Home Forums Modern Stat Blocks – Which is Better?

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  • #170791
    Avatar photoAotrs Commander
    Participant

    A bnit of an informal poll of the community.

    I am trying to get the Maneouvre Group Issue 2 rules prodded back into motion.

    (A task not helped by discovering the added changes to a version that was not the one I’d last gone over, meaning I’ll have to go through line-by-line to catch all the things that needed fixing the first time…)

    The current subject of… spirited debate is the format of MG’s stat blocks. I argue for clarity over presentation taking precedences over size, they argue for a more condensed (and in my opinion, less clear) stat block because the page count is smaller. I finally suggested that it would not hurt to actually show it to the intended target audience and get some feedback.

    So here in order: the current stat blocks to be revised

    My (currently-discarded) revision of said stat blocks

    And their proposed new one.

    This is very similar to the current one, and is a bit of a mock-up and the data/colouring isn’t quite correct, as it is also the prototype for actually explaining the stat blocks.

    On the other hand, it’s provided last since it will be illustrative what people can read out of the stat blocks cold anyway.

    Please let us know which you think is better, or with any other feedback, comments etc, it would really help ensure that MG puts out the best product!

    #170792
    Avatar photoTony Hughes
    Participant

    Put the lines around the cells back (looks better without, works better with)

    Don’t use white on black (it may have high contrast but is not as easy to read quickly)

    Make the green lighter (so the contrast is increased)

    My eyes are older and these thing have started to matter more than they used to.

     

     

    #170832
    Avatar photoirishserb
    Participant

    I find the discarded Challenger II card easier to read than the new one.  The White characters on the green seem to be harder for me to see, and a I agree with Tony about the lines around the cells.

    #170849
    Avatar photoAotrs Commander
    Participant

    Thanks folks. Colour feedback noted.

     

    Looks like from here and other places, though we’ve not had a lot of responses, so far pretty much all of them have said “second one,” so Dad has, somewhat reluctantly, decided to bow to the inevitable. He thinks he will move the stad block entirely the the appendixs, and he wants to see if we can maybe get two columns by using landscape, so when I get chance to have another crack at it all, I can experiment with that and maybe make some tweaks.

     

     

    It’s probably for the best, though, since a) I actually did all the stat blocks in that format the first time before they changed their minds (so all I have to do is copy it back again and maybe tweak some colours – much less work than redoing them entirely for a second time) and b), it means that the scifi MG stat block can be probely unifed like I had intended.

     

    #170851
    Avatar photoMike
    Keymaster

    I like the last one. I think it would benefit from cells/boxes though.

    #170862
    Avatar photoGeneral Slade
    Participant

    I agree with the other guys about the cells.  I also don’t find alternating between black and green in the column headings to be helpful.  The headings in black stand out more and so appear more significant when in fact they are essentially just the same as the headings in green.  For example, in the last table the 1000m range band looks more important than the 500m range band and the stats for rear armour look more important than the stats for side armour.

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