Oathmark - Who's Playing?

[Ultravanillasmurf]

Here is my 0.625p worth.

1) How large of a role do heroes/leaders play in Oathmark? are they single models, separate from the unit like Warmaster or something? About how strong is a hero? equivalent to half a unit? a quarter?

Command and Champion characters are generally best as part of a bodyguard unit. As noted by Hobgoblin, mounted individual Champion characters would be quite useful.

Command characters allow you to activate two or more units at a time so you can synchronise attacks. Champion characters can kill unit officers (which may or may not be characters) damaging the units ability to act and their morale.

Spellcasters (oddly enough) cast spells. They might be better off with a bodyguard unit, or individual (depends on the opponent's forces - if your opponent's archers can choose their targets your spell caster is going to be vulnerable even if there are ranks of goblins between them and the archers).

2) I see people use Frostgrave's Gnolls, but has anyone considered the snake-men or tribal boxes from Ghost Archipelago for some exotic looking units? Too far removed from the Dark Ages/Tolkien look of Oathmark?

My inspiration (barring my Gnoll fixation) is Game of Thrones, so most of my projected forces are human (built from Frostgrave, Oathmark, Fireforge -  Northmen and Medievals, Gripping Beast plastics, Mantic Northern Alliance), I am recycling Frostgrave scenery so everyone will be wearing their wooly mammoth underwear.

That being said, I see no reason why you could not use any suitable figures (I have concerns about Snakemen as they were originally on 30mm bases so might be a bit large). Tribals would be fun, as would Bronze Age or Roman armies. If you can match them to an existing unit type all the better. You might want to build a "Counts As" Kingdom Terrain chart so you can build "legal" Kingdom based lists:
So for a Human - Snakeman Alliance there is a Terrain Type of "Snakeman City", it is Rarity 2 and gives access to one Snakeman Champion, Snakeman Warriors and Snakeman Linebreakers (this is a direct map to the Human Terrain type Iron Mines).

3) With Oathmark being army battles and RoSD being hereo-party level co-op, I feel like I should get Frostgrave for warband skirmishing in between the two. Not super into the new look of that game though. Particularly the font on the title, looks like a Disney movie. An odd thing to object to for sure, but it is what it is...

It really depends on what you (or the people you play with) want to do. There are a number of war band level games out there (and Crooked Dice will be adding to the number soon), so whether you buy Frostgrave is up to you. I have both (but not RotSD, and I need to get FG2). Frostgrave does have a high figure count (the max eleven "man" squad - I think there is a set up which takes your figure count up to that - is not where the figures are), especially if you have lots of different wandering monsters. Now if you have an Oathmark Undead army, there is your skeleton crew, Gnolls etc...
4) This is me buying a lot of titles from Joseph A. McCullough...a game designer I've not played a game from before. With Frostgrave 2nd newly released, RosD seeing new scenarios, Oathmark on the march, and all the development being done for the upcoming Stargrave...how can one man keep up with all of this? How can all of this be tested well? I'm not into the competitive scene for any of these titles, so perfect balance isn't anything I'm expecting, but this seems a lot for one person to take on at one time. Can anyone speak to how deep his playtest/assistant pool is? I'm still likely in for these games, but this does seem quite the workload...
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The Oathmark credits list 26 play testers (there are probably a number of additional players involved).

[Mr. White]

I'm not expecting these unit non-differentiatons to be too big of an issue. I'm looking for some fantasy wargaming here on the lighter side of the spectrum. I'm a more 'rule of cool' gamer anyway.

That said...besides ordering the Oathmark book, I just ordered a copy of Warhammer 3rd edition. I think between these two...I'll be good.

[Ultravanillasmurf]

The absence of unit differentiation had also occurred to me as a rather serious omission, not only in armour and weapon type, but in training and experience. As things stand, an infantry unit of a given race is identical to every other infantry unit of that race, whether we consider them to be levies, militia, professionals, or household troops. The Battlesworn supplement has rules or an individual unit to progress over a campaign, but otherwise fails to address the issue. 

It shouldn't be too difficult to fix with house rules, but for an otherwise impressive and reasonably comprehensive set of rules, this really should be built in, in my opinion.

I see what you mean - Humans are 5 6 2 2 in general. Militia are less easy to control (6), Warriors and Linebreakers in their Heavy armour are slower (5).

For Humans, my only missing load out was Militia with ranged weapons (slings/bows) and sticks (sorry Spears), but then if they are not trained, would they be able to Brace?

The Species names really only name the skins the figures wear, so if you wanted to do a Human army using Spartans (well disciplined, Accurate, hard, expensive) you could use Elves.

If you wanted Roman Heavy Infantry you might decide that they are Dwarf Spear (this bakes in the close order training).

As forces can be multi-species, as long as you clearly document and identify your forces, there should be no problem.

Jack Hooligan asked about the testing, I can see that covering five races with a selection of force types involves a lot of testing, adding modifiers for this weapon or that armour or a particular type of training multiplies the testing required.

[Ultravanillasmurf]

2) I see people use Frostgrave's Gnolls, but has anyone considered the snake-men or tribal boxes from Ghost Archipelago for some exotic looking units? Too far removed from the Dark Ages/Tolkien look of Oathmark?

