Gets my Goat all these freeloaders getting it all for free while peasants like me has to hack off and arm or leg or dig up grandma for her gold teeth to afford it 😂😂😂
Yes. I didn't want to just make a video from the book, but to play some games first. Even now I feel as though what I saying is very provisional- I hope and expect to have developed (and maybe challenged) my initial views after 25 games or so.
I think a simple fix for the long lines of models is to cap them at double the "Models per Rank" minimum. Regular infantry cap at 10 wide, Heavy infantry at 8, monstrous at 6, ext.
Although it's more of a rules adjustment, I'd like to limit the amount of models that can attack each side that aren't in combat to 1 or 2. (2 or 4 in total). Then it becomes a bit of paper scissors rock...you want to be wider than your opponent but if youre too wide up you're at a disadvantage
I don't care how this is manage to think about kings of war in this situation since that game has no ranks. Honestly those are totally different system man, you should compare kings of war Hordes of the Things, Pike and Shoote and other fixed footprints games. Might sound like a simple nitpick for you but its true fixed bases and ranks plays completely different even when they have similar rolls and stuff like that.
I really appreciate that you've told us exactly how much gameplay you've based your review on, even down to your list and your opponent's armies. Amazingly candid, and practically nonexistent on youtube nowadays. I'll be very interested if you do a follow up video after you hit that 25-50 game mark. As for line hammer, do you think that being able to attack with multiple units into the unit that's formed up into a line will be a way to counter the wider frontage?
Exactly, that's my intension. Do another talkie video at about the the 25 game mark. To some extent, yes- although I think a better counter to the linehammer is, unfortunately, more linehammer! However, the lines can be easily chaffed with fast units. Lines are also weaker if hit in the flank.
Brother I'm really digging the analysis here. I understand no step up, but taking away supporting attacks from rear ranks really does seem like a headscratcher.
Ok! I think some very on point criticism here. And I like that you resisted being prescriptive on how one might "fix" these things. Unlike army building, which risks breaking the game before a model is deployed, I think all of these are things that are reasonable to let play out. I'm also super confident that the designers have an eye on the way this game is played in the margins - there are numerous references in the book to playing to win and at events, and you can tell they care about the rules working as intended. I do think some decisions are headscratchers, but that's OK! Like 8th I feel like most if not all concerns can be addressed with some pretty simple errata. Unlike 8th I am confident that in time those those errata will come, and in the meantime it will be exciting to see how it all plays out. Even if in the near term that means tOW events might not quite look like what we hoped for on the table.
@@valheffelfinger6521 So I spoke with my co-organiser for our tourney and I think a key way of positively incentivising ranked up classic looking fantasy would be the use of missions. You may recall the pack I sent with you with scoring missions (+3 or -3 TPs) taken from the 9th Age. These missions have been tested to destruction and they really work- in 8th ed too and no reason why not in OW. You need to meet certain qualifcations to get a scoring unit: have a banner, not be skirmish, fast cav minimun 10 models. Using these would: a.) Make skirmishers less good as they can't score. b.) Involve movement, which the lines are less good at. c.) Comparatively disadvantage big heroes who are a large points commitment and can't score themselves. That, and perhaps using closest to closest charge for tournament play (which would really speed it up) might very swiftly restore a more pleasing equilibrium to the ecosystem.
@@DrBlaxill so long as that 8th Ed Tower mission isn't included. I once took Ogres to an 8th Ed event and game 1 was randomly drawn as take the tower but Ogres don't fit into Towers, well not under GW rules of the time they didn't. Needless to say it didn't go well 😂
@@DrBlaxill Missions in tournament play! Yes, Yes & Yes. Having done so in both historical and fantasy play for many years, these are the answers to all the grumblers out there! It requires force balance and it's FAIR! The real commanders get to shine, and the list stackers are forced to play the game 😇 P.S. Partner's account, not mine ☺
Thank you for the unbiased review. I was looking forward to you thought on the new edition. I have played 1 game. I had a great time. Empire vs Bretonnia at 1000 points. No magic users. We felt this was the best way to get to grips with the core rules. Skirmishes do seem a little loosey goosey. Pardon the phrase. Thanks again.
You’ve quickly become a favorite warhammer UA-camr. I’m very new to the game coming from TWW, but so excited. You always raise valid points with out it devolving into a diatribe against GW. Also awesome fashion sense. From a fellow punk player have a good day DR.
Well if you are new you may be interested to know that there's a strong tradition of Warhammer with 80s new wave British heavy metal, power metal, early death metal. This was very much the ballard of that era when Warhammer was being born. Punk less so musically, but it's aesthetic influence was undoubtedly there on 80s models, especially chaos. Also a certain veneration of the rebel. This all rather vanished as it became a mass market product from the very early 1990. Why I can't help but be startstruck by the 80s era.
@@DrBlaxill I think we have a very similar mindset, I love bands like bolt thrower that have Obvs call outs to warhammer lmao. While lot of people were miffed about the old models being used I love it so much since I’m so young I never had a chance to collect them myself.
As someone who became interested in 8th at the very end and made some purchases, but never got to play before the world blew up, I appreciate a lot of the context that accompanies the analysis.
As someone who is giving serious thought to embarking on my own campaign across the Old World, this was an extremely useful video. Thank you for the detailed analysis and examples, your passionate and eloquent delivery are a breath of fresh air on UA-cam!
On pondering it further, I think there is maybe something to be said about great monsters being able to rampage hither and yon in a chaotic, monster-like fashion. I don't know how it plays out though, personally. Maybe if going rampant it was something only big slobbery monsters could do? Ah, whatever! No monster born of man or elf shall be spared the Slayer's axe! Other kinds of monster also not spared.
I'm 4th Ed ( the last great age of the competitive dragon rider) my empire opponent used an allied dwarf slayer lord with 200 points of heavily optimized runic death axe to kill monsters by catapulting him around the table with grey teleportation magic provided by grey wizard lord with the cheesy total power staff. The slayer travelled hundreds of miles in this way as he was sent after the vast otherwise unkillable monsters. Such antics are remembered in posterity as a disgrace for both dwarf and men, there was no doubting the effectiveness of such a gloriously pragmatic alliance.
Great video, really good to hear your thoughts on ToW. You've confirmed a lot of the concerns we had about this new iteration. Be good to hear if your views change much after you get more games in 👍
The best review of the game that I've watched so far. Great stuff. (And I'd definitely be at the back of the pub having a beer with you and the rest of the punks!)
The biggest gripe I have with that release is that gw didn't made some wide spread playtest with players to get proper theoryn craft and check what might be broken
Loved the video! The last bit was especially poingant. Haven't gotten my dwarfs on the table yet, as I'm a recovering 6th-er who only recently dragged my army out of the bin my parents stuffed it in when I went off to college (20 years ago!) Monsters and magic are certainly concerning, but I really like what I'm seeing from my short kings. But who really cares! We're back!
18:00 I believe the fighting rank mechanic is meant to simulate a larger formation wrapping around a smaller one without having to faff about moving individual models into base contact as in 6th. Some historical rank and flank wargames like Field of Glory also have this mechanic IIRC.
I do see your point. The only problem is that, theoretically, your troops on the flank are fighting those enemies that are lapping round, but they get no attacks in the rules. Also, if the enemy line gets charged by another one of your units, then those enemy troops are somehow magically teleported back to their original line formation 😅.
I am growing to love this channel, amazing back story introductions and a proper unbiased opinion on a game that I have loved for years. Honestly you have hit the nail on the head, the game is feeling a bit pale in comparison to a couple of other editions and I feel they've only just missed the mark of 7th or 8th edition.
Loving the content Dr B. Really appreciate listening to well articulated points from the perspectives of a knowledgeable gamer whose obviously passionate about both the setting as well as the games mechanics. Great review, look forward to hearing more. Thank you.
Line warfare has been dominant for most of history for very good reasons. Missile frontage is one such reason. The target density for missile receipt is another. Perhaps the biggest, however, is the peril of being surrounded. What really happens when a line of 10 meets a line of 8 is that the line of 8 stretches wider, so that they are not surrounded. This distributes the extra pressure over their number, instead of sacrificing the guys on the ends of the line, who would otherwise be immediately surrounded; forced to fight a determined enemy in front and another behind. The friendly line would very rapidly recede from a length of 8 to 6, to 4, to 2, to 0. If the agressors understood the situation, their main body could fight defensively and avoid suffering any casualties at all, unless the enemy were extremely careless. There are exceptions to this state of warfare, for example: - when frontage is restricted by fortifications, bridges and so on - when an army is ambushed while on the march - when heavy cavalry are posing a significant threat - when the soldiers have very long weapons, which require a certain density to be effective - when the soldiers have very large static shields, which require a certain density to be effective (most historical infantry shields were active, requiring a lack of density to be effective) - when the soldiers' armour is virtually impervious to enemy attacks - when the enemy numerical advantage is so great that the best way to minimise the ratio of attackers to defenders is to form a ring, rather than a line But otherwise, the general state of affairs has been for a line of spearmen, supported by a mass of ranged troops... typically descending into absolute chaos in very short order. The silly blocks found in old Warhammer games are not remotely representative of the general situation on ancient or medieval battlefields. They're a bastardised hotchpotch of some outlying situations, mashed into a rule system for a game that primarily aims to be fun, not plausible. The fact that everyone in the longer line gets to attack is not a completely unreasonable approximation of the absolute destruction that would befall any real world body of troops that allowed its ends to be surrounded. A better approximation might be to simply remove the narrower unit from play, but apparently players often have very expensive dice and would be a bit miffed if the game didn't allow for their deployment. The facts that ranged troops need line of sight and that units block their own allies from passing are completely unrealistic nerfs to the line, clearly designed to appease the poor fools who've grown to love the old WFB game system. I'd caveat this paean to lines, however, with the fact that a line does not typically have time to surround a cavalry unit that has charged it. Unfortunately, ToW does not have rules for cavalry making passing attacks - they are always bogged down by any unit that they encounter and are subject to the same combat rules as everyone else. A line of archers hit by a cavalry charge should certainly only deliver base to base attacks, at most. Personally, I'd make them roll to see whether they even get to attack, modified by the initiative difference. -- Whatever you think of this game system, it will inevitably put models suitable for previous editions in the clutches of a far greater number of players, so expect those editions to also see a lot more play.
The system should have been built to not make it so you should almost always use lines, though. That's just bad Fantasy design. P.S. This is incorrect, depending on weapons and such. For some of history, what was best was actually column attacks (i.e. one-man wide lines, as opposed to long lines as you might see with horse charges in Lord of the Rings). Alexander did prove that a mixed system is good about 330 BC. But, for most of history, square-like blocks were best, as shown by the Roman Empire. Greeks also heavily used blocks with shields on the outside, or other set-ups. As I said, it depends on the weapons and enemy, and land/ground. In reality, if magic and monsters existed and very powerful long-distance weapons (i.e. blast templates), any kind of rank/file would be terrible. Best would likely be something closer to Sigmar/40k with single round bases to ensure you don't get 50 guys killed in one spot. This would be closer to something like WWII. Many smaller units working together, even at distance, to a common goal, or a number of different sub-goals. But it does heavily depend on the terrain. If we're quite advanced with big towns and cities, etc., a lot of combat might be closer to WWII and modern urban warfare than big open fields akin to WWI and 1066, etc. that we saw with Fantasy and LOTR system. If you look at modern warfare, such as with the U.S. Army, you will notice how tiny the units are, as each man is very powerful yet still has the issue of movement and range. As a result, since the enemy has major firepower, it's illogical to have 20 guys in one spot. Better is a 4- or 5-man unit using complex mixed tactics to push forward. It seems, Old World was trying to go for many different types of warfare all at once, and overlooked the strictness of Fantasy Battles. Not sure where this failure came from, but everybody having 1x20 is not right unless they are archers and your enemy is across the field (or there's some rule that means 2x10 is very bad, such as hitting your own guy, or lack of range). Naturally, using something like horses is also good for 1x6, and that is normally what you see (or 2x3). (On the other hand, if your enemy is going to use blast templates, having 1x20 is good to avoid getting all your guys killed, as would possibly happen with something like a 4x5 unit).
@TalkChannel I think I made it quite clear that I was talking about infantry formations. Columns were used in combat by cavalry, who had no intention of allowing themselves to be flanked. The higher speed and lower manouvrability of cavalry completely changed the parameters in which it could operate. Alexander inhereted the army reforms made by his father, who had already proven their worth, completely upturning the status quo in the region through his own military exploits. Philip did not invent mixed arms; the standard mode of operations throughout the ancient world. He developed a way of making deep infantry formations work, by giving them very long spears, which were too cumbersome to be used in a thin line, requiring a great density to be effective. This mode of warfare hinged on the supremacy of the Macedonian cavalry, which defended the flanks. Previously, the Greeks had fought field battles in the typical manner, with a thin line of infantry, supported by archers and light cavalry. They had to bunch up in certain siege situations and naval warfare. The Romans fought in the same way, until faced with sarissa formations, which they ultimately found a way to defeat by bunching up themselves and exploiting the gaps caused by terrain features. Because their equipment was less cumbersome, they could effectively act as cavalry in that context, punching a hole in the enemy formation without any risk of being surrounded, as the sarissa can only face forward. I did mention this fringe case in my comment, along with the other fringe cases relating to the Romans, who for a while used interlocking board shields and after a time, used heavy cavalry, which could force the enemy to bunch up. My comment pointed out that it's a simple mechanical necessity for troops to form a thin line in the absence of these factors. The most important of these in the real world, is the existence of cavalry. In Warhammer, however, no units actually operate like cavalry, just as no units operate like a pike block and no units lock shields into a testudo. Under these circumstances (which irl, were the _only_ circumstances until a few thousand years ago and continued to be so in the New World until a few hundred years ago), it's completely realistic for the thin line to dominate. Vs a dragon, most troops would probably be advised to stay at home, but even today, when we have far worse than dragons - warheads guided by godlike surveillance, we still see solders frequently bunch up, sleeping in barracks and moving in columns. Soldiers have long range communication, but still operate in tight little units, which are highly susceptable to explosives. The common soldier ignores the largest threats and commits themself to fighting the equal threats, so if the same thing applied to the fantasy situation, troops may respond to the threat of magical attacks by pretending that they don't exist, since changing their mode of operation wouldn't actually allow them to defeat the dragon, but it would compromise their effectiveness against enemy infantry.
