soak314

Gitz and idoneth pics are floating around now! Anything on a mount/thematically a knight seems to pack a heck of a punch.

Cheers for all the thoughts, so far folks! I quite like @Ravinsild's comparisons to bloodbowl, in particular: and I'd just like to highlight @gjnoronh's fantastic points,: and I'm very much for the "think on your feet" approach, because I feel that AoS is *not* a highly defined, highly standardized ruleset, and houseruling scenario setup so there's more defined, standardized conditions coming into a game does little to change that. I also agree that Bloodbowl's the better skill based tournament game. And seeing elements of BB in the recent matched play guidelines, I think the design team does too. Consider Meeting Engagements: it's an official matched play format that guarantees some very funky mixed up deployments and matchups, obviously another case of the design team pushing for "think on your feet".

Banging out my bonesplitterz in a particular order, so that I get a good spread of units done first, giving me a nice selection of all the Warcry-legal ones for next week. Once I finish I'll do up some retro squig hoppers for my gitz. Not sure how big a deal the preset terrain loadouts are for Warcry, but my first few games are going to be on whatever's available at the store.

Strike hard and fast, I guess? Very keen to play these fellas.

Alright ladz! We got the best value Warcry box, some of the nicest, most expressive models, and from what I can vaguely recall of the book I peeked during demo day, a pretty okay campaign quest! What do you reckon we can expect for rules though? "Most Well Rounded" faction never really bodes well, IMO. Ironjawz don't got it any better with "Simple To Play". I think we'll be a reasonably tough, reasonably mobile, reasonably hordey faction. I'm eyeballin "Lodsa Arrows" on our skillsheet, so that might mean we have situational shooting. "Charge!" seems like it'll really help us cover some ground, "Toof Shiv" is a bit uuuh (maybe it's for nailing those last few HPs?), and the juju one is probably tied to our totem boy. The thing I'm most looking forward to is the Big Stabba rules, they're always hilarious to use in core, and hopefully that carries over here.

Hey, I'm not invalidating anyone's chosen way to play here, if the American GT's find a way to standardize the game in their community with houserules so more folks are happy, then more power to them!

In a jervis johnson movement and positioning heavy game where most of the setups need the game done in 3-4 turns? I think differentiation will actually be pretty easy. I bet you'll feel the little differences in move values and health values way more as you play more and more games.

Honestly, good on them for making such robust use of Open Play!

That's what makes it fun~

Oh hey someone finally addressing ghur! This lovely realm rule is actually worded real vague, and having gone over it I think the best way to handle ghur is to have the organiser pre assign monstrous beasts. It doesn't say the players have to pick beasts out of their own battletomes iirc, so we can play this one by ear pretty easily. That's my solution that sticks totally within what the ghb defines matched play as, at least. But also if your opponent brings something stupid and insists on using it as per the book you could simply avoid it and have it crashing back into his own army. Which is how you make a tactics out of one of the dumbest rules in matched play.

Im pretty sure we'll have a rough time coming to any sort of accord at this point. But i still think any sort of 'welp im boned' mentality born of rolling one of the simple realm effect variants you could have easily prepared a list for is *very much* something any player can curb at list building. It really just boils down to realm rules on not letting players roll the lists they want to roll (one trick pony lists as folks have called em) because that's what the game's early established meta has conditioned them to.

Yeah, exactly. They're trying to differentiate further within the genre they previously defined. Nobody else is approaching it like they are, and they're leaning into it. I can see a lot of people here don't regard the ability to adapt to something you can't control as good measure of tactica, but is it really not? Id be way more impressed with someone who can consistently win tourneys with realm rules on. Anyone can mathhammer an even playing field, not everyone can keep themselves form breaking when things look hairy, and manage to pull wins out their ass in a random, unfair environment.

It's fine. I've won and lost my fair share of games off double turns, but it adds a lot of spice to the system. Adds something to worry about for unit placement and melee engagement, which I appreciate.

