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Spawned off an AOS discussion but can represent any fantasy game.

Basically - how heroic do you like your fantasy?

Do you like your fantasy 5th ed whfb style where heroes on dragons were the center point and could wreck entire armies by themselves? Do you enjoy heroes that really don't need armies and can rack up a kill count in the hundreds by themselves Dynasy Warrior style? Do you enjoy your wizards to single handedly purple sun an entire army off the table?

Do you like your fantasy to actually need the armies that are on the table? Where you command massive numbers of troops and coordinate them to victory through maneuver and tactics as opposed to blunt force trauma inflicted by heroes?

Where abouts do you sit on the threshold?

First off, I know you personally don't like hero hammer but the way you have worded it is really abrasive towards those that do.

Anyways, in power-scale terms I like the way it is done in AoS for the most part. The thing is that heroes, even/especially ones on monsters, will generally die 1v1 against an equivalent unit of non-hero(s). The ones that don't are generally the ones that simply need point increases. Yeah, it is unrealistic, but it is fun and it cuts down on the number of models on the table. The latter in particular is a big benefit that is easy to forget. There is a matter of practicality involved when it comes to heroes/monsters/elites.

That element also bleeds into what is used and thus what is perceived when it comes to imbalanced unit options. Overpowered heroes, monsters, and elite units are quickly found out, spammed, and abused to create 'herohammer' while swarmy units that are as much or even more overpowered only a faction of the exploitation. Spamming the board with 200 plague monks has been a tourney-viable strategy since first edition but does not get done because no one wants to actually deal with that. 60-man blobs of grot stabbas are among the strongest units in Gloomspite yet people often only run one (if that). And so on.

As I indicated in the other thread, I like a bit of both. This is a fantasy setting, not a medieval one. The idea of a powerful warrior going against 100 men or whatnot (not literally being able to kill 100 models of course) is the stuff of legends and is damn cool. And even battles in the ancient world often came down to duels between commanders, with the victorious commander's forces routing the other as morale is shattered watching their hero fall before the enemy. It shouldn't be like a medieval/renaissance era force where your commanders are safely tucked in the back giving orders but not fighting themselves.

However, when that's all there is, it becomes a problem as in 5th edition WHFB. I played that edition and very much remember "HeroHammer" where your kitted out Lord on Dragon could mulch through the enemy army and most of the time games ended in a duel between heroes (cool) where the army that won had no opposition and easily won the game (not cool). That is too extreme and I have not-so-fond memories of a nasty Bretonnian player doing just that (Bretonnia could have a larger allotment of heroes than other armies at the time) and having like two minimum squads of archers hiding in the woods while a massively OP lord on dragon steamrolled the enemy in a 1000 point multi-week tournament that made everyone but me quit in disgust (I made one attempt in the finals to kill him with a Vampire Lord casting a total power Hand of Dust spell, but didn't roll enough damage. So he won and I came in 2nd place by default since literally everybody else dropped out)

I think there should be a mix, but getting the balance of that mix is the hardest part.

Well a dragon riding hero cant wreck armies if theres no armies to weck.. I do like my dragon riding heroes. Cenrtainly there needs to be balance. but a dragon plowing into a phalanx of infantry is what fantasy is made for, at least in my books.

Well for me it depends entirely on context.

For a 28mm wargame - or really a wargame at any scale - I don't want to put down my army of models and then take half of them off the table next turn because the one enemy lord just charged into them and smote them to nothing. I want lords and leaders to have power yes, but when they become a standard feature of one-man armies it can feel a little boring and disgruntling and feel like there's no point putting down the rest of the army. For a tabletop wargame this is a bad thing because those models are just as big a money and time sink as the leader - if not much more so. So seeing all those other fun big investments wiped out by one lord isn't fun. It also doesn't become fun even when you've got your own because then the game feels much like there wasn't any point putting down the army and you might as well have just put down the lords/leaders.

That said give me a 15mm and I've no problem if a lord can wipe out a whole rank and file unit because chances are you've got 10 or 20 of them on the table per side. So they can appear far more "heroic Dynasty Warriors" style because the game board has much more to work with.



If you mean in games or books, stories or TV shows or the like then I favour neither approach. BOTH are great fun in their own ways. Right now in reading I'm focusing more on adventuring with Gotrek and such, so a lot of "one mighty darn grumpy hard to kill dwarf". So very much on the heroic scale. I've also loved Malazan book of the Fallen where you've got equally heroic style heroes rubbing shoulder with grizzled grunt troops. Then there's something suitably low fantasy like Game of Thrones. etc...


