"What makes a good sci-fi game...?" Topic

Is the key to great games mostly about the rules or the fluff.
I am going so say fluff.

Look at historical gamers (they/we) game that period as that is what interests them, the history of it all.
Most Napoleonics players play that period as they like the history.
I doubt they found a great set of rules and decided to play Napoleonics because the rules were swanky, more likely they chose the rules to match their period.

The same with sci-fi I guess.
I like sci-fi because of the look of the vehicles and aliens and things.
I can create my own world and am not bound by adhering to correct historical details.

I don't like sci-fi simply because I think they have the best rules.
All periods have great rules.

In fact with my own sci-fi rules the fluff came first.
I started gaming sci-fi using modern rules and wrote the fluff for each game.
It was the story and the backdrop that I enjoyed.
As the fluff grew I wrote some rules to use with them.

I chose the rules to best allow my fluff to come alive.
(what did I just say…)

What do you like best?
Playing with a favourite set of rules in various backdrops or playing your favourite backdrop?
Or models, will you play with good models even if the fluff and rules suck?
Or cake?

For me it is models first, backdrop/fluff second, rules next/last.

Mmm…cake…

Rules/mechanics.

Particularly mobility. Make movement matter in the game. So many WH40K games really only matter in a small 18x18 inch square of the larger 4x6 foot battlefield, because that's where everyone goes to get stuck in.

I much prefer games that encourage squads to range all over the battlefield, securing objectives and occupying fortifications over the course of an 8-turn game.

If we're just going to put our toys on the battlefield and then roll dice for 2 hours, that's just a diorama.

I chose the rules to best allow my fluff to come alive.

For me, the rules have to permit a good range of options for units and play styles, and have something beyond the hit/wound/save mechanic for combat.

The game should allow me to use figures of my choosing (if in a fictional background; in historical games, I really like accuracy over 'characterful'). I'll buy toys I like the look of, but if I don't like the game they're made for I'll use them with another rules set.

'Fluff' doesn't matter too much in the long run – we can always come up with our own reasons for our toys to fight.

Good point Patrick, I concur in the desire for 'mobility' on the tabletop battlefield, it was this that drew me to 6 mm for sci-fi over the more (then) available 15 or 28 mm. Admittedly my 'megalomania' has created some larger 'task force' units than originally intended and a lot more factions too……but it is that flexibility in deploying Merc or Corporate backed units against each other and/or indigs that allows it all to come together……..a decent set of rules helps, I used the original Slammers rules from Pireme but am settling with FUBAR as a base with mods having g gone thru' Iron Cow on the way!
It's finding the balance of nice models and terrain (AB:-) with playable rules that work for you………if you don't get the enjoyment then some part of the 'balance' is out of kilter……..

Good point Patrick, I concur in the desire for 'mobility' on the tabletop battlefield, it was this that drew me to 6 mm for sci-fi over the more (then) available 15 or 28 mm. Admittedly my 'megalomania' has created some larger 'task force' units than originally intended and a lot more factions too……but it is that flexibility in deploying Merc or Corporate backed units against each other and/or in digs that allows it all to come together……..a decent set of rules helps, I used the original Slammers rules from Pireme but am settling with FUBAR as a base with mods having g gone thru' Iron Cow on the way!
It's finding the balance of nice models and terrain (AB:-) with playable rules that work for you………if you don't get the enjoyment then some part of the 'balance' is out of kilter……..

Well if you are looking for a game with figures, those pretty much take priority, with rule system coming in a very, very, close 2d. Otherwise games with counters, then rules take priority. The thing about figures, they can generally be used in various gaming systems … sometimes with little modification to rules. My idea for rules with my predilection for 6mm Sci-fi, besides GW E:A, are DRM Seeds Of War, The Crucible, Strike Legion, FWC, DS, to name a few off the top of my head. It really comes down to what a player is looking for in gaming rules. For example, of the 4 iterations of GW Epic, we found most of E:A the best and almost ALL of SM2 the worst of the worst … As far as fluff goes, unless it radically affects the rule system, it's just that fluff, ie.: a nice story line. GW Space Marines can fill the bill for many of the gaming fluff out there, along with GZG's infantry. As well as CinC, DRM, Exodus Wars, Microworld, Old Crow, Darkest Star, etc. models can work regardless of the fluff. Rules like Strike Legion and FWC takes into account many models from various model producers. Of course to play with my 6mm Slammers say using E:A, we'd have to do a little "rule tweeking". Like give a Hammer M2 MBT, 2 or 3 times the stats/cost of an Epic Shadowsword … making it particularly powerful keep with the Slammer-verse tech level/fluff. Or just stat an M2, like a Shadowsword. Or a DRM or Exodus Wars MBT as a proxie model for an Epic Leman Russ … Fluff is the last thing in my mind that goes into a gaming system. Figures/Rules and then fluff … IMO …

I used to love the weapons and off the wall weapons effects in the OLD 40K / RT world, Facing an unstoppable trooper in god armor and shields? Shoot him with a graviton gun and pin him to the ground and out of the game :) That game used to be all about having fun.

