[Epic] A few comments on E40k

From: Jeff Schmidt <jschmidt_at_...>
Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 10:24:35 -0500

Re: Loss of Flavor

I agree with the past gripes, to an extent. Much of the game has become
'genericized' (sp?), but not without justification. When a rules system
becomes overrun with special cases such that there are no standard cases
anymore, there is a problem. I no longer had fun playing the old Epic
because the rules were so absurd as to be laughable. Sure, house rules
would fix _some_ of the problems, but it became apparent that we needed so
many house rules that we had an entirely new game. Besides, I don't want
to _have_ to fix someone else's rules system; I want to pick up a game,
paint some minis, and have fun without sucking up all my precious freetime.

I don't see any reason why people couldn't take the new framework, with its
standard special abilities, and duplicate some of the lost 'flavor'. Just
off the top of my head, an avid Ork player could work up the Kustom Force
Field for his dragsta by toying with the points value of granting a Save to
the dragsta and any unit within 5cm.

My point is this: I think GW did an great job of standardizing abilities
and generalizing each races' units. It's a hell of a lot easier to build
diversity with standards than with cobbled-together special cases.

And now for something completely different...

1. Anyone else think the crit charts are broken? Work out the
probibilities for a few and you get some interesting results. Biotitans
either seem to instinctivly block incoming fire with their right arms, or
all opponents tend to aim at the right side, since it is slightly more
likely to hit the right weapon. Other titans have similar skews.
Personally I would have liked to seen crit charts somewhat like:
        2 : Catastrophic Damage
        3 : Reactor Hit / Deep Wound / Etc.
        4-6 : Weapon Hits
        7 : Glancing Hit / Flesh Wound
        8-10 : Mobility Hits
        11 : Reactor Hit / Deep Wound / Etc.
        12 : Catastrophic Damage
where weapons hits are always random for right/left splits (ie. 6 =
Carapace Hit, 1-3 left carapace weapon, 4-6 right). Expand the extremes
for smaller war machines.

2. Close Combat weapons do CATASTROPHIC DAMAGE? Wow. Don't leave home
without 'em. And always take Hierophants if you take any biotitans. I
would have thought a single automatic critical, or a critical for each hit
inflicted would have been sufficient.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeff Schmidt | NetCo Communications Corporation
software engineer, Mac development | 333 N. Washington Ave. Ste. 102
(612) 519-0878 | Minneapolis MN 55401, USA
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Received on Wed Apr 16 1997 - 15:24:35 UTC