I like tactical combats, with or without minis.

Seanchai

Quote from: Christmas ApeMelinglor - Dammit, that's something Vincent Baker's done I actually like, then...

Heh. Sorry you had to hear it from me.

If you don't know, Mechaton is a simple tactical wargame using Lego mechs. He provides a blueprint for a basic mecha frame, then you assign ratings based on the actual pieces you use. Chainsaw arm? Put those dice in Melee. Gauss Rivle with sniper scope? Long range. Jump Jets? Extra movement, etc. . .

Then you roll some generic dice each turn and assign them to whatever categories you want. Damage an enemy and they have to choose the piece to get actually blown off. Looks like hella fun, I just need to get the legos together to try it. I've only read the simple "Beta" version that was up on his site (doesn't seem to be anymore). There was much playtesting and rules elaboration and now there's a pay version incorporating the elaborations that worked out.

Dunno if any of that has much relevance to the topic, except that it is a model for one type of tactical engine. 'Course, it most definitely uses minis and a map surface, though ironically enough I want to harness its ideas to bypass the minis for tactical goodness. . .

Peace,
-Joel

Quote from: HalfjackGM: You burst into the room to find Doctor Nein surrounded by his henchmen.  Some nearby engineers are refueling some kind of aircraft and the clamshell doors of the hangar are opening slowly.
Jack Speed: I blaze away with my .45 to try to get the hencmen to take cover!
GM: Your intense and accurate fire forces them to cower behind crates and machinery!
Dana DeNiall: I hold the Jewell of Darian close to my breast and begin summoning the Revenge Spirits while informing Doctor Nein that he is about to be entrapped for...
Dirk Blade: Fuck that.  I leap over the cowering Nazis and cleave Doctor Nein in the face with my blade, Silverfang!
GM: Whoah, a legendary blow!  Doctor Nein staggers back, his face a ragged mess!
Jack Speed: I'm gonna go figure out how to fly this thing.

That's some hot shit right there. Exactly the sort of effect I'm looking for.

Quote from: HalfjackGood rolls make things happen rather than events being fixed and rolls determining only quality of response to them.

That's a great way of putting it. Seems like things would be A) much more dynamic and B) not fall into that deflating mode of declaring a super-cool intention and then whiffing, having to revise and say "Oh, well I guess I tried to shoot the gun out of his hand but I, uh. . .missed or something. . ."

I'd be interested to see your example with the dice rolls in, to get a handle on how actual play would look.

Peace,
-Joel

Quote from: MelinglorSeems like things would be A) much more dynamic and B) not fall into that deflating mode of declaring a super-cool intention and then whiffing, having to revise and say "Oh, well I guess I tried to shoot the gun out of his hand but I, uh. . .missed or something. . ."

I'd be interested to see your example with the dice rolls in, to get a handle on how actual play would look.

Well the joy of SotC (and that was SotC in case it wasn't obvious) is that if you manage your fate points properly you can have a base to work from that should put you in a position to solve plot-critical issues.  And if you fail it won't be for lack of trying.  I cycle through players in turn in tense situations, so I'll break out the GM/player pairs too.  Here's a stab at AP for the example:

GM: You burst into the room to find Doctor Nein surrounded by his henchmen. Some nearby engineers are refueling some kind of aircraft and the clamshell doors of the hangar are opening slowly.

GM and Jack Speed
Jack Speed: I blaze away with my .45 to try to get the henchmen to take cover!
Jack has Guns at Great (+4) and rolls ++b- for a total of Superb (+5).  The henchmen are just mooks so I choose to roll for all of them on one roll against their average (+1) resolve.  I get +++- for +2 giving them a Fair result.  Not good enough and Jack gets his way.  We could have gone into more detail and track composure points and so on but honestly it didn't suit the pace so we just bulled on.  Hence:
GM: Your intense and accurate fire forces them to cower behind crates and machinery!

GM and Dana DeNiall
Dana DeNiall: I hold the Jewell of Darian close to my breast and begin summoning the Revenge Spirits while informing Doctor Nein that he is about to be entrapped for...

GM, Dana, and Dirk Blade
Dirk Blade OOC: I think Dirk would totally interrupt here and just attack.
Dana DeNiall OOC: Definitely.
GM: Okay, roll it.
Weapons is Dirk's apex skill -- Superb at +5.  He rolls ---b for -3 cutting it down to Fair.  He doesn't think that's going to be enough so he invokes an aspect -- "Exposition?  Fuck that, it's time to fight" (hence the narrative) -- to get a re-roll.  He pays his point and rolls +--b for +1, giving him +6 -- Fantastic.  He still doesn't think it's enough for the boss bad guy so he invokes the aspect for his legendary Berber blade, Silverfang for +2 on the roll (and another fate point) putting his blow at +8: Legendary!  Doctor Nein rolls his Athletics to dodge, but Athletics aren't his strong suit (Average) and despite burning a fate point on a re-roll the best he can come up with is -bbb for -1: Mediocre at +0.  The difference between attack and defense is 8, which is way off the map for health points so we call curtains on Doctor Nein.  If we wanted to stretch out the fight we could give him a Consequence and keep fighting but the scene was viscerally complete at this point so we put him down.
Dirk Blade: Woo!  Fuck that. I leap over the cowering Nazis and cleave Doctor Nein in the face with my blade, Silverfang!
Doctor Nein: Argh!  Curse you Dirk Blade!
GM: Whoah, a legendary blow! Doctor Nein staggers back, his face a ragged mess!

