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I don't know about anyone else but I find the standard scenarios presented in the Rulebook to be rather lacklustre. When playing them I often find that the winner according to the objective based victory conditions often doesn't reflect the way the game has gone. Too much all or nothing involved on whether a squad happens to be holding an objective on the last turn or not. Anyways, this is less a thread about attacking the current system (I am sure many people enjoy it just fine) but to see what the community has created in a homebrew setting.

My current favorite custom conditions are as follows:

- 3/4 Objectives setup down the center of the map.
- Each objective is worth 1VP per turn held. (Points added at the end of each player turn)
- Standard secondary objects - linebreaker, first blood & slay the warlord still used.

I feel objectives granting a small amount of VPs per turn more accurately reflects the tide of the battle than a whole pile of points on the last turn. In addition, placing them down the center of the map (with both players having prior knowledge) forces more creative list building (simple gun lines don't work as well). As a Tau player it really forces me to mix up my list. Fire warriors in devilfish become key parts of the force where before sitting behind a defence line with riptides, broadsides and others provided easy wins.

It's easy to place variations on these too. An objective in the dead center of the map with zero cover nearby is worth 2VPs per turn. Risky to try and cap but the rewards might be worth it. I also saw a variant in a forgeoworld scenario that gave the objectives a defensive profile allowing them to be shot at. You could also make them defender/attacker dependent. Perhaps the defender starts with 3 in their deployment zone worth 1VP per turn and the attacker has to destroy them, granting 3VPs for a successful destruction.

Another variation I want to try out soon is allowing any infantry unit to cap rather than just troops. However, in order to do so they have to take a wargear upgrade (perhaps 20pts per squad). This should provide you with an interesting choice of spending lots of points on capping units or taking only a few for more manpower.

What victory conditions have you made up? What have you found that works, that is balanced, that is fun?

I like the sound of your variant mission there. I'll have to try it out.

We use the Bay Area Open rules and scenarios for our games.
http://www.frontlinegaming.org/community/bao-tournament-format/

I actually kind of like the way the scenarios are set up in the book, but that's perhaps because I'm new.

I like doing the missions because it's easy to set up. Too many times have I tried to just wing it and it's always baloney. People setting up terrain blatantly in their favour, after having picked deployment. I like having the rules there and the charts so I can go "okay, we set the table up like this and this is what everything does, let's play by :roll: these rules."

I think it would be great fun to do some of the FW books, actually the one where it's IG vs Nids seems really fun.

Making up your own rules for scenarios is all fine and dandy, but I'll tell you what. As a new player I really appreciate the scenarios as they are. They're a great way to learn the game really. There is no point in new players starting out trying to make up their own scenarios, or to play with alternative rules of any kind until they really know the game. Not tryin to slam the OP's idea, but if you're new and reading this thread, just chill out and play the scenarios as they are.

I have these mission decks that I use. One card forthe primary mission (40% VPs) and one for secondary (10% VPs). The other 50% is victory points (the old ones, not kill point gak)

 Eldarain wrote:
I like the sound of your variant mission there. I'll have to try it out.

We use the Bay Area Open rules and scenarios for our games.
http://www.frontlinegaming.org/community/bao-tournament-format/

Those are some interesting and sensible tweaks to the standard systems. I like the idea of combining two standard missions together. The requirement for objectives to be placed outside deployment zones works for me too. Thanks for sharing.

I think running with complete strangers you do tend to need to stick to the books in order for it to be clear what is and isn't allowed. However playing around with scenario rules is definitely something worth experimenting with known people, especially with a good bit of discussion before hand about what could work and what would be balanced.

Did a battle this weekend with the following rules:

Game duration: 5 turns.

Victory Conditions: Slay the Warlord, Linebreaker, Objectives.

Objectives:

5 objectives positioned equally down the centre of the map.
Each objective is worth 1 Victory point per turn held.
Objectives activate at the beginning of turn 2. They deactivate at the end of turn 4.

Objectives can only be captured if a unit has the wargear: DATA RETRIEVAL DEVICE

Wargear, Data Retrieval Device: 20pts. Allows unit to capture objectives. Can be taken by infantry, jump infantry, jet pack infantry.

http://grimdarkrealms.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/warhammer-40k-custom-scenario-weekends.html#.UwIMN0J_sdI

An exceedingly fun game and very very close. Some very interesting decision points during the game had to be made in regard to pushing up the field to get early victory points balanced against moving out of cover and being exposed. Really felt like it added another level of strategy.

