Starting to Play Car Wars

[High Tyrol]

I am a new car wars player only discovered and read through the car wars classic rules last week. I have played 2 games so far. Both were with my 10-year old little brother. I turned to it because I had an idea for running a roleplaying game about mountain pass racing wizards and stumbled across car wars. I think that I need to play a lot of games before I can run something like that.

What aspects of the game are difficult to me?

Collisions are difficult to resolve. If my car skids the rules don't say what direction. Also I don't understand conforming that well. If two identical cars sideswipe at the same speed which car conforms?

The biggest misunderstanding I had was how handling class worked. I thought handling class was the highest handling status a car could get. I also ran both my games where only 1 handling class was restored a second because I misread the rules the first time through.

What type of games do I like to play most often? The only type of game I have played was a 1v1 race starting side by side at 0mph with killer karts on a two car width wide track with 5 right angle turns and 3 U-turns.

I am planning on more races and a few Amateur night games over Christmas. I also found a few people who were interested in playing next semester. I made a few courses fairly quickly and I am hoping to translate some real mountain roads to 1 inch scale.

What types of play aids do I need to understand the game better and make it easier to play?
I printed out the tables and car options in Car Wars Classic. I also have some turning keys. I don't really know what other aids would be useful yet.

[43Supporter]

Originally Posted by High Tyrol

Collisions are difficult to resolve. If my car skids the rules don't say what direction.

One skids in the direction one was going *before* one maneuvered. Yes, this does mean one has to remember what direction one was going before maneuvering; but one can use markers for that.

Originally Posted by High Tyrol

Also I don't understand conforming that well. If two identical cars sideswipe at the same speed which car conforms?

Not sure what Official Ruling was (if any); back-when, if cars of equal mass hit, we "split the difference" between what each of them did. (I think there's a _Mythbusters_ episode out there with a live demonstration of what happens in sideswipes, but I'd have to find it.)

Originally Posted by High Tyrol

The biggest misunderstanding I had was how handling class worked. I thought handling class was the highest handling status a car could get.

This is correct -- if one's HC is 3 (after all modifiers), that is the highest it can go; so if one is at HC 1, and recovers 4 HC points/turn, one only recovers 2 HC points, to HC 3; the remaining 2 HC points are lost.

[swordtart]

In movement the fastest car moves first.

In order to resolve ties we also ruled that in the event cars were moving at exactly the same speed, cars moved in reverse order of reflexes. This means the driver with higher reflexes gets to see what the other car is going to do before declaring his move.

If it is still a tie, roll a dice.

There are still occasions where you need to make a judgement call. We had a car sideswipe a fixed obstacle and another car at the same time. The difficulty was the moving car had a lower DM than the stationary car and didn't have enough damage to breach the fixed obstacle. The rules at this point were contradictory.

In the last case the best thing to do is have each player in the collision put forward their case and discuss it. If you can't reach an agreement after 2 minutes roll a dice to see which interpretation you use.

[43Supporter]

Originally Posted by owenmp

What aspects of the game are difficult for you?

-- Jumping/Falling: Badly overcomplicated, which drives players away, and causes even experienced players to avoid arenas with jumps. [Yes, I have a solution for that. :) ]

-- Fire/Explosion: Too many die-rolls required. [Yes, I have a solution for that, as well. :) ]

-- Calculating To-Hit: It's always been a bit annoying to me that the *lower* a base T-H is, the better it is.

Originally Posted by owenmp

What types of games do like to play most often (arenas, highway duels, mini-scenarios, adventures, multi-session campaigns, etc.)?

I try to do a bit of everything; as much as I like steak, I don't eat it every day.... :)

The problem arises with anything multi-session; trying to get all the players involved to show up can be a scheduling nightmare.

Originally Posted by owenmp

What types of play-aids do you need to understand the game better and make it easier to play?

Ah, yes -- this. I write stuff down; for ex., when drawing up the damage sheet for a car, next to each weapon is data like "to-hit number", "damage", and such (with any bonuses). That way, it's right there where the player can find it quickly, as opposed to silly-walking through the manual.

[Blue Ghost]

Originally Posted by owenmp

After having several excellent conversations with new Car Wars player industrialchild, I thought starting this thread might be helpful.

If you are a new Car Wars player . . .

What aspects of the game are difficult for you?

What types of games do like to play most often (arenas, highway duels, mini-scenarios, adventures, multi-session campaigns, etc.)?

What types of play-aids do you need to understand the game better and make it easier to play?

I think the best way to learn is to just do as the rules recommend. Start off with the first basic road scenario, and build from there to familiarize yourself with the rules. It's what we did.