Review - WtNW: Quick Play

Today a short follow-up review for the steampunk wargame When the Navy Walked by ArmChairGeneral. The full ruleset pdf was reviewed a few weeks back, beginning here, and the review was positive on many levels. On the whole, I like the game very much.

The assets for me were the rich setting, command-focused mechanics and almost complete freedom in unit, machine and army building. There's more on each aspect in the original review: setting in the first part; mechanics in the second; options in the third.

That third part puts an intriguing idea too, for the boldest. By giving us master points values and allowing a wide range of possible miniature scales, WtNW makes it easy to switch whole game worlds to this system if an original is too restrictive in terms of options. This makes the system a very powerful gaming tool, and something worth looking into for a gaming group wanting to stretch its legs.

Plenty of benefits then, but I did have a major reservation. I felt the presentation was making it difficult to understand and learn, throwing the reader in at the deep end and offering too little visual help, and that some of the rules were open to interpretation. My conclusion was that for these reasons the game would be best suited to more experienced wargamers, on friendly enough terms to discuss and compromise.

To his credit, ArmChairGeneral didn't simply shrug his shoulders and move on, but rose to the challenge, and he'd apparently already begun work on a simpler introduction to the game. This is the Quick Play pdf, and it's what I'm looking at here.

There are several key differences between the full pdf and the Quick Play. Most noticeably the new version is shorter, missing the extensive history of the setting and the rules for unit, machine and army building. In their place we have an introductory campaign of four linked scenarios, with ready-made army lists drawn from the exotic set in the full pdf. Although this means a less detailed context, together they go some way to conveying the flavour of the world; there are maps to accompany the scenarios too, adding more colour, and most of the illustrations and photos remain, as do some of the Edges and Flaws. For a stripped-down version, it doesn't feel especially bare.

The scenarios themselves are worth a specific mention. They're set during the 'African Land Grab' and see British and German forces clashing. While they could all be played alone, they're clearly designed to fit together and each builds in terms of forces or complexity on the next. The one issue is that there's arguably at least an assumption of a certain outcome in each successive encounter, although tweaking this could be as simple as reversing the force names. The colourful maps, drawn by Scrying Eye Games, show the lie of the land and give a sense of its character.

As for the game mechanics, there's a far more intuitive arrangement of information than there was. Another set of diagrams are added and key concepts are clarified. The large unit introductions from the fuller version are sent to the back as reference material and clearer, shorter intros placed with their outline graphic representations, which works well. I found myself nodding happily as I read, acknowledging the changes. There's a more comfortable learning curve, and I'd go as far as saying even a non-gamer could make head and tail of the wargaming idea and WtNW's specific approach.

In summary, the feedback from the last review has been taken into account and the result is an improvement on the key drawback, with bonus material to boot. 

An interesting situation then if you're thinking of firing up the boiler. The fuller pdf has the history, generic scenarios and freedom to build almost at will, but a heavier presentation of the mechanics. The Quick Play has no history section or build options, but an easier introduction and four specific scenarios. Admittedly the absolute prices are low, at $10 and $5 respectively, but the choice could still be tough. That's war I guess. You can see an excerpt of the first few pages of each at wargamevault.com, and the range as it stands is here. The full ruleset is now in a print version too, for $25 through the website.

As for the future, the supplement Conflict on Mars! is due and there'll be a review of that up at Yours in a White Wine Sauce at some point. I'll almost certainly do a brief one here too as I don't doubt I'll be getting worked up by it all - the grey aliens and their Overlord masters, even tripods. There are WtNW miniatures coming out for these too and ArmChairGeneral's blog is a good place to follow developments on that front.

All wrapped up here for now then. Almost.

This seems a good place to reiterate the recent exhortation. If you're sitting on a game or three - and most of us must be - play it, test it, write it up pretty and get it out here. If you want more and even better choice, and from smaller studios and individuals, go encourage the rest of the artists and games designers in the blogroll on the left.
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