Errata, Errata everywhere, but not a page in sight :)

[Asroc2000]

OK, so disclaimer first: this is heresay, sorry if I have been missinformed.

I bought the hardcopy of the game as soon as it was available, as I long time SFU player (SFB since the early 80's, Fed Commander and Starmada since they came out) I was quite excited about the prospect, as each game as added, in it's own way to the universe, and the idea of a hexless game i quite appealing as I already had several fleets of mini's available.

I was expecting the wipe-off ships cards to be available soon after the rules, but as this has still not happened, decided to go ahead with home made ship forms.
At this point, a couple of weeks ago, my long term main SFU opponent pointed out that there had been many changes to the rules already, some quite major, and rendering the ship as seen in the book obsolete!

To be perfectly honest I was dismayed to hear this, as over the years ADB, and TFG before them, have been meticulous with their playtesting and proof reading, and very little in the way of errors has ever made it's way through to customers.

And so I find myself here, expecting to see somethign near the top clearing pointing the way to this errata that I obviously need before attempting a game, yet I see nothing (except a note of 900+ topics to scan through).

So, my questions are:-
* is there in fact considerable errata for this game?
* if so, where can I find it?
* is there a single document I can download containing all errata so far?
* (if not, please make one)
* why is there so much - was the game rushed out without proper playtesting and/or proof reading?
* is there any plan to re-print a revised rulebook, and if so can we have a trade in policy for thiose of us who may be feeling more than a little miffed at buying something that appears to have become obsolete almost overnight?

I look forward to your response, and I am still hoping there is a good game in here somewhere

I will be at UK Games Expo for all 3 days, and very happy to discuss any or all of the above in person with any of your representatives.

Thanks for your attention to this,

Andy

 

[nerfherder]

I'll answer the easiest question, and leave others to give their opinions on the others

The errata is on the product page for the rulebook:

http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/miniatures/ctastarfleet/rulebooks/a-call-to-arms-star-fleet.html

 

[Asroc2000]

Thanks

 

[billclo]

I don't have as a big of a problem with the numerous errata; believe me I got used to it with the early days of SFB where they had many pages worth.

What gets me is that the errata, despite claiming to be complete and up to date, doesn't list some ship changes (D7C for example), and while they give you new rulebook pages with ships on them, the changes to said ships aren't always listed in the errata. This forces one to look at the new ship, compare everything with the old rulebook page, and then make corrections.

 

[Tinfish]

...expecting to see somethign near the top clearing pointing the way to this errata that I obviously need before attempting a game, yet I see nothing (except a note of 900+ topics to scan through).

To be fair it's not difficult to find - the topic SF Errata (or whatever it's called) is on the first page of this section of the forum, approx 10 - 15 topics below this one.

The game is not unplayable without the errata, some fire arcs have changed and the odd points value has changed - you can't have played many different rules sets for different periods if this hasn't happened to you before. Most people expect an errata & FAQ within a few months of a new ruleset being released as typos happen, playtesters miss things and rules can be interpreted differently by different people. Look at GW - their best was an 11 page errata (solid text, no pictures) for one of their codexes.

If you scan through the 900+ topics you will find the answer to your question about the plans for the rule book. I'll let you hunt for that though as too many people feel the need to be spoonfed information rather than spending 5 minutes looking for something these days.

 

[Trenchbucket]

I think if yopu collect a well rounded fleet it will always work no matter the tweeks (about 2 - 3 of each ship), those that will cry plue murder will be the ones that see a beardy ship and order just lots of them (like the Fed's DWD's before they went up 2-pts)

My current 1000 point Klingon fleet only has 3 classes in it and have lots of other ships to swap and replace as the rules change.

But remember just have fun and check the errata now and then and enjoy the ride.

 

[Asroc2000]

I find some of these replies quite sad.

Would you accept such errata and changes in others products you buy?
If you had a meal delivered to your table when eating out, would you accept the waiter rushing over just as you were taking your first bit to say sorry, the chef added sugar in stead of salt, and it probably will not taste the way you wanted?
If your new car was recalled before your first drive for tweaks and changes?

I certainly would not, neither would most people I knon.
Just because other companies publish errata does not mean it should (or has) become the norm.
The old saying two wrongs do not make a right comes to mind!

Of course there will be the odd typo or small correction here and there, but this appears to be major changes. For example one ship trait was completely removed - where was the playtesting there? Or the massed drone problem - I can't believe no one took a Kzinti fleet out of Stardock at least once?
War Eagle without armour? Any experienced SFB player would have seen that right away - I did on my first skim through on the bus home from the game shop!

