Recently, I've been doing my best to cut back on the amount of miniatures I've been buying. For the first time in about five years I skipped the "Call to Arms" show in Theale, on the grounds that I would just bring back more stuff that I didn't have time to assemble or paint. Of course, I blew it slightly by taking a trip into London and buying two more models for Bushido instead.
Bushido has acted as something of an exception to my "no new models" rule, largely because I want to keep up to date with the Temple of Ro-kan faction. But the fact that I have allowed this exception, says something about the effectiveness of GCT's marketing.
Games Workshop games are all but armies for me. I pick an army and buy models until it feels big enough. And then GW try to encourage me to start a new army. I don't expect to collect every model or unit available for the army and I may even restrict my choices to make it more thematic. While I wouldn't describe any of my armies as "finished" exactly, they are all of a size were I don't feel any great pressure to add any more models to any of them.
Oddly, Games Workshop's release pattern helps reinforces this behaviour. Every five years or so they release a new army book, I buy it and maybe one or two units or characters and that's it. My army is up to date. I don't feel the need to replace my existing models. Take the new dwarf book, I will probably grab it, King Duregar and a Gyrobomber and leave it at that. I won't replace my carefully painted metal hammerers with the new plastics any more than I replace my beloved metal miners when the plastic miners came along.
Bushido is different. For some reason, Bushido doesn't feel bounded in the same way as my Warhammer armies, so every time a new release comes along for the Temple of Ro-Kan, I buy it. Due to a combination of the small number of models required to play the game and the relatively low cost of each, I have started thinking of my Bushido models as a "collection" and not an army. Which means I need to buy the lot. Because new models are released every two months or so, there is never a natural pause and so I keep buying.
Bushido isn't the only game to do this. Warmachine/Hordes, Infinity, Malifaux, Helldorado, even Anima Tactics if it was more organised, all depend on a model of steady and constant releases, which keeps you army/gang/warband/crew in a permanently incomplete state.
It reminds me of when I was seriously into Magic the Gathering. Every time a new expansion appeared I had to buy a few boosters or feel like the game was leaving me behind. Consequently, the collection was never complete only constantly expanding. This is great for the company, as they get a steady income. The drawback is that players have to be pretty devoted to the game to keep up. Part of the reason I never really got into Warmachine was because I couldn't get the old models assembled painted and on the table before the next expansion came out, not when there was so many other games out there. As a marketing strategy, it encourages the fanatic at the expense of the casual gamer.
Of course much of the pressure is self-imposed. I have more than enough Bushido models to game with and I really don't need any more. And yet the pull is still there and, for the moment at least, I can keep up with the new releases without it totally monopolising my time.
In the last few months I have found myself drawn back to games that have effectively "died." Games Workshop's Epic and Mordheim and Confrontation. It's the lack of new releases that is the draw in these cases. With no more support coming, the games are "finite" and I can concentrate on painting and gaming with the models I have without feeling a compulsion to buy any more. Except, of course, for those last one or two Mordheim models I might get from Ebay...
Showing posts with label Malifaux. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Malifaux. Show all posts
Friday, 28 February 2014
Thursday, 13 February 2014
Wrong Impressions
It's funny how seeing a small part of something can you the wrong impression of the whole.
The thing that first attracted me to Malifaux was the slightly gothic, slightly cartoony concept art, combined with who well it had been translated to the first metal models. I still love those early designs. They put me in mind of some of Tim Burton's best work, think Edward Scissorhands or Sleep Hollow, or, perhaps more accurately, the Nightmare before Christmas or the Corpse Bride. It was a look that also snuck into the Series of Unfortunate Events. A kind of caricature of gothic turned up to 11.
Take a look at the early Rasputina, with top hat, stripy stockings and pure white skin. Or Nicodem, with his ridiculously high collar, super-sized top hat, dark glasses obliterating his eyes and Judge Dredd chin. It was a look I wanted to recreate as perfectly as possible in 3D when I painted the model.
This is pretty typical for me. I have bought games, warbands, gangs, whole armies on the strength of a single illustration or a model that appealed and for whom I had to find a home. It's a tendency I have tried to reign in in recent years as it has left me with more than a few attractive but unplayed games.
In the case of Malifaux, I am reaching the conclusion that the creators idea of the game world was quite different than the one I assembled in my head from the art work. The first clue came in the rule back, which laid out a background story far darker and grimmer than the slightly playful, dark humour I had expected. But it has become increasingly apparent with the release of Malifaux second edition and the redesigned plastic models.
Gone is Rasputina's hat and stockings in favour of what could only be called practical cold weather gear. While her spindly Ice Golem, has been replaced with a hulking brute, and the previously playful Ice Gamlins have become far more sinister This is a world that, for all its fantasy elements, is far more grounded in reality than the one I thought I was entering.
Not that there's anything inherently wrong with this approach, it just doesn't appeal to me in the same way. My Malifaux models are now lying somewhat neglected as a consequence. It all goes to show the danger of over committing to a game based on a partial understanding of what it's supposed to be.
The thing that first attracted me to Malifaux was the slightly gothic, slightly cartoony concept art, combined with who well it had been translated to the first metal models. I still love those early designs. They put me in mind of some of Tim Burton's best work, think Edward Scissorhands or Sleep Hollow, or, perhaps more accurately, the Nightmare before Christmas or the Corpse Bride. It was a look that also snuck into the Series of Unfortunate Events. A kind of caricature of gothic turned up to 11.
Take a look at the early Rasputina, with top hat, stripy stockings and pure white skin. Or Nicodem, with his ridiculously high collar, super-sized top hat, dark glasses obliterating his eyes and Judge Dredd chin. It was a look I wanted to recreate as perfectly as possible in 3D when I painted the model.
Early Nicodem...
...and my early Nicodem model
This is pretty typical for me. I have bought games, warbands, gangs, whole armies on the strength of a single illustration or a model that appealed and for whom I had to find a home. It's a tendency I have tried to reign in in recent years as it has left me with more than a few attractive but unplayed games.
In the case of Malifaux, I am reaching the conclusion that the creators idea of the game world was quite different than the one I assembled in my head from the art work. The first clue came in the rule back, which laid out a background story far darker and grimmer than the slightly playful, dark humour I had expected. But it has become increasingly apparent with the release of Malifaux second edition and the redesigned plastic models.
Gone is Rasputina's hat and stockings in favour of what could only be called practical cold weather gear. While her spindly Ice Golem, has been replaced with a hulking brute, and the previously playful Ice Gamlins have become far more sinister This is a world that, for all its fantasy elements, is far more grounded in reality than the one I thought I was entering.
Not that there's anything inherently wrong with this approach, it just doesn't appeal to me in the same way. My Malifaux models are now lying somewhat neglected as a consequence. It all goes to show the danger of over committing to a game based on a partial understanding of what it's supposed to be.
Tuesday, 18 June 2013
Too much rules makes my brain hurt!
When getting used to a new set of rules, the first few games tend to be a pretty uneven affair, characterised by a lot of flicking back and forth through rulebooks and checking stats. I'll admit that these early games are not always a lot of fun to play; I'm far too busy trying to keep track of the rules to think about tactics and victory or defeat all to often depends on whether you got the rules right.
It's for this reason I find myself gravitating back to Warhammer so often. It's not that I think it's the best set of rules, it isn't, but for most of the 1990s it was, for me, literally the only game in town. I have played it so much over the years that the fundamentals are second nature and when new editions come along, I just have to be on the look out for the changes.
