Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
My opinion is what happened to fantasy was extreme and too much. They could've waited for the many warhammer fantasy video games to come out and given them time before axing off fantasy. The fact the 'dawn of war' series did so well and hooked me into warhammer in the first place should tell GW something. Perhaps they should branch out rather than get obsessed over IP protection and trying to sue people at first opportunity.

The move GW made alienated a good portion of their warhammer fantasy fans and they have a right to be angry. How would anybody else feel if they'd spent hundreds and put lots of time, effort and progress accumulating money only to be told the setting they loved was destroyed and if they like competitions they best just 'GET OUT!'? Even the local GW manager mentioned that if people quit that GW didn't want them anyway. You know back in 2007 i was told by a GW manager/employee some sales pitch that 'Sure you spent a lot of money on warhammer but you'll have it longer whereas with a video game you spend 50 dollars and are through with it in a month.' Lately i've seen 'End Times' books and stuff being taken off the shelves after having only been on them for a few months and costing about 70 something USD to buy. GW doesn't understand that we're not made out of money. Treating us like saps that'll just buy anything new they put out and crap ourselves and buy the next new thing when they make the previous one obsolete in 3 months is going to alienate and anger the player base.

To be fair, on your second point about people effectively losing out on a game they have invested in, this is a risk that every person has to consider when they invest into a game. I'm not trying to mitigate their loss, or try to invalidate their feelings. But games won't always exist forever. I was heavily invested in Heroclix when it was first released and bought product and played it religiously. Then Topps had a panic attack and ended up dropping the game. I'm fortunate that the game came back, but for several years, the game I loved and devoted my time and money into was effectively GONE. Was I pissed? Yes. But it opened my eyes to this realization.

I don't expect 40k to be around forever. When/if it dies, it'll suck. But it will likely happen.

That is a good point, Malevolence. Most games do not have anything like the lifespan WHFB enjoyed. (Starship Troopers, AT-43, Confrontation, etc., etc.) Of course, there have been folks who felt the specific WHFB they loved "died" with the advent of a new edition. I read a lot of that around here when Eighth came out.

I just came back from the midnight release party for AoS at my LGS. The store was pretty packed and everyone seemed to really enjoy the miniatures and demos. I think AoS is going to do very well, especially compared to WHFB's performance over the past 5+ years. 40k players will probably be getting Age of Abaddon or what have you in the not too distant future.

I feel bad for the Fantasy players, because GW was silent for months and then sprung a new system and completely pulled support from the old. I'm not a super geek but I can't think of a reboot in any fandom or media that has done that. Some people will say 'GW said they were ending the world, you should have known!' But the direction of fluff is different from the future of a game system, I really think they should have just straight-up SAID what they were going to do.

All that said, I was never going to play WHFB in its old form, I enjoyed the background but the entry cost in terms of money and time was a deal-breaker. Last night on a whim I showed the AoS rules to my non-gamer-but-game-to-try-my-games wife. After commenting on the length ("Its not a book?") she read them and wants to try a game soon. That would never have happened in a million years with WHFB and has only ever happened once before (ironically, with X-Wing). So in my book Fantasy went from a zero to a slight positive. We'll see how her first game goes.

 Manchu wrote:
That is a good point, Malevolence. Most games do not have anything like the lifespan WHFB enjoyed. (Starship Troopers, AT-43, Confrontation, etc., etc.) Of course, there have been folks who felt the specific WHFB they loved "died" with the advent of a new edition. I read a lot of that around here when Eighth came out.

I just came back from the midnight release party for AoS at my LGS. The store was pretty packed and everyone seemed to really enjoy the miniatures and demos. I think AoS is going to do very well, especially compared to WHFB's performance over the past 5+ years. 40k players will probably be getting Age of Abaddon or what have you in the not too distant future.

My guess will be this: Age of Sigmar is going to be Fantasy until this game revives the interest/possibility of a 9th edition. I think when GW refines the basic starter rules, the game will get more favor amongs vets as well. I have a feeling what will happen is AoS will become the Fantasy intro game, that allows newcommers to play with their first few investments and have fun doing it. Then, if they keep investing, they can move up to a much grander, more in depth/complicated game if a 9th edition comes out or if GW redistributes 8th.

Honestly, I was always on the fence about Fantasy because of the general cost. 40k was expensive enough, but the base points limit that people tended to play for Fantasy was 1000+ points MORE than 40k. Not to mention the armies had a lot of units. The Orc and Goblin book intimidated me with just how many units they had. i didn't even know where to begin.

With AoS, I can play small, invest small, and have some fun with Fantasy's great model line. Then, when I build up enough, I can join the guys who still intent to play 8th edition, and that will give me time to figure out what I want to buy for that massive army.

Melevolence wrote:
My guess will be this: Age of Sigmar is going to be Fantasy until this game revives the interest/possibility of a 9th edition.

There may eventually be an "advanced" handbook for AoS but I honestly don't think GW will go back to blocks of troops.

 rabidaskal wrote:
I really think they should have just straight-up SAID what they were going to do.

Just looking at the date on the product, AoS was well on its way since at least 2014. In some ways, the release mirrors the fluff -- a bolt from the blue strike. Guess that makes us customers the hordes of enraged Khornites? If the shoe fits ...

