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 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 MWHistorian wrote:

That seems like an awful lot of effort to achieve balance that supposedly isn't necessary in a casual game.
I'm a very casual player and balance to me is essential in having a fun game. My narrative is ruined when my awesome army gets wiped off the table on turn two just because my opponent's army is simply much much stronger than mine. (Not list building, but that army is just nigh unbeatable no matter what I do.)

It's actually not as much work as you'd think... Usually, as guys are unpacking one will say, "that's all you're taking??" and if the other says, "yeah, it's all I got" then the first usually responds with, "ohh OK. I'll take some stuff out then"


And, at least so far, I haven't run into any "Wood Elf problems". And by that, I mean that, based on previous threads, in 7th/8th Ed. WHFB, Wood Elves were so incredibly under powered until they finally got a new book, that for most people, if you lined up a WE army, it was almost an auto-win for the opposing player.

Well, using GW games as a comparison to balance is going to put anything in a favorable light.

 MWHistorian wrote:

Well, using GW games as a comparison to balance is going to put anything in a favorable light.

Lol, true... my point was more that, in my own experience of AOS, I have yet to come across any "auto-win/auto-lose" units or armies.

I also want to throw out there that Sudden Death is kind of stupid, sometimes. I mean if you have, say, 30 sigmarines against 50 sigmarines then sure, it's valid. But when it's 30 sigmaries against 100 skeletons, sigmarines can still win rather easily. But since there's a hell of a lot more skeletons, the sigmarines player gets the chance to give him or herself another opportunity to win.

I should mention that the rules state that an outnumbered player CAN use Sudden Death rules. So every time I'm facing Sigmarines with my Night Goblins I basically ask my opponent to not use Sudden Death and explain why. Usually works, but sometimes I end up with people who want every advantage they can get (they're no fun).

Yeah, we've been either ignoring it or using it as a minor/partial victory condition.

I'd rather see some more tactical objective in place of it, like, nominate one terrain feature in your opponent's territory, if you can get X models in B2B and remain there for 1 game turn then you win.

Just something that's not as easy as "kill that guy" (which is stupid easy with Sigmarines' lighting bolt powers alone)

I brought a friend I used to play 5th Ed 40k with to try the game. He hated it. Lack of points system, no rules writing, and he found the entire experience unpleasant. I told him about the Azyr rules and he fully approved of those.

And neither of us took a dick list. He ran all the Orcs I had (20 savage, 40 regular, 10 black, 2 pump wagons, Grimgor, Wurzaag, mangler and a goblin on wolf) and I set a fairly even warriors list: 20 warriors, 5 Knights, 5 hellstriders, 5 blight kings, gutrot, 2 spawn, lord on demon mount. We quit early, but he had his two named characters, a pump wagon, and 8 black orcs left. I had 18 warriors, 4 Knights, 4 striders, gutrot, lord and BKs left. No summoning, I took no magic at all and far fewer numbers. Skipped SD too. He hated the "if you're within 3", you have to retreat further because you can't charge into combat or move blah blah crap". 3"? Terrible rule. What ever happened to 1"?

 timetowaste85 wrote:
He hated the "if you're within 3", you have to retreat further because you can't charge into combat or move blah blah crap". 3"? Terrible rule. What ever happened to 1"?

Um, that's not correct. You can't charge, yes - but by being within 3" you get your pile-in so will get to fight anyway. You don't have to retreat.

Yup, you read it wrong. That may have something to do with him not enjoying the game, might I suggest giving it another go?

Next time he drives five hours to visit, we shall.

Both of us got irritated at it. It screwed both of us at the point it happened.

Fair enough, glad you're willing to go another round

We ignore the sudden death rule and play according to the azyr comp system.
The games are more balanced and missions as for steamroller make the battles more interesting.

 thegreatchimp wrote:


Model wise I'm not mad about the Stormcast. They're good models, but suffer from all being a bit "samey." The Khornate models look great, and the new Sylvaneth are stunning. Those treemen in particular are the best thing to come out of the design room in a while. Ordered the army set for no other reason than I liked the models.

The sylvaneth are just the last incarnation of wood elf tree based units in pretty new boxes with pretty new names. The treemen figures are still nice models, though. I have a set of the khorne figs from the AoS box now that I am converting for 40k usage since I don't do fantasy these days. Have to say that the khorne models are starting to annoy me as each week shows the next more powerful khorne unit and they have bigger and more plentiful skulls and bigger axes than the last. Sorry, but bigger axes do not a cooler model make past a point. I'd like to see minis that look more like mutants with heads of blood thirsters or heads of flesh hounds. Things that look khorne, but not corny with such massive axes that they probably would not be able to even use them effectively. Of course I have khorne models going back to 3rd edition WHFB in my collection so I am getting harder to please.

