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Wounds are horrible because they are a poor gauge of power.

Compare the two statlines:
1 wound
3+ save
3+ to hit 3+ to wound -1 rend 2 damage

vs

1 wound
5+ save
4+ to hit 4+ to wound 0 rend 1 damage

By wounds they would be equal even though it is apparent one is very much superior to the other.

RoperPG wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

RoperPG wrote:
The more I hear in defense of points / comp - no matter the system - the more I wonder why I didn't spot how much of a false floor / crutch it is years ago.

Personally I don't see it as that cut-and-dry; I absolutely hated AoS until I found a good points system and now it's my favorite game. I can see why people get frustrated/annoyed/bored and don't like the game, because without a good comp it is really hard to judge how one army will be balanced against another without playing that matchup at least once, if not several times, which is effectively saying 'you can have good games after you have played several crappy ones' and that is the sort of thing which irritates people. On top of that, the vast majority of comps have shoddy balance anyway which kills the point; the game is already being comped so why can't it be comped well? Leading to further anger. At the end of the day, people are willing to put up with a decent amount of imbalance if it comes from an official source because it gives everyone a common reference point. Once things are being comped by the community, people are going to have higher expectations, and I think the broad failure of many AoS comps to meet that causes a lot of anger and dismissal from people honestly trying to give the game a chance.

I don't use comp, but then I appear to game amongst a group of very like-minded individuals so it hasn't been an issue yet.

However, I do follow some of the comp systems and quite frankly (although some took it as a urination/mouth interface) I was really happy when GW announced on the FB page that there are a) no plans to comp AoS and b) if you did want comp, then using the unofficial systems is fine. This is brilliant news.
Because it means playing without comp is the default out-of-the-box option, and the more I do it, the more I enjoy it.
Whatever GW's reason for dropping points / 'approving' unofficial comps - which depending on the poster will be anything from genius visionaries through to a happy accident resulting from financially-sanctioned laziness - is immaterial. It's the best result for the players themselves.
Even the most ardent fanboy can't argue that GW got it's comp/pointing right all the time, and there are plenty of examples in non-GW systems where official points have caused problems.
By allowing the community to decide what the balance is, independently of GW, those that want a decent, adaptive codified balance mechanism can have one.
That's kept up to date, and in the better cases, runs on feedback too.

I don't mean to criticize GW's decision, I do think it was a combination of their own little circle of logic (that had been spinning away from reality for some time) and financial laziness, but I also agree that it was the best choice for the game because the fans will be able to comp things to their preference and better than GW ever could. While it comes with its own downsides I am happier with that than I ever was with WHFB.

auticus wrote:The problem with deriding community comps is that I can go harvest a list of pretty much every major comp out there now and find a list of people deriding it as bad and having no balance, as well as a list of people saying its great and has great balance and is why they play the game.

Meaning the community that uses comps should support each other instead of trying to slam each other. That certainly doesn't help the cause anyway.

Re-reading what I wrote I should expand on what I said. I don't mean to dismiss people who like a given comp, what I mean to say is that having a vaguely points-like system is something people generally want but the degree to which they want it differs. To put it another way, people want balance, or rather 'balanced enough' which is different for each player and group, leading to comps that people defend as having good balance while others criticize it for lack of balance (the former has a lower threshold for 'balanced enough'). Case in point I said "most comps have shoddy balance anyways" but that is measured to my personal benchmark; I only extrapolated it to a larger audience based on the evidence I have seen of broader opinion (I probably should have used less-strong wording at any rate). Ultimately what I mean to say is that there is a gradient of what/how much of a balancing mechanism players want, with each individual falling on a different point. With a single points system set by the game itself people are more likely to settle for that even if it is faulty, without one each group finds their own way and players left outside the range of a given comp's 'balance gradient' will naturally get frustrated for the reasons I described. What it all adds up to is that while many people may be complaining it doesn't mean that a points system is a required crutch for a game as much as it may seem, though the prevalence of people comping replacements means it is also a somewhat important component; thus my initial statement about it not being so cut-and-dry.

Totally agree. For all the comments of "yeah, but you could always do what you wanted", finding a WFB game that wasn't PITCHED BATTLE AT X POINTS was the proverbial needle in a haystack. It was always a neat idea, but required other like-minded people to work.

