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 pancakeonions wrote:
We still don't know much about the planned WFB rank-and-file game, do we?

I wonder if they might opt to keep round bases, while introducing trays like A Song Of Ice And Fire miniatures game? (large rectangular trays with holes for round, individually based models, for those who don't know ASOIF). I recently discovered this game, and it's absolutely fantastic - but I'm missing my 'high fantasy'. What kept me away from ASOIF initially was that it's (mostly) an all-human focus, very few monsters and no elves/dwarves/etc.

But the off board machinations of your non combat units and the cardplay of ASOIF are just genius, and make it so fun and interesting relative to other wargames I've played. It feels a bit like Deadzone (a little) or maybe the way 40K might play (with strategems, but I've not played 40K in a long time). I sure hope they're able to integrate these more "modern" gameplay elements, as they've really made table top wargaming much more fun, IMO!

The very first thing they ever told us about the game is that it will be square - not round - bases.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

 Eilif wrote:
Back in the day a RPGer could visit the FLGS and compare blister packs from WHFB, Reaper and likely a couple other games /companies to choosing their fantasy minis. Citadel always came at a premium but not outrageously so. GW has abandoned that market. Today a well stocked FLGS will have a plethora of fantasy minis on offer for less than 10 bucks, but they won't be GW.

This was the "gateway drug" for my gaming group. Citadel Miniatures were often very affordable, especially when you wanted the party to face more than one monster (say a dozen orcs). Over time, we started thinking about having our "lord-level" characters build retinues and wage bigger battles, and for all its faults, WHFB was far superior to the old TSR Battlesystem.

How much that still applies I'm not sure, but some of the new fantasy kits could be "boss monster" types and therefore worth a premium price tag.

It's a stretch these days, especially with Reaper offering multiple sculpts many of the baddie minions in the Bones line.

The boss monster scenario is possible if you have a particularly deep pocketed GM. However, I think it's far more likely that when in need of a big baddie, they will reach for a Bones or Deep Cuts figure for 1/4 the price.

 Rihgu wrote:

 pancakeonions wrote:
We still don't know much about the planned WFB rank-and-file game, do we?

I wonder if they might opt to keep round bases, while introducing trays like A Song Of Ice And Fire miniatures game? (large rectangular trays with holes for round, individually based models, for those who don't know ASOIF). I recently discovered this game, and it's absolutely fantastic - but I'm missing my 'high fantasy'. What kept me away from ASOIF initially was that it's (mostly) an all-human focus, very few monsters and no elves/dwarves/etc.

But the off board machinations of your non combat units and the cardplay of ASOIF are just genius, and make it so fun and interesting relative to other wargames I've played. It feels a bit like Deadzone (a little) or maybe the way 40K might play (with strategems, but I've not played 40K in a long time). I sure hope they're able to integrate these more "modern" gameplay elements, as they've really made table top wargaming much more fun, IMO!

The very first thing they ever told us about the game is that it will be square - not round - bases.

This exact exchange will happen once a month until release, and wouldn't shock me if it takes place AFTER the release.

Asoiaf is too much of board/card game. It's not more "modern" it's a different beast altogether.

GW already had this style of bases for War of the Rings, and as this game did not work out well for GW I doubt to go back to it
as in general to a system were you would use the majority of models from a different gaming system, like GW has no problem that people use the models from a small game to get into the main game, but don't want people to play the small game without buying the dedicated models

yet if we see a different size of square bases, well last Edition of Warhammer did not have a fixed size at all and old armies are still playable of the new standard is 28mm instead of 20/25mm (and GW for sure will use some strange number to make 3rd party stuff incompatible)

 pancakeonions wrote:
We still don't know much about the planned WFB rank-and-file game, do we?

I wonder if they might opt to keep round bases, while introducing trays like A Song Of Ice And Fire miniatures game? (large rectangular trays with holes for round, individually based models, for those who don't know ASOIF). I recently discovered this game, and it's absolutely fantastic - but I'm missing my 'high fantasy'. What kept me away from ASOIF initially was that it's (mostly) an all-human focus, very few monsters and no elves/dwarves/etc.

