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Is this even possible without just throwing away any semblance of balance? Some people at my FLGS have come up with a "campaign" with a map that's based on Risk (the board game) and just posted the rules for this last night. Each faction has territories and have to submit movements that include attacking another territory, but you won't know how many points your opponent has put in the territory, you declare how many you want to send. So you could end up with 25 points attacking an area with 35 points placed in it, without any idea of what caster they are using. You literally will send something like "Khador sends 35 points from Zone 1 into Cryx's Zone 3 with Sorscha1" to the organizer and then Cryx could have 50 points with Lich2 in that zone, or 15 points with Venethrax, you won't know until afterwards when the game gets set up.

This to me seems like absolute nonsense and will completely break the game, but the organizers and the people at the FLGS are adamant that it will work. To me it sounds like they don't really understand how the game is balanced at all (they're still fairly new players), although I can't say that as it will make me sound like "that guy" who is trying to push his playstyle on everybody as they don't seem like a big fan of the official leagues from Privateer Press.

This seems like a really really bad idea for a game like Warmachine (although it might work for 40k and historical gaming).

It probably depends on what the matchup is. I bet you can find plenty of bad matchups that can be won a whole bunch of points down.

I'd expect a lot of uphill battles (and some more or less unwinnable), but as long as they know that I don't think there's a problem..?

It's possible, it probably won't work very well though.

But hey, let them play. If it doesn't work, then change IT.

Sounds stupid, just don't play in it.

 Chute82 wrote:
Sounds stupid, just don't play in it.

I'm considering it. I mean, they might have fun but it's 180 degrees from what I personally want out of the game. It doesn't sound like fun to me at all.

Sounds like a hell of a lot of paper keeping, and probably require an impartial bystander to ref, but it sounds like it could be a ton of fun, especially if you play with traditional Risk reallocation time.

Sure, possibly unbalanced, but adds macro-management and strategy to the game.

Probably more for a fun group then a cut-throat comp, but still.

Its a narrative campaign in the truest meaning of the term.

Its not supposed to be balanced, its supposed to be about telling a story and as long as every participant is aware of this, it can be tremendously fun.

I think it sounds awesome, but it would work better if you knew what people had allocated for each zone (ya know, like in Risk). There would need to be an option for retreat as well.

 melkorthetonedeaf wrote:
I think it sounds awesome, but it would work better if you knew what people had allocated for each zone (ya know, like in Risk). There would need to be an option for retreat as well.

A retreat option would definitely help. It stands to reason that factions would have some kind of scouting/recon elements that would give them this ability to react to incoming forces.

Deadnight wrote:

 melkorthetonedeaf wrote:
I think it sounds awesome, but it would work better if you knew what people had allocated for each zone (ya know, like in Risk). There would need to be an option for retreat as well.

A retreat option would definitely help. It stands to reason that factions would have some kind of scouting/recon elements that would give them this ability to react to incoming forces.

They did mention something like that. I don't know it just seems like not my cup of tea.

I think it would be ok if they got rid of not knowing how many points you have in each territory. That should be known information.

One of the GenCon scenario premium tables was a 15 or 25 pt force trying to hold a choke point against a 35 point list. The smaller force didn't autolose if the warnoun died and the larger force had to have more models within a certain range of the back edge then the defender before the turn limit.

Sounds awesome to me. I had a Mordhiem campaign that was similar. You had 3 warbands and x gold to split between them. You could go balanced or have an uber warband and two weak ones.

Basically it adds another strategic level to the game. It's not for everyone but I would love it.

This is actually a well known and prominent feature of historical miniature games. As long as the goals of each side are equally easy to achieve it doesn't matter if the force sizes themselves are matched (extreme example, you have one model and the opponent has a 50 pt force, but you win if you can kill an opposing model).

I beat a 35 point list with a 25 once. Turns out my friend changed the point limit without informing me. pSevy and an arcnode showed him what Menoth thinks of such shenannigans.

 dementedwombat wrote:
This is actually a well known and prominent feature of historical miniature games. As long as the goals of each side are equally easy to achieve it doesn't matter if the force sizes themselves are matched (extreme example, you have one model and the opponent has a 50 pt force, but you win if you can kill an opposing model).

The funny thing is that for basically any other game but Warmachine I'd like it and be all into the idea. However, I don't think that the organizer(s) are going to create custom scenarios for victory, it's going to be an actual game of Warmachine with imbalanced sides and maybe some weird faction benefits (e.g. Khador gets +1 ARM to one Warjack, Legion gets +1 SPD to one beast).

If it had different victory conditions such as if you hold this building for six turns you win, if the enemy gets to it and holds it you lose kind of thing it would sound cool. I just have no confidence that they will do it.

Absent custom scenarios I'm going to call no on this one. If you want to run a map campaign it might make more sense to have to predefine a set of 35pt armies and have them run about the field and when a territory gets attacked the defender gets to pick which of the predefined armies that's sitting in that territory (if any) to fight back with, you'd have better games and the where-do-I-put-my-stuff question still matters. The Cygnar player can only cover one territory with EHaley.

For me this would greatly depend on the players.

If you're playing with 3 or 4 good mates who you play against often then it could be good fun with plenty of memerable moments and against the odds stories.

However played at a club or flgs against guys who you don't usually play, I think it will be tough going and not so fun, therefore pretty pointless.

You guys are right. This whole thing sounds waayyyy too much like actual war.

You could write a scenario for that. You'd just have to adjust the
win conditions. I think an easy balance would be to do three
flags, two close and one far. Attacker has to win on control
points, defender can win with control points or assassination.

 melkorthetonedeaf wrote:
You guys are right. This whole thing sounds waayyyy too much like actual war.

Good thing we're playing a game and not a war simulation then.

Seriously, not to pick on you but I hate that argument. Someone used that very thing when I voiced concern about uneven points ("War isn't balanced"), well this isn't war it's a game first and foremost.. Warmachine is a game balanced around equal points, once you skew that you're treading dangerously close to needing to make up your own scenarios and the like to avoid completely unbalanced matchups.

Should be fine for a campaign with custom scenarios. I wouldn't
recommend it long-term though.

Asymmetrical games can be fun so long as you don't always run them that way.

I tried 75 points of caster-less Cryx vs. two 25 point armies (Searforge and Blindwater). Stomped the hell out of the dwarves but got butchered by the gators.

Though all I had to do was make it to the opposing table edge with one of a few different solos. It was interesting, though we ended it before there was a clear victor.

Thinking outside the box can lead to super memorable games.

Would be interesting to add a scout dynamic. Each round, an army may scout adjacent territory to determine army size(could include presence of a colossal too).

So, Round 1:
move forces
scout

Round 2:
receive scout report(based on round 1)
ie; "your scouts return, they report an estimated presences of approximately 50 points and the presence of a colossal!"
move forces
scout.

By moving forces after receiving scout report from previous round, it is possible that the opponent has shifted forces around as your report is now a round old.

There was a good point made above, as long as scenario is within reach of everyone, it shouldn't matter

I think defender should set up first, puts outs 4 objectives and three flags outside of starting zone 10", all objectives and flags must be 8" apart. All objectives are of the attackers choosing (its why he's attacking after all)...rules for flags/objectives are standard, except the defender cannot score cps

Attackers may advance deploy everything, models with AD gain outflank, and attacker goes first...attackers play until caster kill, 5 cps, or dead