This is why I think Mantic have been very smart with Warpath and Kings of War. Here we have two examples of a set of rules that are designed to be easy to learn and play at the exclusion of all else. This can lead to some odd quirks. Nevertheless, I am more willing to play these two than a number of games I have previously played more, simply because I know I am not going to have to look very much up and I can concentrate on the business of actually playing.
The trend in Fantasy and Sci-Fi gaming in recent years has been towards smaller scale skirmish games. This has the advantage that I can build a usable force more quickly and cheaply, even when individual models cost more than Games Workshop (at least until the advent of Finecast). If you I need five to ten models a side, you're much less likely to baulk at paying £10 a model. And you can focus more time and effort painting individual models and still get them painted more quickly. I have a larger proportion of my Anima Tactics models painted than I ever have with Games Workshop.
The drawback is it does tend to split my collection across lots of different games. Money and time I would have spent building up one army, ends up diffused across multiple gangs, crews or factions. And this means more rules to learn. Unsurprisingly, I find myself gravitating towards the systems where the rules are easiest to learn.
I have all but abandoned Malifaux, largely because it combines an unusual random mechanism, based around playing cards, with a large number of special rules for most models and a complicated abbreviation system for keeping track of them. Then there's Bushido, a game I like and really want to play more, but which, unfortunately, has one mechanism for activation (two short or one long action per turn), one for special abilities (points that are accumulated turn by turn, but which can be stored across multiple turns) and another for combat (a pool of combat dice that have to be divided between attack and defence and which can be sacrificed to produce additional effects).
One of the things I have always liked about Anima Tactics is that it has very few mechanisms to control things. Activation is based on action points that are renewed at the start of the turn, special abilities are mostly special actions that work in the same way and most effects are resolved by rolling a d10 adding a stat and modifiers and comparing it to a target number or the opposing players roll. Dreadball, and soon Deadzone, use a similar mechanism of rolling multiple dice, trying to equal or exceed a target number and counting the number of successful rolls. Even the badly presented Infinity rules, have the advantage of a single dice mechanism which covers most situations.
I wonder how often 'ease of learning' is factored into rules design? I know Jake Thornton has said he favours rules that are quick to learn but with plenty of tactical depth. But with some designers it feels like depth is being confused with complexity. I also wonder if my experience with Warhammer tells us anything. When your playing the same game day after day it becomes second nature and it's all to easy to forget how baffling it can appear to outsiders.
It's for this reason I find myself gravitating back to Warhammer so often. It's not that I think it's the best set of rules, it isn't, but for most of the 1990s it was, for me, literally the only game in town. I have played it so much over the years that the fundamentals are second nature and when new editions come along, I just have to be on the look out for the changes.
This is why I think Mantic have been very smart with Warpath and Kings of War. Here we have two examples of a set of rules that are designed to be easy to learn and play at the exclusion of all else. This can lead to some odd quirks. Nevertheless, I am more willing to play these two than a number of games I have previously played more, simply because I know I am not going to have to look very much up and I can concentrate on the business of actually playing.
The trend in Fantasy and Sci-Fi gaming in recent years has been towards smaller scale skirmish games. This has the advantage that I can build a usable force more quickly and cheaply, even when individual models cost more than Games Workshop (at least until the advent of Finecast). If you I need five to ten models a side, you're much less likely to baulk at paying £10 a model. And you can focus more time and effort painting individual models and still get them painted more quickly. I have a larger proportion of my Anima Tactics models painted than I ever have with Games Workshop.
The drawback is it does tend to split my collection across lots of different games. Money and time I would have spent building up one army, ends up diffused across multiple gangs, crews or factions. And this means more rules to learn. Unsurprisingly, I find myself gravitating towards the systems where the rules are easiest to learn.
I have all but abandoned Malifaux, largely because it combines an unusual random mechanism, based around playing cards, with a large number of special rules for most models and a complicated abbreviation system for keeping track of them. Then there's Bushido, a game I like and really want to play more, but which, unfortunately, has one mechanism for activation (two short or one long action per turn), one for special abilities (points that are accumulated turn by turn, but which can be stored across multiple turns) and another for combat (a pool of combat dice that have to be divided between attack and defence and which can be sacrificed to produce additional effects).
One of the things I have always liked about Anima Tactics is that it has very few mechanisms to control things. Activation is based on action points that are renewed at the start of the turn, special abilities are mostly special actions that work in the same way and most effects are resolved by rolling a d10 adding a stat and modifiers and comparing it to a target number or the opposing players roll. Dreadball, and soon Deadzone, use a similar mechanism of rolling multiple dice, trying to equal or exceed a target number and counting the number of successful rolls. Even the badly presented Infinity rules, have the advantage of a single dice mechanism which covers most situations.
I wonder how often 'ease of learning' is factored into rules design? I know Jake Thornton has said he favours rules that are quick to learn but with plenty of tactical depth. But with some designers it feels like depth is being confused with complexity. I also wonder if my experience with Warhammer tells us anything. When your playing the same game day after day it becomes second nature and it's all to easy to forget how baffling it can appear to outsiders.
Monday, 9 July 2012
The Role of Narrative
In my last post I wrote about how Inquisitor is an odd miss-match between a range of models based on specific characters and a game system that emphasised creating characters of your own. It seems odd that this miss-match would have come about when the concept for the model range came first and Inquisitor was one of many game ideas on the table. In fact, that a game of this type was ultimately produced says something about Games Workshop and its history.
The history of Games Workshop games does not begin with Warhammer, but to a large extent, the company that it is now began with Warhammer. Prior to the release of Warhammer 1st edition, most fantasy miniatures were used as props for Roleplaying games (which themselves evolved from Wargaming, but that's another story). Warhammer was essentially a slightly different thing to do with your fantasy miniatures. I put "slightly" because 1st edition Warhammer was still substantially a Roleplaying game. It was supposed to use a Games Master, have player created characters and "adventures" rather than scenarios. The concept of competing players each with their own armies, really developed from 2nd edition onwards.
However, the roleplaying concepts were not forgotten. 3rd edition Warhammer is particularly interesting. The 3rd edition rulebook was written as if it were a stand-alone system, the dedicated army list book Warhammer Armies, came later and appears to have been written to support tournament play. The basic rule book has no army lists, but it does have an extensive bestiary of fantasy creatures with points values for all of them. In addition, it includes rules and points values for a number of specialist troop types. These included Shock and Missile elites who were simply better at fighting or shooting, but also included more unusual troops like scouts, skirmishers, assassins, flagellants and berserkers. The interesting thing is that these specialist types were included as upgrades to existing troops. So if you wanted to create a goblin assassin or an elf berserker you could, and adjust the points values accordingly.
Characters were also presented as upgrades. They were given levels from 5 to 25 and these represented the number of bonuses applied to troops' profiles. The interesting thing was that these bonuses were variable, with six different options presented allowing more combat orientated or leadership orientated characters (though one was presented as the standard version to use in tournaments).
When Warhammer 40,000 was released a similar system was presented, with tables for randomly generating troops and characters and with an emphasis on scenario-based game play.
In subsequent editions, these ideas have been diluted, but elements remain. Standard Games Workshop characters are still generic types upgraded by players with equipment and/or magic items. Units vary in numbers and can frequently be upgraded with different weapon options as well as extra elements like standard bearers, musicians and champions.
