So, had an opportunity to jet up the road to poke into Fall In today. Saw
several people from my local game shop.club there, as well as Mark Kinsey.
Wearing my GZG ECC shirt, had one guy come up to me to inquire about it. He
was hesitant about maybe going, because he only recently learned about Full
Thrust, and while he likes it a lot, has no one to play with/against,
and wasn't certain how he, a noobie, would be received at the con. I assured
him he would be welcome by pretty much everyone there. Yay, new ECC attendee!
I spent entirely too much time (and money) in the dealer hall, but I think
I have my Check Your Six needs met for the next few months/year. :-D I
then made my way back to the main resort where I ran into Mark Kinsey for a
bit. Then toured the flea market, browsed around a number of games, then got
involved in a new starship combat game currently under development called
Silent Fury. I had done a blind playtest of the game about a month ago, after
being put in touch with the game designers who were looking for some folks to
do blind playtesting, so it was nice to meet them in person. And after the
debacle of our playtest session (which, according to them, went far better
than others they had gotten feedback from!), sitting at the
table with them I saw all the mistakes we made. :-D
Their game is definitely not Full Thrust. It IS pretty quick and relatively
simple in many ways, but it is also immersed in hex movement (surprisingly
they use vector hex movement - which works pretty well, actually), and
offers a sub-game in the form of boarding action (where you actually
play
out boarding party/ship crew battles on another ship as you take over
various systems on the opposing ship - if they don't kill you off
first!).
However, my Full Thrust Curse Flag flew true!
The first ship I was assigned was the first ship destroyed - on turn 2.
Took ONE hit...and exploded catastrophically. I hung out to kibitz and take
some photos of the game for the designers, then got an opportunity to take
over another ship as one of the other players on my side had to leave early.
That ship was catastrophically exploded the next turn. One of the badly
damaged enemy ships was involved in an overwhelming boarding party action with
boarders from another player's ship from my side. As he was having a tough
enough time fighting his ship, I happily took over for him. I managed to take
the enemy ship...but then was fired upon by our opponents which all but gutted
my new ship (I had one functional engine and one crew unit remaining). As the
game then wrapped up at that point (so luckily my third ship lived), one of
the game designers took stock of the carnage on the table, and the tally of
ships blown out from under me. He looked up from across the table, shook his
head, and said, "You are just cursed, Indy!"
I chatted some with him after the game. Turned out that he had gotten his
first taste of Full Thrust yesterday in a FT Light game that was being run
(don't know who was running it; I wasn't there yesterday). He liked it, but
he wasn't very fond of how the fire control system/rules worked. (to his
mind tracking firecons that have or have not been used to fire on enemy ship
was a needless complication; firecons should just lock up at any time they are
needed)
Was a fun time, but alas I only had enough time to be there just today. Maybe
next year I'll try for the whole weekend.
Mk
Staying true! Thanks for the update
Michael Brown
mwsaber6@msn.com
Date: Sat, 7 Nov 2015 21:20:43 -0500
Subject: brief Fall In convention AAR
From: indy.kochte@gmail.com
To: gzg@firedrake.org
So, had an opportunity to jet up the road to poke into Fall In today. Saw
several people from my local game shop.club there, as well as Mark Kinsey.
Wearing my GZG ECC shirt, had one guy come up to me to inquire about it. He
was hesitant about maybe going, because he only recently learned about Full
Thrust, and while he likes it a lot, has no one to
play with/against, and wasn't certain how he, a noobie, would be
received at the con. I assured him he would be welcome by pretty much everyone
there. Yay, new ECC attendee!
I spent entirely too much time (and money) in the dealer hall, but I
think I have my Check Your Six needs met for the next few months/year.
:-D I then made my way back to the main resort where I ran into Mark
Kinsey for a bit. Then toured the flea market, browsed around a number of
games, then got involved in a new starship combat game currently under
development called Silent Fury. I had done a blind playtest of the game about
a month ago, after being put in touch with the game designers who were looking
for some folks to do blind playtesting, so it was nice to meet them in person.
And after the debacle of our playtest session (which, according to them, went
far better than others they had gotten feedback from!), sitting at the table
with them I saw all the mistakes
we made. :-D
Their game is definitely not Full Thrust. It IS pretty quick and relatively
simple in many ways, but it is also immersed in hex movement
(surprisingly they use vector hex movement - which works pretty well,
actually), and offers a sub-game in the form of boarding action (where
you actually play out boarding party/ship crew battles on another ship
as you take over various systems on the opposing ship - if they don't
kill you off first!). However, my Full Thrust Curse Flag flew true!
The first ship I was assigned was the first ship destroyed - on turn 2.
Took ONE hit...and exploded catastrophically. I hung out to kibitz and take
some photos of the game for the designers, then got an opportunity to take
over another ship as one of the other players on my side had to leave early.