In the end Wargames on tabletop have more restrictions because of the time and money that you put into the whole army. You can still have powerful heroes, just not totally at the cost of devaluing all the infantry too (which is partly why I dislike the current slaanesh book because infantry/troops/monster/sanything not a leader is very devalued at present for a powerful list). That said with proper balance you can have an army of 3 or 4 models go against an army of 200 skaven and have it fun for both sides - one side wiping out rank after rank, the other taking heavy losses, but at the same time able to have the chance to overwhelm their opponent and drown them in attacks.

First off, I know you personally don't like hero hammer but the way you have worded it is really abrasive towards those that do.

Thats something I find fascinating with people.

I reviewed what I wrote and I can find nothing where I feel I am being abrasive, but through the power of text and lack of context or voice or facial expressions etc... some people may view it as abrasive when thats just how I talk (and therefore write)

In my gaming (War or RPG), I prefer a low-fantasy setting.......

 auticus wrote:
I reviewed what I wrote and I can find nothing where I feel I am being abrasive

That's part of the problem.

Without prior context, to me auticus does not seem abrasive in this matter, so that might be partially on the readers, too.

On topic, however, on my part I enjoy the grittier side of fantastical. Historically inspired, rough and dirty yet phantasmagoric and vivid in its imagery. Served with a side of heavy metal and we're there, like lots of classic GW art did (especially around 2000 or so, when we got out of the retro phase but hadn't yet stumbled into the soulless plastic repro art used today). This manifests more clearly on the literary side as well as RPG's where I can enjoy a giant, sprawling fantasy-effin-Vietnam campaign setup of pulp adventurers eking out a living in the horrors of "Europe in the 1400's with death magic and unicorns" or dying in droves trying, which then lends a hand to a more deconstructive view of fantasy heroism: characters aren't born heroes, they may become such through extraordinary feats of daring and sacrifice though most are bound to fall on the way. Heck, just counting the times our OSR-D&D group has managed to get their comrades killed by mishandled molotov cocktails while fighting sewer rats gets out of hand

Funnily enough, on miniature side, I have a much higher tolerance for fantasy heroism. I like games where commanders are just humans with command skills, but I also like it when my supercharged magic frog grannies call heavens down on massed ranks of gleaming spears before their dragon lord swoops in to burninate half of my line. Balancing troops and heroes should tilt towards troops being more important, but allowing heroes to be somewhat larger than life at the same time. I quite liked the relation troops and heroes had in Fantasy Battle's 6th edition (cheesing aside), where a singular captain would be run down by a regiment through numbers alone, but a captain bolstering a regiment of their own would often tip a 1 vs 1 fight of unit blocks where you needed it.

 EnTyme wrote:

 auticus wrote:
I reviewed what I wrote and I can find nothing where I feel I am being abrasive

That's part of the problem.

Not really my problem no, i can only clarify things if asked. I dont have these issues anywhere else and i communicate the same way in all things. If you and I were to meet up at Adepticon and you didn't know who I was, and we had a discussion and I talk exactly how I post, I am willing to bet you wouldn't have a problem with me at all because you wouldn't be carrying your bias that I'm auticus, the guy that doesn't like the game that you do for reasons that you don't agree with, and therefore you wouldn't assume that the things I am saying are meant to be personal attacks or what not that you'd be offended by, because you wouldn't be offended without that bias of knowing that I don't like the game you do for reasons you don't agree with.

Also with face to face conversation you wouldn't be assuming the tone of my voice in your head to be a sneering comic book guy knock off because of the bias mentioned above.

I started WHFB in 4th and it was great to be able to get a couple of really powerful heroes and a smattering of units and have it as a full army but as time went on I found it less and less satisfying. In 6th my main armies are DoW and O&G and whilst I do max out the hero slots they are generally not capable of anything much at all (wyvern boss and scroll caddie aside) and I do prefer it that way.

I like a beatstick HQ on the table, but in the fluff I prefer a hero who can be gunned/chopped down by enemy infantry if outnumbered, wounded, out of position, unlucky etc. A story has more tension if you know one of the named good guys can die to ork boyz with shootas or the talons of a hormagaunt.

Low fantasy for me, definitely, when given a choice.

 auticus wrote:

First off, I know you personally don't like hero hammer but the way you have worded it is really abrasive towards those that do.

Thats something I find fascinating with people.

I reviewed what I wrote and I can find nothing where I feel I am being abrasive, but through the power of text and lack of context or voice or facial expressions etc... some people may view it as abrasive when thats just how I talk (and therefore write)

This might explain why you only seem to game with hostile opponents. You are sabotaging yourself and not even realizing it.

Perhaps give How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie a read? (Really, it's a good resource for improving people skills.)

