"General Quarters 3 Rules" Topic

I own the old GQ red and blue books. Can anyone please tell me the benefits of buying GQ3? Does it cover 1914-1945? Thanks

The new version comes in 2 parts, one for WW2 (General Quarters) and one for WW1 (Fleet Action Imminent). It's the next evolution of the game concepts. Still fast play and lets players command multiple ships, but it is a serious upgrade, not just a "tweak."

Oh, so you have to buy BOTH sets…wow, that's pretty expensive. Thanks for the heads up. Probably just stick to my old set. Thanks alot

You don't have to buy both sets – only if you want both wars. The games add a lot while still keeping it fast play like EC said. However, from the rules that have been added, aside from basic movement and combat, you can decide what you want to use or not. Basic ship-to-ship combat didn't changed a lot.

FWIW, I recommend the older versions (GQ I and II), if you already have them. I have GQ III, have skimmed the rules, but didn't like various changes made. I would say that the original design delivers more realism "per unit complexity", and is easier to modify to your preferences. One caveat is that I *have* modified them, including doubling movement to make it correspond to the time scale, fixing the straddle table to correspond to my historical preferences, modifying SDSs, converting "inches" to thousands of yards to allow easy switch between ground scales, etc.

Even so, GQ III looks like a good rule set, and I would probably use it if I didn't already have the earlier versions.

Mark

Of course many of those changes that you've done to GQ1 are in GQ3 – moves corresponding to time scale, distances in thousands of yards.
But the mechanics of GQ1/2 are indeed simpler than GQ3. Depends how much detail you want.
If you buy GQ3 as PDFs it's not that expensive.

Depends how much detail you want.

The problem is that I found too much of the detail to be questionable; for example in the country-specific CRTs. A common error we fall into, IMHO, is to confuse complexity and detail with accuracy. With GQ III, a consequence of this is that when one disagrees with something, the greater complexity of the supporting paperwork (charts, tables, etc.) makes changes more difficult. Now because GQ III gives you download-able pdfs (for registered purchasers), if you have a pdf editor, you can change them and reprint. If you are the type who wants to do this to a rule set, I advise you to price pdf editors before you buy.

Still, as I said before, if you can't find GQ I and II, I would recommend GQ III as a good third choice.

Mark

Actually, the nation specific CRTs in GQ3 is one of the strong points of the game since it allows those subtle differences between each navy's combat systems to be represented in a painless manner. And the damage system is considerably expanded over GQ1/2 allowing a more detailed game (again, without sacrificing ease of play).

The air combat is particularly good reflecting the difference doctrines for such important items as fleet defense.

That said, GQ1/2 are a good set of rules. Their only fault (if you can all it that) is their age; GQ1 is, afterall, 40 YEARS old. An awful lot of information has surfaced since then and GQ3 is the beneficiary of that.

And as for the ease of play of GQ1/2 over GQ3, I've had players comment that GQ3 is easier since it does away with the 'math problem' needed for combat (something the math challenged in my group always had trouble with).

And finally, I'd advise not opening the CRTs with a pdf editor. First, the editors only work with fairly simple documents (and the CRTs are anything but). And second, unless you have the exact same fonts loaded (not always a given) you're liable to end up with an unintelligible mush. (And I speak from experience on this.)

Well coastal2, you and I disagree as to the historical accuracy of some of the stuff in the CRTs. Of course, when one questions the CRTs, the extra detail is no longer an asset. For example, I tend to agree with Norman Friedman, who is of the opinion that the newer WWII British surface fire control systems (ex: AFCT Mk IX) were the best (see his "Naval Firepower" book), but the respective German / British surface CRTs don't seem to show this. The CRTs imply that the heavier and probably more efficient British 15" shell was less effective than the German, and this is questionable, especially for ships with a modernized FCSs. I haven't recently calculated the effective broadside of a GQ III KGV versus the Bismarck, but the former should be slightly better than the latter, based on weight of APC shell, and FCSs. One can argue that stuff like this is relatively unimportant, but then why have the extra detail at all? Other examples are that I don't particularly like the way triple turrets and above are penalized (heavy guns rarely fired at their maximum rates, and what about quadruple turrets?). I don't like rolling large numbers of dice. Etc.

For what it's worth, I'm sure I would find an equal or greater amount of issues with many of the other popular rule sets, such as Naval Thunder, Micronauts, or SeeKreig. I would therefore use GQ III if I wasn't able to use I or II. I realize that you have a slightly different opinion WRT the GHQ variants. BTW, are you by any chance affiliated with ODGW?

WRT editing PDFs, I used to have access to Adobe Acrobat (a $400 USD-plus piece of software), and it worked fine for editing the GQ III PDFs. The problem you refer to is probably experienced when one uses less professional / less expensive PDF editors. Perhaps one of the "free" ones.

Mark

GQ3's big advantage over GQ1 & 2 is that it is scaleable for smaller ships.

A game of 3 destroyers v 3 destroyers is worth playing with GQ3 while it isnt much cop for GQ1&2.

Mark-

Well, that there will differences on the interpretation of the history of the period goes without saying (even professional historians differ in their interpretations; that gamers and game designers have the same differing opinions is no surprise). So you having a different take on the period to Lonnie's (Lonnie Gill, designer of GQ1/2/3) is perfectly valid. And that's why we have so many games with so many different approaches (in design and play); every author with his own interpretation of the history and his own ideas on game play.

Bottomline is finding a game that YOU enjoy. And if that entails massaging an existing game, then that's fine, too. (Besides, is there a gamer alive that hasn't changed a set rules in some way?)

As for GQ1/2, I still play it (and enjoy it, a lot). A nice, good set of rules that gives good results. And still popular 40 years later. The only down side is that the publisher of GQ1/2 (which is not ODGW) has allowed the rules to go OOP and evidently doesn't intend to do another print run. Luckily, there are some stocks out there on shop shelves and they show up pretty regularly on the secondary markets (you can still find GQ1/2, but you may have to work at it).

My comments about pdf editors was primarily aimed at the low end editors (freeware and low cost). Some of those can be pretty grim. Of course, if you have access to a high end professional grade editor, then things are obviously different (but that's something most of us don't have or can't justify the cost of).