Mike Looney wrote:
>
> Ok, warning this is a rant.
>
> <rant>
> Several persons on the list have complained that the current blast marker
> rules "end the game to soon" or "make objective not important" or other
> such like, and have suggested rules to fix said same problem.
>
> While I know that "realism" and "Games Workshop Game" should not be used
> at the same time, I think that the current blast marker rules are the
> best thing to happen to war gaming after the invention of the combat
> results table, as they tend to end a game way before you have needed to
> kill off 75+% of the enemy forces, some thing that only happens VERY
> rarely in real life. In fact no more that 10 or 15 "major" battles in
> all of history ended that way.
>
> While obviously related to the Command Decision "hits" system, it is an
> improvement on that. It is a simple method, that with VERY small amounts
> of tweaking can be used to reflect a wide variety of battle field command
> and control problems, unit morale, fire suppression and other "fog of
> war" effects. When I finish "Imperial Space" (E41K is the start on that,
> BTW) blast markers will be a major part. While I am at it, there is very
> strong evidence that Space Marine, 1st ed, was based, in the main, on
> "Combined Arms" the "Modern" (i.e. post WW II) version of Command
> Decision. This bit came out on the CD mailing list where some one
> wanted help in translating WH40K stuff to Command Decision stats. E40K,
> it should be noted, is based more on AT/SM than SM/TL.
>
> In my view, and I could be wrong, the persons that are whining about
> blast markers "end a game to soon", versus needing to "break" x amount of
> the enemy detachments or needing to play "capture the flag with bolters",
> have to much of a "GW only" game back ground. Epic 40K is, despite the
> dumb ass marketing that went into it, the first GW game done in a long
> time that feels like it was in fact written by a war gamer, not a figure
> painter. (example, command troops, even "Supreme Commanders" are not that
> big of a deal in E40K. Compare the results of loosing one to the results
> in ANY other current GW game).
>
> In a later post I will be posting the E41K rules on "troop quality", in
> which blast markers and blast marker removal will figure heavily.
> </rant>
>
> --
> The Epic 41K project
> http://www.spellbooksoftware.com/epic
> 'er we go, 'er we go 'er we go
This post reads like it was written by a company flackey rather than a serious wargamer.
Some BM effects are good and proper, but the amount of blind fire an army puts out should
not be 50%+ of a battle.
Furthermore, "killing" a unit in E40k does not necessarily represent fatality, but an end
to its combat effectiveness. Playing to 20% casualties may be appropriate for a real
battle, but makes for really bad games, considering how easy it is to "kill" a unit.
Historically, most battles have been fought to acheive some goal other than "kill 50% of
the enemy", or "pin the enemy down". Once upon a time, objectives represented this fairly
well. Now they do not.
Finally, this is supposedly a list of ideas, not of game-company dogma. If you don't like
alternative rules posted here, that is your right; but people pointing out perceived flaws
of a system is not "whining", and you don't have to play by a single thing that is ever
posted here. Obviously a great number of us are disatisfied by the current system, and
I've played LOTS of non-GW games; in fact SM/TL was the only GW game I played for 2 years.
Otherwise its been avalon hill/ssi/computer wargames, which play much more like 2nd
edition and require much more thought.
Thane
Received on Tue Mar 31 1998 - 01:11:30 UTC