I Feel Ridiculous, SJGames Update

For whatever reason, I decided this year to get back to blogging about Car Wars without driving a lap around the internet for any recent news and updates.  Holy macaroni!  Almost every product is now online!  Mercy sake and hallelujah!  It's going to take some time for me to take stock of all the new stuff (and maybe I should update my links etc). 

I am in the boonies on Car Wars in general; I'm waiting for my kids to get old enough to play it, and even then - given the necessary taboo in our times about kids even talking about firearms in schools - I'm worried about doing that.  I may need to wait until they are even older.

Stuff to have in Car Wars

As I only get into Car Wars every year in the early fall (I don't know why, but that is really what happens), I missed the announcement that they are going to be making a 6th edition.  I need to write the SJG folks with all my wonderful obsessive points and plans.  But even if the 6e stinks, I probably will stay in 2.5e with just a lot of home-brewed ideas. 

For some reason, this part of the game is my favorite, hence all my posts under the tag "weapon analysis".  I don't want full verisimilitude, but I think there needs to be some correspondence to what is useful in current anti-tank warfare (which is what CW is).

Part of the problem in calibrating the CW-RW (Car Wars - Real World) correspondence is that CW was slapped together with different mentalities over the 12 or so years of it's heyday (1981 to 1992; CWC2.5e was 1990, UACFH was 1992... although the pdf of CWC2.5 lists 1996 & 1998, so I wonder if that book is now more authoritative.)

I go through this part of the CW project/obsession every year as well.  It starts with analyzing the weapons, like the "The State of the Art, 2039,Part I", by Craig Sheeley and Charles Oines (and HTMLized by Gustav Dahlström); see all my blog posts for the whole Sturm und Drang.

What I want to do with this post is to get the notes down of what I think needs to be added, for now (unless noted, all pictures are from the linked Wiki article):

• Personal equipment:  Pistol Gripped Sawed Off Double Barreled Shotgun (PGSODBSG, or "Mad Max Gun" or even "Bronze Gun").  As I tipped off, this is the weapon of the police force, the Bronze, in the Mad Max movies.  And how can that *not* be in Car Wars?! (Note, the pic below is  from Rage, a computer game that came out in 2011, and I totally missed it!  It looks like a Mad Max/CW hybrid game, coooooool!)
  
• Mini-Multiple-Fire-Rocket-Pod (I wrote it up already, here). Cloest to the Hydra 70mm rocket system.
  
• Minigun - 30 cal gatling gun.  I've written about it here, and here, and I realize that I really should consolidate all of this.  Hrm.
  
• Grenade Machine Gun (GMG) - like the Mk 19, which was used even in Vietnam. 

• 25mm Chain Gun - the famed M242 Bushmaster, which could possibly be the CW "Autocannon"
  
• 20mm Autocannon - like the famed 20mm Oerlikon, back in use since WWII!, which could be the CW "heavy machine gun" 
  
• 40mm Bofors - This may be too big for standard CW vehicles.Still, it's an old military standby, in use since 1934!  
  
• 30mm Avenger - Oh baby, the best of the best, the 30mm GAU-8 Avenger.  For all I know, this could be the RFTG (6 spaces), the HVMG (3), or the GC (5).
  
• 25mm Equalizer - A lesser known Avenger type. To quote from the Wiki: "GAU-12/U Equalizer is a five-barrel 25 mm Gatling-type rotary cannon." (Pic from here).  Same quetions as above, is this the HMVG or GC?
  

I can add more later, but that's all for the ballistic weapon system.  Most antitank weapons nowadays are actually missiles and as far as I can tell, most of the missiles have been taken care of with the Aeroduel nonsense.  Since most CW cars are designed to carry laser guided rockets, that actually fits the current state of the art, and that wasn't the full intention of the CW designers.  Which shows that it actually makes sense.

Tarqeq - Div15, Div5 Subcompact (Galaxy)

Subcompact (Carbon-Aluminum Frame), Xhvy Ch., Hvy. Sus., Small PP (PC & SC), 4 Radial-Solid Tires, Driver (in BA); VMG (20/reg) front, 8 foam dischargers, 2 smoke/oil dischargers, 40 pts WG/WH, 116 pts Plastic Armor: F 25 B 25 R 22 L 22 T 10 U 12 HC 5, Acc. 5, Top 90, Pwr 920, 2760 lbs., $14,976.00

• Economy Option - Subcompact, Xhvy Ch., Hvy. Sus., Small PP (PC & SC), 4 PR Tires, Driver; VMG (10/reg) front, 8 foam dischargers, 2 smoke/oil dischargers, 40 pts WG/WH, 70 pts Plastic Armor: F 15 B 15 R 15 L 30 T 7 U 3 HC 4, Acc. 5, Top 90, Pwr 920, 2760 lbs., $6,220.00


• Div5 Option - Subcompact, Heavy Ch., Imp. Sus., Small PP (PC & SC), 4 HD Tires, Driver; VMG (10/reg) front, 56 pts Composite Armor (2 Metal/54 Plastic): F 2/10 BRL 0/10 TU 0/7  HC 3, Acc. 5, Top 95, Pwr 920, 2530 lbs., $4,999.00

Design Notes - Ya know, I like the Div5 the best.  This was in my draft box dated Sept 5, 2010.  I think it was a design experiment for a subcompact with a VMG.  Vans like subcompacts tempt you to use C/A but it's best to resist. I wonder if we should redo the rules on subs like I want for vans (because this is a sign of how flawed the rules are on this).

One idea, I'm wondering if we should allow cycle engines for subcompacts?

Name Notes - Tarqeq is a moon of Saturn, named after an Inuit moon god.  Well, at least it's a moon, eh Tarqeq?

Updating Design Methodology

As you regular readers know (that's a joke, this blog is not updated enough to reward any regularity), ahem, as you passersby may have noticed, I'm going through an update frenzy.  As I've said before, I really get the hankering for CarWars at this time of year.  It's freaky but true.  That may change because my oldest is 9 years old and I was 10-11 when I started playing (any of you grey-beard nerds  out there want to chip in as to how it feels to play RPGs with your kids?)

I'm starting this years' post-apolous with Vans.  But the following methodology works for any of the cars I "update."

What I do first with any update is add the main modern components:

1. Dischargers x 10 (1 front,  1 back, 2 Right, 2 left, 2 under, 2 top)  My standard is oil/smoke because they cost the same.  Since all dischargers weigh the same, customizers can easily update based on arena conditions.  Usually I put them in this configuration: any side that can be rammed gets oil (so all four sides = 6), the rest are smoke and hooked to the laser reactive webs (the tops & under)
2. Laser reactive webs.  For $100, this is a great tool for stopping laser-lock-on.
3. Sloped armor = the is especially so for Vans, but sloping is such a great tool (as it is in real life).  To foist an unchangeable -1 to hit to all enemies is a big boost.  It weighs nothing, and since vans have too much space vis-a-vis weight capacity, they really help. 
4. Component armor = Good for all, but super especially for vans for the same reasons as sloped.  I also make this LRFP because you only lose 1 pt armor (and at the point when you're breached, that 1 is probably not so needed), but the LR can help save your bacon.  In general I have a tough time seeing the pro-con of LR armor.  Maybe when I get to playing more, I'll see if I should do it. 
5. Depending on the division wealth, I'll add the big ticket, "grand each" items, e.g. HTM, overdrive, antilock brakes, HD brakes, no-paint windshields, and FP armor.  If I have a money crunch, I think FP tires are more important than armor, but that's only what I've read... when I finally get to have "live" playtesting all these rules could fly to flinders.
6. Vans will get a DSP (see here for why)
7. Often I need to add Wheelguards/hubs (I use that designation in my designs because different drivers like to arrange in different ways and it all weighs the same).
8. If possible, especially for vans, I will add a gunner.  That's a key addition, especially if there's more than 1 weapon system.  Gunners generally get to distribute the 30 skill points to add a +1 to hit, and at the very worst, they will act as internal 3 DP.  Heh.  This is also why I don't give them CA.  Because by the time the outside armor is breached, all I care about is no mobility kill and gunners are expendable.
9. I used to give the crew personal equipment.  I stopped because that is something customizers can decide on (esp. if playing with alternative encumbrance). 
10. I will contemplate the use of IC engines and metal armor.  The former saves weight (at the expense of price), while the latter can save a bunch of money in the low divisions

After the modern components, I will seek to:

1. reduce weapon variety in order to maximize smart-linking, or use of SWC
2. in general reduce weapons in order to fit the above modern adds
3. depending on cost issues, I'll put the rockets on LGL    
4. I've grown wary of C/A frames

I still have trouble with some of the modern adds:

1. I still don't have a handle on how to use trailers, jump jets, and rocket boosters
2. Ramplate rules have changed so much that I can't see using them again (esp. with the rocket booster problem)
3. I still refuse to use stickyfoam
4. I keep forgetting how cool FCE is!  
5. I haven't seen a use for GSS and such
6. Much of the missile technology is taken away from AADA tournaments

I'll update this more if I recall more issues.