In all seriousness, I can see why GW did not say -- hey guys, we are getting rid of rank and flank altogether, along with points-based list building -- months before they were ready for release. That would have caused at least the same amount of hard feelings as currently and arguably more, considering we'd be waiting for all the gorgeous models to assuage skepticism, bafflement, and downright offense. Doing it this way is certainly shocking -- but with shock comes awe, I guess.

 rabidaskal wrote:
After commenting on the length ("Its not a book?") she read them and wants to try a game soon.

This is such an important point, and not just for non-gamers and would-be gamers!

My opinion is that Age of Sigmar has some good core ideas but needs some fleshing out. There is no rules at all to army building other than using Warscrolls and the guidelines provided therein. However, I am excited by the idea that I can just take units from whatever faction I want. It'd be neat to add some Dwarven warriors or Wood Elf archers to support my Sigmarines. Sooo.... I'm a little torn.

Maybe what I would like to see is a book that puts some kind of army composition to Age of Sigmar. As cool as how open list building is Age of Sigmar is impossible to run tournaments for out of the box.

Regardless, I love the Sigmarines and even if Age of Sigmar tanks there are plenty of alternative games to use the models. KoW comes to mind and maybe Dragon's Rampant.

Have played a few games and the game is really awesome and fun, however as mentioned army list building is somewhat of an issue, especially at my FLGS. We have been working on creating some form of Format when it comes to list building that we feel so far has worked really well, especially in larger sized games. We ran this all day today and had zero complaints and overall seemed to work really well:

-12 War Scrolls Max
-x3 Hero War Scrolls Only
-x3 Monster War Scrolls
-Max number of Wounds in a Unit: 40

Keeping it to this everyone was able to have fun and even run Formations that they wanted to and no one had to worry about anyone trying to pull some crazy shenanigans. Personally I played my Wood Elves against the new Stormcast Eternals, new Khorne and an Undead army. Shooting in this edition/game got even better with no negative modifiers for range or terrain and my Waywatchers and Glade Riders proved that! Looking forward to expanding my Aelf army to include some more units from the High Elf forces and see how it goes!

Never mind, I'm an idiot.

frozenwastes wrote:

Commissar Molotov wrote:I really liked the WHFB fantasy setting - I still think WHFRP's "Enemy Within" campaign is the best RPG supplement ever published - and it was sad to see them burn a deep, living background down because the bean-counters didn't like what they were seeing from the financial returns.

I just got my hands on the first book from 1986. It's really quite something.

Ejay wrote:So you wanted them to keep investing in a dead platform that is actually making them lose money

The setting was used for a profitable game line for almost three decades. It's recent financial trouble but past success tells us that it's not the setting, but what GW was doing with the game. Continuing to do the same and investing more money in a failed platform obviously wasn't going to work, but that doesn't mean you have to burn it to the ground and start over. Instead you can stop doing what's not working, look at what was working when the company grew from a UK importer of D&D into an international miniatures company and do more of that.

If the Warhammer universe served as a successful basis for a commercial product for decades and then it starts failing, the place to look for a problem to fix is not in the setting, but in how it has been mishandled in recent years.

Ok, so I'm a gate crashing 40k player here, but I exalted this post as it just nicely sums up the problem with GW all over. Nevermind all the "no market research" nonsense, the current management have zero ability to do any kind of critical self reflection. Any problem with sales, player base etc. can't possibly be the result of their decisions. It must be the fault of small third party manufacturers. Or eBay bits sellers. Or everyone in the world suddenly simultaneously getting bored with a game that they've loved for over three decades. Or moon rays.

Whatever your feelings on AoS I hope everyone can recognise that GW need to wake up fast, because any company that is that detached from reality is going to get in real trouble, real fast.

I played a couple more games yesterday in store, one of which appeared to be quite a lop-sided game at one point. An army of Dwarves and lizardmen Vs Ogres and Goblins.
Basically, the terrifying large monsters, Giants and Mangler Squigs, were all destroyed by the end of turn 1 leaving a swirling shooting/ melee of units.
We had a couple of ambush units, and some camouflage skinks which, in cover managed to throw a confident pair of opponents completely off guard.
We also discussed game breaking deathstars. Units of Ogres, backed up with multiple wizards casting Mystic shield against the same unit to give unbeatable armour saves, 1+ save anyone? However, -2 rends and Mortal wounds helped there.
It was interesting fun, and we all seem to be learning the strengths and weakness of the format.

One thing that leapt out at me was the balancing system. We didn't adopt one, apart from our own self-regulation. However, this consisted of, "you can't take that whole load of Ogres, they've only got 2 units of skinks and some quarrellers."
This was a natural thing to do and I agree that the points mechanic has been deliberately left out to force people to adopt a more social attitude towards their opponents. Whilst it's possible to be a bell end, you are actively discouraged from doing so by the fact that the game would be utterly pointless, and over by turn 1 or 2. No one would bother playing that again, what's the point?

However, the games were fun, and I was surprised at how much strategy, team work and sportsmanship came out of the games. More so than the usual 40k games I've played.
Sportsmanship and team work particularly, were very obvious. Both sides were genuinely seeking opportunities for everyone to enjoy themselves, and were playing with that in mind. Strategy came from studying our unit abilities and working out how to best place and utilise them in the face of what appeared to be overwhelming superiority.
With those aspects in mind, it's been a winner for me so far.

I hate myself for enjoying it so much, though it means I can do a Clan Skyre Skaven army on the "cheap"...though Stormvermin are nasty!

