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Some friends and I were playing a big game of Dystopian Wars yesterday, and we were finding ourselves somewhat hindered by the rules. Furthermore, it's no secret that there are balance issues both intrafaction and interfaction. Sloppy wording in the rulebook led to confusion about the intended meaning of rules, and some rules are seemingly absent or hidden somewhere bizarre. The thing is, we (well, at least I) really like the setting, and some of the game mechanics make for a really entertaining game. The ship combat is fun, and the exploding D6 mechanic is quite unique and entertaining. So, the question is this.

If you were re-writing the rules to Dystopian Wars, what would you fix? Where are it's major problems, what needs to be addressed? This is part of a planned project to fix up the rules and make a houseruled player's guide to DW which we - and hopefully others - can play by.

I look forward to seeing what you come up with! While I've been enjoying the game quite a bit as-is, I admit there are a few areas that could use some refinement. In the interest of not re-inventing the wheel, I thought I woudl point out that there has a been a lot of discussion about this very topic over at the SG forums. Check out these 2 threads in particular:

http://forum.spartangames.co.uk/smf/index.php?topic=7771.0

http://forum.spartangames.co.uk/smf/index.php?topic=6037.0

I'll also try to briefly summarize for those that don't have time to read through all that .

While of course there are many different opinions and thoughts on this topic, there seems to be a wide consensus on several particular issues:

-Some models are not pointed/stated well. One example often cited for under-costing is the PE Sky Fortress, while an example of over-costing would be the KoB battleship.

-Obscured flyers are generally regarded as OP, due to the resiliency gained by only being hit on a 6; this problem is exacerbated by the Altitude Skimming MAR. A common proposal is to nerf this modifier to a 5+ instead of a 6.

-Some players have expressed concern over Indirect Fire; using an attached recon plane and a scout flyer allows a modification of indirect fire such that it hits on a 4+, like a normal shooting attack would. This would mean that a fleet with long range shooting could sit back behind an island and pound any approaching enemy without reprisal.

-Tiny flyers a bit too fiddly for their own good. Proposed solutions include dropping the fuel tracking entirely, or limiting tiny flyers to only those that can be launched by a carrier (ie, no automatic 10 free tokens).

-As a subset of the point above, Tiny Flyers are also of limited value due to their vulnerability to Ack Ack and the length of time involved in re-arming and re-launching them after they have made their attacks.

-Faction Balance: Right now, there is a lot of debate over which faction is the "weakest." The KoB are commonly discussed here, due to their under-performing cruisers and battleship, while the PE are also often discussed as being towards the bottom due to their relative fragility (no shields on the cruisers) and lack of a weapon system that is not affected by damage (like bombs and torps). One often proposed solution to that problem is to house-rule that Tesla weapons are not affected by damage. The FSA are generally described as being a bit over the top, as they have a strong defense (shields, an additional point of DR over other factions) and a strong offense (effective long range shooting).

There are probably more points I'm glossing over, but those are the ones that immediately spring to mind!

Well, that's certainly enough to get going on! Thanks, Ruckdog, it's good to get some feedback from someone who's put as much time into the game as you have. I'll have a trawl through those threads for inspiritation.

It seemed like the critical hit table was the biggest gripe, along with indirect fire being silly. I think that would be remedied with a single change: Allow a +1 from a spotter or from a recon plane, but not both. It's not uncommon for our games to limit the ability of bonuses of the same type from different sources to stack.

Also, what's the deal with flying units? Do people leave them obscured, and just go with the 6's to hit enemies? When I leave my fliers obscured, they tend to do jack all to the enemy. I have to come out of the clouds to really do any damage, so I felt it was balanced to hit obscured on 6's unless using ack ack. How much do people stay obscured and bank on rolling lots of 6's?

Well, the problem with flyers is that they can stay obscured until they are in prime attack/boarding range, avoiding the worst of an enemy's fire. So no, the idea is not to leave them obscured, the idea is to leave them obscured until they are close enough to wreak havoc.

Speaking for myself, I tend to leave my flyers obscured until I hit RB 2, maybe RB 1. It depends a lot on when they are being activated, and what else the enemy has left to activate.

See the thing with that is, it basically allows the enemy to maximize their firepower. When you get into RB1, rockets [which most fliers seem to be armed with] actually become less effective, plus you give the enemy a free out-of-turn shot from their whole squadron if you're trying to shoot in RB1. In addition, on their turn while up until now they've been shooting their guns at surface targets [or trying to hit your fliers on 6's] now they're able to shoot guns at surface targets AND ack ack at your fliers, increasing their ships' utility.

Now what I've found recently is that by making a nearly all flying fleet, I can basically auto-win against the brits - their torpedoes are useless then, and if I can play keep away with my frigates, they have the choice of shooting my Ika or.....well that's it really, and he can take the fire.

Spellbound wrote:See the thing with that is, it basically allows the enemy to maximize their firepower. When you get into RB1, rockets [which most fliers seem to be armed with] actually become less effective, plus you give the enemy a free out-of-turn shot from their whole squadron if you're trying to shoot in RB1. In addition, on their turn while up until now they've been shooting their guns at surface targets [or trying to hit your fliers on 6's] now they're able to shoot guns at surface targets AND ack ack at your fliers, increasing their ships' utility.

Now what I've found recently is that by making a nearly all flying fleet, I can basically auto-win against the brits - their torpedoes are useless then, and if I can play keep away with my frigates, they have the choice of shooting my Ika or.....well that's it really, and he can take the fire.

Don't forget about bombs, though. Once you get into RB1, who needs rockets when you have bombs ? They also have the advantage of not being ack-ackable or blockable by shields. And, once you've softened up your target with bombs and/or your surface fleet, most flyers a packed to the gills with marines for boarding. Finally, Ack Ack is not too scary in a lot of situations...a squadron of undamaged cruisers is giong to put up about 5 AD of ack ack, which might just get through on an armor 4 or 5 medium flyer, but is not very effective against an armor 6 or 7 larger flyer. A BB or DN is a different matter, of course. A target like that is best softened up by your own large surface models before your flyers go in.

Well the gyro for example is DR4. The blimps are DR5. I suppose when you get into the war gyro it's a bit nastier, but also call me crazy but I find bombs hard to get into position. The fact that they have to be in a fixed channel behind you and within 4" is rough. And though the picture makes one think you hit everything in the channel, it never mentions you hit everything, just that everything in the channel is a valid target [and the middle tank, while a valid target, will be hit with half dice if you choose to shoot it]. So I think bombs still target just one thing.