And as for other SFU products having errata, I would repeat that I have found their proof reading and play testing to be of a very high standard, and even with the massive project of converting SFB to Fed Cmdr, there was not a great deal of revision or major changes, and all the ship cards that came with my opriginal copy of Klingon border are perfectly valid without any bneed for me to scribble changes on them.

I see no reason to call this effort a rushed, poor quality attempt, unworthy of the tradition of the Star Fleet Universe, and nothing that makes me want to go in search of other Mongoose products, unless some kind of quality insurance or money-back guarrantee comes with it

taking the example of Starmada, there have been (to my knowledge) no major errors and indeed, it prompted me to go out and buy the rest of the Starmada range.

My only consolation so far, is that not having the ship cards to buy, hopefully when they do come out, they will be correct

Thanks for all the responses.

 

[Asroc2000]

Oh and I forgot, yes I do object to scanning the 900+ topics Tinfish.
I paid hard earned cash for a complete product, and have yet to actually receive that, why should I or anyone, be expected to waste precious time as well?

Please, let's not go the way of the software industry, where you dare not buy a product untill it is on about release three, in order to have a half decent chance of getting a working copy.

Just because we now have the ability to publish changes, and most people will be able to download them is no excuse to all QC standards to slip. In the pre net days, we would have had to do all this by snail mail, and the postage costs alone would probably have crippled the company!
Chances are, facing that, things would have been a lot tighter - I see no reason for that to be any different just because the cost has gone away

 

[Myrm]

OK, so disclaimer first: this is heresay, sorry if I have been missinformed.

I think you have been, or at leastgiven a skewed view.

At this point, a couple of weeks ago, my long term main SFU opponent pointed out that there had been many changes to the rules already, some quite major, and rendering the ship as seen in the book obsolete!

Two noticable ones -
1) Drones are done differently with to hit rolls required over 18" and a limit on the number of ships that fire drones at a single target. That has changed how lethal dropes are at range in ACtA.
2) Removal of Lumbering (not that that made a huge difference IMO, I know Im in the minority there though)

Also, The civilian ships stats were completely reworked due to, but since they are minor part of the game with no standard use (ie scenario only) thats pretty minor, there have been a bunch of small errata in terms of arcs and weapons to reflect the SFU accurately (hard given those details can change from SFB to FC alone) and precise points as more gaming has been done.

Even if you play with it out of the book, you'll still have a perfectly useable game by the way - just you'll find some differences with the SFU.

To be perfectly honest I was dismayed to hear this, as over the years ADB, and TFG before them, have been meticulous with their playtesting and proof reading, and very little in the way of errors has ever made it's way through to customers.

I have pages and pages of errata and rules change documents for various versions of SFB. I bought the big 2004 Master Rulebook that supposed to be everything in one, and there is currently an 11page PDF of changes for it to update it to the 2010. Now given the complexity of the rules and the size of the game universe, errata are to be expected and if thats a level of errata meticulous and very little in the way of error on your scale then the effectively two pages of errata for ACtA should be fine for you.

There is an 8 page pdf, but the last 6 are full coloor book style templates, the actual data in those changes can be summated down to something like 10lines of text if you want.

And so I find myself here, expecting to see somethign near the top clearing pointing the way to this errata that I obviously need before attempting a game, yet I see nothing (except a note of 900+ topics to scan through).

On a PC Cntl+F and errata will bring up the thread with the link, a search for errata in the forum will find more than one thread in a few seconds.To directly find the document on the mongoose shop pages, go to the ACTA section, click on the rulebook and scroll down - there's an FAQ, an errata and a preview.

1 is there in fact considerable errata for this game?
2 if so, where can I find it?
3 is there a single document I can download containing all errata so far?
4 (if not, please make one)
5 why is there so much - was the game rushed out without proper playtesting and/or proof reading?
6 is there any plan to re-print a revised rulebook, and if so can we have a trade in policy for thiose of us who may be feeling more than a little miffed at buying something that appears to have become obsolete almost overnight?

