ARMA2: alternative title Game Developers - Some ARE awesome!

This is one of the best free games you will ever play. http://www.arma2.com/free
 You need no personal info to register - a working gmail account, for example, is all the verification you need.

The shaky camera can be disabled for the motion sick amongst us  :-)

The free version only differs from the full version as lacking a game editor (I think it also lacks full HD support) but if that bothers you the full version will set you back only $20. 

It is slow-paced and very tactical.   It is based on a simulator used by actual militaries, so bunny hopping Team Fortress/CoD/TF2 gameplay is definintely out. You can play as a squad leader (or squad member) or command platoons in strategic operations.  You need to co ordinate your forces or death is very swift.
 
The orders you can give to your squadmates are quite fiddly (using F1-F9 menus and submenus). The full version is infinitely customisable. The publishers encourage modders and there are some excellent mods out there. 

My only criticims is multiplayer is a little clunky - you can't leap into the action like a CoD style game.  But those sort of players who demand instant pew-pew and scoreboard gratification (*cough* teens *cough*) are unlikely to be playing ARMA2. 

This is close as a military simulator as you can come.  It's basically a big box of military toys, and an enormous map  to fight over (I'm talking 100s of km based on actual locations )

They're not perfect - they still use copy protection (who doesn't) but they even impress me with that - the copy protection stuffs up your aim in the game! Though they have removed part of their copy protection in a patch...

Give this a go - at 1 gig and a 250 meg patch download even its download is better than the 10 gig demanded by, say, Team Fortress 2....

15mm Sky Barge (*cough* Dark Eldar Raider *cough*)

Horribly lit. I'll get the wife to re-take them. 

At least you can see the 15mm figure on the deck in this one.

I'll have to make myself one of those light boxes to eliminate glare.

Remember a time before Finecast?

Remember a time when GW didn't 'price fix' by banning retailers from selling outside the region?*

*Price in Australian dollars $55 ($57 US Dollars)

*Price in UK pounds 20.5 (after conversion) $31.55

These used to be available from Wayland Games and Maelstrom for free shipping..... for the UK price

So someone is making an extra $ 23.45 (or 57% markup)

I bought this model for around $25 pre price hike about a year ago... I wish I had stockpiled them!

Anyways this is the basis for my Witch Corsairs force for Tomorrow's War.  They work in "Nines" - 2 x 3 man fire teams and a 3-man heavy shardcannon team. These groups can be combined into larger 6 or 9 man forces.

EDIT:  Here's the TW stats

Witch Corsairs TQ8 Confidence 6 (they don't like stiff resistence)
Active trauma nanites (they heal with vampire-like rapidity)
Augmented senses (they can psychically sense enemies)
Old school (they don't need the grid)
Despised

"Coven of Nine"
3 man fireteam (projectile)
3 man fireteam (projectile)
3 man heavy weapons team (AP: 3 AP: 2 light)

I'd like to have have three sail barges - one per coven but.... at $110... just no

Interestingly, the 30 or so 15mm models came to $18...
The same amount of GW 28mm would have come to $144

The difference in cost  ($126) would allow me to buy a complete 15mm city from JR Miniatures

Open vs Closed Rules (Fantasy/Sci Fi)

Open: Can be used to design your own armies and even figure stats; can be used with a variety of figure lines
Secrets of the Third Reich, Song of Blades and Heroes, AAG/Tomorrow's War, Where Heroes Dare, Full Thrust, Starmada, Strange Aeons, any 2HW game. Primarily designed to sell rulebooks.

Closed: Specific rules for specific figures, usually have unit cards. You often find yourself with an identically painted character figure as your foe. Often lots of unit-specific rules, seldom any room for campaign/advancement. . 

Malifaux, Infinity, Bushido, Warmachine, Lightning Strike, Anima Tactics, Heavy Gear, Confrontation 3, Alkemy, Carnevale, Havoc, Primarily designed to sell miniatures. 

