OT - Non Warhammer fantasy wargames & websites?

[bwgwl]

It's in the works and was demoed at GenCon. Pictures can be seen at this page http://www.wizkidsgames.com/wk_article.asp?cid=37101&frame=Events .

oh man! there's goes my savings account!

and i simply love the idea of playing Crimson Skies on a glass table with the terrain underneath! brilliant!

 

[mmadsen]

I was looking at a wargame to use for large wars in my campaign (now D&D, but it's been through several iterations). After looking through various options I came down to two options. Dark Heaven Apocolypse from Reaper & Fantasy Rules! Fantasy Rules! lost out, but merely because I found a copy of Dark Heaven Apocolypse first.

So, without actually have played the game, I can recommend it based on thorough research on my part (although something better may have come out recently).

What did your research reveal? What did you like about Fantasy Rules (and Dark Heaven Apocalypse)?

 

[mmadsen]

That Free Fantasy Wargame Rules page linked to a DBFi ruleset (De Bellis Fictionalis) based on DBM (De Bellis Multitudinis).

An amusing quote from the intro to DBFi:

Those "science-fiction" worlds described in the 1940s-1970s such as Burroughs' Mars whose soldiers mix hand to hand weapons and relatively primitive and apparently ineffective laser or other beam weapons can also be used with these rules.

ERB's Barsoom is now from the 1940's to 1970's? And here I was, thinking Under the Moons of Mars (aka A Princess of Mars) went back to 1912...

 

[Glyfair]

What did your research reveal? What did you like about Fantasy Rules (and Dark Heaven Apocalypse)?

Well, to tell the truth, it has been a few years. Basically, Fantasy Rules! came across as a good "generic" wargame that was apparently simple to use. It wasn't difficult to get into for a non-wargamer.

Dark Heaven Apocalypse was is a nice simple system. It's not so generic, you have to make up unit stats for figures that aren't Reaper miniatures. I settled for this because then something like 80% of my miniatures were Reaper's. To tell the truth, I never have gotten around to the war yet. Campaign's kept falling apart before they got to that point in time.

Glyfair of Glamis

 

[Eben]

I mostly play warhammer ancient battles. When you drop the magic and ignore the GW machine, you have a really fun game. A few years ago, the author of the rules, Jervis Johnson, posted a bit of a system to design your own army lists: how to calculate point values for your troops. You can find all of his posts here:

http://www.lochagos.com/wab/index.html

If anyone is interested, I'v made a summary in an excell sheet, let me know something and I'll mail it to you.

It's a really cool way to game: you can make up army lists that will fit you own game world.

 

[mmadsen]

I mostly play warhammer ancient battles. When you drop the magic and ignore the GW machine, you have a really fun game.

So, is Warhammer Ancient just Warhammer Fantasy without the magic?

 

[Eben]

Originally posted by mmadsen:
"So, is Warhammer Ancient just Warhammer Fantasy without the magic?"

Basically, yes. There are some added details that enhance the game (in my opinion at least): cavalry can try to retreat from combat, skirmishers work slightly different (regular troops don't have to make panic tests for seeing the flee), rules for light troops, drilled troops, ...) In the army list booklet (Armies of Antiquity) there are rules for phalanxes, cataphracts, shieldwalls, berserkers,...
Also it's less dry than a lot of other historical rules sets, presentation is verry nice and they don't take themselves too serious.

 

[mmadsen]

Also it's less dry than a lot of other historical rules sets, presentation is verry nice and they don't take themselves too serious.

That's worth something. And, of course, you don't have to buy in to the whole Games Workshop scene to play with an ancient army. You can buy very cheap plastic figs for standardized units.