Who here plays 40k cooperatively?

[Inquisitor Eisenhorn]

Co-operative war games/skirmish games like Rangers of Shadow Deep, 5 Parsecs from home and others have been a really interesting and welcome development for me in the past few years, and they renewed my interest in finding my own way of playing 40k, because I just can't keep up with the pace of the game, and also because I mainly just play with friends with my own collection. 

 

In my hobby life, there's always been a bit of a tension in my mind about a PVP wargame like 40k which has such a big component that is about aesthetics and lore as opposed to just rules mechanics. 

 

I have been wondering recently if anyone else has adopted a "cooperative" way of playing the game, where maybe you choose factions or split a force with your gaming companion and then play out a scenario against an enemy AI which is basically some sort of common sense agreement between you about what the enemy would do. 

 

Or maybe you do it another way; I'd be curious to hear. 

[Noserenda]

Used to be a big thing in Oldcramunda campaigns with stealers and zombies :D Since then i think only once when i GM'ed a zombie horde chocking a city map with small forces raiding things that ended up being semi coop. GM's used to be a lot more common as a concept in wargaming but it feels like in the wider hobby they are making a bit of a comeback?

[Axineton]

I played  a two v one game about two years back. Me and my mate had two thousand points each, he was admech and I was ultramarines Vs our other mate who had four thousand points of necrons. Was a great game and we whooped those necrons big time.

Edited February 4, 2022 by Axineton

[Inquisitor Eisenhorn]

Used to be a big thing in Oldcramunda campaigns with stealers and zombies Since then i think only once when i GM'ed a zombie horde chocking a city map with small forces raiding things that ended up being semi coop. GM's used to be a lot more common as a concept in wargaming but it feels like in the wider hobby they are making a bit of a comeback?

Yes, GMing 40k is so great, I agree!

[Brother Tyler]

I could definitely see this being done in a limited fashion. Much the way both Rangers of Shadow Deep and Five Parsecs From Home involve limited options for both the protagonists and antagonists, a variety of adaptations could be made in the Warhammer 40,000 setting.

 

Plague zombies are always an easy go-to (and part of my own solo/co-op effort with the Hive of the Dead), and easily work in the Warhammer 40,000, Necromunda, and Kill Team games.

 

An "easy" way to do this would be to allow players to choose a squad/team/gang from a limited set of options - allies that make sense from the perspective the setting's lore. The easiest way to do this is to use one codex and to allow everyone to choose from that codex and its codex supplements. A slightly better way would be to allow for a meta-faction. For example, everyone has to choose an IMPERIUM force (minus Imperial Knights and Legio Cybernetica). Or everyone chooses an AELDARI force (Asuryani, Drukhari, Harlequins, or Corsairs). Or everyone has to choose a hive gang (not including Enforcers). Regardless, everyone is allowed a similar amount of points to kit their squad/team/gang out. The antagonists in the campaign would then be some "simple" force to which an AI system could be applied without too much complexity - something like Orks, Tyranids, Chaos Daemons, or even Plague Zombies. Things could even get more difficult and more dangerous versions of the antagonist would appear as the campaign progresses.

 

This could even be adapted for the various Space Marine Adventures games, Space Hulk, and even within the Horus Heresy setting (though the latter becomes a bit more difficult since the classic antagonist would be just as canny as the protagonists, requiring a designated antagonist player setup - see below).

 

And I think it's even possible to allow for more complexity than I'm describing. Much of that depends upon the players, their tolerances, and their willingness to both do work and allow for flexibility.

 

While I like the campaign progression for Five Parsecs from Home more, I think that Rangers of Shadow Deep's progression and the missions/scenarios concept is better. YMMV. My point here, though, is that it would be relatively easy to adapt the campaign systems of the various games to a solo/co-op system, winnowing things down to the squad/team/gang level.

 

An alternative or augmentation to an AI system would be a designated antagonist - a player that is responsible for controlling the antagonists in battles. In a league/tournament setting, this might involve a rotation if you don't want to/can't have a designated antagonist.

 

Bottom line - I think that there are a ton of ways to do this and it might be worthwhile for the community to develop some baseline ideas that hobbyists can use in their gaming.

[ThePenitentOne]

Sort of yes?

 

Saint Katherine's Aegis is an arbitrated Crusade campaign, and there are a lot of planned story events that everyone is working toward- it's like Greek Tragedy, in that we all have pretty concrete ideas about WHAT is going happen, but the game helps us figure out HOW.