This sort of approach is common for games produced independent of a range of models, such as Hordes of the Things, Armies or Arcana, Song of Blades and Heroes or Warrior Heroes: Armies and Adventurers. This is understandable as the game needs to be adaptable to players miniatures. It is more unusual for games and miniature ranges produced together.
For example in War Machine and Hordes, the number of models in a unit can vary, but not their equipment. Some can be upgraded with additional specialist models, but not all. Warjacks and Warbeasts are defined types with standard equipment. And all characters are named individuals with a defined range of abilities and equipment. The same is true of Malifaux, Helldorado, Bushido and Anima Tactics. All of them emphasise named characters with only limited, if any, upgrade options for individual troops.
Warhammer's origins as a hybrid roleplaying game has bled across into other Games Workshop games. Inquisitor, with its player-created warbands of characters has already been mentioned, but it also present in Mordheim, Necromunda and Blood Bowl. All of which feature a campaign system that emphasises gangs/warbands/teams developing over time as games are played. This system was transferred to the Warhammer Historicals Legends of the Old West and Legends of the High Seas, though the first time something like this was attempted was in Realms of Chaos.
Interestingly, it is not an approach adopted by most other Fantasy and Sci-Fi skirmish games. Bushido, Infinity, Anima Tactics, Malifaux, all of these games are of a scale similar to the Games Workshop games, but none of them have taken this route, instead opting to focus on characters created by the games designers, rather than the players.
Most of these games focus on a strongly defined game world, many with an evolving narrative. This is particularly true of Malifaux, whose narrative has developed with each rule book to the point where it seems that the writers aren't entirely sure if they're writing a rulebook or a novel. It is also true of War Machine and Hordes. In contrast, the narrative of the Warhammer world has hardly moved on in twenty five years. The game world has changed, but this has mostly consisted of retconning the existing background to fit the development of new armies. There is not a defined ongoing story.
And yet this actually fits better with the narrative approach that Games Workshop takes with its games. They present a well defined, but essentially static game world and invite players to create their own characters and develop their own narratives. The campaigns that have been built up around the Games Workshop skirmish games develop a life and a story of their own, rather than following a story defined by the game writers.
In contrast, most of the other games listed above present a strong, developing narrative and use it as a back drop. Players have essentially three choices. The first is to ignore the background and focus on the game. The narrative provides a theme to build a game and miniatures, but little more than that. This is essentially the way that card games, such as Magic the Gathering or board games work. Nobody thinks that Settlers of Catan accurately reflects the settlement of an island or Monopoly running a property empire, but it doesn't matter. The second option is to try and play within the limits of the background, much as some historical gamers prefer only to play games based around known historical events and campaigns. The third option is to develop your own background or play "what if" games that develop the official narrative in a direction of the players choosing.
What these games pointedly do not do, which most Games Workshop games do, is provide a narrative with sufficient space for players to develop their own characters and stories that still fit into the overarching story of the game world.
For some players this does not matter. Many players view wargaming as imply gaming and the narrative is of minor or no importance. But for others, developing a narrative around your characters and armies is part of the enjoyment of wargaming. And, for all the legitimate criticism aimed at it, this is one thing that Games Workshop has done well in the past and that other Sci-Fi and Fantasy games, for all their positive qualities, often neglect.
The history of Games Workshop games does not begin with Warhammer, but to a large extent, the company that it is now began with Warhammer. Prior to the release of Warhammer 1st edition, most fantasy miniatures were used as props for Roleplaying games (which themselves evolved from Wargaming, but that's another story). Warhammer was essentially a slightly different thing to do with your fantasy miniatures. I put "slightly" because 1st edition Warhammer was still substantially a Roleplaying game. It was supposed to use a Games Master, have player created characters and "adventures" rather than scenarios. The concept of competing players each with their own armies, really developed from 2nd edition onwards.
The 1st edition Warhammer rule books including character generation
However, the roleplaying concepts were not forgotten. 3rd edition Warhammer is particularly interesting. The 3rd edition rulebook was written as if it were a stand-alone system, the dedicated army list book Warhammer Armies, came later and appears to have been written to support tournament play. The basic rule book has no army lists, but it does have an extensive bestiary of fantasy creatures with points values for all of them. In addition, it includes rules and points values for a number of specialist troop types. These included Shock and Missile elites who were simply better at fighting or shooting, but also included more unusual troops like scouts, skirmishers, assassins, flagellants and berserkers. The interesting thing is that these specialist types were included as upgrades to existing troops. So if you wanted to create a goblin assassin or an elf berserker you could, and adjust the points values accordingly.
Characters were also presented as upgrades. They were given levels from 5 to 25 and these represented the number of bonuses applied to troops' profiles. The interesting thing was that these bonuses were variable, with six different options presented allowing more combat orientated or leadership orientated characters (though one was presented as the standard version to use in tournaments).
When Warhammer 40,000 was released a similar system was presented, with tables for randomly generating troops and characters and with an emphasis on scenario-based game play.
In subsequent editions, these ideas have been diluted, but elements remain. Standard Games Workshop characters are still generic types upgraded by players with equipment and/or magic items. Units vary in numbers and can frequently be upgraded with different weapon options as well as extra elements like standard bearers, musicians and champions.
This sort of approach is common for games produced independent of a range of models, such as Hordes of the Things, Armies or Arcana, Song of Blades and Heroes or Warrior Heroes: Armies and Adventurers. This is understandable as the game needs to be adaptable to players miniatures. It is more unusual for games and miniature ranges produced together.
For example in War Machine and Hordes, the number of models in a unit can vary, but not their equipment. Some can be upgraded with additional specialist models, but not all. Warjacks and Warbeasts are defined types with standard equipment. And all characters are named individuals with a defined range of abilities and equipment. The same is true of Malifaux, Helldorado, Bushido and Anima Tactics. All of them emphasise named characters with only limited, if any, upgrade options for individual troops.
Warhammer's origins as a hybrid roleplaying game has bled across into other Games Workshop games. Inquisitor, with its player-created warbands of characters has already been mentioned, but it also present in Mordheim, Necromunda and Blood Bowl. All of which feature a campaign system that emphasises gangs/warbands/teams developing over time as games are played. This system was transferred to the Warhammer Historicals Legends of the Old West and Legends of the High Seas, though the first time something like this was attempted was in Realms of Chaos.
Interestingly, it is not an approach adopted by most other Fantasy and Sci-Fi skirmish games. Bushido, Infinity, Anima Tactics, Malifaux, all of these games are of a scale similar to the Games Workshop games, but none of them have taken this route, instead opting to focus on characters created by the games designers, rather than the players.
Most of these games focus on a strongly defined game world, many with an evolving narrative. This is particularly true of Malifaux, whose narrative has developed with each rule book to the point where it seems that the writers aren't entirely sure if they're writing a rulebook or a novel. It is also true of War Machine and Hordes. In contrast, the narrative of the Warhammer world has hardly moved on in twenty five years. The game world has changed, but this has mostly consisted of retconning the existing background to fit the development of new armies. There is not a defined ongoing story.
And yet this actually fits better with the narrative approach that Games Workshop takes with its games. They present a well defined, but essentially static game world and invite players to create their own characters and develop their own narratives. The campaigns that have been built up around the Games Workshop skirmish games develop a life and a story of their own, rather than following a story defined by the game writers.
