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So I've sporadically put bits about this in other peoples threads, so I thought I'd better make my own!

I'm throwing together a campaign for 40k, which will be based on the idea of a small(ish) force on a dead planet in a system which is being fought over. No-one wants the planet, but no-one wants anyone else to have the planet. The planet gets periodic reinforcements from their fleet, but are otherwise left to try and hold the place.

The general idea is:
Every player makes a Roster, featuring models and wargear - with wargear now being priced uniformly instead of dependent on the unit buying it, this is quite simple. So you have a Roster of troops/vehicles and an Armoury of any non-0-point weapons (assume enough 0-point weapons for anyone who wants one).

For each "round", a player is presented with 3 games, with points values and a brief outline of their role, EG 1000pts, attacker. They then make 3 army lists from their Roster, with no units being used in 2 or more army lists, and fight the battles.

Any model slain is removed from the Roster, along with any wargear it was carrying. At the end of the 3 games, you will then receive points equal to the points of the games to add to your Roster (meaning if you're tabled you can buy it all back, if no-one dies then you end up with a much larger Roster).

EG if you play a 1000pt, a 1500pt and a 2000pt game, you gain 4,500 pts for your Roster - but if you lost 3,500pts in those games, you'll only end up gaining 1000pts.

Whoever wins 2/3 of the games will win the round. Draws will be determined by total VP in the games, further draws will give both players a campaign point.

Winning criteria for the campaign will be:

Most Campaign Points
Best Win/Loss ratio across all games
Largest Army Roster

I've dropped any ideas of rules which will affect the games themselves - it's barely balanced as it is! I also had some other rules which I've considered but I'm thinking not to use:

- your Army Warlord never counts as slain, so you don't have to buy him back - a bit skewed for armies with expensive warlords (Ghazzie springs to mind), where one army might get 250 "free" points and another only get 100.
- bringing units from reserves in exchange for CP, if you had them left in your roster - not fair for players with smaller rosters

Basically I've dropped anything which can affect the players games, and made the campaign a direct string of trios of attacker - defender - battle, so you each get a chance to be the attacker and the defender, and then a regular pitched battle game of 40k.

using Win/Loss ratio as a winning point stops players from feeling that there's no point in playing the third game if they lost the first two, as well as the Roster size (for the player who died the least).

What do you all think?

At a glance, it seems like it should work. I question whether or not if captures the "feel" that you're going for though.

When I think "finite force," I think of having my list of units dwindle over time, forcing me to take unconventional combinations. I feel like what you've pitched, as I understand it, would be more likely to force frequent losers to keep buying back the core their armies while frequent winners end up with a larger roster of optional units. Basically, it kind of feels like these rules reflect a growing warband that occassionally shrinks rather than reflecting a shrinking warband that occassionally grows. But maybe I'm missing a key part of the larger picture.

I'll also note that some armies are much more prone to losing units in a battle than others. Drukhari, for instance, tend to lose units left and right while something like Grey Knights or Custodes are more likely to have a few tenacious survivors hanging in their from various squads.

Wyldhunt wrote:
At a glance, it seems like it should work. I question whether or not if captures the "feel" that you're going for though.

When I think "finite force," I think of having my list of units dwindle over time, forcing me to take unconventional combinations. I feel like what you've pitched, as I understand it, would be more likely to force frequent losers to keep buying back the core their armies while frequent winners end up with a larger roster of optional units. Basically, it kind of feels like these rules reflect a growing warband that occassionally shrinks rather than reflecting a shrinking warband that occassionally grows. But maybe I'm missing a key part of the larger picture.

I'll also note that some armies are much more prone to losing units in a battle than others. Drukhari, for instance, tend to lose units left and right while something like Grey Knights or Custodes are more likely to have a few tenacious survivors hanging in their from various squads.

That last part is the reason why I'm making it so individual models die instead of whole units - so you don't hold a single guy and try and keep him alive so - somehow - the rest of his unit never died.

With individual model costs and weapon costs, it's not difficult to track individual models - and the rules cover incomplete squads so if one guy survives and you don't buy him any mates, you're still ok to use him. If half of 2 squads die, you can combine them in the next round as your Roster will just have model counts and weapons, no set units.

EG I could have 4 deff dreads in my list, and a variety of weapons - each different game (assuming they survive) I can fit said dreads with different weapons, and put them in different squads.