State of the Art, 2011 Edition - Part 1, introduction

As seen in the obsessions about weapon analysis, I am committed to finding out what the Car Wars weapons are in our real world terms. Why?

1. Because even more than playing the game, I like designing cars (as this website attests) and the best cars to design are replicas of fictional entities (like James Bond vehicles) or of fearsome real-world vehicles (like the Apache helicopter).
2. Because in general, my imagination is engaged when I can picture the car's behavior using real-world analogues. I like the VMG not just because of game dynamics but because the real-world Vulcan, especially in the F-15 Eagle, is so awesome and practical. And, in contrast, since I can't imagine just what SJG means by an "autocannon" I have trouble with that weapon and the game world.
3. Because whenever new weapons are introduced by the game-makers or the fans, having real world cognates will help keep the game balanced. Even though I suggested that a MG and an RR aren't weapons but just the average guns for their sizes, at the same time the (idiotic) "blast cannon" was introduced as a large RR, and even the AC is supposed to be some large machine gun. What gives?

Just by going with game names alone, I was going to attempt to recreate the real-world cognates, starting with the "MG" as the 50 caliber M2A1 "Ma Deuce." This is based on the very first page of the very first booklet (c) 1981 which stated:

Eight years ago: "Crazy Joe" Harshman wins Fresno destruction derby by mounting a surplus .50-caliber machine gun in his Chevy.

That's as good as I can get to think that the MG in the original game is 50 caliber (and, probabilities being what they are, is the M2A1). This also meant that the M2 does 1d damage - and considering that M2s are used in an anti-aircraft role, even in 2011, 1d is a heckuva lot of damage!

Next easily identified weapon is the Vulcan Machine Gun. There actually is something called a Vulcan (see above) and it's 20mm with 3-6 barrels. One Vulcan is good enough for an F-15 to take down another fighter jet. Those babies do 2d damage, no problem compared to 50 cal's 1d. And the Gatling gun action explains the higher accuracy. These 2 weapons can give me a basic system, the Box Set System, to extrapolate. Or so I thought.

I was also told there's an "Anti-Tank Gun" (whose picture, in the first Uncle Al's, made it look like an actual tank gun), but there's not something like that term in common use. Recoilless Rifles are rarely used as well. And rocket launchers? That's either the Hydra 70mm system, or the simple Bazooka and its descendants. These did not adapt well to a real-life system. And that would have been OK, had the whole Car Wars Military scene not expanded in impossible directions. In real life, an Autocannon, for example, is just a big machine-gun. MFRP all come with ripple-fire and can be 19 shots - even at once.

All this confusion would be bad enough if the ADQ didn't introduce the first official comprehensive attempt to actually explain the whole system. According to "The State of the Art, 2039,Part I", By Craig Sheeley and Charles Oines (and HTMLized by Gustav Dahlström) make these claims about the weaponry of the Car Wars world (this is cut and pasted from the HTML site with sci-fi weaponry deleted and typos fixed):

Weapons Definitions

Machine Gun - A 5-6mm machine gun firing rifle charge rounds at a cyclic rate of about 1,200 rounds per minute. In use this figure is smaller, since the gun is not continually discharged. Most MGs use caseless-propellant rounds, although some use brass or plastic cased rounds. Cased-round MGs typically have a slower rate of fire, around 800 rpm.

Vulcan Machine Gun - A 5-6mm multi-barrel machine gun firing rounds identical to the MG but firing more of them. Typically VMGs have two to three barrels and fire at 2,000 rounds per minute, cyclic. VMGs always use caseless ammunition.

Autocannon - A 10-20mm cannon firing cased high-explosive rounds at a cyclic rate of 400-600 rounds per minute.

Recoilless Rifle - A 3Omm recoilless rifle, firing a 2-lb. high-explosive anti-tank fin-stabilized round in classic recoilless fashion. The muzzle velocity is low due to the lack of enough propellant to shoot the shell; the recoilless principle of 20% propellant to 80% backblast leaves the 21/2 lbs. of propellant too small for high-velocity. RR-armed cars can occasionally be identified by the "exhaust pipes" necessary for venting the backblast.

Anti-Tank Gun - A classic 37-40mm projectile gun; the base design is over 120 years old. The ATG fires a 4-5 lb. cased high-explosive or fin-stabilized, discarding-sabot round at fair muzzle velocity.

Blast Cannon - A 6Omm recoilless rifle, twice the size of the standard RR. It has the same drawbacks and strengths as the RR.

Tank Gun - A short-barreled 75mm/3" cannon firing high-explosive or fin-stabilized discarding-sabot rounds. (Unscrupulous advertisers have billed it as a 105mm gun in the past. This is a falsehood.) The base design of this cannon dates back 150 years.

Grenade Launcher - An automated grenade launcher, firing 1-lb. cased grenades with an auto-loading mechanism.

Mini Rocket - A 20mm rocket.

Light Rocket - A 25mm rocket. This is also the size used by VLAWs.

Micro-missile Launcher - A ten-shot launcher for 25mm rockets.

Six-Shooter - A six-shot ripple-fire launcher using 25mm rockets.

Variable-Fire Rocket Pod - A 30-shot advanced ripple-fire launcher for 25mm rockets.

Medium Rocket - A 40mm rocket. This is also the size used by LAWs.

Rocket Launcher - A ten-shot launcher for 4Omm rockets.

Heavy Rocket - A 67mm rocket. This is also the size used by bazookas.

Wire-Guided Missile - A 67mm warhead...
Radar-Guided Missile - A 67mm warhead...
Surface-to-Air Missile - An 80mm warhead...

Problems with this list.
Where to begin? Well, a 5mm MG is just laughable. That's called a "light machine gun" today and is definitely not used in an anti-armor role - which is what *all* weapons in Car Wars need to be continued (hence every gun is technically an anti-tank gun). An M249 cannot be expected to tear apart an armored car. And a 5mm Gatling Gun is called a micro-gun and is similarly not meant for vehicles.

Most of the State of the Art details are implausible and make my task much harder. Moreover, I believe many other weapons were developed by SJG based on the ADQ scale - and that frankly makes it worse and worse. The "Heavy Machine Gun" is hard to understand according to my Box Set System - because above 50 cal, a MG is called a cannon (or even an autocannon). But in the ADQ system, the HMG is probably the 50 cal MG.

So what I plan to do is analyze the whole system based on current real-life, doing the best I can with what is frankly a broken, or at least bifurcated, base.

Sources:

When doing research on weapons, I have needed to go to outside resources than my own military experience (health reasons kept me out of the main military but I have done my share of voluntary paramilitary defense work in the middle-east; nothing to brag about and I've never been under small arms fire, but my knowledge of things that go bang still needs to come from research).


1. Weapons: An International Encyclopedia from 5000 BC to 2000 AD, by The Diagram Group.
I fell in love with this book as a teenager, right when I started playing Car Wars. When I became an adult, with my own income, I had that realization one day that I could actually buy stuff I liked (a middle class child vs. middle class adult makes all the difference).


2. Encyclopedia of Modern U.S. Military Weapons by Timothy M. Laur.
This is a very comprehensive book that isn't for the guy looking for pretty pictures. It's detail rich and covers almost every aspect of what a weapons researcher would need.