In contrast, most of the other games listed above present a strong, developing narrative and use it as a back drop. Players have essentially three choices. The first is to ignore the background and focus on the game. The narrative provides a theme to build a game and miniatures, but little more than that. This is essentially the way that card games, such as Magic the Gathering or board games work. Nobody thinks that Settlers of Catan accurately reflects the settlement of an island or Monopoly running a property empire, but it doesn't matter. The second option is to try and play within the limits of the background, much as some historical gamers prefer only to play games based around known historical events and campaigns. The third option is to develop your own background or play "what if" games that develop the official narrative in a direction of the players choosing.
What these games pointedly do not do, which most Games Workshop games do, is provide a narrative with sufficient space for players to develop their own characters and stories that still fit into the overarching story of the game world.
For some players this does not matter. Many players view wargaming as imply gaming and the narrative is of minor or no importance. But for others, developing a narrative around your characters and armies is part of the enjoyment of wargaming. And, for all the legitimate criticism aimed at it, this is one thing that Games Workshop has done well in the past and that other Sci-Fi and Fantasy games, for all their positive qualities, often neglect.
Wednesday, 4 January 2012
What do I get out of Wargaming?
I have been reading a lot of discussion of late about randomness in wargaming and in Warhammer 8th edition in particular. There is a school of thought that 8th edition has introduced so much randomness into the game that all, or most, tactical skill has been lost to the detriment of the gaming experience.
I was particularly intrigued by this blog post which suggests that the randomness may be a leveller attempting to eliminate the disparity between experienced and inexperienced gamers, thus making for a more rewarding experience for younger gamers.
A few days ago I finally got round to playing some Warhammer 8th edition with my little brother, who had taken the opportunity at Christmas to get his Ogre army up to speed. For my part, I had recently indulged myself by grabbing an Arachnarok and so was in a position to field 2500 points of Goblins against his Ogres.
There was certainly no shortage of randomness over the course of the game. There was the moment when my Night Goblin Great Shaman killed himself with a poisoned mushroom on the last turn, having previously suffered another wound due to dodgy mushrooms and one because of a miscast. Then there was the Ogre Iron Blaster misfiring and taking itself out of the game for two turns. Or the Ogre Slaughtermaster losing control of the great maw which subsequently ate two of his own Ogres. With nine fanatics in play randomness was certainly in evidence there, most spectacularly when a unit of nine Ogre Ironguts, including a Tyrant, charged through two fanatics, only to lose the subsequent combat because of the goblins superior rank bonus, unexpectedly break and flee through the same fanatics killing all of them except the Tyrant.
I'm not really sure how much tactical skill was really in evidence, be we had an absolute blast playing it. In fact it was a lot more fun than the game of Malifaux we played two days earlier. To be fair, we were both trying out new factions and MLB got the hang of his a lot faster than I did. The end result was pretty one-sided, but hats off to him, he won fair and square. To a large extent, this was a less enjoyable experience simply because we had to spend so much time checking the rules.
Another highly enjoyable Christmas diversion was the Lego game Heroica, probably the most random game of all. A simplified dungeon crawl experience, essentially a race to the end of a dungeon, were everything is determined with single dice rolls. Heroica has been floating around the wargaming blogosphere and has received much praise because of its simplicity and accessibility.
The point about all of this, is that the amount of enjoyment I get from a game is not proportionate to the amount of control I have.
I can certainly understand the complaints of more competitive and tournament focused gamers of Warhammer 8th edition, but it is isn't a perspective I can share. For me, I am getting something entirely different from the experience.
I came to Wargaming at about the same time as Roleplaying and while I could never properly interest my friends in Dungeons & Dragons, wargaming proved to be more popular. For me, much of the enjoyment now comes form army building, painting and the creation of some kind of narrative in my gaming.
My recent forays into Realms of Chaos taps into a similar idea. There is far more fun to be had creating champions and warbands and telling their story than in any kind of competitive engagement. Especially when the generation of warbands is so random and straight forward competition so, necessarily, unfair.
All of which serves to explain how I was able to extract such straight forward enjoyment from my post-Christmas Warhammer. I am simply not a competitive person and wasn't in it for the tactical contest, it was more fun to line up my troops, direct them as best I could and watch the carnage unfold, regardless of outcome.
While Games Workshop's new spirit of randomness may be off-putting to many, and I can fully understand their complaints, for me it adds, rather than detracts, from the enjoyment.
I was particularly intrigued by this blog post which suggests that the randomness may be a leveller attempting to eliminate the disparity between experienced and inexperienced gamers, thus making for a more rewarding experience for younger gamers.
A few days ago I finally got round to playing some Warhammer 8th edition with my little brother, who had taken the opportunity at Christmas to get his Ogre army up to speed. For my part, I had recently indulged myself by grabbing an Arachnarok and so was in a position to field 2500 points of Goblins against his Ogres.
There was certainly no shortage of randomness over the course of the game. There was the moment when my Night Goblin Great Shaman killed himself with a poisoned mushroom on the last turn, having previously suffered another wound due to dodgy mushrooms and one because of a miscast. Then there was the Ogre Iron Blaster misfiring and taking itself out of the game for two turns. Or the Ogre Slaughtermaster losing control of the great maw which subsequently ate two of his own Ogres. With nine fanatics in play randomness was certainly in evidence there, most spectacularly when a unit of nine Ogre Ironguts, including a Tyrant, charged through two fanatics, only to lose the subsequent combat because of the goblins superior rank bonus, unexpectedly break and flee through the same fanatics killing all of them except the Tyrant.
I'm not really sure how much tactical skill was really in evidence, be we had an absolute blast playing it. In fact it was a lot more fun than the game of Malifaux we played two days earlier. To be fair, we were both trying out new factions and MLB got the hang of his a lot faster than I did. The end result was pretty one-sided, but hats off to him, he won fair and square. To a large extent, this was a less enjoyable experience simply because we had to spend so much time checking the rules.
Another highly enjoyable Christmas diversion was the Lego game Heroica, probably the most random game of all. A simplified dungeon crawl experience, essentially a race to the end of a dungeon, were everything is determined with single dice rolls. Heroica has been floating around the wargaming blogosphere and has received much praise because of its simplicity and accessibility.
The point about all of this, is that the amount of enjoyment I get from a game is not proportionate to the amount of control I have.
I can certainly understand the complaints of more competitive and tournament focused gamers of Warhammer 8th edition, but it is isn't a perspective I can share. For me, I am getting something entirely different from the experience.
I came to Wargaming at about the same time as Roleplaying and while I could never properly interest my friends in Dungeons & Dragons, wargaming proved to be more popular. For me, much of the enjoyment now comes form army building, painting and the creation of some kind of narrative in my gaming.
My recent forays into Realms of Chaos taps into a similar idea. There is far more fun to be had creating champions and warbands and telling their story than in any kind of competitive engagement. Especially when the generation of warbands is so random and straight forward competition so, necessarily, unfair.
All of which serves to explain how I was able to extract such straight forward enjoyment from my post-Christmas Warhammer. I am simply not a competitive person and wasn't in it for the tactical contest, it was more fun to line up my troops, direct them as best I could and watch the carnage unfold, regardless of outcome.
While Games Workshop's new spirit of randomness may be off-putting to many, and I can fully understand their complaints, for me it adds, rather than detracts, from the enjoyment.
