The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread

[Dolmot]

Sometimes I feel like kick starter is only 12 year olds with their parents credit cards.

Nope. Grown-ups with self-control of a 12 year old.

Based on observing a friend of mine...

[Cubs]

Nope. Grown-ups with self-control of a 12 year old.

Guilty.

Me when I saw the Blood Rage Kickstarter : "Oh man, I've got to have this! All of it!!"

Me when it came through : "Holy crap, that's way more stuff than I thought it would be, I can't possibly paint all this."

[Vermis]

A bunch of agreements here: Hobgoblin, Grant, Rhoderic, Dolmot...

I don't think anyone here was making the argument that you had to use official miniatures for Specialist Games.

Maybe not here, but when you've witnessed forum topics, started just to complain about folk using cheaper proxies in 40K/FB, as if it's cheating ("I paid for my obscenely expensive model! I should get something more from it than these people.") then you know someone's going to make that argument, somewhere.

After a twenty-year-plus hiatus from fantasy gaming, I was astonished to find that considerable numbers of people appear to believe that only certain miniatures should be used with specific games.

Yup. And most of the time it's not even people actively complaining about proxies - it's that it just doesn't seem to occur to them.

[Argonor]

I don't think anyone here was making the argument that you had to use official miniatures for Specialist Games.

My remark was a comment on this:

I dread the very likely possibility that there will be some negative pressure applied to those that have spent many hours for the vendor of others like the guys at Yak and Net Epic.

I realize now that I am not quite sure what is meant by it, but I read it as how Vermis responded.

[Mr Brown]

There must have been a weird auto correct from my tablet. The word vendor should have been benefit.

Apologies and I can see where there would be confusion.

[Hobgoblin]

A bunch of agreements here: Hobgoblin, Grant, Rhoderic, Dolmot...

Maybe not here, but when you've witnessed forum topics, started just to complain about folk using cheaper proxies in 40K/FB, as if it's cheating ("I paid for my obscenely expensive model! I should get something more from it than these people.") then you know someone's going to make that argument, somewhere.

Yup. And most of the time it's not even people actively complaining about proxies - it's that it just doesn't seem to occur to them.

What happened to the rest of your post? I thought your analysis of special rules, etc., was really interesting and illuminating!

The whole phenomenon strikes me as really odd in the light of the Warhammer 2nd and 3rd edition armies that my friends and I played with as kids. I had an orcish horde that had Citadel orcs as its largest component, but was brimming with models from Grenadier, Essex, Ral Partha, RAFM and the like. My friends' dwarf, chaos, elf and human armies were similarly varied, as were my lizardmen (Runequest dragonewts, D&D troglodytes, all manner of Grenadier reptiles).

And that sort of approach was the rule. Look at Bryan Ansell's famous chaos army (which featured in Warhammer 3rd edition and Warhammer Armies): it's got large numbers of non-Citadel figures. It also has lots of figures used as creatures other than what they were sold as: I see, for example, a chaos goblin used as beastman, skeletons used as chaos warriors, a manticore used as a beastman, beastmen used as chaos warriors, and so on.

That, of course, is exactly what fantasy wargaming should be about - using creativity and imagination to achieve striking results that look good on the table. Why not use an orc or a goblin as a beastman if it fits? And you can almost certainly make it fit with imagination and paintwork. But isn't it an irony that Bryan Ansell's chaos army - the same chaos army that featured in material for the first, second and third editions of the game - would be illegal (from what I gather) in many Warhammer tournaments. And, worse, sniffed at by Warhammer players!

If I may address your (great but deleted) points about special rules to go with specific miniatures, I can remember very clearly when a gaming friend and I switched, quite abruptly, from Warhammer to Hordes of the Things (it must have been the year it was first published). It was the last hurrah of the first phase of our wargaming, before university and sport lowered their portcullis for 20-odd years. But it was a revelation. Rather than working with fiddly and unbalanced rules for particular models, you just looked at them, worked out which generic troop type represented them best, and based them accordingly. I still have some heavily armoured orcs on thin multi-bases who were "blades" and many more lightly armoured types who were "warbands", and so on. And the generic approach instantly removed questions of balance and "power play". Lion/Dragon Rampant does exactly the same, as does Battlesworn. But there's no shortage of flavour - that comes from the overall composition and, of course, the miniatures themselves!

