Warhammer 5th Edition
On 14 October I went to Kashiwa to play a game of Warhammer 5th edition with the lads from the Oldhammer Facebook group. I was somewhat disorganized that day but managed to get to the venue at around 12.30 pm, where I found Rodion and Joshua already setting up for their Grudge of Drong campaign games. I was pleasantly surprised at the space, as it was quite large and roomy, with plenty of tables available. There was also free coffee I believe, and the shop itself was well stocked with the accoutrements of miniature gaming. There were a few other Japanese folk playing games of 40K, which opened up some avenues for networking. Kashiwa is a bit of a hike for me, though, so I can only see myself coming there if we have a gathering on the calendar. For now it was good to put some faces on the texts from the Messenger app, and to see some other armies on the table. Joshua's Dwarves in particular were painted to an exceptional standard, and gave me ample motivation to work on my little guys beyond a simple three colour job.
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| Our table in Kashiwa. |
Jonjo was my opponent that day, and he brought a Lizardmen army to the tabletop. Jonjo was a budding sculptor, and he showed me two Kroxigors in progress he had scratch built himself. We had previously agreed on a limit of 2400 points. I fielded the Empire that day, and brought a gunline army composed of handgunners, more handgunners, supplemented by crossbows and archers, and backed by a full complement of Empire artillery. This included a steam tank, two hellblaster volley guns, a cannon and a halfling hot pot! I also brought three wizards to the table, including one mounted on a pegasus. Clearly I had been playing too much 40K in recent weeks, as my aim was to blow my enemy away with superior firepower.
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| My Empire! Some unpainted models in there. |
But alas, as it was in 40K, my gunline was overrun, smashed to pieces, and sent running for the hills. The hellblasters were characteristically vicious, almost wiping out two separate regiments each. The cannons were a non-event, overshooting every time. The hot pot killed one Saurus before exploding in a cataclysmic catastrophe of culinary proportions. The handgunners were very poor - in 5th edition they can only fire once and then have to spend one turn reloading which meant I was shooting my units of 10 in five shot volleys (handgunners in two ranks can fire each rank every turn). Their damage output during the game was nothing to write home about. The highlight of my magic phase was blasting a flying skink with a cloak that made him impervious to mundane weapons, which gave the little bastard enough gumption to land right in front of my handgunner line and do the haka. He was interrupted mid-dance by a ball of flame slung by my Wizard Lord on a pegasus which turned him into a smoking pile of ash.
I also remember now why I never fielded an Empire lord on a griffon before. The Empire's leadership sucks dog's bollocks, and given that Panic rules are so powerful in 5th edition you really need the general to be in among troops, soothing them and giving them his Leadership bonus. In 5th edition any troops within 12" of a unit breaking in combat has to take a Panic test. This is a MASSIVE distance (12" inches on each side is two feet, or one-third of the game board). This was toned down in subsequent editions to 6", but in my game it send my entire right flank running off the board after one combat. I knew I shouldn't have taken the combat - I should have just run away - but I'd just blown Jonjo's Lizardmen cavalry to smithereens with the hellblaster. The decision to hold cost me my right flank, as the resulting Panic tests sent my Ogres, and most of my missile troops running for the hills. This also means in future games I cannot take any combats that I know I will lose, because the resultant Panic tests can decimate my army.
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| Jonjo's battle line. |
I also failed on using my general on several levels. I tried to induce some Terror tests by placing him within 8" of two to three units, but completely failed to crunch the numbers on the probability of this actually happening. The Lizardmen's Cold-Blooded rule (roll three dice for Leadership tests and discard the highest) is actually amazing when you run the numbers. On Leadership 9 the chance of failure for a Lizardman is 5.09% (just a shade over 1 in 20). The chance of failure for all other races on Leadership 9 is 16.7% (1 in 6 exactly). This means that Lizardmen are three times more likely to pass Leadership 9 tests than any other race in the game. It gets even better with Leadership 10. A Slann with Leadership 10 will fail a test 1.85% of the time (less than 1 in 50). Dwarves with Leadership 10, by contrast, will fail 8.3% of the time (1 in 12), which is four times more likely. Add a Battle Standard Bearer for re-rolls in combat, and the statistical probability tapers off to almost zero on the higher bands of Leadership. Forget using Psychology against the Lizardmen. They will never run away except on very, very rare occasions.
Me being the idiot I am, of course, tried to do just that. Nothing happened of course - the skinks might have blinked a litttle - a saurus might have eaten a fly off his snout - the slann might have released a disdainful fart - but they watched the griffon's landing with casual disinterest. He might as well been a giant chicken, for all they cared. In Jonjo's subsequent turns he made me pay for my folly by killing my general with magic and skink bowfire. To add insult to injury, 5th edition also has the rule which states that the whole army must take a Panic test if the general is slain. This rule was removed in later editions, but this being 5th edition I dutifully rolled for every Leadership 7 unit I had on the board. Which meant all of them, with exception of the steam tank. Half of my lads panicked and ran. I ended up conceding on turn four. Back to the drawing board!
