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I'm going to have to be very clear when I said that it is the CAMPAIGN that has no depth, not warcry the game. In fact if you go up to previous posts you will see I gave the gameplay by itself higher marks.

 auticus wrote:

Interested in why this is (since I was foolish enough to buy a box and now it looks like I have another box of models sitting in my house that will only be good for painting and little else) the answers mainly echo:

In my area, more than the usual "it's another game, I don't have time/money/interest left for it amongst the others I'm still playing", I get the "yeah I'm waiting to see if GW won't do another Bloodbowl/Necromunda move and remove the support with cards/part of the terrain/miniatures without warning" reason.

The game is good, but I struggle to see people gathering to play Warcry. Also the price on Chaos warbands didn't help.

TBH, I think it's more a problem for any new game trying to build a new community out of the same targeted public - you can't have an infinite number of game for a very finite number of players...who usually already have busy lives and shrinking free time...

People have enough of the FOMO trick from game societies ("get it now while you can!"), I can feel that. Also, while GW has teased about Warcry a long time ago, it feels in the end like any other preview - you get a few stuff the weeks before the preorder dates and then once it's out, nothing - like it never happened. Felt a bit weird, though in the end it's pretty much GW stance for anything so far.

But then, Mordheim didn't build itself in one day.

 auticus wrote:
I'm going to have to be very clear when I said that it is the CAMPAIGN that has no depth, not warcry the game. In fact if you go up to previous posts you will see I gave the gameplay by itself higher marks.

The campaign is fine. I think you are looking at things in the most shallow way possible, then coming to the conclusion that it must be shallow. I think there's a lot of hidden depth in the way campaigns play out. Let's be explicit:

The campaign quests are not the campaign. You can keep doing quests, collecting artifacts, leveling up. The quest is a single leg of a warband's campaign. Right now, most warbands have 1 quest and only the chaos warbands have 2, but with more quests, there's more opportunities for leveling up. Collecting completed quests isn't just about getting more powerful warbands, but about building the story of your warband as it overcomes many challenges. The quests you complete become part of your warband, with unique rewards and upgrades.

Campaign quests define your roster, and can potentially have more than one faction runemark. This leaves open the possibility of having multi-faction rosters. Not sure if they'll let you split and combine warbands, so that you can take an Unmade warband and an Untamed Beast warband, combine together for a single double-runemark quest, and then split apart at the end and go separate ways. But it's obvious that multi-runemark quests are on the table, as the core book is very explicit about how they work.

During the quest, you can gain glory points. This allows you a permanent bonus of +50 points in a battle and the ability to add thralls to your team (but not your roster, chaos teams only). However, this costs 10 glory points, while boosting your points by the same amount for a single battle only costs 1 glory point, so it isn't a particularly efficient way to boost your points - but you can only boost your points if your opponent has more territory. So gaining territory is the only way to gain an advantage, while compensating for that advantage is fairly cheap.

Gaining an additional 50 points per battle isn't that big of a strength since none of the units cost less than 50. The cheapest unit in the game is a Legion of Nagash skeleton at 55 points. I think the chaos beasts are 70 pts and 110 pts. Gaining territory is not going to immediately result on more models, but you can trade out a cheap model for a more expensive one. Also, your opponent can close the gap for 1 or 3 glory points, so even if you have max territories (which you probably won't do during a quest) and get a full 300 extra points, your opponent can add 100 extra points for 3 glory points, reducing your advantage by a third - and chances are, you won't have 6 territories going against someone with 0.

Glory points can also be spent to make another roll on the lesser artifacts table. Lesser artifacts, which you get one of after every campaign mission, are either consumable (disappear after using) or perishable (50% chance of disappearing after the mission). Models can hold only one of these at a time. You won't be amassing these, but you are always in the market for lesser artifacts, and it will be the easiest thing to add to the game in White Dwarf or whatever. A new loot table or two could change the game in a pretty significant way.

Artifacts of power and command traits are, currently, limited to one each per quest (not including the quest completion artifact). You can give a major artifact to any model on your roster, and they are good stuff, but you need to go through multiple quests to get any quantity of them. Command traits can only be given to your leader and your favored warrior. These things are unique to each quest, which means deciding which quests to go on is part of army building. You want Korrgad's Infernal Hammer? You need to play through the Iron Golem Conquer the Forge Quest. This means that if they release more quests, there's more artifacts and command traits. Every campaign quest broadens what your warband can become.

After each battle in a campaign, you roll a D6 for each fighter who participated in the battle and didn't go down. On a 6 they gain a destiny level (so a 17% chance). This gives that fighter a reusable reroll (up to 3), which is a pretty powerful thing to have. However, if they get injured and roll on the injury table, they have a 6% chance of dying and losing all the destiny levels, and a 6% chance of losing a destiny level. Basically, if they survive a mission, they have a 17% chance of gaining a destiny level and if they are taken down, they have a 11% chance of losing one or all of their destiny levels. I think destiny levels are a little more important than they initially seem. They seem like they will be plentiful and easily abused, but you get a destiny level or two on a model and you can bet your opponent will make sure that model doesn't make it to the aftermath phase.

Losing a character doesn't just take out their destiny levels. They also lose their artifacts of power or command traits - those things which you only get one or two of per quest (and you can't replay quests). The amount of time you invested in getting those artifacts will be substantial - maybe a dozen games or more. Losing a model with that stuff is going to HURT. You seem to think that the injury table is too simple and that death doesn't mean anything. I heartily disagree. With major artifacts unique to quests that you can't replay, you'll permanently lose a unique item or ability. Death is going to be far, far more dangerous to warbands with multiple quests under their belt - as it should be.

Convergences are interesting because they are the only time when you know the battle plan ahead of time. You know the terrain, you know the victory conditions, you often know the deployment, and every once in a while, the twist. This gives you a huge advantage, since you can plan out what fighters to bring and how to break them into dagger/hammer/shield groups. Where drawing cards produces random missions that are often impossible to predict or plan for, convergences give you specific missions that you can plan for, and have to keep playing until you get it right. These are where you can use your specialized, situational units to their best effect.

Convergences are the only battles you have to win to move on. You can go through every other campaign scenario, lose, and still progress. You can use this to farm glory points and lesser artifacts, or just focus on taking out a particularly annoying enemy fighter. Winning a quest gives you the most glory points, but you can get a fair few by taking out enemy fighters. In missions where you have no chance at winning the scenario, instead focus on taking out the enemy leader and a third of his warband and you'll still walk away with 3 glory points and a new lesser artifact.

The campaign quests they have now are bare bones, but future quests will have, at the very least, new command traits and artifacts of power. They'll also likely have new territory rules. Right now, territory only adds points and (for chaos) the ability to use thralls, but you can imagine a lot of possibilities here. If campaign quests got their own lesser artifact tables, or even their own chaos beasts, it could be pretty different. My main concern is that they've got these cool ravaged lands boxes but the campaign quests will never use anything except the core box set terrain cards because they don't want to sell new expansions to people who haven't collected them all. They should really package a few quests in the ravaged lands boxes directly. Might show up in White Dwarf though.

I think the campaigns in Warcry, barebones they may seem, have a lot going on. I think the decisions you make aren't as trivial and unimportant as they may initially seem. But while each individual part of the campaign may seem simple, when taken together, add up into something interesting. I think this was the thread where I said it was like a collectible card game. Each of the cards, individually, are simple, but how you put them into a deck creates very different and unique experiences. The framework is there, but it needs more cards. I think it will get them.

 Sqorgar wrote:

You can keep doing quests, collecting artifacts, leveling up.

Thing is, you don't level up in Warcry. All you get are minor artifacts and destiny levels on a pure random roll - both tend to lower with time as your warriors get Disgraced while being out of action or their power eventually disappear (either with one use items or the fateful dice that makes your minor artifact expire). There isn't a real experience system like in Kill Team.

