Re: Star Grunt 2 : Whenit finaly comes together.

At 12:20 PM 5/27/97 +1000, you wrote:

>But given that Australia is heavily dominated by GW, and that many
people
>are disenchanted with the Model of the Week and excessive price rises,
we
>NEED to cater for those who are use to points (GW players plus Modern
and
>WWII).

I tend to agree with you. I don't much care for point systems. As a
younger
player, I spent far too much time building point based armies only to
find a
serious flaw in the points that threw me back to guesstimating, anyway.
I
also dislike the cheesy min-maxing that occurs with points. 

That being said, there is nothing easier to allow new players to play
the
game than to give them a simple points system. It doesn't have to be
elaborate, just something to give them a rough idea of element strength.
I
agree with Jon's sentiments for not including a point system. I also
think
that it is good marketing to throw in a points system.

What I don't like is the tournament style game that seems to take over
most
GW players. It becomes something akin to collectible card game deck
design:
set a point total and then try to build the "best" army to that total
for a
simple meeting engagement. Still, if that's the way you want to play the
game, so be it.

Maybe a hybrid system is the way to go. Mikko once reminded me of the
WH40K
scenario design system in Rogue Trader. That might be the way to go.
Come up
with a random scenario generator with different point totals per side
based
on terrain given in the scenario. For example: 

Scenario die roll 15 - 20 (on 1D100)
Rearguard Action. Attacker: 1000 points. 
Defender: 350 points. Defender sets up first
in a built up area of hard cover. Defender 
places 3 objective markers. Attacker sets up 
first in his start area. Defender wins
if he ends the game holding two or more
objectives. Attacker wins if he holds all
objectives. Any other result is a tie.

New players will probably try to min-max the points, but because the
points
are "asymetrical" the min-maxing won't have that much of an effect.
Experienced players will just create their own scenarios. This can be
understood even by GW players :-) and leads them, subtly, into designing
scenarios.

Allan Goodall:	agoodall@sympatico.ca 
"You'll want to hear about my new obsession.
 I'm riding high upon a deep depression. 
 I'm only happy when it rains."    - Garbage