AA County House Rules for WFB v8

[Fritz]

Yeah man, I'd be happy to do the same when I get back stateside. Get an order form from these guys: http://www.miniaturemarket.com/table-to ... kshop.html , have it sent to me and I'll ship it out if you don't mind reimbursing me for the shipping costs. For example, I could get you, say, 4 boxes of Knights of the Realm for $105 USD plus shipping costs to Australia. The equivalent would cost you $224 USD (220 Australian) plus taxes (do they have sales tax over there?). Something tells me that shipping costs are not going to be over $124 USD. Hell, even if we paid full retail price over here, I bet we would still save you money. That Australian price hike is ridiculous.

[Fritz]

I was messing with lists and stumbled onto the fact that characters riding Monstrous Beasts follow the rules for Monstrous Cavalry. That means you use the highest of the Toughness and Wound characteristics of the two models when being attacked (last FAQ added the toughness portion). For example, if I put a High Elf Prince on a Great Eagle, the model effectively has Toughness 4 with 3 Wounds, Fly, 2 extra Strength 4 attacks, and Stomp. That's not a bad deal for 50 points. Sure, independently the Eagle and the Prince would have a combined 6 wounds, but in return all of the Prince's defensive items are used against every single attack.

That got me thinking: why the hell aren't the rules for monsters similar? Instead of a combined profile, it's a hodge-podge of situational rules. If you're shooting at a character on a monster with a conventional BS-based weapon, you randomize between the mount and rider. When in combat, you get to choose. And finally, the thing that stops character-ridden monsters from being used, if you're using a template (ie cannon) you hit both mount and character (dumbest rule in the game at the moment). If the monster dies before the character, you have to have another model to represent the character. If the character dies before the monster, you have to take a monster reaction test. That's a lot of extra rules.

Why not make it simple? Instead of all those situational rules, what if Characters riding monsters simply used the highest wounds and toughness characteristics of the two? To keep this in perspective, a decked out High Elf Prince on a Star Dragon currently has 3 wounds at toughness 3 with a 2+ re-rolling armor save and a 4+ ward save and 7 wounds at toughness 6 with a 3+ armor save. That costs 612 points. With this rule edit, he would only have 7 Wounds (as opposed to 10 combined), but they would all be Toughness 6 with a 2+ re-rolling armor save, and a 4+ ward. For 612 points is that too powerful? Anyone willing to test it out to see how it plays?

[Fritz]

No thoughts? Or did I not do a good enough job explaining what I was talking about?

[Titus]

Never reALly ever used ridden monsters so I can not say either way.

[MorGrendel]

No your explaination was good, I just didn't have a cohesive thought. So here they are in no particular order.
1. Monsters are much bigger than MB.
2. Mo are (more) sentient/intellegent than a MB.
3. Mo are awesome fluff but weak stats. Unique is where it is at.
4. Skaven can't mount monsters, so no bonus for me. Cannons are awesome and killy. Change is bad.
5. I never noticed that a bonebreaker is a MB... I thought he was MI... This totally changes the way he is used, and it sure doesn't seem right. I guess I need to read the FAQ. Sounds like shenanigans or misrepresentation.
6. Blows my mind when thinking about a Stegadon with a Skink Priest. T6 W6 Ar2+ Ward4+ for my crew, sweet! Would Cloak of Feathers make my Stegadon Fly?! Super Sweet. Finally a dragon, albeit a pudgy dragon.
7. Pay for a mount, but lose wounds. Hard sell.

[Fritz]

4. Skaven can't mount monsters, so no bonus for me. Cannons are awesome and killy. Change is bad.

Cannons are one of the main reasons nobody takes characters on Monsters. For 200-300 points you are damn near guaranteed to annihilate my 600 point general before he sees combat. Your cannons are a little less reliable than, say, Serban's, but they're also dirt cheap. It sure as hell is the reason I don't take Dragons. The rider and the character both get hit when shot with a cannon, so I can take as many as 12 wounds with a minimum of 2. A regular monster, or a character on a monstrous beast is only risking 1-6 wounds per shot. There is far too little benefit compared to the huge risks of putting a character on a Monster. I'm dying to use Dragons, and I'll still do it for the fun every now and then, but when everything is said and done it's a huge handicap.

