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

 Insectum7 wrote:
Those are some gorgeous boards @Sherrypie

I know, right? Dreams for the future, when one can have a proper house with a dedicated gaming space...

It's funny how much of a difference it makes when using gravel, bushes and other small scatter stuff to blend the terrain's edges with the board. Also helps with a pet peeve of mine: buildings have been ruined, but the rest of it has simply vanished. Where's the rubble, rest of the corners, a fallen roof? There are singular standing walls everywhere in the Imperium, sometimes on urban mats where it looks like someone has even replaced the floor tiles around it when the previous one was cleaned away

Yeah, the shop where SS82 does his video is pretty baller, at least on the terrain front. He always has nice tables. Definitely something to aspire to!

 Sherrypie wrote:
It's funny how much of a difference it makes when using gravel, bushes and other small scatter stuff to blend the terrain's edges with the board.

I was just thinking the same thing- that first image in particular is just terrain pieces set up on a neoprene mat, but the extra rubble really gives it that 'static homemade board' look. I imagine it can't be that hard to set up or take down either; just funnel the gravel into the middle and dump it into a bag.

Now I need to figure out some sort of jungle equivalent.

30kChannel uses a table that has an inch or so of sand on it and they can blend all terrain (or models' bases) in it, which is also pretty sweet for those who can spare the space.

Using lots of rubble also benefits from having a bit of raised edge on your table, which isn't necessarily too common a feature on larger tables, else they can fly all over the place

Glyserine treated moss is pretty rad for shrubs and bushes, could work for jungles as well. Easily available, too.

Aye, moss is what I use for the more natural environments. I have a few other things to add to this set that I'm looking forward to finishing.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Aye, moss is what I use for the more natural environments. I have a few other things to add to this set that I'm looking forward to finishing.

If you are playing 2nd ed, you should really have some styrofoam balls with sticks stuck in them on the table.

Just say’n...

Nice looking setup!

^You jest, but they are already about halfway done.

I have about 2 single-story ruins and use big hills to break up LOS. I also make multi-level hill pieces by stacking smaller hills on top of larger ones. I mostly play 6mm scale stuff, though, so take anything I say with a grain of salt.

Hah, I am likewise preparing to make some old red-spike cactii....as well. Also been eying the 2nd edition Ziterdes bunker.

Thanks Insectum7, that looks perfect. I think I have a variety pack of moss around already.

Banville wrote:
It's the single most irritating part if 8th that terrain doesn't matter unless it blocks LoS. Every single house rule quoted above lends the game more depth, decision-making, and, dare I say it, fun.

I mean, they're not house rules. They're more official than rules that literally everyone seems to abide by, like Rule of 3, which is a SUGGESTION for TOURNAMENT PLAY. Obscurement, hard and soft cover, height advantage, etc...that's all in an official rule supplement package called Cities of Death.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The store where we play is actually very nice in that they allow us to collect funds from our club in exchange for a nice discount. We take 10$/person every 6 months and very quickly have enough for a very nice table. At this point we've got

3 tables worth of old GW ruins
3 tables worth of imperial bunker MDF
1 table of eldar MDF
1 table of custom Necron foam terrain
2 tables of sector mechanicus
1 table of zone mortalis
1 table of ork junkyard terrain

Those tables look very good. But they seem rather bad to play on.

The first picture does have aria terain (red) the statue with special aura rules (purple) and tank traps (blue). That is fine enough. But I woul rather not start on the right side of the tale due to lack of cover saves. And my tanks can not drive there.

On the second picture I have marked where you do not get cover saves. It is rather a lot. And also, with the nice peppels thrown about it is very hard to define what model is and is not in cover.In 8th edition line of sight blocking means nothing. Either your whole unit is standing in/on terain or it does not. The second table have some light of sight blocking, but besides that it has very little cover.

 Niiai wrote:
Those tables look very good. But they seem rather bad to play on.

The first picture does have aria terain (red) the statue with special aura rules (purple) and tank traps (blue). That is fine enough. But I woul rather not start on the right side of the tale due to lack of cover saves. And my tanks can not drive there.

On the second picture I have marked where you do not get cover saves. It is rather a lot. And also, with the nice peppels thrown about it is very hard to define what model is and is not in cover.In 8th edition line of sight blocking means nothing. Either your whole unit is standing in/on terain or it does not. The second table have some light of sight blocking, but besides that it has very little cover.

Quite untrue. As the_scotsman said above, 8th edition has a lot of terrain rules available beyond binary yes/no blocking and it does not take much work to utilize them in a way that makes use of the fact. Best tables (and games, hot take) are a result of pre-planning and agreed upon ideas to begin with anyway, so not being able to use any collection of miniatures easily on that set is not necessarily a drawback. The first picture as an example is obviously a defensive scenario and if you aren't driving tanks up their grill... good, that's what dragon's teeth are designed to do They can act as area cover for infantry, though, so the attacker would have some cover there as well as in the craters before running on the open field as they assault the lines. Also, what? LoS blocking means you aren't getting shot at, most of the units in the game still aren't shooting indirectly so there's plenty of space to hide your units on the second picture as well as giving units a cover save like from a barricade if they hug a hillside but end up getting shot by something tall. It's up to the players at the table how they want to run things.

