Meeting Engagements Relevance Declining?

[JackStreicher]

I still like ME and Play them. MWG also plays ME.

there‘s just less hype around it.

[Sedraxis]

I think loads of people picked it up as a second way to play, it's a new little format to make smaller games more interesting.

Around here people are hyped about it and it's being played about as much as regular old 2k. Then again, we also like 1500 or 1250 games here to break up the lists a bit.

It allows for a lot more variety in listbuilding.

[soak314]

1 hour ago, Kramer said:

Could you elaborate? Because surely if I play, just for an example I actually have, scourge privateers I’m better of at 1k with my limited roster than 2K? Or do you mean that it makes lists more difficult because you can’t keep adding the best ones? 

I think they just mean you can't play with all your toys, ie the maximum bonuses certain units get when they're taken at max count.

 

1 hour ago, Thiagoma said:

To me is kinda the oposite. Been fielding Eldritch Council to fight my wifes DoKs and it has been fun.

Some of the non-tome armies are surprisingly potent in the format. I'm taking a break from constantly playing this week, but once I get back next week, I'll be facing someone bringing Tomb Kings, which should be interesting.

Edited July 20, 2019 by soak314
Grammar

[Infeston]

I played two matches with different friends and they both were surprisingly even. The first match was Destruction vs. Stormcast and the second match was Destruction vs. Sylvaneth. The ME matches we played never felt one-sided. Especially because you get points for killing models and points for holding objectives. 

Also the match was pretty fast. Normally some matches take a whole evening and sometimes we don't even get to finish the match, because it took so long. 

For my gaming group Meeting Engagements was a new way to play faster matches on a limited space. This is why I generally like the new GHB. Because it focusses on the exact situation, which my gaming group and many other gaming groups are in. Most people don't have a store close to them, so they often have to play at home. I also don't have enough space for a Tabletop table of 6x4. So Meeting Engagements was perfect for our group. 

Edited July 20, 2019 by Infeston

[Equinox]

23 hours ago, tripchimeras said:

 

EDIT: Re-reading this post, it is more negative towards meeting engagement then I intended.  Can't say enough that it is a fun/good idea, and I am sure it will see plenty of play.  I just don't think it is a great tourney option, nor do I think it needs to be.  I know a lot of ppl prefer faster games, and this is a great option for that, I just don't think it is a tourney solution, unless you can engineer a lot of self policing of army lists in said tourney/are clear that it is a casual thing, or are willing to introduce comp.

At this point your posts have become textbook confirmation bias.  You dogged the format before it was released and once available you jumped on the points that supported your views.  Everytime someone talks about meeting engagements,  you respond with how basically it is not a valid option for tournaments and other such dribble.  You have made your opinion clear about the format,  so now your posts are coming off as redundant and frankly a poor attempt to badger others into sharing your viewpoint.   

There is nothing wrong with disliking a format, game or whatever, but actively discouraging others from exploring something that is intended to be leisurely activity is just bad for everyone. 

 

Edited July 20, 2019 by Equinox
Clarification

[Equinox]

With regards to the OP, stuff is out there, just not at the levels of the default format (2000 points).  The fact you already have a group that is playing ME is a huge leap ahead when compared to others.  I also agree with other posts that there is lots of stuff on TGA, it just moved mostly to the faction specific threads.

I am hoping a podcast or two appears that embrace the smaller formats (Warcry, ME, etc...).   I really feel there is a market for smaller format AoS, it just takes a couple driven and talented folks for it to gain more exposure.

Edited July 20, 2019 by Equinox

[Infeston]

33 minutes ago, Equinox said:

  There is nothing wrong with disliking a format, game or whatever, but actively discouraging others from exploring something that is intended to be leisurely activity is just bad for everyone. 

I wouldn't say he actively discouraged others from exploring the format. He even said that he doesn't like hardcore elitism. He only said that he doesn't think that ME is a viable competitive option. I disagree with this statement, because I think it is a good competitive option. But I wouldn't go that far and say that he actively discouraged me from playing this format.

10 minutes ago, Equinox said:

I am hoping a podcast or two appears that embrace the smaller formats (Warcry, ME, etc...).   I really feel there is a market for smaller format AoS, it just takes a couple driven and talented folks for it to gain more exposure.

I really hope that the format catches on and more people will play it. I think it is a step in the right direction, especially for new players. I think the current "normal" format (2k) discourages people from joining the hobby. And I think GW really tries to establish new formats for new players, but it is often the community that dismisses such formats.

