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Why I went with Kings of War and not WFB

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gaarew
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« Reply #15 on: December 06, 2011, 08:49:08 pm »

GW never asked me to write for them   Cheesy

Not even cheques?   Roll Eyes
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« Reply #16 on: December 06, 2011, 08:51:43 pm »

Wrote WAY too many cheques for them  Shocked
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« Reply #17 on: December 06, 2011, 11:01:00 pm »

I've been in the fantasy gaming hobby for 26 years now, even working for GW back in the good years of 89-99 (I like to think it all went downhill after I left Tongue). Anyway, while I collected and painted and gamed in the instore campaigns, I never really gamed at home. Painted - yes. Gamed, well lets just say the divorce that came in 99 was in part to me painting all the time but that's a story for another day (and which you can read in my novella available at all good Amazon outlets  Cool)

But I digest...

A couple years back I wanted to get back into the hobby and after selling a kidney and several pints of blood I bought the boxset Island Of Blood, and the hunky-chunky rulebook. Jump forward in time several months and nothing was painted and I'd read about ten pages of the rules, gotten a bloodloss infused headache and gave up. Remember, I used to teach people how to play this for a living and even I'd lost interest (as well as a chunk load of scratch).

But then I stumbled across Mantic and Kings Of War. Gorgeous models that look real and not like a Hanna Barbera character, rules that make sense and allow players to play each other and not the rules plus multiple ways to enter the Mantic hobby - paint set with models, FREE rules, box set with it all, FREE rules, box of soldiers - oh, and did I mention the FREE rules?

When I showed Lucy the models and a brief demo of the game using the FREE rules she said: "Right. Get me some Elves to kick your ass with!" When I showed her the WFB rulebook she'd said: "WTF?"

Need I say more...?

And now, nearly two years later I have 1500 points of Undead, 1500 points of Elves, 500 points of Dwarfs ALL PAINTED, plus 1000 points of Orcs to paint in the new year and DKH Green Menace all painted. We game every week, and even better than that, I'm writing stuff for Mantic.    Lips sealed

GW never asked me to write for them   Cheesy


... You digest?
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Darsc Zacal
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« Reply #18 on: December 06, 2011, 11:35:02 pm »

I could never digest the entirety of the WHFB ruleset. Tongue
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« Reply #19 on: December 07, 2011, 05:22:04 am »

okay..my turn.


Okay now i was originally a WFB player and fan and have been for over 2o years now - walked into my first Games Workshop in Derby (UK) in the 1980's, back when they sold other companies stuff as well as their own...thats dating me.

anyway, i have been playing and collecting (rarely painting, i know it looks good, but just can't stand doing it) since then and do really enjoy the "world" of warhammer.

However, as most have mentioned the cost of GW stuff just keeps going up and up. they seem to enjoy making rules where you need 20 miniatures for a unit, but can't actually buy that number in a pack (i remeber buying the WFb fantasy army box for 10 pound - you got 10x orcs, 10x goblins, 10x skaven, 10 x Dark Elves, 10 x wood elves and 10 x Dwarves...and that seemed steep at the time!). Okay, now that i pretend to be a grown up and have a job, study wife and child i find it hard to justify spending such massive amounts of cash on the hobby, or indeed the entire day it takes just to have one battle now.

The 8th ed rules are poor. Now don't get me wrong i like some aspects, but dislike more. Magic is a double edged sword. it really gives great character to the game, but really unbalances it too. I took two sorceresses, one with shadow and the other with dark and i really, really dominated the magic phase...and the game with them. Cavalry became a liability as the new age of hordes simply swallowed them whole...and gifted the opponent a large amount of vps and shooting units, just got in the way of getting more hand to hand specailists or you bought them simply to fulfill your core requirments. changing the rules but not all the army books completely changed the way people had to play (Dwarf couldn't really on being dour defenders anymore as they always went last and often had few attacks, leading to armies of slayers and great weapon wielding units, not the shield wall type image i think they always had before) -  and made some armies over-powered and near unplayable.

To make matters worse, the game was now so over-complicated that it was near impossible to teach to new players, unless they had years of Warhammer experince. We tried to teach both my wife and a friend's girlfriend and while they were keen, they couldn't get thier heads around the whole mass of rules.


Then while looking for cheaper miniatures online i discovered Kings of War. Well after looking at the models (not so keen on the Dwarf or Elves in fairness but they are so much cheaper...plus after getting them i have come around. The undead look brilliant though) and then the rules, i was converted almost instantly. The rules made for fast, exciting battles that were easy to explain. the company seemed genuinally enaged with their customers and they were very affordable! The game is great and easy to follow and has reignited my passion for fantasy gaming. It is well balanced and units that were a liability in warhammer; such as cavalry, archers..Witch Elves! actually had an effective role to play again.

I am also a huge fan of KoW because my 9 year old son, who always loved looking at the miniatures and watching us play, could actually join in, as the rules didn't go screaming over his head. I can now share my hobby with my son which gives me that precious father/son time that really is so very valuable.