I do not include historical rules as these usually constrain the player with a specific army order of battle.

So what do you play more of, and why?

I know I have a strong preference for open systems. I like the freedom to have a unique army - to avoid situations like Malifaux where everyone has an identical (and identically painted, since no one seems to be able, in any game, do a paint scheme other than the fluff). I have probably played more AAG/SoBH

The irony is, if a figure line is good in itself, the miniatures will sell anyway. I have hundreds of Confrontation minis, and many Anima Tactics, despite not using either ruleset.  Bushido looks like a great game, but the narrow focus (small force selection, unit-specific cards) has stopped me getting involved.  I like their minis, but if I had the ability to create my own forces I would have already gotten into it - I could have created my own armies until more official ones became available.  In this case, a 'closed' system stopped me getting involved at the start-up stage - instead of jumping in, and buying rules and box sets, I'm waiting til they expand - and spending my $$$ and efforts elsewhere. 

So what do you think - does a closed or open system benefit a games company most, and in what situations?
Does a closed system REALLY sell more minis? 
Does proxying lose miniature companies so much money?
Can/should miniatures stand on their own merit or do they need their value to the game to prop them up (*cough* Lucky 13th Gun mages *cough*)
Does this link to units who are valuable-in-game having a higher price?  (i.e. a single heroic mini might cost as much as a box of 6 normal 'grunts.')
Would having an open system attract more players to the game? Have you been deterred by special cards-n-lotza-rules?

Giving All Ships a Role: Delta Vector

In 90% of space games, small ships die in the first few turns, acting as ablative armour or one-shot weapons platforms.  This may or may not reflect reality, but it is poor game design that has small ships simply as weaker versions of large ships, without a defined role. Colonial Battlefleet attempts to shortcut this in its design rules, giving points cuts and bonuses for ships designated "escort"  "battle line ship" and whilst this is admirable I think the gameplay itself should do this.

I admire EvE Online, a MMO in which players in tiny frigates could play a useful role (and have a excellent chance of survival) against much bigger ships.  The basically made it harder for ships to damage and lock ships smaller then themselves - the bigger the size difference, the harder for the large ship to lock and fire.

I'm striving to do this in Delta Vector with size penalties to hit (which I may make more significant) and the ability to turn unused thrust into 'surviviability'. Currently this has created an anomoly whereas smaller, fast ships can engage larger ships further away, which assumes all size ships have the same computer tracking suites.  At least it is different to traditional WW2 combat but it feels a bit weird.

I may go further and add a penalty for each size difference between target and firer; relecting the difficulty in smaller, rapid-fire escort weapons damaging big ships, and slow-firing, slow-traverse big guns tracking smaller ships.

If we can ensure small ships are survivable, and more mobile, then they can be cheap platforms for deploying "special devices" i.e.

Interdictor
This prevents enemy ships engaging jump drives within CQ radius?

Immobiliser/EMP Pulse
Roll a CQ test to fire an emp pulse. Enemy ships in range must pass a CQ test or lose thrust this turn. 
Perhaps this also applies to the ship using the EMP.

Jammer/ECM
This degrades enemy weapons, perhaps giving defensive bonuses to friendly ships in CQ range.

Targetting Array/ECCM (Active Sensors)
Cancels out enemy ECM, and if there is no ECM, allows a target to be lit up wiht powerful active sensors, adding +1 to all fire aimed at it...

Comms Relay/Beacon
This enables ships to relay messages between squadrons or drones, effectively extending the range of CQ bonuses and drones control. This also allows friendly ships to jump into areas not inside a gravity well. 

Passive Sensors
This may allow an initative re-roll or similar as the powerful sensors can better predict enemy movements and spot hidden units from double range. 

