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While I'm loathe to agree with Eilif on the Wild West Exodus, you shouldn't go toe to toe with that company. They are putting out plastic sculpts with high quality and a decent price (and fething rivets everywhere!).

Hi all.
In my opinion its probably best to get the free development stuff done first.
The core resolution methods and game mechanics in a well defined elegant and intuitive rule set.

Then develop the 'naked' army lists, work out interesting generic themes and organisations.

FINALY after all this is developed as far as you can, then look at interesting settings and asthetics to add flavour to the game and its unique hook to separate it from the rest ...

Eilif wrote:Having beat you up a bit here, I'll reply to your initial question. I think that both genres have a fair bit of competition. However, if you could make a mass battle game work with affordable plastic minis, then I think that Steampunk is your best bet. As long as you can stay away from the Americana look of Wild West Exodus, and the fantasy feel of Warmachine you might find a good niche. There aren't currently any major 28mm steampunk mass-battle games like that. I realize that this might change your plans a bit as you included "gold rush" in your description, but going toe to toe with WWExodus is not a wise idea right now.

You're only competition would be Dystopian Legions, and not only is it a fairly expensive all-metal game, but it really seems to be aimed at the platoon level.

Alfndrate wrote:While I'm loathe to agree with Eilif on the Wild West Exodus, you shouldn't go toe to toe with that company. They are putting out plastic sculpts with high quality and a decent price (and fething rivets everywhere!).

I have to agree with you both on the WWX thing, and honestly I'm not aiming for a wild west type game. what I just gave my sales presentation to my speech class on was a kind of "steampunk in space" type wargame with factions from every continent on the globe. I got a lot of praise for it from the class, and honestly it's what I've been wanting to do this entire time but everyone kept telling me there was no market. I'd like to elaborate on it but I don't exactly have a lot of time on my hands these days.

I always thought the idea of making my own game was something I ought to do, but I am no good with rules and anyone I try and partner with seems to feel they must do everything alone, and can't write stories for crap.

personally, I like the second idea

 yeri wrote:

I have to agree with you both on the WWX thing, and honestly I'm not aiming for a wild west type game. what I just gave my sales presentation to my speech class on was a kind of "steampunk in space" type wargame with factions from every continent on the globe. I got a lot of praise for it from the class, and honestly it's what I've been wanting to do this entire time but everyone kept telling me there was no market. I'd like to elaborate on it but I don't exactly have a lot of time on my hands these days.

First off, a sales presentation to a speech class feels good, but it's not going to indicate a market.

On a wider scale, here's the confusion:
You say you don't have alot of time on your hands, and you appear to be in school and can't get a working ruleset out for folks to look at.
On the other hand...
You also say you have plans for plastic minis, trading card mechanics, financial backing from a family holding company, potential access to a plastic injection company, etc.

I think folks here are pretty confused because you seem to be at the very beginning (unfinished rules) while at the same time dreaming/brainstorming about the very end (production of minis that don't even have designs), all while still being a student without much free time. It's kind of discordant. I wouldn't discourage you from asking folks about ideas for games, but I think folks are seeing that you're not being completely honest with how much work you're doing on your end and where you are on the development track. It still has the feeling that -as was said on one of you're previous game threads-

 lord_blackfang wrote:
You're basically throwing paper napkin ideas out and seeing what sticks.

This is ok, just be honest about it and finish the flipping rules!

Let me explain: from my prospective these steps you see are not the end step of designing a game. planing for supply chains, source of seed money, estimating costs, these are the number one killers of start up companies, and if you don't address them in the initial business plan one of them will get you. it all boils down to the three Ps: People, Process, Product, you need all three to make a successful company. where I see a lot of miniature companies screw up is in the second P, Process. that's why I'm working on the thing that screws up most companies in the industry, so that I don't make the same mistakes. that means I need to know exactly what a product is going to cost me, what can I sell it for and how much it's going to cost me to develop for starters. I need to know all those things before I even start designing the minis.