[Equinox]

22 minutes ago, Infeston said:

I wouldn't say he actively discouraged others from exploring the format. He even said that he doesn't like hardcore elitism. He only said that he doesn't think that ME is a viable competitive option. I disagree with this statement, because I think it is a good competitive option. But I wouldn't go that far and say that he actively discouraged me from playing this format.

Sorry Infeston, my comments are more in response to all of his TGA posts on the topic of ME.  The joys of the internet in that we can both read a post and interpret it differently.  Like yourself, I am finding the format to be a positive one and personally the breath of fresh air I need to "possibly" re-engage with the hobby.  I get the format is not for everyone, which is totally acceptable.  I am personally done with 2000 point games and the matched play format at that level for a list of reasons, but don't feel compelled to spam every discussion about said format just because I don't think it works for me.    

[Kasper]

To me, Warcry has made Meeting Engagementd irrelevant. I like AoS with 2.000 pts., but want something on the side in the form of a much smaller and faster game. Warcry just seems much more exciting.

[soak314]

4 hours ago, Equinox said:

I am hoping a podcast or two appears that embrace the smaller formats (Warcry, ME, etc...).   I really feel there is a market for smaller format AoS, it just takes a couple driven and talented folks for it to gain more exposure.

Being a fan of smaller scale formats myself, I had a really good feeling about ME and wanted to see loads of games of it as soon as it came out. Thing with my local meta is everyone's utterly fixated on the next tournament, which is usually run at 2k. Games are almost always practice games for the next coming tourney, which can honestly drive me up the wall because I feel 2k AoS is a pretty flimsy competitive format, and not one I'd like to play in every single time.

Having been part of the limited Kill Team scene, and having watched it slowly die, I knew I had to do something if I wanted this format to become more popular. So I made a list of all the active players, and started hitting them up one by one for ME games.

I started with the people I knew would immediately bite: the more experienced tourneyheads who I knew would get a kick out of the fresh tactical experience. And people with underperforming factions keen to try anything to get some of the game's math back in their corner. 

The games went pretty great! Easily curbing an FeC player's gheist, while also getting stomped by BcR and Idoneth players made it feel like I was in topsy turvy land. Some people would finish a game, look at the mere 1.5-2 hours that had passed, and immediately ask me if I wanted another. I made sure to let people know about it back on the group, and I kept popping into people's DM's asking for meeting engagement games.

Some felt the format was indeed a very good competitive option. Others shared the same trepidations as people on this site. But what's important is I've made people aware of it as an option. We've got an upcoming 1k narrative event shift to Meeting Engagements completely, but I've yet to badger the shop's tourney runner to start some events up. I'll be sliding into their DM's soon to see if I can do anything about that, too!   

[Thostos]

ME is here to stay,,the few games my group has played have been fun and quite balanced.Im planning an area tournament near the end of the year.

  Its way to early to count the new format as "failing" anyway,,lots of stuff going on with AoS now so I wouldn't expect a lot of play focusing on a new format at this time.

 

Just a few observations from the games we have tried,,it takes more planning than many think when building a force for the various detatchments.As was expected,armies that may struggle competitively in 2k,shine in the 1k format,Gitz come to mind,were is backdooring SCE not so much since the deploying from reserve restrictions really don't let anyone "backdoor".

[InSaint]

On the contrary, I think GW struck gold with Meeting Engagement. It is immensely popular in my local gaming community and many players have even switched over from 2k Pitch Battle to ME. 

I actually think they might even change some rules for Pitch Battle next year to follow ME.

Here are the reasons why;

• It is mentally less taxing because units come in in waves and you don't need to go through the cycle of completing all actions for the full 1000pts from T1. You can easily clock in 2-3 games and still feel energized.
• It takes up less space in any game store, two 6x4 tables can accommodate 8 players. Having more players gathering also helps to build the community.
• It is faster and players can enjoy rotating around fighting different factions and army compositions.
• It  makes shooting viable again due to the smaller board size and how VP is calculated. If you kill off just 1 model from range and stay untouched, you will lead by VP alone at the end of each battle round!
• It aligns with the Start Collecting box sets as the army composition just requires 1 battleline. GW you sneaky ******... 
• It is more balanced than Pitch Battle at 1000pts because you no longer have to deal with the full might of broken synergy from Turn 1.
• It addresses the horde spam issue as you can only field double unit size for the battleline in the main body and any units in rearguard. No more triple max unit size and your double units only have 2-3 turns of effectiveness depending on the battleplan.

