When I started out in miniature wargaming almost 20 years ago, I started with early Games Workshop (Space Hulk lead to Rogue Trader/40k to Fantasy and Blood Bowl). But my lack of easy access to opponents at the time pushed me to expand my gaming horizons. I fell into a group that played 15mm Napoleonic (Napoleon's Battles), Civil War (Johnny Reb then later Fire and Fury) and ultimately ancients.
This was when De Bellis Multitudinous was new and I was hooked immediately with the variety of armies, the tactical plus strategic thinking involved and simplicity of the game. For a couple years DBM was a good chunk of my life. Painting figures to play with. Selling older armies to fund new ones in a vicious cycle that saw a lot of different ancient nations pass through my painting table to the green felt battlefield.
But things change and I was forced by my choice of career to move away from a solid group of players to a location that had zero players that i was able to find. And again in another location.
Things changed again, and now I have found people willing to play, I find myself falling in love again with the 15mm armies of antiquity. I'm painting Mycenaens and figures to round out my Macedonian and Polish forces. I have a regular DBA game which I hope will build to more large scale games. All my 40k stuff has migrated to the shelves, but not consciously and not all at once. I could find a game if I wanted to pursue one. But I have not felt the urge. I still love the fluff, but even new units for my old armies isn't giving me the urge to play and I'm not certain why.
I'm not giving up on it, I just don't have the drive to seek out and get people to play. I just wish I had a better handle on what changed.
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Whither the Warlord Traits
When going through the steps leading to turn one of a game, I'm seeing in our group the most derided and unenthusiastic step to be the roll for Warlord Traits. There hasn't yet been a documented case of a Warlord Trait being used for advantage in my group. While this is only anecdotal and people are probably using their warlord skills to great effect somewhere out there, it is consistent with other similar rules I have tried using.
In writing up the original Rules of Engagement update for 5th Edition I did with a co-worker, I added unique conditions, a set of wholly optional rules to theoretically spice up a generic game. Rules would modify run/charge distances for example. The problem quickly became the additional scenario rules felt more a nuisance than a benefit. They were left in the rule set, but abandoned in play, never used again.
I ignored this lesson as I wrote up an expansion of the Rules of Engagement concept to give games more of a campaign feel without the campaign extension. Each player's objective came with a USR or special rule benefit that narratively supported the goal. Again, in play these benefits often were ignored or forgotten.
The problem comes from the necessity of not overpowering these benefits. They need to be useful in some way, but not in a way they confer a distinct advantage to one player over another. But since they confer no distinct advantage their usefulness is suspect. This is exacerbated by the random roll to determine your benefit. So even if one or two of the Warlord Traits is useful, the odds do not favor you getting them.
How could this be fixed?
The random roll of the Trait is in line with the 6th Edition philosophy which seems to favor the uncertainty of the dice roll. So hiding a useful Trait among the 6 you can roll fits the edition, but does it add to the game or subtract from it? I'd suggest neither which is why my group still makes the roll but inevitably ignores the result. Removing the die roll and allowing a trait to be chosen addresses this problem, but creates a new one in the fact the USRs handed down by these Traits don't affect each army equally and can be cherry picked to suit who you are fighting that game. It changes from a trait of your HQ model to a "how can I best beat opponent X?"
Could we modify the dice roll to favor generic traits and make more unusual traits harder to roll? Change the table to a 2d6 roll and the the distribution of results becomes more predictable. This doesn't make traits more consistently useful.
Ultimately, given the power to change the rulebook, I think I would move the Warlord Traits into fluff/optional rules. Maybe tailor them to each race. More likely though, I'd wash my hands of it as a bad idea and cut it from the game.
In writing up the original Rules of Engagement update for 5th Edition I did with a co-worker, I added unique conditions, a set of wholly optional rules to theoretically spice up a generic game. Rules would modify run/charge distances for example. The problem quickly became the additional scenario rules felt more a nuisance than a benefit. They were left in the rule set, but abandoned in play, never used again.