Believe me or not but according to industry insiders “steam punk” doesn’t sale as well as people would hoped it would. The genre didn’t pick up as much as the hoped.

 yeri wrote:
Let me explain: from my prospective these steps you see are not the end step of designing a game. planing for supply chains, source of seed money, estimating costs, these are the number one killers of start up companies, and if you don't address them in the initial business plan one of them will get you. it all boils down to the three Ps: People, Process, Product, you need all three to make a successful company. where I see a lot of miniature companies screw up is in the second P, Process. that's why I'm working on the thing that screws up most companies in the industry, so that I don't make the same mistakes. that means I need to know exactly what a product is going to cost me, what can I sell it for and how much it's going to cost me to develop for starters. I need to know all those things before I even start designing the minis.

This is all well and fine, and you can have all of the people and process in the world, but if you don't have a product you can't implement your process..

It's fine to get the business side numbers crunched, but at the same time you're delaying your product which means you're wasting valuable man hours on something that isn't possible without a product to put through your process...

/sigh, I need to be honest here: the game engine I've used for all these games I've proposed has essentially been the same, my problem has been that as far as genres go I like everything equally. I enjoy both fantasy and sci-fi, and it's been hard for me to choose between settings because I like everything. I keep coming here because I need to do market research to see just which one of my ideas will sell the best, that's the one I really want the setting that will sell the best, because honestly when people tell me to choose the one I like the most, I like the settings themselves equally, but what I want is the genre that will sell the best, because I honestly could care less weather the guns shoot lasers, musket balls or crossbow bolts because I like all the geeky genres equally. so I guess what I really want to know is where the market is, because the setting to me is adaptable to the market.

 yeri wrote:
/sigh, I need to be honest here: the game engine I've used for all these games I've proposed has essentially been the same, my problem has been that as far as genres go I like everything equally. I enjoy both fantasy and sci-fi, and it's been hard for me to choose between settings because I like everything. I keep coming here because I need to do market research to see just which one of my ideas will sell the best, that's the one I really want the setting that will sell the best, because honestly when people tell me to choose the one I like the most, I like the settings themselves equally, but what I want is the genre that will sell the best, because I honestly could care less weather the guns shoot lasers, musket balls or crossbow bolts because I like all the geeky genres equally. so I guess what I really want to know is where the market is, because the setting to me is adaptable to the market.

The miniature wargaming market is too broad to really dictate where you should go. Things that appeal to Sci-Fi gamers might not appeal to historicals. Things that would appeal to historicals might not appeal to steampunk even though the timelines might match up. With that being said, 3 things
1) Most of us won't really care if the models aren't to our tastes as long as the game is fun
2) We're an internet forum and are most likely the vocal minority, if you want a better sample size flip a damn coin to settle on an idea and start attending conventions and trade shows with one of your ideas. Even if you attend as an attendee and just sit in the hallways or what not you can find people that might be interested in your game.
3) Your fluff and rules should mesh well, so deciding on a theme will help you work out special rules for the game.

ok well I did some soul searching and honestly I think I want to go with a kind of steampunk WWI in space idea. in my opinion the reason that steampunk minis have not sold well is because to me it seemed that you could never get a good deal on them for the price or in plastic. think about how many people playing 40k like to convert their IG army into seampunk but have to build stuff from scratch? I see a very under supplied market where you only have maybe four or five choices and they're pretty much all metal. it is my opinion that if someone offered a nice line of multi part plastic steampunk minis people would not only buy them for the game, but also for conversion parts.

also the game I envision will explore some parts of that period that not many minis games have gone to. beyond the great European powers and America I have plans to include a faction from every continent on the globe (well except Antarctica) so this game will have Chinese with gyro-jet guns, Ottomans with fancy turbans and paints, Congolese fighting to free their homeland from European domination, and even south American jungle fighters led by the pope.

I know what I want now, now it's time to make it happen!