GM and Jack Speed
Jack Speed: I'm gonna go figure out how to fly this thing.
Jack rolls his Pilot (Superb) and invokes "If it flies I can fly it" and manages to figure out the controls to Nein's city-sized zeppelin, flying it home to drop off Nein at Scotland Yard.

I would love a game to have simple and flexible rules for making mechanically significant tactical decisions during combat.  The game should also be fairly rules light with quick chargen.

I ain't found it yet though.

Quote from: BalbinusI would love a game to have simple and flexible rules for making mechanically significant tactical decisions during combat.  The game should also be fairly rules light with quick chargen.

I ain't found it yet though.

Yeah, ouch.  That'd be a dream game, but it's hard to pull off.  I think the closest I've found has been Savage Worlds, and I don't think that's perfect by a long shot.

Quote from: BalbinusI would love a game to have simple and flexible rules for making mechanically significant tactical decisions during combat.  The game should also be fairly rules light with quick chargen.

I ain't found it yet though.

It's the Grail, no?

IMHO, the problem is that it's difficult to facilitate mechanically significant tactical decisions without getting into more complex, usually less flexible rules.  To add rules light and quick chargen is like a dagger in the heart...

But that's just my opinion. And please note I did not say impossible, just difficult (extremely, IMHO).

I wonder if a computer would help...

Quote from: James J Skach...I wonder if a computer would help...

It surely would.

Quote from: RedFoxYeah, ouch.  That'd be a dream game, but it's hard to pull off.  I think the closest I've found has been Savage Worlds, and I don't think that's perfect by a long shot.

It's far from perfect, but about as close to the ideal as I've come across too. In the right hands SW can be quite a tactically intense game, although the choices and maneuvers selected mid-combat never seem to bog play down. Given how many games have abjectly failed when trying to get this kind of balance right I'd have to declare it a roaring success, warts and all.

I love mini and map tactical play because it actually feeds both story and action for me.

As an example, last weekend in a game I was running: The group was spelunking in some caves for various purposes, and they stumbled upon a colony of cave beasties, a la The Descent.  They were quickly separated, and one group got boxed in.

We'd been running the chase without visual aids up until that point, but we busted out the minis and they put their characters backs to the wall of my hastily sketched out cul-de-sac.  

Combat with jumpy, clawed things ensued, including one character being dragged kicking and screaming down the hall, another attempting to push the beasties back to a choke point he'd noticed (which was entirely due to my wavery hand when drawing the hallway) and lots of dead beastie bodies.

The thing that really got me was when the spirit warrior stalked past his childhood friend, who was lying on the ground about to be eviscerated by two of the nasties, to save his shaman, who was in similar dire straits.  We could watch his stalking thanks to the minis and map.  As soon as he moved his little spirit warrior dude out of sword range, making his conscious decision to leave his friend to her fate, everyone around the table, seriously, erupted with an "Ohhhhh!"

The shaman lived, the friend died, and now in the larger game the spirit warrior is guilt- and doubt-ridden.  Sweet.  And tense.

Now I could have come up with that scenario or one of my players could have suggested it, but it would have lacked, I dunno - weight?  A feeling of strange organic-ness? Spontaneity?  That's not to say that others should play with maps or minis - whatever makes you go, go with it; for me, though, those organic, yummy, second-by-second circumstantial discoveries are a basic part of the experience.

I think that's an excellent example of miniatures aiding immersion.  Thank you for sharing that, Reimdall.

We were playtesting our SotC -> Traveller re-set space combat rules last night using an Agon-like 1 dimensional position abstraction and Star Wars Starship minis for the ships.  The minis *definitely* added substantially to the feel of the game once we got the rules hammered out so they were fun.  In fact there was an actual cheer when the little 200 ton scout vessel scored a major hit on the 400 ton heavily armed pirate pursuing it and the player of the scout slowly turned it around -- the hunter just became the hunted!

Quote from: RedFoxI think that's an excellent example of miniatures aiding immersion.  Thank you for sharing that, Reimdall.

You're welcome, Red!  I figure it's about time for me to stop lurking and get after posting a bit more.