Re: [GZG] System Diversity

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Gzg-l mailing list
Gzg-l@mail.csua.berkeley.edu
http://mail.csua.berkeley.edu:8080/mailman/listinfo/gzg-lWhen we were
learning how to play and experimenting with FT designs and technologies
some people designed fleets that were heavily based around one
technology especially heavy missiles.

You could let Darwinism take it's logical course and then everyone ends
up with the dominant technology and defences and players can exactly
copy each others ship designs it turns into chess with more counters and
dice.

From a personal point of view I don't enjoy playing games that rely
heavily on FT ordnance. The two fleets sit at opposite ends of the table
and fire missiles at each other or launch fighter squadrons ship
manouvre is largely irrelevant. Those kind of engagements might make for
interesting novels but they make for boring games.

Tom makes a good point. You need to ensure that there is a reason to
have different types of unit, different mission capabilites need to be
required. In DS if you didn't care about holding terrain and the playing
area was flat featureless plain with no cover then everyone would use
tanks, unless they couldn't build them. In FT if all you play are large
fleet action then destroyers are only viable for the fringes because
they get chewed up pretty quickly. So you need to ensure the games
require you to have multiple mission capabilities to encourage players
to take fleets made up of different types.

You also need to ensure that it's viable to have different army
compositions and not just the optimum. If you want to play things other
than warsaw pact vs nato, say a hypothetical invasion of the African oil
fields you need to ensure that the gaming is interesting and not just a
slaughter by one side or other. If you don't do this you ensure that you
can only play warsaw pact vs nato and can't simulate other opponents.

I think FT would be a much less attractive game if you could quickly
get to a point where a particular formula dominated.