Sunday, August 29, 2010

Randomhammer

   So today i had the joy of playing one of the local fantasy fanatics that was at the time running the fantasy 'ard boyz tournament at my local games store (I was there to be the ringer but it turned out to not be needed).  Anyhow our game turned out to be just as crazy as every game i have ever seen him play, it was my Orcs vs. his Brettonians, and despite the fact that to start out the game everything went right for me (rolling 6's for everything, including the number of hits on his knights from the doom divers) I couldn't pull it out in the end.  To start turn 2 i declared my waaagh! and a decent amount of the units ran forward for their full 6 inches.  Then I start to roll for my charges and fail not one but all three of the charges that I made that turn, suffice to say the knights made short work of the failed-to-charge Orcs and shortly thereafter the warmachines followed (the rock lobba misfired all three turns and always just couldn't fire that turn). 

   Bad dice rolls aside I would like to look at the complete randomness that is the new edition of fantasy.  First: the charge roll, so yeah you could have a dwarf going 15 inches in the charge phase but at the same time you could have knights going 10 (unlikely I know but it could happen), so how do you try and deal with this randomness?  For me I try to line up at least 2 charges at the same spot or relying on the Waaagh! spell to get me there is also not a terrible idea.  Second: the magic phase, the new magic lores are damn near as over powered as the dreaded thirteenth spell (damn you skaven, you gotta get real good after I've sold the army), but at the same time the magic phase can be damn near as bad for you as it is for your opponent.  So is there any real way to avoid the magic phase altogether?  Well you could just not take mages/not cast at all but then you are missing out on the joys that your opponent will surely be raining down on you.  Third: dear to my heart this one is, because I roll poorly on it every damn time, animosity, yeah its an Orcs only thing but dammit I play Orcs.  Also I managed to roll one's on all four of my animosity checks on turn 3 today. 

   All of today's disappointments did give way to the greatest idea I have ever heard, so one of my favorite models in fantasy currently is the Orc boar boys.  Beautiful model everything about it screams "play with me, I am full of the awesome," much to my chagrin they in fact are not full of the awesome and downright suck.  So this is a simple plan in how to use many of them and at least have them be decent, drum roll please, Bretonnian Orc's.  Yes that's right I am going to take rules from another of the bottom tier army books and create a completely converted (maybe) army that I will love forever (probably not).  Eh, why not sounds fun.