But of course there are still balance issues, which is inevitable for any gaming system and will take time to rectify. But compared with previous formats, ME is the most enjoyable till date.

Edited July 21, 2019 by InSaint

[Nin Win]

I'm in a pretty much only open and narrative gaming group and Meeting Engagement has gotten us to actually play Matched Play stuff.  Even planning on all attending a local tournament in a few months that is going to be Meeting Engagement.  Still expecting to lose and play each other in the bottom tables, but we're going to actually show up.  2k pitched battle?  Never.  I don't like building or playing against perfectly crafted synergy engines.  The max unit size being reduced, 2 of each unit max meaning you can't just spam the single most points efficient unit and the breaking up of deployment into three groups makes for a very, very different experience.

Edited July 22, 2019 by Nin Win

[Eevika]

Here locally ME is a huge success. I have played 8 games of ME and 3 games of 2k after the new GHB and I have to say I love ME as a format. We even had a great 10 player 5 round ME tournament last week and it was so fun I managed to go 3-2 with a Fimir/Troggoth list. I personally find 2k games a bit hard to keep track of when something like Fyreslayers have 8 heros praying and giving random buffs to everything and skaven is using a billion things to buff their guys. In ME im able to keep track of everything and think better. Even playing 5 games in a day was easy when the games only last about an hour.

[DerZauberer]

After playing/seeing several ME games, i think it's a good first draw on balanced 1000 points games, but right now it still has several issues.

All the positive points for ME are very generic, e.g. "it's faster", "it's a good starting point", "it takes less space" and those are true for sure, but those are  goals you can easily achieve by saying "let's play 1000 points on a smaller table" and you could already do that. 

What ME advertised to be is a challanging, fast, balanced and thought-of 1000 point system at the heart of the competetive scene.

So what i think so far:

1. Deployment has still it's issues, for example on Rearguard Action a Mainbody of 20 Plaguebearers (32mm) or 40 Stabbas (25mm) + anything else cant legaly be set up as the plaguebeares/stabbas fill out the 12"x3" and any addition to that does not fit - even not with the "wonky tableedge" rule. There is a rule that says "the unit is destroyed if it can't be set up", but you auto-loose units depending on which mission you play? Thats not well thought off imo.
    
2. The missions are  boring. There is no finesse in fighting about one or three points and killing models, especially in a melee focused game as age of sigmar is. Due to the lack of units you can't try to outmanouver your opponent, build screens or use chaff as it feed kill points. All games i've witnessed were "who can hit the hardest on the middle objective, yays!"
    
3. It's fast, it's lightweighted and ideal for after-work games or quick filler games. All games were played in 60-90minutes. It's a good hobby starting point, as you can focus on a supported 1000 point matched play scheme to start, but i would generate a custom mission for a more thematic feel to it. 
    
4. It will have it's own meta, as you need to kill stuff and have a killerunit on the center objective which is able to get hurt and shrug it off, e.g. hearthguard berzerkers. While on paper only 2 wounds, they effectivly have 3 wounds (+4 shrug), so you deny 1/3 of wounds for scoring the secondary objective, while still dishing out lots of damage. Another point is speed. Some missions play on the same width as 2000 points with 3 objectives spreading out on 48", but with 2-3 (depending on contingent) less turns to score any of them. In Rearguard action my ardboys (4" move) arrived at the end of turn 2 (as Spearhead), and ran 2 turns only to reach the mid objective with 4/10 ardboys, while Slaanesh hits easily ~18" ranges and threats the whole board at all time. It's just as breakable as 2000 points and it has the same issues 2000 points has. If you want a balanced match, both players need to agree to that and balance their armies out.
    
5. The whole terrain minigame is defined as "must", but it would just destroy the time save of meeting engagement as you need to roll-off, choose, and think of possible terrain locations. In addition there are so many measuring restrictions on terrain, which terrain, scenery rules for unique terrain etc. It would easily add up 10-15min, so we (and every battle report i've seen) skipped this phase all along.
    
