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Would anyone be opposed to GW occasionally releasing army specific missions where both factions had their components pre built? There would be no list building. But terrain deployment and tactics would still be involved. It would be a way for GW to create less competitive scenarios where different units could be used rather than just the most efficient. For instance they could do a monolith necron force against a sentinel guard force. They could set which units are used even if points wise they didn't match up as long as they play tested the mission well and it came up balanced. This would then allow GW to use different units to boost sales and they could compile them and have events based off of them.

Any thoughts or concerns about this idea?

I like it. Hopefully in some cases, there could be two options for a unit, rather than only one. Ie bikes OR assault marines rather than just one

It'd likely just be stuff like monolith vs wraithknight or lord of skulls vs stompa. It'd just be a cash grab for models that aren't selling. It might be ok if it was a free supplement on the community website I guess. But charging people for it wouldn't sit well with a lot of people.

Common enough in other game systems but unlikely to fly with GW customers who are so bound to idea of matched play being The Only True Way To Play(and thinking points are somehow meant to be balance tool when points are 100% impossible to create balanced game).

mhalko1 wrote:
Would anyone be opposed to GW occasionally releasing army specific missions where both factions had their components pre built? There would be no list building. But terrain deployment and tactics would still be involved. It would be a way for GW to create less competitive scenarios where different units could be used rather than just the most efficient. For instance they could do a monolith necron force against a sentinel guard force. They could set which units are used even if points wise they didn't match up as long as they play tested the mission well and it came up balanced. This would then allow GW to use different units to boost sales and they could compile them and have events based off of them.

Any thoughts or concerns about this idea?

The big issue is that, in general, unless people happen to have those exact sets of models, they'll go nowhere. I don't see many people going out to buy stuff just to play with those matched forces if they don't happen to have everything therein just to play one or two scenarios.

I like the concept, but knowing people and players and the history of this game, I just don't see it being popular enough unless there's some serious supplement material & support that GW has never really shown for such things. Other games like Battletech and Heavy Gear would do things like this, but those were far easier to assemble a force for, as the number of mini's was very small and they even had things like large packs of colored cardboard stand-ins for mini's you could buy, and they also usually had pre-determined terrain/maps.

GW's unfortunate history of unique scenario design, from the 5E Battle Missions book to the AoS scenarios, has largely been "here's a modified rulebook mission with a tweak to a victory condition and maybe a defined center terrain piece or a massively deployment advantage to one side, maybe some sort of special table condition, then proceed to construct forces, set up terrain, and play as normal".

Because GW can balance the normal game enough to trust them to know how to balance a one-off mission.

Forge world use to do this.

Coming from lotr I can say GW did that with many scenarios there. It worked overall though in my playgroup we usually just took the scenario and built our own lists with the models we had available.
However, for 40K I'd prefer if it was more like historical missions with some restrictions rather than whole prebuilt lists you possibly don't have the minis of.

For example there could be things like: You have a power level of 75, you have to take character X as he's the historical leader of that battle, but you can't have any fliers and you can't deep strike as this battle tells a story where X's army is cut off from any airsupport and tries to survive.

 IronBrand wrote:
It'd likely just be stuff like monolith vs wraithknight or lord of skulls vs stompa. It'd just be a cash grab for models that aren't selling. It might be ok if it was a free supplement on the community website I guess. But charging people for it wouldn't sit well with a lot of people.

Wraithknights aren't selling because they are garbage, and they are garbage because they sold a metric ton of them in the last edition. The only thing that will produce WK sales will be a big boost to their profile, but that won't happen for another edition or two.

 Vaktathi wrote:
The big issue is that, in general, unless people happen to have those exact sets of models, they'll go nowhere. I don't see many people going out to buy stuff just to play with those matched forces if they don't happen to have everything therein just to play one or two scenarios.