People can argue that KoW doesn't have the character of Warhammer, but my group simply uses the warhammer world's bacgkround, with KoW rules. Plus at the end of the day, warhammers supposed variety of character (especially in magic) is just interesting description that still ultimately boils down to rolls of the dice. A bit of imagination easily overcomes this; My wood elves Zap! manifests as roots bursting forth from beneath their enemies feet.




This is why i went Kings of War

...yeah here ends my rant, lol. 
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gaarew
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« Reply #20 on: December 07, 2011, 05:56:13 am »

study wife

Is that like a trophy wife, but a bit more bookish?

 Tongue


Wow, it seems like a lot of us remember the old Fantasy Regiment box...
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« Reply #21 on: December 07, 2011, 06:16:42 am »

I really like that description of the Forest Realm Elves Zap! spell. I can see Undead being ripped apart as the vines explode from the ground around them... I may have to use that  Wink
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Herne
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« Reply #22 on: December 07, 2011, 07:37:27 am »

study wife

Is that like a trophy wife, but a bit more bookish?

 ..okay their was supposed to be a comma in there, lol. Hey i'm home sick, leave me alone.
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« Reply #23 on: December 12, 2011, 09:37:16 pm »

Really I am tired of:

1. Inflated prices.
2. point and click magic regiment removal
3. Random charge moves
4. OMG it takes forever to write a list
5. net listing
6. Book creep
7. Were's the fun!?
8. Douchen baggen players
9. You want me to read what? (300 pages)
10. Schoolbus formation slave rats! WTF!? Thats a column and columns were not made for combat lol.
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« Reply #24 on: December 12, 2011, 10:56:45 pm »

The main issue with WFB is that the cost to just get the rules (rulebook + army book) is $145 Canadian (£90).

Then I can think about getting some miniatures after I digest that massive rulebook.

OR

I could go with Kings of War.

Rules?  Army lists?  Free!

What does £90 get me?

Over 100 miniatures depending on the army build/boxes I buy.

The decision to go with free rules and a focus on lots of miniatures in each of the big sets makes Kings of War a no brainer over spending $145/£90 on two books before I can even get started.
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« Reply #25 on: January 04, 2012, 04:56:47 am »

I played Rouge Trader back in the day. I drop 40K when 4th ed came out. I had got like 2 games eachof RT 2nd ed and 3rd ed both 2 years ago I gotinto 7th ed WFB. I started driving 2 hours everfy other weekend to play. I was out of a job and trying to have some fun to take my mind off things. Then 8th ed came out.  Take most of the rules I was learning and therw them out a window + $75 for the rule book! I got a job nov 2009. And I still can't afford that price.  I found Mantic just this Dec. I remember most rules even after only playing twice.  I like the minis.  While the prices are a lot cheaper then the others. I am still going to have to save my. Pennies to get some minis, but the minis I have for WFB will work for KOW. So I can finish painting what ^ have and slowly add to my armies. And maybe even get back into 25mm scifi.  I like the look of the Corporation minis.  Well that's my rant. I hope I made sense. Sometimes I get to rambling and things don't come out right.
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« Reply #26 on: January 04, 2012, 01:12:15 pm »

I haven't really chosen one over  the other just yet. I love WFB, the background is great, the models are brilliant and the rules...well they are alright. The problem is the price. I cannot justify buying a new WFB army (or any 40k army for that matter) this year as the prices are just too high and I am certain that the price will go up again in a few months. £25 for an army book, £60+ for a battallion, £10+ for a hero is too much to spend on a 600ish point force. KoW on the otherhand has brilliant models, great FREE rules that are constantly updated and are excellent price. The one thing it lacks is background but I can always make up my own. Now I am not just going to give up on WFB, but I will probably just stick to fleshing out armies I have and limiting the ammount I spend on them. I reckon by the end of the year though, Mantic will be my most bought model company (bar anything that GW brings out for th hobbit, I love that book far too much not to get into that :p).
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Llew
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« Reply #27 on: January 04, 2012, 04:32:29 pm »

And another reason why I love KoW over WFB...there are far fewer discussions like this:

http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=327908

Maybe it's the rules.  Maybe it's just that we get a better quality of player.  Wink
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« Reply #28 on: January 04, 2012, 04:54:59 pm »

^ Oh, man, what a trainwreck of a discussion. I can barely understand what's going on never mind forming an opinion on it.

If someone said "no, X works like X because of the specific wording found in page 267, paragraph 17, 3rd sentence" in a game I'd generally just (after my eyes stopped glazing over) take their word for it. I'm not sure that I've ever played a game of warhammer in a way that is entirely accurate, there were often times when something that I'd been playing the wrong way for years suddenly got pointed out to me as being wrong.. lines like "multiple attacks confer a -1 penalty for each of the dice rolled" are just asking to be read in the wrong way. I played that one as "okay, -1 modifier" for about 4 years before someone pointed out the specific wording of the line actually means that you add an extra -1 modifier for each dice.

8th edition is something I just plain can't be bothered to learn, it's like trying to carry an encyclopaedia around in your head.
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« Reply #29 on: January 04, 2012, 05:05:19 pm »

And another reason why I love KoW over WFB...there are far fewer discussions like this:

http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=327908

Maybe it's the rules.  Maybe it's just that we get a better quality of player.  Wink
What a...riveting discussion  Tongue
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