Absolutely, I love the story aspect, just read any of my battle reports!

To some extent that's true, except that if we always played true to the story mode the outcome would always be predictable.

I like that the bad guys can win sometimes! (When playing with my goblins.)

I find it harder to play a scenario knowing that it has been pre-determined and that my army is destined to fail for plot reasons.

Having said that, if I could play an unlimited number of games, whenever I wanted, I'd be able to handle playing an always lose scenario by trying to lose by less every time.

And the only thing worse than knowing you were going to lose, in my opinion, would be knowing that I was going to win. That I had such an advantage that my skill level wasn't really a factor. Ewww.

So the points values help keep it so that both teams have a chance to win.

I reckon you could get a really accurate points system that perfectly describes each individual troop numerically well, but it would be complicated.

You'd certainly have to have a profile for each type of guy, and you'd have to use a bigger scale. I think the system we have works pretty well for how insanely simple it is.

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My LotR and 40k blog, Realm of Battle board, dwarves, gobs, space wolves and battle reports. http://simbattleboard.blogspot.com/

I didn't mean "predictable"...all I meant was it's nice to have a "realistic" rationale for a rule rather than adopting something arbitrary because it serves the purpose of game balance. You provided that, so I'm grateful

Actually, for many of the scenarios I've played in SBG I wouldn't say they are predetermined. In fact, we've had a few times with the Balin's Tomb and a few others where Good did NOT get away as easy as they did in the stories and sometimes we've seen a complete upset. Sauron would be happy.

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Wait ye the finish! The fight is not yours.
Beowulf

http://TacticsInMiniature.com

Yup, Beowulf, that's the point, in SBG the scenarios are not one-sided and it's the point values and army choices that make that work.

I love the Balin's tomb one, particularly as the cave troll gets to smash hobbits! Way more fun than baseball or cricket =)

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My LotR and 40k blog, Realm of Battle board, dwarves, gobs, space wolves and battle reports. http://simbattleboard.blogspot.com/