Warhammer: Where is the Skill (Part 6: Wrapping it up)

There are a number of topics I thought I should cover in this series, but which I am yet to get to. This is partly because I started grouping the items together, and these are the things that got left behind. I figured that rather than leaving these things out, I would lump them all together at the end in order to wrap things up.

I have mentioned on the new navigation page for this series of articles that I may revisit this subject, in order to address specific topics in more detail rather than covering the entirety of the game with a broad brush (as I have done thus far).

Magical management
It is well documented that 8th edition has seen the introduction (or in many cases, the reintroduction) of some extremely dangerous spells. Spells like Purple Sun of Xereus offer the potential to cripple units that are vulnerable due to certain low characteristics. There are spells that pose a significant threat to characters, sometimes in addition to knocking a sizeable chunk out of their bodyguard unit (The Dwellers Below being the most obvious example). The addition of these “game over” spells has arguably made the management of magic more important than ever before.

I should point out at this point that it has always been possible for a well-timed spell to decide a game. In recent times, the game-winning spells went about their business more subtly than the current range of “super spells”. Dwellers is a blunt instrument that will often remove half a unit, hopefully throwing a key character or two into the bargain. Anyone who has read the spell can see the danger (although this obviously doesn’t guarantee protection against it). In the past, the main offenders were more commonly a Vanhel’s Danse Macabre or an Incantation of Urgency, which enabled an otherwise impossible flank charge and thus decided the game. The spell might not be as dramatic, but the outcome was probably more certain. Spells like Infernal Gateway and Curse of the Horned Rat were also present in 7th edition, but given these are race-specific spells, they are admittedly not as prevalent as those that come from the common Lores of Magic.

Regardless of whether you believe that magic is more powerful than it was previously, the truth of the matter is that management of the magic phase has always been a critical element of the game. This is true whether you have a powerful wizard with earth-shattering spells, or an army with no magical ability whatsoever. How you handle your opponent’s magic is just as important as what you do with your own.

The Magic Phase is unique in the game of Warhammer, in that it is the one time when you have the option of directly interfering with the actions of your opponent. When he aims a cannon at you, all you can do is hope it doesn’t hurt. However, when he lines you up with a fireball, you can take the same approach, or you can attempt to stop the spell from happening. This is part of what makes magic the most fickle of mistresses in the game, and why basing an army around a plan involving magic can be fraught with risk.

There is something of an art form to properly controlling the magic phase, and there are considerations to make for both the attacker and the defender.

Attacking
For the attacking player, the Magic Phase is a balancing act of trying to drain an opponent’s dispel pool, sliding relatively innocuous spells through unopposed, and using brute force to get the really powerful stuff through his defences. The attacker needs to prioritise his spells and decide on the best way to get each one through before rolling the dice.

In the previous edition of Warhammer, a player could largely plan out his magic phase in advance. You knew exactly how many power dice you would have at your disposal, and how many dispel dice your opponent would be holding. This meant that, all things being equal, you might potentially approach every magic phase of the game in the exact same way.

8th edition Warhammer is different. You don’t know how many power dice you will have until you have rolled the 2D6 for the Winds of Magic. The potential for results anywhere between 2 and 12 will mean any two Magic Phases can pan out very differently. In the same way, you don’t know exactly how many dispel dice your opponent is going to be holding. In essence, unless you have a bundle of items guaranteed to add power dice to your pool, you don’t know how dominant a position you will be in until the dice have been rolled.

Warhammer: Where is the Skill (Part 5: Preparation)

We’re now up to the fifth segment in our discussion of the skill in Warhammer. This time I’ll focus on stuff that happens before the game, when neither player has even moved a model yet.

OK, maybe this should have been the first part of the series, rather than part 5. But these things kind of evolve as I write them. Apologies to those who are confused by my apparent lack of structure.

Army selection

Much as some people might not like it, a great deal of a player’s success tends to come from army selection. Warhammer army books are designed to give you a wide range of options to choose from when building your army. In some cases it is possible for the same race to construct lists that vary so wildly in appearance and playing style that you might be forgiven for thinking they came from different army books. 

This flexibility also means that in terms of competitiveness, not all armies are created equal. Some armies are the stuff of nightmares, designed to crush the hopes and dreams of opponents, club cut baby seals, and garner the loving attention of all the wrong sorts of admirers. Other armies are utterly toothless – rendered ineffective by weak selections, a lack of synergy and generally just the wrong tools for the job. More often though, an army will be somewhere in between, and often it will perform differently depending upon the opposition.