 

So players are ultimately trying to defeat each other, but not before certain story events occur.

 

There's also an "NPC" faction to facilitate the growth of Cult armies without triggering their own discovery prematurely.

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

I've played in team games which are a lot of fun but aren't quite co-op I think you're suggesting. I think if I were going to design a co-op experience, I'd use nids. Mainly use their CC units and then just have some fairly simple rules for how they would move (really just towards the closet models, always advance unless they could shoot and/or charge). Then to spice it up I'd have them come from random board edges almost like a tower defense game. I wouldn't worry about using a standard size table, I'd just experiment till I found something that works but making it a bit more up close and personal would be cool.

 

I think you could get a really thematic experience with something simple like that, though I think I would put a round limit on it, so it stays fresh. The big issue would be getting a nid force big enough to really make it work. I think you want to have a fair number of different units and then roll for the unit/table edge it comes in at. It'd be an interesting experiment but really couldn't justify starting another force at the moment.

[phandaal]

Used to be a big thing in Oldcramunda campaigns with stealers and zombies :D Since then i think only once when i GM'ed a zombie horde chocking a city map with small forces raiding things that ended up being semi coop. GM's used to be a lot more common as a concept in wargaming but it feels like in the wider hobby they are making a bit of a comeback?

Time is a flat circle, man!

 

Only a matter of time before the Space Hulk and Heroquest revival.

[gideon stargreave]

I've been toying with a semi co-op game of mordheim with hordes of skaven as the enemy. I want to get some friends into the hobby who have never experienced its glory, so I'm reducing warbands size to 5 miniatures more or less.

I'm terms of 40k etc I would err on the small size too, a squad and a warmachine perhaps, more than that might become unwieldy.

[Bryan Blaire]

Only a matter of time before the … Heroquest revival.

That already happened: https://hasbropulse.com/products/heroquest-game-system-1 - but it isn’t affiliated with GW any more.

 

Personally, I always like managed/arbitrated campaigns for 40K, but haven’t ever done a true me + friends playing forces (of any size) vs. a GM run op for.

[Antarius]

I did a primitive “AI” system two years or so ago and we played a couple of linked, story-driven scenarios revolving around a squad of Tempestus on a suicide mission to recapture an artifact. It was good fun, but then the pandemic hit and, well...

 

I should still have my notes somewhere, though. IIRC I’d actually written most of the next mini-campaign revolving around a Sororitas order, but it just never came about :/

[Khornestar]

I’d be very interested in seeing some of the “AI” mechanics people have used, or maybe a nutshell description of other systems that you think work well and might be applicable to 40k.

[Brother Tyler]

A very simplified form of AI, but for a boardgame, would be that found in the Space Marine Adventures games. You can download the rules for Rise of the Orks here (see pages 10 and 11). Most AI systems are similar, providing basic decision flowcharts for determining the actions of the antagonists. Rangers of Shadow Deep has a decision flowchart that is comparable in its complexity, comprised of three questions, each with different actions depending on whether you answer "yes" or "no" to each. The Space Marine Adventures games can be played completely solo/co-op without the need for a neutral player controlling the antagonists. Five Parsecs from Home, meanwhile, is developed as a solo game (that can be played co-op), but requires some decision-making on behalf of the enemy models. The rules are scattered throughout the book (e.g., enemy movement is in the section on movement, shooting is in the section on shooting, etc.). Overall, the level of complexity in the AI system will be driven by the complexity level of the game and the tactical sophistication of the enemy models. A relatively straightforward enemy (like a Genestealer) might simply require a flowchart about determining if there are any enemies in LOS and which is closest in order to determine the direction that the model moves and who it tries to eviscerate. A model with more options, such as a Chaos Space Marine, meanwhile (not a Berzerker - he would do what the Genestealer does), might require some more questions.

[N1SB]

I'm going to check out these games you've been talking about (Rangers of Shadow Deep and 5 Parsecs From Home). I'll share a Work-In-Progress thing for now.

+++ 40,000 Heroes, designed by our Warhammer Store Manager +++

1st, I want to talk about managing the player's side of a co-op game.

Here's the basis of what our local Warhammer Store's moving towards for co-op games, that we've been testing out. We played this from Christmas to New Years. The big idea is, multiplayer games are tricky logistically, so we had each player control 1 unit, then let them customise their 1 unit with Narrative Play Crusade rules.