@@Meevious You make a very good point. Nonetheless, linehammer cannot work within Fantasy. It's no longer Fantasy, regardless of realism or time periods. Naturally, it's all very messy given that we have horses, men, dragons, war machines, and magic/non-real races (e.g. goblins, lizardmen, and super-rat-men). This means, in-universe, you can justify anything. But, there are very good reasons why Fantasy has been BLOCKS of men for about 35 years. But, in the real world, blocks still have their place (but as you said, it depends on the exact war/time period, etc.). In reality, Warhammer makes little sense at any time in history -- but this is not reality. It's a blend of simulated war at very particular levels of analysis (the major example clearly being the large-scale strategic wargame of blocks of units -- which is what most Fantasy players love about it compared to most wargames. It's also what many loved about old 40k with vaster armies and more fog of war elements), simple D&D/game-playing elements (some of which is actually made up of character progression systems and more), and straight up Tolkienian fantasy storytelling/world-building.
@@SwitchTalkChannel Yeah, I completely understand simply wanting Warhammer to be Warhammer and I think it a completely rational objection. I was just responding to the commentary that linehammer doesn't make any sense as a simulation of real world battles and that seeing lines of infantry arrayed against each other decreases the believability of the game, which in my view, is a problem not with the game, but the education system. Realistically, the guys on the ends should indeed have a greater effect on the outcome than a second rank, but the game lacks realism in many other mechanics, so it's not like this is the missing piece to make it an accurate simulation. From this starting point that the fanbase enjoys, it does make more sense for the designers to aim to replicate the feeling of Warhammer than to move toward a realistic simulation and in that context, this mechanic isn't ideal.
@@Meevious I still think, though, as it stands, linehammer is not realistic in all situations. There are two reasons areas to this. The first is clear: if you're at the end of the line, it's impossible to hit somebody in the centre of the line. Warhammer weirdly allows this. Second, line-fighting does not work in every battle, as proven by history. So, it depends on the battle/era, etc. As linehammer currently exists, it has never existed in any real battle. But, certainly, it has existed in history under real conditions (i.e. base-to-base contact/close-quarters, or a long line of horses or long-range weapons such as bows). Clearly, 1x20 dwarfs or otherwise with meele weapons, and all of them can attack is not realistic at all. In short: even as a realistic simulation of war, they failed due to the way they wrote the rules, which is impossible in real life. This means there is no real purpose to it at any level of analysis. The only times I think linehammer ever works is when you maybe have 1x3 horses or 1x10 archers to get max hits from a distance. Very rare cases that I think existed in 5th edition Fantasy or so (if I can recall from my childhood). But, certainly, two ranks make good sense: more guys closer to the enemy, and you can get a more logical sense of the guy behind maybe getting a hit, as opposed to being at the end of a long line. It also makes good higher-order sense, in terms of movement/marching troops. In real war, troops often march in blocks, so you get this feel from movement. In combat, it can be more skirmish or otherwise. That depends. But the rules clearly making it very linehammer-centric is a bad idea (though, thankfully, very few people are actually using linehammer right now).
I think you may be suffering from "I liked 8th edition" syndrome. First, line-hammer isn't going to be a thing in competitive play. Between terrain issues and chaff, it's just too easy to counter. I do agree that we will see wider units but I prefer that vs the old 5 wide, 10 deep stubborn bus units. I very much like the toned down magic. The escalation of horde formation to death stars led to 8th edition magic which was just silly. I completely agree with you on the rules for skirmishers, 360 for shooting is fine but charging? I do like that they got rid of the building rules, those were abused terribly, in general I like the simplified terrain rules. I guess we will see how it shakes out over the coming months but I would think a simple set up like this should get us started: 1999 points for games, no allies, rule of 3.
I finally got my hands on the rulebook and the page 130 figures seem to provide a great solution to linehammer. Arrange and pivot your units just so that an enemy linehammer unit loses it's Ini bonus against your most killy unit
Fantastic review. I was going into withdrawal waiting for more Dr. Luke videos. 😵💫 I've nearly finished assembling my new Dark Elf army on the new base sizes, next I'll be doing my unpainted Warriors of Chaos that have been rotting on the shelf since the end of Fantasy! Both those armies feature Dragons. 😅 I've also recruited 3 friends to start up the game with me and I'm attending my first ever Warhammer tournament this weekend (I've been playing since just before 5th). 2024 is going to be a good year! ⚔️
After a couple of games myself I’ve come to the similar conclusions but with a few caveats Linehammer definitely skews the game and is a necessity for non volley fire missile units but… you’re much less maneuverable, can get multi-charged quite easily, and you’re betting the farm on kill count Skirmishers/solo units are very very good. Getting that level of movement/ redirection flexibility is a game changer. Wood elf kiting will make you want to become an arsonist Monster heroes are absolutely problematic with combined profiles and the toning down of war machines. There are ways to deal with them head on but they are exceedingly rare, monster slayer comes to mind but there are maybe a select few slayer magic weapon equipped units that can go toe to toe with the dragons. Other less direct methods exist in nearly every army as well and they’ll probably be an auto include since monsters will see lots of play Magic is flat but strong still and putting wizards in units is a traps 95% of the time. The feast or famine level 4 or nothing incentive is pretty annoying as well. Chariot’s 360 arc is unbelievably good with flying monsters a close second. Cool combos and skill expression is still there but it feels very flowcharty. Also magic missile/vortex spam is strong and easily abusable Overall I like the new old world but there are definitely cracks where the stinky cheese can seep through
Beautifully put. I'm playing more tomorrow and I am hoping eventually it will get less warped than it seems at the moment. It's definitely got a lot more problems out of the box than 8th Ed had.
Excellent reviews. I played a lot of 8th. We've played 2 games of old world so far, a lot of the issues you mention are raising their head. Great and well thought out review. Thank you.
@@DrBlaxill line hammer is crap on the table, I'm not going to create a UA-cam rant about it... Erhem... You would expect your fellow punks and gents to not play that way. 8ths horde 10 max was a good rule of thumb. 2nd row one attack and anyone not in base surely nothing. Surely that the point of bringing rank and flank back, sir!!!?
GW have never made enough of cavalry charges. In a game, the cavalry slams into the defending front rank and stops dead. What happened in real life would depend entirely on the number of defending ranks. With a single rank, the cavalry would blast straight through and out the other side. With deeper ranks, the chargers might be repelled or unhorsed. GW should allow these factors to play a part in the game - thereby incentivising units to line up with deeper ranks if they are expecting to receive a charge. This would soon put an end to single rank formations.
I will say this. I'm so glad it's back. I hope that it does well enough that they actually make a second edition and maybe improve on the rule sets in due time. they already plan to issue bi yearly FAQS for it. now it's just time to get through the growing pains of a new edition and maybe figure out some better rules for it as needed....
I fully agree with you regarding the magic. In short, it’s become flat and boring. Reason being that it has removed the minigame that was the magic phase. No longer do we have any personal choice involved, there are no stakes. We just throw the dice and hope for the best. In previous editions we’d have to make decisions, we knew what spells the opponent had, we knew what we had available to us to defend against it. Hence, we might have opted to eat a magic missile, to save our dice for something more dangerous, and so on. Same thing goes for the caster side of things, we might’ve ended up baiting dispel dice casting small annoying things, to then go big on whatever spell we really wanted to have enter. As for the rest of it, I’ve been having a good time with ToW so far. I’m 4 games deep with my orcs as of now. My main concern right now is that I feel that there are a lot of incentives to play monsters, heroes on dragons, etc. These big pieces are very hard to kill and don’t really have that many drawbacks from what I’ve seen. Especially considering that artillery isn’t quite as dangerous as it used to be. On top of this, unless I’ve misinterpreted something, they don’t grant any victory points unless killed, which is a stark contrast to the older editions where we’d get 50% of the unit if we managed to remove half of their wounds.
Certainly giving half points for them if reduced to 25% of their starting wounds (say) would help- an incentive to damage the dragon even if you don't kill it. I might put something like that in our comp pack. With magic, alas, I feel a large segment of public opinion really had it in for it! I think many people who have played the resource managament risk/reward mini game system of older editions will feel that way. I liked all of the previous editions there, though I thought 8th was the best. I resolved myself to being in a minority with this view on magic though- I think some people may just like the simplicity, especially if they don't remember old editions or realise what nuances have been lost.
@DrBlaxill I would be a moderate magic defender, and I agree about the sad loss of complexity, but I will disagree on nuke spells. Mind, I am more used to Warhammers Armies Projects, a fork of 8th, where nuke spells are easier to get off. But for an army like Lizardmen, there were a number of "pass this i test or die" spells, that could essentially swallow every unit in our army. This was never fun to deal with, and disproportionately hurt Lizardmen, as opposed to humans or elves. There were too many nuke spells like that which were tilted to destroy one faction type, and wipe them off the table, so I'm glad they're gone.
WFB in the past has no business having mini-games in it. It's bad game design. I get that a handful of you like it - 99% don't and that's why the past games failed. With a comedy 100+ core rule set (most of which is entirely convoluted and "complex but not intelligent"), a mini game compounds the busy-work and mental load of an already poor ruleset by evolved standards. Had they cut the rules down to 10-20 pages (as they should have done) then a mini-game magic phase makes sense. Song of Ice and Fire (WFB boiled down to its essentials) is like 10 pages, but then they have a "game of thrones" mini-game that you play along side the rank and flank affecting the outcome of the battle + giving you a chance to get new miniatures that look cool. They reduced the mental load by cutting the nonsense out of the game, which gave space to insert a mini-game in. Good game design. That being said magic in Old World is a bit bland.
The "nuke spells" are present in 8th edition in an attempt to balance out the horde rule etc. There is purpose behind them which comes directly from other game design choices which have knock on effects / chain reactions: so they have to find ways of "patching" the game. Sometimes "bad rules" or a generic rule can only exist because of another rule etc. Stomp/thunderstomp only existed because Monsterous Infantry and Monsters were increasingly underpowered in 7th through 8th + rules such as steadfast. They couldn't manually update every statline due to the nature of the release schedule so they just made a "catch all" rule and wrote it into the core rules. Now you'll note Stomp I believe is gone in TOW but Thunderstomp is still there. Weird. Until you realise Old World's rules are purposefully written to sell specific models (they did the same for recent 40K). Dr Blaxill's videos demonstrate which models GW clearly want you to be buying if it's not obvious already.... @@ndalum75
As usual, a fine and entertaining video! If you ever taught us the game one on one we would have it made!! Kudos to you Dr. Blaxill, and cheers from America!
I cannot tell you how much I appreciated the Road Rash references. This channel just rocketed up my favourites... Remember Dr - brake into the corners and accelerate out.
It's nice to get really high quality analysis. I'm curious what tournaments eventually come up with for balancing out some of the rougher edges. One other thing to dislike about magic is that lower level casters end up looking a bit useless. With 2d6 odds their chances of getting off spells are much lower, and any enemy level 4 Wizard who's in range will make them pretty much irrelevant. Although potentially this can be avoided with positioning, there may not be too much of a reason to take lower level casters.
I believe Wizards casting four magic missiles a phase is not actually something you can do, because while they're allowed to cast all their spells, they aren't allowed to shoot more than once a phase.
If they went up in attacks across the board, but also reduced the lethality of attacks across the board I can maybe see supporting attacks in the front rank being fine, because the 10 extra attacks a 15 man unit would get would only be equivalent to the 10 attacks of the 5 men in base contact, but as it is implemented in a system where almost every model has a single attack supporting attacks really doesn’t work except for monster units like Ogres or trolls.
Great review, agree with almost everything. As a dwarf player I'm very scared of the "linehammer" and big monsters no more in check, given cannons and war machines seem unplayable. Though I think it is a good edition, and magic very much manageable with some dispel runes and magic resistance, I also think they did some steps back regarding close combat. It already was the most powerful step, and now it is more than before, with many exploitable oversights (for example the cap on rank bonuses, that was the only thing getting wide units in check. I think right now the march column seems pretty useless since it exposes to flank charges and nothing more really).
I think there will be a rock-paper-scissors in list construction, with elements that can punish the low maneuverability of long lines, or even build around slaying monsters. I also think the magic mini-game will work out okay, given some of the nuances. I'm not really sure that skirmishers will be "fixed" by the meta though- they probably should have been confined to special/rare.
as a new subscriber of that 0.7% this was a fantastic review! i'm also one of those competitive players, so i'm very curious to play some games myself.
