Post by streetpizza on Jul 17, 2017 12:36:35 GMT
Posted this one over on the CID boards and figured I'd put it here to see where the discussion goes.
Note that this article is written from the point of view of somebody who plays Cygnar, Protectorate, Circle and Trolls. Your mileage may vary in other factions but I'm pretty sure the logic holds true across the game.
Over the weekend I was very excited to get my hand on the new troll theme force and started building some lists. While I was doing this I found that I kept running into the same issue over and over again that I run into while building Circle lists for Wild Hunt and Devourer's Host in that Hordes just can't make good use of the free points in infantry centric theme forces. I find it near impossible to craft an effective battle group that can fuel my caster and be combat worthy while attempting to maximize my free points from the theme force. This is a problem given that;
A) theme forces are becomming the defacto way to play the game and
B) Warmachine armies do not have an issue with the requirement to have their battle group fuel their caster making this a non issue on that side of the game
Dismayed I started looking at Power of Duhnia theme forces and started to try and work in Runehsapers in an attempt to get some infantry and magic slinging coolness to the list. Almost every time I kept running up against the fact that putting in a runeshaper was costing me at least 4pts extra and if I wanted to field more than 2 it was costing me 8pts extra. This in effect was making the shapers a very inefficient choice and it kept pushing me back in to all beast mode. In effect I had to ask myself are runshapers just a dead unit now? Why would I build them in except because I need a unit in 2017 to capture zones? This is a very uninspiring reason to take a unit. This also got me thinking about what other forgotten units there are that' I'm just unlikely to run because the theme's they're in are actively punishing them for their inclusion. Some other examples:
- Sword knights in Heavy Metal
- Rhoven and Co in Creator's might
- Marshaled Ranged jacks in Sons of the Tempest (seriously marshaling a cyclone would be cool but you give up too much to do so)
- Wold Stalkers in Bones
- War wolves in Wild hunt
- Kriel warriors and Fenn's in Blood of Heroes
- Runeshapers in Power Duhnia
- Death wolves in the Wild Hunt
- LotF in Devourer's Host
All of the above get tragically shot in the foot for being included in theme forces where they do not contribute to the tally for obtaining free points and they're not viable options as free solos. When I look at my first observation and couple it with the second I've come to the conclusion that this is horrible for list diversity within the theme forces. The themes already restrict what model combinations can be used which in and of itself isn't a bad thing and is a great tool for pushing game balance. The allocation of free points to the themes pushes players to use them to exclusion of normal theme forces which is also fine if this is the direction of game design. Leaving all of the great choices I've listed above to wallow in obscurity because of small list building technicalities should not be okay. List diversity is being severely hampered by these restrictions.
As such I would propose that PP consider making the free points of theme forces be available simply for playing in theme. A rule such as "When this theme force is selected the controlling player may select up to three Friendly Faction Solos to add to the list free of cost from the list of available solos for the theme force." Adding such a rule opens up the themes for much greater versatility in how the lists are built. A secondary benefit of the rule would be to even out the disparity between some jack/beast theme lists being able to field four free solos rather trivially while other lists struggle just to reach two.
If there is an intended flavor for the theme that could be lost doing this, such as a focus on elite infantry in Blood of Heroes, then it should be the theme benefits that then push you towards those options. For example in Blood of Heroes something like "champs, warders and long riders gain 4+ tough instead of 5+ tough" would probably be enough to get people to play more of the intended unit without heir hands being tied in terms of list composition.
I've looked at this from the perspective of all four of my factions and the current forces available to them and have only seen up sides. If somebody sees a big downside to this proposal lets hear it below.
Please PP give it some though. My forgotten units and solos implore you.