 Skriker wrote:


The sylvaneth are just the last incarnation of wood elf tree based units in pretty new boxes with pretty new names. The treemen figures are still nice models, though. I have a set of the khorne figs from the AoS box now that I am converting for 40k usage since I don't do fantasy these days. Have to say that the khorne models are starting to annoy me as each week shows the next more powerful khorne unit and they have bigger and more plentiful skulls and bigger axes than the last. Sorry, but bigger axes do not a cooler model make past a point. I'd like to see minis that look more like mutants with heads of blood thirsters or heads of flesh hounds. Things that look khorne, but not corny with such massive axes that they probably would not be able to even use them effectively. Of course I have khorne models going back to 3rd edition WHFB in my collection so I am getting harder to please.

Ah right, my mistake -I presumed the Sylvaneth were new releases, didn't realise it was simply a re-boxing -goes to show my unfamiliarity with Fantasy Battle.

We think alike -I'm not for oversize weapons unless they're being wielded by a creature that's also oversize. I convert smaller power fists and file down some of my space wolves' axe heads to more realistic proportions for that reason. Tend to remove excessive bling too, as much because it gets in the way of my conversions as because a church on the back of a tank or a giant tome on the windshield of Samael's jetbike just looks silly imho.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Next time he drives five hours to visit, we shall.

Both of us got irritated at it. It screwed both of us at the point it happened.

Five hours? He needs another game that is closer to him... Or try vassal next time.

What worries me a bit is the flatness of the discussions around AoS, especially the army lists.
Am i wrong here?

I've noticed the same, but them I am just a hater so I dunno.
/shrug

 wuestenfux wrote:
What worries me a bit is the flatness of the discussions around AoS, especially the army lists.
Am i wrong here?

flatness?? I'm not sure I follow you there.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:
What worries me a bit is the flatness of the discussions around AoS, especially the army lists.
Am i wrong here?

flatness?? I'm not sure I follow you there.

E.g., look at the design of army lists. How to configure, how many wounds, against what opponents? You never know.

 wuestenfux wrote:

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:
What worries me a bit is the flatness of the discussions around AoS, especially the army lists.
Am i wrong here?

flatness?? I'm not sure I follow you there.

E.g., look at the design of army lists. How to configure, how many wounds, against what opponents? You never know.

The dakka community for AoS isn't very big yet for obvious reasons, and on top of that there are quite a few different comp systems and it will be a while before any of them emerge as clear winners. So under those circumstances it's a bit hard to discuss army composition, which is an extremely important part of a game like AoS that relies so heavily on synergies between units.

I think many aos players don't post army lists or gaming threads here on dakka because the naysayers and 8th folks seem to flood the threads with anti gw, aos fan, and aos posts. No one wants to be attacked or have their game 'bashed' just for trying to have a positive conversation about their game (and then told that they are being mean because they like or try to defend their game).

Warseer is the same. Our aos community is getting huge here in central wisconsin, but it seems like most stay off the forums for the most part (besides lurking) because of the earlier said reasons.

 455_PWR wrote:
I think many aos players don't post army lists or gaming threads here on dakka because the naysayers and 8th folks seem to flood the threads with anti gw, aos fan, and aos posts. No one wants to be attacked or have their game 'bashed' just for trying to have a positive conversation about their game (and then told that they are being mean because they like or try to defend their game).

To be frank, the tactics, army lists and rules sub-forums have been entirely devoid from any negative comments for as long as I have followed them. The skeptics keep themselves to the general forum as a rule of thumb as they have stated that they are not that interested in the game to post into the more specialized sub-forums. For me the lack of army lists may be attributed to two things:
1. Only a few players come to the forums. To be frank, again, even as I like the game, I don't have much to say about it. Models are placed, dice are rolled, units clash, someone wins. I can comment on new releases, but can't seem to produce something interesting (to me) in order to post it.
2. Players aren't using comp systems. Without them army lists are pointless .

As for tactics, I am still searching for a nice report

 CoreCommander wrote:

 455_PWR wrote:
I think many aos players don't post army lists or gaming threads here on dakka because the naysayers and 8th folks seem to flood the threads with anti gw, aos fan, and aos posts. No one wants to be attacked or have their game 'bashed' just for trying to have a positive conversation about their game (and then told that they are being mean because they like or try to defend their game).

