Blame the TooFatLardies

[Steve J]

Steve, I am not convinced that £20 for a set of full colour rules is expensive.  Gamers seem very happy to spend hundreds of pounds on figures, but when you ask them what game they are playing they answer "IABSM" or "Sharp Practice" (or FOW, or BKC or Rapid Fire).  In truth the rules that they are using are actually the cheapest part of the game.  The figures cost more, the terrain costs more, in some cases even the dice cost more.   Yet what is it that makes the game?  Surely the rules? 

I think £20 for a ruleset is good value for money, especially given the seemingly relentless way rules appear to be going down the GW route of a ruleset followed by inumerable supplements. This is especially true of FoW and by the look of it, Black Powder and Force-on-Force. But then these companies are businesses first and foremost, so I suppose this is how they can keep interest in their products and thus stay in business.

My personal favourite rules are the xxCommander series by Pete Jones; I get everything I need in one book for £20, there is no fluff and the core rules cover about 10 pages, the rest being examples of play and army lists. But then Pete has a full-time job so doesn't rely upon the series as his sole income. The rules are also backed up by a great Forum, with additional free downloads, FAQs etc. For me it just ticks all the boxes.

On the subject on the rules being the cheapest part of the game, a lot naturally depends upon the scale used and the size of games played. With FoW, the rules and supplements for one period, say NWE, would cost way more than a battlegroup if I was using Pendraken or H&R. I reckon I could still do it in 15mm with a bit of tweaking where the rules were 50%, the battlegroup 50% in terms of cost. When I bought RoE about 5 years ago, the rules and templates cost slightly less than than a re-inforced platoon with support in 28mm. Now if I did BP in 28mm, then the rules are by far and away the cheapest part of the game.

So, that's my two penneth for what it's worth .

I have had a look at the Lardies website as a result of this discussion, and I must admit the rulesets do look good. If I ever get the chance to watch a game in action, I will. No one down this neck of the woods plays any of the games I'm afraid.

TTFN.

Steve J. (Not sure if I'm the Steve at the start of your last post Rich?)

[sunjester]

I played the new edition of IABSM on Tuesday with Last Hussar, and I have to say I was very impressed. We played Scenario One "North of Caen"had an really enjoyable game (well I enjoyed it with my Germans).

My prefered WW2 rules are BKC in 10mm, although I do occasionally dabble with TW&T in 20mm. While i won't be chucking BKC out I can see myself playing IABSM quite a lot in the future. Next Friday we will be trying another scenario out with some tanks.