As outlined in the threat that spawned this one:
I have some expectations in a fantasy game, that being heroes which can perform above the level of a common soldier, monsters which genuinely feel monstrous, and magic that offers something beyond being just artillery with a different name.

That does not mean I want heroes that tank whole armies on their own, or magic that can eat a unit per turn. What I do want is a game that reflect fantasy is something more than history with elves and orcs.

If I take a 100-point hero, I expect him to provide utility roughly equivalent of 100pts of basic troops, be it in spells, combat, or some form of buff. If I take a combat hero, I want him to perform feats of arms, not kill 4 dudes where a normal unit leader can kill 2.

At the same time, I don't want 500-point heroes which can chew through a whole unit without any chance of stopping by the basic troops, because I realize it will ruin fun for the person that painted those 20 models and brought it to the table. It's a balancing act, but so is every aspect of game design.

I definitely don't want the situation as it was in WFB 6th ed, where the normal heroes had maybe 3 to 4 attacks that resulted in just as few casualties, and maybe provided +1Ld buff to the unit. But that partially was the fault of the system, which heavily promoted static combat-score fight resolution over actually killing things.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 auticus wrote:

First off, I know you personally don't like hero hammer but the way you have worded it is really abrasive towards those that do.

Thats something I find fascinating with people.

I reviewed what I wrote and I can find nothing where I feel I am being abrasive, but through the power of text and lack of context or voice or facial expressions etc... some people may view it as abrasive when thats just how I talk (and therefore write)

This might explain why you only seem to game with hostile opponents. You are sabotaging yourself and not even realizing it.

Perhaps give How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie a read? (Really, it's a good resource for improving people skills.)

The people that i personally game with are most certainly not hostile towards me or really anyone.

Cronch wrote:
As outlined in the threat that spawned this one:
I have some expectations in a fantasy game, that being heroes which can perform above the level of a common soldier, monsters which genuinely feel monstrous, and magic that offers something beyond being just artillery with a different name.

That does not mean I want heroes that tank whole armies on their own, or magic that can eat a unit per turn. What I do want is a game that reflect fantasy is something more than history with elves and orcs.

If I take a 100-point hero, I expect him to provide utility roughly equivalent of 100pts of basic troops, be it in spells, combat, or some form of buff. If I take a combat hero, I want him to perform feats of arms, not kill 4 dudes where a normal unit leader can kill 2.

At the same time, I don't want 500-point heroes which can chew through a whole unit without any chance of stopping by the basic troops, because I realize it will ruin fun for the person that painted those 20 models and brought it to the table. It's a balancing act, but so is every aspect of game design.

I definitely don't want the situation as it was in WFB 6th ed, where the normal heroes had maybe 3 to 4 attacks that resulted in just as few casualties, and maybe provided +1Ld buff to the unit. But that partially was the fault of the system, which heavily promoted static combat-score fight resolution over actually killing things.

That's funny, because I think a hero in that stature is about the right fit. A lone hero shouldn't be leaps and bounds better than their troops, they should inspire more than incinerate. Now, I do think that maybe Dragon type substances were handled poorly in 6th. I don't think they should have deleted units, but I think they should have maybe affected morale a bit more, or maybe made people -1 to hit because of the sheer terror of the enemy. Maybe D6 breath attack hits in combat as well? Not sure...

. A lone hero shouldn't be leaps and bounds better than their troops

So...he shouldn't be a hero then? That's kind of what heroes in fiction do, stand out from everyone else. Gilgamesh, Achilles, Roland, myriad other cultural heroes from our own myths and history, not to mention actual fantasy, they're all larger than life. Even if you take actual historical people, like Musashi or Simo Hayha, they all possessed skills that put them way ahead of their peers in terms of pure combat prowess. Then of course you have people who did inspire, like Alexander or Hannibal, who again, would be "too much" for the down to earth view on what heroes' role should be in game. What you, from my POV, want, is an army of mediocre soldiers led by mediocre officers, capable of nothing more than lukewarm encouragements. Anything more than that is "too much impact" on the blocks of mindless bodies duking it out.

This is where that divide I spoke about in my original post comes.

Some people want heroes to be going toe to toe with entire armies and be able to win.

Other people want heroes to be leaders of men and you have to control the army to win the battle as opposed to direct the handful of heroes into the enemy army to win.

Neither is wrong. They are both represented in fantasy fiction.

When 6th edition WHFB dropped there was a huge uproar for a few months on this very topic because people that liked the heroes to wade into armies by themselves couldn't do that anymore.

A lot of that has to do with not wanting to own and paint many models either, which is also understandable. Which is why today skirmish games (defined in this context as games that require a dozen models or so, not the skirmish formation) are the kings of the table in so many places.