That's pretty clear to me personally: they've made a wargame and they acknowledge its nature. It's not an RTS, not a tactical action chess analogue like KT Arena or a hybrid tabletop competitive system like Underworlds*, it's a wargame. And as pointed out earlier, if you want to emulate what is tested in war you need to make the competition a test of who can make the most out unknowable and terrible situations. Nobody else in the industry tries to do that, and if there's one thing GW has absolutely nailed across the years, it's making a one of a kind identity for themselves. I'm pretty sure this is just them applying that philosophy to competitive play. *(KT Arena and Underworlds are fantastic dedicated competitive systems more in line with the balancing seen in GW's contemporaries and everyone should give them a shot.)

I'm of the same outlook: I think the aos core system is one of the farthest things from "ideal competitive wargame system" I've ever seen, but all the game-changing, randomized factors in scenario setup help push it more towards being a very interesting, much more compelling meta where you're tested on your ability to adapt and think on your feet instead of your list's ability to take toy soldiers off the table in the first couple of turns. EDIT: And I disagree about the list building being de-emphasised! Someone swayed me to this opinion in the meeting engagements thread: in a format where the scenarios are highly variable it is imperative that you make a list with less strategic holes in it, one that can efficiently cover its exposed hindquarters in any given situation.

And I'm not just talking about rolling scenery dice and realm artefacts, Im talkin full monty: A.) All realm effects followed INCLUDING Ulgu in all it's 8" limiting glory, and Ghur and the often violently ignored Rampaging Monsters rule. B.) Terrain rules as per their relevant warscrolls. This includes stuff like full on LoS blocking, Obstacle rules, and Garrison rules, that supersede the scenery dice. C.) Full terrain and board setup as seen in the new GHB. Most people I play don't ever bother with realm rules past the artefacts, or possibly the spells. The realm *effects* in particular are very polarizing. Every single person I've played with isn't or is only partially aware of the terrain warscrolls, despite the GHB stating they should be used for matched play. The new board setup is far more readily accepted, as the GHB is pretty clear on how this process is done. *** This topic is really interesting to me because there's a lot to talk about around it. Realm Artefacts for example are readily incorporated because it's a big range of toys for you to pick from, at no major disadvantage. Realm spells, not as much, because it will depend on how caster-heavy your army is. Realm Effects tend to be ignored because there is that one chance you roll something that completely shifts the game dynamic (Ulgu range limitations, Ghur Beasts, Ghyran no run rule, Hysh/Shyish spellcasting bonus rules, Aqshy total LOS blocking on all terrain, etc etc.). Terrain warscroll rules are ignored for good reason: not everyone has all the bits required. There's also the extra layer of rules you now have to account for, and a lot of tournament players correlate not being fully aware of what rules could be in play to losing, often horribly. This is a fair outlook, as some of the terrain warscrolls are considerably more gamechanging than their scenery dice counterparts! And the board setup at this point is an easy adapt cuz it removes a very vaguely defined aspect of the game. The most pushback I've seen levied against it is that it makes the game longer. *** Now, assuming you have a local independent shop, that has several multiples of ALL the warscroll terrain, all proper done up and presented on appropriate neoprene mats. It has two dozen 6x4 tables, it has loads of floor space, and all the nice little small tables with little wheels on the side for you to put your models on. It's an ideal tournament venue! Now imagine the venue does indeed run regular tournaments, but with very specifically laid out rules: they will follow the GHB guidelines to the word. This includes everything I mentioned above (and the painting points/hidden agendas for tiebreaking, but those are less interesting talking points). Would you frequent these hypothetical tournaments, knowing they followed the frankly much more random nature of the GHB's official take on matched play? If you wouldn't, then at what point do you think a matched play game stops "being matched play"? How many of these optional rules do you have to keep intact for it to be an ideal tournament rule set? How much space in their wording do you think GW specifically leaves up for organiser interpretation in this regard? And just to throw another wrench into things, at what pointage do you think would following the *full* GW-mandated matched play setup work best? 2k? 2.5k? Meeting Engagements?

I like how you can easily slot your own writing into the format, and potentially bang out different quests for your entire gaming community if you're so inclined.

Same! They're the kind of chaos themeing that really grabs me (opulence + deception + a liiiiittle bit of intelligence to hide the bat**** insanity). The thrallmaster a.) being a ripped dude in flowy, pretty robes and b.) having a secret third arm behind em is exactly what sold me on it.

