need help deciding on ruleset

[nb246]

I like different aspects of all three of these games and can't decide
which one to buy. .45 Adventures, Flying Lead, or Larger Than Life.
I really like the Song of Blades and Heroes combat system so I lean a little
toward Flying Lead, however I like playing solo and narrative games, which
.45 and LTL seem to cater to. What does everyone recommend?
Help would be greatly appreciated! - Nate

[General]

Hey man, I'm a big fan of the Two-Hour Wargames system, so I use NUTS version 2 as my basic system, which just simply powerful for skirmish shoot-em-ups.  LTL is good as a a bolt-on for the pulp milieu to generate on-going adventures, especially if you are creative.  I also have a library of adventure generators from Adamant Entertainment, Terra Incognita, etc. as well my own home-brew stuff.  "I'm just making this up as I go."  Anybody got any good pulp ideas you want to share?

[Froggy the Great]

I've played a lot of the Rattrap games and recommend them highly.  I have not played the other two, but I hear that FUBAR has a lot of similar concepts to Song of Blades.

[capthugeca]

I'd second General's comments. LTL is a good bolt-on to create adventures but I would use NUTS or CR.3 for the actual battles.
Personally I find 2HW the best for solo games.

[revford]

THW stuff and Rattrap give you very different games.  I play them both.

Rattrap is more Adventure driven.  When a Hero is shot in .45 he grits his teeth, and with a heroic effort drives on towards his objective.

THW is more Combat driven.  When a Hero is shot in a THW game, he drops like a ton of bricks, gains a manly scar and comes back to fight another day.

[tima113]

I own all the mentioned rulesets and like each for various reasons.

.45 Adventures gives you a lite RPG feel, has detailed characters, hit locations and wound effects, and it is nigh impossible to kill a hero. .45 doesn't have any specific solo rules, you have to make the best decisions for each side. The random nature of the encounter chit mechanism provides the suprise factor for solo games. Character creation is driven by sample archetypes, and takes a bit of thought/time. There are several rule expansions available which add new settings, archetypes, and equipment. .45 is in the midst of a reboot, with the 2nd edition in playtest and I think scheduled for release later this year.

Flying Lead will need to be adapted for pulp situations. The rules spell out the combat aspects, but you'll need to add house rules or detailed scenarios to provide the pulp feel (nothing included for weird science, pulp equipment, etc.). Again you'll need to act in the best interest of the opposition since there are no specific solo rules. Pregame prep can be fairly quick, although it can take a while to set up your main characters selecting special rules.

Larger Than Life lends itself to solo gaming out of the box, especially the campaign mechanism which is geared toward a single team of adventurers vs. a big bad. I've found the LTL campaign requires some house ruling to adapt to multiple parties, but the basic combat rules easily support multiple players. LTL rules make it very difficult to outright kill a character, but there is a free add-on option that aligns LTL combat with other THW offerings making it much more deadly. Character creation is probably the simplest of the three, allowing game set up on the fly.

[richarDISNEY]

Don't rule out:
1) Astounding Tales 2 -- Lots of great RPG-ish elements to it...
2) Where Heroes Dare -- Very similar to Disposable Heroes WW2 ruleset...

[nb246]

Thank you for all your input. Very helpful. I'm now leaning toward LTL due to
the solo factor. How does the combat work? Is it simple and easy to pick up?
I've got CR3. Is is comparable to that with the reaction tables and such, or is
it more simple? One thing I like about Song of Blades & Heroes is the ease of
the combat. Simple, but tactical. How does LTL compare in combat?

[DD-Chris]

I am a very big fan of the .45 rules set.
However you need to spend a fair ammount of time to build each scanario, and create encounters that work. the rules are not built for a good vs bad slug fest, but rather a great system for "OMFG the train is going to run over that sexy blonde woman, and i have to kill 100 masked goons before i can get close enough to save her"
So if you build a good story, and have flavorful encounters, and just want to have a good time. 45 adventure is a great system.
but if you want actions to be deadly, as said before, it is near impossible to kill a hero.

[nb246]

OK. I just looked up Where Heroes Dare. That does look very good.
Opinions on that? I've seen it mentioned on LAF, but never really
checked it out. How does it compare to LTL? Is it suited well for
solo gaming?
I really appreciate all of your input and help!

[richarDISNEY]

Here is a tid bit on how LTL works.... Just download the PDFs...
www.angelfire.com/az3/twohourwargames/copy_of_bighurt.htm

[Doctor Merkury]

Where Heroes Dare! can be played as small as a 2' x 2' area or as large as a 4' x 8' table and is flexible enough to allow 3 - 30 models per side.  The game is powered by Dare! locations on the table that can be generated using the Campaign Tables which can whip up a quick locale and storyline.  At the Iron Ivan Games store there is a Dossier file that acts as a Character Calculator taking the work out of Character creation.  For more info on the game:

http://doctormerkury.blogspot.com/2009/10/what-is-where-heroes-dare.html

and for an article on Team Building:

http://doctormerkury.blogspot.com/2009/11/team-building-in-where-heroes-dare.html

Hope that helps!

Doc