No one so far seems to be talking about taking down entire armies on their own as their idea of heroic. It's just this strawman that people who want unrealistically weak characters decided to make to portray the other side as some sort of super-hero fans who want to field Superman and Thor on the tabletop.

Cronch wrote:
No one so far seems to be talking about taking down entire armies on their own as their idea of heroic. It's just this strawman that people who want unrealistically weak characters decided to make to portray the other side as some sort of super-hero fans who want to field Superman and Thor on the tabletop.

I guess thats a good place to start distinguishing.

My chaos lord in 5th edition DID kill entire armies by himself so thats my point of reference. As in single handedly tanked and killed entire armies by himself while the rest of my army watched or maybe pitched in a little here or there.

My opponents heroes largely did kill or do most of the damage to other armies with their heroes as well in 5th edition with the exception of certain armies like empire. The high elf, chaos, undead/vampire count, and bretonnian players that i was most familiar with in those days however were grossly in the kill category solely with their heroes. As that is my point of reference that is where I am going to be talking about.

In AOS, a lot of my games have had the kill count dominated by the heroes as well. My very last AOS game for example, I had a dual keeper of secrets list, and between those two and my exalted chariot hero, they made up for 100% of the kills. Thats not an every day occurrence obviously but its common enough where the heroes are slaying well over 60-70% of the casualties that to me thats a form of hero hammer and in some instances the heroes are tanking the entire army by themselves.

While no one is advocating specifically for that, the support for AOS that is on these boards leads me to believe that something close to what is the current in terms of heroic power is what is desired, which is pretty close to heroes taking on armies (and in fact with the Dynasty Warrior reference a few weeks back there are individuals on here calling for just that) specifically as a combination of preferred heroic fantasy setting where heroes are highly lethal against hordes of common foes, and as a vehicle to allow them to only need a handful of models given the choice between a single 200 point hero vs 15 models that form a 200 point unit.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I will also add that in whfb 6th you did have a version of hero hammer. My VC army was the bus of doom. Four vampire characters in a black knight regiment. It was gross, and the characters did most of the killing.

That army placed 5th at a GW GT out of 80 players. And the bus of doom configuration was in quite a few armies.

I run Stormcast, and none of the heroes I use are actually even close to that power level. Neither are my regular opponent's NH heroes. Slaanesh army is well known for being almost entirely hero-oriented, which is notable because of how unusual it is. There are *some* heros that can deal a lot of damage, but there are also some units that will maul a hero just as easy, this isn't proof of anything beyond GW's swingy game balance.

As for 6th ed, I've no doubt there were builds that emphasized heroes (VCs as you say, did rely on them a lot), but that was the outlier in that edition. And again, different perspective, I'm talking as a normal player, who played/plays at home and maybe at a club/store, not someone who treats the game as a competition. I fear your pov is alien to most people who might comment on it.

I don't think my perspective is alien. In fact I'd say of everyone I associate with or speak with online, that the people who play primarily at a store or club who treat the game as a competition are in the majority. That is not a small number either.

Polls on dakka have shown that as well that there are a large number of players that are competitive driven game-first.

In the "perfect game", it wouldn't matter.

One person could bring his seven dragon-riding samurai, because that's what he/she enjoys, the other brings ranks of spearman and crossbowman, and the game would still be "reasonably" balanced.

If people get squeezed into hero-hammer, that don't enjoy it, because it's more effective in the game, that'd be suboptimal. If people that enjoy kick-ass heroes are disadvantaged in the game for what they prefer, that'd be suboptimal.

I prefer low fantasy settings but granted while 6th was my favourite old-hammer edition I still loved things like the dragon riding elves and greater demons. So it is a hard balance to strike for me personally. For the game I prefer blocks of infantry and cavalry to be actually useful and not just be cheerleaders., but I understand that raises the issue of what dragon riders are supposed to be for. Just being a glorified buff bot is not enticing but them tanking/routing entire blocks isn't fun either.

Heroes should be heroic, but the games need to be designed in a way that makes it playable without being overbearing. A named hero should be able to take on a unit, maybe 2, but not an army. You definitely don't want situations like the old Confrontation 3.0/3.5, where you had 300 point battles as the standard game size, but some of the crazier heroes cost 400+ just by themselves and could literally take down an entire warband single handedly. It's great for RPGs, not great for miniature wargames.

Personal sweet-spot is that individual heroes are each about 150~300 points of a 2k army and have equivalent wounds/resilience/attacks of a group of 5 to 10 elite infantry. Ideally the scenarios are designed in such a way as to encourage a good mix of heroes, infantry, cavalry and monsters/artillery.

