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mj12games.com/forum → Posts by Justin Crough
Anyone thought of starting an MJ12 Group on Facebook?
JP
To expand on my title "Combat Simulator?", reading this stuff helped me figure out something about points systems, as opposed to scenario-only, that I really like.
No-points systems are inherently Simulationist. Defiance, ironically enough, seems to me to be near-pure Gamist.
The Simulationist approach would be to put together an order of battle based on the history or fiction then see if within the parameters of the rules it played out according to the "historical" outcome- to either test the system's ability to produce historical outcomes, or to simulate alternative historical outcomes by testing different strategic approaches to the historical situation.
The Gamist approach is to take a level playing field so that strategy, guts, and performance (on the part of the players) are alone in the spotlight. If a historical rather than points-derived battle were fought this way, it would not be with the goal of testing the system or simulating alternative history but with the intention of kicking the other player's butt by either winning outright or fulfilling the scenario goals with flair and panache- thus kicking the butt of whatever historical figure was involved, too.
I think it depends on what you are doing with the tools you are given.
Just because Defiance allows you a highly accurate method to determine the combat effectiveness of your forces does not mean that you MUST play in a balance. You could use them to simulate a historical battle where the sides were not even, and still rest assured that the units in question function realistically in relation to each other.
JP
AC (from what I've read through of Justin's rules) takes much more of the command, troop morale, and such into consideration than Wardogs ever will without being setting or scenario specific. (which to me is the difference between a hardcore wargame and a simple one.
)
For the record, the command and troop morale rules consist of rolling 2 dice for initiative. One for the unit's commander, and one for the unit's morale/training level.
The highest rolling unit goes first.
Some units have a command/control/communications die which they can devote to any one unit on their side to add to that initiative roll.
I'm just trying to dispel some misconceptions people seem to have that AC is some kind of convoluted mysterious system.
From my own observations, Wardogs seems to be the game with more complex 'detail' and nitty gritty 'guts' to it...with lock on rolls and signatures and what-have-you. That, to me, says hardcore wargaming.
lol. To each their own.
JP
As for Assault Corps, I got the playtest pack because I figured it might be well suited for BIG battles, but haven't really read all the way through it, yet.
Thanks for the interest Mat.
It depends on what you consider 'BIG'.
There is a perception among some people that AC is an 'epic' scale game, pitting battalions in a major conflict, where a tank model might represent a whole platoon of tanks, or the like.
In fact, AC is best used for simulation of 1 tactical level higher than a skirmish game, such as Defiance.
In that respect, it shares much of its intent with Wardogs. Pretty much the exact same level in fact.
The difference comes in the fact that Wardogs uses a system to 'build' its warriors, assembling them with very specific components, for that added detail required by some people for big robots and the like. It was originally intended for that genre of big robots vs big robots in a beer and pretzels type of game, though it has evolved to include a more comprehensive portfolio of futuristic war 'stuff' based on its specific setting.
In AC you determine the capabilities of your element, and then use the formula to see how much it's worth.
In Defiance its 'man vs man' combat, with vehicles there for support.
In AC its 'vehicle vs vehicle' with infantry squads there for support.
In Defiance, the vehicles are restricted in their movement due to the smaller battlefield, but infantry can move and use the details of terrain to best advantage.
In AC vehicles have the room to use their speed, maneuver and ranged weapons to best their opponents, whereas infantry are nearly immobile due to the larger battlefield scale without vehicular transport.
Try out AC using just a few armed hummers and a couple infantry squads, against a similar light force to see how well it can handle the 'small stuff'.
Larger games are just 'more of the same'.
The reason AC can handle games with dozens of elements on a side is because of the simplicity of the attack and damage system.
JP
cricket wrote:Actually, I think perfect equality of fighting potential is possible; see chess.
Chess is actually not perfectly balanced because White has an advantage.
Oh?
That's the 'White goes First, so it has an advantage' take on the subject?
I've heard that one before. It can be argued that the fact that White is 'forced' to move first is a disadvantage that balances the equation, since the opponent, 'Black' gets to see and evaluate that initial move, before committing a single move of his own.
More than one game allows the side that 'Wins' initiative to force his opponent to move first.
JP
We Canadians got to do that several weeks ago, eh!
Enjoy your feast.
JP
http://allaboutminiatures.libsyn.com/
In addition to my poor grammaticalizing in the actual speech, I plug Defiance and some of the forum games
download it and listen to me wax poetic about the days of yore and why I like Aces better'n blue max
ha ha.
