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So my most frequent opponent is my wife. She plays DE and I play HE, making for a decent campaign story. I plan on drawing up a map of the Blighted Isle that houses the Shrine of Khaine which will be the main objective in the campaign.

I was thinking of using the following house rules for the campaign:

1. Characters select a single set of magic items, and that character must take those same items in every game it is fielded in.
2. If a character is slain AND the enemy won, the items it had are now forfeit to the winning side, which can then be swapped out by the other army. (common magic items are never lost in this manner)
3. All characters made for any single list MUST be present in larger lists unless they were slain, in which case the player may make a new version of the character, sans the same magic items.
So if in 500 points I take a Noble with magic items X Y and Z, he must be present in any list higher than 500 points for future games. If he dies outright, the player may make a new one with different magic items for following games. If a 1000 point list has a noble and a mage, both must be present in higher points games and so on.
4. At any point in the campaign characters eligible may upgrade things like magic level and becoming a BSB. Once they have upgraded they must stay that way through the campaign.
5. Units taken in smaller games must be in larger scale games unless they were destroyed in a previous game(killed outright or run down while fleeing). Units that flee off the table do not count as destroyed, and thus must be in future lists.

The idea is that characters and units will be more defined rather than being nameless faces on the field.

thoughts?

it's good, though for what it's worth I would add a 'battle honours systemf or units, I used one in my last campaign.

Basically units get a point for doing things such as surviving a battle with 2 thrids of their fighting strength, breaking an enemy unit in combat, wiping an enemy unit out in combat (or shooting) they get 2 points for breaking/wiping out a unit thats at least twice their number etc

after a certain number of points are gathered (we used 5) after the battle where the last point is gained roll on a d6 table and this gives the battle honour that unit recieves.

It could be 1 re roll of morale per turn, +1 to cobat resolution, 1 extra shooting dice, +2 movement rate etc, nothing to big and powerfull but just enough to give colour and personality to the units, we found it was fun as the units eveolved, though the system isnt exactly fair.

I like the idea of magic items. As they could be heirlooms. And otherwise it seems like you have an infinite selection fo magic items to choose from every week you fight (USE THEM ALL YOU IDIOT!). But things like characters can totally destroy an army. Like if someone comes out with heavy spellcasting and LOLs victories with mega spells and the other side is just combat lords and heroes, that's going to keep happening and won't be fun for anyone.

If the same general(s) are losing fights, they get replaced. If a character is killed, it's not like he's being cloned, they can go with something else. Just because a lvl 4 mage was killed doesn't mean a lvl 4 mage would replace him, maybe the higher-ups figure they should try something different.

So maybe you could have to use the same hero unless he dies, then you can use anything.

Indeed. Considering that it's a 2 person campaign, and I write the lists for both armies OP things won't really be an issue, as I write the lists specifically with that same enemy in mind. The HE list is designed to deal with DE, and vice versa.

The third rule says the player MAY replace the dead character with a new one of the same type as long as the magic items are different. Taking a different type altogether would be fine provided the magic items rule stays.

Indeed, that may make for some interesting choices later in the campaign as perhaps a character is found lacking, and thus is put to the sword by it's own player so that they can erase it from the larger lists and replace it. Not an uncommon practice among Dark Elves to be sure.

I like it. I have sets of lists that I make for campaign play and I usually keep whatever was in the lowest point value list in the rest of the lists.

I find it's good in campaigns like these to avoid naming everyone at the start. None of the names will have any meaning, and having to come up with 5 or 6 names at once means most of them will probably be pretty forgettable.

So in past campaigns we had a policy of 'do something, get a name'. So it was only when a character did something, either heroic or incompetent/cowardly . It meant some people only got names post-humously

We built up stories for these characters as we went, and some of them even managed to build little narratives for themselves over time.

I like most of the ideas here. Though number 2 sounds like it could be really problematic as items that weren't meant to be available to the opposing race could make some insanely powerful combinations.

I found when I was playing a campaign to have a Grand Hero of sorts because someone's got to lead the expedition. Maybe it's just a normal character or maybe it's a special character (Teclis [correct the spelling] etc.) to lead them. He get's a bonus whether it's a better Attack or an axe that the other race loathes...
But also what works is if you see Blood (Or is it battle?) in the Badlands campaign book they have this awsome thing where if a character has been killed on the battle-field; post-battle you roll 2d6 for them IIRC and you see what happens. It's got some great ideas as well for scenarios and hero systems and stuff.

-Bax123

I have been thinking along similar lines in order to promote narrative gaming at the local club.

My thoughts are these, all characters start with no items/magic levels etc. These are obtained by gaining objectives, completing missions etc in the campaign. No magic item, common or codex specific, can be used by more than one character - there is only one dispel scroll, fire banner etc.

If you lose a rare unit, then it is gone for good. Thus if you lose two rares in the campaign then you can no longer use that unit. Each Special can be lost twice. Core can be lost as often as you like.

My current thinking is to use a matrix similar to the one used in Muskets and Tomahawks or Dux Britanniarum to generate secret missions - which will then be playing using the rulebook scenarios - with an additional secret sub mission. For instance, the secret mission might be scout - the player has to move a unit into each table quarter and retreat off the map - the rule book scenario might be watchtower - and the secret sub mission might the general has to win a challenge. The opposing player would have a different secret mission and sub mission.

Thus a player would have the chance of winning three ways. These victory points could then be spent in various ways - increasing magic levels, upgrading troops, etc

Essentially it does all the things your system does but it allows things to develop out of the games, rather than having a list of does and don'ts at the start.

marielle wrote:I have been thinking along similar lines in order to promote narrative gaming at the local club.

My thoughts are these, all characters start with no items/magic levels etc. These are obtained by gaining objectives, completing missions etc in the campaign. No magic item, common or codex specific, can be used by more than one character - there is only one dispel scroll, fire banner etc.

If you lose a rare unit, then it is gone for good. Thus if you lose two rares in the campaign then you can no longer use that unit. Each Special can be lost twice. Core can be lost as often as you like.

I'd be a little wary of that, as a lot of people are likely to drop out of the tournament when they're told they're not allowed to use their favourite unit anymore.

Perhaps instead you could have access to special and rare units based on a similar system to magic items - people get access to them when they win objectives, claim territories, that kind of thing. Then they risk losing that access when they fail to achieve objectives, lose territory and all that stuff.

It means if a player lost access to, say hydras, he wouldn't be facing the rest of the campaign without ever getting to use a hydra ever again, instead he'd just have to recognise that he had to play a couple of clever games to get access again.

My current thinking is to use a matrix similar to the one used in Muskets and Tomahawks or Dux Britanniarum to generate secret missions - which will then be playing using the rulebook scenarios - with an additional secret sub mission. For instance, the secret mission might be scout - the player has to move a unit into each table quarter and retreat off the map - the rule book scenario might be watchtower - and the secret sub mission might the general has to win a challenge. The opposing player would have a different secret mission and sub mission.

Yeah, I've always loved this idea.