3. The Intertubes. God Bless This Web.

Started 10-17-2010

Weapon Analysis - Part 5 (The New Weapons)

Part 3 of this series (see 1 & 2), came up with these new weapon possibilities:

1. Railgun (3 space Gauss Gun)
   
2. Light & Heavy Mortars (in new category that combines Grenade Launchers & Shotguns)
   
3. Light & Medium Howitzers (new category to re-house the ol' ATG)
   
4. AC moved to MG family, modify the HVMG
   
5. or AC in own family, move VMG into that, add new weapon: minigun, then change HMG into a 2 space weapon
   
6. Light and Heavy Recoilless Rifles
   
7. Heavy Rocket Launcher (3 space in guided-rocket category)
   
8. Mini Multiple Fire Rocket Pod (1 space unguided rocket)

Part 4 of this analysis described the different needs of game balance in general, without specific categories. Based on the earlier posts, and irrespective of the system analysis in part 3, here are the gaps in the offensive weapons:

1. No 6-accuracy burst weapons outside of Autocannon
   
2. related to that: only rockets are one space burst weapons
   
3. no 3 space, 7-accuracy weapon
   
4. no 3 space, 6-accuracy area effect weapon
   
5. very few options with 8-accuracy weapons

Based on comparing the two lists, do the new weapons help or hurt game balance?

1. Railgun - I admit that I've wanted this weapon in Car Wars ever since I played Quake3, and it would be the 3-space 6-accuracy area-effect weapon (if we keep the Autocannon as burst effect)
   
2. Mortars - Part of me wants mortars because doggonit, they exist! And they're useful as small "artillery" weapons. At least they should be available for pedestrians, no? But for cars, they would be a way of adding the small space, low accuracy weapons (with a number of special modifiers given the high-lobbing trajectory of mortar rounds balanced with the purposeful shrapnel damage, which I guess is in every 'burst effect' weapon. This is less than necessary, except as a non-rocket based 9-accuracy weapon.
   
3. Howitzers - This would expand the 8-accuracy field away from exclusively rockets. I think it's necessary.
   
4. Heavy Vulcan (Modified) - not really necessary, but I like to be thorough.
   
5. Minigun - Only necessary if we keep Autocannon in it's own category (i.e. gatling guns). I like it also as a 6-accuracy 1 -space weapon, but that will probably skew the game.
   
6. Heavy Machine Gun - I think that the Heavy MG is a rule flaw; 1 space 2 dice weapon?! And a Light Laser is only 1d? Anyway, I think it should be moved up to 2 spaces and rules modified accordingly.
   
7. Light & Heavy Recoilless Rifles - I think this is a more necessary fill, for 7-accuracy burst effects (the Blast Cannon should have made this inevitable)
   
8. Heavy Rocket Launcher - seems natural but may be unnecessary
   
9. Mini Multiple Fire Rocket Pod - I'm really surprised this hasn't been done yet.

Other Ideas I've toyed with some other ideas that just seem to be natural (as I see from others): heavier shotguns, grenade droppers, etc. but I will try to post the above ideas first.

Weapon Analysis - Part 4 (Game Balance Issues)

Part 3 of this series (see 1 & 2), came up with new weapon possibilities. But as I described in part 1, and part 4, all these nifty ideas are secondary to the necessities of game balance.

We should elaborate the game balance issue for things beyond straightforward cost/weight/space/damage (because it's not set out clearly in the rulebooks and lists). Here are the special issues:

1. Area vs. Burst effect
   
2. Volatility
   
3. Shot Number
   
4. Hazards
   
5. Benefits
   
6. DP (Damage Points)

Area vs. Burst

In the original game, area vs. burst was a nonsense/RPG issue. Unless you were aiming at pedestrians, who cares if the gun is area or burst? In the age of metal armor, it's a big difference (especially with HESH ammo): area weapons strip off metal armor on a 6 on a damage die, burst effect on a 5 or 6. So the fact that there's no 1 space, 7 accuracy, burst effect weapon has ramifications.

• Area
  • all Machine guns & ammo except explosive
    
  • FG, VS, GG, all Lasers, all Flamethrowers
• Burst
  • all the following (excepting the special ammo in "neither" below): RR, AC, bombs, BC, GL*, ATG, TG, all rockets, all missiles, all torpedos, depth charges, and mines (MD etc).
    
  • Possibly the Cloud Bomb (CBSS) - who knows
• Neither
  • Armor Piercing ammo for all rockets,
    
  • HEAT, HESH, APFSDS ammo

Incendiary and/or Volatile Weaponry

Which weapons are "volatile"? There's no list in UACFH, no index entry in the CWC2. The CWC2 (p31) states that your car will catch fire if hit by incendiary weapons - natch - but also if a some weapons are hit by enemy fire (2 in 6 chance), and 4 in 6 chance if those weapons are hit by other volatile weapon. And if a car is on fire, then certain weapons can explode the car. A keyword in making sense of this mess is that some weapons are "incendiary" and some are "volatile" and it's bad to mix the two. All incendiary seem to be also volatile, but not vice-versa.

Incendiary is easy to figure out (either the ammo is called 'incendiary' or there's the word "flame/fire" in the title), but which are the volatiles? Here's the list according to what I can piece together from the CWC2 & UACFH:

1. Incendiary (and thus Volatile)
   1. Any weapon with incendiary ammo
      
   2. any flamethrower
      
   3. Flaming Oil Jets (FOJ, HDFOJ
      
   4. Flame Cloud Ejectors (FCE, HDFCE, FCGS)
2. Volatile Without Being Incendiary
   1. Depth Charges (UACFH p.15)
      
   2. All missiles (SAM, AAM, RGM, WGM etc)
      
   3. All rockets (MML, RL, HR, MFR, VFRP etc)
      
   4. All torpedos (whatever)
      
   5. Anti-Tank Guns & Tank Guns
      
   6. Rocket boosters & jump jets
3. Not Volatile But Should Be - Prob. Because of a mistake
   1. Bombs (UACFH doesn't say anything, see p.10-11)
      
   2. Minedropper ammo (UACFH doesn't say anything, see p.15)
      
   3. Dischargers of incendiary material (Flaming Oil, Flaming Cloud)
4. Not Volatile But Should Be - For Game Balance
   1. Any burst effect weapon (e.g. AC, GL, RR, BC) - the reason why not could be the quantity of explosive in a RR round is less than in the ATG. But then the Blast Cannon should definitely be volatile!
      
   2. Hot Smoke (this is my pet-peeve, see my rant here)

Volatility is an issue for three things 1. Setting on fire, 2. getting on fire, and explosion.

Incendiary weapons can set a vehicle ablaze according to certain modifiers (see a chart somewhere), but non-incen. volatile weapons (e.g. ATG) won't do this. Volatile & incendiary weapons (and your power plant), if hit by enemy fire, can set your own car on fire on a 1 or 2 on a d6. If the volatile weapon is hit by an incendiary weapon OR a laser (which is itself not volatile) then your car will catch fire on a 1,2,3,or 4 on a d6.

If a car on fire has a volatile weapon then the car will explode on a 1 on a d6.

Shot Number

This mainly comes into contrast between the Machine Gun family and the rest. Also the Mine Flinger and other defensive weapons, e.g. the Oil Jet vs. Smokescreen (25 or 10). No real need for a chart here (even for my OCD).

Hazards

In this category are detriments from firing the weapon (this could include the danger of housing a volatile weapon, but that's in its own list):

1. the handling class hazard when firing the ATG,
   
2. the power-draining from Lasers and GGs,
   
3. Radar guided missiles need a certain distance to be active (and other mishugass)
   
4. Wire guided missiles can't be fired while moving
   
5. It used to be that Flamethrowers couldn't be fired forward, no longer.

Benefits

This category includes all the extra effects of the weapon beyond causing damage:

1. Flamethrowers and Lasers are automatically incendiary (no need for special ammunition).
   
2. Gauss Guns are silent (whoop-de-doo)
   
3. Flamethrowers & FOJ create a smokescreen
   
4. FCE & FOJ create a hot-smoke SS

DP

Sometimes it matters that your weapon is sturdy (RR, HMG) or not (RL, Laser). The drop spike plate is a classic example of as close to a possible DP-sink there is.