Great stuff!
Quite the MJ12 Ambassador you'd make!
JP
How about rules for differentiating between civilian and military hulled ships? I've played a couple of scenarios where a big lumbering 10 Hull freighter with decent shields and basically a pop-gun holds off a small fast raider because the raider has only a few hull. Even a massive 20 Hull freighter should fear a true warship, no matter what its size.
In our local campaign, we have ruled that civilian ships are cheaper to build but if you take a hull hit, you lose two hull boxes. This is to reflect not only the fact that they're not designed for battle, shouldn't be there and have less redundancy etc.. I would have no idea how to figure a point value for that one though.
Since there isn't a specific size relation to hull points (AFAIK), its probably easier to just 'say' that a'civilian frieghter is larger than its hull points might indicate.
Therefore you can design the freighter with 10 hull points...and say that it is physically twice as large as that.
There's therefore no need for changing anything in the rules except your individual fluff for your creation.
I got married last weekend.
No big deal as long as you can deal with a Bridezilla.
That and getting asked if you are nervous about 500 times.
Congratulations and all the best.
JP
Some weird thing about meeting a girl got through to the Yahoo Digest that I just got...more a personal thing, than a spam about some dating site....
What was that?
Ignore that.
It was a mis-sent message for my brother.
I got a message from him, and one from the yahoo group at the same time, and replied to the wrong one.
JP
Well, I installed the correct mod, and so far we've blocked four bogus registrations. Yaay!
Couple questions,
I'm a moderator (of the Assault Corps forum.) But I cannot make any post to the News Forum. It says you need to be a moderator for that priviledge. Is this an oversight, or am I just considered to volatile a personality to get keys to the place?
Also, Is the option to post files to the forum gone for good, or is it a work in progress due to the hacker incident?
JP
cricket wrote:Some good ideas have been posted here... so I don't want to seem like I'm dismissing them, but I have to wonder:
Is there a point in simulating weapons that aren't usable against spacecraft in a space-combat game?
I would think it enough to set aside a few SUs and call it "ground ordnance" or something -- no need to come up with stats for something that can't be used in the game...
If Full Thrust can interface with Dirtside 2, we need to be ready to interface Starmada with Assault Corps. We're trying to be prepared.
I've got you covered from the Assault Corps side of the house...
Off-Board attacks
Representing artillery, attacks from orbit, high-altitude bombing and long-range missile strikes.
see:
http://mj12games.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=6746
Also, you may be interested to know that I have nearly everything from the Colonial Marines Technical Manual converted for Assault Corps. (With the obvious exception of the Sulacco, the individual drop capsules, the powerloader and the colony tractor.)
JP
--snip --And 150 mph would equate to a movment of 75 inches.
Or basically one pass on a normal table.
I don't have a problem with longer turns, but I would like to keep the game in the ballpark of being realistically scaled.
Kevin[/quote]
What about having a smaller scaled map to the side, and then a combat map?
You can plot the movement of the cars over a wider area, and use the rest of the table top for the times when the cars are actually in proximity to each other.
That would give you the bst of both worlds maybe....as well as that maze-running aspect of going through the city streets a la Twisted Metal.
Just a casual interjection.
JP
10 mecha 'tent' mini's for test play are now located here....thanks to Mike!
http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/mj12games/files/Wardogs%21/
I'm currently working on stats for these and hope to have them available by sunday. :wink:
Looking pretty awesome there Mike!
JP
Well, all I can say is...great minds think alike....and timing is everything.
JP
Ahem.
A shameless cross-post from the Assault Corps neck of the woods:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mj12games/files/Assault%20Corps/WAR%20of%20WORLDS.rtf
cricket wrote:hundvig wrote:Red Russian Heat Rays may actually be a better weapon overall, as they're a better compromise between armor penetration and bulk.
Perhaps...
So what do you think the "original" Martian heat rays can do?
Well, they can't cure the common cold...
Rich
LMFAO
I don't understand why a fighter ramming into a ship should do more damage than a drone that is purpose-built to be an explosively damaging weapon system.
JP
Well, I hate to kick anyone when they are down, but I just can't get worked up about the idea of Palladium going under.
I've been fairly outspoken in the past about just how much I despise that company, and it's president in particular, so I'll leave the rest unsaid.
JP
I was contemplating how to design a Death Star the other day, and I figured that I could design six Hull 20 segments. Each one would have only the weapon arcs for the direction that segment was facing, and the big frickin' planet-bustin' gun would be represented by having eight spinal mounts in a single segment (can you even have more than spinal mount?). The other segments would be festooned with turbolasers, laser towers, armor plating, etc.