I think on a largish table, with good terrain, it will become more than just a giant mosh pit in the middle. I think the combat phase is more nuanced than I originally though. Activating the wrong unit and the wrong time can be fatal.

All in all, it was good fun. GW will probably get a few more dollars out of me for it.

 r_squared wrote:

However, the games were fun, and I was surprised at how much strategy, team work and sportsmanship came out of the games. More so than the usual 40k games I've played.
Sportsmanship and team work particularly, were very obvious. Both sides were genuinely seeking opportunities for everyone to enjoy themselves, and were playing with that in mind. Strategy came from studying our unit abilities and working out how to best place and utilise them in the face of what appeared to be overwhelming superiority.
With those aspects in mind, it's been a winner for me so far.

Funny enough, but that kind of behavior isn't coming from the rules; I play many other games and I don't really see many players acting as a jerk - except for a few "social cases".

It comes from the players, and for now, in stores, it's obvious the managers would promote "fun and not nitpicking playstyle" for the demo games, because the rules are so easy to abuse and they don't want their game to look bad or silly.

We'll see if that stays the same in the next few months.


For myself, I believe AoS will attract new players - rules are free, you can play with a few models and games don't have to take a lot of time (you can also easily make a few games in a row!). Prices are relative; GW's ones aren't so high compared to other skirmish games. Since you don't have to buy a few dozen boxes to really "start playing", that new politic will surely be appealing to a lot of people previously staying out of this because of the high investment.

We just have to see what will be available in the future. It will be fun to see what the next months will bring ...

 TheNewBlood wrote:

2. You want a game where close combat is powerful? This is that game. CC makes or breaks games, and the threat of CC dictates how people move and use terrain. Instead of only the first couple ranks mattering, you can now bubble-wrap and dogpile like in 40k. Just remember that if an unengaged enemy unit is within 3" of your combat they can pile into you! If you couldn't shoot into combats, assault would be broken in this game.

3. You know what's great in CC? Monsters. Even with their weakening with taking wounds, they are still more than capable of wrecking face and smashing through infantry blobs. Proper CC Heroes are no slouches either.

4. You want to kill monsters or heroes? Magic is how. Arcane Arrow is one of the most powerful spells in the game. Magic is great for whittling down monsters or heroes while staying safely out of CC range. Massed shooting can have a similar effect.

5. You want morale to matter? It definitely does here. Battleshock can be just as deadly as a good round of shooting or assault. The command ability that lets a unit automatically pass is one of the most important things you can do to keep your army alive and intact.

6. The most important dice roll is the one that decides who goes first in the round. Games are won and lost based on this single roll-off every game turn.

BONUS: http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2015/07/age-of-sigmar-competitive-rules-doing-the-rounds.html Just as a rebuttal to anyone who says that nobody at GW has a clue about balance.

2-3: combat's important in a wargame, and monsters are important in a GW wargame. Well I never. The assertion that a weird shooting mechanic (that I can't see in the rules pdf) is the only thing that saves it doesn't sit well.

4: magic is powerful in a GW wargame. Get away.

5: didn't some people dislike KoW because morale mattered?

6: I've got a great house rule that'll make AoS even easier to learn and more streamlined. Each player deploys their forces, then they flip a coin to decide who wins...

On that note, yeah, no. I don't think that a couple of guys in a random GW store coming up with unofficial, unsupported house rules entirely counts.

I've decided today that I will be exchanging the starter set for some 40k stuff instead :p I've already bought the game on pre-order.

My store manager is going to be upset about it since he has been so excited for this game. But it's a lot of money to spend on a game that I won't have motivation to play.

I've done some thinking and my conclusion is this; that they would pretty much have to re-design the whole game to fix it. I'm looking back on all of the other game systems that I have played over the years. Gorkamorka, Epic 40k, Gothic, Necromunda......I'm not saying that I'm the biggest expert of table top games or anything, but for me I think AOS might just be the worst game ever designed.

They could maybe fix the balance and add some points cost, I have heard rumors of this. But that won't fix the issues with the core gameplay. Your units always interact the same way with other units...the dice never change. There is no strategy with movement and no consequences to being charged. Measuring from the model and not the base was just a horribly conceived idea.....scratching your painted miniatures trying to cram your guys in. The scenery and cover in general is just crap. I was trying to watch a battle report on Youtube and it was just so boring, I had to skip to the end :p

This is just my opinion on it. I have noticed a lot of people on Dakka supporting AOS and being optimistic about it. I don't know if it's because it is new and exciting game and they just want to love it. Or maybe they want to be the alternative, because the reviews have been so bad on the product.

I'm actually a GW fanboy too. I dropped money on AOS right away and the game didn't even need to be very good for me to spend more on it. But the product is the absolute worst case scenario for me.

I'll preface this by saying imo I was neither a white knight on AoS, its release and rules nor a hater.
I was willing to give it a shot as fantasy was never my main game and whilst I loved the lore I had no real attachment to the game – I own no fantasy models but have played games with friends around the 2001 edition and again in the 2009 edition.
In terms of my gaming background I have played all of 40k editions bar 3rd, played Warmachine, read the rules for Force on Force and played several other games with different mechanics – Space Hulk, Bloodbowl, BFG and other board games like Axis and Allies, Risk etc.
That is not trying to say I am an experienced gamer or know everything but I'd consider myself far from a greenhorn either.