Yeah after a while the standard missions do get a bit boring. One mission idea I like the sound of, taken from the old battle missions book, is that you get VPs at the and of the turn for holding an object.

So basically it encourages people to go out for the objectives as soon as possible to earn as many VPs as possible.

I kind of like the idea of "secret missions" so some mission cards you draw at random. I dunno the missions could be, " get a unit of any type in each table quarter",

Maybe each card could have 2 secret missions, an attack mission or a defence mission.

Something I would explore in future I think is terrain placement, I think that would make a big difference to variety. Especially creating more city battles.

I would even consider a bigger playing field to make the scale work a little better.

 turgon868 wrote:
Did a battle this weekend with the following rules:

Game duration: 5 turns.

Victory Conditions: Slay the Warlord, Linebreaker, Objectives.

Objectives:

5 objectives positioned equally down the centre of the map.
Each objective is worth 1 Victory point per turn held.
Objectives activate at the beginning of turn 2. They deactivate at the end of turn 4.

Objectives can only be captured if a unit has the wargear: DATA RETRIEVAL DEVICE

Wargear, Data Retrieval Device: 20pts. Allows unit to capture objectives. Can be taken by infantry, jump infantry, jet pack infantry.

http://grimdarkrealms.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/warhammer-40k-custom-scenario-weekends.html#.UwIMN0J_sdI

An exceedingly fun game and very very close. Some very interesting decision points during the game had to be made in regard to pushing up the field to get early victory points balanced against moving out of cover and being exposed. Really felt like it added another level of strategy.

]

I like this idea but I would personally let both players give d3 of their infantry (including jump/jet pack infantry) the device for free. The result of the d3 would be the same for each player.

 rohansoldier wrote:

 turgon868 wrote:
Did a battle this weekend with the following rules:

Game duration: 5 turns.

Victory Conditions: Slay the Warlord, Linebreaker, Objectives.

Objectives:

5 objectives positioned equally down the centre of the map.
Each objective is worth 1 Victory point per turn held.
Objectives activate at the beginning of turn 2. They deactivate at the end of turn 4.

Objectives can only be captured if a unit has the wargear: DATA RETRIEVAL DEVICE

Wargear, Data Retrieval Device: 20pts. Allows unit to capture objectives. Can be taken by infantry, jump infantry, jet pack infantry.

http://grimdarkrealms.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/warhammer-40k-custom-scenario-weekends.html#.UwIMN0J_sdI

An exceedingly fun game and very very close. Some very interesting decision points during the game had to be made in regard to pushing up the field to get early victory points balanced against moving out of cover and being exposed. Really felt like it added another level of strategy.

]

I like this idea but I would personally let both players give d3 of their infantry (including jump/jet pack infantry) the device for free. The result of the d3 would be the same for each player.

Interesting. If I may ask, why would you apply a random factor to something key to the balance of the game? With unlucky rolling it could end up with one army at effectively 1980 points and another at 1960 (in a 2000 point army), that would become more pronounced at lower point armies. I am not sure I see the benefit of adding randomness in this area.

Anyone got any further mission types? I thought there might be more people who tried out different things. It was pretty much the first thing I did after learning the basics.

 turgon868 wrote:
Anyone got any further mission types? I thought there might be more people who tried out different things. It was pretty much the first thing I did after learning the basics.

If you wanted to try a mission I just wrote and give me some feedback I'd appreciate it.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/579359.page

At my local club we use some of the dawn of war 1/2 missions but balance them out abit, with the dow2 ones, we use 12 turn games, and a pushenpull table, canyon style tyhat sort of thing and we can destroy anytype of terrain, we give terrain a toughness, and have a replacement peaice of a damaged version, anxd armour saves are only taken if you coverd, we dont use area terrain

characters, when they die, they can ressurect, with a 3+ roll, (reroll if theres a medic/apothacary ) and it dosnt have too be the next turn it can be any turn but only when a allie is within 1 inch and does not fire, that turn, the character comes back with 1 wound, and cannot do it again

 lord_blackfang wrote:
I have these mission decks that I use. One card forthe primary mission (40% VPs) and one for secondary (10% VPs). The other 50% is victory points (the old ones, not kill point gak)

Are those mission decks home made?, or purchased?