First up, let me get something straight. It is not possible for a single army to be completely dominant in all important aspects of the game. The armies in Warhammer might not be perfectly balanced, but some standards do exist. The points system used for army selection means that, unless you are playing a very large game, you will not be able to afford everything you want to cover every contingency. A list of the aspects to consider for a given army might look something like this:

Speed

Here we are talking about the speed of units (and the army as a whole) in terms of movement. If you are slower than you opponent, you will find yourself having to dislodge him from the defensible location or building, because he got there first. If your forces are too slow, you give your opponent more time to whittle down or annihilate units with shooting or magic before you make combat. Faster units can get into better positions, and can generally charge further – this gives you a better chance of combining charges to overwhelm your opposition. Finally, if your troops are faster than your enemy’s, you have the ability to dictate the terms to your opponent. You will be the one that picks the charge targets, and chooses when to engage. These are all important considerations.

Ranged firepower

This is pretty simple. We’re talking about bows, handguns, crossbows, war machines and the like. The ability to remove or cripple the elements of the enemy army that most threaten your own, without giving them a chance to swing back. Some armies excel at this; others have nothing at all.

Magic offence

An effective magical offence means a combination of the right range of spells, and the ability to ensure that you generate enough power dice to make them work. Magic offence does not necessarily mean killing enemy troops with direct damage spells. It could also mean casting the right augment and hex spells to enable your army to get the job done.

Magic defence

This means being able to negate your opponent’s magic offence, by whatever means. It may mean generating additional dispel dice, stealing your opponent’s power dice, carrying items that automatically stop or ignore spells, or even the ability to kill or cripple enemy wizards before they can do real damage. Against simple damage spells it might be enough to have units that can weather the damage with no soft targets available, however not all spells work this way; it’s best to be able to stop the spells ever being cast.

Hitting power

The ability to do damage in close combat is a fundamental requirement of nearly all Warhammer armies. You need to be able to comprehensively out-fight your enemies, so that they not only lose more models than you – you also need them to break or crumble as a result of the combat. If you can’t do these things, you will find it very hard to win games.

Resilience

This topic really covers a range of issues. In general terms, it means having units your opponent can’t get rid of. In practical terms however, this means units that can absorb damage, will not break or crumble from combat, and will not panic at the first opportunity. It’s no good having units that can do apocalyptic damage if they don’t survive to see combat, or to swing when it gets to their Initiative.

Expendability

It is extremely useful to have units you don’t mind losing. These are the Skaven Slaves, Goblin Wolf Riders and Great Eagles of the world. It is often necessary to sacrifice (or at the very least, endanger) a unit in order to position your enemy where you want him. This may be through diverting a charge or by holding up a unit for as long as possible. Either way, you don’t want to be doing this with your best fighters.

Redundancy

Things go wrong in a game of Warhammer (hello, fellow Greenskin players! This one’s for you…). Whether it’s due to a failed psychology test, an unexpected spell or a miserable charge roll, a plan can unravel when a single unit fails in its duty (don’t worry, you can punish it later). Having a redundancy plan (eg a second unit waiting to succeed where the first failed you so miserably) is a great way to ensure your game stays on track.

Other words may come to mind like “versatility” and “flexibility”, however if it is possible for an army to cover all of the items above at once, you probably have all the versatility/flexibility you could need. The point is, it is not possible for a single, standard-sized army (2000-2500pts) to cover all the bases. Some well-built armies might come close, but there is no perfect solution. As such, selecting your army is an exercise in compromise.

There are two ways to go about making compromises in building an army. You can try to cover all the bases, but this will mean you are “Jack of all trades, master of none”. If you are fortunate, you might be able to muster moderate amounts of magic, shooting and combat, with some quick, disposable units. With these tools, you should be able to take a crack at anything, and could end up having a very interesting game against another army that has taken a similar approach.

Little shooting, no infantry: my unbalanced BoG list

The other way to compromise is to focus on some considerations to the exclusion of others. This is an approach you see often; sometimes it is forced upon you by your army book. Chaos and Vampire Counts armies are pretty lousy at shooting, with the exception of perhaps 1 unit per army. Dwarfs are never going to be fast, nor can they field magic. Many players also prefer to focus on certain aspects of the game, or like the way a particular, potentially unbalanced build of the army plays (or even just looks on the table). Unbalanced armies are often some of the most “themed” or characterful forces going around.

Warhammer: Where is the Skill (Part 4: Mentality)

And now we continue with my series on the skill in Warhammer. Hopefully by this point I have started to make some people think about how much really does go into a game of Warhammer, regardless of how seriously you might be taking it.

Today we are going to look at a player’s mentality. Some of these are topics I have never really heard discussed before.

Aggression and a sound defence
I am an aggressive Warhammer player. I tend to field armies that like to get to grips with the enemy, and very rarely will I hold back and make my opponent’s army come to me. Part of this is that I am rather impatient in my games, and like things to start happening. I also seem to lack faith in the ability of whatever shooting I field to seriously damage or cripple the enemy, and prefer to address the problem directly in combat. I think this partially stems from backlash in gaming circles against the “gun line” approach, which is really how far you need to take things if you want your missile troops to do the bulk of the work for you.

