tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3469427374826339357.post5578945642809936952..comments2023-11-11T00:11:28.141-06:00Comments on BattleTech Engineer: A Reply To My IneptitudeBad Syntaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05952088688624485275noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3469427374826339357.post-84692997087577773042012-09-30T10:02:42.687-05:002012-09-30T10:02:42.687-05:00Basically, the system generation rules in ATOW Com...Basically, the system generation rules in ATOW Companion are just worthless for generating a system. However, it is an RPG system, and the GM can do whatever he wants for system generation. The book says the GM should use his own creativity, so why they put a half-assed version of what is sure to be more detailed in IO is beyond me.<br /><br />It would be like having the first battletech book only telling you how to get the engine rating for a mech, without listing out weights for all your equipment, gyros, cockpits, etc. It is just an incomplete set of rules that I seriously think should have just been left out of this book entirely. The book itself has a lot of great stuff in it, but system generation simply isn't one of those things.<br /><br />If I'm going to build a system I won't use any BT resources. Even the original black small Traveller books did a much better job, and while not by any means scientifically accurate, FAR more so based on the knowledge of the time than these rules. <br /><br />The highest life, well *I* don't really care for it, but that is my opinion and I can't tell others it shouldn't be there. However, we only have 1 sampling of data (Earth) and its pretty darned hard to extrapolate an algorithm based on a single dataset. What if insects or fish ended up surpassing mammals in intelligence, what is the highest life form? I'm nitpicking on that, to me if a planet has an ecosystem developed enough for human life, its got mammals there. THAT is a detail I'd rather leave up to GM's, not letting them "guess" on how a binary star system works or how few asteroids there actually are in an asteroid belt.<br /><br />In their defense tho, there are probably only about 10K BT players worldwide, so they simply *have* to produce for the lowest common denominator to sell the most of anything in order to continue their business. Board/miniature games simply don't have the popularity they did 20 years ago, and based on my own encounters with gamers I can only see that number decline even more as people like me get deterred and simply stop playing it.Bad Syntaxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05952088688624485275noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3469427374826339357.post-43371368631539790472012-09-30T01:23:46.557-05:002012-09-30T01:23:46.557-05:00I suspect you could indeed roll moons the same as ...I suspect you could indeed roll moons the same as planets, but on everything else that guy is misreading or overreacting. (And seems blissfully unaware of Neopithicanthropus, heh.) No big deal. <br /><br /><br />A couple of things I did wonder about:<br /><br />-this "lite" system generator is presumably aimed at normal interstellar characters rather than explorers, so it ought to generate inhabited systems by default. Does it? (I could figure it out from your spreadsheet, but the randomizer breaks a little in OpenOffice, and I haven't taken the time to fix it yet.)<br /><br />-Catalyst sometimes spends so many words explaining what they've left out that they could have just included it (or at least a quick-fix of it) to begin with. Is that the case at all here? <br /><br />-minus the governments section, this generator seems about the same length as the one in Explorer Corp. You usually prefer the more detailed version of a ruleset, and here you say that Explorer Corps' version was more detailed, yet in a previous post you said the aToW:Companion beats them. Have you changed your mind, or are there things that this new system does better?<br /><br />PS: I always liked the "% native life" and "highest life form" entries as stand-ins for more complex information. Biosphere, habitats, type of vegetation, climate, geologic age, hospitability to humans, chance of living off the land, and so on. SkilTaohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15496366094516039415noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3469427374826339357.post-12426565669414138602012-09-28T12:13:03.590-05:002012-09-28T12:13:03.590-05:00My point was (and still is) you are complaining ab...My point was (and still is) you are complaining about a book not being something when it clearly says what it is and isn't. It's akin to complaining that the milk you are drinking just isn't great because what you were wanting was pop. You knew (supposedly) what you were getting, so judge it on its own merits, not ones you *assumed* it would have.<br /><br />Personally, I think it does well what it states to be. A basic outline to be used for planetary system generation. You want more detail? Wait for Interstellar Operations.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05431578410057070779noreply@blogger.com