So. With that in mind, here's my review for a first game of AoS.
I played orcs n Gobbos VS Lizardmen with the following armies:

O&G:
Ork warboss on boar – 6 w
Ork shaman on boar – 5w
Ork bully – 4w
Ork bully – 4w
2 x 10 Ork boys – 20w
10 x Ork arrerboys  -10w
5 x Boarboys – 10w
15 x gobbos – 15w
2 x rocklobbas – 10w
Total W = 84
Model count = 56
 
Lizardmen:
Saurus oldblood – 7w
Saurus standard bearer - 4w
10 x Saurus – 10w
5 Krox – 20w
2 x 7 cham skinks – 14w
2 x 4 terradon riders – 24w
Stegadon – 10w
Total W = 89
Model count = 40

I chose each army basically like this:
A Lord style character or Command-esque unit
A few normal core units mixed with shooting
Something I considered might be fun – Stegadon and Gobbo artillery
Something useful – Terradon and Boarboys

I gave very little thought to points (in terms of old WHFB ideals), wounds or what was fair until towards the end of each army when I did try and balance things out a bit via # of wounds.
I never played O&G or Lizzies in WHFB so leave it up to the more experienced guys here to comment on the lists or see if I was completely out of whack.

Either way, I mainly tried to pick two roughly balanced armies to have some fun.

Overall thoughts:
Setup:
The random terrain table roll I feel dosent work as fairly as it should. As you can see the Lms ended up with no terrain in one of their table quarters. In dirtier, shooting heavy battles this could make a real difference as having a +1 save for cover allied to say the magic shield can really improve a units survivability. I think every quarter should have at least 1 piece of terrain in it, even if its just a small wood or wall etc.
The other thing the rules dont clarify is who actually places the terrain down and in what positions. I couldn't find a rule for this? Have you guys?

I also ignored the terrain effects table, I think its very weak and just adds something else to track of with no overly fun elements. YMMV.

The alternating unit deployment mechanic was very interesting, in fact I really enjoyed it. It makes you have to react to your opponents placements of units and effectively try and "read" what his plan is. Of course he might well be using a feint or a unit as a distraction to throw you off.
In this game it was apparent the Terradons were going after the Orc artillery and as a result the Orcs reinforced that area with Gobbos which were originally planned to form a huge skirmish line centrally. It was a fun mechanic in this game.

The Warlord trait table is OK, I didn't find it made much of a difference this game but it could be a major factor in other games – a single re-roll might save your general or get a spell off and 2-3 on it is useful.

Command abilities especially for low LD armies makes a big difference, twice the Orcs managed to save units from being BS'd from the table.


Strategic VS Tactical elements:
I'll say this straight up, a lack of objectives or overall "goal" really hurts the game. Mine didn't bog down too much into a central mosh pit as I chose to move and attack other isolated units but I have seen several reps where it becomes just that. Its too one dimensional and frankly eliminates almost completely refused flanks, objective defence, using dedicated outflankers for obj captures, tactical focal points and even use of terrain features.
Afaik the new scenarios coming out will put some form of objective into them such as get X models off the board or kill the general or capture a point and this absolutely needs to be the case imo.
A few "whack em till dead style" games sure can be fun but on a long term basis, its definitely not going to keep my interest.
I await the new scenarios.

I feel a strategic element is lacking in the game so far. However tactical nuances do exist and for those claiming its just pewpew in a mosh are incorrect. Running skirmish lines, bublewrapping key units, shooting priority, hth target and turn priority, removal of casualties, stacking wounds or not on multi wound models all play a part in this as does taking cover and trying to get the best save possible (cover + magic shield) or simply staying out of LoS.

Combinations such as having your general use a command ability or inspiring presence can also have an affect on the game.

No, these arent earth shattering dynamics and experienced gamers will be well used to them, however, they are present and most certainly do make a difference.

Bases VS actual models.
Again straight up to me this dosent work at all. I was proxying 40k models for this but even then found myself quite literally shoving models closer to the enemy in order to get hth range. It felt totally wrong and almost childish. Something as simple as an extended weapon arm poking into someone's belly can make a big difference and I dont agree with it Im afraid.
Things get worse when you have 3-4 units in melee range juggling for position. Since bases dont matter at all, you can as said, shove the model as close as you like in all sorts of strange rotations and "clumped-uped-ness".
I will definitely be houseruling that aspect to use bases again even it means less attacks or less clear situations.


Shooting:
Shooting is simply and fairly clear, anyone who has ever played any wargame will get it, range, LoS, to hit etc all apply and theres no real need to comment further. It works as a mechanic.
On the shooting into and out of combat, in my game it didn't make a huge difference as I hadn't a massive amount of ranged units, however as a tactics, it will definitely influence games for the better imo. It adds another layer to the target priority angle, you must consider wiping out ranged units, even skirmishers as they will continue popping away at you VS taking out the real harder dedicated hth units.
I liked it tbh and so far welcome it as a rule.

