Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

To be fair, the fact that the old FOC was kept for a game that is meant to be played at larger points values (~3000 points) was always kinda weird as the old FOC really struggled at 2000 points or more (which was why 7th allowed a second FOC at 2000).

That means that basically every HH army either has FOC shenanigans or doesn't really work.

Challenge!

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/zxczxmzi/rules-in-the-age-of-darkness-a-challenge-of-champions/

 zedmeister wrote:
Challenge!

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/zxczxmzi/rules-in-the-age-of-darkness-a-challenge-of-champions/

Looks like the FOC hasn't gone away after all...

Ok, challenge rules are interesting.

I like the gambits, but with nine universal and further Legion Specific ones, balance could be an issue.

There’s nowt wrong with say, Emperors Children excelling in Duels, but I fear an advantage could become a Delete Button.

Definitely something I’d want to experiment with in dice based theory hammer once we have more rules.

 Quixote wrote:

 zedmeister wrote:
Challenge!

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/zxczxmzi/rules-in-the-age-of-darkness-a-challenge-of-champions/

Looks like the FOC hasn't gone away after all...

I was gonna say, the few leaks I've seen imply there's still an FOC, but not what it looks like.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Ok, challenge rules are interesting.

I like the gambits, but with nine universal and further Legion Specific ones, balance could be an issue.

There’s nowt wrong with say, Emperors Children excelling in Duels, but I fear an advantage could become a Delete Button.

Definitely something I’d want to experiment with in dice based theory hammer once we have more rules.

It's almost like challenges were a bullshitty time wasting mechanic, easily abused to manipulate the fight phase, which most people hated and that's why it was removed.

Edit the more I think about it, why were 4 leadership stats needed and the none of them used for duels, instead leaning on some algebraic stat of modifiers and a dice roll?

Eh, I’m not at all against the mechanic as a concept. For certain Legions with the right equipment, it may prevent a character simply rampaging through an entire unit, bringing an element of risk.

Gambits add to that, but whether in a positive or negative way will require knowledge of all the Gambits and possible equipment stuff.

How the heck did they make charnabal weapons *worse* even in their own niche of being the duel weapons?

They stayed exactly the same as they are now (at least the sabre did) except now because of dice rolls they can go *second*, and they still have next to nil chance to deal damage.

And all this duel complication and no mention of off-hands? Like at least they could've let the off-hand use the additional attack it grants in challenges, instead of just giving +1A to the main weapon. We're trying to be narratively satisfying with these rules, right? ack.

Oh brilliant, an entire phase my main army categorically won't interact with at all.

Looks like the rules writers didn't learn with thr Psychic Phase.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Eh, I’m not at all against the mechanic as a concept. For certain Legions with the right equipment, it may prevent a character simply rampaging through an entire unit, bringing an element of risk.

Gambits add to that, but whether in a positive or negative way will require knowledge of all the Gambits and possible equipment stuff.

At best you find that in some circumstances you have a character who can out duel another character or stall them. Reducing it to unit vs unit and you've got value from a niche character build.

It's still a win more or lose more mechanic at heart and eats a load of time doing it for 4 fights a turn.

Like the “advanced” stats, I’m sure there’ll be an initial slowdown in gameplay as folks get used to it.

But once we’re up to speed? It’s choose your gambit, determine Initiative with bonuses, give them a good slap with some modifiers. Which shouldn’t take terribly long, unless your opponent is determined to spin out the clock choosing a sodding Gambit.

Which, let’s be honest, is a clock spinning they’d achieve through other means, if that’s central to their plan. Irritating in a setting with strict time limits for your game - but then, it’s not a game designed with strict time limits in mind.

 Quixote wrote:
Looks like the FOC hasn't gone away after all...

Literally the only good thing we see in this article

This gak is worse than every bad change we've seen so far put together. Honestly so bad that right now I can't even think of anything else I disliked previously and I'm sure there was stuff. Slow, stupid, badly phrased, bloat.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Like the “advanced” stats, I’m sure there’ll be an initial slowdown in gameplay as folks get used to it.

But once we’re up to speed? It’s choose your gambit, determine Initiative with bonuses, give them a good slap with some modifiers. Which shouldn’t take terribly long, unless your opponent is determined to spin out the clock choosing a sodding Gambit.

Which, let’s be honest, is a clock spinning they’d achieve through other means, if that’s central to their plan. Irritating in a setting with strict time limits for your game - but then, it’s not a game designed with strict time limits in mind.

