Questions, questions, questions...

[ZombieLenin]

Hey guys, I first encountered Twilight 2000 sometime in the mid-1990s. At the time I thought the setting was awesome, but just never got around to running it.

Fast forward to two weeks ago. I saw a used copy of Twilight 2000 v2 at my local game retailer and picked it up. So now I am thinking very seriously about running a campaign with my group, and I have a lot of questions as a result. I'm hoping you guys can help.

My first question is what rule set do you suggest I use? I own 2.0 and picked up 2.2 and TW2013 on drivethrurpg. I am not so worried about setting here, because I plan on emptying a lot of the lore (all of it from TW3013) and adding my own. My biggest concern is mechanics and playability.

Really though my biggest concern is a game design one. Specifically how do you guys run these games? My biggest concern is the player NPC ratio for encounters. I will have 5 players, and given how fatal the combat seems generally, I find myself scratching my head at the published encounter NPC #s.

Is the game assuming that, besides the players, the GM (or the players themselves) are running 15 friendly NPCs as well? Or do I just need to adjust down hostile NPC #s.

Honestly, I prefer the latter. I can see running 2 friendly NPCs without much trouble, but 15 is too much--for me. Partially because I don't want an entire 6 hour session to be a single combat encounter, and partially because I think that, from a storytelling perspective, it takes away from players' sense that the adventure always centers on their characters.