At least this way, it is entirely down to the players as to what constitutes balance, it'll allow local metas to guide rather than exploit the game, and so on.

I think the other problem is that it seems like nobody who claims the game is unplayable without points *is* a tfg/powergamer/whatever, but all the people they play against are. Seems a bit odd.
Having a big player like GW move away from comp is a big deal, especially as they were a lot of people's first - if not current - experience of wargaming and the framework. Comp was part of that framework. It was largely the focus of everything that occurs right up to placing minis on the board, from choosing an army to purchasing decisions to actually writing the list.

I think for a number of people playing the game almost became secondary to that, or at least was the 'test' that you got that part right. By removing comp, the focus is *just* the game. That's a big shift.
For me at least, it's not just that I don't have to think about that stuff until I'm setting up the table, it's that there's largely no point. Even against my regular opponents I might know what faction they're using, and can deduce certain things I'll want to take - but until we've determined scenario and started setting stuff up, I have no bar to judge against.

I can get why people want(need?) a comp system, but I'm genuinely glad that those systems are not in GW's hands.

But, I would like a good gauge of how one army matches up to another. Like if I were to field my Stormcast, what would my opponent need to get a decent match of force so that it will be a pretty fair game.

The problem with this is that it assumes a specific scenario,often the straight up battle, where you charge each other and victory is determined by killing most, last one standing, units killed or some similar. Unit balance and points are geared to how much they contribute to that scenario and its victory condition. It might be that is precisely what you have in mind, fair enough.

However, AoS is focused to not being that style of game, but instead having a range of scenarios with different victory conditions, or players coming up with their own interesting scenarios depending on their own interest.

For a game with that concept then some generic points are really not great, as victory is determined by a variety of other factors. A 'fair game' requires that both players choose forces that have an equal chance of winning, not just killing each other. There is a difference in value between weak but fast units in a scenario which is a 'kill most stuff' vs 'exit units off the opponents edge'. In some scenarios what constitutes 'valuable unit' may be quite different for each side, as stopping someone achieving something vs being the one trying to achieve that objective can result in considerable asymmetry for optimal force composition. In the above case of getting off the opponents edge, if only one player is trying to do that in limited turns then for him fast units are probably very good, but slow ranged units are not, for the other guy a couple of the slow ranged units that could be very valuable for shooting fast units rather than trying to catch them.

If you have a game that is not focused on the idea of one big battle than spending time working out points, that then need to be maintained, or become a joke (or bigger joke) is not worth it. Better to come up with some non point based balance mechanism. Whilst I can't say how well it works, the scenario that seems to be getting used at a couple of the GW events is heading in that direction concept wise - place what you want up to a model limit from however big a collection you have (so you don't pre-define a list), but the one who deploys less wounds has more chances to gain VP in a fairly short game with the VP both sides can gain being fairly limited, so even a couple of the underdog points could swing it. They may not have it quite right yet?, but that is where the game needs to go IMO for a standard competitive/pick up game as it is somewhat more future proof than points. It is far easier to tweak one scenario as they see how it plays out than some largely irrelevant points (outside the one scenario) and all the knock on affects in relative values etc.

You're right that a unit's value can alter drastically depending on the victory conditions. One way would be to assign all units a "type" such as Light Cavalry or Scout for the fast, weak units we talked about. In the scenario set-up you could then use these types to govern either handicaps or bonuses for example.

- The breakthrough player can only spend x% of points on Light Cavalry
Or
- The defending player gains extra points to spend on units equal to 50% of the total cost of the attacker's Light Cavalry units.

Something like that. Well, I can see both sides of the argument - with the scenarios of AoS it makes it very difficult to cost units when their battlefield role can be so varied, at the same time it can be jolly good fun to agree on a point limit, crunch some numbers to get a strong list and go all out to beat your oppenent.

I love watching Tabletopminis AoS battle reports - they focused on AoS vanilla for a long time playing through the different scenarios. Later on they brought in SDK for a pitched battle and it really perked my interest as the game gave a completely different feeling.

Both are good for different types of games - a pitched battle with points can be very fun to play, just as fun as a scenario.

