RE: [Epic] Epic scale, rant and rave - long -

From: Miller, Chris <CMiller_at_...>
Date: Mon, 10 Nov 1997 14:43:25 -0600

>The Soviets had over 200 Motor
>Rifle Divisions. 8,000,000+ points THAT'S EPIC SCALE. This messing
>around with at most five or six hundred guys on a side is hardly "Grand
>Tactical", in fact its rather micro scale tactics.

-------> Yep. I posted some #'s long ago on the numbers involved in WW2
battles, and they would be impossibly huge to play in "Epic" scale. Even
Civil War fights are usually way too large.

>At Battalion level, the commander damn sure does know the difference
>between a machine gun, an anti-tank weapon, an indirect fire weapon and
>squad/platoon level small arms fire, and know damn good and well that
>you can't just use them all the same way. At this level the difference
>between an 90 mm, 105 mm and 120 mm main gun on your tanks matters.
-----> And someone , somewhere said that if the range of different guns
comes into play, it's probably a tactical game. I think we can all agree
that epic is some kind of tactical game, can't we?

>Space Marine 1st ed went into to much weapon detail. In the "beta"
>version, (WD 110, I think) what kind of grenade a stand had mattered.
>In some cases a 5 man stand could make 3 attacks, each at different
>target.
-----> Yep again -you had bolters or whatever, then each stand could
pretty much pick a different heavy weapon (lascannon, heavy bolter,
heavy plasma gun, etc) and some units had special grenades AND ALL OF
THESE WERE DIFFERENT WEAPONS WITH DIFFERENT FACTORS IN GAME TERMS! This
would bog down like you wouldn't believeif someone went nuts and picked
numerous different weapon types. But at least a Lascannon was a
Lascannon, whether used by a trooper or mounted on a tank.

>It however has a very simple set of rules
>for army design, in the "Card" system. This made for slow play, but
>rather fast setup.
-----> I never was upset by the cards the way some people seem to
be.They only annoyed me in the purchasing of mini's (and getting odd
numbers) but not really in play.
>Given that the "setup/army design" stage can be done before hand (weeks
>before hand if need be) this is not important. Adding levels of
>complexity to an all ready complex system that is NOT used DURING (vs
>before) play is NOT a bad thing. Adding levels of complexity that take
>effect during game play needs to be done with some care. And yes, I am
>guilty of making some some what complex house rules (my Engineering
>rules spring to mind). I am working on changing them so that the
>complex part is done before game play, not during.

------> I agree that this is a major distinction. I love the flexibility
of the new army lists, but it is a much more involved task to pick your
units now. I would also add that there is a difference between adding
new rules ( which is what it would take to carry over cool items from
SM/TL like the Deflekta shield dragsta, Madboyz, etc.) and just
changing/adding a unit using what's in the game already (like giving
orks a vehicle with AT shots, or adding support weapons with FPand some
support weapons with an AT shot to cover the differences between a Mole
>Mortar and a Tarantula.)
>If you have problems looking down at the game table and telling 2 weapon
>systems apart (for that matter telling 10+ weapon systems apart) you
>really should not be war gaming. The argument that having more than one
>kind of support weapon makes the game "to complex" really is missing the
>point.
>
></rant>

------> I don't know about the Wargaming part, but miniatures could
certainly be a problem. I don't think adding units using existing rules
is a problem (at least it's not for me), but I do pause when someone
posts 50 lines of new rules to accomodate one unit. I think there's a
way to work in most of what we've tried within these rules (E40K). If I
want all the "little differences" and sometimes I do, then I'll get out
SM/TL. Just don't post about how great E40K is and then add 10 e-mails
worth of unique exceptions and new rules to cover units not included in
the game. That's what SM/TL did (both a strength and a weakness to many)
and we don't need to do it over. This thing is supposed to be complete
unto itself, so let's keep it that way. A new unit - fine. A new special
weapon (the Bork ray!) is kinda questionable .You have the "system", now
"build" your unit within the system. I've seen enough posts here to
finally (and grudgingly) admit it can be done. May not be exactly what
it was in the old version, but I bet it's close, like most of the other
units in E40K.

Chris Miller
>
Received on Mon Nov 10 1997 - 20:43:25 UTC