|
I have had the rules for a while now, and I thought that I would offer up some thoughts on them. Firstly, this post will probably pick at details, but I should point out that I like the rules. I am glad that they went with keeping altitude in - it does complicate but it adds detail, and that is important. It would have been too easy to go the BFG route and keep it 2D.
The rules seem fast and reasonably intuitive, but brief. If you buy the book for the rules, then you will probably be disappointed. Only 19 pages are devoted to rules, the rest is a standard (high quality) Forge World background, pictures and excellent detail. This is a book where the actual game is only a part of the package.
There are three issues that I have with it...
Firstly, it is clearly Forge World. Not a problem in itself, if you can take a leap of faith and gamble that the rules are actually playable this time. However, the alligence is clear in certain places. What is the Marine ground defence? No, there is no Hunter, but a Hyperios... a what now? Why? Well, Forge World dont make the Hunter, despite the fact that it is now established in Epic. Still, this does have an upside... if development follows form, we should see an Epic scale Sabre platform with a choice of Heavy Bolter, Auto Cannon or Heavy Stubber. Sure, it is more IG stuff... but my cult wants one please!
Second issue - cards. Perhaps irrational, but having to physically place the card in front of the base, and 'follow the line' just doesnt sit well with me. This may be just me, so I wont say much more.
Finally, the rules just dont go quite far enough. There are a lot of gaps that could be filled. An example - the tailing rules state that tailing allows the attacker to fire more often and react to the enemy movement. Firing more often is covered, but nothing about watching your target and following their movement. Hits are simply 'two strikes and youre out'. It could be a lot more detailed, but perhaps that would spoil the feel of it, the fast paced play. I am tempted to leave it as it is and just play it as written, to stop it getting slowed down too much.
Finally, in this post which doesnt really go anywhere... there are a couple of things that act as speed bumps when reading. The most obvious omission is when things are 'seriously damaged'. Now, I assume that this is reduced to half or less of the original damage points, but unless I have missed it this is not defined anywhere in the rules at all, and yet determines victory points! Also not covered are the victory points awarded for destruction and damage of ground defence units. I guess that these work in the same way as air units, but again this is not specified.
Lastly, the victory point table confused me a little. I understand the intention - it is to try to stop a player shooting down a single enemy craft and rushing off the table to claim a victory, but if I have any craft left on the table at the end of the game, they are not worth any victoy points, despite the fact that they would be out of fuel?
Thanks for making it this far. Comments?
_________________ https://www.cybershadow.ninja - A brief look into my twisted world, including wargames and beyond. https://www.net-armageddon.org - The official NetEA (Epic Armageddon) site and resource.
|
. My conclusion is that aircraft are not going to kill anything with more than 8 hit points, which would be an unshieled reaver. You just don't hit enough.
