WYSIWYG or not so much.

[The Red Graf]

I have a couple of miniatures that I want to use as thugs for the game. Both are armed with two hand weapons. I am not sure if I want to mutilate them to make them meet the letter of the law. Thoughts. suggestions, random bits of invective thrown my way.

[frogimus]

IMO, that is completely up to your campaign's group. I figure thugs will be left behind after a few good treasure hauls, anyway.

[Irishvince]

We will be playing as WYSIWYG as possible in our upcoming campaign (we might even give extra XP for people who paint and field figs that are closest to what they are supposed to be) but even then our rule of thumb is as long as it's clearly stated what the figs is and what weapon it's carrying at the start of the game we can let that kind of details slide.

Anyways that's how we intend on playing it. The only big no-no in our group is you cannot field a figurine that could be confused with a monster from the random encounter table (so no skeleton army)   

[Fencing Frog]

I think as long as you don't also have say a Barbarian in your party that looks a lot like the thugs you should be good.  My group has a limited WYSIWYG were we don't worry if a thug has a shield as long as the guy you are using as a man at arms is clearly better armored.  We sort of go through war bands at the start so people know what each-other have to avoid confusion.  We do have a hard and fast rule that troops armed with missile weapons have to have a missile weapon. 

[The Red Graf]

Thanks for the replies guys, that helps a lot. One point of clarification. The potential thugs are each carrying two one handed weapons, not two handed weapons like the barbarian. So dual wielding.

Specifically

Her


and her.


As you can see, excessive armor is not really an issue.

[DeGray]

In our group we are pretty lax about things like this as long as you make your opponent aware and it looks right (rule of cool).

For instance my barbarian is this girl http://www.copplestonecastings.co.uk/images/BQ1col.jpg
Obviosly a barbarian compared to the rest of my crew but not armed technically correctly.

as Irishvince says we just go through what all our guys are pre game.

However  we have ruled that models with black powder weapons have to be crossbows rather than bows.

[The Red Graf]

I like that Copplestone Barbarian girl myself. I had thought about getting her as well.

I think the one point that really hit home was the one about how long the thugs are going to be in my band. I hadn't thought about that aspect.

[PhilM]

Those women seem to have forgotten to put their clothes on, its cold in Frostgrave, they'll catch their deaths.

[The Red Graf]

They come from hardy stock and laugh at what passes for cold in Frostgrave.

[PhilM]

No one is that hardy.

[admiraldick]

my personal opinion is that WYSIWYG is vastly overrated. I totally understand that in many situations it is important to be able to tell the difference between units based on their appearance. however, this is largely limited to using one appearance to represent more than one thing (e.g. "this Ork with a shoota has a shoota, but this Ork with a shoota has a rokkit launcher").

as long as it is possible to tell two different units apart, you have made it clear to your opponent which rules will be used for which unit and have your list to hand for reference (all pretty basic good sportsmanship), then I can't see any reasonable ground to object. In my experience, more often than not WYSIWYG is used as a crutch for gamers who can't be bothered to engage with their opponent properly or as a needless stick to punish people for artistry and creativity.

these things are especially true of Frostgrave, where you only have to keep track of ten men. of which, 8 have set stats that can't be changed. even the most vaguely astute opponent is in no danger of a surprise.

[fastolfrus]

They come from hardy stock and laugh at what passes for cold in Frostgrave.

I thought they were just pleased to see me :~}

[The Red Graf]

my personal opinion is that WYSIWYG is vastly overrated. I totally understand that in many situations it is important to be able to tell the difference between units based on their appearance. however, this is largely limited to using one appearance to represent more than one thing (e.g. "this Ork with a shoota has a shoota, but this Ork with a shoota has a rokkit launcher").

as long as it is possible to tell two different units apart, you have made it clear to your opponent which rules will be used for which unit and have your list to hand for reference (all pretty basic good sportsmanship), then I can't see any reasonable ground to object. In my experience, more often than not WYSIWYG is used as a crutch for gamers who can't be bothered to engage with their opponent properly or as a needless stick to punish people for artistry and creativity.

these things are especially true of Frostgrave, where you only have to keep track of ten men. of which, 8 have set stats that can't be changed. even the most vaguely astute opponent is in no danger of a surprise.

This is really an answer after my own heart. I don't see why you couldn't print out a little one page explanation of who was who in your warband complete with a picture of each model and present it to your opponent.

[Corporal Chaos]

As far as showing what the model has.... As has been said so long as it is clear what each figure is I see no problems keeping the model as it was cast.

[PhilM]

A lot of it is about the look of the game for me, it ruins the suspension of disbelief a little if I have to remember that those skeletons are archers and those ones are thugs when they all have hand weapons and spears, in a game with as small a force as Frostgrave where most of the difference is just in the weapons of which there are only a few categories, there is not really much excuse not to have WYSIWYG, its not hard to get the right models painted so they at least have the right weapons.