*sets clock* we'll see you in at least a month with your new game idea...

 yeri wrote:
also the game I envision will explore some parts of that period that not many minis games have gone to. beyond the great European powers and America I have plans to include a faction from every continent on the globe (well except Antarctica) so this game will have Chinese with gyro-jet guns, Ottomans with fancy turbans and paints, Congolese fighting to free their homeland from European domination, and even south American jungle fighters led by the pope.

And what's this got to do with your game?

Anyway I wish you good luck. If you come with a brand new idea next month I'm sure I'm not the only one that will lose interest.

 yeri wrote:
ok well I did some soul searching and honestly I think I want to go with a kind of steampunk WWI in space idea. in my opinion the reason that steampunk minis have not sold well is because to me it seemed that you could never get a good deal on them for the price or in plastic. think about how many people playing 40k like to convert their IG army into seampunk but have to build stuff from scratch? I see a very under supplied market where you only have maybe four or five choices and they're pretty much all metal. it is my opinion that if someone offered a nice line of multi part plastic steampunk minis people would not only buy them for the game, but also for conversion parts.

It seems like you're going head-first into Dystopian Legions territory. Not that they have an overwhelming monopoly on that genre niche, of course. And they're mostly metal (or is the Dl stuff resin?) so that gives you a theoretical major distinction.

As for conversion parts, it sounds good, but I think a lot of people find 'conversions' that are basically "I used models from another game" unsatisfying. Steampunk heads, sure. Weapons, maybe.

 yeri wrote:

also the game I envision will explore some parts of that period that not many minis games have gone to. beyond the great European powers and America I have plans to include a faction from every continent on the globe (well except Antarctica) so this game will have Chinese with gyro-jet guns, Ottomans with fancy turbans and paints, Congolese fighting to free their homeland from European domination, and even south American jungle fighters led by the pope.

So, to expand this out... What's the pitch to make it interesting? Consider the 'elevator pitch' concept: You're stuck in an elevator for 30 seconds with some wealthy woman considering investing in your project. How do you sell this to her?

40k's elevator pitch would be "Large armies of minis that mix science fiction and fantasy tropes with a lot of gothic embellishment and over-the-top heavy metal album cover imagery."

For your concept as presented... What makes it more interesting than the aforementioned Dystopian Legions (Which is chronologically an 'early' World War I, thoguh the designers for DW seem to occasionally be inspired by other eras) and why is it different from our world? (For another example, the Dystopian Wars/Dystopian legions setting has the discovery and disruptive effects of Sturginium (and some other Weird Stuff) as an explanation for the altered history and why the landships, war zeppelins, etc. are reasonable and workable. is it a realistic setting (if so, probably not particularly steampunk), or is there magic, mad science, or alien tech?

A great essay (written by a former employee at the guys I do work for, but I'm not sure who) is what they called the Y-Cubed rule. Basically, as a guideline for developing RPG scenarios, make sure you can answer the inevitable 'Why is it like that?' question at least three generations.

(Again, using 40k as an example most Dakka Dakka readers are familiar with.)
Why are these 40k Space marines wearing skulls and medieval-looking armor.
-They are art of an order of warrior-monks and venerate their technolgoy and their spiritual leaders.
Why do they venerate technology?
-They are part of a culture that has lost a lot of technology due the dark age caused by the Horus Heresy civil war.
Why did a civil war cause technology to be lost?
-The civil war destroyed a lot of high-tech planets and the quasi-religious group in charge of science and technology suffered a major schism. Many people distrusted technology due to earlier issues with rogue AIs (Iron Men?) and the events of the Heresy reinforced this as daemonic possession of technology occured, the Adeptus Mechanicus turned up the creepy factor, etc.

Pr, to put it another way, let me paraphrase Teller from entertainers Penn and Teller: "..."

Wait, I mean, let me paraphrase him when he actually talked and said "The secret to magic is spending more time figuring out how to do a trick than anyone will beleive you'd spend on it."