Monday, 16 May 2011
I go, you activate
When Mantic Games released its Kings of War rules there were complaints from some quarters about its use of the IGOUGO turn sequence. The phrase, an abbreviation of "I go, you go" refers to a game in which one player takes a turn moving, shooting and fighting with their miniatures and then the other player does the same. This is contrasted with something that might be called "alternating activation" in which one player chooses a miniature and does something with it, then the other player, then back to the first and so on until the turn is over.*
IGOUGO has been criticised for being unrealistic as it does not allow players to respond to their opponents actions and because the 'passive player' has to wait for long periods of time before being able to do anything. These long waiting periods can make IGOUGO seem dull or jerky in contrast to AA's fluidity or dynamism. There is even a tendency to regard IGOUGO as slightly old fashion or out of date, a complaint that was leveled at Kings of War and at each edition of Warhammer that continues to use it. When Privateer Press announced their new big battle supplement for War Machine, stating that it would use AA, many applauded it as a step forward. As though the move represented a progressive shift, instead of a simple rules choice.
Alternating activation often goes along with the abandonment the of traditional turn sequence. Specific movement, shooting and fighting phases are usually lost in favour of allowing units to move, shoot and fight when they are activated, before another model does the same. One notable exception was Rackham's Confrontation, which used AA in its movement phase, before having separate shooting and close combat phases afterwards.
AA is very common for skirmish games, possibly because the quick back and forth between players better mirrors a dual or brawl than the careful maneuvering the characterises a big battle. There are, however, some big battle games that use this approach. Games Workshop's Epic Armageddon is one example and soon War Machine will follow. However, one aspect of large scale battles that is not easily modeled by AA is co-ordinated attacks.
In a game that uses IGOUGO game, with the turn divided into stages, it is easy to have one unit or miniature attack another and then be joined by a supporting ally. The actual combat resolution doesn't happen until later allowing multiple units to join the attack. This is much more difficult to model in AA. If one unit or character activates at a time, with no separate phases, then one unit completes its attack before another can join. It is possible to have combat engagements last over several activations, but this requires the initial attacker to survive the first attack.
Imagine a situation in which two weak units attack a stronger one. In IGOUGO they can both engage and the combat is worked out in one go. In AA, the first unit has two attack and survive a potential counter attack before its ally joins it.
There are ways around this problem. Malifaux has a companion rule that allows some groups of models to activate together, for example. However, these are generally compromises or fudges that work around the natural flow of the rules and arguably undermine the fluidity of Alternating Activation.
The point is that AA feels more fluid and sometimes more real, because the way the miniatures or units activate feels closer to simultaneous. However, the fact that allies cannot easily act in concert undermines that by demonstrating that it is still turn-based. Wargaming is necessarily a fudge that does its best to simulate the effect of real warfare whilst allowing players to actually play a game. Ultimately, Alternating Activation is as much a compromise as IGOUGO, they just have different strengths. Alternating Activation simulates the back and forth of combat, IGOUGO is better for co-ordinating strategies and careful maneuvering.
*This is a slight simplification as many games that use some variation of AA have a mechanism that allows one player to activate two or more miniatures or units in sequence. Broadly we are talking about a system in which one player gets to activate some, but not all, of their models and then the other does.
IGOUGO has been criticised for being unrealistic as it does not allow players to respond to their opponents actions and because the 'passive player' has to wait for long periods of time before being able to do anything. These long waiting periods can make IGOUGO seem dull or jerky in contrast to AA's fluidity or dynamism. There is even a tendency to regard IGOUGO as slightly old fashion or out of date, a complaint that was leveled at Kings of War and at each edition of Warhammer that continues to use it. When Privateer Press announced their new big battle supplement for War Machine, stating that it would use AA, many applauded it as a step forward. As though the move represented a progressive shift, instead of a simple rules choice.
Alternating activation often goes along with the abandonment the of traditional turn sequence. Specific movement, shooting and fighting phases are usually lost in favour of allowing units to move, shoot and fight when they are activated, before another model does the same. One notable exception was Rackham's Confrontation, which used AA in its movement phase, before having separate shooting and close combat phases afterwards.
AA is very common for skirmish games, possibly because the quick back and forth between players better mirrors a dual or brawl than the careful maneuvering the characterises a big battle. There are, however, some big battle games that use this approach. Games Workshop's Epic Armageddon is one example and soon War Machine will follow. However, one aspect of large scale battles that is not easily modeled by AA is co-ordinated attacks.
In a game that uses IGOUGO game, with the turn divided into stages, it is easy to have one unit or miniature attack another and then be joined by a supporting ally. The actual combat resolution doesn't happen until later allowing multiple units to join the attack. This is much more difficult to model in AA. If one unit or character activates at a time, with no separate phases, then one unit completes its attack before another can join. It is possible to have combat engagements last over several activations, but this requires the initial attacker to survive the first attack.
Imagine a situation in which two weak units attack a stronger one. In IGOUGO they can both engage and the combat is worked out in one go. In AA, the first unit has two attack and survive a potential counter attack before its ally joins it.
There are ways around this problem. Malifaux has a companion rule that allows some groups of models to activate together, for example. However, these are generally compromises or fudges that work around the natural flow of the rules and arguably undermine the fluidity of Alternating Activation.
The point is that AA feels more fluid and sometimes more real, because the way the miniatures or units activate feels closer to simultaneous. However, the fact that allies cannot easily act in concert undermines that by demonstrating that it is still turn-based. Wargaming is necessarily a fudge that does its best to simulate the effect of real warfare whilst allowing players to actually play a game. Ultimately, Alternating Activation is as much a compromise as IGOUGO, they just have different strengths. Alternating Activation simulates the back and forth of combat, IGOUGO is better for co-ordinating strategies and careful maneuvering.
*This is a slight simplification as many games that use some variation of AA have a mechanism that allows one player to activate two or more miniatures or units in sequence. Broadly we are talking about a system in which one player gets to activate some, but not all, of their models and then the other does.
Saturday, 12 March 2011
Tipping the Scale
A while back I wrote a post in which I commented on the price and perceived value of Games Workshop's miniatures versus other company's. Eventually, I concluded that the price of a model was less important than it's value within a game. I have been trying to come up with a way to quantify this and rate various different games.
Today, I'm going to write about 'scalability.'
This can be defined as how easy it is to start and collect miniatures for a particular game, or how scalable it is. I will subdivide it into three areas:
1. How much does it cost to get enough bits (miniatures, rules, scenery) to play the game?
2. How much does it cost to add a new element to your army/ gang/ crew/ squad?
3. How big can the game get?
When I refer to cost, I don't just mean in purely financial terms, but also the time cost in collecting assembling and painting the necessary miniatures.
A game with good scalability allows you to start from nothing and expand your collection as far and as fast as you like.
The first element is the most straightforward - how much does it cost to start playing? How many models do you need and how much will you have to pay for them? As I have mentioned a few times before, Warhammer has high start up costs. You now have to spend over £60 on rulebooks, never mind the miniatures. Games Workshop has attempted to soften this with a high value starter set containing as many plastic models as can be sensibly squeezed between two sheets of cardboard. But this is of limited value if you don't plan to collect the armies included in the starter set. Mantic's Kings of War does a good job in reducing the cost of the models, but still scores quite low in this area because of the amount of time you have to spend painting them.