I see this more as a definition of an escalation league. Let GW make some campaigns that grow in size. Start off with maybe a Deathwatch Kill Team going after a Tyranid Swarm. Match them up as best as is possible (maybe narrative-wise rather than matched play). And let the game play out. If the Tyranids win, move to mission 2a. If Deathwatch wins, move on to mission 2b. Have mission 2a or 2b give the models that should be bought to complete that mission. Rinse, repeat. By the end of the campaign, you'll have enough models to play with a new army (one could be made for 500 points, 1000 points, 1500 points, or 2000 points depending on how big you want the army to get).

Sounds honestly like just a prewritten escalation league. I think it's actually a very good idea.

SG

Edit: This idea would allow two people to play in escalation leagues of their choice rather than having one stretching across many people across the store. It's tough to get escalation league games in with so many people having so many different schedules. If only two people could play a campaign that would give them a brand new or bolstered army by the end of a maybe 3, 6, or 9 month campaign depending on how often the two players can get together, how much money they can spend and how often, and how quickly they can get the models painted.

I was just thinking that it could be a way to have matches especially if tournaments get held using these missions, where less than ideal units are required. So that essentially you would get your tournament match up and that would determine which mission you'd play. I think there would be more emphasis on tactics.

mhalko1 wrote:
I was just thinking that it could be a way to have matches especially if tournaments get held using these missions, where less than ideal units are required. So that essentially you would get your tournament match up and that would determine which mission you'd play. I think there would be more emphasis on tactics.

There, it becomes a problem with models. If you had these missions written down that require a certain set of models, you'd have to own, assemble, and paint enough of each model in the entire range of that army to be able to play any of these missions.

Let's say you play a Tyranid Swarm army, but the mission you're given requires a Monstrous Creature list instead. Well, you may be very short on MCs (or just Monsters as I believe they are called now) since you run a swarm. That means that you won't be able to compete in that mission and would have to forfeit the game.

SG

There are people that play the campaigns in the IA books, often building armies specifically for them, but there are few of these people.

 Scott-S6 wrote:
There are people that play the campaigns in the IA books, often building armies specifically for them, but there are few of these people.

I know the IA books had 7th Edition rules for all of the FW units. Are the campaigns 7th Edition as well?

SG

SFB had in general two sets of scenarios, the "generic" ones, that had suggested forces occasionally or noted a point value and provided a few restrictions, and the "historic" ones with actual forces, often more detailed victory conditions dealing with asymmetric forces and often suggested alternative forces for other factions.

Would love GW to do something similar with scenario books, have a mix of "historical" events with actual OBs and suggestions on how to vary them - e.g. perhaps specify the HQs to use, note the force must have say four troops choices and that it gets "x" command points - but outside the usual formations

 ServiceGames wrote:

mhalko1 wrote:
I was just thinking that it could be a way to have matches especially if tournaments get held using these missions, where less than ideal units are required. So that essentially you would get your tournament match up and that would determine which mission you'd play. I think there would be more emphasis on tactics.

There, it becomes a problem with models. If you had these missions written down that require a certain set of models, you'd have to own, assemble, and paint enough of each model in the entire range of that army to be able to play any of these missions.

Let's say you play a Tyranid Swarm army, but the mission you're given requires a Monstrous Creature list instead. Well, you may be very short on MCs (or just Monsters as I believe they are called now) since you run a swarm. That means that you won't be able to compete in that mission and would have to forfeit the game.

SG

But you would know the armies ahead of time. The book has each factions prebuilt armies that are made to use various units and are more balanced against the other factions versus when 2 players list build. You would have a specific mission based on who you were against but you would know both sides' armies because they have been laid out for you. You don't own the models? then you don't play in that event, it's not a change in the army comp at each event. This would drive their sales for different units. Maybe an ork army had a 6 deff kopta list or a big mek and MA running the tellyport blasta instead of the forcefield.

 ServiceGames wrote:
see this more as a definition of an escalation league. Let GW make some campaigns that grow in size. Start off with maybe a Deathwatch Kill Team going after a Tyranid Swarm. Match them up as best as is possible (maybe narrative-wise rather than matched play). And let the game play out. If the Tyranids win, move to mission 2a. If Deathwatch wins, move on to mission 2b. Have mission 2a or 2b give the models that should be bought to complete that mission. Rinse, repeat. By the end of the campaign, you'll have enough models to play with a new army (one could be made for 500 points, 1000 points, 1500 points, or 2000 points depending on how big you want the army to get).

