Cyel
Junior Strategist
Posts: 685
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Post by Cyel on Mar 13, 2020 8:18:49 GMT
Thanks for being understanding, Samurai. On topic, then. The prototype rules have been around for a few days now. They are considered by some of you the selling point of the system (akin to, say, Splotter games). Has anyone tried them out? Online I can find reviews of models, so apparently PP is sending them to independent reviewers, but still no independent gameplays or reviews of the game itself.
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Post by beardmonk on Mar 13, 2020 8:34:18 GMT
Iv been quite encouraged to see shots of PP at gaming trade shows over the last few weeks as well as doing lots of podcasts and interviews to promote NeoMec. Hopefully this marks PP re-engaging with the market and advertising, actively pushing their products. But it was interesting to not that their stands at these events had MonPoc, RiotQuest and NeoMec, but no WM/H
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snoozer
Junior Strategist
Posts: 467
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Post by snoozer on Mar 13, 2020 14:11:38 GMT
I have tested the rules with proxied startes and they are a blast! I would say it is the maybe even the main selling point. It works very smooth once you know what you are doing. It feels less complicated than Wm/H but not less complex. Warmachine is about maicro management of your troops to capture Objectives. Warcaster is about Marco management to plan and control table space. A good comparison would be a Real Time Strategy Game merged with Tabletop. This is because everything could be replaced and global attrition is less important than local attrition and long term control over table space. Also the activation system forces you to plan and react more in a way that you find in some Board games of the complexer kind. Same goes for the Cypher cards. Both feel really good in the game actually.
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Post by anoddman on Mar 13, 2020 20:17:25 GMT
Thanks for being understanding, Samurai. On topic, then. The prototype rules have been around for a few days now. They are considered by some of you the selling point of the system (akin to, say, Splotter games). Has anyone tried them out? Online I can find reviews of models, so apparently PP is sending them to independent reviewers, but still no independent gameplays or reviews of the game itself. The game is very, very good. I've played a handful of Skirmish-level games (8 units) so far, and I think the most amazing thing is that there's nothing about the game that feels clunky. Some elements might be a little more stripped than their Warmachine counterpart, but the game moves very quickly. Moments that might slow play for a minute or two just aren't as prevalent in this game. The first time you move a squad, clear an objective, slingshot them close enough to score, then drop a gate right behind them full of Arc feels great. Putting gates on the table and summoning units right into the thick of things or exactly where you need them keeps you moving across the entire table. And little things that normally make me feel bad in games don't matter as much. Did I spend the first 30 seconds of my first game getting my Dusk Wulf shot off the board? Yes, I did. Did it feel bad at the time because my brain was used to Warmachine? Yes, it did. But all it took was a few activations passed back and forth for me to regain footing and trade a few more blows with my opponent. I'm not in love with this game like a few other people in my community are, but I'm damn excited for it come this summer.
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Post by marxlives on Mar 18, 2020 19:17:37 GMT
Ya if PP does AoS the setting, I hope they do it rule wise. Not a complete overhaul but from MonPoc to Riot Quest the custom dice just work and allow for ease of play. If MAT was you rolled this many white dice and DEF was you roll this many white dice and then just compare the results it would move the game a bit faster for most people. I don't mind the maths that are in place now, but I know most people do.
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snoozer
Junior Strategist
Posts: 467
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Post by snoozer on Mar 23, 2020 7:57:40 GMT
Everybody can try the rules, they are at warcaster.com The system is in my opinion nicely streamlined and left a lot of baggage away that warmachine has, due to its age (and which are fine if you are into that). MkIII removed some for warmschine, like morale but the integral system cannot be overhauled.
Neo-mechanika is pretty much everything they learned from WmH, monpoc and riot quest. The dice allow for variation but also easy math. It's super fast to compare things that are smaller than 7 (brain thing).
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Post by beardmonk on Mar 23, 2020 8:59:38 GMT
I was listening to the latest episode of The Meta where they had Will Hungerford on to take questions about Warcaster and WM/H.
Around the 9 minute mark there was a discussion around what learnings and new rules from Warcaster would Will like to bring into WM/H. One of the things discussed by Will was that, should there ever be a full Mk4, he would like to see things like facing removed to speed up play. iv yet to look at the rule book in any detail but im wondering what else we could see in a year or so time of PP decide to do a Mk4? Maybe that's a separate topic in its own right.