You have a FEELING of leveling up with the quests giving your command traits (and permanent artifacts), as well as claiming dominions that let you build a bigger force (you must have a quest for that). It is not true to say that you can level up without the quests. Those are meant for giving you that feeling.

The framework is there, but it needs more cards. I think it will get them.

I don't have anything else to add that I haven't already stated, but I will say you start your premise disagreeing with me and explaining why you think its got great depth, and then end with what my summary is.

The framework is there. But it needs a lot more than a framework campaign wise for my interest level. I'm sure that it could be something... with extensive houserules.

Which has been the story of AOS since the beginning. It has a great framework... and could be great... with extensive houserules.

The problem with houserules is that in 1989 that was embraced, but in 2019 it is hated.

And as next to zero people in my city are playing (there was a league at our GW with 3 people signed up of which to my knowledge no games have yet to be played and we're nearing a month out), at least in public (I'm sure there is someone playing somewhere in a garage) and the boxes are sitting on store shelves not really moving, and part of that other than "its not 40k" is that "campaign is too shallow", I'm going to have to say that I'm not the only one that feels that way either.

Problem with games using cards was showed with what happened with Necromunda/Bloodbowl on the GW webstore : when the cards suddenly aren't available anymore, new players are annoyed to say the least. Sure, you can always find someone who has the cards or *cough* find scans on the internet *coughs*.

Warcry also uses a hell lot of cards. I got all the chaos boxes, some of the non chaos faction cards and terrains, and I already have enough to fill four deck cases from Ultimate Guard (yeah, I'm using sleeves as well, I'd better keep them as long as possible after all). No doubt I will need more for expansions to come.

Cards are in the end a trick to sell more gaming stuff to players. Trouble is when they stop selling the stuff...so far, GW didn't put a PDF with all the special cards for Bloodbowl they stopped selling for whatever reason. Only the community can help then.

 Sarouan wrote:

Thing is, you don't level up in Warcry. All you get are minor artifacts and destiny levels on a pure random roll - both tend to lower with time as your warriors get Disgraced while being out of action or their power eventually disappear (either with one use items or the fateful dice that makes your minor artifact expire). There isn't a real experience system like in Kill Team.

Leveling up was the wrong word for it. Rather than leveling up, which implies a linear growth, Warcry has a roughly straight power curve, with lots of spikes and dips. So, you might get a good artifact of power on a unit with three destiny points, only for him to die, dropping you back to zero. Gain territory only to finish your quest and start another one, dropping back to zero. Only your leader, who can not die, can permanently earn artifacts and command traits. On a long enough timeline, everybody else will die and take their benefits with them, but part of the genius of Warcry is that it makes some of those dips feel like victories.

It's more like card drafting. Your party is always in a state of change, and you can affect that change but never really control it. Every time a spike ends and you get to a dip, you build up again in a new and different way. With traditional leveling, eventually, you plateau. You reach the highest level or reach a point where your army is unable to lose, and that's it. You are the best of the best. You are done. But with Warcry, you are playing a different warband every few battles, and drastically changing trajectory between quests. You are always in a state of trying to make the best party from whatever you are dealt. You are building structure from randomness. The quests, artifacts, command traits, and so on are the cards you are dealt, and not only do you have to turn them into a winning deck, you also have to do what you can to maintain its strength over a long period of time.

I find the approach fascinating. It reminds me of early AoS in that it is an unfamiliar game structure that is similar, but not quite the same as what came before. I think it solves one of the problems with the traditional way of doing things (the plateauing), but at a cost of impermanence. You collect special powerful items, but you don't keep them forever. There was a time when I would consider losing such things to be a punishment, but now I see it as an opportunity - kind of like weapon durability in Breath of the Wild. You get an opportunity to play with more toys and you end up in situations where you must rely on toys you wouldn't have, if you had the choice. It makes for a dynamic game which never lets you grow comfortable, forcing you to always pay attention, plan ahead, and keep on top of things. It's a super interesting choice for a campaign game, but like the weapon durability, I think it'll end up a controversial one.

 Sqorgar wrote:
It's a super interesting choice for a campaign game, but like the weapon durability, I think it'll end up a controversial one.

Oh I agree with it as an interesting game design choice. I do believe it comes with its own price - the price of immersion, mostly. Since it's not linear like most experience system, it's kinda removed from the interaction with other warbands, and the actions of your individual warriors don't really matter in the aftergame. Sure, they can give you victory but everything is made so that you don't bother too much about their fate. They may die, but there is no sense of gravity since most of the boosts they can have are designed not to last forever anyway. Only the command traits and the "permanent" artifacts matter, and the fact your leader may never die means you only worry when you do a second quest and giving the second boosts to your favorite warrior (since he can die).

The great difference with weapon durability is that your bonus don't "break" during the game. One-used items are consumed after use, and perishable items disappear only after the game. So frustration is totally not the same, IMHO. I don't think it's that controversial, but I feel like you are less attached to your fighters in the end.

Because, as you said, it feels more like a card drafting game. The profiles are mostly here to be always the same, and while you can give a name to your fighter, you'll less likely to give them a real customization from any other fighter of the same type.

I played Mordheim a few days before and one of my opponents got his leader killed while he had a nice upgrade in his profile. He was really frustrated with that, and I can understand why - he got "punished" hard here (diving alone in the middle of enemy warriors was a risky action for sure). Thinking about it, I get why Warcry has this system - it's made so that kind of frustration is really watered down.

But then, in Warcry, I won't hesitate about throwing my leader in the middle of the enemy warband. I know the worst he can get is a disgrace,after all (which doesn't matter if he has no destiny level anyway). In Mordheim, I would think more than twice...it's more immersive in Mordheim, I believe, but then I get that not everyone think the same and I do agree frustrating the players is not a good idea in general when you design games.

 Sqorgar wrote:

Of the 144 people who voted on this thread's poll, 84 of them rated it an 8 or higher. The response to Warcry has been overwhelmingly positive - I'd even argue giddy. In fact, outside of you and Owen from the GMG review, I don't think I've seen much negativity about the game at all - and both of you are more bitter that the game isn't a different game instead of being reasonable about what the game actually is.

The poll had a couple of 10s on it (but no 1s) before the game was out, so I would guess the "GW can do no wrong ever" contingent is still going strong.

Sarouan wrote:Only the command traits and the "permanent" artifacts matter, and the fact your leader may never die means you only worry when you do a second quest and giving the second boosts to your favorite warrior (since he can die).

This is true, and also something interesting - new players will probably not feel particularly punished during their first quest, causing them to continue playing. An early setback can cause a new player to dump a game completely, but here, you've got to play a bunch of games first and potentially lose several characters and their temporary lesser artifacts, allowing you to acclimate to the concept of model death.

I don't think it's that controversial, but I feel like you are less attached to your fighters in the end.

I think if players actually bother to name their characters, they'll get attached to them. I think a lot of people won't bother to create names of background stories, so they'll view a character's death more as a model reset.

...you'll less likely to give them a real customization from any other fighter of the same type.

This is probably true, which is why I hope the warbands have more models coming. Frostgrave, for instance, treat the non-wizard characters largely as disposable, but since there are a large number of specializations to choose from, they become individuals just by virtue of not being fighters of the same type.

I also think it is worth considering the personalization that comes from painting the models too. For instance, if I got a second box of Untamed Beasts, I'd paint the two Rocktusk Prowlers with different fur patterns. I've seen some people online painting their Corvus Cabal to look like multi-colored parrots, and while I wouldn't do that for my first model, I'd absolutely do that with my second (or maybe paint him yellow, like Big Bird).

But then, in Warcry, I won't hesitate about throwing my leader in the middle of the enemy warband.