At this point what I would like to see is GW officially endorse some points systems for that competetive crunch and at the same time continue to make cool fluffy scenarios else where.

It would be a mistake for GW to endorse one particular fan comp system as the official preferred rules for AoS.

Without evaluating them all, how can GW pick the best or most popular? GW can't afford to endorse a bad one.
The point of fan systems is that anyone can make one. To endorse one means all the others get un-endorsed. It's not GW's place to start telling people how to play the game.
What happens when the people behind the chosen system stop updating it? It gets a bigger and bigger task as GW release more war scrools and battalions.

By this stage the people playing AoS fall into two groups; people who don't care about the points and are happy to play the game out of the box plus official scenario and campaign books. GW can serve these guys best by writing good scenarios for official competitions. By publishing these, a library of balanced scenarios will gradually by created.

The other group is people who want comp. These guys including indie TOs, should just pick one of the unofficial systems, which is exactly what GW have suggested they do, because there isn't going to be an official system.

I didn't mean endorsing one - but endorsing a few of the big ones. Having multiple would suggest it is optional as well. When they are no longer updated, stop supporting them.

It doesn't need to be anything more than a link on a community page. They've already started mentioning them on the Facebook page so we are nearly there.

OgreChubbs wrote:


It is getting to the point when I walk in the doors I get embarassed, I see a bunch of teens maybe preteens screaming waggghhhhh and moving around giant want to be 90s action figures.

That's EXACTLY what playing in store (and at home with friends) was like when I was a teenager, twenty years ago. The staff would get us all hyped and we'd have tremendous fun. A bunch of young nerds letting it all out in an environment where it was safe and, I daresay, COOL to be a nerd.

I'm not sure at what point a kid having fun with a game of fantasy toy soldiers turns in to a Super Serious Adult playing Super Serious Fantasy War Games but I'm glad I missed it.

I'm not sure at what point a kid having fun with a game of fantasy toy soldiers turns in to a Super Serious Adult playing Super Serious Fantasy War Games but I'm glad I missed it.

Roughly the late 90s or so when Magic the Gathering started having world championships and was televised live on ESPN and gamers the world over wanted their game to have that same thing.

puree wrote:
However, AoS is focused to not being that style of game, but instead having a range of scenarios with different victory conditions, or players coming up with their own interesting scenarios depending on their own interest.

That's a good thing though - maybe the big unit you paid a bunch of points for is great in a pitched battle but not for the scenario you rolled up. Now it comes down to your skill in playing the game to compensate for that. Yes, it may give the edge to your opponent but it was a result of random chance, not picking bad units from your army. This also encourages people to make armies that can deal with things other than pitched battles, rather than focusing solely on units and tactics ideal for only that. Further; a good comp will point units based on their average level of usefulness across various scenarios rather than only in a pitched battle.

I for one am glad that the era of pitched-battles and only pitched-battles is gone.

For me, and I hope I can explain this properly, some kind of valuation system is necessary so that I can bound projects I'm thinking of working on.

I can't just say "I'm going to start a Moonclan army" and head out on my merry way - I need to fit it into some kind of structure, to give its edges some definition so I have a specific goal to work for.

Points do this because I can aim for a specific limit, whether it be 1000, 1500, 2000, whatever.

Formations can work as well, by giving you a guide on what units constitute them, but since those units have no upper limit on size they're only good as a guide. Wounds don't work because no one uses them as a balancing system, at least not in my experience.

This is an anecdote, so I don't expect it to suffice as evidence, but up until very recently I hadn't worked on any Fantasy models. However, I've organised a 1000pt game (using the SDK) with a friend to test out how balanced it is, and I've found myself working on Night Goblins in preparation. It's given me a specific, bounded goal to work towards, and that's apparently something I need.

auticus wrote:
I for one am glad that the era of pitched-battles and only pitched-battles is gone.

Unfortunately it took the era of any other battles with it, too :(

Herzlos wrote:

auticus wrote:
I for one am glad that the era of pitched-battles and only pitched-battles is gone.

Unfortunately it took the era of any other battles with it, too :(

Of course it hasn't! The Era of Absurdly-overpriced-skirmish-warbands-hammering-at-each-other battles is upon us!