In contrast, skirmish games like Malifaux, Helldorado, Anima Tactics or Infinity can be played with as few as two or three models and a decent sized force may be no more than half a dozen. Anima and Infinity have expensive rule books, but both compensate with free downloadable startup rules (which actually cut out very little of the detail in the main books). So, while individual metal miniatures may be a lot pricier than plastics, you need very few to play the game and can devote more time and effort to making each one look that bit better.
Warmachine and Hordes, although based on larger armies than the skirmish games, make good use of starter sets and quick start rules to draw players in. It is at least possible to play a game with the contents of two starter sets, even if these games are a bit limited in tactical options.
My second criteria is slightly harder to explain, but in essence it's about how much it costs to add a new element to your army or force. By an element I mean the basic number of models that has to be added to an army to make it viable. In Anima Tactics or Malifaux that will usually be a single figure, but in Warhammer you need a whole unit. Anima Tactics and Malifaux miniatures cost a lot, but each one operates as a separate individual within the game, in contrast Warhammer and Kings of War use models in groups.
What this means is that although Games Workshop and Mantic's models are comparatively cheap, you need to buy them in large numbers. For Warhammer you now need two or three boxes , costing £30 - £45. For Anima, you can have a miniature for £8 and have it assembled, painted and on the gaming table the next day. So although the cost of a Warhammer miniature is lower, so is its value in the game. This means that Anima scores higher on criteria 2 than Warhammer.
Warmachine and Hordes sit somewhere in between. They sell units in boxes, which means one box usually gets you one unit, but the boxes are often very expensive at £30 or more (though the UK does seem to suffer due to the exchange rate here).
My final criteria is how big a game can get. How well does it support large armies? Or at what point does it become pointless to buy any more models? This is where the Games Workshop games, and Kings of War score highly. Games can get very big, very easily without becoming unweildy and Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 even have rules specifically to support extra big games.
Most skirmish games start to become unweildy when they get beyond twenty or thirty models, creating a natural cap in your collection where models can only be swapped not added to your force.
So skirmish games tend to score well for criteria 1 and 2, while mass battle Warhammer scores better for 3. Warmachine and Hordes score moderately well on 1 and 3, but not so well for 2 and sit as something as a compromise.
Companies have tried several ways to address the scalability problem. One approach is to produce 2 or more games to cover different scales of conflict. Games Workshop have tried it with the Lord of the Rings strategy battle game and War of the Ring and the late Rackham, famously, had Confrontation and Ragnarok. The idea is that you start with the skirmish game and, as your collection grows, you naturally progress to mass battles.
The problem with this approach, is that skirmish games tend to require only 1 or 2 of any individual miniature, while mass battle games require units, usually of at least five, if not ten or twenty. This means that the progression is rarely natural. Looking at Lord of the Rings, 1 or 2 plastic boxes is likely to give you as many of one particular trooper as your likely to need for the strategy battle game, but for War of the Rings 4 - 6 is more realistic. Meaning that you will probably have to double the size of your collection to make it viable for War of the Ring. This is simply not a natural progression.
So, what is my point here? Well essentially, creating wargame rules is a compromise and creating a game that scales well is very difficult. Games Workshop plays to its strengths by pushing bigger and bigger armies, while the skirmish games listed above are newer and benefit from a pool of players who still have plenty of models to get before they exhaust the possibilities of the smaller scale. In the end, perfect scalability may be impossible and it a company has to make the most of the rules they have.
Today, I'm going to write about 'scalability.'
This can be defined as how easy it is to start and collect miniatures for a particular game, or how scalable it is. I will subdivide it into three areas:
1. How much does it cost to get enough bits (miniatures, rules, scenery) to play the game?
2. How much does it cost to add a new element to your army/ gang/ crew/ squad?
3. How big can the game get?
When I refer to cost, I don't just mean in purely financial terms, but also the time cost in collecting assembling and painting the necessary miniatures.
A game with good scalability allows you to start from nothing and expand your collection as far and as fast as you like.
The first element is the most straightforward - how much does it cost to start playing? How many models do you need and how much will you have to pay for them? As I have mentioned a few times before, Warhammer has high start up costs. You now have to spend over £60 on rulebooks, never mind the miniatures. Games Workshop has attempted to soften this with a high value starter set containing as many plastic models as can be sensibly squeezed between two sheets of cardboard. But this is of limited value if you don't plan to collect the armies included in the starter set. Mantic's Kings of War does a good job in reducing the cost of the models, but still scores quite low in this area because of the amount of time you have to spend painting them.
In contrast, skirmish games like Malifaux, Helldorado, Anima Tactics or Infinity can be played with as few as two or three models and a decent sized force may be no more than half a dozen. Anima and Infinity have expensive rule books, but both compensate with free downloadable startup rules (which actually cut out very little of the detail in the main books). So, while individual metal miniatures may be a lot pricier than plastics, you need very few to play the game and can devote more time and effort to making each one look that bit better.
Warmachine and Hordes, although based on larger armies than the skirmish games, make good use of starter sets and quick start rules to draw players in. It is at least possible to play a game with the contents of two starter sets, even if these games are a bit limited in tactical options.
My second criteria is slightly harder to explain, but in essence it's about how much it costs to add a new element to your army or force. By an element I mean the basic number of models that has to be added to an army to make it viable. In Anima Tactics or Malifaux that will usually be a single figure, but in Warhammer you need a whole unit. Anima Tactics and Malifaux miniatures cost a lot, but each one operates as a separate individual within the game, in contrast Warhammer and Kings of War use models in groups.
What this means is that although Games Workshop and Mantic's models are comparatively cheap, you need to buy them in large numbers. For Warhammer you now need two or three boxes , costing £30 - £45. For Anima, you can have a miniature for £8 and have it assembled, painted and on the gaming table the next day. So although the cost of a Warhammer miniature is lower, so is its value in the game. This means that Anima scores higher on criteria 2 than Warhammer.
Warmachine and Hordes sit somewhere in between. They sell units in boxes, which means one box usually gets you one unit, but the boxes are often very expensive at £30 or more (though the UK does seem to suffer due to the exchange rate here).
My final criteria is how big a game can get. How well does it support large armies? Or at what point does it become pointless to buy any more models? This is where the Games Workshop games, and Kings of War score highly. Games can get very big, very easily without becoming unweildy and Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 even have rules specifically to support extra big games.
Most skirmish games start to become unweildy when they get beyond twenty or thirty models, creating a natural cap in your collection where models can only be swapped not added to your force.
So skirmish games tend to score well for criteria 1 and 2, while mass battle Warhammer scores better for 3. Warmachine and Hordes score moderately well on 1 and 3, but not so well for 2 and sit as something as a compromise.
Companies have tried several ways to address the scalability problem. One approach is to produce 2 or more games to cover different scales of conflict. Games Workshop have tried it with the Lord of the Rings strategy battle game and War of the Ring and the late Rackham, famously, had Confrontation and Ragnarok. The idea is that you start with the skirmish game and, as your collection grows, you naturally progress to mass battles.
The problem with this approach, is that skirmish games tend to require only 1 or 2 of any individual miniature, while mass battle games require units, usually of at least five, if not ten or twenty. This means that the progression is rarely natural. Looking at Lord of the Rings, 1 or 2 plastic boxes is likely to give you as many of one particular trooper as your likely to need for the strategy battle game, but for War of the Rings 4 - 6 is more realistic. Meaning that you will probably have to double the size of your collection to make it viable for War of the Ring. This is simply not a natural progression.
