Within the hobby I think that 2015 will be looked upon as the year that everything changed.
For the first time we saw a major company blow up an established tabletop game that generated multimillion dollar revenue/sales. And with that action alienate a substantial part of their existing customer base.
Yes, an alternative game was produced as a replacement but let's just say that it wasn't like for like.
Now I understand the business explanations for why things had to change but I'm guessing that GW didn't expect what appears to be a full scale rejection of Age of Sigmar (small pockets of England, their vassal state Scotland excepted). Indeed, if it was not for the schilling of the game on what were Warhammer podcasts I think we would be watching a full scale train wreck.
But that's not the half of it. What I believe that GW didn't expect was the wholesale abandonment of the company. The genie has been well and truly let out of the bottle and long term customers are now casting their world weary eyes to greener pastures.
Games that previously never received more than a cursory look are now seeing major influxes of new players. Kings of War is obvious example but Bolt Action and Infinity are major winners as well.
And the level of ill-will GW has engendered is quite amazing in its escalating intensity.
This must eventually hit the bottom line. I use to buy White Dwarf every week and Warhammer Visions (old WD sub). That is $500 per year that they are no longer seeing. Similarly I used to buy the Horus Heresy novels and audiobooks from Black Library. Every army book was bought digitally as well as a physical copy.
My only purchase now is the occasional pot of Chaos Black paint. No more spraycans, no more flock, no new air brush paints etc. this from a customer who even on a bad year used to give them $3000.
I have fallen out of love with the company, their offering and their vision. It will take an awful lot for me to re-enter that fold.
I decided wanted to try out a mounted character in my Ratkin list. You have the opportunity to mount your Enforcer on a Fleabag. Here is my take on this:
Speed, robotics and razor sharp blades! What can go wrong?
My third game on Saturday was against Sam's Twilight Kin. Unfortunately I didn't take any photos. Not sure why as this was for me the most interesting game of the day.
The reason for this was that was the first time I had played a scenario other than Kill! And what a different game it makes. It certainly showed the weakness of the one dimensional list I had. Sam's list was very mobile - gargoyles and a Dragon - and I had nothing to engage them if they didn't want to be engaged. Without any ranged ability I was unable to shoot Sam's units off objectives where I couldn't engage them.
We had six objectives and at the end the score was 2-1 to Sam with three contested. If it had gone another two it would likely have been 2-0.
There were a couple of interactions that were interesting. My Slaves charged Sam's cavalry and I was able to do enough wounds to Rout them on a 10. Another Slave unit survived rolling snake eyes but this was no real impediment to Sam as with his shooting he only had to do another wound to ensure they broke. If it had occurred the other way around I would have had to engage them in Melee to break them.
So the upshot was it demonstrated clearly why scenarios are good for the game and why you need a balanced list to succeed at scenarios.
I'm looking forward to adding some capacity into my Ratkin for future games.
I had heard that the release of the expansion book "Uncharted Empires" was November 15.
Thinking this sounded awfully soon, I asked the question on the Mantic forum and was told by a retailer that this is indeed the expected date of release.
Apparently retailers pre-orders were by 15 October.
Not sure when we can expect to see it locally.
EDIT: Confirmed by Mantic blog post
Using the same list as before I played Lliam's Empire of Dust. This army had a Horde of archers, two catapults plus a lot of characters giving the "Surge".
My deployment was aimed at stretching him out as much as possible and then stacking one flank to hit the vulnerable part of his line. Again this was the right where a unit of Skelly Warriors and a catapult were on the end.
Here you see Lliam's setup. From the far end it is catapult - skellys - archer horde - catapult. Then we have his more elite troops.
My right flank - with all my heavy hitters. The Shock Troops are next to the Legion of Slaves.
I probed on the left with the Hackpaws hoping to distract him from the rest of my refused flank. They got outside his chariots who then turned and surged into them. Still this used up two turns total which stopped the chariots redeploying to the far side.
My Legion and Brutes hit the Warriors but bounced. Outside Hackpaws hit the flank of the Catapult. The Death Engine followed up behind with the Fiend.
The Bone Giant and Skellies finished off the Legion. I was able to get the Brutes and Death Engine into the Giant killing it but the Hackpaws were wavered two turns in a row and couldn't charge the Casket. Eventually I withdrew them to safety.
In my centre I stupidly had pushed the Shock Troops forward and they disappeared to ranged shooting.
Lliam brought his chariots into the centre to contact my Blight. Over two turns the Blight were able to see them off. Ensnare is a great ability!
At around this time my pics stopped. However the Tomb Guard came in and surged into the flank of the Brutes who survived. This allowed the Death Engine to hit them in the flank and with a Countercharge from the Brutes this was enough to rout them.
In the end the score was 775 - 525 in my favour. A small but hard fought win.
Given it is going to be my workhorse, this morning I had my Gamer's Edition KoW Rulebook spiral bound.
This provides a few advantages - easier to flick though, it sits flat and it stays open.
View it as a good investment for $6!
So my first game on Saturday was a rematch with the Dwarfs. I made a few small changes to the list I used in the first game.
My list was essentially:
So I've added some speed to the army at the cost of my Artillery piece and a Regiment of Shock Troops.
Rob's list was a gunline with two Hordes of guns, three artillery pieces, some brocks and hordes of Warriors and Regiment of De 6 warriors.
I decided to play a refused flank game and piled all my heavy hitters on the right. The Brutes, Fiend and Engine were backed up with Hackpaws, Vermintide and Spears. In the centre I left the Legion and the Shock Troops while rest of army on the left.
You can see Rob had one Horde and the De 6 guys opposite my stacked flank with one cannon.