You can take the initiative and make a PDF of your own rule updates. It could couch all of your rule preferences under a single thematic concept (i.e. When Blaxill's warp "mist" (English or German definition) is present on the battlefield, base to base contact is required for melee combat due to vision limitations or slippery ground. And due to the mist's warp origin, the rules of magic are changed completely by it, etc.). Maybe limit the skirmishers vision or charge scope to lower than 360 degrees or something? Or toss the thematic element and make the rule changes Doctor's orders for better game play.
Great review! Regarding "Linehammer", I agree that is very strange that they didn't put any kind of limit on the maximal unit width. Maybe a good compromise would have been to allow models in the fighting rank to attack, as long as they are in base to base with a friendly model which is in basecontact with the enemy (So basically you get two extra models attacking, one on each side). The big flying monsters with combined profiles are also a big issue. Maybe they should have enforced that only the armor saves of the monster can be used (Therefore no ward and/or regeneration save from a rider's artifacts). Only time will tell how it all works out. Glad WH Fantasy is back!
What they couldbhave done was have something like an automatic number of attacks. No step up but say a striaght +2 attacks representing someone from the back getting an attack in. So even if you're front rank base to base is killed you'll always get some kind of attack back.
Thanks as ever for the video. On the give ground/fall back/flee thing I think it's quite funny in a way that after a lot of talk about how it meant nobody would flee etc the thing that passed people by was the outcome that is missing entirely i.e. 'Hold'. Big implications from that in a couple of the battles I've watched as we discussed briefly yesterday on the Triple Crown game with the High Elf Dragon Lord. As you say there are things that can be done about the lines though they will probably all have to involve altering the rules. I guess anything from ruling a fixed maximum number for unit width, a maximum that get to strike over and above the width of a unit they go into combat with, removing the close order bonus from single rank units, I'm sure there are more options. I think the spectacle of a line getting flanked by another line so that loads of models are attacking the single figure that only three of them (or even one depending on base sizes) are in contact with is about as silly as it gets, that and lines attacking single models I suppose. Agree that the double unit strength negating FBIGO thing seems to mean things won't be as bogged down as suspected - the reform when overrunning etc seems to mean the winner can often be back in position almost as quickly by breaking a unit over two combat phases (one to reduce and the next to break) as if it had done it in one. No idea what can be done about the skirmishers without rewriting them entirely - they look to me to be very confusing even in relatively small numbers. I'm hoping that seeing them in action enough times will help me to get my head round them - it will perhaps be easier once everyone's agreed on exactly how they work and is playing them 'right' as not every battle I've watched has done everything the same way up to now which is hardly surprising really.
Excellent thoughts. The problem of course with a lot of fixes you or I might come up with is that they in effect amount to rebuilding aspects of 8th ed within the new game. Posterity has not been kind to 8th edition- but perhaps in time people will increasingly realise just how good that ruleset was- and even after years of competitive abuse it didn't break. In TOW, off the bat I would like to see: 1.) base to base brought back for fighting; 2,) skirmishers as in 8th ed; 3.) charges closest to closest and wheels being free. I honestly can't think any of those would have much or any downside! Perhaps with skirmishers there are some subtleties and cool things I'm not seeing- but the other two, I can't see any pros. They are of course brining back 8th ed by stealth, so I am not sure that would go down too well! Another point on this reformhammer shenanigans we have discussed. Even if the dragon catches fleeing enemy he gets to reform. In 8th ed if he did that he didn't get the free turn so had to make the calculation between optimised position and running down the enemy. Now he once again finds himself having his cake and eating it.
@@DrBlaxill The base to base thing isn't 8th specific so you may get more sympathy there! I'm keen that the game shouldn't be too slow and the complex working out of movement that then ends up not happening is one of the things that doesn't appeal greatly so I think I probably agree about the charge calculations even though part of me thinks it would be more 'proper' to have to work them out and I can understand people feeling that it's right to have to do it. I need to see (and ultimately use) more skirmishers to feel I have any sort of valid opinion on them - I'm just finding them a bit baffling for the time being and hope that I get past it! I think the Dragon in that game we discussed managed to fight in eight consecutive combat phases (he might have missed one, could have been 8 out of 9). Think the cakes he ate were a unit of skeleton horse, those dudes on serpents, Ushabti, One and a half units of skeleton archers, three chariots and the Tomb King on the sphinx (who had already taken some damage). Now he was aided by an unwise charge by his opponent on one occasion and perhaps his opponent's deployment, but it was just too much.
@@jojomerou4075 I am talking about limiting supporting attacks in combat, not shooting attacks. Wide shooting units would be shooting as normal. In the combat step they would fight with how many are in base to base and some number lets say 4-6 models get to support. Not supporting from the whole conga line.
I love yours theatric and little sceptic performance. You are natural and full by passion. Mostly video it’s made by generic, common guys with typical enthusiasm.
Probably the most honest and best analysis of ToW I have seen so far. You are hitting all the points that I also sadly have to address in the rules. The worst being Lineformations... skirmishers all over like its 40k... herohammer while tuning down artillery and boring magic (no phase anymore). But I am not sure about the 4 magic missiles. I think 3 is maximum. Ruby ring of Ruin + Arcane familiar, dropping 1 spell into daemonology for the summoning, i.e. signature spell, and putting the rest of your spells into battle magic and hoping for that fireball spell to have twice. I think a wizard always only has 1 signature spell available to choose. I am happy that there are no unit killing spells anymore! This was just bonkers. As a former ETC player, ok 40k and not WHF but still being an quite old WHF player, I am dissapointed about such obvious loopholes or weird ways of creating a game that is meant to be a RnF game. I started 40k beginning 3rd, WHF start 5th edition, mainly played 6th and 7th WHF, stopped 8th Edition because of 8th edition. Ah yeah, I am for banning dragons in ToW because! 🧐 Besides, at the moment I have more hopes into T9A 3.0 but I suppose that a lot of tournament organizers will go ToW just because it draws more players (sadly).
Many thanks! I am unsure if I am allowed the Daemonology signiature and the Blue Fire of Tzeentch from the Daemonology book. Yes, I am surprised they succumbed to what (seem) like obvious loopholes. Why they got rid of base to base is beyond me, because for some other things it does still matter (so it is not as if they saved on the complexity front!)
@@DrBlaxill I am also not sure to 100% but I think 1 signature spell per magician only. Only the Slann is an exception here which can, with that one special skill "wandering deliberations", take 4 signature spells. Yeah they did not made the game tuning complexity down. Ok well, magic is tuned down a lot but instead there are other time consuming mechanisms. And as you wrote for instance, magic is very strange. It got tuned down in having no uber killer spells BUT they implemented that dispel range around mages and this can easily lead to, if outmaneuvered, that some mages will be able to cast ALL their spells with no fear of getting dispelled when swooping around on fast flying eagles or so, always staying outside of dispel range... I mean ok I can imagine why, they wanted to push mages into the centre of the tables as well, so that they are more in the fights than lurking around somwhere far behind in a bunker unit but... with that dispel range and having no dispels to fear when being out of any dispel range, they in fact made the opposite. Mages will even hug more the table edges and corners now, trying to stay out of dispel range to get off all their spells if possible. Magic missiling and vortexing away everything that can be reached... And yeah the monster/cowboy push while reducing static CR in close combat and tuning down the artillery pieces that were good against single models/cowboys is sadly such an obvious "hey we want to sell dozen of ubercool single models and heroes on big mounts so do not disturb our CHING CHING game..." 🤑 Ah yes, very cool Chaos and Breton armies by the way. I love that super oldschool miniatures as well as paining style.
Quite right, I didn't have to wait long! An interesting watch, and I agree with many points, and see your perspective on others. Briefly: - On magic, I sort of agree that its a shame to miss the old system and you could have just reigned in the worst of the big damage spells, but I also can see the merit of a simpler more gradual system. I think it bears seeing how things go. I like the positional counterplay that is available versus wizards (no dispelling in combat, and many spells unable to be cast in combat). - On skirmishers, and this might be the historical gamer in me, but I like that they are super flexible. They have definite downsides as combat troops, with no rank bonus and no close order. They've also lost their redirecting role. - On lines (and incidentally on charge distances), I think you yourself mentioned one of the big drawbacks of lines later in the video. In a world where you must pay to wheel for your charges, I think a line is very easy to out manoeuvre and take out of the game. A line may be better in a one unit vs one unit situation, but the huge frontage lets multiple enemy units get in to combat. That means chariots and the like coming to help, or multiple infantry units, where the +1 combat resolution for close order stacks. Two lines of 18 wide vs two blocks of 6x3, I can see a situation where the two units of 6 x 3 easily get a double charge off on one line, and roughly handle it. They'd be up by 3 or 4 on static res. - I'm worried about big dragons too.
Have to disagree with thebmagic bit. Played a 1500 game on Monday, got only half my spells off, and from them half were denied, but one of them denials he roll double 1 and took a wound. He got a few more spell off than i did, was this as he had a lvl4 and me only a lvl3, but that also meant i had more points in other palces that turned the battle in my favour.
TBH I'm more excited to see Wednesday 13 performing Murderdolls in UK(October ) than playing Old World 😂 but good luck 🤞.PS love your chaos 80s disco vibe 😍 but wouldn't laugh from 40k cause that's the main sponsor for old world and tbh 40k let ya play few extra years in past when Warhammer Fantasy was a store shelf filler ...
Regarding models swinging at models not in base to base - In my head, the units smashing together aren't staying in straight lines and are curving in towards eachother as the combat comences, so I'm not bothered by it (within reason of course!) Regarding line formations... I honestly don't know what you mean, look forward to a demonstration if you record one 😅 (10/10 ending, legendary haha)
About magic: I agree that it's rather boring. I really, really liked the old "dice poker" we had with Power Dice, Channeling and so on. The way magic works now you have literally 0 incentive to take a low level wizard. Because if your opponent brings even a single lvl 4 wizard, your pathetic lvl 1 or 2 wizard will just have his spells unbound. Doesn't matter if you bring four lvl 2 wizards, that one enemy lvl 4 wizard can dispell an unlimited amount of times, which is rather silly.
So, full disclosure, I haven't played yet. With that said, I have watched several battle reports, and I played a ton of fantasy many years ago. So with that all in mind, take what I say as it is. My opinion, not based on science. Lol. So first off, I have to disagree with your Line Hammer a little. I'm sure there are some units it's fantastic with, but things like skeletons, clan rats, other basic at best infantry, I would think the combat results from ranks can be more effective than some extra attacks from these units. They really don't deal out a great deal of damage. Also allows for more units to get into combat easily, and can lead your destruction. It becomes more difficult to get support, as your footprint is so large, if you have good counter punch units behind, they may not be able to get in. Also I believe, and may be mistaken, you can only make 1 attack with units not in base contact? As far as magic, I have to agree a great deal. Something that really bothers me, is I could take 4 wizards, cast 10 spells in a turn, and my opponents single wizard could potentially attempt to dispell every single one. So as you mentioned why not with a gated dispell. I do so miss have some sort of resource, be it power dice, or you get x number of dispells and must choose wisely. I do like the power level of magic though. I mean spell effects. The other couple things that I really feel is a little too strong, is Counter Charge, and Monster Slayer. Monster Slayer should be doing 3 damage or something. The idea of a single strike being able to kill your warlord on dragon is nuts. They nerfed warmachines and spells and say don't be afraid to take your big monsters.... I'm a little worried. Counter charge shouldaybe have some test or something, seems really strong in a game of positioning and trying to get important charges off. It kinda gives the feel of being able to be carless with a strong unit with counter charge. Anyway, really excited to play. Thanks for your thoughts.
A fair and good analysis of the rules by the looks of things. I must say I don't particularly care for the sound of line hammer when ranked troops can't step up to fight. Lines of troops would suggest a weak force and yet the rules say otherwise.
Regarding the long lines of troops, a simple fix from GW during the first FAQ should be to limit the width of a unit of 30mm bases size or smaller to 10" or 12". Secondly, regarding magic, I agree that the miscast table should definitely be amped up a bit. I think they could really spice it up with just adding Dimensional Cascade's quantity of hits is equal to dX, where X is the wizards level. A powerful wizard should have a more powerful miscast. So a lvl 1 wizard is always 1 S10 hit as per the current rules, however, a lvl 4 is d4 S10 hits. Now that really adds some flare and caution in regards to position, so that a caster truly has to be weigh where and how many spells to cast.
I'd just add that supporting attacks (from front rank) can be up to the amount of models in basecontact. So if you have 5 models in basecontact with enemy, you get up to 5 attacks from those who arn't in contact. This way running a huge 15-20 man line can be catastrophic when it's hit by a single chariot/monster/character or even a deep unit with tight frontage.
Thanks Dr. ! We tested lines and effectively it looks silly. With montruous infantry it's deadly. For skirmisher, sorry it didn't look like WH40k ... it look like AOS !
Line hammer does sound weird, but sometimes I think the problem is overstated. With the increased base sizes this leads to unwieldy units. The typical example being used to showcase the linehammer absurdity are dwarven missile units. They are perhaps the only missile unit that can fight back as hard as it does. But they don't seem to take into account that they only ever target a single unit, so very large units are not ideal for shooting and with 3" movement they can barely turn to face you. I don't like this line hammer either since it seems like a counter force for ranks, but at the same time I am happy they didn't promote units with 4+ ranks since that doesn't make a lot of sense either.
