Preface:
I love
warmahordes. It is the longest running
of my mini hobbies. So, when I heard
MKIII was inbound I had astronomically high hopes and proportionately terrible
fears. How was my pet game going to
change? Was I going to like those
changes? How was my style of gaming
going to fit in the new sandbox? It is
difficult to separate my feelings about the new edition from my feelings about
the associated decisions PP has made since the initial release. The PP faction forums were a daily
touchstone—the first thing I checked when I woke up and the last thing I
checked at night. Their loss, regardless
of the reason, is indelibly associated with MKIII in my head. I cannot objectively review the new edition
without considering the changes to the surrounding bureaucratic
architecture. So, I am going to write a
couple of rambling reviews on a variety of subjects. Be advised that this is all personal
opinion. I am a long term casual player. I do not get to play much. So, errors are my own—salt to taste.
List building:
This edition often
feels like it is just a little off—like a pair of jeans cut for someone not
quite my size. For example, in MKII
standard list construction was 50 points with average war jack points of
6. Double that for the edition change
and you get 112. In MKIII the system is
balanced around 75-point lists with an average of 28 battlegroup points,
totaling 103. So, even though the
relative point ranges were doubled, we are working with less wiggle room when
adjusted for inflation.
From one perspective, having all
those war jack points makes it feel like you are getting a bargain on
battlegroup models. The catch is that 25
of those points used to be unencumbered.
This forces us to build lists that more closely resemble PP’s vision but
it also puts us in a compositional box.
Those points are not free—
They are just a force composition requirement.
Theme lists further complicate the
matter. I prayed that theme forces would be less prone to abuse while providing
for a wider range of lists. Initially I
was thrilled with the new template. As I
played a couple games and read about tournament composition though I lost that
good feeling. Theme forces do not expand
list building options. Rather, they ask
the question, if you do not use a theme list, can you overcome the qualitative
and strategic disadvantage posed by forfeiting 8-12 free points and associated
bennies? Too often the answer is
no. Mercenaries exist primarily as
add-ons for faction lists. How appealing
is it to grab a unit of steelheads or dwarves, even with a ranking officer, if
that choice puts you at an 8-12-point handicap?
What combination of mercenary solos provides such a boost that you can
give up 8 free points to field it? Further,
sometimes I just want to take a unit of doomreavers with my man-o-war. What if there is no theme force that combines
both of those choices? So even when I am
not looking to get my merc on, I find myself wondering whether it is worth it
to go themeless
Note: As I was
writing this piece, PP started a CID development cycle with limited theme
mercenary access. I will go into design
impressions later but suffice it to say that this gives me some hope that
someone somewhere is listening. It does
not resolve the inherent imbalance in free models but progress is progress.
These
issues are not a big deal individually but collectively, they have a profound effect
on list construction. I feel as if
privateer press looked at the MKII list trends and said, “We are not going to
tell you how to have fun but we are going to strongly encourage you to do
things our way.” So, while I still enjoy
playing the game, I also find this forcible design style concerning. What
bothers me the most about this scenario is that this sort of nonsense is
exactly what I was afraid would happen.
Unlinking theme forces from specific casters provides for some list
flexibility. However, keeping the
discount rate mechanic means that theme forces still break the basic
point-based economy. The ability to pick
your caster just means you have more ways to capitalize on the disparity.
I might not feel as bad about list
construction if I was not playing in the only faction without light jacks. Ever since the berserker chassis was edited
into obsolescence, I keep coming back to the same jack subset. Cutting the destroyer down to 14 points
certainly helped but not to the extent I would like. At issue seems to be the gap between the way
PP wants Khadoran jacks to perform and the way they actually behave. Granted, this is just my experience. Others may have a different double penny.
My impression is that Khador jacks
are supposed to be the near invincible juggernaut—hitting hard and darned near
untouchable without dedicated armor cracking.
While armor 20 and 34 boxes is a difficult nut to crack, it is far from
invincible—lose an arm and you may be in the game but without a way to affect
the board. I judge a jack’s worth based
on utility. What job do I need 25% or
more of my army to perform? What tools
do I have to make that possible? The
problem is that Khadoran jacks design philosophy is inherently defensive. High armor, low defense, multiple boxes
assumes that the way we get to battle is by weathering the storm. This requires me to take damage to get stuck
in. Presumably our low speed and
relatively poor shooting is to compensate for our toughness and melee
strength. These factors combine with a
lack of cheap supplemental platforms (no light jacks) to push me toward the
most efficient and effective models. I
cannot afford to dabble in the jank because all my choices are 10 or more
points and I do not have cheap filler to cover all my bases.
Put another way, I tend to shy
away from melee jacks without MAT 7. If
I am going to be slower than my opponent, then I tend toward destroyers and
behemoth as my ranged jacks to offset my snail-like pace. I tend to avoid non-character jacks that cost
more than 14 points. The decimator,
which used to be one of my favorite jacks, just does not get enough work done
to justify its cost—thus losing out to the destroyer. What hurts old doser hand even more is that I
can take 2 destroyers and exactly expend my battlegroup points giving me
Maximum list
building flexibility for my unencumbered resources.
Infantry suffers from the same malady. If I am going in-theme-and let’s be honest
most people are, then my first choice will probably be a full unit of ‘X’ plus
a unit attachment, and a free support solo.
That combination just feels boring—especially if you double up—that is
almost half your army pre-selected as auto-include by virtue of the theme
force. When lists just build themselves
it does not feel like there is much undiscovered territory left to delve.
Finally, I feel as if I am missing
something every time I look at the points values for most of the range. Part of this is that the system is still not
granular enough to account for certain models.
Alten Ashley might or might not have been underpriced at 5 points but at
6 he is definitely over-costed—especially since they made it so his gun cannot
stop huge models from healing. Man
hunters, MOW Kovniks, and the spriggan all suffer from this disorder as
well. They have utility but not quite as
much as their points would suggest. This
problem also crops up when you find you only have 1 or 2 points left…what do
you do? I feel like most solos are
slightly over-costed but cutting them down a full point would be too much. I also feel that in designing the model point
matrix PP overlooked what happens when you only have a couple points left over
and nothing to fill it. For some models
like bombardiers, a mere point cut would not be enough to make them generally
viable again but for others like the spriggan, it would be enough to give it serious
consideration if it came down to the 16 or 17-point range. The math just pushes me toward certain
choices and the spriggan and manhunters are not down that path.
I know PP had a lot to balance
with this edition—over a thousand models, 13 factions, supplemental pieces from
hordes and minions, multiple formats, and a wealth of fan expectation could not
have made the development process easy. I
have a lot of sympathy for the designers tasked with fulfilling this devil’s
bargain. I want this edition to be
successful even if it takes a few false starts to make it. Unfortunately, I cannot give my seal of
approval to the list building component yet.
The rules are better than MKII but theme forces, high war jack point
quotients, and a limited pool of high-value choices finds me unimpressed so
far. (Next up, game play.)
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