For a game setting, I feel this means making it make sense on a deep enough level that people won't be willing to dig too deep and start picking out issues. I think you need to find a setting concept you're really into (not one that is a flavor-of-the-month online) ad really develop that.

I think it's great that you are doing the research on production. A lot of small companies don't do that. However, you need a focus you can really commit to to get through the massive walls of putting hundreds of hours into writing, revising, editing, and otherwise developing a setting and game rules.

Did we scare the OP off?

yeri so far you are writing a story, not a game. How does the turn structure work? How does one model resolve an attack against another? How are armies and units built? At this point these are somewhat more important questions than "Should it be WW1 or WW2 steampunk".

 Devoted-to-the-machine wrote:
Believe me or not but according to industry insiders “steam punk” doesn’t sale as well as people would hoped it would. The genre didn’t pick up as much as the hoped.

In the miniature gaming industry perhaps, but steampunk is slated to be the "next big thing" when it comes to the world of fashion, literature, video games, etc. In reality, I would say that the reason for its failure in the tabletop gaming industry is that it hasn't been done "right" with the exception of Privateer Press (which is only somewhat vaguely steampunk in its offerings), mostly owing to the small scale nature of those attempting to penetrate their market, and thus the limited budgets that they have to work with affecting the quality of their product (and in some cases resulting in very amateurish rulesets.

I need to be honest here: the game engine I've used for all these games I've proposed has essentially been the same, my problem has been that as far as genres go I like everything equally. I enjoy both fantasy and sci-fi, and it's been hard for me to choose between settings because I like everything. I keep coming here because I need to do market research to see just which one of my ideas will sell the best, that's the one I really want the setting that will sell the best, because honestly when people tell me to choose the one I like the most, I like the settings themselves equally, but what I want is the genre that will sell the best, because I honestly could care less weather the guns shoot lasers, musket balls or crossbow bolts because I like all the geeky genres equally. so I guess what I really want to know is where the market is, because the setting to me is adaptable to the market.

I've never seen a ruleset that works just as well for hack and slash sword and sorcery as it does for futuristic space lasers... that you claim to have one, to me, isn't a good thing.

1) Most of us won't really care if the models aren't to our tastes as long as the game is fun

This. One of the first things your 'market research' should have turned up is that miniatures and artwork drive sales, not fluff, not rules. If you make an awesome mini at the right price, it will appeal to 90% of gamers regardless of genre.

think about how many people playing 40k like to convert their IG army into seampunk but have to build stuff from scratch?

Part of the steampunk culture (and miniature gaming as well actually) is a do it yourself attitude. Offering steampunk minis isn't going to change that.

it is my opinion that if someone offered a nice line of multi part plastic steampunk minis people would not only buy them for the game, but also for conversion parts.

You do know the costs involved with multipart plastic kits right?

also the game I envision will explore some parts of that period that not many minis games have gone to. beyond the great European powers and America I have plans to include a faction from every continent on the globe (well except Antarctica) so this game will have Chinese with gyro-jet guns, Ottomans with fancy turbans and paints, Congolese fighting to free their homeland from European domination, and even south American jungle fighters led by the pope.

You're hardly the first to offer these things, although it may be the first in a steampunk setting (its not, see Dystopian Wars)

Balance wrote:Did we scare the OP off?

No I just needed some time to think, honestly the reason I come here is because the creative process I worked with when I was the consigliere to a hollywood director was that basically you'd get the creative team in a room and bounce ideas off each other. unfortunetly where I am I have no one to bounce those ideas off of. so I come here to try and bounce ideas off people, and when they say it doesn't work that means that the setting needs to go back to the drawing board to me. that's why there's so many threads, because I keep getting responses that have negative views on the settings.

bosky wrote:yeri so far you are writing a story, not a game. How does the turn structure work? How does one model resolve an attack against another? How are armies and units built? At this point these are somewhat more important questions than "Should it be WW1 or WW2 steampunk".

exactly, that's because I've already got the game rules in my head, I just need to know the setting to get the right tone for the written rulebook. and in answer to your questions:
1) turn structure works like this: 1) player collects resources from units placed in the "logistics zone". 2) player draws a card from their army deck. 3) player may spend resources to deploy units. 4) player activates each of his units one at a time. 5) after all units have activated turn ends. at any point in your turn) you may play normal support cards. at any point in your turn or you opponent's turn) you may play rapid support cards.

