Tuesday, December 27, 2011

What is Wrong with 8th Edition Fantasy??

That's the question asked by BoLS.

Just my opinion and the reasons why I dislike this 8th Edition:
  • I hate the measure anything anytime.
  • I hate the randomness of charging and the obnoxiously long charges that can be pulled off by randomly rolling dice.
  • I don't like that they attempted to fix combat which I did not think needed fixing in the first place.  Now its massed casaulties for a cool looking visual.
  • I still think magic ruins the game and is still broken.   Not even close to being fixed and in my opinion is worse in many ways.
  • Mass casualties for less strategy in my opinion.  You no longer need that eye for getting your distances correct. 
  • Killed skirmishers.
  • True line of sight annoys me.
  • Cannons.

No,  I don't like this edition.  I really like the core Warhammer rules, but I think they just made the game a lot less fun with tweaks that were not needed.  And the tweaks that were needed, were not made.  I don't like randomness.  Warhammer Ancient Battles 2.0 was what Warhammer Fantasy should have become in my opinion.  And WAB 2 is a heck of a lot more fun and more strategic.  And unfortunately I don't see them ever going back to the core.  I still play the game on occassion because I enjoy playing with the group of local players, but that is about it.

15 comments:

  1. What is so wrong with pre-measuring? All of my game buddies can eyeball distances to a scary level of accuracy, whereas I cannot since I only played Magic:the Gathering and video games as a child. The measuring speeds the game up and balances it for me. I agree with all of your other points though. As a fellow WoC player, I find that running the Third Eye of Tzeentch balances the magic phase a tad.

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  2. For me one of the main fundamentals of a table top war game is that you should be able to judge distance, and that is what makes it more strategic.

    Yea when I play WoC with magic 3rd eys is something that I use.

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  3. Sounds very familiar PsychosisPC. Much of what I have said several months ago resonates in this article. Great minds think alike I guess.

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  4. I'm not sure what's so strategic about measuring. Also if you try to think 'realistically', the figures themselves would probably be better judges of 'real life' distances than most generals or, at least, they wouldn't all be dependent on one general to guess all distances. But I've not played 8th edition and am happy to accept criticisms of its randomness etc.

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  5. Hmmm I am not so sure anymore. I have played I think eight games in this edition, all long ago. I am coming to the conclusion that it is far more strategic than can be seen on the surface. A deep look through the rules shows a lot of checks and balances built in. I am slowly warming to the system again.
    1) Scenarios are everythig. I really think that these have to be played and they have to be randomised before the battle. It prevents cookie cutter lists and allows players to play to the scenario instead of smashing each other. It really forces army lists to be toned down and generalised.
    2) Magic is there to deal with a lot of the problems that the system generates with its sudden reliance on massive regiments. The more powerful spells are fine in most cases and the challenge here is to not put all your eggs in one basket, like a deathstar unit, to poresnt difficult choices to your opponent.
    3) Premeasuring is a difficult one to defend but I do think in most cases this is for the better. It removes luck. To have a good game you need to balance the level of luck and the level of certainty. With regard to warmachines the luck is in the misfore and scatter rolls. No need to have even more.
    4) Random charges are again the opposite of the above. You can premeasure the distance and judge what level of risk you are taking by attempting the charge. It offers more tactical choices during the battle.

    IWarhammer is now providing the player with more information to inform their choices. It is telling them exactly the risk vs. reward balance of their actions and it is in many ways better than before.

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  6. I agree with some of your ponits, specially with TLoS, it really annoys me too. It just sucks.

    Cheers!

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  7. - Never particularly liked magic in any version...

    - haven't played 8th ed. (although I will be getting a demo game in in this week, so we will see...), I have played 1st through 7th (I am that old).

    - I have always felt that since 5th edition that GW has changed rules for 2 reasons: Sell more models and rulebooks (duh!) and then perhaps to fix things. Heck, a game with Ogre Kingdoms will look like one of those silly WH40K games when there are 8 valkyries jockeying for space on a 4 X 6 table because of all the giant (and admittedly sweet...) models. The massed infantry bit ensures loads of additional figures.

    - Random Charges, well okay I guess... Have to see it in a game.

    - I agree with Shawn. For me, WAB is more in line with what I seek in a miniatures game. I do love the models and mythos of both 40K and WHFB though...