40,000 Heroes is this game mode that our Warhammer Store Manager came up with...but I don't think he's alone. His goal was to just host some simple multiplayer events on public holidays for both newcomers and veterans alike, and the easiest way was to do a team-based game where each player controls 1 Character unit.

He did this in 8th edition using the Chapter Approved custom Character design rules, but in 9th ed there are built-in custom Character design rules in the Crusade system. Long story short - choose an unnamed Character Datasheet below Power Level 9, the lower the PL the more Battle Honours he gets, then join the game.

If this looks familiar, I put together a thing for our Warhammer Store WhatsApp, then shared it here. This is an updated version using Crusade rules (minor edit, changed to clearer PNG image):

Not shown here - the most recent mission we played was Christmas-themed where we go to the opponent's deployment zone and 2 side objectives to steal their presents. Players were split into 2 teams, no Deep Strike or Infiltrate. When Characters died they respawned back in their deployment zone, and have to run back up the field again. A few other details like we rolled off to activate, but it was a surprisingly deep strategic (like in Character design) and tactical (few number of units lead to a lot of punch-counterpunch situations), fun times.

(Sidenote - so we made this focused on Characters...after playing, and re-reading Crusade rules...I think you could replace a Character with a squad of other units and it'll balance fine. Reason - Characters get the best options in the form of Crusade Relics, everyone chose the 4++ Invuln save and 5+++ Feel No Pain ones if they didn't already have those rules built-in on their Datasheets, which made everyone very tough...but those options aren't available to non-Character units. Just a thought to increase options for a more skirmish style game, because right now it feels like a RPG.)

Why do I share this? So we did team vs. team, or as our local players called it PvP, but we're planning full co-op or PvE soon. The idea was...because it's catchy to say and everyone here watches anime, "Attack One Titan", or have these Characters come back to fight a single Lord of War unit controlled by some sort of AI rules.

This Attack One Titan mode is just a variation of fighting, say, plague zombies as you guys suggested...mainly because it's easier to paint one large Lord of War instead of a horde of plague zombies. The Warhammer Store manager will no doubt choose some Battle Honours to put on it. As to how to govern that one Lord of War:

+++ The A.I. Card Deck Idea +++

Now, I want to describe our thoughts on the actual enemy/PvE/Artificial Intelligence side of a co-op game.

I’d be very interested in seeing some of the “AI” mechanics people have used, or maybe a nutshell description of other systems that you think work well and might be applicable to 40k.

We've been playing a number of games where it is a group of players vs. an Artificial Intelligence represented by an A.I. deck of cards. Games where you play against a deck are nothing new, Games Workshop did this long ago with 1-player game, Chainsaw Warrior (which may or may not be a strange 21st century version of Warhammer, where you're in New York fighting against "Chaos Agents" that bear the 8-point star). Talisman is also like that with co-op. But the one I want to focus on is Kingdom Death.

(Sidenote - when I 1st saw Kingdom Death's miniatures, I thought it was some weird game of lewd nurses vs. naughty tentacles. I was pleasantly surprised it's a very strategic and tactical game in a hellish environment that makes 40k look noblebright in comparison.)

A typical Kingdom Death fight has 4 players co-op against 1 monster. That monster is determined by its own A.I. deck of cards that is unique to it. For example, let's say you fight some Manticore-like creature with a scorpion tail. That Manticore's A.I. deck will include card(s) for a scorpion tail attack targeting those behind it. The deck will multiple cards of the same type, so you're anticipating cards you haven't drawn yet, like counting cards as the odds are a little stacked against you.

Aside from determining its actions, that A.I. deck is also its health. Your attacks whittle down that A.I. deck. So if you damage it, it might lose that scorpion tail attack, like you managed to cut its tail off. Now it can no longer use that specific attack...so you might change your tactics, like you'll try to gang up on it from behind, as that's now safer to do now.

The idea is that, like the hunters that you are, you're studying your prey, learning its behaviour, to more effectively kill it. It's way more strategic (in that you have to choose weapons before a fight suited for a particular hunt), tactical (like you're changing your plan of attack anticipating what cards may be drawn), but also thematic (as the A.I. deck usually represents its corresponding monster pretty well.)

Those are all ideas we're thinking about for that Attack One Titan mode of play. And I'm just sharing some thoughts now.

In addition to that, we also play Gloomhaven which is also based on enemy A.I. decks, but that's really just a convenience. We're also looking at Stargrave that my friend Timperial Guard's wife bought him for Christmas and won't shut up about, which has a co-op mode.