That ship was catastrophically exploded the next turn. One of the badly
damaged enemy ships was involved in an overwhelming boarding party action with
boarders from another player's ship from my side. As he was having a tough
enough time fighting his ship, I happily took over for him. I managed to take
the enemy ship...but then was fired upon by our opponents which all but gutted
my new ship (I had one functional engine and one crew unit remaining). As the
game then wrapped up at that point (so luckily my third ship lived), one of
the game designers took stock of the carnage on the table, and the tally of
ships blown out from under me. He looked up from across the table, shook his
head, and said, "You are just cursed, Indy!"
I chatted some with him after the game. Turned out that he had gotten his
first taste of Full Thrust yesterday in a FT Light game that was being run
(don't know who was running it; I wasn't there yesterday). He
liked it, but he wasn't very fond of how the fire control system/rules
worked. (to his mind tracking firecons that have or have not been used to fire
on enemy ship was a needless complication; firecons should just lock up at any
time they are needed)
Was a fun time, but alas I only had enough time to be there just today. Maybe
next year I'll try for the whole weekend.
Mk
Interesting report, Indy - sorry to hear that the Kochte Effect is still
haunting youâ¦.. don't worry, in FT3 there will be some cases where low rolls
are GOOD for you (though I suspect that will be when you start
rolling 6sâ¦.) ;-)
Re the comment about the Firecons in FT (especially in FT Light) I'm afraid I
really can't see how anyone can find that complicated, unless
they've completely misunderstood it of course - after all, if you have
one Firecon then you can only fire at one target each turn, if you have two
then you can split your fire between two targets and so on, I really don't
know how it could be much simpler than that�
Jon (GZG)
> On 8 Nov 2015, at 02:20, Indy <indy.kochte@gmail.com> wrote:
> So, had an opportunity to jet up the road to poke into Fall In today.
Saw several people from my local game shop.club there, as well as Mark Kinsey.
Wearing my GZG ECC shirt, had one guy come up to me to inquire about it. He
was hesitant about maybe going, because he only recently learned about Full
Thrust, and while he likes it a lot, has no one to
play with/against, and wasn't certain how he, a noobie, would be
received at the con. I assured him he would be welcome by pretty much everyone
there. Yay, new ECC attendee!
> I spent entirely too much time (and money) in the dealer hall, but I
:-D I then made my way back to the main resort where I ran into Mark
Kinsey for a bit. Then toured the flea market, browsed around a number of
games, then got involved in a new starship combat game currently under
development called Silent Fury. I had done a blind playtest of the game about
a month ago, after being put in touch with the game designers who were looking
for some folks to do blind playtesting, so it was nice to meet them in person.
And after the debacle of our playtest session (which, according to them, went
far better than others they had gotten feedback from!), sitting at the table
with them I saw all the mistakes
we made. :-D
> Their game is definitely not Full Thrust. It IS pretty quick and
Eh, it's all good (the Kochte Effect or, as was being passed around ECC for
some years, The Curse of Indy). I had fun with it. :-D I mean, if I
didn't, I'd probably have soured on gaming altogether! :-/
Firecons. I'm all good with how they are written. But there are (apparently,
as I have now learned) some folks who feel they are too restrictive. "If you
have two firecons on a ship, and five weapons, you can only shoot at two
ships?!? You can't shoot at five different targets?? Why not? That doesn't
make any kind of sense." This is where they are coming from.
In the Silent Fury game, ships have weapons, but they completely take out fire
control systems as being systems to hit, damage, whatever. They fold fire
control into the weapon systems. So if a ship has four weapons, it can shoot
at four targets. To them this makes a lot more sense.
I get where they are coming from. But I like having the fire control separated
from the weapons. This gives the players a tactical decision point in what
they are going to do in a given turn. While I like simple games (as opposed
to, oh, say, Starfleet Battles), I like having tactical decision points in the
games, too.
Mk
> On Sun, Nov 8, 2015 at 5:37 AM, Jon Tuffley <jon@gzg.com> wrote:
> Interesting report, Indy - sorry to hear that the Kochte Effect is
Yay,
> new ECC attendee!
:-D
> >
(to
> his mind tracking firecons that have or have not been used to fire on
> On Sun, Nov 08, 2015 at 07:12:26AM -0500, Indy wrote:
Why
> not? That doesn't make any kind of sense." This is where they are
It's an additional complication, but it's very true to real-life naval
warfare in the radar and missile ages. (These days there are all sorts
of cunning multi-tracking sensors, and you could argue that futuristic
space-war-ships will do the same, but if we were trying to make truly
realistic space war we probably wouldn't be starting from here.)
One could argue that it's almost always best to fire all weapons at a single
target anyway, of course...