Hand to hand combat:
taking a step back and looking at the game overall I did enjoy the hand to hand. It ultimately felt juicy especially something like the Kroxigors Vs the Orc Boyz and then the General piling in.
However I do concede it got quite complicated and sometimes difficult to track who attacked, hit what and who can pile in etc.
I think on a personal level for future games some sort of home-made chart or grid to track things would go a long way.
There was also a lot of looking up of special hth attacks or abilities which slowed things down a lot. However this is common with new games systems and rote and practice will get over this.
Hero characters definitely make a difference and hit hard as they should do – but dont seem too overpowered - in my game anyway. Having said that, big block units like the Orcboys or Saurus felt underwhelming and a bit like filler in some sense which was disappointing. I had more fun with the Boarboys and Stegadon than the rank n file troops. Should that be AoS or was WHFB the same? Im kinda 50-50 on that point and more games are needed.
Some units felt a touch wacky – Terradons with 16 attacks in a unit of 4 or Boarboys with 15 in 5 did again take away from the core troops. Solution? Take more Core guys? It then becomes difficult imo due to model placement and the distance to attack rules. Even with 10 Boyz I found it hard to squeeze them into the big fight that erupted.
Im not convinced on this so far but overall the mechanic rates as OK.

Magic:
I didn't have enough wizards to really make a big difference in this game so cant really comment on what might be broken or fun in that aspect. From my reading of the rules the relatively low cost of casting means one must always take a counter wizard to try and dispel as you could have lots of nasty stuff going off if not.
More games are needed in that aspect for myself.

Dice rolls:
I found I was rolling a lot of dice tbh. However the fact that a lot of the rolls are flat i.e. 3+ 4+ etc does speed things up. Even with things like 20 dice, it was a case of batch rolling which sped things up nicely. Im not sure in bigger games how it might go however as some models can make multiple shooting and hth attacks. TBC I feel.

Overall impressions:
It was a fun game, I did enjoy it. However until some form of objectives or strategic element is introduced, longevity is most certainly going to suffer.
Was it as fun as some of the old WHFB games I had? Hmmm, some elements were, it was faster, it was simpler, there were less omfg moments ala comet of cassander or Arkans flying chariot of crazy. However the hth did get bogged down a bit and keeping track of it was tough. Tactical movement is less important now than target priority and hth priority and terrain didnt feature much which Im personally disappointed in, being a terrain nut. Whilst I thin something like 40ks random difficult terrain stuff is crap, some form of loss or angle should be brought in I feel – it adds another layer of tactics.

Thats it for me so, I'm hoping to get the batrep with pics up today or during the week. Hope the review was useful.

Addendum:

6. The most important dice roll is the one that decides who goes first in the round. Games are won and lost based on this single roll-off every game turn.

I completely forgot about this in my game. Darn it. I ddnt even realise it was a rule. that will make an enormous difference in the game. I'll have to refight so and see what impact it has.

AoS is popular with 40k players. I hear a lot of people around this forum saying they hated fantasy but played 40k and they love AoS which is all well and good for them but some of us did like fantasy so to say "get over it" from a 40k perspective would be like GW making 40k mass army with square bases and totally changing your game and then us saying "well its more like fantasy which is great so get over it"

AoS is like the new Star trek movies, Abrams said "lets make it more like star wars, people love star wars" and they did and lots of star wars types liked it but a lot of the star trek fans didn't because its not star trek, its star wars wearing star treks face. AoS shares warhammer fantasies name and races but beyond that, its not fantasy. It feels more like dredfleet and yes I own a box of dredfleet because its a nice standalone one off game and AoS; is more like a small one off independent game. It does not deserve to be fantasy's full replacement it just doesn't have enough meat to be a full on game.

I'll probably pick up a small force later on when the armies are all released just to store in case I want to have a one off game but im not going in to collect, it just doesn't have longevity for a table top game and thats my opinion on it.

I saw the beginnings of a game in my local GW earlier this week and there was a LOT of "ok, this is how we'll do this. This is how we'll work around that" type of talk. The store manager was even getting involved and suggesting things, which leads me to believe that it may come to be a passable pick up game in that store but I highly doubt there will ever be anything sweeping and official for the ruleset as far as fixes go.

For those who like big battles, with ranked up models, give this a look.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/655766.page
These are some house rules my group and I use.
so far it works well.

Give them a try

Thanks
austin

 Dr. Cheesesteak wrote:
It's still sad that some wargamers just don't get it.

I get "it", it's just that "it" isn't very good in my opinion, and certainly isn't really what I want out of a wargame.

 Manchu wrote:
That is a good point, Malevolence. Most games do not have anything like the lifespan WHFB enjoyed. (Starship Troopers, AT-43, Confrontation, etc., etc.) Of course, there have been folks who felt the specific WHFB they loved "died" with the advent of a new edition. I read a lot of that around here when Eighth came out.

I just came back from the midnight release party for AoS at my LGS. The store was pretty packed and everyone seemed to really enjoy the miniatures and demos. I think AoS is going to do very well, especially compared to WHFB's performance over the past 5+ years. 40k players will probably be getting Age of Abaddon or what have you in the not too distant future.

The launch party I went to went really well, too. It was more people that I saw interested in spending money on Fantasy than I've seen in like, the last 3 years put together. It didn't hurt that the weekend was a Magic prerelease date, and there were people who went for that, and saw Sigmar too.

The box contents are really beautiful. The miniatures are just amazing, and the book has wonderful artwork in it, though amazingly little written content for 96 pages. Compared to the WMH starter set book, it blows it out of the water in terms of presentation and fluff (well, there is essentially no fluff in the WMH starter rulebook). It's *clearly* built with a different target audience in mind.

