"Polyversal 6mm Sci-Fi Game" Topic

Something I stumbled across during a Google-fu session. Was unable to find anything here on TMP about it, so I thought I'd pass it along.

polyversal-game.com

I really enjoy the "different dice for different quality" mechanic that Dirtside and Pride of Lions use. I am looking forward to seeing more about this system.

yeah stumbled on this myself. Its a must buy for me as i love 6mm rules….

Savage Worlds and Tommorow's War are other examples of polyhedral quality dice mechanics.

Interesting.

Still not much information out there. I follow Collins Epic Wargames on Facebook, waiting for info, but there isnt much.

collinsepicwargames.com
link

Not much more info, but there is some talk on the plasmablast home page link

Look forward to see what rumbles, can we have more 6mm dropships please ;-)

PS guys, you might want to credit Brigade Models for the Power Armour in the image, especially as you are working with them!

However that aside, looks a very well produced package at this stage and well done to all concerned. Interested for some pointers on which way any new ranges will be going and who will be involved in creating them.

I would love to see some more information about this along with some pic's.

I do love the render of that Marhaf Machines tank on the Plasmablast site.
When/if that one came out I'd buy a ton of those.

Interested, but not too much info is available. I'm looking forward to seeing more.

NICE tank, would love to see how the game plays.

Just found this thread…
Byron from Collins Epic Wargames will be at GAMA Trade Show in Las Vegas next week with some new tidbits, including some prototype combatant tiles. We have been quietly working on it behind the scenes. I hope to get some more info out in the near future.

Ken Whitehurst, designer of Polyversal

Cant wait!!!!

There was a tiny preview here: link

They are talking to the designer on the Meeples and Miniatures podcast: meeplesandminiatures.co.uk

Savage Worlds and Tommorow's War are other examples of polyhedral quality dice mechanics.

And, of course, Silent Death.

(pause… 5… 6… 7… 8…)

Hi Leland!

:)

John T

Ken

I just listened to Neil's podcast.

I was the chap that did the Silent Death adaptation to Low Level Hell back in '98. link

The 'three dice, roll them once and read them twice' approach from Silent Death: I love it too. My first version of Hammer's Slammers rules used the same system.

Looking forward to yours. I'd love to review it for MiniWargs when it coms out (though I might have to fight Neil for it!).

John T

I'm still listening to the podcast episode, but like what I'm hearing. I look forward to getting hold of the rules and giving them a go.

Silent Death is a smaller scale game, though, isnt it? Not many fighters on the map at once, or am I thinking of a different game?

Kealios – I think youre right in as much as I've rarely played Silent Death with more than 4 or 5 ships under one player.

But – if I'm reading Ken aright – doesn't a Polyversal force have some 7 elements, max: the command hexagon and up to six hexes around it. Sure, being 1/300th, each element has a few things on it (tanks and what-not) but I think they're treated as one thing. But I'm only going by what I could deduce from the poscast so.. what do I know!

John

Actually listening to the podcast again now. I think one unit (for want of more precise word) would be composed of up to 6 elements under a command element, but there are likely to be more than one such unit. If I understand correctly….

No, John is correct. That each hexagon is a "unit" under the commanders hex. But apparently "a good game is three sets of those", which I think means three commander hexes with their groups of units. Described as three companies.

Thanks for checking in John! Your work has been an inspiration.

You and Kealios are right about the number of ships in a Silent Death game, but one difference between SD and Polyversal has to do with the focus on scale. In SD, ships are degraded by marking boxes off of stat sheets, and take many hits over the course of a game.

In Polyversal, most combatants, when relatively evenly-matched, are clearly either missed, or killed. Only the superheavies and larger typically take multiple hits. Main and light vehicles can take damaging (rather than killing) hits, but often are destroyed in the very next shot).

A "unit" is represented by a combatant tile, and typically represents a platoon-sized unit, so 1 or 2 superheavies, or 3-6 MBTS, APCS, etc., or 5-10 infantry stands. The tiles are organized into a battlegroup of a commander and up to six units. When you activate a unit, you are moving and/or shooting with one tile's worth of combatants. You do make individual die rolls per shot, they are not aggregated. Colossal vehicles may have quite a few weapons, but are only one per tile, whereas more populous units (of infantry, recon bikes, etc.) usually will have only one weapon per combatant. In practice, even rolling 6-10 attacks, it moves quickly because most of the time the smaller calibre weapons are immediately determined to be a miss/no effect at a glance, so it is just a matter of quick rolls in succession. It typically only slows down when larger vehicles get involved, as there are more possibilities that can arise from a hit (stress, weapons down, immobilized, etc.). Consider how Epic dealt with Titans versus most units. Most units were quick affairs. Titans required choosing a target on a diagram rolls to hit/armor, etc., deviation, then results on table. More complex and dangerous vehicles should have more detailed results.

John: the combatants in a single unit (3 tanks, for example) are not treated as one thing. They all are activated together as a unit, but they designate targets and roll separately for their shots.

Ken