 Sherrypie wrote:

 Niiai wrote:
Those tables look very good. But they seem rather bad to play on.

The first picture does have aria terain (red) the statue with special aura rules (purple) and tank traps (blue). That is fine enough. But I woul rather not start on the right side of the tale due to lack of cover saves. And my tanks can not drive there.

On the second picture I have marked where you do not get cover saves. It is rather a lot. And also, with the nice peppels thrown about it is very hard to define what model is and is not in cover.In 8th edition line of sight blocking means nothing. Either your whole unit is standing in/on terain or it does not. The second table have some light of sight blocking, but besides that it has very little cover.

Quite untrue. As the_scotsman said above, 8th edition has a lot of terrain rules available beyond binary yes/no blocking and it does not take much work to utilize them in a way that makes use of the fact. Best tables (and games, hot take) are a result of pre-planning and agreed upon ideas to begin with anyway, so not being able to use any collection of miniatures easily on that set is not necessarily a drawback. The first picture as an example is obviously a defensive scenario and if you aren't driving tanks up their grill... good, that's what dragon's teeth are designed to do They can act as area cover for infantry, though, so the attacker would have some cover there as well as in the craters before running on the open field as they assault the lines. Also, what? LoS blocking means you aren't getting shot at, most of the units in the game still aren't shooting indirectly so there's plenty of space to hide your units on the second picture as well as giving units a cover save like from a barricade if they hug a hillside but end up getting shot by something tall. It's up to the players at the table how they want to run things.

It never ceases to boggle my mind that the dedicated faction of folks who are the most dedicated to rigidly following the strictures of the rules only as they are written in the rulebook also refuse to read and take into account what the words on those pages say.

Both pages of the terrain rules in the core rulebook (which are actually called Expanded Terrain Rules) say that terrain rules will need to be customized with a discussion with your opponent.

which makes sense, at least to me, as 40k is a game designed to be played with terrain ranging from anything from beer cans and cardboard to purpose-built plastic kits. Also, obscurement is a rule that is in a book published by supreme overlord and grand pooh-bah of rules James Workshop, so you can go and buy his book and read it and gain magical permission to use that rule if you want.

 Elbows wrote:
Hah, I am likewise preparing to make some old red-spike cactii....as well. Also been eying the 2nd edition Ziterdes bunker.

You can't go past some good, foam ball cactusesiesii. Although I slightly updated the idea for mine, using toothbrush bristles instead of toothpicks:

^Hey, those are cool. I never got around to diasassembling a toothbrush but the effect is nice.

I have to disagree with your post above Niai.

A wargaming table's playability isn't based on "open space" on the table. If that were the case, your typical Zone Mortalis board would be hot garbage. It's about the length of line-of-sight which can be drawn from any point to any other. A more accurate example of the table you quoted is this:

A more logical way to look at a table is to start at a point and see how far your LOS continues in any direction, such as below:


Also, open space on a table can be 100% fine, if it's part of the tactical challenge of the table. A wargame is not just about defeating your opponents list mathematically, but should be a challenge to the player's ability to maneuver around geographic challenges. Now, tournament players will argue against this and that's fine...I understand the desire to have matching (if boring) identical table layouts for each game, etc.

When I build a table (often for other people to game on, and not for my own games), I build a table before the mission or armies are shown to me or declared. We use a special deck of additional deployment cards (with a strategic initiative game method, allowing a player control over deployments). So the players show up, see the table and then have to adapt their tactics to fit the table. If we mimic a real combat encounter, a commander rarely has to ability to choose where he fights. This also helps players start to consider random tables when building a list. Some tables I build are more friendly to infantry, or more friendly to tanks, or have sections where Knights will excel or stumble...depending on the build.

 Elbows wrote:
I have to disagree with your post above Niai.

A wargaming table's playability isn't based on "open space" on the table. If that were the case, your typical Zone Mortalis board would be hot garbage. It's about the length of line-of-sight which can be drawn from any point to any other. A more accurate example of the table you quoted is this:

A more logical way to look at a table is to start at a point and see how far your LOS continues in any direction, such as below:

Spoiler:

Also, open space on a table can be 100% fine, if it's part of the tactical challenge of the table. A wargame is not just about defeating your opponents list mathematically, but should be a challenge to the player's ability to maneuver around geographic challenges. Now, tournament players will argue against this and that's fine...I understand the desire to have matching (if boring) identical table layouts for each game, etc.

When I build a table (often for other people to game on, and not for my own games), I build a table before the mission or armies are shown to me or declared. We use a special deck of additional deployment cards (with a strategic initiative game method, allowing a player control over deployments). So the players show up, see the table and then have to adapt their tactics to fit the table. If we mimic a real combat encounter, a commander rarely has to ability to choose where he fights. This also helps players start to consider random tables when building a list. Some tables I build are more friendly to infantry, or more friendly to tanks, or have sections where Knights will excel or stumble...depending on the build.

Well, as for mimicking a real combat encounter, one of the commanders had the ability to chose where they fought. Usually the one on the attack.