Yeah, but just your leader. Your favored warrior, with his artifact of power and command trait, has a lot to lose. I probably would avoid beefing up my Rocktusk Prowler too much because he is the powerhouse of the Untamed Beasts, and he's got to get in there and fight - he'll die more often than any other character, but he'll kill the most by a wide margin too. Meanwhile, the First Fang, with his 8 inch ranged death harpoon, makes a good candidate for favored warrior. But a ranged guy who doesn't get in the fray would benefit less from an artifact that increases toughness than the murder kitty - so the choices won't always be easy.

lord_blackfang wrote:The poll had a couple of 10s on it (but no 1s) before the game was out, so I would guess the "GW can do no wrong ever" contingent is still going strong.

The most populated response is an 8. Even if you remove all the 10s and all the 1s, 55% of the respondents still voted an 8 or a 9.

Frostgrave also has a lot more immersion and gravity if you lose members. Its not hard to replace them but you certainly feel it a lot more.

 Sqorgar wrote:

I think if players actually bother to name their characters, they'll get attached to them. I think a lot of people won't bother to create names of background stories, so they'll view a character's death more as a model reset.

They can, but given your characters won't really have a progression, it doesn't matter that much. In my group of players with Mordheim, most of us also use the same miniature when getting a replacement after a warrior's death. Its profile is just reset, which is actually quite a big deal since Mordheim not only have a progression system but also permit to customize their equipment. In Warcry, not so much. So yeah, of course, people can convert and use a different miniature after each death, but the game isn't really incentive for them to do that. When a game is designed to allow the player to really customize their warriors (with equipment, and so on), you'll see much more people willing to make it at least somewhat WYSIWYG.

Warcry doesn't do that at all.

This is probably true, which is why I hope the warbands have more models coming. Frostgrave, for instance, treat the non-wizard characters largely as disposable, but since there are a large number of specializations to choose from, they become individuals just by virtue of not being fighters of the same type.

The big difference in Frostgrave is that you don't replace your losses for free. You have to pay for their replacements, which is also why death still matters in Frostgrave and why it's not such a big deal in Warcry. Your Ogor Breacher kicked the bucket ? No worry, just take another one for free in your roster. I always disliked that system in Kill Team and I'm not appreciating it in Warcry. This is also part of the "watering player frustration down". Do it too much, though, and it gets tasteless, IMHO.

I also think it is worth considering the personalization that comes from painting the models too. For instance, if I got a second box of Untamed Beasts, I'd paint the two Rocktusk Prowlers with different fur patterns. I've seen some people online painting their Corvus Cabal to look like multi-colored parrots, and while I wouldn't do that for my first model, I'd absolutely do that with my second (or maybe paint him yellow, like Big Bird).

That's another problem entirely here - fact that chaos warbands miniatures for Warcry have very few options to change their pose/appearance. All of them are set in a specific pose, even the heads can't be moved without using your loyal cutter. There are barely any spare heads (the only I found is the Unmade warrior showing his face, and even him is really specific to one warrior model). So yeah, unless you convert models, the only way left is different painting. It really doesn't help to make your band feel really different from another, but that's mainly a kit design matter here. Still, you can feel it's really tied to the card profiles, since everything is made so that the visual on the cards immediately makes the player see to which miniature it refers.

GW can maybe make different models (Forgeworld ?), but I don't know...what is sure is that old times of customisation with multi parts miniatures are more and more a thing of the past with new GW kits.

Yeah, but just your leader. Your favored warrior, with his artifact of power and command trait, has a lot to lose. I probably would avoid beefing up my Rocktusk Prowler too much because he is the powerhouse of the Untamed Beasts, and he's got to get in there and fight - he'll die more often than any other character, but he'll kill the most by a wide margin too. Meanwhile, the First Fang, with his 8 inch ranged death harpoon, makes a good candidate for favored warrior. But a ranged guy who doesn't get in the fray would benefit less from an artifact that increases toughness than the murder kitty - so the choices won't always be easy.

That's a side effect of the campaign system in Warcry, to me. Given the advantages of the command traits and permanent artifacts, it is obvious they are intended to be given first to your leader. A second quest may be fun indeed, but the benefits will certainly be less appealing over time if we get more quests in the future. I wouldn't be surprised if they add a rule saying your favorite warriors cannot die too at some point (yeah, I'm using plural here, since if you do a third quest, you'll certainly need other warriors of the same kind to keep having benefits of the command trait).

But so far, it is clear the game is meant with only one quest at a time. Non chaos factions only have one, so they can't do a second one so far. It is really the starter set. Question is : when is the next expansion coming ? I think that's why I struggle a bit to recruit new players and having the answer of them waiting to see. It's a good game, it's a fun game, models are nice - but people want to know where GW will go with this one in the end. And since GW keeps us in the dark on purpose for their marketing tricks, I understand if they are a bit more careful here.

That's the trouble with "DLC games", that don't have everything in the book. You're forced to wait and gather all the smaller parts until it "feels" complete. And if it stops selling in the middle...you're fethed.

 auticus wrote:
Frostgrave also has a lot more immersion and gravity if you lose members. Its not hard to replace them but you certainly feel it a lot more.

How so? Unless it was changed in one of the later books, your model just dies and loses all his items (same as Warcry). Your wizard and apprentice can get permanent injuries, and the death of a wizard is pretty harsh, but I'm not sure how Frostgrave differs from Warcry in the loss of a regular unit.

 Sqorgar wrote:

 auticus wrote:
Frostgrave also has a lot more immersion and gravity if you lose members. Its not hard to replace them but you certainly feel it a lot more.

How so? Unless it was changed in one of the later books, your model just dies and loses all his items (same as Warcry). Your wizard and apprentice can get permanent injuries, and the death of a wizard is pretty harsh, but I'm not sure how Frostgrave differs from Warcry in the loss of a regular unit.

Like I said, you have to buy them in your roster. Warcry allows you to do so for free. It's a "small" difference, but actually a huge one in terms of immersion.

 Sarouan wrote:

They can, but given your characters won't really have a progression, it doesn't matter that much. In my group of players with Mordheim, most of us also use the same miniature when getting a replacement after a warrior's death. Its profile is just reset, which is actually quite a big deal since Mordheim not only have a progression system but also permit to customize their equipment. In Warcry, not so much. So yeah, of course, people can convert and use a different miniature after each death, but the game isn't really incentive for them to do that. When a game is designed to allow the player to really customize their warriors (with equipment, and so on), you'll see much more people willing to make it at least somewhat WYSIWYG.

Warcry doesn't do that at all.

I think some people are narrative players and some people aren't, and I don't think the game mechanics need to force you into that role if you don't want to do it. The rulebook does mention several times that players will have more fun if they use the name and background tables, but it never enforces it. For some people, using the same model is a pro, not a con. But I remember when Sam Pearson was on StormCast, he talked about giving names and backstories to his generals in AoS, and when they died, he'd write little histories of their accomplishments. Nothing in the game did that. He did it because he wanted to. GW, in general, takes a more permissive attitude towards that kind of thing - always recommending you immerse yourself in the lore and the story on the battlefield, but never forcing it. Some people won't do it unless forced or explicitly permitted, which I've always thought was kind of a sad state of affairs.

The big difference in Frostgrave is that you don't replace your losses for free. You have to pay for their replacements, which is also why death still matters in Frostgrave and why it's not such a big deal in Warcry. Your Ogor Breacher kicked the bucket ? No worry, just take another one for free in your roster. I always disliked that system in Kill Team and I'm not appreciating it in Warcry. This is also part of the "watering player frustration down". Do it too much, though, and it gets tasteless, IMHO.

But if your Ogor Breacher had three destiny levels and was rocking an artifact of power, you'll feel the difference. Warcry allows you to add models to your roster for free because A) Warcry doesn't have money and B) GW wants you to be able to buy a new model and use it immediately. If you want that minor sting of punishment, why not make replacing dead members on your roster cost 1 glory point for every 50 points. So replacing a model that is 110 points will cost 3 glory points. Future campaigns could change basically everything, so they could potentially have money or a cost for hiring models or tie model recruitment to territory.