I ignored this lesson as I wrote up an expansion of the Rules of Engagement concept to give games more of a campaign feel without the campaign extension. Each player's objective came with a USR or special rule benefit that narratively supported the goal. Again, in play these benefits often were ignored or forgotten.
The problem comes from the necessity of not overpowering these benefits. They need to be useful in some way, but not in a way they confer a distinct advantage to one player over another. But since they confer no distinct advantage their usefulness is suspect. This is exacerbated by the random roll to determine your benefit. So even if one or two of the Warlord Traits is useful, the odds do not favor you getting them.
How could this be fixed?
The random roll of the Trait is in line with the 6th Edition philosophy which seems to favor the uncertainty of the dice roll. So hiding a useful Trait among the 6 you can roll fits the edition, but does it add to the game or subtract from it? I'd suggest neither which is why my group still makes the roll but inevitably ignores the result. Removing the die roll and allowing a trait to be chosen addresses this problem, but creates a new one in the fact the USRs handed down by these Traits don't affect each army equally and can be cherry picked to suit who you are fighting that game. It changes from a trait of your HQ model to a "how can I best beat opponent X?"
Could we modify the dice roll to favor generic traits and make more unusual traits harder to roll? Change the table to a 2d6 roll and the the distribution of results becomes more predictable. This doesn't make traits more consistently useful.
Ultimately, given the power to change the rulebook, I think I would move the Warlord Traits into fluff/optional rules. Maybe tailor them to each race. More likely though, I'd wash my hands of it as a bad idea and cut it from the game.
Thursday, August 2, 2012
IPad Codex Mini-Review
I have had the Necron codex on my IPad for a short time and used it during a game or two to look things up. So here are my thoughts on them.
I still like the concept and expect all future codices to get this treatment. The art is good and the built in photo rotations and other bells and whistles work great.
The downside of that is they are slow on my IPad. Granted, my device is a first gen IPad and current machines may work better but it can take a long time to load up pages which can be frustrating when you're hunting a rule down.
Value to me is subjective, but in this hobby of ours I think that one you're in it it's too late to start crying about prices. You bought your bed, you need to lay in it. Was it worth the money I spent on it to me? I'd say on the lower side of yes, leaning towards no. My enjoyment of the accessibility and the quality just outweighs the frustration of load times.
So for what it's worth, that's my view on at least one of the new ibooks for 40k.
I still like the concept and expect all future codices to get this treatment. The art is good and the built in photo rotations and other bells and whistles work great.
The downside of that is they are slow on my IPad. Granted, my device is a first gen IPad and current machines may work better but it can take a long time to load up pages which can be frustrating when you're hunting a rule down.
Value to me is subjective, but in this hobby of ours I think that one you're in it it's too late to start crying about prices. You bought your bed, you need to lay in it. Was it worth the money I spent on it to me? I'd say on the lower side of yes, leaning towards no. My enjoyment of the accessibility and the quality just outweighs the frustration of load times.
So for what it's worth, that's my view on at least one of the new ibooks for 40k.
Monday, July 9, 2012
GW updates digital edition of Codex Space Marines
While the instructions aren't ideal the concept was a no-brainer. When new FAQs come out, you update the digital editions to be current. And in this case they did and I applaud that.
They also just released Codex Necrons, I haven't looked to see if it is already up to date or not.
Now guys, just follow through on my included army builder app and everything will be awesome.
They also just released Codex Necrons, I haven't looked to see if it is already up to date or not.
Now guys, just follow through on my included army builder app and everything will be awesome.
Thursday, July 5, 2012
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
6th Edition Fliers and Allies Video from GW
Looks like GW is releasing videos highlighting new features of the upcoming rulebook. Today this was posted discussing superficially the addition of allies and fliers. Very little new information is mentioned but fliers crashing to the ground sounds amusing.
Friday, June 15, 2012
Death Guard WIP
My test model for a Death Guard Terminator. I originally wanted to do a marble white like the pre-heresy Death Guard. I am not a fan of the green color scheme. But the marble white was not looking good to me and I ended up reworking this guy and a couple others like him several times before settling on a rotting flesh color for the armor with green starting to crack through.
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