So, what is my point here? Well essentially, creating wargame rules is a compromise and creating a game that scales well is very difficult. Games Workshop plays to its strengths by pushing bigger and bigger armies, while the skirmish games listed above are newer and benefit from a pool of players who still have plenty of models to get before they exhaust the possibilities of the smaller scale. In the end, perfect scalability may be impossible and it a company has to make the most of the rules they have.
Sunday, 6 February 2011
Two Models of doing business with Models
There seems to be a rise in the number of games companies offering generic sci-fi and fantasy miniatures. That is to say, miniatures not tied to a particular game world or with no particular rules set in mind. Some are offering alternatives miniatures for an existing IP, usually Games Workshop. Mantic Games started off like this, before developing Kings of War, but there are others such as Gribbly miniatures or Avatars of War that offer good alternatives to the miniatures GW produce.
Also on the increase are companies offering unofficial lookalikes of characters from TV, films and comics. Examples include, the 'not' Doctor Who miniatures produced by Heresy and Crooked Dice or Harby from Haslefree miniatures who in no way resembles Hellboy or Marv from Sin City. The newly arrived Elodie Mae offer miniatures for fans of anime, manga and Japanese video games. There are also a number of 'not' Buffys, 'not' Lara Crofts and 'not' Jack Sparrows for the gamer who wants to game with an unlicensed IP.
Then there are the companies that produce miniatures with no particular IP in mind and without wishing to produce an entire range, simply supplying miniatures that can be used in a number of different games. Heresy have a large range here, as do Haslefree, with Pig Iron productions supplying Sci-Fi. This isn't even close to an exhaustive list.
Part of this rise can in part be put down to the Internet which has enabled small 'garage' companies to become even more prevalent in the industry than before. Thanks to the ease of marketing and selling to customers through websites there is no longer a need to sell an entire range of models to a Games Store. The rise of generic rule systems has also been helped by the Internet, thanks to the possibility of PDF sales. This in turn increases the appeal of generic miniatures no tied to a specific game as they can always be Incorporated into a generic rule set. Word of Mouth has become more powerful as a marketing tool thanks to the growth of message forums, social networking, blogs and sites like coolminiornot.
But at the same time a very different trend has developed for highly specialised games with a very specific appeal. I have mentioned Anima Tactics before. This is a fantasy game with an aesthetic inspired by Manga and Anime in which most miniatures are specific individuals. The game is skirmish based, requires very few miniatures to play and it is unlikely that most players will buy more than one of most models. Then there is Malifaux, Wyrd Games fantasy/ si-fi/ horror/ wild west/ steam punk/ Victoriana skirmish game with a distinctive card based rule set intended to reflect it's bizarre hybrid setting. And this is just the tip of the Ice burg.
So how is that the industry appears to be trending in two directions simultaneously? Both more generic and more specific? Oddly, I think this is all linked. The same interconnectedness between customers and producers that allows companies to survive with a small range of miniatures also allows games with very niche to find their audience.
There may only be a handful of potential Malifaux or Anima Tactics fans compared with a more traditional fantasy game like Warhammer, but in the Internet world it is possible for Wyrd Games and Cipher Studios to reach all, or at very least most of them. A smaller market can still support a game if that market is reached more efficiently. And this is more practical in a world where the Internet is so prevalent. It's not by accident that Cipher Studios has worked so hard to release Anima and Helldorado in so many languages at once, they know that there audience is diverse and wide spread and they want to reach all of them.
So the Internet allows and indeed encourages companies to both specialise and generalise. Both ways of doing business can work well.
Also on the increase are companies offering unofficial lookalikes of characters from TV, films and comics. Examples include, the 'not' Doctor Who miniatures produced by Heresy and Crooked Dice or Harby from Haslefree miniatures who in no way resembles Hellboy or Marv from Sin City. The newly arrived Elodie Mae offer miniatures for fans of anime, manga and Japanese video games. There are also a number of 'not' Buffys, 'not' Lara Crofts and 'not' Jack Sparrows for the gamer who wants to game with an unlicensed IP.
Then there are the companies that produce miniatures with no particular IP in mind and without wishing to produce an entire range, simply supplying miniatures that can be used in a number of different games. Heresy have a large range here, as do Haslefree, with Pig Iron productions supplying Sci-Fi. This isn't even close to an exhaustive list.
Part of this rise can in part be put down to the Internet which has enabled small 'garage' companies to become even more prevalent in the industry than before. Thanks to the ease of marketing and selling to customers through websites there is no longer a need to sell an entire range of models to a Games Store. The rise of generic rule systems has also been helped by the Internet, thanks to the possibility of PDF sales. This in turn increases the appeal of generic miniatures no tied to a specific game as they can always be Incorporated into a generic rule set. Word of Mouth has become more powerful as a marketing tool thanks to the growth of message forums, social networking, blogs and sites like coolminiornot.
But at the same time a very different trend has developed for highly specialised games with a very specific appeal. I have mentioned Anima Tactics before. This is a fantasy game with an aesthetic inspired by Manga and Anime in which most miniatures are specific individuals. The game is skirmish based, requires very few miniatures to play and it is unlikely that most players will buy more than one of most models. Then there is Malifaux, Wyrd Games fantasy/ si-fi/ horror/ wild west/ steam punk/ Victoriana skirmish game with a distinctive card based rule set intended to reflect it's bizarre hybrid setting. And this is just the tip of the Ice burg.
So how is that the industry appears to be trending in two directions simultaneously? Both more generic and more specific? Oddly, I think this is all linked. The same interconnectedness between customers and producers that allows companies to survive with a small range of miniatures also allows games with very niche to find their audience.
There may only be a handful of potential Malifaux or Anima Tactics fans compared with a more traditional fantasy game like Warhammer, but in the Internet world it is possible for Wyrd Games and Cipher Studios to reach all, or at very least most of them. A smaller market can still support a game if that market is reached more efficiently. And this is more practical in a world where the Internet is so prevalent. It's not by accident that Cipher Studios has worked so hard to release Anima and Helldorado in so many languages at once, they know that there audience is diverse and wide spread and they want to reach all of them.
So the Internet allows and indeed encourages companies to both specialise and generalise. Both ways of doing business can work well.
Sunday, 9 January 2011
The Devil's in the Details
With Rick Priestly's recent departure from Games Workshop discussion of him has been all over the Wargaming community's message boards and blogs. As a consequence of this I've found myself reading a number of interviews with him both recent and old. Interestingly a prevailing theme has emerged. Take this comment from an unabridged version of an interview from Battlegames 21 February 2010 (sadly I've lost the link).
The theme emerges again in an interview in Miniature Wargames 333.
The contrast Priestly identifies is between, what he sees as, the prevailing taste among wargamers for very tightly written rules designed to cover all situations and his approach, which concentrates on fun but open-ended rules that players are encouraged to develop themselves.
I'm not sure how accurate his perception of the hobby is, nor am I sure whether it is intended to be read as a criticism, but his comments did strike a chord with me. In my more sanguine moments I can find myself nodding along with Priestly's comments and I certainly have no competitive streak or interest in the tournament scene. But in the middle of a game I often find myself flicking through rulebooks desperately searching for the elusive paragraph that explains an apparent contradiction.
