I always had trouble fitting GW models into Dirtside size classes.
You have to be willing to make some changes, in my opinion. For
instance,
you might think of bikes mainly as transport, replacing the bikes with
infantry stands when they get somewhere, rather than the GW notion of
bikes as little two-wheeled vehicles with guns.
Some GW models have more guns on them than DSII would encourage. This
affects two things.
One is the capacity rules. I'd prefer if DSII just had point rules and
left capacity up to "you can take anything on a vehicle that looks like
it is actually on the model". That way the style of minis you used
would
be your capacity system, and you'd probably use minis reflecting the
style
you want to play. (Leman Russ has guns poking out all over the place,
and I found it hard to get 'em all in there. Some GW vehicles have guns
much bigger than DSII would allow. You have to make some exceptions.)
The other place this affects the game is that DSII lets you fire one
weapon system per turn. I don't know how much it would change game
balance to allow shooting more than one, since so many GW models have
guns sticking out all over the place. DSII has rules that allow
oversized
vehicles to take more than one fire control. I'd allow any vehicle to
pay for extra fire controls (but at different levels, not always same as
the first), and assign weapon systems to fire controls. Each fire
control
system can fire one weapon system.
Some GW models with fixed guns suffer in DSII, which uses a rule that
fixed
guns may not move after they shoot in their activation. (Each unit
(group
of models) gets one activation during the turn, and does all its
movement
and shooting in that activation.) The old GW falcons have a fixed gun,
but I'd expect a grav tank to be more agile, and would probably treat
the
gun as not being fixed.
There are no point values for troop qualities, so if a unit (like Space
Marines) always uses higher troop qualities, I think you'd have to
remember
to take that into account as you design a scenario. DSII has a point
system for designing vehicles, but troop qualities are either specified
for a scenario or drawn randomly. I'd like to know if a simple point
multiplier would work.
Finally, there are a lot of systems in Dirtside II that don't really
show
up in GW's universe, at least explicitly. Point defense and area
defense
systems, for shooting down missiles, for example. I think if I were
designing vehicles purely for a DSII implementation of Epic, I'd pick
some systems to just leave off. But if I face anyone with a lot of
guided
missiles, I'd really be a sitting duck. I find it hard to know which
defensive systems to put on a vehicle. For example, an army that uses
a lot of lasers might be expected to have ablative armor, which protects
from lasers. But their enemies might never use lasers. Similarly for
guided missiles and reactive armor. Do I want to fool with that?
It needs some tweaking for walkers (knights to titans) to be more
viable,
but this has been done by various people.
I've had DSII for a long time; I actually bought it before Space Marine,
which I bought as a big box of minis for DSII. But I've only played it
once, at a convention. (We used GW, battletech, and Renegade Legion
minis.)
Space Marine's core rules looked simpler, so I've stuck with that. I'd
like to try it out, but I've always gotten stuck on house rules
(allowing
multiple firecons), designing vehicles, and slightly increased
complexity.
I also think it would take longer to play than Epic 40K, for similarly
sized
armies.
If I ever do continue with DSII, I won't be trying to reproduce GW's
universe very strictly. Space Marines may be elite, but won't be all
that they are in GW. I might treat them as armored (I'll need to tweak
infantry rules), but not power-armored. (I picture Stormtroopers from
Star Wars.) I picture Space Marines using DFFGs (Direct Fire Fusion
Gun)
on their tanks, Eldar using grav and lasers. (Grav tanks don't do
pop-ups
in Dirtside II, but VTOLs do.) I'd make some of the aircraft from Epic
into VTOLs, because I like having the models on the board. The
aerospace
craft rules are similar to E40K, flying across the board in a turn.
andy
--
Andy Skinner
askinner_at_...
Received on Tue Feb 10 1998 - 13:34:23 UTC