Unless you're pressed into situations where you know you’ve won/lost the duel before it starts and it doesnt matter if they accept or not, which is often how these mechanics go. It's not fun seeing your character either forced to skulk in the back or get turned into sushi.

Looks like some rules writer got really taken away by the concept, I mean, 9 gambits + legion specific ones' to choose from for a "Sub-phase", wtf? Talk about bloat...

Which is why we need the remaining rules and that for proper context. We also need to consider already injured characters, and how deadly a challenge might be to them if the Gambit goes awry.

It might be awful in practice, but I’m still open to it for now.

Challenges are the first thing I am disappointed by rules wise. Feels like they reused the mechanics from Death from the Skies fighter battles. At least from the sounds of it it is far more limited and not every combat with a Sergeant or better involved

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Which is why we need the remaining rules and that for proper context. We also need to consider already injured characters, and how deadly a challenge might be to them if the Gambit goes awry.

It might be awful in practice, but I’m still open to it for now.

Chances with GW are that out of the 9 gambits there are 2-3 obvious ones' you'll take 90% of the time(like, one if you really want that char dead, one if you rather want the squad dead, too, and one defensive one or so) and others are for fringe cases that only become relevant because of combos with Rites, Legion Rules, weapons etc.

What I’m intrigued by is whether there’ll be much point in Challenging when there’s only Unit Champions throwing hands.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Chances with GW are that out of the 9 gambits there are 2-3 obvious ones' you'll take 90% of the time(like, one if you really want that char dead, one if you rather want the squad dead, too, and one defensive one or so) and others are for fringe cases that only become relevant because of combos with Rites, Legion Rules, weapons etc.

Despite being a clear sign of bad writing I honestly hope this is the case, imagine having to decide from 10 viable options four times every melee phase.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Which is why we need the remaining rules and that for proper context. We also need to consider already injured characters, and how deadly a challenge might be to them if the Gambit goes awry.

It might be awful in practice, but I’m still open to it for now.

Chances with GW are that out of the 9 gambits there are 2-3 obvious ones' you'll take 90% of the time(like, one if you really want that char dead, one if you rather want the squad dead, too, and one defensive one or so) and others are for fringe cases that only become relevant because of combos with Rites, Legion Rules, weapons etc.

Yeah, that is probably spot on. I like the idea of challenges being like those big character battles from the books and GW has always struggled making those work in practice. Maybe this will do it finally.

I also hope the penalties for refusing a challenge aren't so crippling that it becomes effectively mandatory to accept if you don't want your unit to be wiped out as a result of refusing.

The only way I could be enjoying the challenge mechanics more is if they still have weird rules for moving the characters which could result in other models popping out of existence around them. Pleeeease GW.

I wonder if character vehicles (like a Knight) will be issuing challenges.

Was this bit there the whole time? I completely missed it on first read.

and vehicle rules on Friday. Yes they’re tougher, and no we haven’t changed how it all works.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Was this bit there the whole time? I completely missed it on first read.

and vehicle rules on Friday. Yes they’re tougher, and no we haven’t changed how it all works.

Reddit person who seems to know a lot said that facings remain, tanks are tougher with better output, there is only a glancing table now with no destroyed result.

But that sounds like what a clever designer would do

High D makes Destroyed redundant, glancing results hopefully folded into the Tactical Statuses

I would be surprised, honestly, if vehicles didn't have a set of specific !Tactical Statuses which function just like Tactical Statuses, but since they're for vehicles you get them from the damage chart instead of specific weapon types.
And of course, no testing Psychological characteristics, they're vehicles!

Shaken, stunned, immobilized, weapon destroyed is 4 results that could reuse the 4 status tokens- suppressed, stunned, pinned, and routed respectively

The challenge rules seem to be complexity and time consuming for the sake of it.

There have been challenge mechanics in other editions of Warhammer (40K and WHFB) and usually it starts the same as what happens with the new HH rules, but then HH piles on the padding.

1: Player makes a challenge with a character/unit leader.
2: Opposing player chooses to take that challenge and the models are normally placed next to each other. If refused the refusing hero/leader makes no attacks.
3: They fight between themselves using all appropriate rules and when all done any modifiers the final battle (wounds) are added to the combat total.

Simple,streamlined, and has been used for 20+ years.

The challenge systems seems cool.

Its also obvious and unnecessary bloat that will slow the game to a crawl.

Im curious what the design brief for this edition was, "add every crazy rule you can imagine, we want the average game to be an all day affair".