6. Double-Turns are extremly punishing. Each game i've seen - due to ME being a big brawl about the centre - games were decided by the double turn. It's almost guarantees the 2 victory points for kill points as you had two turns to choose your charges and combats, which is huge when you only have several units without screen or chaff on the board, and even if theres screen or chaff, those feed kill points to your opponent. But the score objectives  at the end of each battle round mechanic dampens the double turn a bit after all. But right now, each game i've seen/played was heavily influenced by the double turn with no way to coming back, with not a single "giving" up on double turn for tactical reasons right now. 

ME has similiar issues as the GHB 2017 had with it's matched play missions. Those were the right steps - but compared to the 2019 versions of those missions - still very lackluster.

We want to play it several times more but those are points which we'll maybe house rule somehow, but we're certain it's a great addition to the roster. But right now, it's far from competetive in my oppinion and a bit blunt. 

Edited July 22, 2019 by DerZauberer
Spelling!

[SwampHeart]

I'm using ME for my Club Night games because it fits better in that scope and lets me get more people on the tables available. That said our store tournaments are and will continue to be 2k and most every Saturday pick up game is still a 2k game. Format is fun, has a ton of issues (just look at the GHB FAQ), and isn't any better than 2k as a tournament game. It has its uses and its been helpful in getting more players up to speed faster for sure but thankfully it won't be replacing 2k as the major tournament standard. 

On a more personal level I have 0 interest in the game, if I want to play small skirmish games there are loads of better options out there. Malifaux is fantastic, I enjoy Infinity, and if I want to keep in AoS Warcry is great fun as well. If I'm going to play AoS I want to, personally, play proper 2k games and practice for my next event or just enjoy getting to use my army as I've assembled it. 

Edited July 22, 2019 by SwampHeart

[Dead Scribe]

Yeah.  2k games are pretty much the only thing i'll play, practicing for the next event.

[svnvaldez]

58 minutes ago, SwampHeart said:

Format is fun, has a ton of issues (just look at the GHB FAQ), and isn't any better than 2k as a tournament game. It has its uses and its been helpful in getting more players up to speed faster for sure but thankfully it won't be replacing 2k as the major tournament standard. 

On a more personal level I have 0 interest in the game, if I want to play small skirmish games there are loads of better options out there. Malifaux is fantastic, I enjoy Infinity, and if I want to keep in AoS Warcry is great fun as well. If I'm going to play AoS I want to, personally, play proper 2k games and practice for my next event or just enjoy getting to use my army as I've assembled it. 

I think ME is great for as you say getting players "up to speed". Its a fine gateway format imo and never should be taken to seriously despite it being in the matched play section right along standard 2k pitched battles.

I'd rather play ME in a tournament then 1k vanguard we had last year. Sometimes when a community is growing they would much rather play 1k then 2k, I live in LA (USA), there are lots of small stores in my area that only dabble in GW games and have held a 1k tournament (or doubles 1k each) tournament over the last few years.

For me 2k is the "real" game, but I see no issues with having ME as an alternative for smaller sized games.

[wayniac]

I was super excited for Meeting Engagements, I like smaller point games.  But the combination of it allowing unbalanced combos out of the gate, the strange table size (why not just 4x4?  Why make it a weird size?) and the extra splitting your army stuff that IMHO wasn't even needed made it seem incredibly bad after the initial "Oh cool a way to legitimize something other than 2k" thing wore off.  It seems like they went too far in the wrong direction with what they decided to do with it.  it didn't need all the extra things on top of it.

Edited July 22, 2019 by wayniac

[soak314]

15 minutes ago, wayniac said:

I was super excited for Meeting Engagements, I like smaller point games.  But the combination of it allowing unbalanced combos out of the gate, the strange table size (why not just 4x4?  Why make it a weird size?) and the extra splitting your army stuff that IMHO wasn't even needed made it seem incredibly bad after the initial "Oh cool a way to legitimize something other than 2k" thing wore off.  It seems like they went too far in the wrong direction with what they decided to do with it.  it didn't need all the extra things on top of it

 

3x4 is so you take a standard 6x4 table and have two games on it at once, which is great space efficiency for tourneys and events.

And man im starting to sound like a broken record here but morathi in the spearhead isn't as scary as you'd think! Unless by 'broken straight out the gate' you mean two stacks of Tzaangor Enlightened in which case you'd have more of an argument, but that's also more of a warscroll problem.

Also the staggered deployment is seriously the best rules idea GW have had for this system since removing the S/T table.

[Skreech Verminking]

Well I’ve been diving my nose into the rules, and from what I’ve seen it is interesting and definitely has potential in being a fun little system.