Conclusion

When seeking to add new weapons, game balance must be preserved in all categories - not only in spaces/weight/cost/damage but in the other factors like DP, volatility, area vs. burst effect, and miscellaneous benefits and hazards.

Weapon Analysis - Part 3 (Weapon Ideas)

In part 1 we looked at the basic game setup, part 2 analyzed the game's basic weapon systems, this post will see what can possibly be added and/or changed.

Two websites that have done a similar analysis, and given game proposals, are the friendly killers of NOVA and this article (PDF) by PDF Oliver Bollmann (main site here).

The three problems we came up with from the previous analysis were:

1. Consolidation of weapon categories (e.g. AC into MG)
   
2. Categories without full distribution (e.g. RR, ATG)
   
3. Possible missing weapon systems (e.g. mortars).

Problem #1 & 2 can be combined. The simple recommendations are these:

1. Autocannons be part of the Machine Gun family with the same stats. The 6-accuracy is like the vulcan and the fewer shots (10 from 20) is indicative of the higher rate of fire for the same caliber ammunition. The only change is that the AC should be area effect (like all weapons which depend on making holes in the target as opposed to applying concussive/blast force). This means modifying the HVMG into a legal item, like the "blast cannon".
   
2. "Anti-Tank Gun" is a misnomer; everything that can pierce tank armor is anti-tank (grenades, rockets, recoilless rifles). This is just a small artillery piece (as the classic "State of the Art" articles by Sheely & Olnes established). As such, I'd like name this category "howitzers" to distinguish it from the mortars (see below), recoilless rifles, and the bona-fide artillery pieces which aren't allowed in the AADA arena (and are called tank-guns). This category is ripe for scaling-expansion.
   
3. "Blast Cannon," like "anti-tank gun," a misnomer for a large-caliber recoilless rifle; this category also needs to be expanded
   
4. "Rocket launcher" - as I analyzed here, the Car Wars RL is in fact a rocket-propelled grenade. And, like the ATG & RR, should be scaled to allow greater "caliber"s (in this case, sizes of explosive). Thus "micro-missile launcher" is another misnomer. The basic difference between a missile and a rocket is guidance. As such, the current Car Wars systems of (guided) rocket (MML, RL), (unguided) rocket (HR, MFR), and missile (WGM, RGM, SAM etc), needs to be clarified. My best guess is that an 8-accuracy is a guided small explosive (real world RPG): the warhead is small and the weapon's space in the car is used for aiming and for velocity, 9-accuracy is for a generally unaimed large warhead rocket, and 6 or 7 (the Car Wars "missiles") are for a large warhead with a sophisticated aiming system.
   
5. Grenade Launcher - As I griped about here, this has a bad fit within the Car Wars system. I believe it should be collapsed into a large-bore, low velocity, category that includes the shotgun, flachette gun, and mortars.

With all that A new weapons chart could thus like this:

1. Flamethrowers (Unchanged)
   
2. Gauss Guns
   1. 1 Space = [not possible; the energy delivery system takes 2 spaces]
      
   2. 2 Space = Gauss Gun (6acc, 3d)
      
   3. 3 Space = Rail Gun (new)
3. Grenade Launchers
   1. 1 Space
      1. Vehicular Shotgun (6acc, 2 hits) - moved,
      2. Flachette Gun (6acc, 1d+1 to tires) - moved,
         
      3. Light Mortar (new)
   2. 2 Space
      1. Grenade Launcher (7acc, 1d*),
         
      2. Heavy Mortar (new)
   3. 3 Space = none [unnecessary because the next tech up is artillery/howitzers]
4. Howitzers (formerly 'Tank Guns')
   1. 1 Space = Light Howitzer (new)
   2. 2 Space = Howitzer (new)
   3. 3 Space = "Anti-Tank Gun" (Heavy Howitzer) (8acc, 3d)
5. Lasers (Unchanged)
6. Machine Guns
   1. 1 Space
      1. Light MG (7acc, 1d-1),
      2. MG (7acc, 1d),
      3. Heavy MG (7acc, 2d-2)
   2. 2 Space = Vulcan MG (6acc, 2d)
      
   3. 3 Space = Autocannon (6acc, 3d)
      
   4. 4 space = Heavy Vulcan (modified)
7. Missiles (Unchanged)
8. Recoilless Rifles
   1. 1 Space = Light RR (new)
      
   2. 2 Space = Recoilless Rifle (7acc, 2d)
      
   3. 3 Space = Heavy RR (new)
      
   4. 4 Space = Blast Cannon(7acc, 4d)
9. Rockets, Guided
   1. 1 Space = Micro Missile Launcher (8acc, 1d)
      
   2. 2 Space = Rocket Launcher (8acc, 2d)
      
   3. 3 Space = Heavy Rocket Launcher (new)
10. Rockets, Unguided [all 9acc]
    1. 1 Space
       1. Mini (1d-1),
       2. Light (1d),
       3. Medium (2d),
       4. Heavy (3d)
          
       5. Mini Rocket Pod (new)
    2. 2 Space = MFR (9acc, 6x1d)
       
    3. 3 Space = VFRP (9acc, 1-6d)

Another option is keep the Autocannon in it's own category, split off the Vulcan from the MG, and make a new 3 space scale: 1 space = Minigun, 2 space = Vulcan, 3 space = Autocannon. The machine gun scale would be Light & regular in one space, Heavy in 2, and larger than that impossible for regular cars (recoil etc).

Summary - Possible New Weapons:

1. Railgun (3 space Gauss Gun)
   
2. Light & Heavy Mortars (in new category that combines Grenade Launchers & Shotguns)
   
3. Light & Medium Howitzers (new category to re-house the ol' ATG)
   
4. AC moved to MG family, modify the HVMG
   
5. or AC in own family, move VMG into that, add new weapon: minigun, then change HMG into a 2 space weapon
   
6. Light and Heavy Recoilless Rifles
   
7. Heavy Rocket Launcher (3 space in guided-rocket category)
   
8. Mini Multiple Fire Rocket Pod (1 space unguided rocket)

Weapon Analysis - Part 2 (System Specifics)

As described in part 1, there are gaps in game-balance for weaponry, specifically in the lower accuracy weapons. As a way of correcting this, we can use the weapon systems as described in UACFH to flesh out the chart. What follows is a weapon system chart to see which components are missing. The chart will list illegal weapons only when necessary, and will be limited to 1-3 spaces as much as possible:

1. Autocannons
   1. 1 Space = none
      
   2. 2 Space = none
      
   3. 3 Space = Autocannon (6acc, 3d)
2. Flamethrowers
   1. 1 Space = Light Flamethrower (6acc, 1d-2)
      
   2. 2 Space = Flamethrower (6acc, 1d)
      
   3. 3 Space = Heavy Duty FT (6acc, 2d)
3. Gauss Guns
   1. 1 Space = none
      
   2. 2 Space = Gauss Gun (6acc, 3d)
      
   3. 3 Space = none
4. Grenade Launchers
   1. 1 Space = none
      
   2. 2 Space = Grenade Launcher (7acc, 1d*)
      
   3. 3 Space = none
5. Lasers
   1. 1 Space = Light Laser (6acc, 1d)
      
   2. 2 Space = Medium Laser (6acc, 2d), Laser (6acc, 3d)
      
   3. 3 Space = Heavy Laser (6acc, 4d) XRay Laser (7acc, 4d)
      
   4. 4 Space = none
      
   5. 5 Space = Heavy XRay Laser (7acc, 5d)
6. Machine Guns
   1. 1 Space = Light MG (7acc, 1d-1), MG (7acc, 1d), Heavy MG (7acc, 2d-2)
      
   2. 2 Space = Vulcan MG (6acc, 2d)
      
   3. 3 Space = Heavy VMG(6acc, 4d) (Illegal)
7. Missiles
   1. 1 Space = RGM (7acc, 3d), WGM (6acc, 3d)
      