6. Blows my mind when thinking about a Stegadon with a Skink Priest. T6 W6 Ar2+ Ward4+ for my crew, sweet! Would Cloak of Feathers make my Stegadon Fly?! Super Sweet. Finally a dragon, albeit a pudgy dragon.

I'm pretty sure Cloak of Feathers is on foot only. Nice try. Also, doesn't the priest displace the crew? Otherwise, yes, your Stegadon would effectively gain a 4+ ward save. Considering how many points you have to shell out for a Priest on a Stegadon, I'd say it's fair.

7. Pay for a mount, but lose wounds. Hard sell.

But it's offset by having higher toughness (in most cases), not getting double hit by cannons, and having magical protection work against all hits. There is no doubt that's it's a trade-off, but it in most cases I see it being a good trade.

[Berserker]

I don't think we should change the rules. I have access to lots of monsters and I can get hunters to ride some of them. I can really make some hard to kill monsters if the items my hunter can wear apply to the monster.

And you should play your dragons anyway. You need to start making armies for the fun of the army, instead of for how good they are against the enemy you are about to play. I have dozens of armies filled with monsters and sometimes they die, sometimes they kill, but they are always awesome and I have lots of fun even if I lose because I got to field 4 monsters at once and that rules! How else could I now tell stories about how my giant picked up Dan's general and put it in his pants never to be heard from again? ;)

An example:
hunter riding stonehorn (halves the number of multi-wounds it takes - canons and uber-characters not so scary anymore).

Stonehorn baseline: st 6, to 6, Wo 6, 4+ armor
hunter baseline: st 5, to 5, wo 4, 5+ armor

So together base : st 6, to 6, wo 6, 4+ armor. So I would lose 4 wounds, but gain 1St, 1To, 1 Armor (for my hunter for free).

for 5 points, 6+ ward against warmachines.
Another 5 points for a shield makes the hunter a 3+ (starting from the 5+ that the hunter had. If I started from the 4+ given by the stonehorn, that would make it a 2+. Woot! I'm a knight!)
For 5 points charmed shield can ignore the first hit (cannon hit) on a 2+.
If I make the hunter a mountain eater, he can never be wounded on better then 3+ (more cannon/uber-hero mitigation).
Or maybe I'll give him the trickster's helmet so the enemy has to re-roll any wounds (a deathcheater hunter does the same thing btw).
and more..

Anyway, I say keep the rules as they are.

[Fritz]

And you should play your dragons anyway. You need to start making armies for the fun of the army, instead of for how good they are against the enemy you are about to play. I have dozens of armies filled with monsters and sometimes they die, sometimes they kill, but they are always awesome and I have lots of fun even if I lose because I got to field 4 monsters at once and that rules! How else could I now tell stories about how my giant picked up Dan's general and put it in his pants never to be heard from again? ;)

Some of us don't have access to regular monsters. Where you can get 4 monsters and have plenty left over for other things, I can not. I can get 2 monsters in a 2500 point list. 2. And to do that I have to invest over 1000 points into two character ridden monsters, one of which is an extremely easy to kill wizard. Having 1000 points removed by two cannon shots before I can do anything is not fun. I don't see the fun in playing a game I'm almost guaranteed to lose horribly. I never make armies to take on certain opponents, but I do have to consider how many cannon weapons are out there. Skaven, Ogres, Empire, and Dwarfs all have access to cannons and tend to take a lot of them. I'm not saying we change the rule willy nilly. I'm just suggesting an experiment to make character ridden monsters at least worth something.

And that Hunter on a Stonehorn you named off costs over 400 points. Sounds fair to me.

[Berserker]

I once played a game against jeff where I brought just one monster in and placed him smach in the middle. He of course, used all his power and might to kill him. He did. It turned out that although he did kill him, he didn't get to touch anything else on the field and we were suddenly in hand-to-hand combat. And you never want do that with an ogre. The ogres partyed later that night eating roast rats and rat kebobs and drinking to the memory of the lost stonehorn.