I tend to greatly dislike games where "heroes" are just regular dudes with with a bonus ability and an extra wound

 Castozor wrote:
I prefer low fantasy settings but granted while 6th was my favourite old-hammer edition I still loved things like the dragon riding elves and greater demons. So it is a hard balance to strike for me personally. For the game I prefer blocks of infantry and cavalry to be actually useful and not just be cheerleaders., but I understand that raises the issue of what dragon riders are supposed to be for. Just being a glorified buff bot is not enticing but them tanking/routing entire blocks isn't fun either.

I'd think, in that case, your dragon rider is likely the premier-level flanker, with the added bonus of also being a premier backfield raider. Depending on how you stat it, it might also be a good monster hunter. All that and it gets to be a pretty good counter-charger too.

Like Sunny Side Up said though, if you point things roughly balanced, it really shouldn't matter. If your supreme-absurd Chaos Lord can take out a while army, then it should cost as much as a whole army. If that Lord costs less, that's a balance issue really, no?

You get Hero-hammer if you subsidize Heros. You get more ranks and files if you subsidize those. If all things are "equal" you get what works better in the meta or better tactically/strategically. Or so it would seem to me.

Heroes, along with warmachines, magic items, and monsters, are why you would play in a fantasy (or space opera) setting, instead of just using historical (or hard sci fi) rules. In fantasy specifically, they help fill out and expand the classic rock/paper/scissors interaction of missile/infantry/cavalry on the battlefield. For much of history, missile troops countered melee infantry, cavalry countered missiles, and infantry countered cavalry. Most games treat war machines as extreme missile troops, super succeptible to light, fast units but having huge range and damage. Monsters, depending on their speed and maneuverability, could be either souped up infantry (Ogres/trolls/giants) super fast and/or flying light cav (eagles, pegasi, harpies) and mega shock cavalry (dragons).

Heroes are the ultimate wild card. Wizards can be mega missile troops that can hide in melee infantry, thus protected from cavalry. Souped up lords that are fast as cavalry but hit harder than infantry breaks the rhythm of the game. If a unit can maneuver like cav but has the resiliency and hitting power of infantry, than it can engage any unit.

the solution? It takes fine balancing. You want heroes to have an impact, but almost still play within the rules. So give things like dragons and other huge flying monsters some weakness, even articifial ones. First, power them so that they can't expect to win head on fights with infantry, they need to either flank or support. It's just really tough to find the point where they are worth buying, but not broken.

Where I draw the line is putting multiple deity level beings on the table. Nagash is BS and multiple Keepers of Secrets is BS and more.

Things like Celestant Prime/stardrake, a Mortarch, Prince Vhordrai, the big boss guy on Maw Krusha, single greater daemons. Those are cool. They're centerpiece models. They serve a narrative function as the ultimate leader of your dudes wherever they may be from.

Taking multiple centerpiece models might be fun for one to two houseruled monster mash type games but should be an exception not a rule.

The rule should be one only of a selection of the biggest dudes. It makes no sense for a bloodthirster and Skarbrand to show up to *every* battle, or 3 Keepers of Secrets or Nagash hell even Archaon. Stuff like that should be relegated to narrative events only, such as a desperate last stand, or a siege of a major strategic location.

"Regular sized" heroic characters aren't even worth really discussing because they fit perfectly into the roles they serve. Leaders and wizards that have utility and lead from within the ranks, force multiplying or shaping the momentum of battle, or otherwise serving as a beatstick on a mount that gets stuck in, beats up a couple units and eventually gets dragged down by regular infantry.

 auticus wrote:
I don't think my perspective is alien. In fact I'd say of everyone I associate with or speak with online, that the people who play primarily at a store or club who treat the game as a competition are in the majority. That is not a small number either.

Polls on dakka have shown that as well that there are a large number of players that are competitive driven game-first.

That, I am afraid, is self-selection. You associate with people who share the same beliefs as you, in this case, in competitive gaming. I associate with people who don't enjoy it as much. And then there's the overwhelming, silent majority of people who make up GW's massive bottom line, who don't interact online on forums, who never went to any tournament, and who only play at home or at the store.
If you compare the sales GW has to the fairly tiny tournament scene, it's clear that competitive is not the most popular way to play. It's the playerbase that interacts the most, checking meta and internet lists to copy or post on forums though, for obvious reasons.

That's beside the point of this thread though. I do think that the post which stated that

You get Hero-hammer if you subsidize Heros. You get more ranks and files if you subsidize those. If all things are "equal" you get what works better in the meta or better tactically/strategically. Or so it would seem to me.

describes the ideal situation best.