   2. 2 Space = none
      
   3. 3 Space = none
8. Recoilless Rifles
   1. 1 Space = none
      
   2. 2 Space = Recoilless Rifle (7acc, 2d)
      
   3. 3 Space = none
      
   4. 4 Space = Blast Cannon(7acc, 4d)
9. Rockets, Guided
   1. 1 Space = Micro Missile Launcher (8acc, 1d)
      
   2. 2 Space = Rocket Launcher (8acc, 2d)
      
   3. 3 Space = none
10. Rockets, Unguided [all 9acc]
    1. 1 Space = Mini (1d-1), Light (1d), Medium (2d), Heavy (3d)
       
    2. 2 Space = MFR (9acc, 6x1d)
       
    3. 3 Space = VFRP (9acc, 1-6d)
11. Shotguns
    1. 1 Space = Vehicular Shotgun (6acc, 2 hits), Flachette Gun (6acc, 1d+1 to tires)
       
    2. 2 Space = none
       
    3. 3 Space = none
12. Tank Guns
    1. 1 Space = none
       
    2. 2 Space = none
       
    3. 3 Space = Anti-Tank Gun (8acc, 3d)

Many other game-wizards, like me, have tried filling in the gaps: here from NOVA (light Gauss Gun and light Recoilless Rifle), here's a very comprehensive list from Oliver Bollmann (PDF, main site here).

Combining my two lists together (i.e. here and this post), we can come to some conclusions:

1. Consolidation of weapon categories - for example, and Bollman recognizes this as well, the Autocannon is basically part of the Machine Gun family and should be placed there; the Flachette Gun could really just be a Vehicular Shotgun with Flachette loads, and to be honest both of them could be under Grenade Launchers (the same way that the M203 can fire grenades or shot); and the Missile-Rocket category is a huge mess.
   
2. Certain categories are populated/distributed well (MG, FT, Laser) and others not (RR, ATG) - despite the true availability of variation within present day weaponry. There's major differences between calibers in Recoilless and regular artillery and that makes a simple scaling system. The best example of how logical this is comes from GURPS Autoduel (see here for the Light RR).
   
3. There may be entire possible weapon systems missing (e.g. mortars).

We'll deal with the new possible weapons in the next post.

Weapon Analysis - Part 1 (Preliminaries)

My favorite weapon, and I'm sure almost everyone's, is the Vulcan. And it's not only in Car Wars; I love the real-life electric gatling gun family of weapons. When it was first introduced, it straddled a strange midrange in the weapon chart. The 7 weapons (to hit) were 1 space (MG) and 2 (RR), the 8 weapons were 2 space (RL) and 3 (ATG) and 6 were both 2 space (FT, Laser). Now a machine gun upgrade was introduced and it was 2 spaces but to hit 6. This made sense in terms of gun physics because, hey, many many barrels! But I would have preferred to have filled out the chart first.

Since then the chart has basically been finished, but there are still lacunae. The following is a list of weaponry based on to-hit. Only AADA allowed (and/or non-military) ground-vehicle offensive weaponry is listed. That is, only direct damage dealers (so mine-flingers, while as offensive a defense you can get, are still not part of the analysis)

TO HIT 6
1 space
..........Light Laser (1d area incendiary but not volatile)
..........Light Flamethrower (1d-1 area incen. & volatile)
..........Vehicular Shotgun (2 hits area)
..........Flachette Gun (whatever)
..........Wire Guided Missile (3d burst volatile)
2 space
..........Vulcan (2d area)
..........Flamethrower (1d area incen & volatile)
..........Laser (3d area incen not vol.)
..........Medium Laser (2d area incen not vol.)
..........Twin Laser (2d+6 area incen not vol.)
..........Gauss Gun (3d area)
3 space
..........Autocannon (3d burst)
..........Heavy Duty Flamethrower (2d area incen. & vol.)
..........Heavy Laser (4d area incen not vol.)
4 space = n/a

TO HIT 7
1 Space
..........Machine Gun (1d area)
..........Light MG (1d-2 area)
..........Heavy MG (2d-2 area)
..........Radar Guided Missile (3d burst volatile)
2 Space
..........Recoilless Rifle (2d burst)
..........Grenade Launcher (1d at best, blast)
3 Space
..........Xray Laser (4d area)
4 Space
..........Blast Cannon (4d burst)
5 space
..........Heavy X-Ray Laser (5d area)

TO HIT 8
1 Space
..........Micro Missile Launcher (1d burst volatile)
2 Space
..........Rocket Launcher (2d burst volatile)
3 Space
..........Anti-Tank Gun (3d burst volatile)

TO HIT 9
1 Space
..........Medium Rocket (2d burst volatile)
..........Heavy Rocket (3d burst volatile)
2 Space
..........Multiple Fire Rocket Pod (1d x 6 burst volatile)
3 Space
..........Variable Fire Rocket Pod (1d-6d burst volatile)

What's clear from the list is that most new weapons, with variety, comes from the 6-Accuracy list. As a game-balance purist, I am unhappy with the missing slots. 6-Accuracy is overstocked, 7 is missing a 3-space, 8 could use more options, 9 is fine (there are a lot of rocket options). Also there should be a balance given to shots available (10 or 20) and area vs. burst, volatility and other hazards (handling modifiers), and even weapon DP (see Drop Spike Plate). See this post for an elaboration of these issues.

Another possible imbalance is in weapon systems. According to UACFH, there are these systems (within the analysis parameters above):

1. Autocannons
   
2. Flamethrowers
   
3. Gauss Guns
   
4. Grenade Launchers
   
5. Lasers
   
6. Machine Guns
   
7. Miscellaneous (VSG, FG)
   
8. Missiles
   
9. Recoilless Rifles
   
10. Rockets (Guided, Unguided)
    
11. Tank Guns

Weapon systems may be seen as only an afterthought of game-balance, i.e. when putting the necessary space/weight/damage/cost chart together, the game designers decided to give the weapons some recognizable names - which helps gameplay and fires up player imagination. It may not be necessary to give space ranks to each of the weapon systems.

On the other hand, the official rules already have done the full complement for some of the systems (MG, FT, Laser, Rocket), so there's a logic to finishing the chart. If so, and while resistant, I'm not totally against it, but I'd do so at first only to fill out the first chart.

With the weapon-system analysis - which relies more on real-world technological connection than the Accuracy system (see more on that analysis here) - we can arbitrarily say that certain weapons start at more than 1 space: Tank Gun, Autocannons, etc. However, if the gun is designed right, then why not?

Rant: Uncle Al's Hell

As I mentioned here, the pictures in Uncle Al's Catalog O'Hell are amateurish to the point of folly. Whatever happened to the awesome graphics of the original (2035) catalog? Instead of nifty realistic munitions, we get this:

I challenge anybody who hasn't seen the picture recently to tell me what the heck that is supposed to be. A watergun? An elephant's trunk?

Grenade Launcher, part 3 - Another idea

I had asked a bunch of questions about the Grenade Launcher here and the answers are here. The impetus for my questions is a combination of: (1) not understanding the grenade scatter rules and (2) wondering why the grenade launcher in car wars is so wimpy compared to the real-world munition of Rocket Propelled Grenades (RPGs).

Car Wars has impact-fuses for the GL and I thought that would make the weapon like the impact-happy RPG. RPGs are a major, hand-held, tank-killer. They were used to devestating effect in the fiasco we know as "Black Hawk Down."

What I've come to accept - to the point where I'd establish that this should be an official "game fact" - is that the real-world RPG is not the Car Wars GL but the Car Wars Rocket Launcher. This makes sense - a 'medium rocket' is 1 space, 1 shot, 50 lb, 2 die damage weapon while a 'rocket launcher' is a 2 die damage but 10 shots in 2 spaces. The unguided nature of the single shot rockets means they're large and cheap (it's just a rocket engine plus a bunch of explosives). The Rocket launcher is a smaller explosive but the aiming mechanism, plus the fuel of the launcher, makes up the full 2 spaces.

Grenade Launcher, Part 2 (Followup)

This is part 2 of the Grenade Launcher discussion, with the answers provided by the jolly-good-dudes from the Steve Jackson Games forum.