That's a side effect of the campaign system in Warcry, to me. Given the advantages of the command traits and permanent artifacts, it is obvious they are intended to be given first to your leader. A second quest may be fun indeed, but the benefits will certainly be less appealing over time if we get more quests in the future. I wouldn't be surprised if they add a rule saying your favorite warriors cannot die too at some point (yeah, I'm using plural here, since if you do a third quest, you'll certainly need other warriors of the same kind to keep having benefits of the command trait).

At the moment, the favored warrior is just a model that can carry an extra command trait, which feels a bit slight for such a designation. I think they'll do more with favored warriors in the future. Frostgrave added a favored warrior module in one of the PDFs (it may have been reprinted in the Folio), which can gain experience and level up alongside your wizard. If they did something like that, I could see them making the favored warrior invincible.

Also, you only get two command traits (leader + favored warrior), but artifacts of power can be given to any model. So additional command traits might not impress, but the artifacts of power can seriously buff up even the cheapest model. So, really, only your command traits past the second one will feel like empty victories - though if your favored warrior dies, a third command trait would allow you to make a new favored warrior.

Question is : when is the next expansion coming ?

I think something will be announced at Nova. Kill Team had monthly (or was it bi-monthly?) releases, with two starters and a killzone being released at the beginning of the month - not to mention Rogue Trader, Commanders, Elites, and Arena. Underworlds had two warbands every other month as well. If GW puts tentpole resources into Warcry, it should expand pretty quickly. The worst case scenario is a Necromunda schedule of one new sprue every four months, but if it came with a Necromunda-like campaign book, they could still make some cool expansions. But Warcry is the AoS team, not Specialist Games.

The fact that there are two supported, but otherwise unreleased warbands (Spire Tyrants and whatever the other one is) makes me think that they'll be released together - maybe in a box set, like Rogue Trader, maybe a October release. It feels supremely weird for GW to admit the existence of something without formally announcing it with pictures, so I have to assume that they are coming REAL soon. They obviously intended to keep it a secret, so it is really about guessing the motivation. It's possible that they are part of a larger Slaves to Darkness release (or otherwise a spoiler of it)

That's the trouble with "DLC games", that don't have everything in the book. You're forced to wait and gather all the smaller parts until it "feels" complete. And if it stops selling in the middle...you're fethed.

To be perfectly honest, with just what is out for Warcry, I think I could get months of content from it (I ended up buying all the warbands and cards) - and when that content ran out, there's a lot of ways I could make my own campaigns within the existing framework. If nothing else was ever released for the game, I'd consider Warcry to be a successful and enjoyable game. I really like it. The fact that we know more is coming out for it (they literally said more campaign quest coming in future GW publications and White Dwarf) makes me excited for how the game will grow and change. I don't feel like it is incomplete now, I just want more because, apparently, $500 worth of toy soldiers can not sate my unquenchable thirst for more.

 Sqorgar wrote:

I think some people are narrative players and some people aren't, and I don't think the game mechanics need to force you into that role if you don't want to do it. The rulebook does mention several times that players will have more fun if they use the name and background tables, but it never enforces it. For some people, using the same model is a pro, not a con. But I remember when Sam Pearson was on StormCast, he talked about giving names and backstories to his generals in AoS, and when they died, he'd write little histories of their accomplishments. Nothing in the game did that. He did it because he wanted to. GW, in general, takes a more permissive attitude towards that kind of thing - always recommending you immerse yourself in the lore and the story on the battlefield, but never forcing it. Some people won't do it unless forced or explicitly permitted, which I've always thought was kind of a sad state of affairs.

It's not forcing them, actually. In Mordheim, you didn't have to give your warriors names, even if GW advised the players to do so. But since your warrior get progression and new equipment, eventually people were encouraged to do so, even the ones who don't care about fluff. Just because that way is simpler to differentiate them from the same kind of fighters in the same band. In my group, we have players who clearly don't care much about the fluff, one calling his beastman hero "Meeeh" and his mutant "Mill-ator" because of his four arms and armed with swords and axes.

I bet in Warcry, he wouldn't even care because even with minor artifacts and destiny levels, the difference isn't that big. Would be more like "the guy with the healing potion".

But yeah, of course the narrative players build their own story in their corner and they keep doing so even if the rules don't push them that way. But you can still have a game designed for a specific direction. I think the main reason for such a watered down system is also partly because GW is pushing his "three ways to play" in all of their games. They have to include competition and equal play for the sake of satisfying as many people as possible. Mordheim was clearly targeted at narrative players on the other hand.

But if your Ogor Breacher had three destiny levels and was rocking an artifact of power, you'll feel the difference.

Yeah, like I said it's only when it really matters - the artifact of power, mostly, because those are really hard to get. Destiny levels tend to lower naturally with time anyway ; having rerolls is nice, sure. You wouldn't care as much if it was a beginner with one use item or one destiny level. In Frostgrave, even with beginners, it was still a big deal because it wasn't free to replace them.

If you want that minor sting of punishment, why not make replacing dead members on your roster cost 1 glory point for every 50 points. So replacing a model that is 110 points will cost 3 glory points. Future campaigns could change basically everything, so they could potentially have money or a cost for hiring models or tie model recruitment to territory.

Yes, that's something close to what I'm using for my house rules, with starting with a roster of 1500 points. That way, you have some reserves and you can still build your roster over time. Chances of dying aren't as high as in Mordheim, after all. It doesn't make the game more complicated nor too punishing, IMHO. But then, I still have to play more to see over time if it's viable (like, more than one quest).

At the moment, the favored warrior is just a model that can carry an extra command trait, which feels a bit slight for such a designation. I think they'll do more with favored warriors in the future. Frostgrave added a favored warrior module in one of the PDFs (it may have been reprinted in the Folio), which can gain experience and level up alongside your wizard. If they did something like that, I could see them making the favored warrior invincible.

Also, you only get two command traits (leader + favored warrior), but artifacts of power can be given to any model. So additional command traits might not impress, but the artifacts of power can seriously buff up even the cheapest model. So, really, only your command traits past the second one will feel like empty victories - though if your favored warrior dies, a third command trait would allow you to make a new favored warrior.

I know, but let's be honest : you'll give the first artifact to your leader (he can't die and is a main asset of your band, being often quite the damage dealer / tanky by himself). Like I said, it's mainly the "not leader" warriors holding artifacts of power that make their death really annoying for the player. It's not like they will be many during your first quest, and you'll have to see some games until you have more than one. You'll tend to be more careful with them, that's the point of death really mattering - there is a risk, so you play according to it.

But the others, they are mainly cannon fodder and you know it. It's not a big deal if they die, there are always a full line of the same types waiting to be recruited for free anyway.

I think something will be announced at Nova. Kill Team had monthly (or was it bi-monthly?) releases, with two starters and a killzone being released at the beginning of the month - not to mention Rogue Trader, Commanders, Elites, and Arena. Underworlds had two warbands every other month as well. If GW puts tentpole resources into Warcry, it should expand pretty quickly. The worst case scenario is a Necromunda schedule of one new sprue every four months, but if it came with a Necromunda-like campaign book, they could still make some cool expansions. But Warcry is the AoS team, not Specialist Games.

I'm talking more about "real" expansions, those who actually add more content for the core aspects of the game. Terrain / band boxes in Kill Team just add more terrain / faction cards. Before having expansion books like Commander or Elite, we had to wait for quite longer, if you remember it well...

Here for warcry, we'll need more new quests so that we can keep playing the same bands. Otherwise, yes, we can always start over with a new one, no problem, or just keeping the same quest to keep our dominions and gathering/losing more destiny levels / minor artifacts. It will be a bit dull after a while, though. Good thing is that we have a lot of combination with the mission system, and we can enjoy ourselves with a Coalition of Death / Triumph and Treason multiplayer game for fun (it's not that difficult to include them in a campaign as well, after all).