2) ok so attacks are a bit different from normal games, and I've come up with two different systems depending on the setting. for a game that involves lots of guns the way it works is if you're shooting a weapon at half or less it's maximum range you use what's called "Close shooting Skill" (CS) to test against your opponent's defense (DEF) if you're at more than half you use Long shooting Skill (LS) you roll a d10 and add your skill to the roll, if you roll at or above their defense you've hit them. after that you do the same test using your strength (STR) vs. their Armor (ARM)

now for a fantasy game it's a little different. instead of having range based skills you have Combat Skill (CS) for melee, Ranged Skill (RS) for shooting, and magic skill (MS) for magic spells. there would also be a difference in the armor, all attacks would have a damage attribute that would tell you what kind of armor they test against, the types are: Piercing, Slashing, Bashing, and Magic. the first three test against their respective armors, but magic tests against a stat called "resistance" (RES)

I'll answer the rest of your questions soon, but now I need to get to class.
EDIT: here's the answer to the rest of your questions: 3) armies are built as decks of between 30 and 60 cards, units are made up of 4 figures that are deployed together in close formation. in adition to the cards you select you will also have an HQ which will affect your army sort of like your choice of caster does in WM, giving you access to special abilities and buffs for your units.

now in regard to chaos's comments:
1) that's exactly what I thought, there's a market out there that is looking for a quality product and I intend to supply them with that.
2) where did I say ruleset? did I say ruleset? I said engine, that's kind of the bare bones and concept of the rules, with certain parts able to be swapped out to make it a fantasy game or scifi game.
3) well the problem is I can't draw or sculpt and I don't have the approved funds to have artwork and minis yet, first I need a concept to guide the art direction.
4) once again you put words in my mouth. how many players want to build a steampunk army but simply don't have the skills to sculpt it out of GS? basically with the design for the minis I envision it would make them very easy to kitbash with other company's minis.
5) yes probably better than you do. my family has been working with plastic for almost 70 years, trust me we know everything there is to know about plastic and the molds used to process it.
6) really? because I don't think I've ever seen a plastic steampunk ottoman mini. if you've seen one I'd love to know where to get one.

I worked with when I was the consigliere to a hollywood director

Come on dude, you're a college student. You can't just toss statements out there and not expect some incredulity. You want us to think you were "Tom" to some Hollywood "Corleone" or are you being deliberately vague and trying to boost our opinion of your resources and experience.

 yeri wrote:

3) well the problem is I can't draw or sculpt and I don't have the approved funds to have artwork and minis yet, first I need a concept to guide the art direction.

To paraphrase something Kevin Clark of CMON said to me, "If you come to me with a game idea you better have art for it because you can't sell a game that no one knows what it's going to look like". I know an artist that will do a black and white line concept art for about 80 to 150 dollars per piece and is doing concept art for On the Lamb, Blackwater Gulch, Mantic, etc... Go to DeviantArt and find an artist looking for work.

5) yes probably better than you do. my family has been working with plastic for almost 70 years, trust me we know everything there is to know about plastic and the molds used to process it.

And yet you showed terrible knowledge of the ways companies like Wargames Factory are making their molds as well as the actual costs.

6) really? because I don't think I've ever seen a plastic steampunk ottoman mini. if you've seen one I'd love to know where to get one.