(I haven’t played it yet sadly, was unable to attend the fun ME tournament in my local area because of a misplaced meeting)

Although great as it looks I’ll probably will enjoy 2k or 3k of aos more, since this is basically we’re I’m getting the feeling of playing a real tide of brown and blackfurred rats.

I think ME is great for many armies, but it has a fe flaws with some certain armies.

for example some armies are overly strong in the game system, other are overly weak, since their true strength usually unfolds in a bigger unit of models.

this is probably something I dislike of the system.

but than again I’ve only seen a few video clips on the system and haven’t used it myself yet.

 

[wayniac]

3 hours ago, soak314 said:

3x4 is so you take a standard 6x4 table and have two games on it at once, which is great space efficiency for tourneys and events.

 

That does make sense, I didn't consider that, I suspect because GW doesn't have to my knowledge a 3x4 board, it's 2x2 pieces so you'd have 4x4.  Which now that I think about it is weird that they don't have something at that smaller size.

[Infeston]

As I said before, me and my gaming group really like ME and we are considering making ME our standard format. Most people I know that play Warhammer or have started Warhammer don't own 2k points armies. Sometimes it es even hard for them to have enough models to play 1k matches. I personally don't understand how a format like 2k could establish itself as the standard format, because it takes so long and it is so hard to get a fully painted 2k army ready. 

But I am not a tournament player, so I don't really know about why the 2k format established itself. 

I really like to play with less models on the table and it is easier to remember all the rules if you only have a handful of models to play with. And as I said before, the matches we played were pretty even, whereas some 2k point matches I played seem to be already decided by the end of the second turn.

But I am not an experienced tournament player, which is why I don't know if my opinion is valid in any way.

Edited July 23, 2019 by Infeston

[VBS]

1 hour ago, Infeston said:

As I said before, me and my gaming group really like ME and we are considering making ME our standard format. Most people I know that play Warhammer or have started Warhammer don't own 2k points armies. Sometimes it es even hard for them to have enough models to play 1k matches. I personally don't understand how a format like 2k could establish itself as the standard format, because it takes so long and it is so hard to get a fully painted 2k army ready. 

But I am not a tournament player, so I don't really know about why the 2k format established itself. 

I really like to play with less models on the table and it is easier to remember all the rules if you only have a handful of models to play with. And as I said before, the matches we played were pretty even, whereas some 2k point matches I played seem to be already decided by the end of the second turn.

But I am not an experienced tournament player, which is why I don't know if my opinion is valid in any way.

2k format is suppose to be the "standard" pushed by GW to design/balance (*cough*) their gaming systems. It was the case in later Fantasy editions, where armies could field a Lord and decent amount of Special/Rare units to bring lots of models and big things on the table. I assume the same is applied to AoS.

Ironically, this 2k format (sometimes 1500 or 2500, depending on the edition/year) was often criticized about Fantasy. Even used as an argument to explain its demise. "People are forced (lol) to buy so many models", etc.... A positive aspect of AoS 1.0 was the lack of such rigidity, but didn't last. Funny how things go back to the square one, even if it was supposed to be bad.

I don't think there are valid and invalid opinions with gaming, just different perceptions when it comes to How to play with miniature soldiers. I bet there are tons of people that share your opinion (myself included). I also find 2k matches a bit too big, and do not work very well with the core AoS rules system, and thus, hold no interest to me. The positive thing about ME is that it brings new formats/ways to play with a different scale and I'm happy because this probably means that GW will continue churning out new material (through GHB) for those that prefer this way to play, instead of just pushing a one-dimensional match play system. The more the merrier, I guess.

At the end of the day, to address the thread title question, I really doubt it matters if the relevance of a game is declining or not on the internet or 3000k away. If one enjoys ME and locally has a few folks that do too, that's all you really need. Extrapolating local perception or internet traffic is pretty narrow-minded, but quite common. I doubt GW just made it a one-trick thing for the GHB 2019, and will most likely (if smart) add at least a few pages (battleplans, etc) in future instances.

[SwampHeart]

3 hours ago, Infeston said:

because it takes so long and it is so hard to get a fully painted 2k army ready. 

I've painted 2k armies in less than a month to a standard that's gotten me paint nominations (player's choice because its all about pop, but you get the idea). 2k only seems daunting until you've built and painted a few armies and then you can see its really not a difficult process (time wise) to get there in a relatively quick time frame. Money is obviously a bit of a different story but that's the hobby in general.