[Vermis]

What happened to the rest of your post? I thought your analysis of special rules, etc., was really interesting and illuminating!

Posted too many of those long lectures lately, I felt. Too full of seasonal viruses to maintain my rage at the mo. Don't worry though, you'll probably see it again. It's like a terrier with a rat. A nerdy terrier with access to the internet. Worst. Rat. Ever.

To drag a bit of it back now, though, I agree with your own points. I only discovered Warhammer in 6th ed (dumped sometime during 7th) but even without experience of the first 2-3 editions, I started to think that it was way too tailored towards selling the right models to match the right special rules in the right game. Didn't help that the attitude seemed to worm it's way into many gamers, making them almost dependent on a game company handing them a complete, prepackaged experience, and from what I can see it hampers them, in different ways.
They say that the Warhammer background and aesthetic give them the most pleasure, so they find GW's rising prices reasonable and they'll keep paying them; while GW assumes the same, ignores rules development, and keeps bumping the prices up to unreasonable levels until they finally leave or the game implodes. They're reliant on special rules intertwined with background to provide 'flavour', complain that their armies are now 'useless', and can't conceive of taking the fluff and minis and using them in a different, smaller game. Until GW itself foists it upon them. (Well, the ones that stuck around, anyway)
Even after moving on to other games, the culture sticks around. Not too unreasonable to assume pickup games proliferated through GW providing everything down to gaming opportunities and venues? But then if you're used to that, you can't start a new game unless there are a dozen others already playing it. (Heck, I've seen people claim that the fact GW's core 2 are played worldwide is a reason to keep playing them, as if pickup gaming is a big thing in foreign holidays.) If you turn up unannounced to the regular gaming night and sit around waiting for a pickup with your new game, when everyone's only expecting and jonesing for 40K, then the game's an automatic failure. An intro game, or historical-style project or hosted game, where one player assembles and provides all materials, is too much work, if it's thought of at all.

But again, to be fair to Rhoderic: it's not quite as black and white as all that when you can't select individual settings, minis, and rulesets yourself, because the minis don't exist for distinctive parts of the settings, at least. (But I'm going to blame that on the 3-in-1 prepackage anyway! Great for business and for gamers when it's around, not so great for gamers who still like it when the business chops it)

Rules... I agree with you. It only helps to realise that most of the background and aesthetics are right there in the background and minis, and as you say the overall army composition, and that you can judge rules by their playability rather than other invented goalposts. The genericness (or as I prefer: the inclusivity) of rules is a plus, in my eyes, when looking at new sets. Hordes of the Things was perhaps a bit too general for my tastes, I admit - I prefer the stat-building and bit of extra chrome of Mayhem. (Though I'm tickled that bits of it's Stronghold expansion seem tailored to provide a generic alternative to special-rules-heavy Warmachine)
Dragon Rampant... I feel Dragon Rampant has lots of potential: small, portable, cheap book; smaller scale fantasy games (arguably better suited to 28mm and character-focused gaming); simple and quick-playing; use whichever models you like. To me it's the game AoS could have been, focused on the carefully constructed general mechanics than on unique unit rules.

But at the same time I think it's going to be dismissed by a lot of fantasy gamers, who think it should naturally be the other way round, let alone how they prefer it: focused on the special rules rather than the base mechanics. Generic, inclusive profiles are 'bland' and 'unfluffy'. Like I said in the deleted bit, a chunk of the WFB player base were all but forced into KoW with the switch from 8th ed to AoS, and were surprised to find how much they enjoyed unit-element gaming with simple, intuitive mechanics and a paucity of special rules. But there are still others who can't even give it a try because they think it's too bare. It can't work without special rules.
On that matter, I see the term 'synergy' pop up more, these days, as an ideal and as praise of wargames. Maybe I'm misunderstanding it, or being too harsh; but when I see it applied to games like 40K, Warmachine, Malifaux, Infinity, and especially AoS, I can only guess it's more about the best combos of special rules of minis that you can then assemble (read: buy), than on tactical decisions allowed by the base rules.