Here are the questions in bold with the answers (provided by SJGames member "Norcross"). Note, I realized after I asked the questions, that I didn't fully understand the Grenade Scatter Rules. Woops.

1. What is the range of a hand-held GL? Is it 5"? (which I've been told is the range of a hand-thrown grenade)

A hand-thrown grenade has a range of 5". Any other hand-held projectile weapon (including a grenade launcher) has a range of 20" unless otherwise specified.

2. If a (car) GL has impact-fused ammo, then does the fuse go off when the shot hits the designated target or do the grenade scatter rules apply first?

Both :-) The grenade doesn't hit until after you roll for scatter (to find out where it will hit).

3. If there are scatter rules, then what happens if the 'to hit' roll is under 7 - does that mean the shot went off into the stratosphere? And if so, this suggests firing the GL engenders two risks - whether you hit on the 7 and even then, you don't really 'hit' (Ed. this is where my ignorance shows)

That's what the scatter rules cover. The distance it scatters depends on how badly you miss your to-hit roll.

4. Does the 'to hit' of the GL, especially with impact fuses, allow using the GL like an Oil Gun? That is, by using the +4 to hit a patch of ground, the impact grenade with a Flaming Oil load is a smaller Oilgun and with a smoke-grenade load it's a 'smoke gun' (for point-shot smoke screens).

I hadn't thought of that before, but I guess you could. It wouldn't be as good as an Oil Gun, but it would be smaller. Also, the +4 only applies at point-blank range - if your target is even 1" away, you don't get the bonus.

(From Josephey) As far as the +4 for aiming at the ground, I'm not sure if it would apply with the GL because you have to pick a specific point on the ground to target (and to base scatter from). A specific point isn't as big as 'the ground,' and in my opinion wouldn't warrant a +4. Also, if you're trying to put a grenade on the ground in front of a moving vehicle you'll have to add speed mods.

5. According to this AADA News (Pyramid #30) article, NOVA has banned impact fuses because they can be used as a tire-eater. Is that a house-rule specific for NOVA or is that part of the AADA banned list?

It's a house rule. From reading the article, it sounds like they over-reacted to a unique circumstance. If the cars had been moving at real duel speeds, or had the kind of tire protection duellists normally use, the effect would have been greatly reduced.

Rant: Hot Smoke

So it's taking me a while to pour through Uncle Al's Hell, and I see that some of the most gnarled of recent game-skewing annoyances (I'm looking right at you, Stickyfoam) are *not* in this book. Shazbot. But there is a particular offender: Hot Smoke.

In general, I don't like any rule change that only affects price. Besides not being even remotely faithful to whatever vague rules of physics Car Wars attempts to emulate (in the words of kjamma4 "Most weapons in Car Wars contain a liberal helping of 'handwavium'"), it's just BAD for game balance.

I know I've said this before. That's why it's labelled a 'rant.'

And it's even worse when the easy item MASSIVELY TILTS THE GAME DYNAMIC. I mean, back in the day, there was the all-powerful Laser. It was heavy, it was expensive, but it took 2 spaces and gave out 3 dice damage. And it started fires! It was the scariest thing around. The only protection from the laser came from the smoke-screen.

Then some joker came up with "infrared" lasers which allowed you to fire lasers through smoke/paint. Infrared didn't reduce damage, didn't add weight or space, just cost. And now the balance went the other way. So I guess 'hot smoke' was the inevitable (un)balance to already extant imbalance. Well, bully for us.

My proposals to balance back these bad rules:

Infrared Laser
Old Rules: (UACFH p. 19) "Two times the cost of a normal laser, IR laser can fire through smoke and paint, but suffer a -1 per die for every 1/2" of smoke or paint between the firer and the target....An IR targeting laser cannot penetrate more than 1" of smoke [which means a 1/2" cloud will block an IR-TL]"
New Rule Suggestions: I think the damage reduction should be standard and permanent. Half-damage should do it. The TL rule is a nice, but arbitrary, tweak. I'll keep it.

Hot (ugh) Smoke
Old Rules: (UACFH p. 38) "Any standard smoke munition or ammo can be made into Hot Smoke for 1.5x the cost with no effect on the ammo weight. Hot smoke behaves like regular smoke, but it completely blocks IR..."
New Rule Suggestions: The precedent model should be the Flaming Cloud Ejector. The Hot-Smoke counter should last one second and then it disappears. The Hot Smoke ejector should also be considered volatile (like FCE/FOJ).

Rant: How You Know Things Went Wrong

I mentioned earlier a discussion on the SJGames Board about what is the most 'useless' weapon/accessory in Car Wars. Useless is the key, because many of the suggestions were for things that were rendered obsolete by later finagling. The following are quotes from that discussion (and then my commentary):

Oil Jet - it's a classic, but the Flaming Oil Jet weighs about the same, doesn't cost that much more, does some tire damage, forces a control roll at +D2, increases the chance of catching fire, creates a smoke screen, and goes away before too long.

He has a good point. The designers to make the FOJ more expensive, a twinge heavier, and more volatile. But it may need to be increased more to make the vanilla OJ more worthwhile.

[Twin lasers are useless]. You'll be better off with a high intensity Laser.

High-Intensity got renamed Pulse Laser; and he's really right. The Twin-Laser (also a late addition) was a balanced weapon - for a guaranteed +6 on damage you needed to sacrifice 250 more lbs. And as I've argued before, weight is *way* more important of a game balancer than cost. Cost means nothing in Car Wars design except at the very low levels. Weight is everything. And every change should have a weight component to it, or else it's begging for game-warp. And so instead of the TwL ($10000/750/2d+6) there's the pulse-Laser (12000/500, 3d+3 damage). Whoever introduced Pulsed lasers should have just gotten rid of the TwL, lowered it's weight, or raised the weight of pulsing.

Ice vs. Stickyfoam: Stickyfoam gives all of the penalties of ice but also causes a point of damage to all tires, slows the opponent by 5 MPH, can't be removed by fire weapons, weighs less, and only costs $250 more? Poor ice dropper, you look so lonely.

As I've mentioned before, a quick way to get me angry is to mention 'stickyfoam' (but that's because I'm old school). However, this discussion is my WHOLE POINT in a nutshell. Leaving aside the fact that ice-droppers are new equipment to my extreme Old School eyes, how can a new weapon like icky-foam be such an easy replacement for an old-school weapon? Just get rid of one or the other.

These are just three examples of what happens when Feature Creep afflicts a role-playing game. Any new device needs to establish why it fits an unfilled niche - that can't destroy a previous device/weapon. And if it will make the other weapon obsolete, either the original weapon just wasn't useful - and so the new device is just an updating - or the new device hasn't been designed with enough disadvantages.

There needs to be a real reason for new stuff that also preserves a real reason why someone would choose the old stuff.

Rant: What Game Mags Should be Doing

In my previous post, I ranted that game magazines have ruined many a game by Revision Creep: introducing new and niftier rules and items that are not fully playtested - quickly warping the original game.

I think there are two reasons for Revision Creep:
1. Laziness or Desperation in keeping the pages filled
2. Irreconcilable debate over Game Source

I. Laziness or Desperation in keeping the pages filled

I understand the tyranny of deadlines. And even in a monthly magazine, there's probably very little time available to fill those many blank pages. So introduce a new character class or new magic item or new weapon and viola! So what if it makes an old play-system obsolete... the article was just a thought experiment, or whatever. Except that in Car Wars, these experiments were often introduced as street legal.

My solution? There are three things that game magazines could and should do that would both fill up space and be invaluable for the player:

1. Modules and Scenarios
   
2. Split-level description of how a game scenario is played out
   
3. NPCs (or for Car Wars - car designs)

Modules & Scenarios

Why do game companies create and sell these? Because newbies need them. So don't be cheapskates, we're buying the game magazines, fill up half or a third of the space for each magazine with scenarios. They require the time and skill and knowledge of the game that the game company employees are supposed to have in a greater amount that we players have. Making a new device takes seconds (e.g. here's a new weapon for car wars: Vehicular Staple Gun, $300, 50 lbs, 1 space, 1 DP, 2 dice damage, to hit 5... that took 10 seconds, including typing time). Scenarios take work and that's what the mags can do best.

