Destroy All Monsters Again

I tried another game of 'Giants' yesterday. It ran a lot more smoothly than the previous one, and I think I have a handle on most of the mechanisms now.

I used two of the same monsters as before (although swapped in a Godzilla figure for Tyrranix - the stats were the same), then added Gamera and Pteradax. Both used stats I lifted from the Facebook page; Pteradax used some provisional stats for Rodan.

I rolled for an initial target once again. The spread was a little better this time, with both Godzilla and Gamera gunning for Pteradax, Gigan after Gamera and Pteradax after Gigan.

Unfortunately this somehow ended up with Gigan in the middle again.

Godzilla had a way to travel to where the fight was obviously going to take place, so was out of it for a while. Pteradax moved in as swiftly as possible. But Gamera and Gigan soon got fighting, exchanging ranged attacks along a street.

Pteradax reached the fight, roosting on a skyscraper. Gamera backed off; their attack allowed them to hit multiple targets and they did so, steadily blasting Gigan and Pteradax with fireballs.

Gigan dragged Pteradax off the building to use as cover. And now Godzilla had entered the fight.

Both Gigan and Pteradax had battered themselves into a fairly terminal state by now, assisted by attacks from Gamera. They took to the buildings and moved to attack the currently undamaged Godzilla.

Godzilla swiftly dealt with the weakened Gigan. Meanwhile Gamera had retired to recover wounds and try to burn off some accumulated stress.

Pteradax challenged Godzilla.

It didn't go well. The flying reptile was tail-slapped into the returning Gamera. Gamera finished it off.

This now left Gamera vs Godzilla!

Gamera got off to a shaky start; they had some stress already, whilst Godzilla was still unharmed. Godzilla exploited this advantage, using tail strikes to smash Gamera into the surrounding buildings.

Gamera was soon up and fighting. Initially the two monsters exchanged ranged attacks, but Godzilla got the better of that fight. Gamera charged, hammering Godzilla back turn after turn and smashing through some more buildings. But Godzilla managed to open up some space, and a couple of blasts finished off the mighty turtle.

As I say, this was a smoother game than the last one, since there was less I had to look up. The only thing I needed clarification on was how being on top of a building affected ranges and reach. It appears that the author measures diagonally. I simply added the height of the building to any lateral distances, which is less fiddly.

I might fiddle around with how attack arcs work, though - I can kind of see how they work according to the rules as written, but they feel unnecessarily fiddly. I may adopt a simpler approach whilst still maintaining the idea that attacks have a designated arc and that rear attacks are something to aim for.