Not that I'm worried about Dragon Rampant, or KoW for that matter. Dan's a big boy and I know there are plenty lining up, waiting for the book's release. It's that, as I say, people hobble their hobby (heh) by assuming the non-WH style of gaming is boring or unviable or too much of a bother. To use the term that's bandied about when GW shakes things up: they invalidate their own armies. It's their loss.
And maybe I shouldn't worry about them either, but it should be such a simple switch to flick that doesn't invalidate the old way, but opens up a lot more possibilities. It's a great, wide hobby! No need to cut yourself off from big chunks of it, for more reasons than are necessary.

Well, I still had a grumpy rant in me. Who'da thunk.

[Argonor]

 

All too true.

And then there are those of us always building both sides of things, because it's the only way we get to play the games we want. 

[Rhoderic]

And then there are those of us always building both sides of things, because it's the only way we get to play the games we want. 

So true. The biggest paradigm shift I've had in this hobby was when I switched over to being a "collect both sides" type of hobbyist. I know it has its downsides but even accounting for them, I'm much happier for making the switch.

No longer do I ask other hobbyists "What army do you collect?". Now I ask them "What's your project right now?".

Of course there's respectable games like Frostgrave, SoBH and KoW which allow for or are even designed for "your army/warband versus my army/warband" pick-up gaming sessions or club campaigns, but even with such games, I prefer an approach that's more along the lines of "Shall I bring my matched set of Melniboneans and Pan Tangians, or are you bringing your Drow and Duergar?".

[Major_Gilbear]

@ Vermis:

As usual, I agree!

That said, a few salient points I wanted to touch on since we're discussing/ranting:

Synergy

This term is bandied about a lot nowadays, it's true. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to discriminate between "combo games" like Malifaux and Warmachine, and "tactical games" like Infinity.

I feel that model-specific rules that rely on other models' specific rules to work themselves fall into that first category, and if done poorly can result in armies getting stale quickly. This because you feel coerced into including all the models in the rules-chain, and then further obliged into playing them in the proscribed way, and this in turn leaves players with relatively few "free" decisions to make for themselves. Some Malifaux crews fall into this, and for a long while I felt the same about Warmachine too (which in part why we drifted away from it).

Other games like Infinity don't have this so much, and rely on the skill of the designers to balance models and on the players to use them to their best advantage in any moment. Yes, Infinity has a myriad of special rules, but it's also pretty much totally free in terms of what actions you can take and how many times a model can be activated - the opposite of the other two games  mentioned. In these games, the synergy comes from actual tactical decisions, and yet I'm constantly surprised to see on the Infinity boards how people jump in with the special abilities, forget to learn how to play the game at it's basic level, and then whine that their opponents are not being rolled by whatever models they've just spent lots of money on.

Games like AoS and 40k... I see lots of special rules, and some buff/de-buff abilities too, but I don't see much synergy as I've outlined it above. I don't know if it's because of the number of models in a typical game, the limitations of the rules, or the nature of the scenarios/scoring system. Whatever the reason, it is pretty clear that the special rules are there to distinguish units/models, and not to provide a game experience.


Official Rules & Official Models

I am always baffled by this.

If the models you like are suitable and aren't ridiculously confusing when playing a game, then use them. Beyond that... Asking for a ruleset to be generic is as dumb to me as asking for generic models.

What I mean by this is that the rules are usually themed because this creates several useful features: it captures a defined look and feel which people find appealing, it sets a natural boundary on expectations on what they will cover, and it provides a scope for the size/type of the game and it's rules mechanics. The theme also provides the basis of story hooks, which allow for narrative scenarios to play as well, and which I prefer to line-em-up-and-kill-each-other scenarios that are devoid of much imagination.