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| Front rank fire! Rear rank, advance! Front rank, fire! |
That was my first game of 5th edition in over two decades, and like 40K, it represents another metagame to learn. The magic metagame is particularly important in HeroHammer - combinations of magic items and character loadouts play a massive role. There were many lessons to be gleaned in our first game. For example, the scroll caddies which were so ubiquitous in 6th edition tournament play in Australia were completely useless. I brought three wizards, each with a Dispel Scroll, in order to counteract magic, but found that the Forbidden Rod just overrides it because of the Total Power rule. The Forbidden Rod is one example of a magic item which is so powerful that it renders one of the phases of the game moot. If you ever needed to cast a clutch spell just use the Forbidden Rod - boom, Total Power, there is nothing your opponent can do about it. There is no reason not to take it, and in fact both Jonjo and I included it in our lists. In my next game, if I play Empire, I'm taking a Wizard Lord with a Forbidden Rod and a Healing Potion, and completely circumvent all the nonsense with the Winds of Magic cards. The Forbidden Rod removes all tactical elements from that phase because you don't have to worry about Winds of Magic cards, Dispel Scrolls or any magical protection your opponent might bring. The only downside is the 50% chance of losing a Wound every time you use it, which is easily mitigated by a Healing Potion and judicious use of the Forbidden Rod. You don't need to cast all your spells with it - just the ones that can swing the game in your favor. In fact I can remember tournament organizers in Australia at CanCon and MOAB specifically banning the item in their tournament packs for this reason.
The Crown of Command (grants Leadership 10) is another example of a "compulsory" magic item. If you have a low Leadership army like Empire or Orcs, why would you not take it? Its value makes it a compulsory choice for Leadership 7 armies, especially after watching my troops take multiple Panic tests all over the board. There are many nasty magic items in 5th edition, and I've barely plumbed the possibilities available. The Orcs have the Banner of Mork which auto-kills wizards if they come into base contact with them. While thinking about what lists to bring on Sunday, I was considering putting that in a wolf rider unit or something that flies, and kamikaze-ing it into Jonjo's Slann unit. Poof, 1000 points of Slann dead. In the end I went with the Empire gunline instead, which I also thought might be OP, but didn't turn out to be the case at all as Jonjo ran over the army without too much fuss. What I consider OP might not actually be OP in the scary world of 5th edition.
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| The Lizards advance! |
I'm not sure how good Empire is in this edition. All the things that made my Empire army great in 6th edition - parent companies being immune to Panic from detachments, cheap cavalry, full plate armor, improved handgunners, rule sets which give outnumbering bonuses in combat, toned down magic, etc. - don't exist yet. Hellblasters are still ridiculous, and they got powered down in 6th, but I would happily dump them for Stubborn great swords, better handgunners, detachment rules and cheap full plate armored cavalry. One knight in 5th edition is 39 points, which is one point cheaper than 10 infantry. They're not worth it. But overall it's too early to tell after a sample of one game, so I can try again with another build, or field one of my other armies instead. Besides, if I'm giving up on an edition just because my army feels underpowered then it means I am actually playing to win and that makes me a sad git, especially in a country with a total pool of six (?) players. 5th edition is not without its charms. But I like rank and file games which prioritize the troops, which is why Kings of War is my favorite fantasy battle game at the moment. All the rules, spells, magic items and army lists in Kings of War are condensed into two books which on aggregate are smaller than the Warhammer rulebook. Rules bloat is a real thing with Warhammer, and this is compounded by the edition switching between 5th, 7th and T9A.
Warhammer 7th Edition Warbands
After I capitulated in our Warhammer game Jonjo and I played one game of 7th edition Warbands. Jonjo also took this one, completing my round of Lizardmen blues. Jonjo used terrain effectively to screen his Saurus infantry and cavalry from my shooters, while I ineptly maneuvered my halberdiers into getting double-teamed by both those units. My poor warband was wiped out to a man - woman? - with my Warrior-Priest fighting valiantly to the bitter end and almost pulling out a win. She went on a run of highly improbable armor saves thanks to the Armor of Meteoric Iron, and I could see Jonjo getting crankier and crankier as I somehow managed not to roll a single 1-2 after about 20 armor saves. Alas, she succumbed to the sheer weight of probability in the end, and my warband suffered a massacre loss. I gave the MVP award to Jonjo's chameleon skinks, whose -2 modifier to shooting made them pretty much invulnerable to my handguns and crossbows, and provoked me into making some bad mistakes as I chased them around with my infantry. In the end Jonjo scored 110 points (100 for the massacre, plus 10 points as an underdog bonus) but lost 2 skinks and 3 sauruses. I got 25 points as the loser, but lost 3 handgunners and 2 crossbowmen so I was down 15 points after replenishing my troops. Luckily I had 28 points stashed, but after replacing my losses my reserve was down to 13 points, with no new troops or veteran levels added. My Warrior-Priest survived, but her Toughness was reduced by one. I should also add that my greenskin warband has been disqualified after I reviewed the list and found it was illegal. Not enough core units. This means my sole Warband is my Empire one, and its record stands currently at 1-1.
Overall the day was a good one. Although the trek out took over an hour it wasn't significantly longer than my trips to Setagaya or Koganei. I was able to field my Karl Franz and Balthasar Gelt models for the first time on the table, and had the opportunity to use some retro units like halflings, ogres and the hot pot (all of which were removed from the Empire list in 6th edition). It was good to meet Jonjo and Joshua at long last after exchanging back and forth on Facebook, and the venue itself was excellent. I might conduct all my purchases whenever I go to Kashiwa since the shop was so well-stocked. In the future I might even be able to find 40K opponents in Kashiwa given the few games I saw running there. There was an older Japanese dude there that expressed an interest in playing Fantasy, but alas I failed to exchange contact details, and the opportunity of adding another player to the network was lost. I hope I can get one more game for the greenskins before 2018 comes to a close, just to put a capstone on the Orcs & Goblins project before I start something else for the new year.
Next: TBC
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