Ah, the dreams of youth...
I went with the same approach when I did a star trek/ star wars crossover a couple years ago. I wanted to keep the ships in scale with each other, but allow the federation ships to have hulls greater than 8.
Thus a star destroyer was made up of three hull 20 segments.
2 segments were all weapons and fighter bays, and 1 segment was all drive engines and shielding.
Destruction of any single segment had a 2 in 6 chance of destroying the whole.
JP
I haven't yet seen where the backwards movement has been a major problem......
Even if backwards movement was restricted, what's to stop someone from placing most of their weapons in the rear arc, and going 'forward' to keep ahead of the advancing opponent, while blasting away?
Looking great!
You really captured the moment. 
JP
A new list? For the name discussion or the game itself? :shock:
If there's no objections, I'm leaning towards officially dubbing the game
"WARDOGS"
Game scale seems to be balancing out at platoon to company level battles.
12 mecha....12 Armored vehicles....16 infantry squads would be company sized forces and conceivably be on the table at the same time for each side. Larger than this and I think play speed is going to bog down like a slug in molasses. :wink:
I like 'Wardogs'.
JP
>
>
> Justin Crough wrote:
>
> This is how Assault Corps started out...before it even had a name.
>
> (end of quote)
>
>
> Actually, to be technically accurate, AC did not start out as a Starmada
> mod -- although this road has been tread before. AC started from a
> combination of two ideas I had: (1) using dice to simulate different sizes
> of vehicle, and (2) using the "half-die size plus armor" mechanic for
> to-hit rolls. The latter ended up getting jettisoned from AC since it
> didn't reflect the high accuracy of modern/sci-fi weapons, but did manage
> to show up in For the Masses and Iron Stars. The former, to my knowledge,
> has never been used anywhere...
Okay, to be even more accurate about what I was referring to. (In order to
be completely Anl Retentive) Assault Corps may have begun from your two
mentioned concepts, BUT you only voiced (put into type) those two concepts
after TWO separate incidents, spaced roughly 11 months apart, where people
suggested using the Starmada game system to make a ground combat game. THAT
prompted the infamous 'Unnamed Ground Combat Game' ...which files I still
have.
In that respect, this Star-mecha game is starting out in a similar fashion.
I was having a bit of deja vu , is all.
>
>
> Should I mention how many of MJ12's games were playtested to any
> significant degree by anyone outside the designer and his immediate
> circle?
>
> A quick look at the forum stats puts the AC board just behind Starmada,
> Defiance, and Iron Stars; I'd say that qualifies as "interest" (much more
> so than a published game like, oh, I dunno, The Grid. )
Well, its just that before I had a playable version, then it seems Iwas
being hounded by people who wanted to play it, relentlessly, and
then....crickets.
No pun intended.
>
> So -- consider this an official request to keep working on AC.
Well...it really is almost done...as far as my part is concerned. Within
the next couple weeks I'll be presenting it to my company commander.
Apparently he's an old wargamer, with a fairly sizeable set of microarmor,
which I only discovered recently. I've managed to convince him to try it out
sometime soon. His verdict and suggestions will mean a lot to me.
>
> At the same time, please continue the Starmecha thing as well... no reason
> to squelch one for the other. Frankly, there's been too much of the "Hey,
> why don't we use X to do Y?" lately ... half the fun of gaming is whipping
> up (and reading) new sets of mechanics. How many of us reguarly play more
> than a fraction of the games we own?
As per Kevin's suggestion, I'd suggest Star Mecha focus on the detail of
piloting and running a big mech, or a few of them. This is something AC
doesn't focus on, in favor of being able to pit several dozen per side, plus
light vehicle, fast air and infantry support.
>
> Besides, if I said one of you has to stop 'cause we can't have two
> somewhat similar games, Iron Stars would have ended up a Starmada clone.
> And Demian would have seen Defiance/Starslayer reduced to an ARES sci-fi
> mod.
Understood.
JP
Don't feel bad Justin...at least you get to play your game. *wry smile* I've not been able to play much of anything since I moved here 5 years back. (think retired surfer/ flower child population with the tactical ability of a banana...come to think of it...the banana could probably kick their butts too. :shock: ) *L*
Funny.
I'm lucky. Most of the people I play with are soldiers.
But that's only lucky if you enjoy losing as often as you win.
:?
JP
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