As the game started I moved my centre back but at some point I had a brainfart and moved the Legion up where it was decimated by the Dwarf shooting.
Looking along my line on the left. The Blight are out of shot, then Hackpaws, Slaves and Shock Troops.
I went through the Dwarf left losing the Hackpaws and receiving 11 wounds on my Brutes (who then hid). The rest turned to move across the Dwarf lines.
One the left a standoff developed. The Blight with Ensnare are good at anchoring the line.
You can see the Ratkin monsters now behind the Dwarf lines - not great for the Dwarfs.
The Dwarf gun hordes have come forward to close with my lines and to escape the monsters.
I then used my Caterpillar Shock Troops to threaten the Dwarf guns.
The Monsters clean out Artillery and line up to hit the Dwarf guns.
And here we are at the end of Turn 6. I was hoping for a Turn 7 but it wasn't to be.
In the end I had killed 610 points to the 290 I lost. So revenge for the Ratkin!
As you can see I am still running a really restricted list, trying to get my head around rules, tactics before I add complexity. Old dog etc.......
Just a heads up for anybody planning the shift to Kings of War that local Mantic stockist Mighty Ape have just received new shipments of the rules - both versions.
I ordered a Gamers Edition last evening and have received notification that it is en route.
Given there is no Antipodean tax, it is nice to be able to support a local distributor - especially one with great customer service.
You can check out all their KoW wares at mightyape.co.nz
This Sunday - October 11 - the Kapiti Wargamers are having their annual swap meet.
It is at the Kapiti Community Centre in Ngahina Street, Paraparaumu, starting at 10.00am.
It's a good opportunity to pick up some bargains and fill holes in the ranks of your armies.
I love my gaming aids and so when I switched to KoW I knew that I needed to get the appropriate tokens to "enhance" my gaming enjoyment.
From my first game it was clear that you need clear wound counters - we used dice and as there are no spaces on trays (because you don't remove casualties) I was constantly picking up "wound" dice.
Using a horde army I also am likely to need a full range of numbers to reflect the larger unit size.
My first port of call was Mantic but there were no tokens in stock. I didn't particularly like the set available with the Kickstarter although it has a great price point.
In my search I found a set produced by Ironheart Artisans. These are made from 2mm acrylic plastic and are generally two coloured. This set cost USD50.00 so not cheap but I thought I'm only ever going to need one so I'd make the investment. You can get a set made from mdf which is cheaper.
Here you can see what you get.
To give you an idea of size the objective markers are similar in size to NZ $2 coin (a bit bigger than Oz $1 coin) and bigger than a US quarter.
The service turnaround from Ironheart was very good. The delivery took a week by tracked USPS post.
And as an added bonus when I opened my box they had included a LoS arc free.
Certainly recommend the company both for its product and its service.
You can access them on IronheartArtisans.com
One thing the Ratkin list has that wasn't in my Skaven was a Fast Cavalry unit. Now. Can see that such a unit would be very useful in a predominantly infantry horde list so decided to build a couple.
Unfortunately Mantic don't really have a suitable unit off the shelf. I suspect that the Fleabag Cavalry in the Gobbo list could be converted but until I saw the unit in the "flesh" I wouldn't know how much work it would entail.
Thankfully Forgeworld have a ready made proxy that can be used straight out of the box. The Skaven Wolf Rats.
I've used these before - as Sabretusks in my Ogre army - so know that they will fit straight in.
Like all FW non monsters it comes in a Clampack, all nicely sealed. There are however these strange oval bases included.
And here are the little blighters. Nicely detailed resin models totally in keeping with the scrawny, vicious aesthetic of the Ratkin. They are a multipart model and as you see from the feet you'll likely need to build up your base (far safer than trying to cut around toes).
So I have 10 Hackpaws. This is enough to have 2x Troops or one Regiment. I'll get them painted over the next week.
I managed to get my first game of Kings of War down at the Warlords yesterday.
Rob and I played 2000 points a side Dwarfs versus my Ratkin. I think this was Rob's third or fourth game so it was good to have someone who had played to talk me through the rules.
My list was the Ratkin I posted on the blog the other day. Here's a series of pics to give you an idea of how it looked.
This was my battleline coming forward. Unsure of what I was doing I focussed on full court press.
The Legion of Tunnel Slaves saw off two units of Berzerkers. Unfortunately the Mutant Rat-Fiend died to a "12" nerve test. Early lesson on keeping your army within Inspiring range.
The Badgers in the bottom saw off my Death Engine - when I forgot I had bought upgrade of CS(2) and Vicious - then took out my depleted Shock Troop Horde. I finally got them last turn with an Artillery shot.
In the end the game was a small win to Rob.
I had great fun with the game. It was always going to be an easy sell as I went into it wanting a positive experience and got it. I came away buzzing with the tactical potential - this may just be newbie afterglow - but as an Ancients player it really felt the game I was looking for.
Keen to get more under my belt as I learn the game.
Last night I set up my Ratkin for a game this weekend versus Dwarfs. I finished and varnished the trays and then went about filling them with my Ratkin models.
I'm "guessing" the Ratkin are all about numbers and so for this weekend have concentrated on seeing what blocks do. With WHFB at 2400 points I'd typically have around 200 models. My 2000 point KoW army is nearer 300 so a real horde.
Here you get an idea of the size that a Ratkin horde brings.
Here is a unit of Warriors with a Horde of Shock Troops behind.
I'm also running a Horde of The Blight.
The unit in front is a Legion of Slaves - it is one big footprint.
I really like the aesthetic of large blocks and with the Ratkin they do really look like an army.
I'll make sure I get some pictures of the game for upcoming blog posts.
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