However, none of that means that you can't play with other models, or prevents players from using a "counts-as" approach. Nothing stops you playing Antares with Mantic models, or playing Infinity with GW models, or Malifaux with Westwind models, or a mix, or whatever. In other words, you don't need generic rulesets any more than you need specific manufacturer models, and many themes can be transposed as well (for example, you can play a Star Wars game with Warmachine or with a superheroes ruleset if you want, and both allow you to focus on the ever-popular Jedi/Sith).

What I do feel however is that rulesets that try to cater for everything are usually pretty much impossible to make in a satisfying way as a game. As a means to get whatever is in your collection onto the table for a bit of dice-rolling, they are fine. This is because the rules-writers cannot possibly know what's in everyone's collection, and by providing all possible options they can think of, the game is nearly impossible to balance or fully detail - and that's where they fail for me.

What I don't really see is the appeal of rules that just involve rolling lots of dice and use reference tables as a substitute for proper rules mechanics - they don't require much more from me than to roll dice and hope for the best, and I don't find that very engaging. For me, rolling dice is not a game, and rolling more dice doesn't make a game more fun.

Unfortunately, that last point has always been a feature of many GW games and I find it hard to be/stay interested in them as a result. I know GW can write better rules (as they've done so in the past, and is another reason why I think the popularity of games like Necromunda and Mordheim has endured so long), so I am inevitably disappointed when I then see rules like those for AoS.


My Toys Are Better

Companies that make games and models are businesses. I know we all know this, but I feel the need to state it again as a reminder. To stay in business, they need to make money; they do this by making more / newer / bigger models, and by releasing more / newer / bigger games.

At some point, I think it's nearly impossible to create a game that caters for those who spent a mortgage payment and six months of work on a single giant model and those who got some old second-hand infantry models and dipped them all in one evening (and BTW: I don't think one is more "right" or "fun" than the other either).

The player with the big toy will feel upset that his efforts are wasted if it isn't the focus of the game and stomps all over everything; the player with the cheap troops will feel aggrieved if they just get stomped every time because he perceives that the game has been reduced to a "pay to win" affair that doesn't allow him to participate properly on his resources.

I know this is a bit of a stilted/extreme example, but it's part of the reason games like 40k Apocalypse were created - to give players an excuse to buy and play with giant toys and seas of models well beyond what was required for 40k.

I therefore think another reason that skirmish-scale games seem to be very popular now is in part because their size acts as a limit in terms of pay-to-win, as giant expensive models and seas of troops are basically excluded by game constraints. In other words, it's a reaction against games like Apocalypse and the latest versions of 40k/WHFB/AoS!

[Ray Rivers]

Games like AoS and 40k... I see lots of special rules, and some buff/de-buff abilities too, but I don't see much synergy as I've outlined it above. I don't know if it's because of the number of models in a typical game, the limitations of the rules, or the nature of the scenarios/scoring system. Whatever the reason, it is pretty clear that the special rules are there to distinguish units/models, and not to provide a game experience.

Untrue in respect to AoS. All scenarios have special rules designed explicitly to enhance the gaming experience... kind of like that Frostgave game.

I therefore think another reason that skirmish-scale games seem to be very popular now is in part because their size acts as a limit in terms of pay-to-win, as giant expensive models and seas of troops are basically excluded by game constraints. In other words, it's a reaction against games like Apocalypse and the latest versions of 40k/WHFB/AoS!

Huh? AoS is a skirmish-scale game the last time I checked.

But no worry, I am sure in no time GW will be filling for bankruptcy. 

Keep it up boys, you're doing a great job!

[Tactalvanic]

Untrue in respect to AoS. All scenarios have special rules designed explicitly to enhance the gaming experience... kind of like that Frostgave game.

Huh? AoS is a skirmish-scale game the last time I checked.

But no worry, I am sure in no time GW will be filling for bankruptcy. 

Keep it up boys, you're doing a great job!

Nah there is plenty of life left in the old nag for them to flog out of it for a few more years yet 

Still, they do have a limitless talent to generate a debate or two which is good.

Its clear though  that many continue to have doubts about their decisions, but as Major_Gilbear already reminded us, they are in the business of making money, and if their method and choices on how to do that disagree with those of others, they don't have to care, even if its part of the customer base that disagrees..

