paper/laptop/whatever, calculate
a
bunch of odds, THEN announce who you're shooting at, and what weapon
you're using?

And your gaming partners haven't yet gotten tired of this? No calls of
"Just take the shot, for crying out loud!"???

We don't 'enforce' fast play as such, but anyone who spends an
inordinate
amount of time measuring rangebands, muttering to themselves and
fiddling
is likely to be growled at. And if someone actually started figuring
actual odds on us...

Pardon me... "Playing the odds" like this is a major, major pet peeve
(can
you tell?). On-the-fly estimations are grand, but the nitpicking,
numbercrunching gamers drive me nuts. It's one of the reasons I dislike
traditional board wargames - all those CRTs ENCOURAGE this sort of
gaming
style!

> >  > 2.  Such a system makes it difficult, if not impossible, to 
> >  > factor in two 
> >  > modifiers (FMA gets "around" this by just saying you use the
worst).
> >  
> >  How so? I think I must misunderstand your meaning here. Can you
give an
> >  example of two modifiers? 
> 
> When firing at a target, you only use the largest of the secondary
dice--a 
> vehicle target in soft cover that is also hull down, for example, only
gets 
> the benefit of hull down (d10 secondary die vs a d6 secondary die). 
This is 
> detailed on page 29 of Dirtside II.  I think that most people will
agree that 
> a vehicle that is in cover AND hull down should be just a little
harder to 
> hit than one that is just hull down.	Oncew again, I want to make sure

> everyone understands that I don't see this as a really big deal, just
one of 
> the reasons I'm not thrilled with this particular method of doing
random 
> event generation.

Well, if someone is in a hull-down position, they're basically in Hard
Cover. It makes sense to me that this would be more important that mere
Soft Cover... think of soft cover as 'just a bit of cover', and Hard as
'lots and lots and lots of cover' - you obviously can't really be in
both
at the same time...

> Anyway, I just re-read the rules and found out that we had run the
morale 
> rules wrong in our game--we should have had more broken units by the
end.  Oh 
> well--C'est la guerre (or some such--I'm not good at frog).

Ribbit... :> All the various detail bits of DS2 can be a fair bit to
remember...

Actually, we found that the stock D2/SG2 morale rules weren't tough
enough
- we had an inordinate number of units being wiped out to the last man,
while still at very high morale levels... no one was running away! We
house-ruled Cascading Morale - basically, if you blow a test, test again
at one Threat level lower, and repeat until you actually pass a test or
you have dropped three morale levels. (or you've dropped below Routed,
in
which case remove the unit from the board...) For ex: Test at TL+3. Blow
it, drop from CO to ST. Test again at TL+2. Blow it, very badly, so you
drop two levels, from ST to BR. Stop rolling, because you've just
dropped
three Morale levels...

Full details can be found at <http://warbard.iwarp.com/ds2rules.html>,
our
DS2 Houserules page. (lots of other houserules, too)

Brian (yh728@victoria.tc.ca)			      
-DS2/SG2/FR!/HOTT-
		   - http://warbard.iwarp.com/games.html -
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