I crave for more, already. Would love a way to "attack" the dominions of a player, especially when he's at the top - like a special scenario when he has to defend his obelisk and if the attacking player manage to destroy it, he could lose the dominion on his territory. Add to that specific places of the Eight Points the warbands are exploring that give special rules for the band raising an obelisk in them, so that they really want to keep it but have to be careful about the attacks of the other players. There are a lot of possibilities, indeed, but I feel like GW won't follow that road.

The fact that there are two supported, but otherwise unreleased warbands (Spire Tyrants and whatever the other one is) makes me think that they'll be released together - maybe in a box set, like Rogue Trader, maybe a October release. It feels supremely weird for GW to admit the existence of something without formally announcing it with pictures, so I have to assume that they are coming REAL soon. They obviously intended to keep it a secret, so it is really about guessing the motivation. It's possible that they are part of a larger Slaves to Darkness release (or otherwise a spoiler of it)

I don't think they'll be specifically a part of Slaves to Darkness release. But I can see GW releasing more warbands in the future, and more faction cards. It's annoying to be in the dark, but that's the GW way and we have to deal with it.

To be perfectly honest, with just what is out for Warcry, I think I could get months of content from it (I ended up buying all the warbands and cards) - and when that content ran out, there's a lot of ways I could make my own campaigns within the existing framework. If nothing else was ever released for the game, I'd consider Warcry to be a successful and enjoyable game. I really like it. The fact that we know more is coming out for it (they literally said more campaign quest coming in future GW publications and White Dwarf) makes me excited for how the game will grow and change. I don't feel like it is incomplete now, I just want more because, apparently, $500 worth of toy soldiers can not sate my unquenchable thirst for more.

I too have all the content so far. I did take the Stormvault terrain expansion twice for my AoS games. I'm thinking to take all of the chaos warbands twice, because for campaign games it's really more suitable. Really love the game as well, actually. It has a great potential, but well...truth is, with GW pulling out games / parts of the game without warning and their history so far (Blood Bowl, Necromunda, reduction of range for Cities of Sigmar, and so on), I can't help but wondering if they won't do the same in the end. It's all about short term sales, nowadays.

Has there been another campaign for a miniature game that represents a variety of warbands roaming an area completing disparate quests and the battles are what happens when they cross paths?

Just conceptually, Warcry's campaign system is neither a military campaign nor just simply linked games. It's multiple questing parties roaming the same area.

 frozenwastes wrote:
Has there been another campaign for a miniature game that represents a variety of warbands roaming an area completing disparate quests and the battles are what happens when they cross paths?

Just conceptually, Warcry's campaign system is neither a military campaign nor just simply linked games. It's multiple questing parties roaming the same area.

Actually, in Warcry, the questing parties may roam in quite different areas - like, a lot. Each quest has a small map road that is linked to the part of the Eight-Points showed in the core book (and it's just a small fragment of the whole realm). It's mostly for their respective narrative, of course, but even that breaks a bit immersion when two bands having different quests in opposite places on the map, but still meeting on the battlefield while they are not supposed to meet in any way given the distances.

Other games tend to keep it in the same area for the same purpose for all the bands (the city of Frostgrave for Frostgrave, the city of Mordheim for Mordheim - heh), or make it deliberatly vague so that you can find a good reason for the bands to meet. In Warcry, they set the place and it doesn't always fit.

Of course, players can also assume "it's not the same warband, but X mercenaries so I'm not actually fighting your Iron Golem band called the Silver Knuckles", but that's dumb to me. Not even talking about the narrative of convergence battles saying that you killed the opposing party while they are obviously alive after your game. It's even funnier when you fight a warband having the same quest than you ("muahaha, who will Conquer the Forge between my Iron Golem band and yours ? Well both of them eventually " ).

It reinforces to me the feeling that it doesn't matter what the other bands are doing, you go on your own quest and all the people you fight aren't really the ones your fellow players want to you to fight.

Missions in Warcry also have victory conditions like find treasures and such, but in the end, they don't really matter in the aftergame - they're just victory conditions, you don't get more artifacts by picking up the treasure objectives or such, and so on. It's obviously made for game balance reasons (putting such a thing in random cards could be seen as quite unfair, after all), but it's also one more point that breaks the immersion in the end. Other games handle that better.

Having players fill all the gaps all the time work only so far, after all. There is a reason why video games telling players to "make their own story" while not putting much content in the game themselves aren't especially richer. than the ones who do take care of filling the world themselves with set and believable stories.

It's pretty silly that warbands would fight each other, or even any serious battle, and both continue as they do in a campaign. Every warband campaign-game is immersion breaking on a certain level. If a warband loses a fight every member that does not actually survive to move off the board edge is dead, because the opposing warband kills them. Injury tables are for models that have damage when they make it off the board, where they risk death again, and any serious injury puts them in a state where they are unfit for combat so they leave the warband anyways. Models on the winning side that took enough damage to be rendered unconscious are in that condition too; injuries that severe are going to at the very least put an individual in recovery for months.

But people overlook that entirely, among other elements, because that is part of enjoying the campaign. We should be honest and admit that all the systems out there are pretty unrealistic.

 Sarouan wrote:
In Mordheim...

I see a lot of comparisons to Mordheim. I haven't played it, but is it really that similar to Warcry? Or does Warcry just compare unfavorably to Mordheim?

I think the main reason for such a watered down system is also partly because GW is pushing his "three ways to play" in all of their games. They have to include competition and equal play for the sake of satisfying as many people as possible. Mordheim was clearly targeted at narrative players on the other hand.

You know, I've always sort of been somewhat in the minority on Dakka because I'm neither a narrative player nor a competitive player. I'm much closer in spirit to that bastard third choice, the open play player. I see narrative and competitive play to be a small subset of a much bigger experience toolset - I think there's a lot more than three ways to play, but the other ways are either yet unidentified or pertain to a type of player which doesn't typically play miniature games (but could).

So, for me, having GW identify and attempt to cater to even three different play styles is the greatest advancement in miniature games in the short time that I've been following them. I feel like it is kind of like the Meyers-Briggs test - the important thing isn't the actual classifications themselves, but the idea that people are not of one mind and that they may do the same things for different reasons, and get different things out of the same actions. The premise that people are different is something we all kind of understand, and yet most online discussions seek conformity of thought and belief. GW saying, hey, there's three ways to play is kind of ground breaking just because someone in a position to do something about it has finally admitted that wargamers like different things. I can't be mad at them for trying, even if I don't think they ever hit the mark with any accuracy.

I think Jervis sees games a lot like I do, based on reading his White Dwarf editorials. But the AoS team is headed by a primarily competitive player, and I'm fairly certain that Sam Pearson (who is lead on Warcry, and I guess number 2 rules writer on AoS) is a heavy narrative player. It creates an interesting dynamic, where AoS/Warcry has influences from all over.

For instance, Warcry's battleplan generator is basically the open war cards from AoS using in open play, but the dagger/hammer/shield formations were original in the General's Handbook 2019 as Meeting Engagements (matched play, but who knows whether it came first). The campaign takes a few things from Paths to Glory (I believe this was narrative?). Warcry has Triumphs and Treacheries, which was an open play thing from one of the General's Handbooks. I don't think Warcry is a watered down version of any of these things, but simply that the sum of all its influences creates something uniquely not narrative or competitive, but which could become more narrative or more competitive easily with an expansion.

But the others, they are mainly cannon fodder and you know it. It's not a big deal if they die, there are always a full line of the same types waiting to be recruited for free anyway.

To be honest, I don't have a huge problem with this. I'm mainly playing with my wife and kids, and being overly punished by a character's death would probably make them stop playing the first time it happened. I would be fine with a more aggressive campaign system - I think characters who lose an eye and walk around on two peg legs before succumbing to the backstab of an enemy fighter to be cool, but I love toolbox games, and anything which gives me an excuse to use my tools in a different way, I'll take. But Warcry is a casual enough game that I can easily play it with my kids, and being super punishing won't go over as well with them. I think you'll feel the loss, but having that out where you can replace Cody with Cody 2 eases it a bit.

