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I was thinking that instead of being tied to detachments, perhaps all infantry should basically act as a 'detchment' (melee section) regardless of size. A heavy cavalry charge historically would be smaller numbers against larger, but absolutely devastating but could get overwhelmed from the sides if they're not supported or had another unit tied up.

Currently detachments seem a bit too limited (and charging the detachment and destroying it first has the parent unit just sit there).

A frontal cavalry Charge never was a very good idea against an infantry line that didn't already crumble from the pure sight of it. As historian Bret Devereaux likes to say: a horse is not a battering ram

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
A frontal cavalry Charge never was a very good idea against an infantry line that didn't already crumble from the pure sight of it. As historian Bret Devereaux likes to say: a horse is not a battering ram

Probably more an issue with spears and pikes not beeing represented properly and some armies still calling their shooting phase after a single unit.

Old World Almanack put up a handful of narrative scenarios, free to download: https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/plbkgjgd/old-world-almanack-narrative-scenarios-for-the-warhammer-world-anniversary/

 Daba wrote:
Medieval armies focussed on cavalry because they got heavier, more elite and effective, and infantry were trained (not to mention knights in some areas also fought on foot a lot depending on circumstances). Ancients used cavalry mostly as a supporting element.

Also you had much smaller armies made up of "loyal" elite warriors rather than professional armies. Cavalry never wants to charge spears etc unless they are going to break - and thats a risky thing, having them cause fear would likely work as if the infantry does break before they reach them the cav would slaughter them.

On the other hand if you are riding a giant boar, a large Raptor, a gigantic rhinox or similar then your experience with spears may be very different and your chance of the enemy breaking and running is probably higher.

A small cavalry regiment outnumbered by infantry will be at a severe morale disadvantage even if they have a great charge - a 5 man cav unit frontal charging 20 goblins is going to be swarmed by survivors, it doesn't matter how effective they are. Hence flank charging being preferred.

Hmm - I think Goblins would just break and run, like most low level infantry if they even faced the charge - now a orc mob, or the undead or Lizardmen or High Elves, elite infantry in general would have the belligerence, discipline etc to stand and swarm them.

New border patrol rules is very nice, used to love playing that.

 Daba wrote:
Medieval armies focussed on cavalry because they got heavier, more elite and effective, and infantry were trained (not to mention knights in some areas also fought on foot a lot depending on circumstances). Ancients used cavalry mostly as a supporting element.

The transition to heavy cavalry happened much earlier; in the Middle & Late Roman empires, the elite combat unit stopped being the infantry, & instead became the cavalry. Not to mention the Parthians, Persians, & other steppe influenced powers, were heavy users of cavalry. Even in Alexander's Macedonian armies, & those of his successors, cavalry (especially heavy cavalry) took on increasing importance.

Damon.

 Olthannon wrote:
New border patrol rules is very nice, used to love playing that.

That's definitely the stand-out part of the release there, really great to see something official for army selection for 500 point games.

TOW is one of the most miniature intense games out there so having a 500 point goal to aim towards is really important, it's got me thinking about designing lists around that format, since I loved playing 6th, but sold off my armies a long time ago.

I notice a lot of local events settle for 1500 out of recognition that it's a lot easier for people to achieve that than 2000+.

One thing GW has become smart on is officially supporting smaller format games AND providing rules for them.

They've always had small format game optoins, but they were often just watered down main game rules and were in the back of the book and were mostly "here's what we use for the demo game, but once you start playing you use the real rules now go get at least 1K worth of models to make the game work properly".


These days there are so many cheap options to get into the game and get playing. New armies, new players and esp younger players can all jump into things like Underworld, Killteam and so forth. Honestly I recall when I was growing up it didn't matter how keen you were - affording an army was tricky and getting games trickier still so you'd have to borrow models or team up with a friend and so on and so forth.


Honestly if Old World keeps doing well I'd 100% expect to see them get something Killteam/Warcry like come along - Mordhiem would be the best marketing wise but as they've gone earlier in the timeline it could well be "It's Mordhiem in all but name" type game

Mordheim is set before Old World, so I don't see any issues with resurrecting it as-is.

Mordheim even gets name-checked in one one of the rulebook's sidebars, as a place under quarantine that still has fortune-seekers delving into.

 Olthannon wrote:
New border patrol rules is very nice, used to love playing that.

What Border Patrol rules?

500pt army rules in the first of the scenarios on Warcom:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/plbkgjgd/old-world-almanack-narrative-scenarios-for-the-warhammer-world-anniversary/

The link seems to be kaput for the pdf.. any chance anyone got the pdf before GW deleted it?

SnotlingPimpWagon wrote:
The link seems to be kaput for the pdf.. any chance anyone got the pdf before GW deleted it?

