Editing Dystopian Wars (section)

== Getting Started in Dystopian Wars ==

=== Basics ===

Games of Dystopian Wars are generally played on either a 4'x4' or 6'x4' surface, using 1/1200 scale miniatures produced by Spartan Games. Dystopian Wars accommodates war at land, sea and air, and while it is certainly fine to have all 3 going in a single game it is more often the case that games end up being either navy + airforce or land + airforce. Generally, naval games are far more popular and are the main attraction to the game for most players.

=== Is it expensive? ===

The game is quite affordable.

The core rules, now in edition 2.0, are the only ones you need in order to play. It contains all of the core rules and special rules in the game at this point. It also contains army lists for the core nations, but you can ignore these since Spartan frequently updates the army lists and releases them as free .pdfs on their [http://www.spartangames.co.uk/resources/downloads site]. 

The 2.0 rules can be bought in three ways if you want a hard copy. The free edition is now avaliable at [http://www.spartangames.co.uk/resources/downloads site]. The Commodore edition, which is hardback and comes complete with background information, costs 30 pounds. The Admiral edition is thinner and only contains the rules, costing 20 pounds. Alternatively, the Admiral edition rules are included in the Shadow Hunter 2-player starter set which costs 80 pounds and comes with two respectably sized navies for Japan and America as well as some extra models related to the special scenarios designed for the starter set. 

If neither of the forces in the starter set take your fancy, another fine place to begin is with a Naval Battle Group for any of the major fleets and some minor fleets as well. This costs 45 pounds RRP and will get you 850-900 points worth of models. For context 700 points would be enough for a tactically satisfying small game, 1200 points or so might be about average and 1500 points would constitute a larger game, though sometimes it is played all the way up to 2000. For context, a small frigate will cost 25 points, an aircraft carrier about 130 points, and a massive dreadnought can cost from 240 points to well over 300 points.

=== Is it complicated? ===

Some of the rules are laid out in a peculiar order in the book, '''plus''' it has a strange habit of '''bolding''' a quarter of the bloody words in each '''sentence''' which is the most '''annoying''' feature of the '''rules'''. 

The core rules are very simple, and the basics of the game can be quickly grasped by someone who has never played a naval wargame. However but there are lots of situational factors, attributes and special rules that can make the first few games daunting or confusing. The 2.5 Ruleset was released just before Spartan's demise; yet is more or less the same as 2.0 with two major differences. First: The rules were totally re-edited to bullet-point form for easy referencing. And second, Carriers can now re-spawn downed fighter craft. Oh, and that stupid random bolding is gone.

=== What are the models like? ===

Highly detailed resin for almost everything except bombers and turrets, which are pewter with the new Warcradle models being made from high quality plastic except for the large capital shops, which are still made from resin with the same plastic turrets used on the smaller vessels. These things have heaps of detail on them, with portholes, piping, planks on the decks and rivets in abundance, as well as including details such as life boats. And the resin isn't too brittle so you don't have to worry about snapping anything off most of the time. Errors do creep in to models from time to time, being resin, but most of them are under the ships where they can't be seen and so make no difference to the appearance or integrity of the model. If something is broken or miscast Spartan Games has a good record for sending replacements. If you lose pieces or want duplicate pieces like turrets or such Spartan may be happy to sell these if you send them an email.

The models range from very practical and realistic with over-the-top guns bolted on (Prussians, Australians) to flying Mosques (Ottomans) and floating oriental fortresses (Chinese). The overall theme is fairly stylised steampunk, with the wackiness limited to a few of the more exotic robots available to the factions like the giant squid, the crab mech and the floating Chinese dragon.