My aggression in the game is not isolated to a preference for engaging the enemy in close combat. I am known to take a high-risk, high-reward approach to my play. This might involve me throwing a pile of dice at a spell, in an attempt to force it past my opponent’s defences, despite whatever risk I might be taking in terms of a miscast. Alternately, it might mean a character lunging madly out of a unit, eschewing the protection of his comrades for the opportunity to assassinate an enemy character, or get into a proper position to cast a devastating spell, or whatever else. A great example of this can be found in the seemingly mad behaviour of my Empire General on his Griffon in the Battle of the Eerie Hills report.

To an extent, I had dismissed my behaviour as a symptom of my impatience. By making no effort to bide my time and potentially over-extending myself, the game comes to a head far more quickly than if both players are being cagey and spend the first few turns trying to set something up. Win or lose, my aggressive play will mean that the game speeds up, and “a fast game’s a good game.”

However, it was suggested to me recently that my aggressive play might stem from my earlier years of playing Warhammer. I started off playing early in 4th edition, and my armies of choice were High Elves and Wood Elves. The High Elf book was a truly woeful thing, in terms of competitiveness. They had almost no special rules, they were poorly equipped, and they were expensive. The Wood Elves didn’t even have a book for years, and were getting by on something similar to the Chaos Dwarf list still floating around from Ravening Hordes at the start of 6th edition. On e of my most frequent opponents used Dwarfs, and these match-ups were pretty well-balanced. However, my other regular games were against Undead and Chaos. These armies were far more powerful than my poor Elves, and I found myself fighting a constant up-hill battle.

You can do iiit!!

When you are fighting a superior army, it is generally necessary to take risks. Assuming you can’t simply out-play your opponent, you are left relying upon luck. You can do nothing out of the ordinary and hope that in a standing fight, you roll well enough to deal with superior opposition. This can happen, however you are trying to consistently out-roll your opponent en-masse. It’s unlikely, and should you achieve it, your opponent will probably be justifiably peeved.

Alternately, you can take risks, play aggressively, and try to setup situations where you either need to simply roll adequately to achieve your goals, or roll well, but with a far more rewarding goal in mind. In both cases, failure will doubtless be worse than if you had played conservatively (you have probably exposed yourself in some way, whether it be the likely loss of a single model, or the collapse of an entire flank or the game as a whole). You have taken the risk because the chance of success is greater than sitting back and doing nothing.

Warhammer: Where is the Skill (Part 3: Choices)

A slightly shorter post this time. I figured I would try to group it a bit more logically as I went...

Choosing the right targets

Whether it be a lining up a charge or the potential victim of a spell, selecting the right target is a vital part of Warhammer. This is one of those skills that an experienced player will take for granted, and then sit there muttering quietly into his beard when he sees a rookie player get it horribly wrong.

Sometimes the right choice will be obvious. On average, it will take 36 Empire Handgunners to bring down a Troll at long range, and the remaining Trolls are immune to panic. The same amount of firepower could kill 8 Goblin Wolf Riders (or panic several units if you are able to spread your fire). Basic principles like using armour-piercing shots against armoured targets and targeting the immediate threat before the one that’s further away often come into the equation.

You might be afraid of Trolls, but pouring all your fire into them might not be the wisest course of action...

Warhammer: Where is the Skill? (Part 2: Knowing)

Continuing on from my previous post, we look at some more of the skill involved in the game of Warhammer...

Know the odds

It is very difficult to stack the odds in your favour when you don’t know what the odds are in the first place. You can’t make an informed decision without knowing what is likely to happen.

I saw a post on WargamerAU recently, asking what the odds were that a Warhammer player needed to know. It was an interesting question. The most common response was along the lines of:

• The average roll on 2D6 is 7
• The average roll on 3D6 is 10-11
• The average roll on 4D6 is 14
• The average roll for 3D6 discarding the lowest is around 9

These numbers (especially the first two) would be well known to most Warhammer players. 2D6 is used a great deal – leadership tests and charge rolls both use 2D6. The odds also become important for casting spells and dispelling. Once you know how many dice it will take to achieve the target (on average), you can decide how brave or conservative you’re feeling. Do you feel lucky, punk?

Warhammer: Where is the Skill? (Part 1)

A brief note:

This was intended to be a single post, however as I got typing I realised it was going to become overly long. I have decided to break it up into multiple segments. Here is the first... 

Since Warhammer 8^th edition was released, I have heard (or read) a lot of people stating that some or all of the skill in the game is gone. Warhammer is now all about huge units rolling a billion dice and everything dying in massive grinding combats, before someone decides the game with a monstrous, broken spell.

I do not deny that 8^th edition has seen a dramatic shift in terms of unit sizes and models killed. I also agree that a lot of the knobbing about with fiddly angles and fractions of inches has gone out of the game (and despite what people may tell you about the “art” of using diverters in 7^th edition, I think this is a good thing). However, I have to disagree with people who state that the skill has gone out of the game.