Split-level descriptions

I *love* it whenever a game rulebook or magazine does one of these step-by-step background descriptions of how the die-rolls and the character descriptions translate into how you and your friends will play - and how the action would look were it in a movie. An example I can recall is from the d20 D&D Dungeon Masters Guide, p. 130-132.

This is really easy to do. Just play a game and write down what you are doing - die rolls, rules consulted. A few of these in every magazine will both be good reading and will teach people how to play (and/or play better). It's especially good when illustrating difficult rules. And Car Wars has many difficult rules.

NPCs/Car Designs

Who doesn't like reading car designs? And I can design a car/NPC rather quickly. It doesn't have to be with new equipment. To make it more relevant, have the design be scenario based (like a 2057 police-cruiser). This category can also include new arenas, new adventure locations (sorta like modules-lite).

With these three idea categories, game magazines would have pages filled with easy-to-write and useful pieces. Instead of the unplaytested 'nifty' garbage that mucks up game history.

II. Irreconcilable debate over Game Source

This is more fundamental to things that try to re-create the extant world. In a pure fantasy setting (e.g. superhero, magic) this is less of a problem. But as I've seen with D&D and Car Wars, there are two main sources for the design - reality or fiction.

The D&D debate was over whether the source for the rules and the 'world' was (a) Thomas Mallorey's King Arthur or (b) Robert Howard's Conan. If it's the former, then there should be rules for how arrows were truly made in 13th Century France, how Bards were trained in Celtic colleges, and how there's no such thing as a martial arts Monk.

If (b) then Barbarian warriors can defeat twelve men with one swing of a Tulwar, where devils take the shape of men and where a full life can be led adventurin' and wenchin.'

The realistic school demands incontrovertible detail. There are 12 types of pole-arms in 1st edition AD&D because, hey, there were 12 types in Medieval Europe. Who cares if nobody used polearms; that remembering the names was ludicrous and that the damage difference was negligible. The details were there so all is right in the world. Note, this makes sense because D&D was a development of an actual realism school Medieval wargame (Chainmail).

The d20 rejuvenation tries for the second school - that the heroes of D&D are mini-Conans with feats, critical hits, and superhuman capabilities. And the weapon list reflects this: there are different swords but only insofar as there are different uses. No more idiotic longsword/broadsword nonsense. A d20 longsword is just another name for "a one-hand d8 damage device with 19-20/x2 critical hit zone."

The D&D Lesson for Car Wars

D&D started as a realistic system and eventually evolved into a fantasy system. Car Wars appears to be the opposite. It started as purely fantasy and over the years became over-burdened with realism.

For example, is the "MG" a:
(a) .50 caliber, belt-fed, air-cooled, machine gun (like Ma Deuce)
or
(b) the basic model for an arbitrary system of gameplay - the MG is 1 unit of space, 1 unit of cost, 1 unit of weight, and 1 unit of damage with 1 unit of ammo that hits on the average unit of accuracy? It's not a fifty-caliber machine-gun, it's a 1-space-1-die gun. A Recoiless Rifle is a 2-space-2-die gun; an Anti-Tank-Gun is a 3-space-3-die gun.

Naturally, given my ranting, you can tell I prefer the latter description. It's just how play-balance works. The playetesters found that a 3 die weapon needed to have a high to-hit to make it equal, so too how the 1 die weapon needed 20 shots.

But we gave these units names (MG, RR) and the game itself is designed to fire up our imagination. So it was natural for there to be crossover into what a 'real' MG would be, what ammo it would take, what variations there would be.

This realism direction is fine - because it's the seat of imagination - but it needed to be balanced with the internal game dynamics. And it wasn't.

Next up, some examples of the broken system and what maybe can be done.

Rant: Game Balance

Those who play RPGs (which includes Car Wars, even though is more like an evolving board game) have witnessed Revision Creep - where every new issue of a game magazine needs to introduce new ideas, new devices, new rules. It is rare for these new things to have been playtested enough to preserve game-balance. They just look and sound nifty! And pretty soon, all games/characters/cars sport the new 'street-legal' devices and doodads that render the old rules obsolete.

Revision Creep: D&D's Cautionary Tale

Rampant Revision Creep can ruin a game. This is arguably what happened to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. Things got very complicated and the attempt to coalesce the new ideas (the 2nd Edition fiasco) just made things worse. The 3rd edition, the D20 rules, were IMHO a great improvement. When it started. But hoo-baby, the Revision Creep from Wizards of the Coast has increased at a bizarre cancerous velocity. It could just be me, but EVERY SINGLE BOOK they publish (and they seem to have a new book every few weeks) has 20 new feats, 20 new prestige classes and at this point the game is almost unrecognizable.

This may be a bad test procedure, but in one of the D20 D&D books I have there is no listing for playtesters in the masthead (and no mention of them in the acknowledgements). It's almost as if the Wizards are trying to wring out as much money from their audience before nausea sets in. It's the Summer Blockbuster methodology - open with 3000 screens, make 50% of the gross on opening weekend before word of mouth renders your high-budget stinkeroo into celluloid oblivion, and then move on to the next blockbuster. No content, just flash.

Grrrr.

Revision Creep in Car Wars

Anyway, this unchecked Revision Creep is possibly what happened to Car Wars. I'm not talking about 5th Edition... I have 100% no interest in a new play system. The old system would be fine with a little tweaking. But I think so many of the new devices that have been introduced have upset game balance in entirely preventable ways:

1. All new devices must be *extensively* playtested (a few months, at least, just to see how they affect game dynamics)

2. Until they're tested, they must be declared as optional and will not be arena/tournament legal

3. One playtest test is to see if an older device becomes obsolete. If it does, fine, then REDEFINE the old device. A good example is RR HESH ammo. It doesn't weigh more, is crazy cheap (175$), and rips off metal armor half the time. And if it's not obviously unbalanced by a simple smell-test, look at car designs since the device was introduced... who DOESN'T use HEAT or HESH in their RRs?

Same holds for HTM (which I've ranted about before). As I said:

back in '37 you needed to have a big engine to get consistently high acceleration. In years hence they invented High Torque Motors and instead of balancing weight-space-cost in engine size you just pay $400 and viola! Grrrr. Yup, I think HTM is a bad idea. Massive changes in game dynamics require more than just a few hundred bucks! Space and weight are much more difficult to manipulate and have much more of a design "cost" (ironically). Once HTM was introduced was it any surprise that almost every duelling car had them installed. Heck, they didn't even make you enter a new price range!

My Self-Applied Rules

If I introduce new rules, rule-tweaks, new weapons etc (which I've done already on this blog), assume that they are optional and untested until stated otherwise.

I enjoy Car Wars; it fires up my imagination like no other game and indulges two great loves (design creativity and violence). I want to help fix this game, the original game, that I played 20 years ago. I'm mainly introducing tweaks. But like any fanboy, I would like to see new equipment if it fits in.

Next: what game mags should be doing (and why they get it wrong).

Rant: Grenade Launchers

The GL is a tough fit in Car Wars. Grenades existed from the very beginning as a pedestrian equalizer - they did full, 1d6, damage to vehicles. They also defined pedestrians (your driver had skills as a driver and gunner and was equal to 6 grenades).

It seemed natural to include the Grenade Launcher as both a weapon for pedestrians and for Vehicles as well.

In a recent (May 2007) discussion at the SJGames Car Wars forum, there was a discussion about what is the worst weapon/accessory in the game. Grenade Launchers were mentioned, and I can see why. They seem oversized and underpowered - and overshadowed by the handheld version which seems to do the same thing!

Yet this rule-warp is on purpose. See how this major (anonymous) question was fobbed off by SJ Dude Charles A. Oines in ADQ-Q&A 6/1:

Q: 2. Why is it that the hand-held grenade launcher can only hold five grenades, but the vehicular model can only hold ten, and takes up 2 spaces? If the vehicular model was one space and held 15 grenades things would compare a little better.