Agreed with Eilif, if you're gonna toss out statements like being an advisor/counsel/gopher for a hollywood director you can't just leave it at that... You can't wee on us and expect us to believe it's rain. You talk a lot of talk dude, but yet to give us something solid.

 yeri wrote:
@ Alfndrate: I honestly don't know at this point. my mom xthrew out all my notes when I went back to collage (I think that's her way of telling me that designing and selling a game is not a real job in her opinion)

I'd like to think that someone who went to college, could actually, oh I don't know, spell college.

Give us directions to a PDF or a word doc that has your rules system in it.

Your supposed costings and hand wringing over themes don't mean a thing if you haven't got a solid, and enjoyable game mechanic.

Get something out with a bit of fluff for flavor and get it played. Solicit feedback just get it on paper and onto gaming tables.

Stop being soft!

So from the brief outline in this post it sounds like you're having some kind of computer game real time strategy approach of building/deploying units on the fly, yeri? Sounds unique and could be interesting.

The other features sound like:

- Full army UGOIGO, activating units until none are left and then the turn is over.
- Not sure what Rapid Support Cards are but maybe you can do some interrupt in the opponent's turn? Otherwise are we back to "sit for 25 minutes" ala 40k?
- Combat is a bland D10+skill > Defense, then a second roll of Strength > Armor. What does having two rolls add to the game, besides bogging down the core mechanic of resolving combat?

From the army building point of view you're saying between 30-60 cards representing units, with a unit being 4 models? So potentially 120-240 models on the table? What benefit does using individual models give the player compared to a platoon/infantry stand? Are the 4 models basically used as wound tokens for the unit?

I'd focus on a single system at once. Don't worry about a system for lots of guns, few guns, and fantasy/magic, imho. Just choose one and make it the best you can.

 yeri wrote:

Balance wrote:Did we scare the OP off?

No I just needed some time to think, honestly the reason I come here is because the creative process I worked with when I was the consigliere to a hollywood director was that basically you'd get the creative team in a room and bounce ideas off each other. unfortunetly where I am I have no one to bounce those ideas off of. so I come here to try and bounce ideas off people, and when they say it doesn't work that means that the setting needs to go back to the drawing board to me. that's why there's so many threads, because I keep getting responses that have negative views on the settings.

To be honest, you're starting to give off a troll-vibe here, to me. 'Consigliere to a hollywood director' is a weird turn of phrase, and not particularly relevant... You're bouncing ideas of people willing to help you, but showing few signs of listening.

 yeri wrote:

exactly, that's because I've already got the game rules in my head, I just need to know the setting to get the right tone for the written rulebook. and in answer to your questions:

Great! But as you've shown so far, you can't explain them. Taking an idea that works in your head and putting it on paper and making it make sense to other people is the tough part, here.I've got no game writing credits to my name, and the closest I've gotten is occasionally bending the ear of some developers. From what I've seen, 90% of ideas are discarded. They either don't work for the game at hand, are too complex, don't fit the theme, or need substantial revising.

(Disclaimer: I have some half-written rules here and there myself. None are ready to present as of yet and some have some 'encumbrances' . Writing is hard work!)

To use the dreaded car-analogy, you're building a homer-mobile:


All those ideas work great together in your head, but that doesn't mean they'll work when it all has to be in a workable, understandable and mostly 'fixed' format.

 yeri wrote:

1) turn structure works like this: 1) player collects resources from units placed in the "logistics zone". 2) player draws a card from their army deck. 3) player may spend resources to deploy units. 4) player activates each of his units one at a time. 5) after all units have activated turn ends. at any point in your turn) you may play normal support cards. at any point in your turn or you opponent's turn) you may play rapid support cards.

Do I spend resources (what resources?) to deploy units? I thought that was what the cards were for?