I crave for more, already. Would love a way to "attack" the dominions of a player, especially when he's at the top - like a special scenario when he has to defend his obelisk and if the attacking player manage to destroy it, he could lose the dominion on his territory. Add to that specific places of the Eight Points the warbands are exploring that give special rules for the band raising an obelisk in them, so that they really want to keep it but have to be careful about the attacks of the other players. There are a lot of possibilities, indeed, but I feel like GW won't follow that road.

I do think the AoS team is more willing to experiment than 40k (or 40k players). With skirmish, path to glory, triumph and treachery, firestorm, malign sorcery, open army generation, it really feels like AoS is comfortable trying out new ways to play. I mean, 40k got Urban Conquest, which seems like a system that could be comfortably modified for an AoS campaign (you can already use it for Kill Team, which I thought was cool - wonder if Firestorm could be used for Warcry?), and Kill Team got Rogue Trader, but neither seemed to get as much traction as something like Apocalypse. I think the AoS team and players are more willing to experiment, especially along non-competitive lines, but 40k/Kill Team is somewhat limited by the narrow interests of 40k players.

I too have all the content so far... I'm thinking to take all of the chaos warbands twice, because for campaign games it's really more suitable.

I'm tempted as well. So far, I've been playing Untamed Beasts and I wouldn't mind a second murder kitty or have the option to switch out Plains-runners and Preytakers depending on the scenario - and to go really nuts on the paintjob for the alternate leader (was thinking of painting him the same, but all bloodied and bruised, so I can swap him out in the game when he is below half health). Unfortunately, they haven't released Untamed Beasts separately. Trying out Corvus Cabal tomorrow, and already having ideas for how to paint duplicates...

Really love the game as well, actually. It has a great potential, but well...truth is, with GW pulling out games / parts of the game without warning and their history so far (Blood Bowl, Necromunda, reduction of range for Cities of Sigmar, and so on), I can't help but wondering if they won't do the same in the end. It's all about short term sales, nowadays.

GW works years in advance. It's certain that if GW is launching Warcry as a tentpole game, they'll have the next year or two's worth of releases planned out. It seems like it will be successful enough to continue past that, though I don't know what GW considers a success.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

But people overlook that entirely, among other elements, because that is part of enjoying the campaign. We should be honest and admit that all the systems out there are pretty unrealistic.

Some are more than others. And it's not because a band loses a fight that instantly, all their members are dead. Mordheim has a system when the band routs after taking too heavy losses, assuming they take their fallen warrior's bodies with them as they are retreating. This is how a game system can make things more believable, in opposite to others that don't even try. But saying "they're all the same so don't bother at all" is quite oversimplifying the matter here.

 Sqorgar wrote:

I see a lot of comparisons to Mordheim. I haven't played it, but is it really that similar to Warcry? Or does Warcry just compare unfavorably to Mordheim?

It's just not the same. Sam Pearson clearly said Mordheim was one of the inspirations for Warcry in the Stormcast Interview and it is obvious he's also fond of the core concept. When he was talking about the negative loop, he was clearly refering to how Mordheim handled game losses and warrior deaths in it.

Game system in Warcry is completely different from Mordheim, but they have core concepts in common - mainly being a skirmish grim fantasy game focusing on a small band of warriors trying to survive and find glory (and riches) in dangerous ruins. But that's pretty much it, TBH.

You know, I've always sort of been somewhat in the minority on Dakka because I'm neither a narrative player nor a competitive player. I'm much closer in spirit to that bastard third choice, the open play player. I see narrative and competitive play to be a small subset of a much bigger experience toolset - I think there's a lot more than three ways to play, but the other ways are either yet unidentified or pertain to a type of player which doesn't typically play miniature games (but could).

Three ways to play is a GW mantra for their games with the last editions and yes, it is simplified as well. And indeed, Warcry is awesome for open/casual play. The game in itself works really well in stand alone games. So I completely understand you love it.

I think Jervis sees games a lot like I do, based on reading his White Dwarf editorials. But the AoS team is headed by a primarily competitive player, and I'm fairly certain that Sam Pearson (who is lead on Warcry, and I guess number 2 rules writer on AoS) is a heavy narrative player. It creates an interesting dynamic, where AoS/Warcry has influences from all over.

Yes, I remember hearing on the Stormcast Interview that warcry prototype rules were made by Jervis Johnson, and that a lot of them were kept in the final game. So I wouldn't be surprised if most of core mechanisms and concepts (including for campaign) are actually from him.

For instance, Warcry's battleplan generator is basically the open war cards from AoS using in open play, but the dagger/hammer/shield formations were original in the General's Handbook 2019 as Meeting Engagements (matched play, but who knows whether it came first). The campaign takes a few things from Paths to Glory (I believe this was narrative?). Warcry has Triumphs and Treacheries, which was an open play thing from one of the General's Handbooks. I don't think Warcry is a watered down version of any of these things, but simply that the sum of all its influences creates something uniquely not narrative or competitive, but which could become more narrative or more competitive easily with an expansion.

The other inspiration for Warcry is the old supplement Realm of Chaos, that is behind the Path to Glory system (much, much MUCH more simplified - if you didn't like random in Path of Glory, you would be horrified to see the random tables from Realm of Chaos. It was completley insane ! ). GW is still doing new with old. But yes, I agree, a lot of ideas are clearly inspired from some things they tried in the last years, and I must say the battleplan generator feels really polished to me. I like it as well very much. And yeah, to me, it feels "watered down", but I guess that's because I remember those old references and keep comparing to it with, I'll be honest, certainly a hint of nostalgia blinding me here.

It's certain that if GW is launching Warcry as a tentpole game, they'll have the next year or two's worth of releases planned out. It seems like it will be successful enough to continue past that, though I don't know what GW considers a success.

I know, I have no doubt they will release at least the last two warbands described in the core rules and certainly another book with new quests. About the success, we'll see indeed.

 Sarouan wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

But people overlook that entirely, among other elements, because that is part of enjoying the campaign. We should be honest and admit that all the systems out there are pretty unrealistic.

Some are more than others. And it's not because a band loses a fight that instantly, all their members are dead. Mordheim has a system when the band routs after taking too heavy losses, assuming they take their fallen warrior's bodies with them as they are retreating. This is how a game system can make things more believable, in opposite to others that don't even try. But saying "they're all the same so don't bother at all" is quite oversimplifying the matter here.

Yes, absolutely. I meant to say that it is important to include the context of all campaign structures containing notable immersion-breaking elements.

 Sarouan wrote:
Game system in Warcry is completely different from Mordheim, but they have core concepts in common - mainly being a skirmish grim fantasy game focusing on a small band of warriors trying to survive and find glory (and riches) in dangerous ruins. But that's pretty much it, TBH.

It really seems that the majority of complaints against Warcry are specifically in comparison to Mordheim. I thought it might be a case where it was close enough to Mordheim that it was frustrating when it didn't live up to it - but now I'm wondering if Mordheim is just a completely different beast and people just wanted Mordheim instead.

Three ways to play is a GW mantra for their games with the last editions and yes, it is simplified as well. And indeed, Warcry is awesome for open/casual play. The game in itself works really well in stand alone games. So I completely understand you love it.

I think the impression people get is that open play is just doing anything you want all willy-nilly, but it is more like being an inventor or tinkerer. It's seeing a bunch of tools and thinking, I wonder what would happen if I put these two things together? Or, I've got this idea for something cool that the game doesn't support, how much do I have to change to achieve this concept?

I think the battleplan cards really kind of exemplify it. It's like, what happens if we take this terrain, this deployment, this victory condition, and then use this twist? It doesn't always work out, because that's the nature of invention. But it is usually surprising and even when it doesn't work, still moderately enjoyable. But sometimes, it will work out REALLY well - some chocolate + peanut butter combination of factors that you just didn't see coming. You get that inventor's high, and you get this really memorable, unique experience. It's awesome.

