Highway: 2000 vs Car Wars

[ak_aramis]

Many years ago (is it really 17 years ago? Yep. Oy.) I got Hell on Wheels.
I'd been a Car Wars casual player for a year or two. And I see reference to these two other car combat games.
I got a chance to read Battlecars...

but I kept an eye out and hadn't seen Highway: 2000.
But I managed to get it in 2020... it was still in shrink, but nastily smokey... Cigars and pipes. (I used to, as well, but NONE of my books reeked as bad - but that did make it cheap.)

So, I figure Some of y'all might want to know a little bit more about it...

the physical components include

• a set of three highway boards, 5 lanes wide, 10 grids long, for a 5×10 grid of 25mm grids.
• A rulebook, in an unusual format - 8.5×11" landscape. 12pp, but only 7 numbered, so, FC, TOC, 1-7, Tables 1, tables 2, back cover, Decent weight paper, big and slightly floppy.
• A 110# card, double sided with Tables 1 and tables 2 on it.
• A single counter sheet, about 8×6"
  • 3× VW 19×19 mm
  • 3× Compact 19×19 mm
  • 3× Mid-size 19×19 mm
  • 3× Full-Size 19×19 mm
  • 3× Caddy 19×19 mm
  • 3× Sportscar 19×19 mm
  • 3× Rolls-Royce 19×19 mm
  • 3× Pickup 19×19 mm
  • 3× Van 19×19 mm
  • 3× Wagon 19×19 mm
  • 3× 18-Weeler 19×38 mm
  • 3× Bus 19×38 mm
  • 10× Motorcycle 19×19 mm (that's 2 packs of cycles.
  • 10 numbered chits, 1-10
  • 1 uncut front view of an oncoming car. Counters are black on infantry blue. White back.
  • one onramp/offramp counter.
• 1d6, 12.5mm, slate grey pips.
• 1d20, ~14mm, marked 0-9 twice. Mine's brown.
• Cardboard folio
• pad of vehicle control sheets
• Spares Catalogue and errata sheet, digest size.

Note that the boards have another inch on each side, so they end up 9×10"

There are 4 scenarios.

• Duel - 2 players
• Open Road, 2+ players
• Rush Hour, 2+ players
• Death Race, 3-5 players

Let's see...
Scale: 1 square per turn = 10 MPH Given that 18 wheelers and busses are the only 2-square counters... that puts the scale about 1 square = 20' to 30' They do look like 20' vans on the semis.

Setup includes randomized speeds, randomized locations, and faster overtaking. There's no terrain of note, other than the roadside.

Body-type tells you max speed before goodies, maximum boosted by goodies speed, acceleration, wheel class, "turn" mode (lane change mode, really), AC (Armor Class Ascending), and "Average Damage" - basically hit points.
It also gives you a weight and price budget.
Weapons include 5 different machinegun calibers, a 20mm ATG, flame-thrower, rocket launcher, and contact mines.

Ammo is not tracked except for RL and FT. Turret conversions are available, too. You can buy speed modifications and armor modifications, and anythign but cycles can get one gunner, at 16 weight units and $50. Weapons run $10 to $100, available cash runs $150-$550, and 20 weight to 100 weight. Given the 16 Weight for a gunner, it's somewhere between 10 and 15 pounds...

Weapon mounting locations... everything but busses and 18-wheelers get 9 locations, the oversized get 11 (left and right sides get 2 locations each).

to hit is a d6, roll high, modified by speed, if turreted or not, and if the gunner is shooting.
Drivers can shoot one turret each phase. Gunners can shoot two turrets per phase, and give a bonus to hit. Fixed weapons fire on targets on their line of fire, and any and/or all can be fired at once.

Range and speed reduce the die to hit...

Armor is an ascending scale, a d10 roll to penetrate is made on weapon vs AC.

Penetrating hits do fixed damage by weapon.

Turn sequence:
1 Acceleration/Decelleration
2 [Movement] plotting phase
3 Reveal speeds phase
4 Movement and combat phases (×4)
5 Encounters phase, wherein new NPC vehicles enter the road. (Duels and Death Races don't have encounters)


Movement is pre plotted, using 4 phases. 10 MPH is one movement.

Movement is Straight, Left, or Right. Facing doesn't change, no diagonals.