These guys are a bit of a faff to mount on  25mm bases (they come with 30mm) and future ones will have legs bent somewhat to ensure they stay within, nothing I hate more in a miniature then overhang.

[Historiker]

My inspiration (barring my Gnoll fixation) is Game of Thrones, so most of my projected forces are human

Exciting! Looking forward to seing pictures of well differentiated human armies!

Just came back from glueing together a few of the elves. What I really like about these boxes is that with all the head and weapon variations you can easily cover more troop types.

As I don't really like the wriggly iconography on the regular elven infantry armor some of my Light Elven Infantry now wear helmets and these are the warriors with the others being soldiers. They will get a different colourscheme as well and those are two troop types sorted. Doing the same with the hoods on the archers and voila Elven Rangers 

[pixelgeek]

1) How large of a role do heroes/leaders play in Oathmark? are they single models, separate from the unit like Warmaster or something? About how strong is a hero? equivalent to half a unit? a quarter?

They can be single models but there is no point in having single combat characters on their own. Spellcasters are much better on their own as they will hinder, or be hindered by, any unit they are attached to.

Heroes can have quite an impact but it is not the norm. The champions can be very useful in eliminating officers in enemy units and reducing their efficiency but they only do that on rolls of 10 so it doesn't come up often.

Heroes with Command are very useful in everything other than Elven forces as they add dice to activation and rally attempts. They can also activate large blocks of troops.

They are useful but nothing like characters in Warhammer

[Ultravanillasmurf]

Exciting! Looking forward to seing pictures of well differentiated human armies!

Well, the Anvil heads with Brodie helmets arrived today so that is the third Northern army started (okay I have assembled five Oathmark HumanInfantry as Spearmen for this new force).

For Humans, my only missing load out was Militia with ranged weapons (slings/bows) and sticks (sorry Spears), but then if they are not trained, would they be able to Brace?

I also forgot Pikes (Crossbows I can live without).

[Historiker]

@ Ultravanillasmurf:

In case of pikes I would use the Linebreaker rules. Too far off?

I have been glueing together units like crazy, so hopefully will be able to update my project thread soon. So far very little painted though

[Mr. White]

I have been glueing together units like crazy, so hopefully will be able to update my project thread soon. So far very little painted though

This is a dangerous practice. I find that if I assemble a lot, but paint little, the painting task feels monumental and discouraging. Or, by time I get around to painting another project or unit jumps ahead.

For my sanity, and to stay ahead of this hobby, I can only assemble as my painting goes. Finish one unit/team/warband before buying or assembling another.

But this is just my experience. Good luck!

[Hobgoblin]

In case of pikes I would use the Linebreaker rules. Too far off?

I'd be inclined to invent a Brace (2) rule for spearmen (maybe for a couple of points more).

[Historiker]

Wise words! I have just recently switched to not buying stuff as long as I have projects to assemble and paint (plus some yet unreleased projects in the pipeline). In fact Oathmark was the last purchase and therefore is a bit of an Oathmark 

I will still assemble all the units as I am going to demo the ruleset to fellow other players who do not own old WHFB armies or such. In general I always keep at least a second army or warband around to let complete beginners who don't even know whether they like wargames give it a try.

Of course demo-ing games right now is absolutely out of the question as we just entered another mini-lockdown. I will use this lockdown however to get some stuff done as to be ready once we are eventually again allowed to meet people and have a friendly game without using Skype or whathaveyou.

[bc99]

This is a dangerous practice. I find that if I assemble a lot, but paint little, the painting task feels monumental and discouraging. Or, by time I get around to painting another project or unit jumps ahead.

For my sanity, and to stay ahead of this hobby, I can only assemble as my painting goes. Finish one unit/team/warband before buying or assembling another.

But this is just my experience. Good luck!

That’s probably the best way to do it. I wish I had your control, I tend to feel that I’m going to miss out if I don’t buy the miniature. That’s why I’ve got a whole shelf of unfinished things next to my shelf of unbuilt things.

[Historiker]

What's so far helped me immensely with my Oathmark project is putting all the other unfinished projects out of sight. As I now only have the Oathmark related stuff in full view I often find myself sitting down just to glue together one dwarf and then assembling ten. This practice will become even easier once my Sarissa trays arrive and I can easily move around whole units.

[BZ]

Hello to Everybody here! This is my first comment here, I just registered because this thread.
I play Oathmark with my kids, sometimws my wife also joins us. I think that the game is easy to play with a very fluent gameplay. After the first party, the rulebook us very rarely needed. I dont know how many playtests were made, but I think that (after a dozen small, 1000-1200 point battles) except some small problems, the balance is pretty good (and we have units from all races). And I like the overall concept of mixed armies with kingdom building, and the old school art concept also. Im so amazed about this, that I started my first blog because of it (and of Frostgrave):
https://oathgrave.blogspot.com
The only problem I see, that its not very wide spread, too few people play it...

[BZ]

I'd be inclined to invent a Brace (2) rule for spearmen (maybe for a couple of points more).

And how about pikes with Brace (2), and two handed (no shields) for the balance? Or halberds: 2 handed, brace (1) and +1 attack strength?