Age of 40k a joke?

[excalibur]

Hey guys!

So, I just got into AoS a while ago and I really like the hobby, so much so that some of my friends have taken notice. One of my best friends in particular expresses certain interest in the hobby, but is more interested in the 40k side of things. (Mainly because of Robots.)

I have a sizeable Skaven force (Verminus/Skyre,) that I have hardly played with, but am still quite attached to. We would want to play against each other, so we could enjoy this awesome hobby with each other, but there are clear restrictions. I hear that there are AoS warscrolls for 40k armies, and looking into it for the Tau (my friend’s top choice right now,) there is a rule set for them. Obviously, close range Skaven against the Uber-shooty tau is a big difference, but would it work? Could it work? (Meaning 40k vs AoS in general.)

He has yet to make a purchase, but would like to get to some painting. Are Tau even viable right now? Should I try to convince him differently? (Maybe to the AoS side?) but, as it goes without saying, it’s his purchases, so right now I’m just telling him what he might want to get. Should I even bother with the 40k warscrolls? Any thoughts welcome!

Thanks a ton!

 

[AthlorianStoners]

Personally if you’ll be playing only with each other I’d suggest staying to one game for internal balance. If you’re gonna play others then it won’t mayger as much. 

Man option could be to use an army with counts as rules, I.e space marines with Stormcast rules, or something like that.

[Ragequit]

The problem is Skaven rules are professionally playtested to fit the AoS system. The Tau are fan made (possibly untested) rules converted to be usable in AoS. It would be up to you two to tweak it to make it more balanced assuming there are no online groups.

Is your friend interested in the 40k rules or just the models? Is he interested in the Age of Sigmar rules?

[pseudonyme]

Playing Tau with AoS Kharadron rules?

Playing Skaven with 40k Cult genestealer rules?

[Fisher KIng]

Have you considered chaos demons?

[Nin Win]

40k and Age of Sigmar are already very compatible.  For example, you need to only add a few house rules to make Age of Sigmar: Skirmish work great with 8th edition 40k.  And basically this amounts to extending the 6" rule of banners and musicians from the skirmish book to all unit affecting abilities.  That covers 90% of the issues that come up.

That said, no one has been playtesting a codex against a battle tome.  Go ahead and try it, but you're going to be on your own in figuring out what works.  Which is cool.  There's nothing wrong with that approach to gaming.  I'm a big fan of Open Play in AoS but even there points can be a useful shorthand to get games going quickly.  You won't have that.  It could easily turn out great, so go for it if you want to, but just remember you'll need to adjust things based on what you want out of the game.  Even if you find someone else's stats for an army so you can use it in the other game, you'll still need to approach it like development work.

I like the idea of finding armies your stuff can stand in as in both games.  What the best ones are will vary by what you do, but I bet you can make it work.  And don't feel confined to stick to one battletome or army.  Go full open.  Find the datasheet or warscroll that represents the unit as best as possible and use it.  Don't worry about battleforged or allegiances or whatever yet.  Get things working first and then worry about adding fancy rules like that.

My suspicion is that it's actually going to work out if you want it to.  The core of the systems are actually very close.  I suspect this was done intentionally so studio designers wouldn't have to shift gears as much.  So their design skills developed for one game wouldn't need drastic relearning if they moved over to help with a project for the other game.  The games are already compatible enough that I can take pretty much any 40k scenario or Age of Sigmar battleplan and quickly adapt it to the other game.  I think the same approach can work for model stats.  And if you can find an existing data sheet that already represents a given unit, just use that as a starting point.

Also, the Skaven really should infest the Tau Septs.

 

[Kronos]

Think skaven would work fit fairly well as a count as forChaos cults and heretics / lost and the damned.

Ogryn Berserkers -  Rat Ogres 

Plague Ogryns - Rat Ogre's ala clan pestilence.

Mutant rabble - clanrats

Rogue Psykers - Grey Seers 

Daemon Prince  - Vermin Lord 

Artillery - Skaven warp canons and whatever you want to kit bash.

[Twitch of Izalith]

Yeah I think there is more mileage in trying to find "counts as" dataslates for your skaven models so you can play 40k with them instead of trying to find counts as warscrolls for the T'au so you can play AoS with them.

Both games are great so my advice would be to make a deal that one of you will back down and you settle on one system for now - then in a few months you start playing the other system aswell.

