Re: [SG2] Bugs Don't Surf: Phalons - Public Beta Test

Hi, Mark.

> I'd just like to say "thanks very much" for the sneaky preview of your
> Phalon ideas.

Thank you very much! I hope you find them as much fun to play as to
read. 

> I like the way you've essentially defined the Phalon's alien nature
> through the mechanism of confidence and reaction without just making
> them acid-drooling threshers whose idea of psychology is to eat it.

Thank you again! That was the plan. Jon has read through them, quickly,
and he thought they looked pretty good. I don't know what will happen
when he playtests them himself, but I suspect that they will go into
_Bugs Don't Surf_ more-or-less intact. 
 
> Pulsars
> 
> Have you considered forcing all Pulsars to expend an action to change
> modes? My group uses a couple of dual mode weapons and there's always
a
> delicious kind of agony attached to the decision of "Do I burn an
action
> trying to change to a better firing mode, or do I just carry on hoping
> for the best in my current mode?"

I thought of that, I really did. I ended up rejecting it for a few
reasons. First, there's the bookkeeping issue. You'd need to have a
counter for each squad indicating what mode the pulsers were in. You
could say that a squad without a counter uses the default setting, but
you'd need a counter the moment a squad changed settings. You'd also
need counters for support pulsers. SG2 is already counter heavy, and
even _more_ counters just detracted from the game. (Yes, you can go with
written squad status sheets, but some people hate writing down things in
mid game.) When I proposed the idea that playtest list members create
alien rules, Jon was supportive but he had some strict requirements for
alien rule creation. One requirement was that the number of additional
counters be kept to a minimum, with the ideal being that the aliens not
require _any_ new counters.

Second, a turn is nominally between 3 and 5 minutes. Eating up a whole
action to change settings seemed a bit long. I couldn't imagine a
firefight where soldiers would bother taking up a couple of minutes
changing weapon settings. They'd be more likely to enter the battle with
a single setting. This was an option, too; have the player set the
weapons for a particular scenario. I figured that people would probably
just use the default setting in that case, which basically made them
assault rifles (FP2 Imp D10). The default setting of the pulser is
already underpowered compared to the standard AAR of most human units
(FP3 Imp D10). By giving the pulser the option of changing settings, it
took a weapon that's underpowered in comparison to its primary
opponents' and made it more powerful. I thought requiring an action to
change settings, or require it be set before the game began, would throw
out the balance again and make the weapon less useful (as players would
then just use t!
 he default setting most of the time). SG2 doesn't require an action to
reload weapons, and I figured that pulsers would have quick-swap lenses,
or an internal setting, or some other PSB that allowed quick changing
(say 30 seconds to change over, maximum). 

Third, requiring an action to change settings would slow down the
Phalons. I wanted them to be _more_ mobile, particularly in swampy
conditions, not less mobile. Requiring an action to change weapons
essentially slows them down, because they would have one less action to
do suppression removal, move, reorganise, etc. 

Finally, it's a lot simpler to declare the pulser setting at the time it
is used. Since the Phalons already have a number of rules changes,
declaring settings at the time of combat makes them a little easier to
play. I had to look at the weapon rules as part of the whole Phalon rule
subset.

That having been said, I did like the idea of requiring an action to
change settings, and that was the original plan until pretty late in the
rule writing (hence the reason there's mention of a "default setting").
In the end, after some playtesting, I rejected it, but not without some
reservations. The big reason was Jon's "no new counters" stipulation.

> We erred on the side of lowest rather than most prevalent impact
because
> we wanted to encourage players to think about firing support weapons
> separately from small arms rather than just throwing everything in at
> once to rack up kills. Also it's highly unlikely that SAWs will
> outnumber small arms with our squad configurations. Anyway, just
thought
> I'd share...

The test list went round and round on this. The "lowest die" is
definitely an option that was looked at. (One member suggested that we
use the most prevalent impact die, not the most prevalent weapon type!)
The reason we went with "most prevalent weapon" is that there was
objection to rolling a D8 for a squad with a single SAW with D8 impact
and 9 guys with D10 Impact AARs. Or, taking the other extreme, if you
have a squad with two D8 SAWs and a squad leader with a pistol it seemed
silly that the pistol (which has the lowest impact) would have the
greatest effect on impact, and not the SAWs.

The "most prevalent" rule is the only rule that doesn't break the Rules
As Written (RAW). Take that squad I mentioned above with 8 guys with
Impact D10 AARs and one Impact D8 SAW. According to the SG2 rule book,
the D10 AAR impact is used. If using the lowest die, the D8 SAW impact
is used. Another one of Jon's requirements is that we not re-write the
RAW unless there was a really good reason. The RAW essentially uses the
"most prevalent weapon" rule already, it just doesn't take into account
what happens when there are casualties and a squad ends up with more
support weapons than small arms. The "most prevalent weapon" is then
just a special case of the RAW. Using the "lowest die" means that some
people would complain that their favourite squads -- which they may have
been using for years -- were now less powerful because of this new rule.
Then you'd have people arguing, "No, stick with the rule in the SG2
rules," and others arguing, "Let's use the new rule that came with t!
 he Phalons."

Note that your rule of using the "lowest die" is actually the most
common one out there! So you're not alone. If you prefer the lowest die,
then use that. I don't think it will make a huge amount of difference.
Just be aware that it's not likely to be the "official" rule.
 
> However the chances of recovering a support weapon in good condition
are
> considerably slimmer in my world. We started off requiring a 3+ to
> reclaim and these days it's a 4+ (on D6). Otherwise, the attacker
finds
> it very difficult to get rid of the blasted things.

This was something I felt really needed playtesting beyond my small
group. The fact that you've actually done the playtesting is cool! My
original rules had _zero_ chance of losing the weapon, but most players
found that wasn't right, so I changed it to a 1 in 6 chance. That's
probably still not steep enough. I think a 4+ is perhaps a little too
steep, so I'm leaning towards a compromise of 3+, which is what you used
at first. 4+ seems a little high only because you already have to burn
two actions before you can use the support weapon again (1 to remove the
suppression, 1 to reorganise). If the chance is 50:50, I suspect a
number of players wouldn't bother spending the Reorganise action.

But I could be wrong about that, as you already have it at 50:50 and
find that it works well with your group. I'll post this to the playtest
list and see what they say. 

Thank you for the input!

All the best,
Allan

--
Allan Goodall		   agoodall@att.net
http://www.hyperbear.com   agoodall@hyperbear.com