RE: [Epic] DSII, cool or what?

From: Andy Skinner <andy.skinner_at_...>
Date: Thu, 06 Feb 97 11:18:00 EST

Temp:
>Someone tell me about DSII. I know nothing.


The following is Brian Lojeck's summary of Dirtside vs Space Marine,
posted last October. I'll put my own comments inside [] brackets. I've
played Dirtside, but not too much, since it seemed harder to get started
than Space Marine. The total number of rules is more involved in SM,
because of unit-specific rules, but the base you start with is simpler.

I hope he doesn't mind me reposting it. I think I posted something
similar once, but don't seem to still have it.

One of the things I think I'd like about DSII is that close assault
doesn't mean the figures are touching each other. Basically a group
of units on one side assaults a position held by a group of units
on the other side. Infantry firing is more deadly, ranges are really
close, and vehicle firing is simplified to speed things along. (I
wonder how necessary the latter is.)

andy
andy.skinner_at_...

Brian's post:

up til now, many folks (me included) have spoke highly of dirtside in
very
abstract terms... but never truly laid out the differences (AFAIK). this
will attempt to do that. if you're not interested, there is nothing else
interesting in this message... feel free to delete it (I won't be
offended...)

Basic Concepts:

both games are 1/285th scale wargames. epic has its own line of figures,
dirtside has no such line, and has rules for making stats for any
miniature out there.
[Although some of the capacity rules make it hard to implement some GW
vehicles, with really big guns, and some of the rules give them a very
different character (only shoot one weapon system per turn)]

Scenery:
 in epic, a building is a building, and a hill is a hill. in dirtside,
cities and hills are represented in a similar way to how most games do
forests... you have a "cloud" of the terrain type, and the
buildings/hills
used to mark the "cloud" do not truly exist. (this is because the ground
scale is 100 times smaller then the figure scale...)

in epic, figures block LOS, in dirtside (due to the groundscale) they
don't (and I assume figures can move through each other for the same
reason)

game engine:

   unit activation:

        in epic, one player moves his entire army, the other does the
same, then they alternate firing by squads.

        in dirtside, the player with the most units moves and fires one
unit first, then play alternates with each player moving and
shooting one unit (other rules apply, but that's basically
it...)

        in epic, you have the hit roll, armor roll mechanism.
        in dirtside, the firer rolls a dice based on his targeting
ability
(basic gets you a d6, enhanced=d8, superior=d12) modifyed up or down by
various factors (that is, the dice rolled is modyfied, not the number
rolled). the defender rolls dice in a similar manner (a small vehicle
rolls a d12, a large rolls a d4, etc...). if the defender rolls higher,
the shot missed.

        for damage in dirtside, chits are drawn from a cup, inspected,
and
added together (thats the real short version of it) and the target is
killed if the total of the chits is greater then its armor.

        in dirtside, targets can also be damaged, unable to fire, or
unable to move, or even abandoned by the crew depending on the results of
the fire action


the primary difference between epic and dirtside weapons is that weapons
have a "specialty". in epic, a big gun is equally good at killing tanks
as
killing infantry. in dirtside, the big gun that takes down tanks real
well
has a hard time taking out infantry (and may not even be able to target
infantry). infantry is, in fact, quite tough in this game (especially
once
they get into hills or rough) with artillery and close assault being the
two best ways to get rid of them... this is my favorite part of the
game,
since this gives real power to an all infantry force which epic doesnt
quite...

overall feel:

dirtside is much tougher to read the rules for (I'm not sure why... but
it
almost seemed like work to learn the game from the book) but five minutes
into playing my first game I was wizzing along with the experts. the game
mechanic is simple, seems quite realistic (moreso then epic) and moves
along almost as quickly. we finished a 4 player game, with each player
having 7 or so platoons ("squads","groups" you get the idea) in 4 hours
with only one or two rule questions popping up (and it was pretty
minor!).
dirtside has NO charecters, vehicles are much more toned down then epic
(the # of weapons a vehicle can hold are much less then in epic) the
rules
are clearer, and make a good mix between tactical and strategic (not only
is it important to attack the target with a good weapon, but movement and
terrain all play a big part...)

all in all, I prefer dirtside... but YMMV...



Brian Lojeck
lojeck_at_...
Received on Thu Feb 06 1997 - 16:18:00 UTC