Sometimes, yes...other times no. Time, weather, other operations, lack of fuel/supplies/protection/flanks, etc. I'd say it's more "had some vague control over when to do X, Y or Z".

That's why we determine a strategic initiative and use the following system:



So, the person in control (often the one who won the last game or is narratively in a position of power) gets to use the following. Basically drawn from the original Total War PC games where you had several days in which to choose to attack, waiting on weather to benefit you, etc. It's been very fun when we use it both in 2nd edition and when we did in 8th.

Do you have a shareable list of those somewhere, Elbows, or is it a product you sell? Would be interesting to have a gander.

 Elbows wrote:
Sometimes, yes...other times no. Time, weather, other operations, lack of fuel/supplies/protection/flanks, etc. I'd say it's more "had some vague control over when to do X, Y or Z".

That's why we determine a strategic initiative and use the following system:

Spoiler:

So, the person in control (often the one who won the last game or is narratively in a position of power) gets to use the following. Basically drawn from the original Total War PC games where you had several days in which to choose to attack, waiting on weather to benefit you, etc. It's been very fun when we use it both in 2nd edition and when we did in 8th.

I'm not certain of that assessment. One of the two parties had to chose the spot and time to fight. If it's raining and it's a swamp, someone chose to fight in the rain and in the swamp for a reason. Otherwise, both parties would have declined engagement and there would be no fight.

Yeah, there are other factors that influence the selection of the battlefield, but the battlefield time and place was still selected by somebody on an operational level similar to [presumably 1 level above] the scale of the battle being conducted.

Gotta disagree, unless you have an exceptionally "loose" definition of choosing when/where to fight. I mean if you consider making a decision something as simple as "okay, well this is absolutely gak...but we have to attack", I guess I'd agree with you?

There are thousands of examples of battles that were fought in poor or awful conditions because it was required by a time-table. Awful situations that no commander would ever "choose" to fight in, but they did not have a choice. Combat commanders frequently do not have the luxury of not attacking if the situation requires that they do in order to support a larger attack or save additonal lives, etc. If your enemy is sitting in a well fortified bunker surrounded by awful approaches but the continuation of your war effort dictates that you must remove that bunker - is that really what you'd consider a "choice"? Or is it simply the gak sandwich of which you're about to take a bite?

At the scale of conflict 40k games often depict, it is also more than likely that you often have two recon groups coming into contact with each other, someone starts firing and the escalation soon draws a nearby platoon or tank unit to aid them. Doesn't matter if the weather sucks or if the firefight starts at a swamp, if you have troops in there believing they cannot retreat and reinforcements are here soon, you have a skirmish at your hands.

Eh, I think it depends. I actually like the strategic initiative thing, but people are kinda being too iron with their interpretation of what that means.

A fight can absolutely happen in a swamp 'by accident'. Meeting engagements and bumbling across one another happen sometimes (seemingly more often in 40k lore) - usually with a prelude of reconnaissance elements skirmishing, as mentioned.

Another situation might be that an army was on the move, but sudden environmental changes (anything from the rain to the Necrons awakening under the world below) have caused it to halt in an unfavorable position. The foe, who now has an advantage, makes the tactical, not operational, decision to strike while the tanks are immobilized by mud or Necrons, for example. It wasn't a swamp before, but it is now, baby. Or a necron death field. Same thing.

To use an extreme example, nobody wanted to deploy solely infantry from unarmored Higgins boats onto open beach against entrenched machine gun bunkers protected by barbed wire and steep slopes.

If you, as the attacker in a wargame, were given the power to control your deployment and scenario conditions, you'd never accept Omaha Beach.

But all the things that created those conditions- the need to secure a landing site in Normandy meaning a beach assault was required, the failure of naval gunnery to destroy the defending emplacements, and the intended tank support sinking in rough waves or pulled off-course by currents- were either required by strategic conditions, or unknown until the tactical operation was already underway.

Lots of commanders have been forced to attack under unfavorable conditions. Lots of commanders haven't known just how unfavorable those conditions would ultimately be until battle was already committed. Lots of commanders didn't even realize they were attacking the bulk of the enemy force until it was already happening. Fog of war is a pain like that.

In a tactical wargame, where those strategic elements and Clausewitzian friction are beyond the scope of the battle, the easiest way to represent those factors is to just give neither player strong control over the engagement conditions. I think having randomized table setups is a good way to represent that, with the attacker getting a bit more control over deployment as in Elbows's system. I'm sure a player with an all-tank army would balk at being forced to play on an urban map, but then again, I doubt the 4th Panzer was very enthused about being sent into Stalingrad.

Anyways, if you're willing to share, Elbows, I'd really love to see what you've got for that deployment deck.

I'm not certain of that assessment. One of the two parties had to chose the spot and time to fight. If it's raining and it's a swamp, someone chose to fight in the rain and in the swamp for a reason. Otherwise, both parties would have declined engagement and there would be no fight.

I think there's a word for people who 'decline engagements' with a reasonable (or even unreasonable) amount of enemies, if you've seen any of this type of behavior your Commissar would like to know very much.