Warhammer Fantasy Battle / Age of Sigmar

[whitebeard]

Thanks a lot Whitebeard! The Sage of Igmar shall be one of my main storyline characters from now on!

You're welcome. But really, that was just too easy. So don't thank me!

Note: all characters are fictional and any semblance to real people or corporations is purely coincidental.

I think someone is going to call BS on that one.

[Big Bene]

Generally, this release has people looking at alternatives ...
... I can see lots of people not buying their new crap and moving over to other tabletop games, at least for a couple of years when they will come back to their senses (unlikely).

Should we move in? Could be the perfect time for a new, well done Tabletop ruleset. We could start a kickstarter...
Well, I'm dreaming...

1.) AoS flops spectacularly
2.) GW goes out of business
3.) IP is for sale
4.) MB buys rights to IP
You see where I'm going with this?
5.) All rights to both HeroQuest and the Warhammer world is in the hands of MB
6.) HeroQuest is revived
7.) Re-release of original packs
8.) Finally completion and release of dwarf and wizard pack
9.) I can die happy

Goblin King,
in fact yesterday evening I dreamed buying the Heroquest brand worldwide and reviving the sale. A new Hero, five to ten new cards, and two or three new quests written by a good storyline author, for the first three expansions. Or some monsters. With terrain that is either paper printable for free or in the deluxe variant it comes from Thantos.
Wouldn't cost more than a couple of millions.
Introduction of colored dices (not the stamped ones, but real ones) slowly, expansion by expansion.
Work together with Michael Moorcock for the Background so that GW couldn't piss on me even if they try hard.
Relaunch the Base Game with a little bit more modern models.
Find a compromise with Gamezones in order that they don't die, but afterwards don't do any move without my acceptance either.
My salary is not in that range, sadly.

It is not totally out of scope. We could do it.
Not remaking Warhammer, of course, but a decent strategy game.
Many people will look for an alternative now, and it may be the best moment in history for the introduction of something new and good. If we make it a kickstarter, we would not have to finish a complete system in a few weeks (as the effect won't last), but people would know that something is coming and join in.

A few thoughts about an "ideal" system:
- Take Warhammer as a base. Our target audience are Warhammer players unhppy with the developement, so it would be good they find something familiar.
- Include the things that were good in older Warhammer edititions but dropped out, such as tactical formations or flying troops.
- Reduce the nomber of dice rolls needed in a normal meele or shooting attack.
- Make it open for all miniature brands. Perhaps sometime we can produce our own (we have a few miniature producers in our ranks), but their use should never be mandatory.
- Make it eqsily adaptable for different scales.
- It should be as user-friendly as possible regarding the marketing. Capitalism is not a fight of seller vs. customer, as GW did it. The rightful interest to earn money from your work should be compatible with giving the fans as much value as possible for as little money as possible. So, I would make the rules downloadable for free, but sell a nice hardcover rulebook with additional art etc.
- Split the "morale" attribute into "morale" and "discipline". Many rolls for morale are really more for the willing to follow orders.
- Make the command chain a key concept. Troops should have "commands" attributed to them (markers?), with a certain chance they don't follow their orders, and under certain circumstance it should be diffcult to give new orders, in wich case they would fall back to a standard behavior.

[cornixt]

Kings of War and Warthrone are free and similar enough to Warhammer that they make for a good alternative if you decide not to stick with Warhammer itself (I'm sticking with 7th edition since I have most of the books from that era and never upgraded to 8th).

[mitchiemasha]

Did warhammer have a priority orders and no priority orders mechanic. Like a move half your army other player moves half. I've never played it but always found large armies on the table and a full turn on turn system quite silly. Having some kind of system like 3 turns before a complete rotation would drastically improve strategy. Battles would unfold so much more like the epic movie battles. Although HQ is a game about dice i'd be so much more into tabletop if it was focused on movement order choices rather than just bulk rolls.

[Goblin-King]

Nope... One player finishes his turn completely...

Let the dice hit the floor
Let the dice hit the floor
Let the dice hit the floor
Let the dice hit the floor
LET THE DICE HIT THE FLOOR
LET THE DICE HIT THE FLOOR
WAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRGH!!!

[Anderas]

Nothing stops you from implementing house rules. The most fun 40k game I had was with unit by unit movement.

[cynthialee]

a point by point movement system has a more realistic feel
formations reacting and counter reacting to each others every step makes for some great battle ground dynamics if you have the time to dedicate to the task

[cornixt]

I knew someone who misread the rules and did both player's movement, then both player's shooting, etc. Only after he went to the local GW did he realise. You could really speed up the game if both players did their actions simultaneously, although you'd need a level of trust that they wouldn't cheat on rolls. Not sure how charging would work though.

[Big Bene]

As much as I remember players take turn, but there are phases in every turn when the opponent has some actions (meele and magic?).

[Goblin-King]

That's right BB. In melee both sides fights, the order based on initiative. In the magic phase you can use dispel magic.