Light sabres.

What else?

The key to a great game no matter what genre are your fellow players. Even a game with a great set of rules can be ruined if your playing with a bunch of jerks.

It's complicated.

Rules matter, and often are tied to background assumptions ie: fluff.

Your fellow players have to be into the game as much as you, otherwise it's not much fun, however good the rules are.

Miniatures matter to me, but not necessarily to others, and using miniatures has implications too as it affects the assumptions underlying the rules.

However, the most important thing to me is the theme eg: giant stompy robots rule, or giant cybertanks rule, or whatever. If the theme feels right, by having a high SF quotient, the definition of which will vary from person-to-person, then that will attract me to a game.

Explosions.. Lots of rockets and lasers creating huge fireballs and smoking craters. And powered armor.. gotta have some kind of powered armor.

Rules.

Good rules good game. Bad rules bad game.

Get good rules (or create) and then plug in your favorite minis.

Yes mobility matters. Long ago we converted Command Decision to SF just to get the feel of sweeping advances etc.

Don't need 6mm for mobility, we've done it in 20mm for years.

TomT

This probably won't help, but as far as Fluff and Rules are concerned, I have to have them both. Chances are good that if I'm not interested in the fluff, I won't be interested in the rules. The flip side, I'm interested in the Fluff, but the rules are "clunky"…then that is a turn off as well.

I'd say you're right though really, fluff is what my initial attraction is to a rule set. However, it does go beyond that once the initial "attraction" is over..the rules have got to deliver!

lol…kinda sounds like dating…kinda

When I was a foolish teenager, the fluff sold me on the game. Bought into GW and this game called Legions of Steel because I thought the idea was cool.

Many years later, the models are what sucked me into Infinity, combined with the almost-RPG rules (all you need to bolt on to the Infinity core rules are non-combat skills). When there are multiple reasons to take a hacker, or a doctor, or an engineer, that's a good ruleset IMO.

I bought Tomorrow's War (and the Dagger and Talon expansion) because I love the basic Ambush Alley rules and was trying to minimize the number of rulesets I need to remember.

Bad rules ruin a game. Good rules fade into the background and allow one to enjoy the models and fluff.
Bad models reduce my enjoyment. Good models heighten the experience.
Bad fluff can be ignored. Good fluff provides an incentive to play but cant save games with bad rules

When I do sci fi I think Aliens, high tech gear, lasers and big explosions. Oh, the aliens must look alien, not a human in a rubber suit.

Sound effects.

The rules have to simulate the fluff, and I have to like the fluff. Thats why X-Wing Miniatures hits all cylinders for me.

Fluff will pull in lots of players. Without that critical mass, you have no one to play with.

That said, Battletech became massively popular because of the "robots," when there was little or no fluff or people just didn't know the fluff.

For me it's the rules. I'd played lots of sci-fi minis rules and most of the earlier versions of GW's Epic and could not get interested, even when I got several armies in trade. I didled about with homebrew rules of doubtful quality, even to me. Then came Epic Armageddon and I've been hooked ever since. It's perfect for both scenarios and 'meeting engagements', gives me lots of options, rapid movement all over the table, and alien armies that play vastly different from the human ones.
That said, good friendly players is equally important. Fluff is somewhere in the background and seldom thought about.

"That said, … Fluff is somewhere in the background and seldom thought about." … Yep …

Good rules that can bend like a reed in the wind, okay maybe not like that but rules that have a little flex to them in those grey areas that come up were there were no rules, and some fluff other wise your just playing a different form of chess

My favorite scifi miniatures (or wargame) rules were the old Battletech rules. Which was all about the fluff, so I would have to go with fluff.

As much as I like fluff, which IMO makes the game a little more savoury.
You can play a game without it. Hard to play without rules.

What I now realize is that if I was a Ghost Buster the destroyer would have come in the form of a three inch thick rule book in 7 point type.