R
> On 8 Nov 2015, at 12:12, Indy <indy.kochte@gmail.com> wrote:
> Eh, it's all good (the Kochte Effect or, as was being passed around
Hehehâ¦. ;-)
> Firecons. I'm all good with how they are written. But there are
Ah, OK, that makes more sense - I think I'd misunderstood your comment
in the AAR, they are simply approaching it from a different angle of PSBâ¦..
it's not that they find the FT rule difficult, it's simply that
they don't agree with itâ¦. ;-)
> In the Silent Fury game, ships have weapons, but they completely take
Yes, the more tactical decision points that can be put into a game turn
(WITHOUT overcomplicating things), the better, I feel, but as always others
may disagree!
Jon (GZG)
> Mk
:-D I then made my way back to the main resort where I ran into Mark
Kinsey for a bit. Then toured the flea market, browsed around a number of
games, then got involved in a new starship combat game currently under
development called Silent Fury. I had done a blind playtest of the game about
a month ago, after being put in touch with the game designers who were looking
for some folks to do blind playtesting, so it was nice to meet them in person.
And after the debacle of our playtest session (which, according to them, went
far better than others they had gotten feedback from!), sitting at the table
with them I saw all the mistakes
we made. :-D
> >
He liked it, but he wasn't very fond of how the fire control
system/rules worked. (to his mind tracking firecons that have or have
not been used to fire on enemy ship was a needless complication; firecons
should just lock up at any time they are needed)
> >
Indy: Firecons. I'm all good with how they are written. But there are
(apparently, as I have now learned) some folks who feel they are too
restrictive. "If you have two firecons on a ship, and five weapons, you can
only shoot at two ships?!? You can't shoot at five different targets?? Why
not? That doesn't make any kind of sense." This is where they are coming from.
****
Understandable, I suppose, as everyone I know is running around with a phone
that has more smarts than most computers when FT started.
Has anyone tried combo weapon/firecon pointing? I know Iâve heard the
same complaint, and I figure it should cost less than one weapon, one firecon,
or maybe the same as it has the advantage of a single threshold roll, but
starts REALLY getting costly the more weapons you have?
âHereâs your multi-fire wonder. Yeah? I guess it IS a lot of
pointsâ¦â
Or, a cheaper multi-target firecon? Should be a bit cheaper; one damn
bad threshold rollâ¦
Or âthis isnât a B-17 with a gunner pointing a simple damn 50 cal at
things a few tens of metres away. Oh, and mostly missingâ¦â
Sorry, idle thought of a Monday O-dark-early start of a 12 hour shift.
Tell me if youâve heard this one: Iâm getting too damn old for this
shâ¦
Hi Doug,
On Mon, Nov 9, 2015 at 4:21 AM, Douglas Evans <devans@nebraska.edu> wrote:
> Indy:
Why
> not? That doesn't make any kind of sense." This is where they are
Not sure what you mean by combo weapon/firecon pointing? IF I understand
what you are saying, you can already do that. The limitation on firecons is
the number of targets you can track/bring weapons to bear upon, not the
number of weapons you can fire in a given turn?
Mk
> On Mon, Nov 09, 2015 at 05:49:43AM -0500, Indy wrote:
I assumed the suggestion was to roll (some fraction of) the cost of
firecons into the cost of weapons - i.e. each gun functionally has its
own firecon and can therefore fire at anything it likes.
Ahhh, I misunderstood. :-)
Mk
On Mon, Nov 9, 2015 at 5:52 AM, Roger Bell_West <roger@firedrake.org>
wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 09, 2015 at 05:49:43AM -0500, Indy wrote:
Oh, sure, I shift attention for a couple of hours, and miss a perfectly good
chance to get all hostile about the fact I canât express myself.
;->=
Thanks, Roger, and no problem, Indy. As I indicated, sounded rather silly to
me.
Doug
From: Gzg [mailto:gzg-bounces@firedrake.org] On Behalf Of Indy
Sent: Monday, November 9, 2015 4:53 AM
To: gzg@firedrake.org
Subject: Re: brief Fall In convention AAR
Ahhh, I misunderstood. :-)
Mk
On Mon, Nov 9, 2015 at 5:52 AM, Roger Bell_West
> <roger@firedrake.org<mailto:roger@firedrake.org>> wrote:
I assumed the suggestion was to roll (some fraction of) the cost of
firecons into the cost of weapons - i.e. each gun functionally has its
own firecon and can therefore fire at anything it likes.
Of course, now that I think on it, there's the whole conundrum of 'what a gun
likes...'
I'm suddenly reminded of the ship's AI from Dark Star.
Doug
[quoted original message omitted]
Let there be light:)
Regards,
Steve Gill
________________________________________
From: Gzg [gzg-bounces@firedrake.org] on behalf of Douglas Evans
[devans@nebraska.edu]
Sent: 09 November 2015 12:01
To: gzg@firedrake.org
Subject: RE: brief Fall In convention AAR
Of course, now that I think on it, there's the whole conundrum of 'what a gun
likes...'
I'm suddenly reminded of the ship's AI from Dark Star.
Doug
[quoted original message omitted]
To this day, and it may only be the chorus, badly remember, I still break in
into Benson Arizona with gusto, if not near pitch.
Doug
[quoted original message omitted]