I'm assuming 'normal support cards' are non-unit stuff (off-board bombardments or whatever that makes sense) and 'rapid support cards' are like M:tG interrupts. as someone else has suggested?

 yeri wrote:

2) ok so attacks are a bit different from normal games, and I've come up with two different systems depending on the setting. for a game that involves lots of guns the way it works is if you're shooting a weapon at half or less it's maximum range you use what's called "Close shooting Skill" (CS) to test against your opponent's defense (DEF) if you're at more than half you use Long shooting Skill (LS) you roll a d10 and add your skill to the roll, if you roll at or above their defense you've hit them. after that you do the same test using your strength (STR) vs. their Armor (ARM)

now for a fantasy game it's a little different. instead of having range based skills you have Combat Skill (CS) for melee, Ranged Skill (RS) for shooting, and magic skill (MS) for magic spells. there would also be a difference in the armor, all attacks would have a damage attribute that would tell you what kind of armor they test against, the types are: Piercing, Slashing, Bashing, and Magic. the first three test against their respective armors, but magic tests against a stat called "resistance" (RES)

Not that unique, really. Pretty basic d10+skill vs. the opponent's defense as a target. Having two for long range vs. short range is a little different, but Necromunda (probably 2nd edition 40k) did a slight variant on this decades ago: Weapons had modifiers for short and long range, as I remember.

 yeri wrote:

I'll answer the rest of your questions soon, but now I need to get to class.
EDIT: here's the answer to the rest of your questions: 3) armies are built as decks of between 30 and 60 cards, units are made up of 4 figures that are deployed together in close formation. in adition to the cards you select you will also have an HQ which will affect your army sort of like your choice of caster does in WM, giving you access to special abilities and buffs for your units.

Again, 120 figures is a pretty massive requirement. Does this '30' include the support cards? If the ratio is weird, this could get ugly. For example, what if I have a couple turns where the only thing I can play are support cards. Am I just SOL as far as getting units out?

(replies to Chaos's comments snipped.)

The 3rd reply hasn't been addressed. Genres. Just change it, especially if you want people to take your thread seriously.

In response to your questions:
yes I'm listed in the credits of several movies as Consigliere to the Director, here's a few of them:


basically in Hollywood jargon the Cosigliere to the director is an unofficial crew member who the director bounces ideas off of.

as far as the art: like I said I need to know what kind of setting its going to have first, that's kind of why I come here. I keep asking about the setting and everyone is keeps telling me they want to see rules. the problem is I need a setting before I can write the rules.

well I don't know how wargames factory does it, but if everyone seems to be quoting a price of about $100K I'd say they are probably making their molds to ISO class 101 mold, those things can run for almost 1,000,000 cycles before they need to be replaced, which is basically about the time that most companies do a re-sculpt. what i plan to do is use ISO class 103, which is the industry standard. the molds will need to be replaced more often, but in the long run it allows us to offer more plastic figures at a similar cost of manufacture.

also those Ottomans are really cool, where can I get some?

@HisDivineShadow: look sometimes I get typing so fast that unless I can see that a word is marked incorrect I don't even notice it's not the word I'm trying to use. also I got pulled out of my spelling classes in primary school to attend a gifted math class so it was kind of a min maxing thing.

@Mr. Burning: well like I said I need a setting to dictate the rules, so it's kind of difficult to give you rules without regards to the setting which is what I need.

@bosky: bingo!
-right on the money!
-rapid support cards are kind of like instants in MtG, you can play them during your turn or your opponents.
-what it adds is a level of rock paper scissors especially if I go with the fantasy version. basically you might have a unit that is good at dodging so they would have high defense, and a heavily armored unit would have high armor. in the fantasy version think about how chainmail reacts to different types of trauma: it works great on sharp force and blunt force, but perforation is a big weakness, so a unit with chainmail armor may have high Slashing Armor and medium Bashing Armor, but their Piercing armor will be low. it creates a system of counters in the game.

well you would have 30-60 cards, they don't all need to be units, in fact I honestly don't recommend you make them all units.
if you were to make them all units then yes in a very rare instance you could have like 240 units on the table at once, but the chances of that happening are very slim. well individual models look better at a 28mm scale and yes they do sort of function as wound tokens, but as a unit loses members you will also see their fighting ability drop significantly because there are less guys fighting.