I'm pretty much brand new to GW's wargames (having been mostly a Warhammer RPG player). I'm curious to see if maybe some of these cons, like the Linehammer example, could be errata'd out. I know GW will do balance slates for 40k, but I have no idea how much they actually change the core sytems. Either way, this was a really wonderful review and has gotten me excited to start my first ever WFB army!
They should've just added a "mini" step up rule where the front rank always get to fight, no matter what. The step up rule was fine with 2 fighting ranks in 8th because it made the game more fluid and simple, but the new rules seems, as you point out, to punish deeper formations.
Thank you sir!! I greatly appreciate your honest feedback! My game group and I love Fantasy Battle and want to see this version be successful, but finding people to give an honest, “balls and strikes” take has been nearly impossible. It also seems if you speak negatively at all about it, you’re kind of shamed into submission for poo pooing on the new version….sorry, but some of us have some skepticism after they killed 8th on us and constructive criticism is very important. But I digress….thank you again! I salute you!
I think we've got to be critical. However, my bar isn't a high one. I doubt it will be better than older.editions (because so many of them were so good!) but they have to avoid making silly mistakes. I think (too early to really know for sure) they've made a few- but to fix them we've got to know what they are!
@@DrBlaxill I completely agree. Give tournament players a few months and the errors will be found. I just hope GW is active in fixing the issues that pop up.
War machines were Waaaay to powerful in 8th. that they only do d3 or d3+1 wounds now is a good thing. Bringing a monster in 8th was risky as if you went up against a player with cannons they could bring 2 or 4 or in the case of the dwarfs like 8 of the damn things and your monster was basically useless. As it stands most riderless monsters are just as vulnerable as they were in 8th and in quite a few cases they got WEAKER then 8th. the Warsphinx got nerfed to hell and back, the Phoenix lost it's ward save. Most monsters are riding a 4+ armor save or gained a 6+ armor save, the Hydra's regen was... actually sorta fixed compared to the ... thing... they tried in 8th, but it's still only a 5+ regen now. War machines not instantly crumpling their armor and one shoting monsters on a roll of 4(in some cases, like the varghulf) or a 5-6 is a good thing. Regen is extremely powerful now though, as it's not innately tied to flaming attacks. you need a combo of rules to lose regen from flaming attacks or take extra damage from it. Now... To be honest. i have no issues with monster getting more wounds when ridden. These characters are huge points sinks and they should be considered a massive threat. Monsters should have always benefited from the rider's ward saves. Now they do. However. I disagree with the stacking of Armor, Ward and regen. All 3 of those is ridiculous to get through. However! There are a few ways to just ignore armor, i see it pop up here and there, Monster slayer is a big problem too. roll a 6 to wound and the whole model dies. you don't get armor or regen just your ward which is usually gonna be a 5+. Getting more is actually really hard without sacrificing your offensive potential. Any way. the lack of a limit on unit copies for special and rare could be a problem. they already had to add a tournament rule of 3 to keep people from spamming joke armies. The rules for the Line is... just dumb. they took away fight in 2 ranks and step up but inserted a rule that overlapping lines can just make supporting attacks any way, and the rules for supporting ranks, (I.E Spears) indicates you don't lose your supporting attacks if the front rank dies. Which is another thing! Without the parry save of a hand weapon and shielded unit, Spears are king for quantity of attacks and Sword and board units are basically worthless now. a Spear and shield unit gets the same armor save as a hand weapon and shield unit, and usually a bunch of extra rules. the only advantage is they're cheaper options now if you need to save points. Some exceptions exist, the Tomb Guard and Grave Guard can straight up refuse to move if they have enough models remaining, like in the old days, but they need hand weapon and shield to do it. And i mean, they DO NOT MOVE, even if they lose. So that's interesting. Any way, i haven't even had a chance to play due to these supply shortages. but... i dunno. i feel like a number of 8th rules replacing a couple of rules in here would make this edition almost perfect.
As 8th edition was the worst edition of all WHF editions, who cares about 8th edition!?! And no there is really nothing good in artillery being toned down to being useless against monsters and single models. 8th edition was already a terrible game with hordes and uber magic and cowboys and single model spam (because they were not too weak...) and ToW now being the same with line formations, single model and herohammer cowboy spam because artillery got made so extremely weak, it almost makes no senes fielding it. Sure, when you played a nice roster with 1 monster against that 2-8 cannons (just to mention 8 cannons is 800 pts from the average 2000 pts army already) or so you mention it is the other way around of being a stupid, pointless game. But for real, sounds super uncomped to me... thankfully 6 and 7th editions, the best ones, had a slot system and not this stupid percentage system which allows spam. Sadly ToW now again has that stupid percentage system that allows spam... But seriously, you are probbably the 1st person so far that is really having the opinion that monsters ever were too weak... seriously! Thankfully all ETC players and veterans see it differently, knowing who really dominated the tables and this never have been artillery pieces but single models, especially cowboys. Also, uncomped WHF never really made sense and so examples with 8 cannons or so do not really say much about ingame balance. They just show list creation abuse due to a lack of restrictions/composition. And ToW now made it worse in tuning down artillery to being almost useless against single models (mostly cowboys due to their incredibly strong saves) and pushing cowboys into the skies... so I repeat, monsters have never been too weak or artillery too good. But now in ToW GW finally managed to make artillery too weak compared to single models. And sure, GW wants to sell tons of cowboys in big mounts and single models in that game ToW... they are not interested in balance at all, just good quarterly margin results.
@@richardpagel6959 8th edition was pretty well rounded, other then horde and steadfast. If you played it normally without trying to use the broken rules it was a solid system. Monsters were very weak. Warmachines were far to common and dangerous to bring monsters for, as they had few defenses and couldn't borrow their riders wards. Monsters couldn't disrupt, and never had enough offensive power to overcome a death star or even a regular horde. Tis common knowledge.
@@skeith1543 With the right people you can always have fun when everyone is not trying to use the broken rules. But exactly THIS does make a game NOT solid at all, when it is only playable as long as everybody is nice to each other and/or knows each other. Exactly this makes it a bad game, when you are only able to play it as long as you and your opponent stick to some gentlemens agreement so to say. 8th was just bonkers and made for children who wanted to throw tons of dice instead of having a tactical Rank and Flank game. I repeat, it was THE edition of WHF that did not made new people play the game, it was the edition that made 1/3 to 1/2 of all players (at least in Germany) stopping to play WHF. 8th was the least welcomed edition of all WHF editions ever. In Germany it made shrink the scene in a couple of month into almost nothing. This did not happened because it was such a great and solid game system. And to be honest, better play T9A instead of 8th WHF edition. T9A is based on 8th edition but as far more balanced. And ToW will, with the right people and if they do not all play with dragons for instance, be a nice game for sure. But competitive wise it also will be a disaster (uncomped) like all WHF editions before, even the good ones were always unplayable uncomped just because GW is a big greedy company that likes to sell tons of expensive models and thus allows all crap and bullshit be done with their rules due to having almost no list building restrictions. Slot system in combination with percentage system would be best but sadly GW is not interested in having a good and balanced game at least army composition wise, not even thinking about core rules.
My problem with earlier magic sistems was the absolute absurdity of the damage magic was capable of, and the game forced you to participate in the magic phase, so it forced you to have higher mages to be able to dispell effectively, now one level 2 mage in the right place can nitigate magic a lot! And let's you focus on other more fighty models not having to feel bad about not having enoigh base dispell dice (speaking from 6th edition here)
While I do share your concern about the risk of _Linehammer_ I do really like most of what I've seen and read about TOW. Can't wait to get some games under my belt.
It's extremely ironic that while Total War: Warhammer is based on Warhammer Fantasy, The Old World meta seems to be exactly like Total War. Explanation: Spaghetti lines have always been meta in the recent Total War games because it "maximizes" the amount of models that are in contact. The spaghetti line essentially wraps around the block of infantry and does more damage. The only way to fix it is by enforcing some arbitrary maximum rank to file length ratio
is that the meta ? I don't play normal TW Warhammer, I play it with the "realistic Warhammer true to lore" Mod, but I'm pretty confident thin lines are broken by cavalry and chariots, ogres, etc - because all models have an "impact" characteristic hidden under the hood. I don't know about the vanilla game, but I certainly would never have spaghetti lines if I knew there were enemy cav, monsters, MI, etc out there....
The amount of censorship against these points has been crazy. There were major red flags about linehammer just from the preview article, the rules aren't even fully functional, and playtesting has confirmed it. Lots of people dependent on or receiving GW money did not give accurate reviews of this product. A lot of people jumped on board the hype train. Hopefully people will wake up and give some pushback
I liked what someone on UA-cam pointed out, that if you're going to have so many titles, it doesn't make sense to have them all overlap the same place on the market. You've got 40K and AoS busy trying to please tournament players, then TOW and other specialist games probably should be targeting friendly game players. I haven't got a game in (not quite through the rulebook) but a lot of what Dr. Blaxill mentions sounds good. They fixed deathstars, they fixed artillery, they fixed magic, they didn't fix mega-models being OP, but then they're selling mega-models is why. The game in general chilled out, which I think it desperately needed to do after 8th. Just as there's a WAAC crowd who enjoy a game trying to balance around their type of play, there's a not-even-trying-to-win crowd who will enjoy a game balanced around their type of play just as much.
Finally!, hard agree on the magic. Since my only care for competitive is hearing your bat-reps I'm pretty ok with the rest. So far seems like changing the frontal attacks rules and maybe a comp system for powerful units like the dragons can be a good patch for the game. And the ork running so much skirmishers have to say that it looks cool XD it seem like that tales (although untrue) where the savage tribes charged the romans formations. Cheers!
I've yet to play, seen a few games played and I'm in agreement with you on the strange abstract linehammer combat mechanic - one unit barely touching the other unit, so everyone not in base to base just attacks .. doesn't seem right to me or fair, I'd rather be hit by a comet or ravaged by dwellers and lose a unit to witchcract and sorcery than to boomerang swordfighters. That said, I'll play, looking forward to seeing how it compares. I prefare a dicepool and a dedicated phase for my wizards though, ah well.
Really obvious solution to the lines problem is this: you may not have more additional attacks from your line than your opponent has ranks, or maybe 2x with a special rule or something.
Thank you for your well balanced criticism. I think you're very right about the exploitable mechanics. I'm much more of a MiddleHammer fan and detested 8th but I understand your point of view. I' very much looking forward to your developing views on the game.
This is the first TOW review I've seen that isn't by someone who's been given £500 worth of free stuff by GW.
You see why nineteenth century politicians liked the unreformed era when electorates were below 100. 'Presents' = MP.
Gets my Goat all these freeloaders getting it all for free while peasants like me has to hack off and arm or leg or dig up grandma for her gold teeth to afford it 😂😂😂
@@DrBlaxillas it should be!
Which group is literally 1000% over represented in Parliament?
@@divafever9754 To learn who rules over you, just observe who you are not allowed to criticize.
I love that Blaxill-lore is expanding. The gang sound crazy.
I love the way you spent time relaxing on what your going to say. Video take longer to come out but the quality is much much higher.
Yes. I didn't want to just make a video from the book, but to play some games first. Even now I feel as though what I saying is very provisional- I hope and expect to have developed (and maybe challenged) my initial views after 25 games or so.
I think a simple fix for the long lines of models is to cap them at double the "Models per Rank" minimum. Regular infantry cap at 10 wide, Heavy infantry at 8, monstrous at 6, ext.
Although it's more of a rules adjustment, I'd like to limit the amount of models that can attack each side that aren't in combat to 1 or 2. (2 or 4 in total). Then it becomes a bit of paper scissors rock...you want to be wider than your opponent but if youre too wide up you're at a disadvantage
But they didn't do that, did they?
I'm just going to keep playing Kings of War.
A simpler fix would be to retvrn to 4th ed.
I don't care how this is manage to think about kings of war in this situation since that game has no ranks. Honestly those are totally different system man, you should compare kings of war Hordes of the Things, Pike and Shoote and other fixed footprints games. Might sound like a simple nitpick for you but its true fixed bases and ranks plays completely different even when they have similar rolls and stuff like that.
They had 4 years to add some caps/restrictions, but they did not.
I really appreciate that you've told us exactly how much gameplay you've based your review on, even down to your list and your opponent's armies. Amazingly candid, and practically nonexistent on youtube nowadays. I'll be very interested if you do a follow up video after you hit that 25-50 game mark.
As for line hammer, do you think that being able to attack with multiple units into the unit that's formed up into a line will be a way to counter the wider frontage?
Exactly, that's my intension. Do another talkie video at about the the 25 game mark.
To some extent, yes- although I think a better counter to the linehammer is, unfortunately, more linehammer! However, the lines can be easily chaffed with fast units. Lines are also weaker if hit in the flank.
Sounds like they looked to Dragon Rampant for inspiration but didn't get past the title page.
A fine mess indeed. You can really tell none of the legacy game designers are present these days.
Curiously also because dragon lore in Warhammer is pretty weak, despite the number of dragon sculpts!
LORD BLAXILL WE HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU.