Yes, I remember hearing on the Stormcast Interview that warcry prototype rules were made by Jervis Johnson, and that a lot of them were kept in the final game. So I wouldn't be surprised if most of core mechanisms and concepts (including for campaign) are actually from him.

I vaguely remember that, now that you mention it. I'm not well versed enough in the relative works of the people on the AoS team to be able to go, "oh, that's such a Jervis thing to put in the game" or "Pearson strikes again", but if I had to say which GW game Warcry reminds me of the most, it's Blood Bowl.

And yeah, to me, it feels "watered down", but I guess that's because I remember those old references and keep comparing to it with, I'll be honest, certainly a hint of nostalgia blinding me here.

It's interesting, because I don't really have a background in wargames. I'm squarely in the video games arena. I own literally thousands of video games and even worked in the video game industry as both a programmer and a writer. My video game knowledge is intimate, encyclopedic, and absolute. But until AoS launched, my involvement in miniature games (and even board games) was extremely limited.

So, I'm coming from a completely different background here, and my nostalgic tug points are completely different, and what I'm looking for out of tabletop gaming is completely different. Even the concept of "watered down" feels strange to me because the concept of complexity in video games is more variable. I very often feel like an outsider, asking questions about why things are, or need to be, a certain way and getting an eye roll as an answer. Wargamers tend to be unable to articulate their thoughts for the benefit of outsiders. Maybe they are just used to only talking to other wargamers with similar backgrounds.

Like, I'm now curious about Mordheim. I've never played it, but I have some understanding of how it influenced things which came afterwards. I'm going to go check it out now, but it's been 20 years and the game has been mined of all its treasures for so long, that almost certainly, the game I'm going to find is going to be completely devoid of its magic. It'll be interesting, from a historical standpoint, but I won't see it like you see it. It is impossible for me, coming at it from where I am at.

It's going to be a "you had to be there" type of thing, and I get it. I've tried to explain to my children what playing Super Mario 64 for the first time felt like. But Super Mario 64 came out a few years before Mordheim did, and while the video game industry has put out thousands of games since, the miniature game industry has put out dozens (if that). Mario 64 feels like a thousand games ago, but Mordheim is still a living memory, it seems. It's truly interesting how wargaming seems to operate at a different speed than video games.

It really seems that the majority of complaints against Warcry are specifically in comparison to Mordheim. I thought it might be a case where it was close enough to Mordheim that it was frustrating when it didn't live up to it - but now I'm wondering if Mordheim is just a completely different beast and people just wanted Mordheim instead.

Something in the same ballpark as Mordheim would have been what I was hoping GW would have produced. Not Mordheim AOS version.

What was produced instead wasn't in the same ballpark, it was a completely different sporting event altogether.

So football fans are going to be put off by the new baseball stadium that replaced the football team altogether.

 auticus wrote:

Something in the same ballpark as Mordheim would have been what I was hoping GW would have produced. Not Mordheim AOS version.

What was produced instead wasn't in the same ballpark, it was a completely different sporting event altogether.

So football fans are going to be put off by the new baseball stadium that replaced the football team altogether.

Warcry is not a replacement for Mordheim. If Warcry was Mordheim, they would've called it Mordheim - it's not like GW hasn't rebooted a great number of their popular games from the past with the same name and nostalgic bent. They said they were inspired by Mordheim, not that it was a reboot, spiritual sequel, or replacement. And for some reason, you expected the AoS team to make something unlike AoS? GW didn't play you, you played yourself.

And let me just say - miniature games could have a LOT more variety than they do. Right now, there's maybe three different genres of miniature games and they all play very similarly. Look at the variety available in video games, and even within a small genre like stealth or real time strategy, you'll see infinitely more variety than the entirety of the miniature games market today! It's okay if we don't constantly remake the same six games over and over and over and over again. It's okay if people make new games that are a little different and maybe even a little strange. Because it's a big world and not everything has to be Mordheim.

 auticus wrote:

It really seems that the majority of complaints against Warcry are specifically in comparison to Mordheim. I thought it might be a case where it was close enough to Mordheim that it was frustrating when it didn't live up to it - but now I'm wondering if Mordheim is just a completely different beast and people just wanted Mordheim instead.

Something in the same ballpark as Mordheim would have been what I was hoping GW would have produced. Not Mordheim AOS version.

What was produced instead wasn't in the same ballpark, it was a completely different sporting event altogether.

So football fans are going to be put off by the new baseball stadium that replaced the football team altogether.

There is no doubt in my mind that gw will eventually do mordheim but given the production schedule of specialist games, I don’t expect to see it until at least 2021. Rather than doing a mordheim light with a very limited shelf life, it is better to do something different which has the chance of continuing to exist alongside Mordheim when it eventually arrives. Gw eventually wants to have both a football and a baseball stadium rather than two football stadiums. Meanwhile the old football stadium may be in a slight state of disrepair but it certainly hasn’t been destroyed. It can even use some of the facilities from the new stadium for a better experience.

 Sqorgar wrote:
It really seems that the majority of complaints against Warcry are specifically in comparison to Mordheim. I thought it might be a case where it was close enough to Mordheim that it was frustrating when it didn't live up to it - but now I'm wondering if Mordheim is just a completely different beast and people just wanted Mordheim instead.

Yes, I admit I was hoping Warcry would be a Mordheim in AoS. And to be honest, I admit my expectations were certainly a bit too wild. Sam Pearson made Hinterlands for AoS some time ago that was inspired partially from Mordheim, so that's where my hope mainly come from. It's true GW never sold Warcry as "Mordheim in AoS" in the end.

really kind of exemplify it. It's like, what happens if we take this terrain, this deployment, this victory condition, and then use this twist? It doesn't always work out, because that's the nature of invention. But it is usually surprising and even when it doesn't work, still moderately enjoyable. But sometimes, it will work out REALLY well - some chocolate + peanut butter combination of factors that you just didn't see coming. You get that inventor's high, and you get this really memorable, unique experience. It's awesome.

Yes, I really love Warcry's battleplan system. Sure, some combinations are sometimes clunky, but it's really easy to build/customize a mission from them with a simple twink here and there to make it work. Their idea of separating cards with symetric/asymetric terrain/deployment/victory condition is a simple one, but one that works really well.

I vaguely remember that, now that you mention it. I'm not well versed enough in the relative works of the people on the AoS team to be able to go, "oh, that's such a Jervis thing to put in the game" or "Pearson strikes again", but if I had to say which GW game Warcry reminds me of the most, it's Blood Bowl.

Now I'm curious. What makes you remind of Bloodbowl in Warcry ? Because to me, the two games are completely and utterly different, in concept, game system and even progression system. Not even the cards have the same importance.

Like, I'm now curious about Mordheim. I've never played it, but I have some understanding of how it influenced things which came afterwards. I'm going to go check it out now, but it's been 20 years and the game has been mined of all its treasures for so long, that almost certainly, the game I'm going to find is going to be completely devoid of its magic. It'll be interesting, from a historical standpoint, but I won't see it like you see it. It is impossible for me, coming at it from where I am at.

Ah I understand. Well it's actually the opposite, because Mordheim's ressources are quite richer from all the years of developpment by the old Specialist Games studio (mainly the magazine Town Cryer, but they had an extension too) and, yeah, fan developpment (which can vary a lot in quality, obviously).

Here is a website with quite a lot of things to download for Mordheim if you're curious : http://broheim.net/downloads.html

I'll just say that when Mordheim first came out, it wasn't as rich as the version I keep playing nowadays with my friends. If I just use the core game, it would certainly not be the same pleasure. Reason why Mordheim can be played instead of Warcry is because of these years of development and having way more lot of content than Warcry in its current state. It may sound unfair, but if I can make a comparison with video games, it's the same as saying if I start World of Warcraft now, the sheer amount of content I'll have will beat any new game coming out recently. WoW is sure older, but it is because it's there with all those years of experience and content that still make it a thing.