1 - No. There's some but not considerable to the level you indicated in your first post. See above
2 - Cited above
3 - yes
4 - answered
5 - There isn't.
6- The game is not obsolete overnight. Its playable out of the box, I have run a couple of games on unchanged rules and it works. Most changes really are for SFU accuracy, the drones is about the only serious change and came in for the extremes where things went totally out of whack eg Kzinti big fleets vs Gorn big fleets.
If you buy the PDF rulebook, it should update as Mongoose tend to update it through that vendor. You have a PDF to update things in the book if you want. Mongoose are part of Bits and Mortar and the PDF I got from that already reflected some errata from the rulebook. They have also said they would like to offer free PDFs for those who bought the hardback rulebook - there are threads on the forum - we are currently waiting on ADB and Mongoose to organise how and where to do this but SVC is a little under the wqeather at the moment, so keep a weather eye open on that one going through the process.

I hope that pretty much covers all your worries, I think there has been some overly critical comment in your direction given your good opinion of ADB's historical errata activity and given that there is already a single full errata doc we are seeing more than you get from many companies.

One of the problem with any game like this is you send it out the wild and people do stuff your smaller test set never imagined - thats any wargame, any computer game, any RPG - you test as well as you can but you upscale by a few thousand percent or more and someone will find the crack you left behind.....simply more man hours trying to break stuff...

 

[MarkDawg]

Yeah it seems that the forum mod wont sticky anything so people can find stuff and he wont give us a sub forum so in each post you have to put SF so people know what game you are talking about.

It's super simple to do I just don't get why it's not been done I know many of us have asked for it in many posts.

 

[MongooseMatt]

unless some kind of quality insurance or money-back guarrantee comes with it

It does. We guarantee all our products, no matter where you bought them.

 

[H]

Yeah it seems that the forum mod wont sticky anything so people can find stuff and he wont give us a sub forum so in each post you have to put SF so people know what game you are talking about.

It's super simple to do I just don't get why it's not been done I know many of us have asked for it in many posts.

seriously, chill. You seem to be excessively negative. If you don't like the game, then don't play it, it's simple stuff. There are enough options out there for you to find something you like.

 

[Tinfish]

I expect every rule set I buy to have an errata released for it - why, because mistakes and oversites are made. It may only a couple of spelling mistakes, or it may be a balance issue only noticed when players start looking for loopholes or the 'perfect' army.

Recently I have bought several new rule sets - including Acta SF and new popular Dark Age skirmish set. Both have had erratas within a month of release. Does this bother me - No. Is the rule set unplayable without the errata - No, but they generally only change things if there is a genuine problem that needs addressed to improve game play, not just to spite customers. All the big companies errata their rules - and some of their rule books cost a lot more than this set. I've never heard more than a slight grumbling from players about erratas before - even if it is a £45 book from GW.

The problems start when there is no support for a rule set. I bought a WW 1 set a few years ago - slightly over complicated in places, but good fun. There are some rules issues with it, but the author has no website and doesn't post on any other forums, so there is no way to clear up the rule issues - That is annoying, not the authors bending over backwards to sort out any issues.

Wasting precious time - you play wargames and are posting on internet forums - I rest my case.

 

[McKinstry]

Wasting precious time - you play wargames and are posting on internet forums - I rest my case.

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[MarkDawg]

Yeah it seems that the forum mod wont sticky anything so people can find stuff and he wont give us a sub forum so in each post you have to put SF so people know what game you are talking about.

It's super simple to do I just don't get why it's not been done I know many of us have asked for it in many posts.

seriously, chill. You seem to be excessively negative. If you don't like the game, then don't play it, it's simple stuff. There are enough options out there for you to find something you like.

Who the hell are you to tell me what to play and what I like and don't like. I do like the game are there issues with the game it self? Not many it's pretty solid and fun to play.

Are there issues with mongoose on the minis side? YES and plenty to complain about here. The simple fact is I am not the only forum user that has asked for the sub forum I think I am in the majority here. Stickying the FAQ and Errata links is simple and should be done to help grow the game. Don't like my point of view don't read my posts!

I never personally attack people on this forum and I have been the victim of many now but I have thick skin I can deal with it but it seems like people here feel free to attack people when they don't like what they have to say.

 

[H]

Yeah it seems that the forum mod wont sticky anything so people can find stuff and he wont give us a sub forum so in each post you have to put SF so people know what game you are talking about.

It's super simple to do I just don't get why it's not been done I know many of us have asked for it in many posts.

seriously, chill. You seem to be excessively negative. If you don't like the game, then don't play it, it's simple stuff. There are enough options out there for you to find something you like.

Who the hell are you to tell me what to play and what I like and don't like. I do like the game are there issues with the game it self? Not many it's pretty solid and fun to play.