Brother I'm really digging the analysis here. I understand no step up, but taking away supporting attacks from rear ranks really does seem like a headscratcher.
Ok! I think some very on point criticism here. And I like that you resisted being prescriptive on how one might "fix" these things. Unlike army building, which risks breaking the game before a model is deployed, I think all of these are things that are reasonable to let play out. I'm also super confident that the designers have an eye on the way this game is played in the margins - there are numerous references in the book to playing to win and at events, and you can tell they care about the rules working as intended.
I do think some decisions are headscratchers, but that's OK! Like 8th I feel like most if not all concerns can be addressed with some pretty simple errata. Unlike 8th I am confident that in time those those errata will come, and in the meantime it will be exciting to see how it all plays out. Even if in the near term that means tOW events might not quite look like what we hoped for on the table.
@@valheffelfinger6521 So I spoke with my co-organiser for our tourney and I think a key way of positively incentivising ranked up classic looking fantasy would be the use of missions. You may recall the pack I sent with you with scoring missions (+3 or -3 TPs) taken from the 9th Age. These missions have been tested to destruction and they really work- in 8th ed too and no reason why not in OW. You need to meet certain qualifcations to get a scoring unit: have a banner, not be skirmish, fast cav minimun 10 models.
Using these would:
a.) Make skirmishers less good as they can't score.
b.) Involve movement, which the lines are less good at.
c.) Comparatively disadvantage big heroes who are a large points commitment and can't score themselves.
That, and perhaps using closest to closest charge for tournament play (which would really speed it up) might very swiftly restore a more pleasing equilibrium to the ecosystem.
@@DrBlaxill so long as that 8th Ed Tower mission isn't included. I once took Ogres to an 8th Ed event and game 1 was randomly drawn as take the tower but Ogres don't fit into Towers, well not under GW rules of the time they didn't. Needless to say it didn't go well 😂
@@DrBlaxill Missions in tournament play! Yes, Yes & Yes. Having done so in both historical and fantasy play for many years, these are the answers to all the grumblers out there! It requires force balance and it's FAIR!
The real commanders get to shine, and the list stackers are forced to play the game 😇
P.S. Partner's account, not mine ☺
Thank you for the unbiased review. I was looking forward to you thought on the new edition. I have played 1 game. I had a great time. Empire vs Bretonnia at 1000 points. No magic users. We felt this was the best way to get to grips with the core rules. Skirmishes do seem a little loosey goosey. Pardon the phrase. Thanks again.
You’ve quickly become a favorite warhammer UA-camr. I’m very new to the game coming from TWW, but so excited. You always raise valid points with out it devolving into a diatribe against GW. Also awesome fashion sense. From a fellow punk player have a good day DR.
Also a punk i love with new wave hardcore and goth it’s cool to meet another warhammer player in the same vein.
Well if you are new you may be interested to know that there's a strong tradition of Warhammer with 80s new wave British heavy metal, power metal, early death metal. This was very much the ballard of that era when Warhammer was being born. Punk less so musically, but it's aesthetic influence was undoubtedly there on 80s models, especially chaos. Also a certain veneration of the rebel. This all rather vanished as it became a mass market product from the very early 1990. Why I can't help but be startstruck by the 80s era.
@@DrBlaxill I think we have a very similar mindset, I love bands like bolt thrower that have Obvs call outs to warhammer lmao. While lot of people were miffed about the old models being used I love it so much since I’m so young I never had a chance to collect them myself.
@@DrBlaxill I’d love to see you cover these topics of bands like bolt thrower that have such a intwined history with warhammer.
The Loremaster has spoken. Harsh but fair and fair in his harshness.
As someone who became interested in 8th at the very end and made some purchases, but never got to play before the world blew up, I appreciate a lot of the context that accompanies the analysis.
As someone who is giving serious thought to embarking on my own campaign across the Old World, this was an extremely useful video. Thank you for the detailed analysis and examples, your passionate and eloquent delivery are a breath of fresh air on UA-cam!
On pondering it further, I think there is maybe something to be said about great monsters being able to rampage hither and yon in a chaotic, monster-like fashion. I don't know how it plays out though, personally. Maybe if going rampant it was something only big slobbery monsters could do? Ah, whatever! No monster born of man or elf shall be spared the Slayer's axe! Other kinds of monster also not spared.
At the least, we still have 6th edition. Hope to see your review in the not to distant future.
broad sword!
I'm 4th Ed ( the last great age of the competitive dragon rider) my empire opponent used an allied dwarf slayer lord with 200 points of heavily optimized runic death axe to kill monsters by catapulting him around the table with grey teleportation magic provided by grey wizard lord with the cheesy total power staff. The slayer travelled hundreds of miles in this way as he was sent after the vast otherwise unkillable monsters. Such antics are remembered in posterity as a disgrace for both dwarf and men, there was no doubting the effectiveness of such a gloriously pragmatic alliance.
Your closing statement is so poetic. It really does make me feel happy to be part of the Warhammer community. Thanks again for your hard work, cheers!
Yes. The Warhammer community. The correct and original title of this game. Enjoy!
Great video, really good to hear your thoughts on ToW. You've confirmed a lot of the concerns we had about this new iteration.
Be good to hear if your views change much after you get more games in 👍
The best review of the game that I've watched so far. Great stuff. (And I'd definitely be at the back of the pub having a beer with you and the rest of the punks!)
The biggest gripe I have with that release is that gw didn't made some wide spread playtest with players to get proper theoryn craft and check what might be broken
Loved the video! The last bit was especially poingant.
Haven't gotten my dwarfs on the table yet, as I'm a recovering 6th-er who only recently dragged my army out of the bin my parents stuffed it in when I went off to college (20 years ago!)
Monsters and magic are certainly concerning, but I really like what I'm seeing from my short kings.
But who really cares! We're back!
Time itself stands still for Dr Blaxill. Let the truth about The Old World be heard!
18:00 I believe the fighting rank mechanic is meant to simulate a larger formation wrapping around a smaller one without having to faff about moving individual models into base contact as in 6th. Some historical rank and flank wargames like Field of Glory also have this mechanic IIRC.
Wrapping around in previous editions only occurred after a round of combat when neither side broke and fled.
I do see your point. The only problem is that, theoretically, your troops on the flank are fighting those enemies that are lapping round, but they get no attacks in the rules. Also, if the enemy line gets charged by another one of your units, then those enemy troops are somehow magically teleported back to their original line formation 😅.
Thank you for being yourself and sharing this awesomeness.
absolutely love your army. Beautiful colours and the banners are a killer. Kudos
I am growing to love this channel, amazing back story introductions and a proper unbiased opinion on a game that I have loved for years. Honestly you have hit the nail on the head, the game is feeling a bit pale in comparison to a couple of other editions and I feel they've only just missed the mark of 7th or 8th edition.
I've been waiting for this!! Can't wait to hear all your thoughts
I think a few youtubers have been review shy on this one so I'm looking forward to watching this.
Loving the content Dr B. Really appreciate listening to well articulated points from the perspectives of a knowledgeable gamer whose obviously passionate about both the setting as well as the games mechanics. Great review, look forward to hearing more. Thank you.
Line warfare has been dominant for most of history for very good reasons.
Missile frontage is one such reason.
The target density for missile receipt is another.
Perhaps the biggest, however, is the peril of being surrounded.
What really happens when a line of 10 meets a line of 8 is that the line of 8 stretches wider, so that they are not surrounded. This distributes the extra pressure over their number, instead of sacrificing the guys on the ends of the line, who would otherwise be immediately surrounded; forced to fight a determined enemy in front and another behind. The friendly line would very rapidly recede from a length of 8 to 6, to 4, to 2, to 0. If the agressors understood the situation, their main body could fight defensively and avoid suffering any casualties at all, unless the enemy were extremely careless.
There are exceptions to this state of warfare, for example:
- when frontage is restricted by fortifications, bridges and so on
- when an army is ambushed while on the march
- when heavy cavalry are posing a significant threat
- when the soldiers have very long weapons, which require a certain density to be effective
- when the soldiers have very large static shields, which require a certain density to be effective (most historical infantry shields were active, requiring a lack of density to be effective)
- when the soldiers' armour is virtually impervious to enemy attacks
- when the enemy numerical advantage is so great that the best way to minimise the ratio of attackers to defenders is to form a ring, rather than a line
But otherwise, the general state of affairs has been for a line of spearmen, supported by a mass of ranged troops... typically descending into absolute chaos in very short order.
The silly blocks found in old Warhammer games are not remotely representative of the general situation on ancient or medieval battlefields. They're a bastardised hotchpotch of some outlying situations, mashed into a rule system for a game that primarily aims to be fun, not plausible.
The fact that everyone in the longer line gets to attack is not a completely unreasonable approximation of the absolute destruction that would befall any real world body of troops that allowed its ends to be surrounded. A better approximation might be to simply remove the narrower unit from play, but apparently players often have very expensive dice and would be a bit miffed if the game didn't allow for their deployment.
The facts that ranged troops need line of sight and that units block their own allies from passing are completely unrealistic nerfs to the line, clearly designed to appease the poor fools who've grown to love the old WFB game system.
I'd caveat this paean to lines, however, with the fact that a line does not typically have time to surround a cavalry unit that has charged it. Unfortunately, ToW does not have rules for cavalry making passing attacks - they are always bogged down by any unit that they encounter and are subject to the same combat rules as everyone else. A line of archers hit by a cavalry charge should certainly only deliver base to base attacks, at most. Personally, I'd make them roll to see whether they even get to attack, modified by the initiative difference.
--
Whatever you think of this game system, it will inevitably put models suitable for previous editions in the clutches of a far greater number of players, so expect those editions to also see a lot more play.
The system should have been built to not make it so you should almost always use lines, though. That's just bad Fantasy design.
P.S. This is incorrect, depending on weapons and such. For some of history, what was best was actually column attacks (i.e. one-man wide lines, as opposed to long lines as you might see with horse charges in Lord of the Rings).
Alexander did prove that a mixed system is good about 330 BC. But, for most of history, square-like blocks were best, as shown by the Roman Empire. Greeks also heavily used blocks with shields on the outside, or other set-ups. As I said, it depends on the weapons and enemy, and land/ground.
In reality, if magic and monsters existed and very powerful long-distance weapons (i.e. blast templates), any kind of rank/file would be terrible. Best would likely be something closer to Sigmar/40k with single round bases to ensure you don't get 50 guys killed in one spot. This would be closer to something like WWII. Many smaller units working together, even at distance, to a common goal, or a number of different sub-goals. But it does heavily depend on the terrain.
If we're quite advanced with big towns and cities, etc., a lot of combat might be closer to WWII and modern urban warfare than big open fields akin to WWI and 1066, etc. that we saw with Fantasy and LOTR system. If you look at modern warfare, such as with the U.S. Army, you will notice how tiny the units are, as each man is very powerful yet still has the issue of movement and range. As a result, since the enemy has major firepower, it's illogical to have 20 guys in one spot. Better is a 4- or 5-man unit using complex mixed tactics to push forward.
It seems, Old World was trying to go for many different types of warfare all at once, and overlooked the strictness of Fantasy Battles. Not sure where this failure came from, but everybody having 1x20 is not right unless they are archers and your enemy is across the field (or there's some rule that means 2x10 is very bad, such as hitting your own guy, or lack of range). Naturally, using something like horses is also good for 1x6, and that is normally what you see (or 2x3). (On the other hand, if your enemy is going to use blast templates, having 1x20 is good to avoid getting all your guys killed, as would possibly happen with something like a 4x5 unit).
@TalkChannel I think I made it quite clear that I was talking about infantry formations. Columns were used in combat by cavalry, who had no intention of allowing themselves to be flanked. The higher speed and lower manouvrability of cavalry completely changed the parameters in which it could operate.
Alexander inhereted the army reforms made by his father, who had already proven their worth, completely upturning the status quo in the region through his own military exploits. Philip did not invent mixed arms; the standard mode of operations throughout the ancient world. He developed a way of making deep infantry formations work, by giving them very long spears, which were too cumbersome to be used in a thin line, requiring a great density to be effective. This mode of warfare hinged on the supremacy of the Macedonian cavalry, which defended the flanks.
Previously, the Greeks had fought field battles in the typical manner, with a thin line of infantry, supported by archers and light cavalry. They had to bunch up in certain siege situations and naval warfare. The Romans fought in the same way, until faced with sarissa formations, which they ultimately found a way to defeat by bunching up themselves and exploiting the gaps caused by terrain features. Because their equipment was less cumbersome, they could effectively act as cavalry in that context, punching a hole in the enemy formation without any risk of being surrounded, as the sarissa can only face forward. I did mention this fringe case in my comment, along with the other fringe cases relating to the Romans, who for a while used interlocking board shields and after a time, used heavy cavalry, which could force the enemy to bunch up. My comment pointed out that it's a simple mechanical necessity for troops to form a thin line in the absence of these factors.
The most important of these in the real world, is the existence of cavalry. In Warhammer, however, no units actually operate like cavalry, just as no units operate like a pike block and no units lock shields into a testudo. Under these circumstances (which irl, were the _only_ circumstances until a few thousand years ago and continued to be so in the New World until a few hundred years ago), it's completely realistic for the thin line to dominate.