Sounds honestly like just a prewritten escalation league. I think it's actually a very good idea.

SG

Edit: This idea would allow two people to play in escalation leagues of their choice rather than having one stretching across many people across the store. It's tough to get escalation league games in with so many people having so many different schedules. If only two people could play a campaign that would give them a brand new or bolstered army by the end of a maybe 3, 6, or 9 month campaign depending on how often the two players can get together, how much money they can spend and how often, and how quickly they can get the models painted.

Ok so the tyranid player sits down with the DW player, and am assuming both exist at the store. The DW player says that he bought some primaris starter sets and would like to play some starter missions, and the tyranid player says he won't be able to play, because his goal army consits of 3 tyrants, 6-9 braibugs ton of horde stuff and he just doesn't have and doesn't want to buy those lictors the first missions asks for, because in his 2k pts list he will never use them. The event stoped before even a single game got played.

It gets even worse when vets starts playing with new people, because they will of course be all in favor of those tank only or termintor only games, because they have those models back from 2ed or when ever those models were good. While a new player is just not going to buy and assemble those models in time, even if he does have the free money to buy models he will use just one time for this event.


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mhalko1 763697 10150651 wrote:

But you would know the armies ahead of time. The book has each factions prebuilt armies that are made to use various units and are more balanced against the other factions versus when 2 players list build. You would have a specific mission based on who you were against but you would know both sides' armies because they have been laid out for you. You don't own the models? then you don't play in that event, it's not a change in the army comp at each event. This would drive their sales for different units. Maybe an ork army had a 6 deff kopta list or a big mek and MA running the tellyport blasta instead of the forcefield.

It wouldn't drive any sales, if most people wouldn't want to buy the books. You would more or less only the people already owning the models, maybe want to play the event. Also what would you do if an event paired demons with something like GK. There are a ton of demon or demon light army players, but you have close to 0 GK players, and even fewer would want to play, and I don't think any sane exist that would like to buy extra models for their army. Just get stomped by demons.

This is basicly what Forgebane and Tooth and Claw are. they give you some minis for two sides, and present you with scenerios to use those units. it's small scale stuff but you obviously can't do massive if you limit yourself to whats in a boxed set. Now I think what could be really neat is if they sort of did a escalation style series of boxes for two factions, (this would inevitably lead to complaining though from those not in the box) for example, using forge base as an example you start out with forge bane then a few months later a second box comes out that continues the narrative/campaign by adding say.. a a dunecrawler, an ironstrider and some rust stalkers, with necrons getting flayed ones, destroyers and a Monolith... (just for example) the idea being that as time goes by people will have bought these packs and assmbled a fun little admech and necron army and gotten a neat narrative campaign to play out as they built and assembled.

But yeah I don't think it'd work, it'd mean GW focusing on two specific factions for a duration of time that would likely make people who played differant factions be restless

That kind of missions used to be in the IA books.

The problem with those missions is that you really have to have every single model, two players playing exactly those factions and you also need to have the proper terrain available.

Failing that, you simply cannot play the mission.

I think a much better idea would be a framework of rules you can combine into a scenario at will, to make games more interesting. The narrative rules are a nice start, but get dull when played too often.

As some people pointed out Forgeworld used to do this.

I have several older Imperial Armour books (especially one of the best story wise IA3) and i love how they did it. Basically you have a shot of the map with terrain, mission rules and forces available to both players with equipment and all.

I never played a single mission of this but i would love to play someday a mission like this from IA3 or IA5.

Too bad they changed it in later publications to normal missions. Its always no problem to play a normal game where you just choose your force but playing a historical scenarion is something entirely different. In other words from giving players something special and unique they gave more of the same you have in the rulebook.

Imperial Armour books or Horus Heresy publications were always written like some kind of a historical books. It would be only fitting to give pictures of the battlefield and forces present.

Edit: ohh and dont be so worried about balance in those missions. Forces should be more or less balanced but you dont have to make them perfect. Its not the point.