Moral is..just because it's big and dead, doesn't mean it was wasted.

Look, if canons are what prevents you from making a dragon list, I'll make one with monters and no canons and I'll play your dragon list. It will be epic! =)

[Fritz]

I once played a game against jeff where I brought just one monster in and placed him smach in the middle. He of course, used all his power and might to kill him. He did. It turned out that although he did kill him, he didn't get to touch anything else on the field and we were suddenly in hand-to-hand combat. And you never want do that with an ogre. The ogres partyed later that night eating roast rats and rat kebobs and drinking to the memory of the lost stonehorn.

Moral is..just because it's big and dead, doesn't mean it was wasted.

Look, if canons are what prevents you from making a dragon list, I'll make one with monters and no canons and I'll play your dragon list. It will be epic! =)

That major difference is the points cost. Your stonehorn is the most expensive monster you have at 250 points. The cheapest dragon I can get is around 350, and that's a naked level 1 wizard riding a fairly crappy dragon (S5 T6 W5). Big and dead is not useless. That's what I have Eagles for. Big, dead, and worth the points of a large unit, pretty useless.

And yes, cannons are the main issue, but that won't stop me from making the occasion list featuring dragons. Some players have great success with a Prince on a Dragon at tournaments. I just don't like having all my eggs in one basket. Rumor has it that High Elves are due up around May, so maybe this will all be a moot point. I just really can't get over out stupid the cannon rules are for characters riding monsters.

[Berserker]

I do think they should give more monsters to armies. They make it fun. They are cool centerpieces too! Maybe you will get some more monsters too!

I'm actually sad that they won't allow more of my army to ride monsters. I would love to have my tyrant on top of something. Particulary since my monsters actually do come base with ogres riding them. So why can regular ogres ride them, but not the tyrant?

Moral... Monsters rock! =)

[MorGrendel]

I love monsters, but not at the expence of a troop game. I think the game attempts to balance itself, but for good games the players should balance themselves. When Serban says he has a "giggles" army, I generally play a fun army too. As it is, I have not taken more than one cannon in a loooonnng time.

[Fritz]

I brought Shadow magic back out to play against Jason, although it was on a supporting level 2 rather than going with a straight up power game. Overall it didn't have much effect on the game, but I did drop 3 Trolls in a Pit of Shades, prompting us to talk about the trends in magic in the latest books. The "test or die" spells are becoming more toned down as we progress, with army book lores usually allowing at least ward saves. The Dark Elf book's Black Horror is probably the meanest spell we've seen out of an army book in a while, but even it allows a ward save. The older 'test or die' spells seem a little ridiculous to me in that even magic resistance doesn't do anything to mitigate their effects.

Here's what I propose for a house rule: Any spell that currently asks you to 'test or die,' such as pit of shades, dwellers below, or purple sun, allow at least a ward save. Thoughts?

[Berserker]

That works great for armies like your elves since you do have ward saves. It does nothing for armies like mine where I have no ward saves at all (besides my lord if I buy him armor) and my guys are multi-wound monsters that are particularly susceptible to those "test or die" spells. It would not be a fair house rule.

[Fritz]

I have one unit that has a ward save. One. It's not that much of an advantage since I'm also the one with the most access to those 'test or die' spells. I can't remember the last time I was on the receiving end of a 'test or die' spell that didn't allow ward save. Jason's Curse of the Bad Moon allows them. Ogres have access to death, but Purple Sun testing against initiative doesn't scare me in the slightest. Skaven have one right? Dreaded Thirteenth? I can only think of one time Jeff managed to get it off against me. To me this argument of me having ward saves isn't really relevant.

What Jason has done in the past, but stopped doing because of how those 'test or die' spells are worded, is put a character with magic resistance in the unit. Jeff in particular has lamented how useless magic resistance is and part of that useless is these 'test or die' spells. Last I checked we all have access to magic resistance.