Square bases definitely, not square movement trays with round holes for round bases. That's been officially confirmed I think, already more than a year ago.

 pancakeonions wrote:

But the off board machinations of your non combat units and the cardplay of ASOIF are just genius, and make it so fun and interesting relative to other wargames I've played. It feels a bit like Deadzone (a little) or maybe the way 40K might play (with strategems, but I've not played 40K in a long time). I sure hope they're able to integrate these more "modern" gameplay elements, as they've really made table top wargaming much more fun, IMO!

They haven't given any detail on rules yet, except they said it's going to be covering rules from all "wargamey" editions so far (3rd-8th E.).

That does not necessarily mean it will use the good old IGYG mechanic, but it's highly probable. It would surprise me if they used something else, like the card activation in ASOIAF. But we will find out in a few months from now I guess.

I'm starting a fantasy orc army and want try and make it game agnostic as far as I can. Round bases with trays sounds good to me. This also means I don't neccessarily have to have 20 dudes to rep a unit of 20; I can put 15 on an appropiately sized base. I beleive this is done in Kings Of War.

I had some Marauders picked up from an AOS auction that I was running in one of my Chaos movement trays. No issues.

 PaddyMick wrote:
I'm starting a fantasy orc army and want try and make it game agnostic as far as I can. Round bases with trays sounds good to me. This also means I don't neccessarily have to have 20 dudes to rep a unit of 20; I can put 15 on an appropiately sized base. I beleive this is done in Kings Of War.

When I made my fantasy rules (link in sig), I generally followed GW's lead on bases, but noted that players could use whatever worked best for them, including round ones (though the game uses ranks). In the section on how to build your own units, I pointed out that bigger bases mean less potential models in contact, so larger infantry bases got a slight discount. For monster and cavalry models, this was factored into their base cost.

Design-wise, I wouldn't expect much of a change simply because it would be too much effort. One could argue that GW's biggest revisions are usually on the army lists rather than core rules mechanics. By that I mean that units (and factions) rise and fall not based on changes to combat or movement mechanics, but how GW decides to distribute special rules.

I'll be interested to see if this game also adheres to the current three-year cycle. If it does, that's even more reason for them not to create too much innovation.

At this point I think the old game has fractured too far in terms of base sizes and model scale for all parties to be brought back together. I do not believe that the new Saurus are going to rank up* on a 25mm base, and I also don't think GW are going to expand their stock to reintroduce every old kit. I also don't think or want base sizes to get bigger, both for the pain of rebasing old armies and also for the visual spectacle of closely-ranked regiments.
The simplest solution to me seems to be going Kings of War/Warmaster where units have a 'footprint', potentially made up of smaller movement trays, and you just fit as many models as you want. Neatly avoids any compatability issues with their older models and new lines existing in the same space.

*For the average/new gamer, at least. I'm sure there is someone out there who's going to get 10 overhanging in every arc in one specific orientation...

GW will not introduce new ranges for Chaos and Lizardmen or Vampire counts after their fairly recent releases in AoS.

So considering the scale creep that has been going on, they either have to use bigger bases alongside these new sculpts or use movement trays. Is there any other option that comes to mind?

 BertBert wrote:
GW will not introduce new ranges for Chaos and Lizardmen or Vampire counts after their fairly recent releases in AoS.

So considering the scale creep that has been going on, they either have to use bigger bases alongside these new sculpts or use movement trays. Is there any other option that comes to mind?

Yeah, the most obvious option is the new Chaos, Lizardmen and "VC" won't be in TOW at all.

There is wiggle room in "we're bringing back square bases." As I recall there wasn't any elaboration. Personally I'm hoping they will abstract the number of models in a unit, so you can have a decently large battle without having to buy, build, and paint a painfully large number of models. And it would make the game accessible for AoS players without require them to rebase their armies; they could just buy GW branded movement trays for £39.99 a pop (other brands are available).

I'm not a fan of AoS or the current editions of 40k, Kill Team, and Necromunda, so I'm not hugely optimistic that the game will be to my taste. (LotR is better designed imo but still has serious creep in the army rules.) I haven't heard who's designing it, and if they were bringing in a bunch of the old guard for a complete nostalgia edition I would have expected an announcement to that effect by now.