People who only played Pitched Battles in FB were missing a lot of the fun. But hey... that's how it is.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

RoperPG wrote:
Totally agree. For all the comments of "yeah, but you could always do what you wanted", finding a WFB game that wasn't PITCHED BATTLE AT X POINTS was the proverbial needle in a haystack. It was always a neat idea, but required other like-minded people to work.

This is exactly the same situation with AoS, because it takes a very specific mindset to be played "as intended".

So how is this a bad thing for FB but a pro (or at least a negative point to disregard) for AoS?

The difference is that you COULD easily get a PUG for FB, but for AoS? Yeah, not so easy. And before you bring the whole "But you can talk with your opponent about the warbands" - that's not how a PUG game goes, and we've discussed this. AoS has been hinted as a game to be played at home or at gaming clubs. It is also there that you could find people willing to play non-pitched battles (mind you I found them in my FLGS too but that's anecdotal).

I seem to remember playing all sorts of scenarios when I played Fantasy battle. Sieges, rearguards, defense of high ground, last stands, breakthroughs, flank attacks...

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

RoperPG wrote:
Totally agree. For all the comments of "yeah, but you could always do what you wanted", finding a WFB game that wasn't PITCHED BATTLE AT X POINTS was the proverbial needle in a haystack. It was always a neat idea, but required other like-minded people to work.

This is exactly the same situation with AoS, because it takes a very specific mindset to be played "as intended".

So how is this a bad thing for FB but a pro (or at least a negative point to disregard) for AoS?

The difference is that the default option for AoS is that you *have* to involve your opponent, you *have* to put some thought in.
For WFB, the default setting was Pitched Battle at X points.
That's only a pro/con on either side depending on your opinion.
That was more the point I was trying to make - AoS doesn't really give you a default setting to fall back on as a 'standard' compared to WFB - rather than an 'AoS is better than WFB because'.
Both still require mental effort - in WFB's case it was more focussed on the 'pre-table' phase (very suited to PUGs), AoS very much in the 'at-table' phase (not suited to PUGs, but forces a more varied approach).

To torture an analogy; you discover that you have a severe food allergy - say dairy.
All of a sudden, instead of eating what you want like you always have, you have to start reading labels and a lot of things you took for granted aren't an option any more.
Two ways of dealing with that - either simply carry on as you did but without the stuff you can't have and resenting their omission, or start putting a bit more thought into what you *can* have and exploring those opportunities.
Some people eat a varied diet to begin with. Some have to have their options restricted before they actually put thought into what they're eating.

I enjoy the AoS approach more, but can totally understand why people who relied on PUGs are still not happy with the 'restriction'.

RoperPG wrote:

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

RoperPG wrote:
Totally agree. For all the comments of "yeah, but you could always do what you wanted", finding a WFB game that wasn't PITCHED BATTLE AT X POINTS was the proverbial needle in a haystack. It was always a neat idea, but required other like-minded people to work.

This is exactly the same situation with AoS, because it takes a very specific mindset to be played "as intended".

So how is this a bad thing for FB but a pro (or at least a negative point to disregard) for AoS?

The difference is that the default option for AoS is that you *have* to involve your opponent, you *have* to put some thought in.
For WFB, the default setting was Pitched Battle at X points.
That's only a pro/con on either side depending on your opinion.
That was more the point I was trying to make - AoS doesn't really give you a default setting to fall back on as a 'standard' compared to WFB - rather than an 'AoS is better than WFB because'.
Both still require mental effort - in WFB's case it was more focussed on the 'pre-table' phase (very suited to PUGs), AoS very much in the 'at-table' phase (not suited to PUGs, but forces a more varied approach).

To torture an analogy; you discover that you have a severe food allergy - say dairy.
All of a sudden, instead of eating what you want like you always have, you have to start reading labels and a lot of things you took for granted aren't an option any more.
Two ways of dealing with that - either simply carry on as you did but without the stuff you can't have and resenting their omission, or start putting a bit more thought into what you *can* have and exploring those opportunities.
Some people eat a varied diet to begin with. Some have to have their options restricted before they actually put thought into what they're eating.

I enjoy the AoS approach more, but can totally understand why people who relied on PUGs are still not happy with the 'restriction'.

