Re: GenCon: Yet another review

many comments cut

>> FT's Future
 >> I was in some good discussions on FT and its future throughout the
con
and 
 >> got some views from Jeff Gullion who also runs a retail game store. 
It
was 
 >> agreed that GW is a miniatures company who creates rules to sell
their 
 >> minis.  They do a good job of making eye-candy minis that kids buy
and of

 >> keeping something new always coming out.  FT minis are not selling
well
at 
 >> Jeff's store but the rules do ok.  In his view, the casual players
pass
up 
 >> on FT because of a lack of pre-designed ships and additional
supplements.
 
 
 >This ties in with what I've seen locally. If you can get people to try
the
 >rules, they love it. However, they mostly don't want the trouble of
having
 >to invent the ships on their own. That's one reason the Star Trek, B5,
and
 >Star Wars backgrounds are so popular. You KNOW what weapons to use for
each
 >ship. You KNOW about how powerful each ship should be. You don't have
to
 >work this out for yourself. 
 
I can second (or third) this train of thought. Full Thrust is very
popular in
my club but most of the games we play are designed by me or are invovled
with
the campaign(s) I am running. Very rarely will anyone pull out ships for
a
pick up game. 
 
>> They are looking to get quickly into a game but do not want to spend
the 
 >> time and effort designing a fleet.	Many members of the list will
disagree 
 >> with this but I would not clasify most of the list memebers as
casual 
 >> gamers.  
 
The only time gamers in the club design fleets is when I set up a
specific
battle and assign to players as admirals. As a club we play a great
variety
of games and many members would probably choose to play the easier game
to
run on short notice.  
 
 >> When Jeff runs FT games at his store, they always fill up quickly 
 >> and the players have fun but no one else is running games there due
to
the 
 >> lack of balanced fleet designs as the powergamers ruin the
design-your-own 
 >> pick-up games and the other gamers do not want to spend the time
designing 
 >> full fleets and scenarios.
 
 Again the ease of play issue. At least some members of the club besides
myself would buy a fleet book and we would have more to work with for
pickup
games. 

> My fear is that the changes in FT3 will not be readily accepted. This
will
> result in cons running FT2 and FT3. At some point FT2 will no longer
be for
> sale so new players will only have FT3 available. The problem comes if
the
> old guard mostly refuse to move to FT3. At that point there is no one
> pushing the new version. Add to this a lack of fleet books and the
game
> could stop selling. We'd still have our ships and our rules, but it
would
be
> harder and harder to bring in new players. I don't know if this would
happen
> but it's what I fear.
 
> Jeff and I had a discussion about this and we came to the conclusion
that
> there wasn't a lot wrong with FT. We'd like to see the point system
fixed
> (there's the A battery over price, the unbalanced Kra'vak weapons,
etc.).
> We'd like to see a campaign system and a fleet book (if not a whack of
fleet
> books). I'd like to see some new systems and the real thrust movement
rules
> (as an option only). However, if these were all rolled into a
combination
> fleet book/second supplement I'd be happy. Jeff feels that DS2 needs a
> revamp, with the command and morale system of SG2 grafted onto it,
before a
> revamp of FT is needed.
 
I'll agree with Allan's comments here almost word for word. I'm afraid
to see
how much FT3 will change the basics of FT2. I really like the game as is
and
with a few changes would be happy. I hope that many of the more radical
changes will be optional or add ons. I'd like to see the Fleet book and
campaign book before FT3.

>  As I said, I'd pick up FT3 without a second thought.
> So would a lot of list members, though a number of list members have
> expressed antipathy towards some of the suggested rules changes. I
would
> like nothing more than to have the GZG games the most popular SF
miniatures
> games on the planet. 
 
Again I agree, although I worried about the impact of FT3 on the game it
is
on my buy at once list. I enjoy playing and demoing GZG systems and I
hope
they continue to grow more popular.

Mike J. Murtha
The Adventurers Club

One additional note I did want to meet the other list members at Gencon
(my
first time) but I was kept very busy working at the Heartbreaker booth.
I did
manage to meet KR and talk with him for a bit but I did not get to meet
any
of the list members. Hopefully I'll get a chance next year if I make it
to
Gencon again.