Are there issues with mongoose on the minis side? YES and plenty to complain about here. The simple fact is I am not the only forum user that has asked for the sub forum I think I am in the majority here. Stickying the FAQ and Errata links is simple and should be done to help grow the game. Don't like my point of view don't read my posts!

I never personally attack people on this forum and I have been the victim of many now but I have thick skin I can deal with it but it seems like people here feel free to attack people when they don't like what they have to say.

Actually, I went pretty easy on you. Whatever your beef is with mongoose, (and I appreciate the launch was a bit poor), This forum is open to new and old players alike and your complaints will turn new players away, which isn't good if the game is to suceed. By all means air your issues, but try not to be so angry about it.
as to who the hell am I, I'm steve, I've been playing acta since B5 and I have had my own issues, though i generally restricted it to mild sarcasm, and have tried to remain positive and supportive.

I think you will find, should you read again, I suggested if you don't like it to play something else, i never "told you what to play" And it's good to hear you like the game, that did not come accross in your posts. Also, telling someone to chill isn't really an attack now, but does kinda back up my point.

lets move along, i'll have a beer if we ever meet at a tourney, and fight it out on the table of carnage

 

[MarkDawg]

Hello Steve,

Look my issue is with the minis side of this game is well documented. You sound like you are from the UK. In the UK minis are way easier to find I am trying to get people to play this game with me that's why I bought 2 squadron boxes of different fleets. I waited to play the game @ The local FLGS until the Feds and Klink released after the first fail launch.

People here still can't get minis Romulans are a no go and our store can't stock the game and would love to because of it's low price point.

I do post positive things about the game a lot look at this thread.
http://forum.mongoosepublishing.com/viewtopic.php?f=103&t=51349

 

[H]

well then my colonial cousin, a beer at a tourney is out.
as for stateside mini's, do you know anyone in the UK who could buy for you and post? though matt "sounded" positive about US mini's, As a short term fix, just proxy different ships, if you have been gaming a while, you should have a good supply of things to use. I granmt you, a sherman doesn't make a good romulan, but a few centauri might, or a chaos fleet as the gorn?


regarding the errata, it IS frustrating, but you get it with most games. I got my DW errata the other day and whilst i'm mildly peeved, at least things got fixed

I have held off buying the rulebook (does that make me an armchair general), as I expected this, and I have been waiting for the PDF, which has been delayed also. I do have access to a rulebook, it's just not mine.
sadly it seems to be par for the course these days, second, third editions, errata upon errata. I suspect games of old were as bad, BUT the medium of the internet wasn't there for it to be discussed, and quickfire updates made. A mistake, or unbalanced fleet in 1985, would have taken months to resolve, if it ever got resolved!
I will say, on this occassion, the errat has been well done with new pages produced to slip in, instead of writing in your book, and hopefully new print editioins will have these errata in and be labeled as such, and the PDF should it ever arrive will be kept updated... allegedly.

 

[Reynard]

Unfortunately my friends who like Star Fleet are few and, literally, far between but, when we can get together, we play the game right out of the book without using the very cumbersome errata. Guess what? We have a blast! When you don't sweat that all the rules are 'wrong' the game goes smoothly and we have fun.

If a PDF version comes out, and it's true we who own the book can get a free copy, I hope it will be continuously updated with rule changes and clarification. That way playing the game will be a matter of reading the rules without referring to separate errata sheets. Really, the rules are two dozen pages. How can it take so long to fix such a small ruleset (excluding the whiners who are never satisfied their favorite ship isn't perfect or favorite Star Fleet Battle rule isn't included)?!

 

[Greg Smith]

I find some of these replies quite sad.

Would you accept such errata and changes in others products you buy?
If you had a meal delivered to your table when eating out, would you accept the waiter rushing over just as you were taking your first bit to say sorry, the chef added sugar in stead of salt, and it probably will not taste the way you wanted?
If your new car was recalled before your first drive for tweaks and changes?

I certainly would not, neither would most people I knon.
Just because other companies publish errata does not mean it should (or has) become the norm.

If my burger was cold, I would expect a replacement.
If car had faulty brakes, I would expect it to be recalled by the manufacturer.
If a new computer game didn't quite work, I'd expect a patch.

There are 11 pages of errata for the SFB Master rulebook. Similarly there are 11 pages of errata for WFB 8th edition.

Sadly these things are the norm.