I think what exacerbates the move and wait opinion in Warcry's case is the lack of a save roll. I don't think warcry's un-interactive because of this, because a save roll's just math that the system is forcing you to play out, when it could have done it in a less random way somewhere else. Which is what warcry did! People are just very defensive at the moment because so far the highest profile review for a very hyped up system is sort of a rushed mess. Owen (finally got his name!) who was the main critic of it seemed like he was being unwillingly dragged through the entire process, and it really came off like he was spiting the game because of it. There's also the knowledge that a lot of people will now be heavily influenced by GMG's weighty opinion, potentially shearing off a portion of the playerbase before it even releases. This kind of backlash is why most pro game reviewers who don't particularly enjoy hyper-competitive mobas or fighting games don't review em! It's particularly rough for Owen's case, but it's clear Warcry is the exact opposite of the kind of game he likes, just there wasn't any way for him to have possibly known beforehand, and now he has to help make an internets about it.

I had the rulebook in my hands like 2 days ago and i feel like a massive dunce for missing that.

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.

It'd be dead easy to houserule. The cards have no words on em, just symbols and measurements, so making your own will be a piece of cake once you figure out which ones are paced to your taste. Also the staggered deployment stops things from dying off all at once with little counterplay ala most of gw's larger scale games.

If cost is truly an issue, even after splitting the monetary and hobby loads between yourselves, consider the non-chaos factions coming out in two weeks time. You can lend them models if you happen to own any of the supported armies, and some of the other factions have some very cost efficient kits for building a warband with (Bonesplitterz and their savage orruk box is bar none the best for this). Once models are sorted, it's just a matter of terrain and the rules, faction, and battleplan cards. You can buy all of those just once, since it's something easily shared. Gauge your options and suss out which will be the optimum choice for your group!

Great examples! And so far a really good demo of how the game is both deeper than it seems and, as you've said, spookily similar to bloodbowl. The larger context of the numbers advantage being a big deal was in a campaign, since the game has still decided to let more successful players take on a bigger core warband, getting them bodies past the point limit. I'm of the opinion that this is a poor decision that can overall hurt a campaign experience, Hoo hoo, man I would argue that Underworlds is roughly 4.2x the *tactical* complexity of a typical AoS game. For one, Underworlds can give me some severe decision paralysis (always a sign of great game design IMO), where in AoS I'm usually just going through the motions of sending my mangler squig murderball at [INSERT META UNIT HERE], making sure the other squigs are in his buff range, and hoping I get a double turn. I do share the same qualms with Warcry, though. At a glance it seems almost too simple. But like most games I'm saving proper, proper judgement for after I've done two dozen games of it.

I'm not! Their review was very rushed and not all that well thought out, as you've made clear. Just everyone's engaging with the current topic with their review context in mind, and the action economy fact is one of the things they actually got right! And I don't think it'll matter that the chaff units are bad. Consider this: if I tie you up in melee in warcry, you have to take one of two actions. a.) retreat, only up to 3 inches in most cases b.) attack me That means if I have six dudes, and you have four dudes, and i send in four of my dudes to do nothing but waste your four dudes turns by engaging them in melee, I'm already at a mathematical advantage because I have two dudes left to sit on points/murder you. Taking your custodes vs orks scenario: I'm an Ork player in KT. KT, especially arena, is also an action economy game. How does an ork... hell let's step it up even further, how does an all GROT team beat a custodes one? You rush your grots into melee, one at a time, wasting the custodes' severely limited turns via the limitations of melee engagement (waste a turn whacking things or running away). This is the exact situation that Warcry is in at the moment! KT curbs the horde advantage with the morale phase, but warcry doesn't have that at all! This is why the black haired boy from GMG was so worried about the action economy, because he'd seen how it could be gamed in a more complex system, and recognized the immediate flaws of a similar system with no shooting and no morale phase to curb a numbers advantage! And once more, let me be perfectly clear, I am not citing GMG as a source, or as an authority, merely as an example of an opinion that in this instance, I happen to agree with.