A: 2. Compare in what way? Personally, I'm happy with the numbers as they are.

Great answer, Oines.

I will restate the ADQ Question: a 5 shot pedestrian weapon (worth 2 GE in the hand) has the same to hit & same damage as a vehicular version - which is 10 shots and 2 spaces. No other pedestrian weapon is equally matched (which is why I always arm my drivers with Grenade Launchers when money is available).

One difference could be range. I don't know if pedestrian weaponry is limited, but that could be a factor. [Update, pedestrians can throw 5", but does that hold for the handheld GL?]

The reason for the rule warp could be the God of Game Balance. If so, it'd be the first time.

I asked the SJGames thread a set of questions about the grenades, as follows, let's see what they can come up with:

A few questions about a much maligned weapon, the Grenade Launcher.

1. What is the range of a hand-held GL? Is it 5"? (which I've been told is the range of a hand-thrown grenade)

2. If a (car) GL has impact-fused ammo, then does the fuse go off when the shot hits the designated target or do the grenade scatter rules apply first?

3. If there are scatter rules, then what happens if the 'to hit' roll is under 7 - does that mean the shot went off into the stratosphere? And if so, this suggests firing the GL engenders two risks - whether you hit on the 7 and even then, you don't really 'hit'

4. Does the 'to hit' of the GL, especially with impact fuses, allow using the GL like an Oil Gun? That is, by using the +4 to hit a patch of ground, the impact grenade with a Flaming Oil load is a smaller Oilgun and with a smoke-grenade load it's a 'smoke gun' (for point-shot smoke screens).

5. According to this AADA News (Pyramid #30) article, NOVA has banned impact fuses because they can be used as a tire-eater. Is that a house-rule specific for NOVA or is that part of the AADA banned list?

Ironically, the ADQ (9/1) introduced the military weapon, an "Auto Grenade Launcher" which has these stats:

Auto-GL – To hit 7, damage by grenade type, 3 DP, $5,000. 250 Ibs., 2 spaces, holds 20 grenades (cost by grenade type +$20, 5 Ibs. each); loaded weight 350 1bs. ; loaded magazine costs $50 plus the cost of grenades and weighs 105 1bs. Different grenade types may be mixed in the magazine and fired in any order desired; rotary magazine effects are included in the price. The auto-GL can fire one, two or three grenades in one firing action. All grenades must be fired at the same target, and all grenades in a salvo use the same to-hit roll to determine the amount of scatter, but each grenade scatters separately. For instance, if a three-shot salvo misses its to-hit roll by 3, then each grenade scatters 2d-2 squares in a random direction.

These seem like perfectly reasonable stats for a standard Grenade Launcher - yet the same logic that downgraded the standard version (play-balance? spite?) is the same logic that bans the AGL.

New Models and Many Rants

At this point, I've uploaded the notes of my old model cars. Now that I have cleansed my mental palette, I can now put up new designs and upgrades.

The resources I am using for this endeavor are my old books:
1. Car Wars Pocket Box (1983 Edition)
2. Truck Stop Pocket Box
3. Uncle Al 2035
4. ADQ 3/1, 3/3
4. Notes from my friends books (I had little disposable income as a teenager, cry me a river)

And the recent resources:
1. Car Wars Compendium vol. 2 (1990, ISBN 1556341458) - the only core rulebook still available (see below)
2. GURPS Autoduel America (1997, ISBN 1556342403) - just to get into the RPG mood
3. The MADHAT excel car designer
4. A lot of great online stuff (which I've tried to put in my link-list)

The problem is that I do not own the most up-to-date rulebooks:
1. The Car Wars Compendium, vol. 2, 5th Edition. (1996, ISBN 1556343167)
2. Uncle Albert's Catalog from Hell (ISBN 1556342209)

The CWC2.5 - as it's known - costs $100-300. UACFH has been seen in the mid-$30 range. After a few months of trying to buy both, I succumbed and purchased CWC2 for $6.99. $300 vs. 7? You do the math.

I felt the purchase was justified because - as far as I could glean online - there doesn't seem to be major differences. Note, for the life of me, while I can find some errata for the 1990 book (here), it's not on the official page and I don't see a list of changes from 2.0 to 2.5.

Core Rulebook Rant

Why are the CORE RULEBOOKS not being printed by Steve Jackson games? Or even being offered as PDF files on their website? Possible answers:

1. SJGames has introduced an updated "5th Edition" version of the game - which is not well liked, as far as I can tell - and SJ doesn't want to promulgate any books from it's old regime.

2. and/or SJGames can claim they *do* sell the old books... by providing a page of stores around the world that sell old games. And considering SJGames created "Illuminati" they may also be anonymously selling their stockpile of old rulebooks to make the 500% markup on the cover-price.

Considering how easy and cheap it would be to make a PDF copy of these books, the fact that SJGames doesn't is infuriating.

As it is, there are a few new weapons and rules that I don't have in my rulebooks - or have found online. I've spent some time reverse engineering the MADHAT information, but that only goes so far.

As such, the new designs and rules-rants I will soon post are hampered by my rulebook ignorance. Apologies ahead of time.

Van introduction (and rant)

Vans are the La Brea Tar Pits of beginners to Car Wars. "SO. MUCH. SPACE." they say to themselves, until they realize that you can only get 2 digits of armor on that mystery machine. As opposed to our everyday experience - where vans are useful and common - they are worthless in Car Wars.

I remember the first ADQ I purchased (3/3) has this ad for the "Security Stalker" - a state of the art wonder machine - that uses the new Gauss Gun and stealth technologies. Wow. Except that, young as I was, I realized that the armor (F15, R15, L15, B10, T11, U10) couldn't withstand one hit with most division 20 cars (let alone anything with a price tag of $57,130).

In the very same magazine was a great article - a perfect example of what game magazines should have - about a cross-country record made by two delivery people. It established the RPG mood of the car-wars world and it probably sparked a lot of my RPG designs. The world of Car Wars was a fascinating one to populate and elaborate.

So anyway, the car they made cross country in 2036 was this (thanks to Odette Morrison):

Warhorse: Van, extra heavy chassis, heavy suspension, super power plant, six solid tires. Armor 135 points (T10, F30, R25, L25, B30, U15). One driver, one gunner. Mounts one AC (autocannon) forward, also mounts 2 HR (heavy rockets) forward -- fired by front bumper trigger. One RL (rocket launcher), and 2 linked PS (paint sprays) also fired by a rear bumper trigger, are mounted in the rear. Carries an improved fire extinguisher, one LDR (Long Distance Radio), and hi-res targeting computers for both driver and gunner. 10 cargo spaces with a 60 lbs. capacity. HC 2, acceleration 5. Weight without cargo -- 7,140 Lbs., cost -- $33,250.

HC 2? 135 pts armor?? Cross country??? Vans were like "Hotshot" all over again.

But this clear, obvious, nonsense didn't stop me from making tons of vans. They're second to Luxuries for my favorite design. All that space, you see. And for a designer like myself - the vehicular homicide version of Versace - the design was part of the fun.

I even took some of these dummies into battle. So I have guts, give me that.

Rule-Change Proposals - Unsucking Vans

The goal is to make vans *plausible* for 2050s Autoduel America. Why should such a popular and usable car in 1990s America become obsolete - through suckage - in a car dominated world?

A first step is to employ the cargo and pickup rules I wrote about below. But in addition:

Increase weight capacity for chassis. This seems obvious. Make the van like it is in 2007 (acc. to Wiki: "While a minivan can tow between 2,000 and 4,000 pounds, a full size van can tow in excess of 8,000 pounds, as well as its own weight"). So instead of 6000 as base chassis, make it close to 7000.

and/or lower the armor weight.

and/or make the armor more effective (i.e. it takes 1.5 hits to take off 1 piece of plastic ablative armor).

and/or in addition to requiring the trucker skill to drive a van effectively (2057 demands more than just blocky movement; you need to drive a heavy unresponsive brick of a car while shooting at moving targets who are shooting back) - possibly vans over 7200 lbs require *truck power plants.* This will use the space more effectively.

Last Idea: Vans should only fight other vans.