CAR WARS THE GREATEST
STRATEGY/ROLEPLAYING GAME EVER MADE
I first discovered wargames in 1979. Browsing the magazine section of a hobby shop
in Boise, Wargamers Digest caught my eye.
Collecting military miniatures was already a hobby of mine and now I had
a chance to use these models to recreate battles. Oh joy!
Oh rapture!
The year after that a new kid in school found out I played
wargames and asked if I had ever role played.
I was intrigued, and soon my hundreds of dollars worth of WW II
miniatures was collecting dust as I embarked on a much more personal
experience.
I became the game master for the numerous games we
played. I liked the level of detail
players could experience by role playing an individual character or even 2 or
3, but the grand scope of play was missing.
There were no good rules to run an organization, kingdom, or army. Some games would mention it in passing, but
their rules were never clear or complete enough to work. I fooled with my own ideas, but didn't
develop anything beyond the play testing stage.
Somewhere in these early years I discovered micro
games. These were cheap enough for a
high schooler to afford and some of them were pretty good. (I thought Hell Tank was a way better game
than Ogre.) When Car Wars showed up in
my hobby shop I thought it was a joke. A
spoof game based on Star Wars that wasn’t worth a second glance. Yet, I did continue to glance. And read reviews. And read the back of the
game again, and again, and again.
Finally I decided to plunk down the $3 (or was it $4) and take a chance.
The rules were a dream come true. This was the first set of rules that actually
tried to model vehicle maneuver as well as combat, and even let you design your
own cars. Oooh joy! Oooh Rapture! Of course I was confused by a few things. Were the power plants gas engines? What did they use for fuel and how much was
needed? The list goes on.
This did not stop me from playing, and I soon created a
small arena and ran a duel. We dueled in
the arena about 4 times and on the road twice.
Then got bored and went back to Villains and Vigilantes. I tried to design my own city streets, but
the scale was all wrong.
The Convoy scenario was what really put the spark back in
the game for me. I ran it solo. I ran it for my group. I ran it for several groups when I went to
college. I ran it and the one where the
players must get the Mormon leader down to California into the ground.
To me this was what Car Wars was all about. Missions in the wastelands, living in a
campaign world that went way beyond the arena.
The challenges would come from new situations, not bigger and more
deadly weapons or equipment.
I then proceeded to try to run a campaign or 2 outside the
arena, but the lack of concrete rules left me writing homemade rules more than
writing adventures. A lot of people were
willing to play the game, but the work was too much. Especially when there were other RPG’s with
campaign rules already fleshed out.
Sure there were the AADA survival guides coming out around
this time, but they were to disjointed, vague, and disappointing to be of much
use. Steve Jackson Games also put out
numerous arenas and vehicle designs, but these were only met with yawns. Without a comprehensive campaign to fit these
into they lost most peoples interests after only 1 try.
The first successful Car Wars campaign that was ran was one
created and ran by my roommate. Myself
and one other guy played rival warlords.
We had a map of our territory, and were given some skill points and
money to buy characters and equipment.
We used a lot of homemade rules and began spying on each other. Shortly after the campaign began, aliens landed
right between us and began to shoot up both sides with anti-grav vehicles and
lasers. We proceeded to fight the
aliens, but never joined forces and the aliens were able to complete their
nefarious experiments and win. We
actually had to start this campaign over once because we had too many troops
and vehicles to play the large scale
battles out successfully.
Next I tried a campaign based on rival trucking companies
trying to make a profit. It flopped,
because the rules I had written were too sparse and the campaign not that
exciting. However, with everything I had
learned Car Wars campaigns now took on a new meaning, and it was all I would
play.
My last few years in college (I was on the 6.5 year party
plan) were a time of few classes and fewer responsibilities. Thus I could devote more time to a game that
had become my favorite. Car Wars. I wrote campaign rules late into the night
and refereed it all day. We would have
up to 8 people playing at one time, and not an arena was ever touched. In fact after my first 4 arena plays in high
school I only played in one other arena.
It was a duel track designed by my friend, and was only a back drop to a
story of murder and betrayal on an Indian reservation in the Southwest.
Since college I have ran campaigns involving individuals as
well as organizations. Most of my games
are set in a post apocalyptic earth with magic and alien technology. My players go on small party quests, lead
company size armies into battles, and even rule small kingdoms. The diversity I am able to achieve using Car
Wars as the base set of rules is incredible.
The biggest factor in making my games a success was the set
of campaign rules I made up over the last 18 years of play. These rules allow characters to interact with
and explore a post apocalyptic landscape using the Car Wars rules as the base
reference. I am particularly proud of my
rules for running organizations and hope to have them ready to be printed in
CWIN by the year 2000.
Car Wars helped set the frame work for a set of rules that
allows me to combine the best of role playing, character interaction and
development, with wargamings grand maneuvers and leadership.
I want to applaud all the hard core Car Wars fans who have
kept the game alive all these years.
There are a lot of good campaigns out there and I encourage those of you
who still use Car Wars as just a set of rules for arena combat to take a look
at some other avenues of play. All the
people I ever got interested in the game wanted to play in campaigns where they
could command a group of warriors to do their bidding. Even at game conventions where one shot
adventures are the king, people would rather make up a character and go explore
a cave or get in a wargame and command hundreds of troops than to play out an
arena combat.
In order to attract and keep new players, the focus must
switch from arenas to campaign worlds.
There is a reason that interest in Car Wars has dropped off while games
like Battletech continue to thrive. Some
will say, “It’s the complicated rules.”
But thousands who already took the time to learn the rules are no longer
playing. Other say, “It’s lack of Steve
Jackson Games support.” But SJG turned
out numerous arenas, counters, and vehicle rules and designs. Steve Jackson pumped out plenty of
supplements but after a while nobody bought them. Battletech, AD & D, and several other
successful games also pump out supplement after supplement, that get bought off
the shelves as soon as they hit the store.
Why are these other games still selling while Car Wars is not? Because they have campaign rules and
worlds. They have a place where the
exploits of the character mean something in a bigger picture. Where the challenge and enjoyment comes not
just from bigger guys with bigger guns, but also in the exploration and
conquering of lands, the interaction with NPC’s, and the immersion of the player characters in a living
environment.
New players might come for the vehicle combat and arena
duels, but they’ll stay for the campaign environment.
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