To be frank, the tactics, army lists and rules sub-forums have been entirely devoid from any negative comments for as long as I have followed them. The skeptics keep themselves to the general forum as a rule of thumb as they have stated that they are not that interested in the game to post into the more specialized sub-forums. For me the lack of army lists may be attributed to two things:
1. Only a few players come to the forums. To be frank, again, even as I like the game, I don't have much to say about it. Models are placed, dice are rolled, units clash, someone wins. I can comment on new releases, but can't seem to produce something interesting (to me) in order to post it.
2. Players aren't using comp systems. Without them army lists are pointless .

As for tactics, I am still searching for a nice report

I think that is the worst way to play the game tbh. You can't just set up two armies and go at it. Well, you can, but you're not really using the system to its full potential. It certainly doesn't make for e most interesting battles. IMO these three things are very important in AoS

1. Players who know their armies and can thus build lists that utilize synergies between units, heroes, buffs etc
2. Playing scenarios other than "kill each other"
3. Utilizing the mysterious terrain rules to add a further layer of complexity and tactics

Since the core system is so simple and fast, it really lends itself to adding more layers of complexity without it slowing down the game. This is the systems greatest strength IMO. If you added all these things on top of an already very complex game, it can be overwhelming. Not so in AoS.

I find it difficult to see how adding more complexity to AoS would not result in more complexity in AoS.

It seems to me that logically an alternative, more complex game, would be likely already to include various elements that in AoS have to be added as extras (formations, command and control, etc).

In fact if you bolt extra stuff on to AoS, probably replacing or modifying core pieces of rules, you are likely to end up with something even more complicated than an alternative ruleset that was designed from the ground up to include the additional complexity.

I'm not talking about adding house rules or changing anything. I'm talking about using the full extent of the rules as they exist. That means utilizing synergies to their fullest, using terrain features and playing scenarios. Nothing is bolted on.

Then I do not understand how it is adding new layers of complexity to what is already included.

Do you mean that players will discover more complexity in the rules that already exist?

It seems a reasonable idea. The discovery of the Inverse T formation took sometime, for example.

Many players seem to be looking at the game solely as its core rules and nothing more, which IMO sells it short. On top of of those core rules we have those things I listed above, adding further layers to the game. And, like you mention, the game is still being explored.

The thing is if someone looks at the core rules and thinks, "Naaah, not my cup of tea," they are unlikely to explore more depth in the special rules, especially as the main new factions' rules are not available free.

Wait, which rules are not available for free? Only the scenarios and some formations cost money, everything else is in the app or their website. But yes, I completely agree that that is something that has, and will continue to happen.

The Sigmarines and Chaos unit scrolls are not available free as PDF downloads that can easily be printed and cut up for reference, etc.

Everything else is, meaning the core rules, terrain rules, and war scrolls for the legacy armies.

I am not interested in the scenarios anyway. I can make my own.
GW have to have something to sell, too.

 455_PWR wrote:
I think many aos players don't post army lists or gaming threads here on dakka because the naysayers and 8th folks seem to flood the threads with anti gw, aos fan, and aos posts. No one wants to be attacked or have their game 'bashed' just for trying to have a positive conversation about their game (and then told that they are being mean because they like or try to defend their game).

Warseer is the same. Our aos community is getting huge here in central wisconsin, but it seems like most stay off the forums for the most part (besides lurking) because of the earlier said reasons.

I would posit that, rather than there being some sort of massive negativity cloud preventing people from using forums, that there's very little reason to post army lists in a game where there's no points costs or limits and no army construction rules.

The way it used to work, you always had two dimensions that defined your army. The points level, and then the composition rules (e.g. no more than 25% rare, at least 25% troops, etc). That gave a basis for people to judge armies between each other.

With neither of these in existence, there's no way to really judge anything. How do you give army construction advice when there's no comparative basis on which to judge? At they very least you'd need to have some sort of comp system that takes the place of the old points system, or an opposing collection/army, to compare against.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The Sigmarines and Chaos unit scrolls are not available free as PDF downloads that can easily be printed and cut up for reference, etc.

Everything else is, meaning the core rules, terrain rules, and war scrolls for the legacy armies.

I am not interested in the scenarios anyway. I can make my own.
GW have to have something to sell, too.

They are on the website as PDFs, if you click a unit in the web store there's a link there.

Edit: I see, you were looking at the compendiums, and they don't have those. That's understandable, hopefully they'll get them out eventually.