One crossover I would recommend for all 40k players would be to try using AoS matched play missions for their games. Very little adaptaion is required and the AoS missions are a lot better than the 40k ones.

 

 

[excalibur]

7 hours ago, Fisher KIng said:

Have you considered chaos demons?

Yes, actually. He’s only really seen Nurgle and Tzeentch, but he seems adamant on Robots. Somehow, he isn’t swayed by the new Idoneth either!

[excalibur]

5 hours ago, Nin Win said:

My suspicion is that it's actually going to work out if you want it to.  The core of the systems are actually very close.  I suspect this was done intentionally so studio designers wouldn't have to shift gears as much.  So their design skills developed for one game wouldn't need drastic relearning if they moved over to help with a project for the other game.  The games are already compatible enough that I can take pretty much any 40k scenario or Age of Sigmar battleplan and quickly adapt it to the other game.  I think the same approach can work for model stats.  And if you can find an existing data sheet that already represents a given unit, just use that as a starting point.

Also, the Skaven really should infest the Tau Septs.

 

Wow, super helpful! I love the creative aspect in the hobby, and stepping it up a notch would be awesome! Thanks for all of that information, super valuable. 

(And yes, every time I think about a Skaven infesting a Sept, I get giddy.) 

  

[excalibur]

8 hours ago, pseudonyme said:

Playing Tau with AoS Kharadron rules?

Playing Skaven with 40k Cult genestealer rules?

I like where this is going...

(Kharadron rule.)

[Kamose]

http://hivefleetcharybdis.blogspot.com/2016/03/age-of-sigmar-40k-space-marine.html?m=1

Check these out and see what you think. They were made by a good friend and he posted them on his blog. I played Tyranids with them and they're solid. Don't know about Tau; I don't play them, just feed 'em to the bugs! ?

[Aelfric]

If he likes robots, what about Necrons and play them as Freeguild.

[AlphaKennyThing]

I think it would be really easy to transfer the Tau to AoS rules. Their ranged weapons simply adapt to the 'missile weapons' slot, and give them a flat 4+ to wound for a fire warrior with rend and damage the same. For melee weapons, they simply get their number of attacks, hitting on their weapon skill, wounding on a 5+ for example. It's just choosing a fair 'To Wound' roll for their weapons, as it doesn't vary against toughness like it does in AoS.

The next issue is points balancing, but I'd go so far as to suggest if you just build armies based around number of wounds and go from there, you'll soon work out what is balanced and what isn't.

[Nin Win]

If you ever want to make something kind of odd for skaven, I think most of the clanrat bodies are compatible with the skitarii arms so you can give them things like the skitarii radium carbines or galvanic rifles which are pretty cheap as bits on ebay.  I'm not sure what warscroll a bunch of clanrat infantry with crazy guns would be best as for AoS, but it's still awesome.

Of course it should probably have a round base.  It's from an image search and is not my work.

I think I agree with the idea that it will be easier to represent skaven in 40k than Tau in Age of Sigmar.  Both are doable and worth a try, but I think 40k already has enough datasheets that can pass for anything in the skaven army while things like crisis suits and drones and whatever probably aren't going to feel right in AoS.

The warhammers are about evoking the fiction.  The game play sort of bringing up the feeling of what goes on in the fictional universe.  Things like the drone saviour protocols matter.  In 40k they can take wounds for nearby living Tau, sacrificing themselves for the actual Tau citizens.  There's no easy pre made warscroll for that in AoS, while there are loads of things that can feel like Skaven for 40k.  Especially if you feel like going with open play and can pull from any faction like using Skitarii stats alongside a chaos daemon for the servants of the Horned Rat.

[excalibur]

2 hours ago, Nin Win said:

 

Of course it should probably have a round base.  It's from an image search and is not my work.

I think I agree with the idea that it will be easier to represent skaven in 40k than Tau in Age of Sigmar.  Both are doable and worth a try, but I think 40k already has enough datasheets that can pass for anything in the skaven army while things like crisis suits and drones and whatever probably aren't going to feel right in AoS.

Definitely awesome. I’ll have to try that, and your other input is really valuable too, I’ll try some 40k Skaven and check that out. Maybe a little of each, like Age of NotSigmarAnymore. 

Thanks man! I’ll take everything you say into mind!