They started into this business primarily as a reseller of other companies products, a small gaming mag, and licensed product, before being able to present to market any of their own products (other than the magazine if I remember correctly).

For a long time they have been doing only their own product now, probably longer than they were a reseller as such. Fair enough. I don't need to buy into all of it, I can enjoy some of it, if I think its for me and my pocket same as any other stuff

I did look at the 80 odd quid horus heresy boxy set thing at Warfare Reading last weekend, was not particularly fussed or impressed and put it back down again. Bought other stuff not GW, that did interest me.

Wait and see what they do next and maybe I might bite, maybe not.

Guarantee though that they won't go bust over my not giving them my money again

I feel ok either way.

[Rhoderic]

But no worry, I am sure in no time GW will be filling for bankruptcy.  

Keep it up boys, you're doing a great job!

Guarantee though that they won't go bust over my not giving them my money again

Not sure how we got into this subject. No one (at least in the more recent discussions in this thread) has been either predicting nor vocally wishing for GW to go bust.

[Tactalvanic]

Agree.

So can we get back to the more interesting debated things?

[Hobgoblin]

Official Rules & Official Models

I am always baffled by this.

If the models you like are suitable and aren't ridiculously confusing when playing a game, then use them. Beyond that... Asking for a ruleset to be generic is as dumb to me as asking for generic models.

What I mean by this is that the rules are usually themed because this creates several useful features: it captures a defined look and feel which people find appealing, it sets a natural boundary on expectations on what they will cover, and it provides a scope for the size/type of the game and it's rules mechanics. The theme also provides the basis of story hooks, which allow for narrative scenarios to play as well, and which I prefer to line-em-up-and-kill-each-other scenarios that are devoid of much imagination.

I agree with nearly all of what you say, but I don't really understand your reservation about generic rules. As an example, all of the fantasy rules I like best are generic: Song of Blades and Heroes, Lion/Dragon Rampant, Hordes of the Things. And, of course, the early iterations of Warhammer, in which the "Warhammer world" was only very faintly sketched, if at all; it was only there by implication (i.e. the bestiary implied a specific, if unstated, setting), I think, in the first edition.

I too massively prefer narrative scenarios, but that's actually why I prefer generic rules. You don't get any of the "these guys can't possibly side with these guys" stuff, and if you want to have wicked dwarves allied with goblins (spot the Tolkien precedent!) to raid an elven keep, you can. I also think that "game worlds" (with the exception of a few, notably Glorantha) tend to be pretty thin, compared with what you can rustle up from books, myths and folklore.

To continue a little along the tangent and perhaps bend it back to the main topic, I thought the genius of the original Warhammer 40K was that the setting was so broad and vague that it was simply a framework for whatever story you wanted to create on whatever far-flung planet. The background was a set of tools and suggestions, rather than anything with constraints. That seems to have ebbed away in subsequent editions, along with the facility to create your own profiles, which was a notable feature of second-edition Warhammer and (if memory serves) first-edition WH40K (I don't recall anyone calling it "Rogue Trader" at the time - the current vogue for doing so seems somewhat revisionist to me!).

Similarly, the joy of the tremendous scenarios for second-edition Warhammer was that they could be plonked down in any fantasy setting with minimal effort; the background pertained largely to the scenario itself rather than the wider world. So, steppe nomads attack a hobgoblin convoy; a usurper fights clansmen; a necromancer and ratmen clash at a remote monastery; orcs muster to raid the lands of men. And so on. Again, that seemed to be eroded as subsequent editions became more heavily invested in "the world".

Age of Sigmar seems, to me at least, to be the antithesis of all that. It's so specific in its troop types and (judging from the rules) has little obvious capacity for allowing, say, a troop of goblin archers mounted on giant lizards or even something as simple as orcish wolfriders. Warhammer 2nd embraced all that - as do the likes of SBH, LR/DR and HOTT. The one thing I do like about it (again, from reading the rules rather than playing) is the built-in facility for asymmetrical games, which seem to me A Very Good Thing.