 Melissia wrote:

 Dr. Cheesesteak wrote:
It's still sad that some wargamers just don't get it.

I get "it", it's just that "it" isn't very good in my opinion, and certainly isn't really what I want out of a wargame.

And I understand that. But that's still beyond the point. You may or may not get that AoS is not designed for players like you, but it still seems a lot of the complainers don't.

Discussing w/ a local game designer, I had originally compared it to various macaroni and cheese products and recipes, but the game designer compared it more to Mercedes.

Basically, he said say you were a Mercedes-Benz (MB from here on out!) collector and bought a new MB every couple years or so. But suddenly MB says they're going to stop making luxury cars and only make economy hatchbacks. I can understand that if an MB collector would be angry. But you can still drive your old MB's. You can still find new cars to collect every couple years. I get not liking the fact MB changed their manufacturing brand, but why dwell on it? Why constantly complain about it? It won't change anything. Your life isn't negatively affected by it. Go collect Lexus instead, or again, just drive your MB's you already have... (another funny coincidence, BoLS did an article about Cadillac in a similar regard, and it's worked out for Cadillac)

But that still doesn't quite address the point the article - and GW - is trying to make. The game is almost ironic in that it's so free and open in rules, that it's actually designed - just not explicitly - to be self-regulated by the players. The overly-austere, discourteous, stubborn powergamers keep trying to point out how flawed the design is, but it seems they just aren't grasping the intention behind the design, b/c they keep criticizing the mechanics as if AoS is supposed to be comparable to 40k (I almost wanna say this is like a right-brain vs left-brain thing).

The game seems to be pulling off its intended goal quite nicely, given how many people/groups are actually communicating, coming up w/ ideas, testing things out, and...COMMUNICATING, etc. Besides new players, those are the types of players AoS is intended for. The people who are just constantly complaining w/o even playing it or coming w/ ideas to break the game - "derp, 20 Archaons, derp" - are essentially beating a dead horse.

So the "it" or the point being the complainers are just perpetuating the negative perception that the community has and that AoS is designed to weed out for itself. Yet rather than weed them out, it's just brought them out to be more vocal. At least in the short term. I'm sure in 3~10 months, the community will normalize and the QQers will be mostly quiet.

And it isn't even a shot at all powergamers in a vacuum or anything like that. There are amicable ones out there. I know a couple of local powergamers who don't like AoS. But rather than constantly whine and complain about the mechanics, they're trying out other games, sticking to 8E, proxying their WHFB models for similar games, hell, or even actually playing it to try to still figure out ways to make it work, etc. Read: moving on or adapting.

Plus, you almost addressed your own problem here. You said it yourself - AoS is not what you want in a wargame. So adapt. That's what we as humans are - or at least should be - all about. You can either adapt by finding something different to play or adapt by finding ways to make AoS work for you. Or stick to 8E, etc.

Honestly, what do you do whenever you test out (you have tested AoS, right?) a game? Constantly complain about it for a week or just move on to something else? A complaint about money sunk into the-now-unsupported-WHFB I can understand, but there are still options to put those models to use (KoW, LotR, WHFB 8E, etc).

 Los pollos hermanos wrote:
AoS is popular with 40k players. I hear a lot of people around this forum saying they hated fantasy but played 40k and they love AoS which is all well and good for them but some of us did like fantasy so to say "get over it" from a 40k perspective would be like GW making 40k mass army with square bases and totally changing your game and then us saying "well its more like fantasy which is great so get over it"

Yeah, it's not fair for 40k players to tell Fantasy fans to "get over it". GW didn't just switch the bases; GW made a new game that uses the same models, but is an unrecognizably different game. So Fantasy fans being sad is a natural thing. Call it what it is: Fantasy Battle was deemed unviable as a commercial product and axed.

On the other hand, as other people have said, the sales have been flagging for a long time, and GW at least gave Fantasy a fitting send-off with End Times -- something most companies that are going to ditch a product wouldn't do. And it wasn't a weak send-off, either. There were plenty of awesome End Times models.

Finally, there is nothing preventing the use of 8e rules in the Sigmar setting. I don't preclude the possibility that one day, GW will release a set of new rules optimized for high model count Fantasy, either -- or maybe a Kill Team type supplement, that gives official rules changes for playing a different type of game (except bigger, in this case, not smaller).

 Manchu wrote:
40k players will probably be getting Age of Abaddon or what have you in the not too distant future.

Having played AoS, moving 40k to Age of Abaddon is not a bad thing.

Look at how streamlined AoS is. Imagine if 40k were just as clean and smooth, instead of having rules crossreferenced everywhere. Each unit boiled down to its essence, with everything on one page. That would be great.

Sure, the game could stand some complications like Characters joining units, but overall, it's very good.

 Dr. Cheesesteak wrote:

Basically, he said say you were a Mercedes-Benz (MB from here on out!) collector and bought a new MB every couple years or so. But suddenly MB says they're going to stop making luxury cars and only make economy hatchbacks. I can understand that if an MB collector would be angry. But you can still drive your old MB's. You can still find new cars to collect every couple years. I get not liking the fact MB changed their manufacturing brand, but why dwell on it? Why constantly complain about it? It won't change anything. Your life isn't negatively affected by it. Go collect Lexus instead, or again, just drive your MB's you already have... (another funny coincidence, BoLS did an article about Cadillac in a similar regard, and it's worked out for Cadillac)

Except its not just switching to a new car, its stopping supporting your luxury cars (if we're going with that example) it means they're stopping insuring your car, making parts for your car and beyond. Any Mercedes owner would be rightly annoyed. They'd say sure make affordable hatchbacks but keep supporting luxury cars for god sake you built your company on them. Or imagine if Apple stopped selling mac products and switched to PC desktops, there would be an amazing uproar.