Movement can attempt to be changed in order to avoid collisions or get a shooting opportunity.

Phase chart is simple left to right wrapping distribution.
1
1/1
1/1/1
1/1/1/1
2/1/1/1
2/2/1/1
etc.

Combat can happen before or after your movement in a given phase, and sequencing in phases is by highest to lowest speeds; if even speeds, forewardmost takes it. It does say what to do if they're side by side. Given the tone in the rules, I'd say it would be rolled for.

If you notice you're going to hit something this phase, either because of play order or simple happenstance, you can attempt to change a Straight to a left or right, or a right or left to straight; 50-50 chance.

When all "Average Damage" is gone, further damage causes rolls on the criticals table It notes on the "Driver or Gunner" line that gunners die first.

There's a chart for impacting - it's a fixed damage. Also, bumping does a crit, even if AD points remain.

There's no provision for increased driver or gunner skills, no campaigning mode.

If you leave the road at more than 10MPH, crash.

There are some quirks. NPCs in certain vehicle types will go after certain other vehicle types. If such occurs, someone's going to need to equip them, and that's overlooked in the rules. It does, however, note that in Scenarios 2 and 3, which differ in the rate of encounters, that bystanders wanting to join or eliminated players may come back in with the next encountered vehicle....

Death Race
The Death Race is a multi-run, with 4 boards long heats, and identical starting cars each heat. Lanes are random, speed is 0, and all start at the back edge. No lane changes on board 1. If you don't like your initial roll, you can reject it and roll a second time, but you're stuck there.

Finishing is 30/20/10/0/0
Cause Kills or Crashes: 15 each.

Most points wins.
I suspect that Cycle Packs shouldn't be used... but there's a bit of missing guidance there.

Reaction

As the Estimable Mr. Alston noted in the AutoVentures line, it's not about the people. They're just components, considerably more so than in Car Wars.

There's some good bones, tho'. It's a very different beastie than Car Wars - old or new - and pretty focused.

It's far less RPG like than it might seem, simply because of it's single level of ability for the 1-2 crew.


Having been flipping through it, and it reeking of smoke, with me being 15.5 years since last smoke, my eyes are irritated and my nose stuffy. Back in the almost airtight box I store it in.

The encounter method is simple, and easily enough imported into CW. Roll a die every new road section, and on a specific number or higher, add an encounter, with a random speed, if slower, it's up front, if faster, it's from behind.

Reminds me of the method in TurboFire for racing.

[43Supporter]

According to one source: _H2K_ is what *very* early versions of _CW_ looked like.

I have two copies. .:)

If you want to get rid of the smoke smell: Leave it out in the sun for a few hours every day; the UV will take care of the worst of it.

[ak_aramis]

I find it's approach to vehicles is a common one in 70's and 80's games (small scale wargames, minisgames, and RPGs).

That is to say, a frame with most of the ratings, and only a few adjustments which add to that frame without reduction in ratings.

It's even still in use - Fria Ligan's Coriolis and Alien ship design.

Traveller and Car Wars, for their major subject area vehicles (T: Starships, CW: cars and trucks) both have no actual ratings from the frame other than maximum installed items, and makes what's installed the bulk of the ratings generation.

For everyone else's benefit...
Basically, the H2K vehicle types are equivalent to the combination of these CW components:

• Frame
• Chassis
• Suspension
• Engine
• Armor
• Driver

[Racer]

To my knowledge , Highway 2000 never reached the UK .
Never saw it in any Games Shops or advertised .
Only thing I did see printed in UK were Battle Cars counter sheets that could be easily converted to Highway 2000 - or Car Wars - available in £1.50 packs .

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by Racer

To my knowledge , Highway 2000 never reached the UK .
Never saw it in any Games Shops or advertised .
Only thing I did see printed in UK were Battle Cars counter sheets that could be easily converted to Highway 2000 - or Car Wars - available in £1.50 packs .

In a small irony, before 43supporter's post, the only other owners of it (outside stores) identified were Aaron Alston and two Englishmen.

[43Supporter]

Originally Posted by ak_aramis

In a small irony, before 43supporter's post, the only other owners of it (outside stores) identified were Aaron Alston and two Englishmen.

And I think one of my copies belonged to Mr. Allston....