Edited February 8, 2022 by N1SB

[Khornestar]

Wow that is a lot of useful info and food for thought, many thanks to the both of you! The deck of cards is a very interesting way of handling it. Edited February 7, 2022 by Khornestar

[MegaVolt87]

The easiest way I have organized AI was each player to bring a second army  to a campaign to create an opportunity for a comeback/ boost without jeopardizing  anyone else's progress. This is only more effective in something like KT or Necromunda, the AI can occupy certain map territory from the start and can be booted back to an unassailable stronghold as not to be wiped. Can even auto take X unclaimed territory with a D3 roll, neutral territory could pop up with a random 2nd enemy AI from a table on a D6 roll. 

[Antarius]

I’d be very interested in seeing some of the “AI” mechanics people have used, or maybe a nutshell description of other systems that you think work well and might be applicable to 40k.

I'd have to dig up my notes again and translate some of them into English, but basically, I created two "temperaments" ("cautious" and "ferocious") for enemies that dicated how they would move (whether they would prioritise being in cover over getting closer to the PCs etc.). Then I created two basic d6 tables with actions, one for enemies with ranged weapons and one for enemies with (only) melee weapons.

 

At first, I created several tables, but in the end I trimmed it down to two and just had a "temperament action" option on each table, which would help to further differentiate between ferocious and cautious enemies without the need for more tables.

 

The goal was to eliminate the need for a dedicated GM and still have enemies that would move and fight according to what made sense for the specific type of enemy, as well as being light on bookkeeping and dice rolls and also be unpredictable enough that players wouldn't be able to know what a certain group of enemies would do next time.

 

We played five-six scenarios IIRC and while I did do a bit of tweaking along the way, we didn't run into any real problems or too much need for "on the fly" solutions. It worked quite well in the sense that we could play co-op scenarios where I basically set up the board and had a rough story outline, but as long as I made the story dependent on random events and objectives (for example having 6 possible exit locations with the right one being randomly determined), I didn't have any problems participating as a player along with everyone else.

[Antarius]

The easiest way I have organized AI was each player to bring a second army  to a campaign to create an opportunity for a comeback/ boost without jeopardizing  anyone else's progress. This is only more effective in something like KT or Necromunda, the AI can occupy certain map territory from the start and can be booted back to an unassailable stronghold as not to be wiped. Can even auto take X unclaimed territory with a D3 roll, neutral territory could pop up with a random 2nd enemy AI from a table on a D6 roll. 

This is a very useful idea! I also think it would combine well with a campaign system similar to Warcry, where each player advance their own story while simultaneously being "NPCs" in their opponent's story.

[MegaVolt87]

 

The easiest way I have organized AI was each player to bring a second army  to a campaign to create an opportunity for a comeback/ boost without jeopardizing  anyone else's progress. This is only more effective in something like KT or Necromunda, the AI can occupy certain map territory from the start and can be booted back to an unassailable stronghold as not to be wiped. Can even auto take X unclaimed territory with a D3 roll, neutral territory could pop up with a random 2nd enemy AI from a table on a D6 roll.

 

This is a very useful idea! I also think it would combine well with a campaign system similar to Warcry, where each player advance their own story while simultaneously being "NPCs" in their opponent's story.

Thats what I was going for. I just couldn't follow along other AI tabletop type ideas or make my own up. The NPC with a player behind it was effective and still a challenge in how I did it. Plus people weren't bored because they drove two different rosters/ factions instead of just one the whole campaign.

[Brother Tyler]

Co-operative war games/skirmish games like Rangers of Shadow Deep, 5 Parsecs from home and others have been a really interesting and welcome development for me in the past few years, and they renewed my interest in finding my own way of playing 40k, because I just can't keep up with the pace of the game, and also because I mainly just play with friends with my own collection.

Out of curiosity, are you considering ways to develop solo/co-op rules using the models in your collection? If so, are you taking the feedback you've been given and working on rules, or is this something you might develop as a community project?

[Inquisitor Eisenhorn]

 

Co-operative war games/skirmish games like Rangers of Shadow Deep, 5 Parsecs from home and others have been a really interesting and welcome development for me in the past few years, and they renewed my interest in finding my own way of playing 40k, because I just can't keep up with the pace of the game, and also because I mainly just play with friends with my own collection.

Out of curiosity, are you considering ways to develop solo/co-op rules using the models in your collection? If so, are you taking the feedback you've been given and working on rules, or is this something you might develop as a community project?

