.45 Adventure Lite

[Argonor]

Whatever I come up with, I will be sure to post it. But we have alot of projects on the burner right now so if you don't hear anything about it for a while, just have a little patience.

 

I still have to get the cash together for the Rattrap books I haven't got, yet, but a lot of projects sounds... swell!!

[dijit]

So far I've only played fantastic worlds, rather than .45, but I'm pretty enamored with the set. I'm not quite sure I understand how your suggestion would work though, I can't seem to work out what the wound boxes mean.

[Captaingeneral]

Speaking as someone who has used these rules extensively for a really successful Wierd War Two campaign thus far, please please If it ain't broke don't fix it!

In my experience games with several players are best played FAST, keeps the story moving, the pressure on and characters that are inactive for whatever reason, don't have long to wait for their chance. I'm sure we have in effect streamlined the game thru playing. All I know is it works and the gameplay makes sense to all the players old and new.

The issue of mooks had been solved I thought. We use a hit to the head or torso has a 'kill'; arms and legs take 2 hits to cause a 'kill' easily recorded with a marker (skull)

By all means make the wound box crossing off easier to understand/achieve and if there is a way of streamlining the paperwork, all well and good.

Hit Location - we like it, even if my players continually insist on shooting things in the legs!

In closing let me say Tournament play? That's just crazy talk, don't let competitive rules lawyers dissect and potentially ruin a great set of rules and supplements.

[CPT Shanks]

About two years ago I played a big battle of SCW using the Hordes of Mooks. Worked like a charm. I also set the charts on their side for ease of use and crossing off. as it was solo play it worked faster for me. I think the system works fine for what it was designed for and for bigger battles with some tweaks and inventiveness. It wound up being a slaughter by the way with a platoon of legion ambushing and wiping out a supply convoy. If I find any other home rules I used as that was nearly two years ago.

[Operator5]

In closing let me say Tournament play? That's just crazy talk, don't let competitive rules lawyers dissect and potentially ruin a great set of rules and supplements.

Damn! There goes my master plan to soak all the gullible players with over-priced tournaments and power spirals.

There are now and never will be any plans for "tournaments." Though, I have been toying with the idea of a worldwide campaign that players can sign up for. The results of each adventure would determine the special rules for the next scenario and each team would have a chance to affect the final story.

[PeteMurray]

I'm going to beat this dead horse! 

I've been playing out a couple of combats using the new combat resolution system, and I think it is, on net, an improvement over the existing combat mechanic. But that said, I think streamlining combat is in some senses an invitation to have more combat in the game.

What I like best about this system is that the degradation is now applied more generally across the character. It seemed somewhat artificial to have Professor Jones able to reason clear-headedly when his arms and legs were non-functioning. And as archetypes will be able to decline at different rates (damage tracks differently on existing archetypes) it seems like a good way to work in some mechanics for gameplay.

I realize there is a lot of concern here that we're fixing something that's not broken. I'd invite you to try it out. I wouldn't describe the existing combat mechanic as "broken," but it did have room for improvement. I've run a lot of games with a lot of leg wounds, and they're not much fun for the players. I'm not saying this is realistic, but this does seem to be able to capture some of the heroism of the system with what looks like a more elegant mechanic.

[The Hooded Claw]

In closing let me say Tournament play? That's just crazy talk, don't let competitive rules lawyers dissect and potentially ruin a great set of rules and supplements.

Being one of the first people to openly throw this subject around, I can honestly say it has nothing to do with tournament play and rules lawyering, competitive or otherwise. I think that there is room in any system for variation. The Rattrap games have been written in steps and with building blocks all along and this is just another.

I don't think simplifying the combat system a touch will invite more combat. That's all a matter of your players, not the system. What it will do is allow the Rattrap games to be more accessible to some player who might find the game a bit cumbersome as it is (the case for my group).

Heck, I can barely get my group to touch a Rattrap game after our first 5-6 games because WHEN combat occurs, and it is bound to occur at some point, the game grinds down to a halt as players chip away at one another and poor through a load of combat descriptions to find out what it is they can or cannot do with a particular HTH result. All of this seriously detracts from the game and makes the prospect of of playing it versus another more streamlined game a bit off-putting.

I think that Rich has and the others who contributed to the optional rules did a great job in addressing those things that made the game a bit of a no-go for me and my players. Pete's comments on maintaining the heroic nature of the game are spot-on and I think that such a mod/fix might make the game appealing to more players.

Now if we can just have somebody clean up HTH a bit. Maybe some sort of quick reference for the possible results or something. Seems to me we should be able to see what we can do before we have to read all about it.

Oh, and thanks for beating the previously living equine!

-Eli

[Argonor]

How about providing both options - players can then decide for themselves what they like best?

[The Hooded Claw]

That's pretty much been the take since the beginning, as far as I understood it. If/When Rich does a 2ED of 45a and such, he could always have it printed as an appendix entry. The biggest difficulty I see in having it both ways is that you have to come up with a way of overlaying the simplified system without needing to reprint all the Archetypes.

This, to me, means having some sort of generic damage progression by rating. This, however, flies in the face of the basic principals of the damage tracks on the archetypes, so in doing so, you mightb e whitewashing some archetypes. Still, it's worth doing, and those who are looking for a lighter combat system, may not miss a few needed losses incurred at the expense of some of the more interesting archetypes.

-Eli