As for it doesn't negatively effect your life thats subjective. A lot of players simply don't like this new system. What are they going to play now if their local switches over to everyone playing AoS they're now left out. They have to go find a new group who play a different game. Perhaps someones left with thousands of pounds of warhammer for a new system they cannot enjoy even when they wanted to or tried it out. Maybe someone just invested in an expensive unit to go along with a list they have been perfecting for months, now worthless for their original intent. So we cannot say for sure that warhammer switching over isn't going to negativly effect any players. As I said before on another thread, what happens when your club wants to play with those silly beard rules and you really don't? you're left out.

Now I don't own any warhammer anymore so AoS doesn't really effect me but I can easily see it from those perspectives who have lost something in this change over and denying that isn't going to help anyone. Nor is telling them to either 'leave' 'stop whining' 'or adapt or get out' because they have only just recently lost what might have been a big thing in their lives or perhaps their only hobby. Give them time to grieve over it for gods sake before kicking them out.

Is all im saying to the AoS fans around here.

 Dr. Cheesesteak wrote:

But that still doesn't quite address the point the article - and GW - is trying to make. The game is almost ironic in that it's so free and open in rules, that it's actually designed - just not explicitly - to be self-regulated by the players. The overly-austere, discourteous, stubborn powergamers keep trying to point out how flawed the design is, but it seems they just aren't grasping the intention behind the design, b/c they keep criticizing the mechanics as if AoS is supposed to be comparable to 40k (I almost wanna say this is like a right-brain vs left-brain thing).

The game seems to be pulling off its intended goal quite nicely, given how many people/groups are actually communicating, coming up w/ ideas, testing things out, and...COMMUNICATING, etc. Besides new players, those are the types of players AoS is intended for. The people who are just constantly complaining w/o even playing it or coming w/ ideas to break the game - "derp, 20 Archaons, derp" - are essentially beating a dead horse.

So the "it" or the point being the complainers are just perpetuating the negative perception that the community has and that AoS is designed to weed out for itself. Yet rather than weed them out, it's just brought them out to be more vocal. At least in the short term. I'm sure in 3~10 months, the community will normalize and the QQers will be mostly quiet.

I mentioned this in the Discussions thread:

A lot of "power gamers" and competitive players only want the illusion of balance. They don't actually WANT balance. I am as guilty of it as the next guy, in 40k and other games. The whole idea of list building is that before the game starts you can give yourself an advantage by creating a better list than your opponent. This is actually antithetical to "balance". The only thing balanced is that both sides have the opportunity to create lopsided power lists, and it makes anything that isn't a power list a loser's list or a fluff bunny list.

There is a class of gamer that I personally don't connect with: the type of person who isn't all that smart or creative, but sees a clever idea on the Internet, builds that list or some variant, and then feels smug or superior when they go play someone (often in a pickup) and destroy them. They feel good about themselves, when really, they should just admit that 75% of their win was due to a list that is 90% unoriginal. This is not balance.

The whole problem with point-based listbuilding is A+B+C is not equal to A, B and C separately. If you take out the points, and force the players to cooperatively design the terms of combat, then player 1 can look at player 2's A+B+C, and say, "well, that's pretty powerful". The thing is, this isn't what a lot of competitive players want. They want to surprise their opponent, and win on the merit of the cleverness of fitting more power into a list of points, rather than what they do with the army.

In 40k, for many, many editions, this has led to dominant armies (can we say Grey Knights?) and monobuilds (can we say Wave Serpents?), especially for people who enjoy winning but don't want to think very hard to be creative. Or buy models to try stuff out that might not be a good long-term strategy.

Now, I am one of the guys who really enjoys being clever and fitting more power into a list of points, so as I say, I'm guilty of this. It's FUN, and AoS takes that away. On the other hand, from a practical perspective, when we play, we actually do the AoS thing in 40k with our armies already -- if someone has something really powerful, we offset it before the game begin because there is no point in playing a game with a predetermined outcome.

Is the AoS way a good solution? Well, for me, not really. On the other hand, I really hate playing 1850 optimized points with a suboptimzied list, knowing that it's an exercise in futility, too. I prefer what we do in 40k (pregame adjustments), but I get it: that just doesn't work if it's a tournament/competitive scene.