It's still right there. You just have to click the image that says "DOWNLOAD SCENARIOS", which takes you to the downloads section of the site, where all 3 pdfs are still posted, undeleted.

https://assets.warhammer-community.com/eng_tow_seize_the_tower_anniversary_scenario_feb25-wzoisw1jzg-kp9mlw8kwu.pdf

 Rihgu wrote:

SnotlingPimpWagon wrote:
The link seems to be kaput for the pdf.. any chance anyone got the pdf before GW deleted it?

It's still right there. You just have to click the image that says "DOWNLOAD SCENARIOS", which takes you to the downloads section of the site, where all 3 pdfs are still posted, undeleted.

https://assets.warhammer-community.com/eng_tow_seize_the_tower_anniversary_scenario_feb25-wzoisw1jzg-kp9mlw8kwu.pdf

Thank you for the direct link, mate, for some reason it took me to “this page doesn’t exis” part of their website..

We are doing 1,500 tournaments here too

The Squarebased podcast TOW survey results are in with some interesting numbers, more than 4,000 respondents. Obviously slanted due to exposure/audience etc etc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vz5S-t8aW8s

For those disinclined to watch, a poster on reddit made a breakdown

Nice to know Total War had such an impact.

One day we'll have Total War 40k... one day.

40K is in a terrible spot right now imo. Night and day difference between the two games - one encourages customization and kit bashing. The other downright prohibits it. Not to mention the rules…

It's very promising to see how well the High Elves have sold. Nearly everything barring the battalion, books, reavers and a few others are temporarily out of stock. It gives me hope for future support of the model range. Very happy it's back I must say.

 RustyNumber wrote:
The Squarebased podcast TOW survey results are in with some interesting numbers, more than 4,000 respondents. Obviously slanted due to exposure/audience etc etc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vz5S-t8aW8s

For those disinclined to watch, a poster on reddit made a breakdown

Very interesting.

I guess in the end it depends on your local numbers.

Locally we used to have a great WHFB atmosphere. Historically lots of players. TOW bombed, maybe 1 game per month, tops, at the LGS.

At the same time, historically very few Epic players (scale seems unpopular). I thought LI was DoA without any kind of doubt. It turns out lots of players at the LGS.

Doesn't make any sense looking back at the previous times.

Makes sense it’s more popular in Europe than the states, they got castles and stuff there. Entire medieval history had its pages written there.

Separately - very happy to learn from watching the survey video they are gonna be at adepticon. I’ll be there with a few buddies and look forward to hopefully meeting the square based guys. I enjoy their channel very much.

 nathan2004 wrote:
Makes sense it’s more popular in Europe than the states, they got castles and stuff there. Entire medieval history had its pages written there.

Separately - very happy to learn from watching the survey video they are gonna be at adepticon. I’ll be there with a few buddies and look forward to hopefully meeting the square based guys. I enjoy their channel very much.

And 40k is more popular in the US because they have NFL guys with huge shoulder pauldrons Explaining stuff is easy.

The main selling point of Warhammer was that it is european history with fantasy elements

For anyone not familiar with that part of history it doesn't really connect the same way

 kodos wrote:
The main selling point of Warhammer was that it is european history with fantasy elements

For anyone not familiar with that part of history it doesn't really connect the same way

I had no idea. As a european I newer got the historical aspects of orcs, high/dark elves, chaos warriors and daemons, beastmen, skaven, lizardmen, and even the Undead was just a fun blend of 70s horror movies rather than acual folklore. I guess Dwarfs and Elves can be said to beloning to some kind of myth/folklore. But I suppose the things I percive as "classic tolkienesque fantasy" with a heavy dose of Moorcock is actually built on some kind of europeean history.

But how come DnD got popular in the US? Its the same basic world, generally speaking.

Well Lizardmen are based on the Aztec ideas and elements.

But yes predominantly Warhammer Fantasy started being based heavily on European themes and ideas coupled to Tolkien fantasy which was also European in focus. You even had one or two almost historical armies squeezed in there from the Perry Twins (eg Bretonnia which is a mix of French and Arthurian ideas)

That said I was always under the impression that the USA leaned heavily into European Fantasy tropes and ideas a LOT. Or at least above other fantasy settings such as African, Asian and so forth.

I suspect the fact is that way back when fantasy was at its height GW was more UK/EU focused than it is today. It took time for them to start properly spreading stores in the USA and the USA is bonkers vast so its very easy to have a game be really popular in one state and not in three .

Just find it hard to believe that "its based on europeean history" was a selling point for the tabletop game.
It is probably a big part of why the setting have survived and still work for a lot of people that get in to the "Empire" aspects and lore of the game. Especially now that The old World actually focus on "the old world" part of the world map. And certainly a big part of the RPG.