Vs a dragon, most troops would probably be advised to stay at home, but even today, when we have far worse than dragons - warheads guided by godlike surveillance, we still see solders frequently bunch up, sleeping in barracks and moving in columns. Soldiers have long range communication, but still operate in tight little units, which are highly susceptable to explosives. The common soldier ignores the largest threats and commits themself to fighting the equal threats, so if the same thing applied to the fantasy situation, troops may respond to the threat of magical attacks by pretending that they don't exist, since changing their mode of operation wouldn't actually allow them to defeat the dragon, but it would compromise their effectiveness against enemy infantry.
@@Meevious You make a very good point. Nonetheless, linehammer cannot work within Fantasy. It's no longer Fantasy, regardless of realism or time periods.
Naturally, it's all very messy given that we have horses, men, dragons, war machines, and magic/non-real races (e.g. goblins, lizardmen, and super-rat-men). This means, in-universe, you can justify anything.
But, there are very good reasons why Fantasy has been BLOCKS of men for about 35 years. But, in the real world, blocks still have their place (but as you said, it depends on the exact war/time period, etc.). In reality, Warhammer makes little sense at any time in history -- but this is not reality. It's a blend of simulated war at very particular levels of analysis (the major example clearly being the large-scale strategic wargame of blocks of units -- which is what most Fantasy players love about it compared to most wargames. It's also what many loved about old 40k with vaster armies and more fog of war elements), simple D&D/game-playing elements (some of which is actually made up of character progression systems and more), and straight up Tolkienian fantasy storytelling/world-building.
@@SwitchTalkChannel Yeah, I completely understand simply wanting Warhammer to be Warhammer and I think it a completely rational objection.
I was just responding to the commentary that linehammer doesn't make any sense as a simulation of real world battles and that seeing lines of infantry arrayed against each other decreases the believability of the game, which in my view, is a problem not with the game, but the education system.
Realistically, the guys on the ends should indeed have a greater effect on the outcome than a second rank, but the game lacks realism in many other mechanics, so it's not like this is the missing piece to make it an accurate simulation. From this starting point that the fanbase enjoys, it does make more sense for the designers to aim to replicate the feeling of Warhammer than to move toward a realistic simulation and in that context, this mechanic isn't ideal.
@@Meevious I still think, though, as it stands, linehammer is not realistic in all situations. There are two reasons areas to this. The first is clear: if you're at the end of the line, it's impossible to hit somebody in the centre of the line. Warhammer weirdly allows this. Second, line-fighting does not work in every battle, as proven by history. So, it depends on the battle/era, etc.
As linehammer currently exists, it has never existed in any real battle. But, certainly, it has existed in history under real conditions (i.e. base-to-base contact/close-quarters, or a long line of horses or long-range weapons such as bows). Clearly, 1x20 dwarfs or otherwise with meele weapons, and all of them can attack is not realistic at all.
In short: even as a realistic simulation of war, they failed due to the way they wrote the rules, which is impossible in real life. This means there is no real purpose to it at any level of analysis.
The only times I think linehammer ever works is when you maybe have 1x3 horses or 1x10 archers to get max hits from a distance. Very rare cases that I think existed in 5th edition Fantasy or so (if I can recall from my childhood). But, certainly, two ranks make good sense: more guys closer to the enemy, and you can get a more logical sense of the guy behind maybe getting a hit, as opposed to being at the end of a long line. It also makes good higher-order sense, in terms of movement/marching troops. In real war, troops often march in blocks, so you get this feel from movement. In combat, it can be more skirmish or otherwise. That depends. But the rules clearly making it very linehammer-centric is a bad idea (though, thankfully, very few people are actually using linehammer right now).
As an AoS player with roots in WHFB 4th ed., I'm glad Fantasy enthusiasts finally get to enjoy their game again.
A thoroughly enjoyable listen and an insightful critic. Bravo.
You have gained a subscriber
Such a great combo of drama, comedy and insight❤❤❤
I think you may be suffering from "I liked 8th edition" syndrome. First, line-hammer isn't going to be a thing in competitive play. Between terrain issues and chaff, it's just too easy to counter. I do agree that we will see wider units but I prefer that vs the old 5 wide, 10 deep stubborn bus units. I very much like the toned down magic. The escalation of horde formation to death stars led to 8th edition magic which was just silly. I completely agree with you on the rules for skirmishers, 360 for shooting is fine but charging? I do like that they got rid of the building rules, those were abused terribly, in general I like the simplified terrain rules.
I guess we will see how it shakes out over the coming months but I would think a simple set up like this should get us started: 1999 points for games, no allies, rule of 3.
I finally got my hands on the rulebook and the page 130 figures seem to provide a great solution to linehammer. Arrange and pivot your units just so that an enemy linehammer unit loses it's Ini bonus against your most killy unit
Fantastic review. I was going into withdrawal waiting for more Dr. Luke videos. 😵💫
I've nearly finished assembling my new Dark Elf army on the new base sizes, next I'll be doing my unpainted Warriors of Chaos that have been rotting on the shelf since the end of Fantasy! Both those armies feature Dragons. 😅
I've also recruited 3 friends to start up the game with me and I'm attending my first ever Warhammer tournament this weekend (I've been playing since just before 5th).
2024 is going to be a good year! ⚔️
I agree. It's going to be a lot of fun.
Sublime as always. Thanks for the video 👌🏻
I couldn't take my eyes off the screen while watching this.
After a couple of games myself I’ve come to the similar conclusions but with a few caveats
Linehammer definitely skews the game and is a necessity for non volley fire missile units but… you’re much less maneuverable, can get multi-charged quite easily, and you’re betting the farm on kill count
Skirmishers/solo units are very very good. Getting that level of movement/ redirection flexibility is a game changer. Wood elf kiting will make you want to become an arsonist
Monster heroes are absolutely problematic with combined profiles and the toning down of war machines. There are ways to deal with them head on but they are exceedingly rare, monster slayer comes to mind but there are maybe a select few slayer magic weapon equipped units that can go toe to toe with the dragons. Other less direct methods exist in nearly every army as well and they’ll probably be an auto include since monsters will see lots of play
Magic is flat but strong still and putting wizards in units is a traps 95% of the time. The feast or famine level 4 or nothing incentive is pretty annoying as well. Chariot’s 360 arc is unbelievably good with flying monsters a close second. Cool combos and skill expression is still there but it feels very flowcharty. Also magic missile/vortex spam is strong and easily abusable
Overall I like the new old world but there are definitely cracks where the stinky cheese can seep through
Beautifully put. I'm playing more tomorrow and I am hoping eventually it will get less warped than it seems at the moment. It's definitely got a lot more problems out of the box than 8th Ed had.
Excellent reviews. I played a lot of 8th. We've played 2 games of old world so far, a lot of the issues you mention are raising their head. Great and well thought out review. Thank you.
I'm up to 9. Some of the issues seem a bit better (magic) but others, for example charging and pursuit, seem jankier and jankier.
@@DrBlaxill line hammer is crap on the table, I'm not going to create a UA-cam rant about it... Erhem... You would expect your fellow punks and gents to not play that way. 8ths horde 10 max was a good rule of thumb. 2nd row one attack and anyone not in base surely nothing. Surely that the point of bringing rank and flank back, sir!!!?
GW have never made enough of cavalry charges. In a game, the cavalry slams into the defending front rank and stops dead. What happened in real life would depend entirely on the number of defending ranks. With a single rank, the cavalry would blast straight through and out the other side. With deeper ranks, the chargers might be repelled or unhorsed. GW should allow these factors to play a part in the game - thereby incentivising units to line up with deeper ranks if they are expecting to receive a charge. This would soon put an end to single rank formations.
Couldn't agree more!
I will say this. I'm so glad it's back. I hope that it does well enough that they actually make a second edition and maybe improve on the rule sets in due time. they already plan to issue bi yearly FAQS for it.
now it's just time to get through the growing pains of a new edition and maybe figure out some better rules for it as needed....
This video really touched my heart.
I fully agree with you regarding the magic.
In short, it’s become flat and boring. Reason being that it has removed the minigame that was the magic phase. No longer do we have any personal choice involved, there are no stakes. We just throw the dice and hope for the best.
In previous editions we’d have to make decisions, we knew what spells the opponent had, we knew what we had available to us to defend against it. Hence, we might have opted to eat a magic missile, to save our dice for something more dangerous, and so on.
Same thing goes for the caster side of things, we might’ve ended up baiting dispel dice casting small annoying things, to then go big on whatever spell we really wanted to have enter.
As for the rest of it, I’ve been having a good time with ToW so far. I’m 4 games deep with my orcs as of now.
My main concern right now is that I feel that there are a lot of incentives to play monsters, heroes on dragons, etc. These big pieces are very hard to kill and don’t really have that many drawbacks from what I’ve seen. Especially considering that artillery isn’t quite as dangerous as it used to be. On top of this, unless I’ve misinterpreted something, they don’t grant any victory points unless killed, which is a stark contrast to the older editions where we’d get 50% of the unit if we managed to remove half of their wounds.
I just realized you basically made the same point regarding the big pieces, as I finished up listening to the last bit of the video :)
Certainly giving half points for them if reduced to 25% of their starting wounds (say) would help- an incentive to damage the dragon even if you don't kill it. I might put something like that in our comp pack.
With magic, alas, I feel a large segment of public opinion really had it in for it! I think many people who have played the resource managament risk/reward mini game system of older editions will feel that way. I liked all of the previous editions there, though I thought 8th was the best. I resolved myself to being in a minority with this view on magic though- I think some people may just like the simplicity, especially if they don't remember old editions or realise what nuances have been lost.
@DrBlaxill I would be a moderate magic defender, and I agree about the sad loss of complexity, but I will disagree on nuke spells. Mind, I am more used to Warhammers Armies Projects, a fork of 8th, where nuke spells are easier to get off. But for an army like Lizardmen, there were a number of "pass this i test or die" spells, that could essentially swallow every unit in our army. This was never fun to deal with, and disproportionately hurt Lizardmen, as opposed to humans or elves. There were too many nuke spells like that which were tilted to destroy one faction type, and wipe them off the table, so I'm glad they're gone.
WFB in the past has no business having mini-games in it. It's bad game design. I get that a handful of you like it - 99% don't and that's why the past games failed. With a comedy 100+ core rule set (most of which is entirely convoluted and "complex but not intelligent"), a mini game compounds the busy-work and mental load of an already poor ruleset by evolved standards. Had they cut the rules down to 10-20 pages (as they should have done) then a mini-game magic phase makes sense. Song of Ice and Fire (WFB boiled down to its essentials) is like 10 pages, but then they have a "game of thrones" mini-game that you play along side the rank and flank affecting the outcome of the battle + giving you a chance to get new miniatures that look cool. They reduced the mental load by cutting the nonsense out of the game, which gave space to insert a mini-game in. Good game design.
That being said magic in Old World is a bit bland.
The "nuke spells" are present in 8th edition in an attempt to balance out the horde rule etc. There is purpose behind them which comes directly from other game design choices which have knock on effects / chain reactions: so they have to find ways of "patching" the game. Sometimes "bad rules" or a generic rule can only exist because of another rule etc.
Stomp/thunderstomp only existed because Monsterous Infantry and Monsters were increasingly underpowered in 7th through 8th + rules such as steadfast. They couldn't manually update every statline due to the nature of the release schedule so they just made a "catch all" rule and wrote it into the core rules.
Now you'll note Stomp I believe is gone in TOW but Thunderstomp is still there. Weird. Until you realise Old World's rules are purposefully written to sell specific models (they did the same for recent 40K). Dr Blaxill's videos demonstrate which models GW clearly want you to be buying if it's not obvious already....
@@ndalum75
Just rewatched this to fully appreciate it. Excellent, bar the intro & expo…
Keep it up fella!
At last! The Dr Blaxill verdict is in 😁
Thanks for sharing your perspective - I can't wait to play my first game!
Great review. As someone who also loves 8th edition, I fully agree with your points.
As usual, a fine and entertaining video! If you ever taught us the game one on one we would have it made!! Kudos to you Dr. Blaxill, and cheers from America!
I'm building an Araby army this year. Whether for 6th ed or the Old world, it will be MY Army!
I cannot tell you how much I appreciated the Road Rash references. This channel just rocketed up my favourites...
Remember Dr - brake into the corners and accelerate out.
I was wondering when someone would twig this! I thought, given the age and demographic of my audience, that somebody would- but it has taken a while.
It's nice to get really high quality analysis. I'm curious what tournaments eventually come up with for balancing out some of the rougher edges.
One other thing to dislike about magic is that lower level casters end up looking a bit useless. With 2d6 odds their chances of getting off spells are much lower, and any enemy level 4 Wizard who's in range will make them pretty much irrelevant. Although potentially this can be avoided with positioning, there may not be too much of a reason to take lower level casters.
I learned so much from this video.
I believe Wizards casting four magic missiles a phase is not actually something you can do, because while they're allowed to cast all their spells, they aren't allowed to shoot more than once a phase.
Skirmished should have a 180 degree vision, same for mounted characters. Only single infantry models should have 360
If they went up in attacks across the board, but also reduced the lethality of attacks across the board I can maybe see supporting attacks in the front rank being fine, because the 10 extra attacks a 15 man unit would get would only be equivalent to the 10 attacks of the 5 men in base contact, but as it is implemented in a system where almost every model has a single attack supporting attacks really doesn’t work except for monster units like Ogres or trolls.