Bomber Launcher
This is a missile-type weapon that detonates where the drift marker was last turn. ALL ships (friendly and hostile) caught in the blast wave suffer damage.  Damage is centred on the drift marker and all enemy vessels are automatically attacked.  Perhaps it has a 8" radius from the blast zone and does d8 damage to ALL targets in the area -off 1 damage each inch from the blast area.So if it was a d8 roll of 4, a ship 2" away would take only 2 damage...  Maybe an EMP blast exists that can shut down all ship weapons if the d8 rolls above the ships' base defence....


Spinal Mount Weapons/Wave Motion Gun
These have a narrow firing arc but perhaps do double damage?

Delta Vector the Game: Weaponry

Since I'm reasonably content with the reactions (may adjust initiative interactions) and movement, I might as well add some new toys to playtest.

Rapidfire Laser
d6 hit/6" range
Rapid Fire: May fire twice during activation (shots must be half velocity apart)
Only -1 every TW) reactions
Burst Fire: If a shot hits, you may roll again (using the same 'to hit' number) to see if other shots from the burst also hit the target. This works similar to Pentrating fire but is impacted by range instead of having a flat +5 success to the follow-up shot

Cutting Laser (B5 style)
d12 hit/12" range
Slicing Beam: This rule works similar to Burst fire and represents a longer dwell time on target by the laser
Fall Off: It follows the same rule as other lasers
Slow Firing: This may not be fired in reaction due to its slow charge-up time

Big Energy Ball (Plasma-ball weapon)
d6" hit/6" range
Fall Off: A hit does d3 damage/d6 if it doubles the to hit roll
Slow Firing: This may not be fired in reaction due to its slow charge-up time

Rapid-Fire Kinetics
d10 hit/10" range
Rapid Fire: May fire twice during activation (shots must be half velocity apart)
Only -1 every TW) reactions

The kinetic cannon fires a series of segmented rounds which have less mass and damage than a single round. They lose penetrating power for the ability to make rapid follow-up shots
All other rules as per Kinetic rounds.

Gatling/Point Defence Kinetics
Not sure. Similar rules as rapid lasers only have the Kinetics velocty penalties and bonuses

ARMOUR

Maybe armour reduces the chance of a hit
-1 to eemy fire (light)
-2 to enemy fire (medium)
-3 to enemy fire (heavy)

Setting a Few Parameters

Ok, I know have enough for a game. The movement system works well, but now I need to balance the combat ranges, movement (especially movement as a ratio to firing ranges), and general weapon lethality.


I hate using WW2 parlance but everyone knows what I'm talking when I use them to classify ships:

HOW FAST?

Thrust
Battleships, freighters = 2
Battlecruisers, cruisers = 3
Most escorts = 4

I don't want them blasting around too fast (I'm expecting a practical in-game velocity of 2-3x thrust) so I've decided to 'cap' velocities at 20".  Perhaps that is the speed of light, which is the maximum matter can move at.

Combat Velocities
I'm going to penalise fast moving combats.  This will make high thrust craft hard to hit, which makes sense.
Any combat over 10" velocity will be penalised. This is Relative Velocity, so two ships heading towards each other at 5" and 6" velocity are already over the 10" limit.

Stationary target = +1 torange
Velocity 1-10" = 0 modifiers
Velocity 11-12 = +1 to range
Velocity 13-14 = +2 to range
Velocity 15-16 = +3 to range
Velocity 17-18 = +4 range
Velocity 19-20 = +5 to range
Velocity 21+ = no combat possible

This should keep speeds manageable whilst adding tactics to the velocity and angle of approach. 
The extra measuring to find velocities is a pain in the butt though.  Viva la hex map!

Firepower : Defence Ratio (or - how fast things go "boom")

This is very situational, as speed and thrust allows ships to avoid concentrated fire.
 I would expect a battleship size vessel to cripple or possibly vaporise a stationary destroyer, but be flat out doing damage to it in a high velocity battle.