I think they chose a solid setting date but the emphasis on 5 factions (was it 5?) per army makes it look like 40k-style 'you can play Cadians, Catachans, Mordian Iron Guard, Armageddon Steel Legion, or Deathkorps, and this gives an armywide bonus but nothing weird or wonderful". I find that giving a list of options like that constrains the imagination rather than inspiring it to just come up with something.

GW tried their best to make AOS models incompatible with rank and flank WHFB.

They stopped selling square bases in most of the kits while at the same time newer kits were impossible to rank up without heavy conversion. They told WHFB players "we don't want your business" with their model designs.

How do you undo that? The bases would have to be huge because the models got bigger and the poses got more animated. A small base size increase is possible because it was needed anyway, but it still won't be enough for those models.

It's possible they were intentionally misleading about the announcement of squares and this is going to be AOS on movement trays or a Mantic clone but that seems like a recipe for failure. Anyone who likes AOS already buys the models.

Goose LeChance wrote:


Yeah, the most obvious option is the new Chaos, Lizardmen and "VC" won't be in TOW at all.

Didn't seem very obvious to me, but now that you've mentioned it, I wouldn't put it past GW.

Yeah to be clear I said "new" as in the new sculpts. I don't think there will be any official support with base size or rules design to accommodate new AOS models. If someone wants to convert that's on them.

Like others have said they might release an index of old armies to get people involved. Assuming it doesn't FLOP maybe there will be new models down the line that are appropriate for ranking.

-Starter box with new models
-legacy armies viable
-????

...Or something completely different because all the info they've been sharing for years is vague and useless

 PaddyMick wrote:
I'm starting a fantasy orc army and want try and make it game agnostic as far as I can. Round bases with trays sounds good to me. This also means I don't neccessarily have to have 20 dudes to rep a unit of 20; I can put 15 on an appropiately sized base. I beleive this is done in Kings Of War.

Kings of War has a defined unit base size and a defined unit tray footprint size. However, they don't have individual model removal and they really don't care how many figures you have on a unit tray or. Even "PMC" (Preferred Model Count) -which is their recommended minimum number of figures per unit- isn't really enforced.

I've got a KoW army that pretty closely adheres to WHFB and KOW square base and unit sizes. The army I'm currently working is on 25mm rounds and not nearly full size units.

Goose LeChance wrote:
GW tried their best to make AOS models incompatible with rank and flank WHFB.

They stopped selling square bases in most of the kits while at the same time newer kits were impossible to rank up without heavy conversion. They told WHFB players "we don't want your business" with their model designs.

How do you undo that? The bases would have to be huge because the models got bigger and the poses got more animated. A small base size increase is possible because it was needed anyway, but it still won't be enough for those models.

It's possible they were intentionally misleading about the announcement of squares and this is going to be AOS on movement trays or a Mantic clone but that seems like a recipe for failure. Anyone who likes AOS already buys the models.

How do they undo it? You know that they were letting Revell run off new copies of Assault On Black Reach models, right? The old molds still exist, and all that needs happen is to press and box.

Sure they can resell anything.

Point is the two model lines are incompatible, GW did everything they could to make sure of it. They're gonna have to pick sides. I couldn't care less about fluff or Cathay and I don't want this to be AOS. We need real info about the game because it's a whole lot of nothing right now.

The only precedent for "backwards compatible" army lists was Ravening Hordes, which remains the single greatest rules supplement GW ever produced. Yes, Bretonnians weren't happy, but overall it hit that sweet spot between brevity, scope and balance.

I've said this before, but when making the sample (or if you like, "WHFB conversion") army lists for Conqueror, I often turned to the 5th ed. books for flavor and feel, but Ravening Hordes was my road map.

Maybe lighting will strike twice?

My main hope for WH:TOW is that it'll release with a 6e Ravening Hordes or 40K 8e Indices style set of full army lists for all the factions.

I want this not to play TOW, but in hopes that it will inspire Patreon STL creators to do their own takes of the army lists in the gap before GW puts out minis, to provide alternate poses and new variety to my existing collections. I have no doubt in GW's ability to somehow make the rules less fun in a new iteration, and make new models in flailing poses leaping off tactical rocks supported by ribbon-thin blades of plastic grass.