 Los pollos hermanos wrote:

 Dr. Cheesesteak wrote:

Basically, he said say you were a Mercedes-Benz (MB from here on out!) collector and bought a new MB every couple years or so. But suddenly MB says they're going to stop making luxury cars and only make economy hatchbacks. I can understand that if an MB collector would be angry. But you can still drive your old MB's. You can still find new cars to collect every couple years. I get not liking the fact MB changed their manufacturing brand, but why dwell on it? Why constantly complain about it? It won't change anything. Your life isn't negatively affected by it. Go collect Lexus instead, or again, just drive your MB's you already have... (another funny coincidence, BoLS did an article about Cadillac in a similar regard, and it's worked out for Cadillac)

As for it doesn't negatively effect your life thats subjective. A lot of players simply don't like this new system. What are they going to play now if their local switches over to everyone playing AoS they're now left out. They have to go find a new group who play a different game. Perhaps someones left with thousands of pounds of warhammer for a new system they cannot enjoy even when they wanted to or tried it out. Maybe someone just invested in an expensive unit to go along with a list they have been perfecting for months, now worthless for their original intent. So we cannot say for sure that warhammer switching over isn't going to negativly effect any players. As I said before on another thread, what happens when your club wants to play with those silly beard rules and you really don't? you're left out.

if having to find new people to play games w/ is a true detriment to your life, then you have it pretty lucky...

"If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat, if your house is on fire, then you've got a problem. Everything else is inconvenience." - Robert Fulghum



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Talys wrote:

Spoiler:

 Dr. Cheesesteak wrote:

But that still doesn't quite address the point the article - and GW - is trying to make. The game is almost ironic in that it's so free and open in rules, that it's actually designed - just not explicitly - to be self-regulated by the players. The overly-austere, discourteous, stubborn powergamers keep trying to point out how flawed the design is, but it seems they just aren't grasping the intention behind the design, b/c they keep criticizing the mechanics as if AoS is supposed to be comparable to 40k (I almost wanna say this is like a right-brain vs left-brain thing).

The game seems to be pulling off its intended goal quite nicely, given how many people/groups are actually communicating, coming up w/ ideas, testing things out, and...COMMUNICATING, etc. Besides new players, those are the types of players AoS is intended for. The people who are just constantly complaining w/o even playing it or coming w/ ideas to break the game - "derp, 20 Archaons, derp" - are essentially beating a dead horse.

So the "it" or the point being the complainers are just perpetuating the negative perception that the community has and that AoS is designed to weed out for itself. Yet rather than weed them out, it's just brought them out to be more vocal. At least in the short term. I'm sure in 3~10 months, the community will normalize and the QQers will be mostly quiet.

Now, I am one of the guys who really enjoys being clever and fitting more power into a list of points, so as I say, I'm guilty of this. It's FUN, and AoS takes that away.

See, pts aside, I've found some interesting combos w/ my Dwarfs and Empire that weren't there in 8E. Empire seem to have got even MORE access to buffing combos. Which given how it's now just flat To Hit, To Wound and not Str/Tough based, makes them even more powerful than 8E, imo. Yeah, it may not have the creative aspect of fitting it into a list regulated by a pts system, but again, there are still ways to force limitations on yourself and still come up w/ creative or interesting ways to get the most out of what you're fielding.

Nostalgia is a strong thing.

The BoLS Cadillac analogy is a good one, because it's true. And it's not just Caddy.

Are people aware that BMW no longer makes entirely lightweight sport sedans? Yet the X5 sells very well, and the huger and heavier 5 and 7 continue to get bigger and heavier. BMW (and Mercedes) even sells front wheel drive cars. Thing is, BMW adapted, and continues on.

Buick was marketing almost exclusively to retirees, but then they rolled back to younger professionals with family-friendly wagons like the Enclave, launching progressively smaller cars and crossovers like the Encore. They're on a huge roll.

Had BMW and Buick stayed only with the past, they wouldn't be as successful. When you're struggling, and you've got deep pockets, it's time to roll the dice and make big changes.

GW did the right thing, to be sure.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
40k players will probably be getting Age of Abaddon or what have you in the not too distant future.

Having played AoS, moving 40k to Age of Abaddon is not a bad thing.

I would stop playing entirely if that happened. AoS is a mess of badly written, badly thought out rules, not something I'd want to dedicate years of my life to.

 Vermis wrote:
2-3: combat's important in a wargame, and monsters are important in a GW wargame. Well I never. The assertion that a weird shooting mechanic (that I can't see in the rules pdf) is the only thing that saves it doesn't sit well.

4: magic is powerful in a GW wargame. Get away.

5: didn't some people dislike KoW because morale mattered?

6: I've got a great house rule that'll make AoS even easier to learn and more streamlined. Each player deploys their forces, then they flip a coin to decide who wins...

On that note, yeah, no. I don't think that a couple of guys in a random GW store coming up with unofficial, unsupported house rules entirely counts.

I wasn't trying for some "earth-shattering" conclusion about the game. I meant that post to illustrate that there is actual tactical and strategic depth to the game, despite what some people have been saying. I still have problems with key aspects of the game like the dice roll to see who goes first in the round and the lack of rules for army construction, deployment, and terrain.

Fun fact: because AoS lacks an explicit prohibition on shooting into ongoing combats, RAW you can. RAW also says that pivoting on the spot costs movement and you can deploy however the feth you want as well. Read into that what you will. I personally think that shooting into combats is a necessary balancing element for shooting vs. assault.

It is really sad that Warhammer Fantasy got axed for a game that at the moment does not fill the same niche as Warhammer Fantasy. I really think that Age of Sigmar could be a good game, and one that I would definitely be interested in playing, if the rules released so far are a base to add upon key needed elements. There have already been leaks that the BRB for Age of Sigmar is 264 pages long. I would bet money that more than 4 of those pages are devoted to rules.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
GW did the right thing, to be sure.

Considering its only around day 4? of AoS I think its too early to tell, jury is still out on that one.