Example ships:

Escort-small
Thrust 4
Defence 2
Missiles -
Lasers 2
Kinetics 1

Cruiser-medium
Thrust 3
Defence 4
Missiles: 2
Lasers: 3
Kinetics: 2

Battlecruiser-large
Thrust 3
Defence 5
Missiles 3
Lasers 4
Kinetics 3

Battleship-large
Thrust 2
Defence 8
Missiles 4
Lasers 5
Kinetics 3
 
Hopefully the fact thrust and size can be used as damage avoidance will help small ships survive:
a escort (+1 small) using 2 thrust to evade (+2) would be hit on a 8+ at 5"
a battleship (-1 large) would be hit on a 4+ at 5"
Thus at what I anticipate to be a 'normal' engagement range, a escort would be 2x harder to hit. 

Weapons (Delta Vector the Game)

Too wide a range of weapons = too many rules and stats to remember. Too few = Battlefleet Gothic blandness.

I'm going to make a few main categories, each of which will have 2-3 variants.

Energy Weapons (rapid-fire 'pulse' lasers, normal lasers, cutting/slicing beams)
Kinetic Weapons (heavy railgun shell, 'grapeshot', rapid-fire)
Missiles (this includes nuclear torpedoes and smaller fast missiles, maybe multi-warhead missiles)
Mines (robot missile "Captor" style or nova EMP AoE blast)

Ok, here goes:

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Energy Beam  D10 to hit.
Drop Off: If you roll double the score you needed you do double damage, i.e. you need 4+ at 4" range and roll an 8+ (this represents how laser power dissipates at long range)

Kinetic Round  D10 to hit.
Slow Shell: As kinetic ammo is much slower than lasers, target realtive velocity is doubled, and evasive action penalties are doubled.
Penetrating:  At any range the shell hits, roll a d10 again; a 6+ means the target takes another damage
Kinetic Round:  If targets are closing at over 10"; roll shots that penetrate on a 6+ a second time (so a lucky kinetic round could do up to 3 damage)

Grapeshot Round  D10 to hit
Area Effect: All ships/missiles/fighters within 2" of a designated target point must roll to be hit, Multiple grape cannon may fire into the same 2" area to score multiple hits
Kinetic Round:  If targets are closing at over 10"; treat any hits as Penetrating

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Missiles
Ships must pass a CQ check to lock and launch a missile.


Missile counters are placed on the ship's drift counter at the start of a ship's activation. The next turn, it may engage any ships who pass within the missile's thrust range of missile counter.

Missiles are fired in 'salvoes' i.e. all of a ship's missiles must be fired at a single target.


Missiles are only active for one turn; then they deactivate and become inert, due to the dangers of live missiles and friendly merchant shipping


The die roll needed to hit is equal to the target's closest distance to the missile marker.  I.e. if the target passes 5" away then a 5+ is needed.  Missiles use a dice equal to their thrust. I.e  6" thrust missile uses d6, 8" thrust missile uses d8.

Missiles do damage equal to their warhead size.  d6 = light warhead, d8 = medium, d10 = heavy?

A ship may not have more than 1 missile salvo 'live' at a time.   Missiles can only be fired once in a turn, in a single salvo, against a single target

I've got rid of tracking for missiles - all you need is a single counter with the number of missiles on it, that gets removed after a turn. Nice!

Example Missile Stats:
"Seeker Missile"
Thrust 10"/d10 to hit
Damage d6

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Mines
Pass a CQ check to launch a mine
Mines are dropped right behind the ship's stand.
Mines remain in that location until an enemy ship enters its thrust (attack) radius
Mines cannot be laid at a speed that exceeds the mine's thrust. I.e. a ship dropping a d6 thrust mine cannot be travelling faster than 6"
Mines can be detected (and reacted to) by ships in their CQ range who pass a CQ check; otherwise they cannot be fired upon as they are stealthy
Mines attack and have a 'to hit' range like missiles that is based on their thrust
Mines are persistent and remain where they are all game
Mines ignore target velocity (they launch from stationary and have more complex passive sensors than missiles)

Example Mine Stats:
"Captor Mine"
Thrust 6"/d6 to hit
Damage d10

There - that's enough to get started.