Great review, agree with almost everything. As a dwarf player I'm very scared of the "linehammer" and big monsters no more in check, given cannons and war machines seem unplayable. Though I think it is a good edition, and magic very much manageable with some dispel runes and magic resistance, I also think they did some steps back regarding close combat. It already was the most powerful step, and now it is more than before, with many exploitable oversights (for example the cap on rank bonuses, that was the only thing getting wide units in check. I think right now the march column seems pretty useless since it exposes to flank charges and nothing more really).
Think the Orc player made a mistake. Only 0-1 units of orc mobs per army can be skirmishers in core.
Right!
What an excellent review!
I think there will be a rock-paper-scissors in list construction, with elements that can punish the low maneuverability of long lines, or even build around slaying monsters. I also think the magic mini-game will work out okay, given some of the nuances. I'm not really sure that skirmishers will be "fixed" by the meta though- they probably should have been confined to special/rare.
I didn’t know Andrew Eldritch played Warhammer? (As well as running an amazing old goth band).
You're a true inspiration.
Good review, certainly felt authentic. Thanks for the t9a mention.
As a beastmen player, thematically speaking, I quite enjoyed my large skirmishing units. It felt right for that army.
Yes, it feels okay for beastmen. I like skirmishers- but not with these rules!
as a new subscriber of that 0.7% this was a fantastic review! i'm also one of those competitive players, so i'm very curious to play some games myself.
Excellent! A few months ago it was 0.3% so the diversity march is on!
You can take the initiative and make a PDF of your own rule updates. It could couch all of your rule preferences under a single thematic concept (i.e. When Blaxill's warp "mist" (English or German definition) is present on the battlefield, base to base contact is required for melee combat due to vision limitations or slippery ground. And due to the mist's warp origin, the rules of magic are changed completely by it, etc.). Maybe limit the skirmishers vision or charge scope to lower than 360 degrees or something? Or toss the thematic element and make the rule changes Doctor's orders for better game play.
Excellent! The Blaxill fog which reinstalls much of 8th Ed via the backdoor!
Great review! Regarding "Linehammer", I agree that is very strange that they didn't put any kind of limit on the maximal unit width. Maybe a good compromise would have been to allow models in the fighting rank to attack, as long as they are in base to base with a friendly model which is in basecontact with the enemy (So basically you get two extra models attacking, one on each side).
The big flying monsters with combined profiles are also a big issue. Maybe they should have enforced that only the armor saves of the monster can be used (Therefore no ward and/or regeneration save from a rider's artifacts).
Only time will tell how it all works out. Glad WH Fantasy is back!
What they couldbhave done was have something like an automatic number of attacks. No step up but say a striaght +2 attacks representing someone from the back getting an attack in. So even if you're front rank base to base is killed you'll always get some kind of attack back.
Thanks as ever for the video.
On the give ground/fall back/flee thing I think it's quite funny in a way that after a lot of talk about how it meant nobody would flee etc the thing that passed people by was the outcome that is missing entirely i.e. 'Hold'. Big implications from that in a couple of the battles I've watched as we discussed briefly yesterday on the Triple Crown game with the High Elf Dragon Lord.
As you say there are things that can be done about the lines though they will probably all have to involve altering the rules. I guess anything from ruling a fixed maximum number for unit width, a maximum that get to strike over and above the width of a unit they go into combat with, removing the close order bonus from single rank units, I'm sure there are more options. I think the spectacle of a line getting flanked by another line so that loads of models are attacking the single figure that only three of them (or even one depending on base sizes) are in contact with is about as silly as it gets, that and lines attacking single models I suppose.
Agree that the double unit strength negating FBIGO thing seems to mean things won't be as bogged down as suspected - the reform when overrunning etc seems to mean the winner can often be back in position almost as quickly by breaking a unit over two combat phases (one to reduce and the next to break) as if it had done it in one.
No idea what can be done about the skirmishers without rewriting them entirely - they look to me to be very confusing even in relatively small numbers. I'm hoping that seeing them in action enough times will help me to get my head round them - it will perhaps be easier once everyone's agreed on exactly how they work and is playing them 'right' as not every battle I've watched has done everything the same way up to now which is hardly surprising really.
Easy fix for the silly lines would be a cap on how many models can participate. Say only max 4-6 models could make supporting attacks?
Excellent thoughts. The problem of course with a lot of fixes you or I might come up with is that they in effect amount to rebuilding aspects of 8th ed within the new game. Posterity has not been kind to 8th edition- but perhaps in time people will increasingly realise just how good that ruleset was- and even after years of competitive abuse it didn't break. In TOW, off the bat I would like to see: 1.) base to base brought back for fighting; 2,) skirmishers as in 8th ed; 3.) charges closest to closest and wheels being free.
I honestly can't think any of those would have much or any downside! Perhaps with skirmishers there are some subtleties and cool things I'm not seeing- but the other two, I can't see any pros.
They are of course brining back 8th ed by stealth, so I am not sure that would go down too well!
Another point on this reformhammer shenanigans we have discussed. Even if the dragon catches fleeing enemy he gets to reform. In 8th ed if he did that he didn't get the free turn so had to make the calculation between optimised position and running down the enemy. Now he once again finds himself having his cake and eating it.
@@DrBlaxill The base to base thing isn't 8th specific so you may get more sympathy there!
I'm keen that the game shouldn't be too slow and the complex working out of movement that then ends up not happening is one of the things that doesn't appeal greatly so I think I probably agree about the charge calculations even though part of me thinks it would be more 'proper' to have to work them out and I can understand people feeling that it's right to have to do it.
I need to see (and ultimately use) more skirmishers to feel I have any sort of valid opinion on them - I'm just finding them a bit baffling for the time being and hope that I get past it!
I think the Dragon in that game we discussed managed to fight in eight consecutive combat phases (he might have missed one, could have been 8 out of 9). Think the cakes he ate were a unit of skeleton horse, those dudes on serpents, Ushabti, One and a half units of skeleton archers, three chariots and the Tomb King on the sphinx (who had already taken some damage). Now he was aided by an unwise charge by his opponent on one occasion and perhaps his opponent's deployment, but it was just too much.
@@iikkakangas2586 The problem is for shooting units if you restrict so much on width.
@@jojomerou4075 I am talking about limiting supporting attacks in combat, not shooting attacks. Wide shooting units would be shooting as normal. In the combat step they would fight with how many are in base to base and some number lets say 4-6 models get to support. Not supporting from the whole conga line.
I love yours theatric and little sceptic performance. You are natural and full by passion. Mostly video it’s made by generic, common guys with typical enthusiasm.
Probably the most honest and best analysis of ToW I have seen so far. You are hitting all the points that I also sadly have to address in the rules.
The worst being Lineformations... skirmishers all over like its 40k... herohammer while tuning down artillery and boring magic (no phase anymore).
But I am not sure about the 4 magic missiles. I think 3 is maximum. Ruby ring of Ruin + Arcane familiar, dropping 1 spell into daemonology for the summoning, i.e. signature spell, and putting the rest of your spells into battle magic and hoping for that fireball spell to have twice. I think a wizard always only has 1 signature spell available to choose.
I am happy that there are no unit killing spells anymore! This was just bonkers.
As a former ETC player, ok 40k and not WHF but still being an quite old WHF player, I am dissapointed about such obvious loopholes or weird ways of creating a game that is meant to be a RnF game. I started 40k beginning 3rd, WHF start 5th edition, mainly played 6th and 7th WHF, stopped 8th Edition because of 8th edition.
Ah yeah, I am for banning dragons in ToW because! 🧐
Besides, at the moment I have more hopes into T9A 3.0 but I suppose that a lot of tournament organizers will go ToW just because it draws more players (sadly).
Many thanks! I am unsure if I am allowed the Daemonology signiature and the Blue Fire of Tzeentch from the Daemonology book.
Yes, I am surprised they succumbed to what (seem) like obvious loopholes. Why they got rid of base to base is beyond me, because for some other things it does still matter (so it is not as if they saved on the complexity front!)
@@DrBlaxill I am also not sure to 100% but I think 1 signature spell per magician only. Only the Slann is an exception here which can, with that one special skill "wandering deliberations", take 4 signature spells.
Yeah they did not made the game tuning complexity down. Ok well, magic is tuned down a lot but instead there are other time consuming mechanisms.
And as you wrote for instance, magic is very strange. It got tuned down in having no uber killer spells BUT they implemented that dispel range around mages and this can easily lead to, if outmaneuvered, that some mages will be able to cast ALL their spells with no fear of getting dispelled when swooping around on fast flying eagles or so, always staying outside of dispel range...
I mean ok I can imagine why, they wanted to push mages into the centre of the tables as well, so that they are more in the fights than lurking around somwhere far behind in a bunker unit but... with that dispel range and having no dispels to fear when being out of any dispel range, they in fact made the opposite. Mages will even hug more the table edges and corners now, trying to stay out of dispel range to get off all their spells if possible. Magic missiling and vortexing away everything that can be reached...
And yeah the monster/cowboy push while reducing static CR in close combat and tuning down the artillery pieces that were good against single models/cowboys is sadly such an obvious "hey we want to sell dozen of ubercool single models and heroes on big mounts so do not disturb our CHING CHING game..." 🤑
Ah yes, very cool Chaos and Breton armies by the way. I love that super oldschool miniatures as well as paining style.
Quite right, I didn't have to wait long! An interesting watch, and I agree with many points, and see your perspective on others. Briefly:
- On magic, I sort of agree that its a shame to miss the old system and you could have just reigned in the worst of the big damage spells, but I also can see the merit of a simpler more gradual system. I think it bears seeing how things go. I like the positional counterplay that is available versus wizards (no dispelling in combat, and many spells unable to be cast in combat).
- On skirmishers, and this might be the historical gamer in me, but I like that they are super flexible. They have definite downsides as combat troops, with no rank bonus and no close order. They've also lost their redirecting role.
- On lines (and incidentally on charge distances), I think you yourself mentioned one of the big drawbacks of lines later in the video. In a world where you must pay to wheel for your charges, I think a line is very easy to out manoeuvre and take out of the game. A line may be better in a one unit vs one unit situation, but the huge frontage lets multiple enemy units get in to combat. That means chariots and the like coming to help, or multiple infantry units, where the +1 combat resolution for close order stacks. Two lines of 18 wide vs two blocks of 6x3, I can see a situation where the two units of 6 x 3 easily get a double charge off on one line, and roughly handle it. They'd be up by 3 or 4 on static res.
- I'm worried about big dragons too.
Finally 😂. Love it!
Have to disagree with thebmagic bit. Played a 1500 game on Monday, got only half my spells off, and from them half were denied, but one of them denials he roll double 1 and took a wound.
He got a few more spell off than i did, was this as he had a lvl4 and me only a lvl3, but that also meant i had more points in other palces that turned the battle in my favour.
TBH I'm more excited to see Wednesday 13 performing Murderdolls in UK(October ) than playing Old World 😂 but good luck 🤞.PS love your chaos 80s disco vibe 😍 but wouldn't laugh from 40k cause that's the main sponsor for old world and tbh 40k let ya play few extra years in past when Warhammer Fantasy was a store shelf filler ...
Regarding models swinging at models not in base to base -
In my head, the units smashing together aren't staying in straight lines and are curving in towards eachother as the combat comences, so I'm not bothered by it (within reason of course!)
Regarding line formations... I honestly don't know what you mean, look forward to a demonstration if you record one 😅
(10/10 ending, legendary haha)
About magic:
I agree that it's rather boring. I really, really liked the old "dice poker" we had with Power Dice, Channeling and so on. The way magic works now you have literally 0 incentive to take a low level wizard. Because if your opponent brings even a single lvl 4 wizard, your pathetic lvl 1 or 2 wizard will just have his spells unbound. Doesn't matter if you bring four lvl 2 wizards, that one enemy lvl 4 wizard can dispell an unlimited amount of times, which is rather silly.
So, full disclosure, I haven't played yet. With that said, I have watched several battle reports, and I played a ton of fantasy many years ago. So with that all in mind, take what I say as it is. My opinion, not based on science. Lol.
So first off, I have to disagree with your Line Hammer a little. I'm sure there are some units it's fantastic with, but things like skeletons, clan rats, other basic at best infantry, I would think the combat results from ranks can be more effective than some extra attacks from these units. They really don't deal out a great deal of damage. Also allows for more units to get into combat easily, and can lead your destruction. It becomes more difficult to get support, as your footprint is so large, if you have good counter punch units behind, they may not be able to get in. Also I believe, and may be mistaken, you can only make 1 attack with units not in base contact?
As far as magic, I have to agree a great deal. Something that really bothers me, is I could take 4 wizards, cast 10 spells in a turn, and my opponents single wizard could potentially attempt to dispell every single one. So as you mentioned why not with a gated dispell. I do so miss have some sort of resource, be it power dice, or you get x number of dispells and must choose wisely. I do like the power level of magic though. I mean spell effects.
The other couple things that I really feel is a little too strong, is Counter Charge, and Monster Slayer. Monster Slayer should be doing 3 damage or something. The idea of a single strike being able to kill your warlord on dragon is nuts. They nerfed warmachines and spells and say don't be afraid to take your big monsters.... I'm a little worried. Counter charge shouldaybe have some test or something, seems really strong in a game of positioning and trying to get important charges off. It kinda gives the feel of being able to be carless with a strong unit with counter charge.