When posting responses please remember a couple of assumptions:
- Themes are the defacto way to play the game and there needs to be a benefit to push them over vanilla lists
- Free points are the main selling factor of themes over vanilla lists
- The point is to try and allow some lesser used models shine in their respective themes even if they're not the main focus of those themes
- List diversity is a good thing
Note that this article is written from the point of view of somebody who plays Cygnar, Protectorate, Circle and Trolls. Your mileage may vary in other factions but I'm pretty sure the logic holds true across the game.
Over the weekend I was very excited to get my hand on the new troll theme force and started building some lists. While I was doing this I found that I kept running into the same issue over and over again that I run into while building Circle lists for Wild Hunt and Devourer's Host in that Hordes just can't make good use of the free points in infantry centric theme forces. I find it near impossible to craft an effective battle group that can fuel my caster and be combat worthy while attempting to maximize my free points from the theme force. This is a problem given that;
A) theme forces are becomming the defacto way to play the game and
B) Warmachine armies do not have an issue with the requirement to have their battle group fuel their caster making this a non issue on that side of the game
Dismayed I started looking at Power of Duhnia theme forces and started to try and work in Runehsapers in an attempt to get some infantry and magic slinging coolness to the list. Almost every time I kept running up against the fact that putting in a runeshaper was costing me at least 4pts extra and if I wanted to field more than 2 it was costing me 8pts extra. This in effect was making the shapers a very inefficient choice and it kept pushing me back in to all beast mode. In effect I had to ask myself are runshapers just a dead unit now? Why would I build them in except because I need a unit in 2017 to capture zones? This is a very uninspiring reason to take a unit. This also got me thinking about what other forgotten units there are that' I'm just unlikely to run because the theme's they're in are actively punishing them for their inclusion. Some other examples:
- Sword knights in Heavy Metal
- Rhoven and Co in Creator's might
- Marshaled Ranged jacks in Sons of the Tempest (seriously marshaling a cyclone would be cool but you give up too much to do so)
- Wold Stalkers in Bones
- War wolves in Wild hunt
- Kriel warriors and Fenn's in Blood of Heroes
- Runeshapers in Power Duhnia
- Death wolves in the Wild Hunt
- LotF in Devourer's Host
All of the above get tragically shot in the foot for being included in theme forces where they do not contribute to the tally for obtaining free points and they're not viable options as free solos. When I look at my first observation and couple it with the second I've come to the conclusion that this is horrible for list diversity within the theme forces. The themes already restrict what model combinations can be used which in and of itself isn't a bad thing and is a great tool for pushing game balance. The allocation of free points to the themes pushes players to use them to exclusion of normal theme forces which is also fine if this is the direction of game design. Leaving all of the great choices I've listed above to wallow in obscurity because of small list building technicalities should not be okay. List diversity is being severely hampered by these restrictions.
As such I would propose that PP consider making the free points of theme forces be available simply for playing in theme. A rule such as "When this theme force is selected the controlling player may select up to three Friendly Faction Solos to add to the list free of cost from the list of available solos for the theme force." Adding such a rule opens up the themes for much greater versatility in how the lists are built. A secondary benefit of the rule would be to even out the disparity between some jack/beast theme lists being able to field four free solos rather trivially while other lists struggle just to reach two.
If there is an intended flavor for the theme that could be lost doing this, such as a focus on elite infantry in Blood of Heroes, then it should be the theme benefits that then push you towards those options. For example in Blood of Heroes something like "champs, warders and long riders gain 4+ tough instead of 5+ tough" would probably be enough to get people to play more of the intended unit without heir hands being tied in terms of list composition.
I've looked at this from the perspective of all four of my factions and the current forces available to them and have only seen up sides. If somebody sees a big downside to this proposal lets hear it below.
Please PP give it some though. My forgotten units and solos implore you.
When posting responses please remember a couple of assumptions:
- Themes are the defacto way to play the game and there needs to be a benefit to push them over vanilla lists
- Free points are the main selling factor of themes over vanilla lists
- The point is to try and allow some lesser used models shine in their respective themes even if they're not the main focus of those themes
- List diversity is a good thing