 

 

 

I'd definitely like to see some sort of community project here that compiles all the different sorts of play modes and scenarios people have home-brewed that involve more game mastering and co-op style. 

 

I personally haven't developed some sort of consistent way of doing things for my own purposes.  Every session tends to be a mish-mash of rules bits and custom ideas that I have that I think suit the narrative and forces involved.  But: I like that way of doing things.  As long as there is an internal logic to what is happening in a session, it doesn't really matter to me whether the outcome is balanced, just that there is a consistent rationale to why an outcome is being decided the way it is. 

 

I recently did a Deathwatch Kill-Team 2.0 scenario where I put up 5 deathwatch marines against about 20 poxwalkers + a bunch of Gellerpox hulks, and i added a Blackstar in there too based on the strafing run rules from the Octarius veterans rules. 

 

I created a few basic conditions for deployment, and the deathwatch were separated by the poxwalkers from their VIP extraction objective.  But I also made the theater a 2'x5' board, with the 'walkers set up in the middle.  They were slowly lumbering towards the vip and i ruled that if one got shot by the DW operatives, on a roll of a 1-3 any walker withing 2" would turn around and start advancing towards the deathwatch rather than the VIP. 

 

I gave plenty of terrain for elevation and distance so the DW wouldn't immediately be swarmed in spite of being massively outnumbered, and it ended up being a nail biter trying to figure out how to use the terrain to get around this huge mass of nurgle in 4 turns.  There are definitely ways of creatively "balancing" a scenario where the point values in the rule book don't need to apply.  Terrain features, deployment, and tabletop size are big factors for this in my experience, and it's always fun to give a force some custom narrative support options.

 

While I was technically playing the nurgle forces, I was mainly just trying to decide what made sense, which was them lumbering around at whatever the rules said got their attention, and then game-mastering the narrative for my friend who managed the DW; reminding him of his options for the Blackstar support, how many turns were left, that sort of thing. 

 

So that's the sort of thing I like to do--I could definitely do something like write up the rules for this scenario for folks here who want to recreate or adapt it.  I would also like to see more custom scenario stuff like posted here as a resource for non-competitive/co-op sessions.

[Antarius]

I would definitely love to be part of a community project.

I'm reasonably good at English and at rules/systems and being creative. I'm also a strong starter but, regrettably, a much less strong "finisher" unless I have other people to work with.

[Brother Tyler]

Based on the feedback given so far, there are plenty of ways that hobbyists can enjoy the WH40K hobby playing solo and cooperatively. I'd hate for a project to limit members to a single option when there are so many to choose from. I propose a range of mini-projects, each providing players with different options for solo/co-op play. This way, most players will find something that might work for them.

 

I've been working on a solo/co-op set of rules with the mods and, motivated by this discussion, have kicked it back into gear. It features Space Marine Scouts versus Plague Zombies. That set of rules was going to include options for replacing the Space Marine Scouts with a variety of alternate progatonists, including Astra Militarum/Planetary Defense Forces, Adepta Sororitas, Voidsmen, Adeptus Arbites/Enforcers, and even Hive Gangers. For the most part, those were just cosmetic changes to the miniatures and their weapons. The core for that project (Space Marine Scouts) is almost done, with only small rules refinements and images for the rulebook remaining.

 

Another thing this discussion motivated was working on an IMPERIUM versus ORKS set of solo rules for Kill Team set in the Third War for Armageddon. I'll kick that project off in the Homegrown Rules forum.

 

If others want to initiate other solo/co-op projects, I can create an index.

 

My original plan with the two projects I initiated was to make each available via our Downloads section. An alternative (or addition) is that we could collect all such projects into a single document, also available via our Downloads section. It might be an omnibus of ideas for solo/co-op play. Historically, such projects have been labors of love driven by the passion of one person. The participation of other members is always helpful, especially in terms of playtesting to identify things that the author overlooks. In my opinion, having many such projects would be very good, but anyone that initiates such a project should expect to drive that project to its conclusion (i.e., don't start a project in hopes that someone else will pick it up and finish it). This discussion or the (hypothetical) index discussion are good places to suggest ideas, with actual project discussions in the Homegrown Rules forum being the place to do the work.

[Antarius]

I went ahead and translated my rules. I am slightly uncertain about where to post them, though.

[Brother Tyler]

Are they in a document? Or are they composed as a discussion post?