Anyway, really excited to play. Thanks for your thoughts.
This video is amazing!
A fair and good analysis of the rules by the looks of things. I must say I don't particularly care for the sound of line hammer when ranked troops can't step up to fight. Lines of troops would suggest a weak force and yet the rules say otherwise.
Regarding the long lines of troops, a simple fix from GW during the first FAQ should be to limit the width of a unit of 30mm bases size or smaller to 10" or 12".
Secondly, regarding magic, I agree that the miscast table should definitely be amped up a bit. I think they could really spice it up with just adding Dimensional Cascade's quantity of hits is equal to dX, where X is the wizards level. A powerful wizard should have a more powerful miscast. So a lvl 1 wizard is always 1 S10 hit as per the current rules, however, a lvl 4 is d4 S10 hits. Now that really adds some flare and caution in regards to position, so that a caster truly has to be weigh where and how many spells to cast.
maybe the miscast chance should increase after every cast?
I'd just add that supporting attacks (from front rank) can be up to the amount of models in basecontact. So if you have 5 models in basecontact with enemy, you get up to 5 attacks from those who arn't in contact. This way running a huge 15-20 man line can be catastrophic when it's hit by a single chariot/monster/character or even a deep unit with tight frontage.
Thanks Dr. ! We tested lines and effectively it looks silly. With montruous infantry it's deadly. For skirmisher, sorry it didn't look like WH40k ... it look like AOS !
Whether skirmishers looks like 40k or AOS it still looks bad!!
Line hammer does sound weird, but sometimes I think the problem is overstated. With the increased base sizes this leads to unwieldy units. The typical example being used to showcase the linehammer absurdity are dwarven missile units. They are perhaps the only missile unit that can fight back as hard as it does. But they don't seem to take into account that they only ever target a single unit, so very large units are not ideal for shooting and with 3" movement they can barely turn to face you. I don't like this line hammer either since it seems like a counter force for ranks, but at the same time I am happy they didn't promote units with 4+ ranks since that doesn't make a lot of sense either.
Glad there's still a few 8th Ed tournaments this year in the UK. I'm not paying £250 for a high elf dragon on ebay just so I can compete in the ToW
Excellent work!
I'm pretty much brand new to GW's wargames (having been mostly a Warhammer RPG player). I'm curious to see if maybe some of these cons, like the Linehammer example, could be errata'd out.
I know GW will do balance slates for 40k, but I have no idea how much they actually change the core sytems.
Either way, this was a really wonderful review and has gotten me excited to start my first ever WFB army!
They should've just added a "mini" step up rule where the front rank always get to fight, no matter what.
The step up rule was fine with 2 fighting ranks in 8th because it made the game more fluid and simple, but the new rules seems, as you point out, to punish deeper formations.
Thank you sir!! I greatly appreciate your honest feedback! My game group and I love Fantasy Battle and want to see this version be successful, but finding people to give an honest, “balls and strikes” take has been nearly impossible. It also seems if you speak negatively at all about it, you’re kind of shamed into submission for poo pooing on the new version….sorry, but some of us have some skepticism after they killed 8th on us and constructive criticism is very important. But I digress….thank you again! I salute you!
I think we've got to be critical. However, my bar isn't a high one. I doubt it will be better than older.editions (because so many of them were so good!) but they have to avoid making silly mistakes. I think (too early to really know for sure) they've made a few- but to fix them we've got to know what they are!
@@DrBlaxill I completely agree. Give tournament players a few months and the errors will be found. I just hope GW is active in fixing the issues that pop up.
even with the HE dragon being busted i think i will still use my Loremaster or Swordmaster characters instead.
War machines were Waaaay to powerful in 8th. that they only do d3 or d3+1 wounds now is a good thing. Bringing a monster in 8th was risky as if you went up against a player with cannons they could bring 2 or 4 or in the case of the dwarfs like 8 of the damn things and your monster was basically useless.
As it stands most riderless monsters are just as vulnerable as they were in 8th and in quite a few cases they got WEAKER then 8th. the Warsphinx got nerfed to hell and back, the Phoenix lost it's ward save.
Most monsters are riding a 4+ armor save or gained a 6+ armor save, the Hydra's regen was... actually sorta fixed compared to the ... thing... they tried in 8th, but it's still only a 5+ regen now.
War machines not instantly crumpling their armor and one shoting monsters on a roll of 4(in some cases, like the varghulf) or a 5-6 is a good thing.
Regen is extremely powerful now though, as it's not innately tied to flaming attacks. you need a combo of rules to lose regen from flaming attacks or take extra damage from it.
Now... To be honest. i have no issues with monster getting more wounds when ridden. These characters are huge points sinks and they should be considered a massive threat. Monsters should have always benefited from the rider's ward saves. Now they do. However. I disagree with the stacking of Armor, Ward and regen. All 3 of those is ridiculous to get through.
However! There are a few ways to just ignore armor, i see it pop up here and there, Monster slayer is a big problem too. roll a 6 to wound and the whole model dies. you don't get armor or regen just your ward which is usually gonna be a 5+. Getting more is actually really hard without sacrificing your offensive potential.
Any way. the lack of a limit on unit copies for special and rare could be a problem. they already had to add a tournament rule of 3 to keep people from spamming joke armies.
The rules for the Line is... just dumb. they took away fight in 2 ranks and step up but inserted a rule that overlapping lines can just make supporting attacks any way, and the rules for supporting ranks, (I.E Spears) indicates you don't lose your supporting attacks if the front rank dies.
Which is another thing! Without the parry save of a hand weapon and shielded unit, Spears are king for quantity of attacks and Sword and board units are basically worthless now. a Spear and shield unit gets the same armor save as a hand weapon and shield unit, and usually a bunch of extra rules. the only advantage is they're cheaper options now if you need to save points.
Some exceptions exist, the Tomb Guard and Grave Guard can straight up refuse to move if they have enough models remaining, like in the old days, but they need hand weapon and shield to do it. And i mean, they DO NOT MOVE, even if they lose. So that's interesting.
Any way, i haven't even had a chance to play due to these supply shortages. but... i dunno. i feel like a number of 8th rules replacing a couple of rules in here would make this edition almost perfect.
As 8th edition was the worst edition of all WHF editions, who cares about 8th edition!?!
And no there is really nothing good in artillery being toned down to being useless against monsters and single models.
8th edition was already a terrible game with hordes and uber magic and cowboys and single model spam (because they were not too weak...) and ToW now being the same with line formations, single model and herohammer cowboy spam because artillery got made so extremely weak, it almost makes no senes fielding it.
Sure, when you played a nice roster with 1 monster against that 2-8 cannons (just to mention 8 cannons is 800 pts from the average 2000 pts army already) or so you mention it is the other way around of being a stupid, pointless game. But for real, sounds super uncomped to me... thankfully 6 and 7th editions, the best ones, had a slot system and not this stupid percentage system which allows spam. Sadly ToW now again has that stupid percentage system that allows spam...
But seriously, you are probbably the 1st person so far that is really having the opinion that monsters ever were too weak... seriously! Thankfully all ETC players and veterans see it differently, knowing who really dominated the tables and this never have been artillery pieces but single models, especially cowboys. Also, uncomped WHF never really made sense and so examples with 8 cannons or so do not really say much about ingame balance. They just show list creation abuse due to a lack of restrictions/composition.
And ToW now made it worse in tuning down artillery to being almost useless against single models (mostly cowboys due to their incredibly strong saves) and pushing cowboys into the skies... so I repeat, monsters have never been too weak or artillery too good. But now in ToW GW finally managed to make artillery too weak compared to single models.
And sure, GW wants to sell tons of cowboys in big mounts and single models in that game ToW... they are not interested in balance at all, just good quarterly margin results.
@@richardpagel6959 8th edition was pretty well rounded, other then horde and steadfast. If you played it normally without trying to use the broken rules it was a solid system.
Monsters were very weak. Warmachines were far to common and dangerous to bring monsters for, as they had few defenses and couldn't borrow their riders wards.
Monsters couldn't disrupt, and never had enough offensive power to overcome a death star or even a regular horde.
Tis common knowledge.
@@skeith1543 With the right people you can always have fun when everyone is not trying to use the broken rules.
But exactly THIS does make a game NOT solid at all, when it is only playable as long as everybody is nice to each other and/or knows each other.
Exactly this makes it a bad game, when you are only able to play it as long as you and your opponent stick to some gentlemens agreement so to say.
8th was just bonkers and made for children who wanted to throw tons of dice instead of having a tactical Rank and Flank game.
I repeat, it was THE edition of WHF that did not made new people play the game, it was the edition that made 1/3 to 1/2 of all players (at least in Germany) stopping to play WHF.
8th was the least welcomed edition of all WHF editions ever. In Germany it made shrink the scene in a couple of month into almost nothing. This did not happened because it was such a great and solid game system. And to be honest, better play T9A instead of 8th WHF edition. T9A is based on 8th edition but as far more balanced.
And ToW will, with the right people and if they do not all play with dragons for instance, be a nice game for sure. But competitive wise it also will be a disaster (uncomped) like all WHF editions before, even the good ones were always unplayable uncomped just because GW is a big greedy company that likes to sell tons of expensive models and thus allows all crap and bullshit be done with their rules due to having almost no list building restrictions.
Slot system in combination with percentage system would be best but sadly GW is not interested in having a good and balanced game at least army composition wise, not even thinking about core rules.
Warhammer indeed. Hear hear!
My problem with earlier magic sistems was the absolute absurdity of the damage magic was capable of, and the game forced you to participate in the magic phase, so it forced you to have higher mages to be able to dispell effectively, now one level 2 mage in the right place can nitigate magic a lot! And let's you focus on other more fighty models not having to feel bad about not having enoigh base dispell dice (speaking from 6th edition here)
Good rundown. Very level headed and fair review. I would expect nothing less from this channel. 😊
While I do share your concern about the risk of _Linehammer_ I do really like most of what I've seen and read about TOW. Can't wait to get some games under my belt.
It's extremely ironic that while Total War: Warhammer is based on Warhammer Fantasy, The Old World meta seems to be exactly like Total War.
Explanation: Spaghetti lines have always been meta in the recent Total War games because it "maximizes" the amount of models that are in contact. The spaghetti line essentially wraps around the block of infantry and does more damage.
The only way to fix it is by enforcing some arbitrary maximum rank to file length ratio
is that the meta ? I don't play normal TW Warhammer, I play it with the "realistic Warhammer true to lore" Mod, but I'm pretty confident thin lines are broken by cavalry and chariots, ogres, etc - because all models have an "impact" characteristic hidden under the hood. I don't know about the vanilla game, but I certainly would never have spaghetti lines if I knew there were enemy cav, monsters, MI, etc out there....
The amount of censorship against these points has been crazy. There were major red flags about linehammer just from the preview article, the rules aren't even fully functional, and playtesting has confirmed it.
Lots of people dependent on or receiving GW money did not give accurate reviews of this product. A lot of people jumped on board the hype train. Hopefully people will wake up and give some pushback
I agree. More independent commentary from gamers who know how to play to win (and who will exploit weakness like this in the rules) are sorely needed.
I liked what someone on UA-cam pointed out, that if you're going to have so many titles, it doesn't make sense to have them all overlap the same place on the market. You've got 40K and AoS busy trying to please tournament players, then TOW and other specialist games probably should be targeting friendly game players.
I haven't got a game in (not quite through the rulebook) but a lot of what Dr. Blaxill mentions sounds good. They fixed deathstars, they fixed artillery, they fixed magic, they didn't fix mega-models being OP, but then they're selling mega-models is why. The game in general chilled out, which I think it desperately needed to do after 8th. Just as there's a WAAC crowd who enjoy a game trying to balance around their type of play, there's a not-even-trying-to-win crowd who will enjoy a game balanced around their type of play just as much.
Finally!, hard agree on the magic. Since my only care for competitive is hearing your bat-reps I'm pretty ok with the rest. So far seems like changing the frontal attacks rules and maybe a comp system for powerful units like the dragons can be a good patch for the game. And the ork running so much skirmishers have to say that it looks cool XD it seem like that tales (although untrue) where the savage tribes charged the romans formations.
Cheers!
I've yet to play, seen a few games played and I'm in agreement with you on the strange abstract linehammer combat mechanic - one unit barely touching the other unit, so everyone not in base to base just attacks .. doesn't seem right to me or fair, I'd rather be hit by a comet or ravaged by dwellers and lose a unit to witchcract and sorcery than to boomerang swordfighters. That said, I'll play, looking forward to seeing how it compares. I prefare a dicepool and a dedicated phase for my wizards though, ah well.
Really obvious solution to the lines problem is this: you may not have more additional attacks from your line than your opponent has ranks, or maybe 2x with a special rule or something.
Correction - as many line attacks as your opponent has ranks * 2 make sense to represent a sort of pseudo lapping around
or put step up back in and let us play with the models we spent £100s on.....
Thank you for your well balanced criticism. I think you're very right about the exploitable mechanics. I'm much more of a MiddleHammer fan and detested 8th but I understand your point of view. I' very much looking forward to your developing views on the game.
Is Viper a Road Rash reference? played that game on the 3DO for a ridiculous amount of time.
Busted!
The first thing i'll try to counter linehammer is a charge with a couple of chariots. Top quality video, as always.
Based as usual!