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Cyel
Junior Strategist
Posts: 685
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Post by Cyel on Mar 23, 2020 22:38:52 GMT
should there ever be a full Mk4, he would like to see things like facing removed to speed up play. I don't believe this to be good direction. Unit facing is a very good element of the game (and other strategy wargames). It's easy to remember and very intuitive even for totally new players (obvious! - a soldier can't target anything in the back and is easier to hit from the back). It's an area where players have full agency (unlike random elements which are out of control or unit skills which are given to us by designers). It's where players can make mistakes and take advantage of their opponents' mistakes by their own actions - manoeuvering. Finally it's something that is balanced for all models equally.
Much better rule than the current glut of unit rules which require 20 minute explanation should your opponent not know the minutiae of your army, create one-sided games due to off match-ups or may have a lot of counter-intuitive interactions.
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Post by Soul Samurai on Mar 24, 2020 7:23:15 GMT
I kinda like the "facing" element, it means you have to make decisions and creates room for interesting plays and special rules like "backstab". I agree that games can be more streamlined without it, but I think it's better to keep it in Warmachine and have a different game for providing a streamlined experience.
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Post by Charistoph on Mar 24, 2020 18:00:10 GMT
Of the many issues facing the speed of WarmaHordes, facing is only a problem for those models with overhang.
Really, what needs to be decided is if it wants to be an army game, platoon game, or a skirmish game. At present the competitive levels are stretching towards an army game, but still operating with the rules interactions of a skirmish game. Either the rules weight needs to be lightened a little to make it run smoothly as a platoon game, lightened significantly to be an army game, or people just buckle up and reduce their game levels down to make the number of skirmish models.
Warjacks in WC:NM are significantly easier to kill than in WarmaHordes, which is one method of speeding things up. Models have only 1 to 3 rules to work with, and are simple, which allows for greatly increasing the size of the games.
To put it another way, skirmish level games can be as complex as Battletech, but for army games, you're going to want to look at the Warhammers for examples.
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snoozer
Junior Strategist
Posts: 467
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Post by snoozer on Apr 1, 2020 9:27:35 GMT
I think the lack of facing, no freestrikes, binding things in meele and probably a few more Warmschinish details that were not carried over, make the game much faster. There is not that much need for you to both go and use two to three measuring sticks and a laser to determine if model X can actually go somewhere and have thing A and B in their meele while also blocking a charge lane with a freestrike.
If you love that kind of stuff that's fine and that's what Warmachine is there for. Also the game needs that to be able to protect your Caster!!! But I think for a modern game it was the right decision to leave those things out. It feels a bit weird in proxy games coming from warmachine, but people coming from WNM to WmH will be very much surprised what all those rules were there for.
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shmeep
Junior Strategist
Posts: 742
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Post by shmeep on Apr 1, 2020 9:48:25 GMT
I think the lack of facing, no freestrikes, binding things in meele and probably a few more Warmschinish details that were not carried over, make the game much faster. There is not that much need for you to both go and use two to three measuring sticks and a laser to determine if model X can actually go somewhere and have thing A and B in their meele while also blocking a charge lane with a freestrike. If you love that kind of stuff that's fine and that's what Warmachine is there for. Also the game needs that to be able to protect your Caster!!! But I think for a modern game it was the right decision to leave those things out. It feels a bit weird in proxy games coming from warmachine, but people coming from WNM to WmH will be very much surprised what all those rules were there for. I'd say that free strikes are something that's carried from the early days of IK, since it started as a D&D supplement. WMH's fat rulebook takes a while to get used to and can be real overwhelming, but I don't think miniatures as a hobby can ever really become casual the way card games can be. nobody's going to just carry around a miniature case wherever they go, and you can't play games on the fly, it's always an event. meanwhile I've got friends who treat their YGO deck like its their strap, there was legitimately not a single time I've met them when they weren't carrying it. anyway, my point is that I think simplifying the rules more would be a mistake.
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Post by Soul Samurai on Apr 2, 2020 7:19:26 GMT
From the latest update:
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Post by hocestbellum on Apr 2, 2020 10:55:15 GMT
I've really enjoyed the ruleset, but the only model I actually like is the Marauder solo. Difficult to go in on a kickstarter when you don't want any of the rewards!
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Post by beardmonk on Apr 2, 2020 11:31:27 GMT
Out of interest has does anyone know people who have backed or are interesting in this game who:
1) wasn't playing a PP game already 2) was a store that doesn't stock PP stuff already
Im on a few general wargaming/hobby FB pages and websites. The models and kickstarter seems to have been met with derision in those places. But that would be at odds with how quickly the KS was backed and the number of stretch goals unlocked. Has this only been popular with the existing fanbase?
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