@Balance:
not trying to troll here, I'm just trying to figure out the setting and all people seem to want to talk about are the rules. and it is relevant because that's the way my creative process works, I'm just trying to explain where I'm coming from.

well I'm really not trying to explain them here, I'm trying to figure out the setting. you guys seem to only ask about the rules and I'm trying to give you a picture but I just can't seem to make my words work because it seems like there's some kind of disconnect somewhere along the line.

tell me about it!

I know it looks like a Homer-Mobile now, but I'm really not even trying to build the car yet, if the rules are the chassis, the setting is the frame, I'm trying to build the frame right now but everyone seems to want to talk about the chassis.

think of resources like mana from MtG, your resources tell you how much of something you can use, the cards are basically the availability of those things. so you may have enough resources to deploy ten riflemen squads, but if you only have three riflemen squads available to you, you can't exactly deploy the ten you can afford.

yep normal support cards are basically support abilities that take some time to arrange, non dedicated artillery strikes could be one of them. rapid support cards are basically stuff that doesn't take a long time to arrange, like an artilary battery already set up to assist you and waiting for the order.

yea it's similar sort of to WM because well I need players to at least have some kind of reference point.

yea that may be a massive requirement numbers wise, but think about money wise: I've never paid less than $350 for a 35pt WM army with this game I can get a starter pack that will actually have everything I need to play for about $50 and a full army of only units should cost no more than $320 you can't even get a minimum 40K army that you could take to a club for that much. also yes that number does include the support cards, so the more support cards you add the cheaper your army gets.
think of it this way: if you can't get any units in your hand then it means that yea you're SOL for those turns, but you can still use your support cards to try and keep the enemy at bay. also there's a unique approach to being "decked" in this game: basically when you run out of cards in your deck you don't automatically lose, but you are at a major disadvantage because whatever is in your hand is all you've got for the rest of the game. basically it represents that the high command has lost faith in you and will no longer send you reinforcements.

morfydd wrote:
Bah just do up the combat system then build both games

THis.


Warmachine and Hordes is proof of concept that if your rule set is strong enough, you can use it for more than one game, and make them interchangeable (if that fits the genre).

Honestly, if you are not a designer, the very first thing is i'd find one to work with. Good rules are critical - good aesthetic design is crucial.

 yeri wrote:

@HisDivineShadow: look sometimes I get typing so fast that unless I can see that a word is marked incorrect I don't even notice it's not the word I'm trying to use. also I got pulled out of my spelling classes in primary school to attend a gifted math class so it was kind of a min maxing thing.

I dread the quality of your rules writing then.

well I was talking about when I post online, when I actually sit down to write the rules I'm sort of the opposite. I stress over every detail and phrase, that's kind of why I haven't written the rules down yet, every time I try I can't get past the first page before I start to worry that it's not right and start all over again. also I have an unofficial editor who is actually a corporate lawyer specializing in contract, entertainment, and tax law who goes through the rules with a fine toothed comb and no preconceptions from other games picking out anything that may cause a problem.

 yeri wrote:
well I was talking about when I post online, when I actually sit down to write the rules I'm sort of the opposite. I stress over every detail and phrase, that's kind of why I haven't written the rules down yet, every time I try I can't get past the first page before I start to worry that it's not right and start all over again. also I have an unofficial editor who is actually a corporate lawyer specializing in contract, entertainment, and tax law who goes through the rules with a fine toothed comb and no preconceptions from other games picking out anything that may cause a problem.

Good grief chief!

Homer mobile is right.

A corporate lawyer, a tax lawyer, a family who make plastic dodads, a director and a teacher for gifted math geniuses are not going to get your ideas out to us.

Son, you need to s*** or get off the pot.

And please correct the threads title.