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Peter Fisla -> RE: Why this vs. ASL (3/23/2016 10:44:37 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: genesismwt
To what everyone above has said, AMEN!
I have played Squad Leader(SL) since 1978. My only regret is that I don't have a Purple box SL(original print run).
This has 85-90% of ASL. But, it contains the parts that matter. TotH lets you play Squad Leader(SL) at any time of your choosing.
Here goes my rant: I am finding that I am in idjester's camp in that what has been left out is mostly unnecessary complexity. SL and ASLSK play fine without snipers. Walls, hedges, gullies, smoke, bypass movement, fire lanes, heroes, manhandling, overruns, infantry overruns,dash, street fighting, cavalry, motorcycles etc. all add flavor, but at a huge cost in complexity. However, the lack of these items in TotH does not prevent one from playing a game of SL. I have yet to play a game of SL that involves climbing. I figure one in three successful foxhole attempts actually provided value. That's something like a ten percent success rate for having dug a foxhole in game. Or, in other words, I could just have just done something else productive.
I would like to point out what TotH has going for it:
Convenience: you can play at any time that you can be at your computer. Set up is done in a handful of minutes, instead of an hour. Heck, once familiar with the editor, you can make a scenario in the time it takes to dig out maps and pieces, and set up. You don't have to bone up on any esoteric rules that are specific to the scenario that you are playing. If its in TotH, the computer pretty much takes care of that for you. If you can't finish in one setting, there's a quick and easy save game feature(as an computer game should have).
Focus: TotH lets you focus on what matters, fire and movement. Rallying and repairs are automatically done by the computer. Attacks and the resulting effects are resolved by the computer. Some complain about the lack of information provided by the game. At first, I lamented that I felt that half of the fun was looking at the charts and fretting over the odds before I throw the dice. In the end though, the odds don't matter when you only have one action available. You do what you have to do, or die trying. I don't need a chart to tell me that running in the open in front of a heavy machine gun(HMG) that has not yet fired has a low chance of success. It doesn't matter whether the HMG as 6, 7 or 8 FP, you still have a low chance of success running in the open in front of that HMG. If you have to try, you try. I don't need the charts to know that the only chance that my Sherman tank has to kill a King Tiger is to flank it. TotH lets me focus on the fire and maneuver, not on the math and the dice rolling it takes to complete the fire and maneuver that's required in SL.
Cost effectiveness: For the $50.00(add $10.00 if you also want a hard copy) you are effectively getting all of the ASLSK's, Beyond Valor, Yanks, and For King and Country(with the Desert boards added, El Alamein now too!). With a little imagination, the flavor of the other modules can be captured also. A prior poster in this thread made an excellent Pacific scenario, Makin Atoll Raid, simulating Marine raiders by using elite US Army, and using the British for the Japanese.
Thanks for letting me rant. I am in no way dissing ASL, I wouldn't be here if I didn't love ASL. Should some of my previously noted unnecessary features of ASL show up in future TotH updates, will I embrace them? Of course! I am just saying that I don't need a wall or smoke to cover movement, I will find another way. Sometimes you don't have those things when or where you would like them in your game of ASL. I appreciate TotH for what it is, SL on the computer(finally! Thanks Peter!).
Wow, thank you for your support genesismwt! :)
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