Britton Publishers
US of A
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| Long Review: | If there are any errors in this review, it's purely because I dislike working with rules in pdf, and may have skimmed over something, and is not a reflection on the rules themselves. That said, on to the review. It was rather difficult to get to grips with these rules, and, in all honesty, I think the hard copy would be better, especially considering the high page-count. Final Combat is a detailed set of rules. Extensive and seriously detailed. The rules have the feel of a role-playing game rather than of a table-top miniatures game. Ben clearly indicates at the beginning of the book that these rules are not "beer and pretzels", but more of a realism-junkie's dream. The aren't wargames rules in the traditional sense, as they seem to involve more than just a couple of players- a GM seems to be a good way of allowing the game to flow better. Having a PC handy is also a bonus, as combat can occasionally get fairly complicated- there is a useful little utility in the Yahoo group's files section that will make it easier to sort out all the modifiers in combat. There are also some other useful spreadsheets and pages there, which, while not essential, are a lot more convenient than having to look up factors in the rules. In order to play, each participant rolls up a character (a spreadsheet in the Yahoo group's files section makes this a lot easier), and the GM provides all the opponents and any support that the players require. Going by the degree of detail required, I believe that squad, i.e. a max of 10 figures per player (not platoon-sized, i.e. 30 figures per player) engagements can be played with practise and familiarity with the rules, although Ben did mention in an e-mail that they have played 30-45 figures per side without any trouble. I'm impressed by the amount of research that's gone into the rules, and how well all possible outcomes and options for combat and actions have been catered for, but I must say that, based on my pdf document, it is probably going to be a big headache for the GM to keep all his stories straight. Certainly not a job I'd like, but then I always fobbed off DMing onto others in our group whenever I could. I will go out on a limb here and say that the rules are good, although possibly overly complicated for the average gamer. When compared to other rules, Final Combat may not pull players in as easily as the others, but I suspect that it may well be very good at providing a much more realistic feel and result to any game that comes up. I think that the learning curve is pretty steep, especially for the GM, but the results should reward the effort put into learning. On a purely personal note, I'll have to say that the effort needed is above what I can dedicate to a set of rules, as I tend to prefer a game that requires less effort, as it allows me to play solo on occasion, which may be a problem with these Final Combat. Still, I'd love to join in a game in order to see them in action- I wasn't able to persuade any of my acquaintances to give these a whirl, as the number of tables scared them off. Period: WW2. Scale: 15-54mm skirmish. Basing: Vehicles and figures are based individually. Contents: Although normally sold as a book, I received a pdf for review purposes, as we both agreed that the despatch of the book would be impractical. The book apparently has 150+ pages, so is good value in terms of quantity. |
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| Historical Accuracy: | Very Good. |
| Sources: | Review pdf donated by Bennet P Lacy. |
| Designer: | Bennet P. Lacy. |
| Other reviews for this company: | See the reviews: |