"Black Powder 2.0 Driving me nuts!" Topic

Let me start by saying I used to play BP back in the day so I'm not totally a newbie but getting back into it via 2nd Edition is proving a pain.

Since my previous time with it there have been three Napoleonic supplements (thankfully all written by the same person) and now the new edition has its own alterations.

There are new rules suggestions in all three supplements (by far the most in the last one – Clash of Eagles) the majority of which a well worth adding to the basic game and then of course there are some "advanced" additions in the rules themselves.

Playing the Peninsular War I have swerved Albion Triumphant – Waterloo but this still means looking at three books to check on a particular item as you learn and to cap it all the two supplements AT-P and CoE are cross referenced to the original BP pages being written and published prior to the 2nd Edition.

Further more I noted elsewhere people getting excited about the 2nd Edition have an Index – what a joke that turns out to be! Many Items have 15 to 20 page numbers listed and some 25 – 30. Some entries are linked to just a couple of lines of text which in turn direct you to another page that's also in the list for the actual explanation!

Its better than having no index but in some places you end up looking through the entire rules section of the book any way!

Not to mention the fact that to get the ultimate rules experience of BP as a Napoleonic set you end up buying a something that cost £76.00 GBP!

Yes, I appreciate there's more to each book than just the playing rules but as they can't be separated out, if you want the rules that's the price!

I happen to think the rules in total will be a good set at what they do but I also think the inconvenience, marketing and price sucks!

What in earth is the problem?

The core rules are very simple to learn.

Just type out the supplement rules you want to use in brief, which will take about half a side of paper. Print out,done.

Sell up and try a decent game?

Good to know. I am still going to purchase a copy of the 2nd edition.

Just learn the core rules.….you don't need to learn the core rules AND all the supplements, unless you want to play one of the supplements.

Actually that's not quite true if you want a broader game.

There are a quite a lot of rules in Clash of Eagles that are very useful and not tied to the 1812 Campaign or the armies there of.

Command variations for Prussian, Russian and Austrian armies and more detailed rules covering different terrain types for example. In fact the terrain rules could be used in a number of BP periods. The AWI and ACW would be two of them.

It's a shame they are locked away by virtue of the fact some players will have no direct interest of Napoleon in Russia and not buy the supplement as a result.