Sigh. We'll be going in circles here, because the answer to your point is "You could do the same with FB, but many chose not to, and GW ignored that", but this is all oh so very subjective.

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

Sigh. We'll be going in circles here, because the answer to your point is "You could do the same with FB, but many chose not to, and GW ignored that", but this is all oh so very subjective.

But that's exactly my point!
Because people had a default setting for WFB, that became what most people expected of the game.
AoS doesn't 'allow' you to do anything that you and a like minded opponent couldn't do in WFB. At all.
What it *does* do is make that approach - doing something 'different' - compulsory.

Because the default setting for AoS (ersatz pitched battle w/sudden death) is terrible, especially after you've tried with scenarios.

Happy for that statement to come back and bite me later, too...

RoperPG wrote:

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

Sigh. We'll be going in circles here, because the answer to your point is "You could do the same with FB, but many chose not to, and GW ignored that", but this is all oh so very subjective.

But that's exactly my point!
Because people had a default setting for WFB, that became what most people expected of the game.
AoS doesn't 'allow' you to do anything that you and a like minded opponent couldn't do in WFB. At all.
What it *does* do is make that approach - doing something 'different' - compulsory.

Because the default setting for AoS (ersatz pitched battle w/sudden death) is terrible, especially after you've tried with scenarios.

Happy for that statement to come back and bite me later, too...

We'll see about that final bit, no doubt. xD

Edit: However, considering the target audience of the game (home/club games) I severely doubt it will.

I think a bigger problem with scenario play in WHFB was that the scenarios given more or less sucked in that they were less fun than a pitched battle and the nature of the rules made it a bit more difficult to design new ones. AoS has a huge number of scenarios, and from what I've seen everyone can find at least a handful they really like.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think a bigger problem with scenario play in WHFB was that the scenarios given more or less sucked in that they were less fun than a pitched battle and the nature of the rules made it a bit more difficult to design new ones. AoS has a huge number of scenarios, and from what I've seen everyone can find at least a handful they really like.

I disagree with pretty much all of that where WHFB is concerned. There were a ton of great scenarios - lots of good ones in the General's Compendium, for instance, I was a huge fan of the one where the attacker could bring back Core units and had to wipe the defender out to a man - and for a while I used a fan-made scenario generator where you divided your army into a vanguard, rear guard, and main force, and that could affect how they got to deploy and so forth.

 Spinner wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think a bigger problem with scenario play in WHFB was that the scenarios given more or less sucked in that they were less fun than a pitched battle and the nature of the rules made it a bit more difficult to design new ones. AoS has a huge number of scenarios, and from what I've seen everyone can find at least a handful they really like.

I disagree with pretty much all of that where WHFB is concerned. There were a ton of great scenarios - lots of good ones in the General's Compendium, for instance, I was a huge fan of the one where the attacker could bring back Core units and had to wipe the defender out to a man - and for a while I used a fan-made scenario generator where you divided your army into a vanguard, rear guard, and main force, and that could affect how they got to deploy and so forth.

I was specifically referring to the ones given in the main rulebook - there was a d6 chart of scenarios, one being pitched battle and the other 5 being... meh at best. WHFB did have good scenarios, but it felt like you had to go out and find them. AoS has dozens of scenarios in its first year of release, where WHFB had that d6 chart.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I was specifically referring to the ones given in the main rulebook - there was a d6 chart of scenarios, one being pitched battle and the other 5 being... meh at best.

Yes and no. Most of the not-Battleline scenarios were decent, but had easily-removed flaws that consistently made them unfun ... until removed! Unless it was Dawn Attak, which frankly always sucked.

Related, I actually made my own chart some years back, to hold onto what was good in the 8E scenarios and avoid just playing Battleline all the time:



For extra Ye Olde Worlde nostalgia, I early on also replaced the terrain chart in the 8E book with one that cut out the Lulz Candy Land! nonsense and focused on pieces that actually had a strategic effect on the game. Otherwise used the same generation rules (like 4+D6 pieces or whatever it was):



- Salvage

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Spinner wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think a bigger problem with scenario play in WHFB was that the scenarios given more or less sucked in that they were less fun than a pitched battle and the nature of the rules made it a bit more difficult to design new ones. AoS has a huge number of scenarios, and from what I've seen everyone can find at least a handful they really like.