 Mr Morden wrote:
Also you had much smaller armies made up of "loyal" elite warriors rather than professional armies. Cavalry never wants to charge spears etc unless they are going to break - and thats a risky thing, having them cause fear would likely work as if the infantry does break before they reach them the cav would slaughter them.

Yeah no, the elite warriors thing was only the case in feudal gakholes. Centralized states, going back into antiquity, were able to field much larger and more professional armies. Greeks, Romans, Persians, Chinese were routinely fielding armies bigger than that of whole dark ages Europe put together no problem. Byzantines (and other misc, less well known attempts like Hungarian or Russian state infantry, or even Turks with their various auxiliaries) would be offended at suggestion such primitive organization was norm.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
A frontal cavalry Charge never was a very good idea against an infantry line that didn't already crumble from the pure sight of it. As historian Bret Devereaux likes to say: a horse is not a battering ram

And he is completely wrong about it, because it heavily depends on said cavalry and charge target. If said cavalry has lances, chances are they will go straight through whatever they charge, there are hundreds of examples of Persian/Byzantine Kataphraktoi or medieval knights/gendarmes doing just that, barring field fortifications or bad terrain. Even infantry having pikes does not guarantee anything, Polish hussars pulled off dozens of charges even against pike and shot formations up to 1700s (Battle of Kircholm, anyone?). Hell, even lighter lancer cavalry can be devastatingly effective agains anything up to modern and semi-modern guns and artillery, as long as it's used competently (say, in 1800s Polish lancers of Napoleon pulled off cavalry charge against Spanish infantry with artillery support dug in narrow mountain pass in Battle of Somosierra, pretty much the worst circumstances for cavalry possible).

The horse is not a battering ram only when it's commanded by idjits, like say the clowns who ordered the charge of Light Brigade alongside Russian trenches turning it into a turkey shoot. But that's skill issue, not fault of horses

 nathan2004 wrote:
40K is in a terrible spot right now imo. Night and day difference between the two games - one encourages customization and kit bashing. The other downright prohibits it.

Care to enlighten us how 40K prohibits kitbashing? Is it by doing weekly articles on WC with really nice kitbash examples? Is it by getting rid of idiotic rules minutia like power knives having different rules than power stilettos or power daggers (I wish I was joking, alas I am not) forcing you into really rigid, unfun for both modelling and converting gak ten times harder than necessary if you wanted to show your opponent basic courtesy and show what your army is equipped with without constant reminders?

I find kitbashing and modelling in 10th is vastly easier than it was for past four editions, simply because you can use whatever you find cool instead of worrying what gak is in rules and what the opponent will say. I recall building Leviathan terminator captain recently and recalling what massive chore it would be in 6th to 9th (go over all terribly written melee options, mathhammer the worst ones out and picking whatever not terribly looking option was left), in 10th it's just 'Relic Power Fist' so I just slapped converted power fist with lightning claws on, something that both fits fluff of my chapter and what hilariously enough wasn't even an option in the gak rules writing of last 15 years!

I find it really hilarious how you can look at TOW rules with 'light weapon' being the exact same thing as generic 'power weapon' is now in 40K and somehow think one is doubleplusgooder and the other unminusgoodest. Mental gymnastics much?

 BorderCountess wrote:
Mordheim is set before Old World, so I don't see any issues with resurrecting it as-is.

I sincerely doubt they'd have the restraint necessary to leave it as-is. Even the original creators have rethought and recontextualized their relationship to the material(eg, Tuomas' "oh no I always intended for the deep dark secret in the Sisters' basement to be Sigmar reincarnated in the body of a girl who would have a mini-End Times anime showdown with Be'lakor, they're the definitive unironic goodies of the story, I just never even remotely hinted at such a thing in the material itself for...um...reasons" take he started talking about a few years back) and probably had a lot of ideas over the years about the gameplay, so even if GW were to bring them back to oversee a new version it's going to be substantially changed and probably not for the better. Not to mention that an active GW product means GW Legal's Eye of Sauron will turn its eye upon all the third party creators and the compilation websites hosting all the materials for the old version of the game, almost certainly to their detriment and thus ours.

Mordheim was lightning in a bottle. It was the right team making the right product at the right time and is rightly regarded as a classic by most, so even more than Necromunda any new version would lack much of what made the original so appealing even if they managed to avoid completely Flanderizing it in the same way. It's the one Specialist Game that almost never has any issues getting a local community going, the system is "solved" to the extent that there are pretty common sets of houserules for dealing with its flaws and everyone knows what warbands to avoid or take special care with in what scenarios, and there's enough supplementary and fan content that you could run a group every weekend for a decade and never have exactly the same experience twice. It doesn't need GW, and nothing GW can offer it would outweigh the probable damage.

I hope they never go near it again.