Chikout wrote:

There is no doubt in my mind that gw will eventually do mordheim but given the production schedule of specialist games, I don’t expect to see it until at least 2021. Rather than doing a mordheim light with a very limited shelf life, it is better to do something different which has the chance of continuing to exist alongside Mordheim when it eventually arrives. Gw eventually wants to have both a football and a baseball stadium rather than two football stadiums. Meanwhile the old football stadium may be in a slight state of disrepair but it certainly hasn’t been destroyed. It can even use some of the facilities from the new stadium for a better experience.

After listening to the interview with Sam Pearson on Stormcast, my hopes of seeing Mordheim coming back are reduced to zero. I don't think GW will make it return, it's a too niche market and the core concepts behind Mordheim aren't anymore suitable to GW's standing and the way the development studio sees what should be their games. I do believe that, in some way, GW thinks Warcry is the answer to requests for Mordheim's return : it looked like Mordheim at first but it's not and will never be. They take inspiration from their previous games and make new things with them, but Blood Bowl's time when they kept the core system is, I feel, a thing of the past already.

t's okay if people make new games that are a little different and maybe even a little strange. Because it's a big world and not everything has to be Mordheim

Let me focus just a little bit on this particular piece.

#1 - I don't want MORDHEIM. Nor do I think everything has to BE MORDHEIM. When I say I wanted something like Mordheim - I want something along the lines of its campaign structure and how that works or a derivative of that.

#2 - No where have I said that its not ok if people don't make games that are a little different.

#3 - To keep my attention I need depth in my campaigns. Warcry does not have that. Warcry is a glorified pick up game that is heavily based off of what drives World of Warcraft PVP players whose primary audience appears to be people who enjoy playing random pick up games at the game store, which is 1000% not me.

#4 - I'm not going to play games that I don't enjoy because its ok that GW made a game that is different. I'm going to play games that I enjoy and this is a thread discussing rating Warcry.

#5 - I'm not interested in a game like warcry or mordheim or frostrgrave or ragnarok or any of the other dozen or so skirmish games on the market for pick up game or tournament purposes. I play mordheim, frostgrave, ragnarok, and other skirmish games exclusively for the campaign systems.

So to conclude, I have never said its not ok to make a game that is not mordheim, I'm not saying that I want 100% mordheim returned, I did not say the gameplay was bad (since these are all mischaractures of things that I have not said being applied to what I have said) and I am responding to comments in a thread specifically about rating Warcry.

As to Warcry being like blood bowl, I'd have to also firmly disagree. If Warcry was remotely like Blood Bowl I'd probably like it more. Because Blood Bowl has consequences. Players get injured and miss the next game. All players climb the progression ladder. At any time players on that progression ladder can be injured and lose stats (something warcry is 1000% against) and at any time that player can die on the pitch and be gone forever (something warcry is 1000% against). Players know they can't just hurl their guys at whatever they want with no consequence because perma injury or death can occur, unlike Warcry, where you will often see people carelessly throw their guys forward because they can't really be hurt and will be back next game.


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After listening to the interview with Sam Pearson on Stormcast, my hopes of seeing Mordheim coming back are reduced to zero. I don't think GW will make it return, it's a too niche market and the core concepts behind Mordheim aren't anymore suitable to GW's standing and the way the development studio sees what should be their games. I do believe that, in some way, GW thinks Warcry is the answer to requests for Mordheim's return : it looked like Mordheim at first but it's not and will never be. They take inspiration from their previous games and make new things with them, but Blood Bowl's time when they kept the core system is, I feel, a thing of the past already.

I completely agree. And even Blood Bowl is being redone for 2020 to include the new friendlier "its not fun when your guys die" mantra, joining all of the other games from the long ago that have transitioned into this new phase as well.

No risk. All reward. Thats what is now fun.

 Sarouan wrote:

Now I'm curious. What makes you remind of Bloodbowl in Warcry ? Because to me, the two games are completely and utterly different, in concept, game system and even progression system. Not even the cards have the same importance.

There's several reasons, really.

1) The scenarios play out more like a sports game. Instead of two armies just sitting there fighting, there are a lot of scenarios which involve scoring points from objectives, keeping treasure away from the enemy, escaping off a board edge, and so on. There's a lot more to it that is about maneuvering smartly and planning a few turns ahead, unlike a more traditional skirmish game where it is basically choosing target priority.

2) The warbands are so thematically over the top that they feel more like sports teams than bands of warriors. The Splintered Fangs even sounds like a sports team. They don't feel like armies coming together to battle, they feel like characters from The Warriors battling over turf in 1980s New York City. The way the models fit into different archetypes feels like this is my runner, this is my thrower, this is my blitzer, and so on.

3) Blood Bowl is less of a sports simulation and more of a misery simulation. The best laid plans are meaningless when your runner trips and drops the ball. In Blood Bowl, the game is less about the overall strategy and more about the moment to moment experiences, and it is built to make those experiences kind of surprising and weird. Blood Bowl never pretends to be fair. The way the battle plan cards work in Warcry, you can end up with wildly unfair scenarios that you have no chance to win, but it is still fun because the scenarios create those little moments of misery for you and your opponent which makes the game play out in a surprising fashion. The way initiative dice and critical hits work gives these spikes of... not randomness, but unpredictability that makes me think of Blood Bowl. Warcry is less of a misery simulator, but it does have that element of, "I have a cunning plan! ...Well crap... I have a NEW cunning plan!"

4) The way the campaign works feels like a Blood Bowl league. You upgrade (or downgrade) your team and then challenge other players to a match. You aren't battling over domains or resources, or even really making choices that impact other players. The players level up, but they are ultimately kind of disposable, and they are more important as their archetypes than as individual characters.

5) The unit cards with the minimal stats remind me of the unit cards that came in the Blood Bowl box. The fact that the models all have the same stat blocks and are differentiated in what they can do by skills isn't unlike how Blood Bowl defines its characters. It's just that you get a Runemark that represent "Sure Hands" rather than listing the skill by name.

6) Blood Bowl also has themed pitches. Kill Team has its killzones, but Blood Bowl was doing it first. The "playset" idea is more of a board game idea than a miniature game one. I think Warcry inches a little closer to Blood Bowl because the terrain cards make the entire playset a self contained board, as opposed to Kill Team which uses it as a starting point.

I've only played Blood Bowl twice, and not in a league, so I may be way off on these comparisons. It's just that Warcry feels kind of like a sports game without actually being a sports game, and its design philosophy seems more in line with Blood Bowl's controlled chaos rather than a more traditional skirmish game.

Here is a website with quite a lot of things to download for Mordheim if you're curious : http://broheim.net/downloads.html

Awesome! Thank you.

So I finally actually got 3 games in. I really enjoyed the mechanics. However, the random mission generator produced a combination that was a literal automatic win for one side in all 3 games - in fact 5 times in a row as we re-drew twice. In all games it was obvious who was going to win before the first model activation and there was no realistic way for the other player to do anything about it.

Positioning-based objectives really don't work when armies arrive from reserve from all over the place.


Example from memory: Player's formation X arrives from short edge A on round 3. That player wins if a model from formation X is on short edge A at the end of round 3. There is no realistic way for the opponent to get enough models to that location in 2 rounds (past the first player's other two formations acting as disposable speed bumps) and kill entire formation X in one round.


Obviously this won't happen 100% of the time. But clearly it happens often enough to be an issue andthe players have the choice of either playing out a game that is a forgone conclusion (I mean... 40k players should be used to that, but I am not ) or keep re-drawing until both players are happy with the mission, but then mission generation becomes a game of politics, guilt-tripping and other psychological manipulation.


Will try with only Matched Play cards next time.


If that's still no good, the next step is to throw out this whole Dagger/Shield/Hammer deployment and use Kill Team missions.