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  8. if WAB 2.0 is what you wished WHFB turned into, play a modified version of WAB with some magic thrown in. Surely, you can make that work if you've played enough games to form opinions this strong. If you've got like-minded friends, they should be up for it as well. GW isn't going to come in with a torch and melt all of your models if you don't play 8th edition. They won't even do it if you play 7th edition with whatever tweaks you felt should have happened.

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  9. First off let me reiterate that is this my opinion.

    Not everyone agrees with me, as I am often reminded of, especially politically in this country. Although, I often think they should, it sure would make things easier on me.

    I’m not trying to bash anyone if they like 8th edition. It just has not had the same appeal to ME in the games I have played. I still love the miniatures, and will probably concentrate more on the hobby side of things than the game in the future, as I like the hobby aspects moreso. And granted I’m generally not a person that likes change for what appears to be the sake of just changing things up. There are few things that I think they did well, but I am annoyed by other aspects that have changed…….And then there is magic.

    I understand Redmanphill’s comments about the point of now you know all of the distances and there is many decisions that can be made from that knowledge, but in the same token the randomness of the charge kills a bit of that knowledge for me to the point that it is not all that much fun. And if the measuring is in the game rules you should utilize it as strategically as you can. I don’t for the most part feel that judging distances is about luck. There is enough luck involved In the game with just rolling the dice. The luck I don’t care for is for making that charge distance that I’m fairly certain can be made by my judgement in which I feel is more reliable than the roll of dice to see if I make that distance. That does not say that I have missed charges by a ¼-inch or less, because I have. My personal feelings again are that with a table top war game there needs to be an ability of the person to judge distance. I realize there are a lot of people that cannot do that as well as others. It just does not sit well with me. Maybe that will change over time, but I doubt it. I have the same feelings about range finders used in hunting, I don’t use them because I like the aspect of relying on my skill with a firearm or bow and arrow.

    Terrain has always been tactical, I do not need gimmicks such as the magical terrain to make the game more interesting. Again, a personal preference, I think this was put in just so that they could sell things, which makes sense from a business standpoint on their part. But from a game aspect, I’m thoroughly annoyed by it.

    Around here there are only four of us that play WAB and we also play Fantasy. I’m not delusional in thinking that WAB historical gaming will ever be more popular than Warhammer Fantasy. The total number of Fantasy players are about 8 including us four. So there is not a lot of us to begin with, not everyone is a fan of playing historicals. Our guys that play Flames of War like that period and I don’t expect that they will ever play in the periods that I like in WAB nor do I suspect they would ever join us in playing fantasy. I have played a game with a buddy using my Imperial Romans stats and special abilities against his beastmen using the eighth rules because he did not know WAB and we had no opponents show up. It can be done off the cuff, but does not work well. I did by the way win the game, just barely, not sure that has any bearing to any discussion other than it strokes my ego.

    And no one is melting my miniatures without getting a broken nose.

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  10. And if everyone agreed with me. We would all be racing go-karts for fun.

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  11. "And if everyone agreed with me. We would all be racing go-karts for fun."

    LOL

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  13. Honestly, the charges in the movement phase is not my biggest problem with the 8th edition. For example, in my perfect world, charges would still be double movement like before but add say a D3 + or - depending on conditions or armies etc. It would give the randomness that half of the people wanted, with the dependability that half of us still wanted.

    If it were ONLY just this change that I had problems with, I would have a hard time justifying not playing much any more. However, all other phases experienced extensive changes to the worse in my opinion. The Movement phase was for me the least of my problems with the 8th.

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  14. It's not "only" that change. All the items I listed are major bummers to me. MAGIC is still a phase I can not stand, I actually think its worse. There are also a number of minor changes that don't necessarily annoy me as much, but were let downs.

    Prior to this addition, I really liked the core rules, the army books - not so much.

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  15. Played my first 8th ed. game last night.
    These are all my impressions, so please nobody go and tell me no one is going melt my minis, etc. :)

    BLUF: Overall I think it is different than 7th, not sure it is any better...

    Close combat: Horde rules are insane, I see why no one leaves home without one for the most part
    Not sure this is a good thing.

    Second rank fighting=everybody dies

    Not sure I like the random charge bit, although it did help me win (by my opponent failing...).

    Shooting: TLOS=eh need more games to see

    Magic:I never liked magic the first place, in any edition. In this game I played dwarves vs. Beastmen (a Close Combat Army you would think). Virtually all of my casualties to include general and BSB came from magic. Bah, still don't like magic.

    My first impression: Fun enough game, a litte too much pre measuring, etc. for my tastes.

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