Priestly's comments came back to me again recently when I read an announcement from Wyrd Games, producers of the rather unusual and wonderful skirmish game Malifaux. Since the release of the Malifaux rulebook, Wyrd have released a number of eratta, rules clarifications and rules tweaks intended to ensure balance in the game. They are now applying these updates to the summary cards packaged with their models and the new cards will be included with future production runs. At the same time, they are offering to exchange existing player's old cards for the new ones if they are posted to Wyrd along with a self-adressed envelope.
This announcement and the reaction to it has prompted illustrates a number of things about the Wargaming community that I intend to return to again, but the reason I thought of it in this case is because it chimes with what Rick Priestly had been saying.
Let me emphasise that this plan has not been prompted by a new edition of Malifaux and that the old cards are still compatable with the rules. The new cards only clarify a few words or make a few minor tweaks. This has been done in the interest of maintaining game balance.
At the same time, Malifaux is one of the most narrative based games I have seen. A good half of the page count of it's two rulebooks is taken up with story explaining the background of the game world and it's characters. The world of Malifaux is a bizarre hybrid of fantasy, victoriana, steam punk and the wild west, in which a western gunslinger can take on a victorian undertaker or an arachnid cyborg face a demonic baby with a doll and a knife. And yet, the creators of this stranged story-based game still feel the need to optimise the rules for tournament play. Treating the game as a strict competition.
It's worth noting that several of the changes have been incorporated to eliminate rules loop holes that, if exploited, can lead to a huge advantage to one side and a boring game for all concerned. There is certainly merit in the argument that if the rules are that lopsided something needs to be done to correct it.
Yet I find myself thinking, if I found a loop hole that allowed me to win, but wrecked the game and rendered it no fun for myself or my opponent, wouldn't I just ignore it? In a sober moment, yes, but I suspect that I, and many other gamers, when faced with that situation in a game would exploit the loophole. Not due to any excessive competitive streak, but simply because when faced with the rules we feel obliged to play them as written and deliberately ignoring an advantage feels like a kind of cheating.
I have often thought there is a touch of the autistic in the wargaming community. Possibly I'm projecting because of my own diagnosis, but I think the obsession with lists and rules has an obvious appeal to the autistic mind. How much time to wargamers spend obsessing over the details of historical uniforms or the precise composition of an army? How much space is taken up on Forums on rules questions? Not that everyone does this, but plenty do. A literalist reading of the rules certainly fits into this characterisation. Not that I would see this as a criticism, getting the details right can be hugely important and a hopelessly unbalanced game is no fun for anybody, otherwise why employ playtesters?
So what conclusions can we draw from this? I'm not sure. Possibly a happy medium can exist between tightly written rules and the flexibility to be creative with them. At the same time, the next time I find myself uncertain of the rules I'll try to take a deep breath and thinking logically before reaching frantically for the rulebook.
"Your sense of overview is very poor as a teenager, but your sense for detail is fantastically precise. That’s something that people sometimes forget, and even today, when I’m writing rules, some of the criticism I get, particularly from older gamers, whilst occasionally I’m accused of dumbing down, it’s usually, “Oh, this is far too complicated,” and my answer is, “Yes it is too complicated for you, but it’s not too complicated for kids! Anyone who is 14 can pick this up, and they’ll have grasped it like that!”This struck a chord with me because it perfectly describes how I used to be when I first started out in Wargaming in the 1990s, obsessed with detail and rules and able to absorb and process them at great speed. I remember being actively dissapointed that when Warhammer moved from 3rd to 4th edition it shifted it's focus from d100 tables to cards. The tables seemed, somehow to be more detailed and 'rulesy', the cards were too straightforward.
The theme emerges again in an interview in Miniature Wargames 333.
"Asked what gap in the Ancients rules market has had identified, Rick replies that "Existing ones like DBM and FOG are based on tournament and competitive play and geared to 15mm. Black Powder is a really fun, enjoyable and refreshing games system that's not comercially orientated."Later in the same interview he talks about the development of his Black Powder rules. They resulted from informal evenings with friends in which they had a curry and decided to push some miniatures around a board.
The contrast Priestly identifies is between, what he sees as, the prevailing taste among wargamers for very tightly written rules designed to cover all situations and his approach, which concentrates on fun but open-ended rules that players are encouraged to develop themselves.
I'm not sure how accurate his perception of the hobby is, nor am I sure whether it is intended to be read as a criticism, but his comments did strike a chord with me. In my more sanguine moments I can find myself nodding along with Priestly's comments and I certainly have no competitive streak or interest in the tournament scene. But in the middle of a game I often find myself flicking through rulebooks desperately searching for the elusive paragraph that explains an apparent contradiction.
Priestly's comments came back to me again recently when I read an announcement from Wyrd Games, producers of the rather unusual and wonderful skirmish game Malifaux. Since the release of the Malifaux rulebook, Wyrd have released a number of eratta, rules clarifications and rules tweaks intended to ensure balance in the game. They are now applying these updates to the summary cards packaged with their models and the new cards will be included with future production runs. At the same time, they are offering to exchange existing player's old cards for the new ones if they are posted to Wyrd along with a self-adressed envelope.
This announcement and the reaction to it has prompted illustrates a number of things about the Wargaming community that I intend to return to again, but the reason I thought of it in this case is because it chimes with what Rick Priestly had been saying.
Let me emphasise that this plan has not been prompted by a new edition of Malifaux and that the old cards are still compatable with the rules. The new cards only clarify a few words or make a few minor tweaks. This has been done in the interest of maintaining game balance.
At the same time, Malifaux is one of the most narrative based games I have seen. A good half of the page count of it's two rulebooks is taken up with story explaining the background of the game world and it's characters. The world of Malifaux is a bizarre hybrid of fantasy, victoriana, steam punk and the wild west, in which a western gunslinger can take on a victorian undertaker or an arachnid cyborg face a demonic baby with a doll and a knife. And yet, the creators of this stranged story-based game still feel the need to optimise the rules for tournament play. Treating the game as a strict competition.
It's worth noting that several of the changes have been incorporated to eliminate rules loop holes that, if exploited, can lead to a huge advantage to one side and a boring game for all concerned. There is certainly merit in the argument that if the rules are that lopsided something needs to be done to correct it.
Yet I find myself thinking, if I found a loop hole that allowed me to win, but wrecked the game and rendered it no fun for myself or my opponent, wouldn't I just ignore it? In a sober moment, yes, but I suspect that I, and many other gamers, when faced with that situation in a game would exploit the loophole. Not due to any excessive competitive streak, but simply because when faced with the rules we feel obliged to play them as written and deliberately ignoring an advantage feels like a kind of cheating.
I have often thought there is a touch of the autistic in the wargaming community. Possibly I'm projecting because of my own diagnosis, but I think the obsession with lists and rules has an obvious appeal to the autistic mind. How much time to wargamers spend obsessing over the details of historical uniforms or the precise composition of an army? How much space is taken up on Forums on rules questions? Not that everyone does this, but plenty do. A literalist reading of the rules certainly fits into this characterisation. Not that I would see this as a criticism, getting the details right can be hugely important and a hopelessly unbalanced game is no fun for anybody, otherwise why employ playtesters?
So what conclusions can we draw from this? I'm not sure. Possibly a happy medium can exist between tightly written rules and the flexibility to be creative with them. At the same time, the next time I find myself uncertain of the rules I'll try to take a deep breath and thinking logically before reaching frantically for the rulebook.
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