Re: [DS2] Spoon Feeding SciFi Genre to players

Army lists are a nice idea but they tend to fall down in practice. When
DS2
was first published I started trying to write an army list for it based
on
popular sci-fi novels. The problem was (with one or two exceptions) that
such lists were just plain boring. Sci-fi writers seem to like having
armed
forces that think that a particular weapon is a "killer" and have
nothing
else. Take "Starship Troopers" for instance. Fine if you want an army
that
consists of nothing but PA but how boring to play would such an army be?
The strength of DS2 is in the subtle interactions of different weapon
systems and defences. There are not very many novels where you will find
that sort of army. David Drake's Hammers Slammers series are a good
exception. There's even an orbat in one of the books. Only trouble is
their
opponents sadly fall into the "boring" category. So you can put together
a
nice DS2 Slammers army, but then who do they fight?

The best approach would be to design an army around particular models
you
like. I have a GEV army based around the Slammer Heavy Hover Tank and
the
Gauntlet APC from GZG's  Dirtside Miniatures range. Generate the stats
for
each type of vehicle that your army could have. Try and be consistent,
for
example most vehicles might be GEV with a few support vehicles either
tracked or wheeled. Or you could have an entirely Grav based army. Then
design a TO&E for your army based on these vehicles. Job done!

Hope that helps
Mike

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