An alternative Escalation Battle Report

[Sception]

By now we've all seen the Eldar/Daemon battle report highlighting probably the worst possible result of adding escalation to the game.

 

However, for those who haven't seen it, here is an another battle report, which paints the expansion/supplement/whatever in a much rosier light:

 

http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?386126-Escalation-Orks-Stompa-vs-IG-Shadowsword

 

Orks vs. Guard, 2500 points with a stompa and a shadowsword.

 

The single shot D template from the shadowsword is much less egregious then the 4 shots of the revenant (or 8 shots of the reaver), the game actually does go back and forth over the first few turns, and all in all it looked like a pretty fun time. It did kind of come down to "whoever's superheavy dies first loses", but the lords of war featured in this battle didn't feel nearly so out of place in a 2500 point game as the revenant clearly was in a smaller battle.

 

I still feel GW messed up by not adjusting D weapons for regular games of 40k. I do not want to understate how inappropriate I still feel the revenant is, and how bitter I am at GW for not taking the time to make sure every faction had a lord of war that both they could enjoy playing with and their opponent could enjoy playing against, and for, I feel, doing a poor job shepherding their game's rule set. However, as long as the multishot D templates are avoided, and lords of war in general are reserved for larger games rather than crammed into as small a game as will fit them, they look like they could make for an enjoyable game experience, so I hope that, once the panic passes, people will be willing to play with and against the less offensive lords of war, at least in games of a suitable size for them to not be completely out of place, rather than rejecting the whole concept altogether based on the most poorly executed and offensive examples.

[the jeske]

They still said that D weapons are  nuts . full HP blade went down in a single turn touched by the D.

 

My view on escalations are this . 2k+pts . bigger tables[imo 4x4 or 4x6 is too small imo] with LoS terrain build to work for and against stuff which maybe as high as a titan . no multi shot D template weapons , then it doesn't realy matter . People are mostly getting melee stuff or the fire of 3 LR in one tank [although not being stun/shakeable is huge] etc.

[Sception]

It wasn't full health, it had already lost a few hull points in previous rounds, and a few more to the bike lord before the stompa went to town on it.  And they had a few turns to try and bring down the stompa before it got there.  They didn't, but they certainly had the chance to try, and I was surprised he didn't send all of his lasplanes after it, but whatever.

 

My views, though, are pretty much the same as yours.  No multishot D templates, 2k+ games, big tables (I might be willing to try 4x6, but 4x8 or 6x8 are clearly superior), tall terrrain.

 

I do think that, with some tweaking to the D rules (or at least tweaking of the individual weapons - turbo lasers and pulsars wouldn't be nearly so offensive without blast, and it doesn't make much sense to me that you can't shoot them at thunderhawks anyway), and maybe an explicit restriction to games of 2k+, and lords of war could be a worthy addition to 40k, something I wouldn't mind seeing as a core part of the game in future editions, included within default force org scructures and appearing as options within codeces and so on.

 

As it is, though, the implementation in escalation certainly feels a bit half baked to me.

[the jeske]

well maybe am getting it wrong when they say at the end that D weapons are needed to deal well with super heavies [although then they go on how shadow sword with 1blast seem more balanced , then super havies with2 or 4 D shots].

 

Oddly enough there is one more IG vs orks report out there . Only there a normal baneblade was used.

 

 

 

It would be nice if D weapon was not str/nocover/nosave , but a rule that helps titan killer weapons kill other titans [6+d6HP down good thing] . This way they could make a weapon str 10 ap 1 [still deadly to normal stuff] ,maybe even ignore cover , but not inv .

Or make D class weapons [shoty ones] lock on to stuff first . This way sure if someone wants to blow up a death star or tank he can, but it is not going to be 2 tanks/vehicles on opposit sides of a table. In general I think the D problem is linked to the d6 and the AV vs W system GW has. if there was no AV [to counter poison vehicles would have machine rule stoping poison from killing it.with maybe nids having rare bio acid rules on rare few weapons that could hurt tanks as if they were living] it would be much easier to balance stuff.

[Sception]

Maybe force rerolls of successful inv saves?

I don't know, I think my favorite fixes to D weapons are:

1) no multishot D templates. one pie plate like a super demolisher, or multiple regular shots like a super lascannon, not both on the same weapon.

2) instead of auto-exploding vehicles on a 2+, make it an auto-pen causing d3+1 structure points, the way monstrous creatures would take d3+1 wounds, leaving auto-explode for a 6. You still probably destroy lighter vehicles outright, and have a better chance of destroying heavy vehicles outright than other weapons, but you have less of a chance of one-shoting a land raider with a single D blast, so it won't feel quite so pointless to field them in games with super-heavies.

I don't know if that's 'enough' or even the right place to start, but something like that.

Honestly, I don't really feel that D weapons apart from pulsars and turbo lasers are that problematic. Maybe some of the melee D weapons could stand to be swinging with fewer attacks. Perhaps instead of some melee weapons just being S D, a few of those weapons could be S10 to start, but could come with some sort of 'Super Smash' special rule granting them S D but halving their attacks sort of how regular Smash works for regular monstrous creatures?

I will say that I'd love to see future rules for Abaddon where Drach'nyen was Strength D, even if it meant Abby would have to become a Lord of War in and of himself, like the Primarchs in the 30k rules.

Man, could you imagine how over the top they could make Abaddon's rules if he were a lord of war? Sure, no matter what it would probably be outright inferior to fielding an actual super heavy (again, much as with the primarchs in the 30k ruleset), but still... so cool.

ADB, are you around? Could you maybe plant some whispers in a few ears?

EDIT: I know I swore I was done with house rules and homebrew, but I don't think I could resist tooling around with what Abaddon might look like as a Lord of War. I may post something in a new thread later this weekend.

[Zincite]

EDIT: I know I swore I was done with house rules and homebrew, but I don't think I could resist tooling around with what Abaddon might look like as a Lord of War.  I may post something in a new thread later this weekend.

That'd be awesome.

 

A character on par with a Titan. That's... epic. Epic.

[the jeske]

Maybe force rerolls of successful inv saves?

that could be an option .

 

For me over playability , being good[as in good for me/world/etc] the important thing about units/models is that they should work . They don't have work good[well not for me at least] , a unit can be so so or even bad at let say assault , but if someone knows that unit X will see melee , it can be an option [maybe a bad one but still an option] . The worse type of units are those that don't work . they are technicly melee/shoty/tarpit , but it is rare to see them do those things[ think vespids , possessed etc] . D class shoting weapons turn any two units in my opponent army [that aren't flyers] int bad units . That is bad for the eviroment , and if some lords of war can double that [4 units make bad-flyers] , we suddenly looking at death of everything , but the most flyer centric builds.

GW says that it wants to push narrative games . It is their right . But D weapons do not add to that one bit .

 

 

 

 

 

I know I swore I was done with house rules and homebrew, but I don't

think I could resist tooling around with what Abaddon might look like as

a Lord of War.  I may post something in a new thread later this

weekend.

Well he did cut through a adamantium gate which was much thicker then armor on many lord of war . +in the good days , his sword was auto wound/auto pen , not the weedy form it has now.

[nurglez]

I'll be honest in that I'm looking forward to playing escalation with my friends. as we can easily agree to things. One of my friends and I were planning a 5000 each apoc game, so maybe we'll just do double force org with lords of battle instead, and agree to either no destroyer weapons or only 1 (my warhound titan only has an inferno gun and vulcan mega blaster so no problem to have no destroyers).

 

Main issue is that people say its not balanced for tournaments, well neither is 40k without it so I dont really see an issue :D