July 20th (Sunday) - Large Warhammer Game

[John]

Hi guys,

Decided to update this post with some more details, we could still do with a couple more players if anyone is interested so please feel free to join up.

Game Details

Date: 20th July
Time: Start Deployment: 13:00 - Finish: 20:00

Table Size: 8'x6'

Terrain: Approximately 20 terrain pieces, one side sets up other chooses side.

Deployment: Wide Sides with 1' flank (no deployment in flank), minimum 12" from Centre Line.

Length: 6 turns.

Armies: Anything, but maximum 3.5k points per player.

Objectives: 3 Terrain pieces will be 'special objectives' granting the controlling side a bonus.

Scoring: Kills, Banners, Generals, 250 per table sixth and 500 per objective.


Players (so far)

John (Vampires OR Dwarves)
Mike (High Elves)
Mark TBC (Super Badger Chariots of doom).
Steve W (DE/HE)

Special Rules

> Deployment: One side deploys entire army first, but gets choice of going first.
> Deployment: 15 Minute limit, anything not on board enters as reserves turn 1.
> Shooting: Additional ranks may fire with -1 to hit.
> Combat: +1CR for 30+ Unit Strength.
> Combat: +1CR for 40+ Unit Strength.
> Magic: Players play 1v1 (chosen by dispel side), players may scroll spells against their own unit (after dispel attempts).

[mike]

Well you can count me in - sounds like great fun

I could field 2.5k of high elves - possibly more by 20th (I've still got quite a lot of stuff half assembled and/or half painted)

Ques: Were you thinking of 3.5k per side or 3.5k per player? - if the later this could get REALLY big
Now wouldn't that be interesting?

[John]

Per Player but it would depend on numbers, less players probably makes bigger single armies easier and vice versa.

The few rule changes I'd like to add are mostly designed to encourage larger units (some ability to shoot in multi-ranks, a couple of extra CR based on unit size), which should allow larger armies without masses of tiny units.

[Stephen Mawson]

I'll probably play as well. Not sure which army as yet, Dwarfs, Skaven or Chaos. I may decide depending on what everyone else wants to play in order to try and keep the sides balanced.

[mike]

OK - this sound good

I'm pretty sure I can top 3k - or if I can't I will be able to by the 20th

All we need are a couple more players

[ralkr56]

I'm up for it, not sure what army I could bring at the moment though. Probably dark elf?

[John]

The 3.5k limit was meant as an upper limit, as anything larger would probably make turns too long. People can bring whatever sized army they like, the sides will be balanced by size anyway.

Dark Elves could be interesting in a big game (especially mobile lists), as the board will be quite large.
The Spearhead (containing the new Dark Elf army book) actually comes out the day before although I'm not sure a huge Warhammer game is the best place to try out one day old rules that no one knows.

[mike]

This is beginning to shape up nicely now - I'm really looking forward to this now

BTW - I can definately top 3K (had a count up over the weekend), might event be able to make 3.5K

[Mark Wightman]

John - what are you aiming for here?

Is the idea that several people bring 3 - 3.5K armies and we play a big game 2 vs 2 or 3 vs 3. Lots of little units (ie normal size ones)?

Or is the idea to field much larger units in the armies. 40+ Hammerers etc.

I guess your answer to the above question may make this second question moot, but do you have any ideas regarding magic. Barry and Stephen were chatting about the Cranfield Legendary Battle game (10k per side, I think) and the magic phase slowed the game down, but hardly any spells got through.

I might be interested in taking part. You and I could field VC. No idea how many points I have, but it's a lot and playing a game would encourage me to finish the few models I've still do do.

[Stephen Mawson]

I've just realised that this is of course the third sunday in July, not the second (the date on the thread ought to have been a give away). Unfortunately I'm not going to be able to attend as I'm going to be at Kelmarsh Hall for the Festival of History event that Phoenix are attending.

[John]

No problem Stephen hope that event goes well.

- - -
Mark:

One big game, basically a Legendary battle but with a couple of minor rule mods. Magic is something I have a few ideas about (splitting casters and dispellers into 1v1 magic phases being likely) because it simply doesn't work.

The larger units part would be something like allowing an additional rank of shooting (-1 to hit), adding a couple more CR for larger units (or making large units get a bonus when taking break tests or rallying). Nothing to force people to take bigger units but a few changes to stop it being a massive waste of points.

All are things I'd like to discuss before hand anyway, and ideas and feedback will be much appreciated.

This is mostly based on experience playing a couple of 8k games, at that size lots of small units slow the game down and a lot have no real involvement in the game.

VC (+ Dark Elves?) vs could be interesting, I was hoping to use mine (unless I need to use Dwarves to balance forces). We have a fair few Vamp players at the club it seems, and I have a VC playing friend who might want to come.

- - -
Current Magic Ideas:
> The dispelling side assigns a player to each casting player, each pair then plays a magic phase (all at the same time).
> Spells that target all enemies have to be targetted at a specific army.
> If a spell is cast on a unit not belonging to the person dispelling and not successfully dispelled then that player could scroll it.
ex: Dave is casting, Mark is dispelling, Dave casts Fireball on John's Wraiths, Mark tries to dispel but fails, John is then asked and decides to scroll the Fireball.

It certainly isn't perfect (and I see a few issues already) but it means that all magic gets going at once, and stops the difficulty in casting multi-dispeller games bring.

[mike]

Hmm - not sure about that John

I'm sure you only get one chance to dispel an spell - either you roll dispel dice OR you burn a scroll
Your suggestion seems to imply two attempts on the same spell (in your example - once from Mark and once from John)

I have no problem with a few house rules to make the system playable, but I do think that breaking the core rules so blatently is probably a nono

[ralkr56]

I could potentially bring High elves rather than dark elves - quite a few figures are painted but not finished basing yet. e.g. 5 @ 24 spear units, 4 @ 24 archer units, 2 @ 12 reaver cavalry units, 2 @ 12 Dragon prince units, 6 pieces of artillery, 3 normal chariots, various magic users and heroes and a hero on Dragon. Not sure the other 6 single dragons or female horse archers on unicornes can be used for this? I know Mark has some high elves as well. What about seeing if Brain wants to field his Tomb Kings on the undead side?

[Mark Wightman]

My High Elves are quite large. Organised for my rules so -

48 Archers
72 Spearmen
24 White Lions
60 Swordmasters
12 Phoenix Guard

Lots of Heroes on a wide range of Mounts etc. Including a flying Swan boat (don't ask).

[John]

Mike: The rules are as you state, the main reason for that exception is that it could be harsh for players to lose very expensive units to magic when they had scrolls to defend them.

Besides which it is actually very inefficient to try and dispel something and then use a scroll as well as you are using double the magic defence you needed to. I know that I would be quite happy watching my opponent was dice and a scroll to dispel one spell as it leaves less defence for my other 5 ^_^

The other option I suppose would be that when a players unit is targetted only he can scroll the spell and must decide straight away to scroll it. (actually this could work quite well).

- - -
Steve: High Elves probably fit the forces of good better than Dark Elves fit Vampire Counts. TC and VC are a wierd mix, the first Necromancer Nagash kind of killed all the Tomb Kings and the Vampires led his armies so I'm not sure their is much love there. I'd even argue that Tomb Kings would probably ally against Vampire Counts, but either can work with a bit of imagination

- - -
"Including a flying Swan boat (don't ask)."

I'm going to have to ignore your comma'ed comment, why?