I disagree with pretty much all of that where WHFB is concerned. There were a ton of great scenarios - lots of good ones in the General's Compendium, for instance, I was a huge fan of the one where the attacker could bring back Core units and had to wipe the defender out to a man - and for a while I used a fan-made scenario generator where you divided your army into a vanguard, rear guard, and main force, and that could affect how they got to deploy and so forth.

I was specifically referring to the ones given in the main rulebook - there was a d6 chart of scenarios, one being pitched battle and the other 5 being... meh at best. WHFB did have good scenarios, but it felt like you had to go out and find them. AoS has dozens of scenarios in its first year of release, where WHFB had that d6 chart.

Right, and they're spread out over books and downloads...just like the WHFB scenarios were spread over books and the internet. I'd argue that Default WHFB has better starting scenarios than Default AoS, because the Default AoS scenario is 'meh, do what you like'.

(Yes, yes, I know, it's not meant to be played that way, but I keep hearing this thing about how people will only play the tacitly endorsed default version of a game and you can never find anyone willing to play a scenario located somewhere else... )

Related, I actually made my own chart some years back, to hold onto what was good in the 8E scenarios and avoid just playing Battleline all the time:

That looks pretty good, and so does the terrain chart! I used one I found on Warseer that had several different subcharts that were designed to emulate different kinds of terrain; you roll on this one if you want to fight in a forest, you roll on this one if you're doing an underground battle, this one is for the Badlands, and so on and so forth. It worked great and really toned down the "Ooooooh SPOOKY MAGIC WOODS" stuff - they were there, but they were more of a special feature than anything else, you were only likely to roll up one or two.

The small 8E rulebook only had the basic scenarios but there were loads of cool scenarios in the big rule book. Like the Bugman's Delivery one where two armies battled over a wagon of XXXXXX as it made its way to the inn. Or the 'last stand' battle.

Solid counterpoints, but history tells us that enough people shared my opinion to create the situation of pitched battle being overused. And I really do think it comes down mainly to most of that chart being less fun than said pitched battle. As I recall (book not with me ATM) there was also the battle for the pass which was battleline-but-warmachines-win, there was watch tower and the banner based scenario which were extremely dependent on the lists players brought, there was a thing with random deployment zones that just wasn't fun, and one other one. They could be fixed but at that point it was easier for a lot of folks to just say 'screw it lets play battleline' which became the standard. With AoS there's so many scenarios available so quickly that if a person doesn't like one they can just pick another, or even just add a time of war to mix up a regular pitched battle.

I can't articulate it very well but during my whole experience with WFB, pitched battle was the way to go. We tried a siege and a watchtower once in a blue moon, but they just seemed wrong, clunky and not what the game was meant for. That was just the sense I and my playing group got from the game.

With AoS, battle line feels wrong and a boring grind. Scenarios feel like the natural way to play.

I think points played somewhat of a role in this, but I'm not sure how much. Pitched battle seemed like the balanced way to face off two armies of the same points in WFB. Any scenarios seemed to throw the balance and direction of the game off. Conversely, pitched battle in AoS is straight up unbalanced, while scenarios seem to balance and direct it.

Where I'm at, I could never get anyone to use any of the scenarios besides pitched battle, because "they aren't balanced".

For one of our last 8th campaigns we did one of the scenarios in the back of the big book and we had half the campaign quit for deviating from pitched battle with a lot of complaining and bad names being tossed back and forth.

They didn't even like doing watch tower or the scenario with the standards because "they weren't balanced" and largely just didn't bother rolling scenarios... sticking with Pitched Battle.

It was very frustrating.

TBF those two could be effectively auto-win or lose for some armies. For instance, if undead or daemons get to slap a unit in the watchtower at the start of the game. Many armies simply didn't have the specific tools to move them within the 5-6 turns available.

As a long term wargamer I'm fully aware of the fun of writing scenarios and campaigns. Kudos to GW for including scenarios and campaigns in their books.

But if people like to play pitched battles, why shouldn't they?

It's only your opinion that pitched battle was "overused" in WHFB.