Balance of BtB Black Dwarfs

Hm, while the public venue thing is true, shoudn't it be possible to find another place or a solution to avoid cheesy rules-lawyers? I know that I certainly would not play against someone whom I hate for being such an a**, as this would not be enjoyable at all, and that's what the games is about, isn't it? Let alone playing a whole campaign with such an individual!

Some people get entertainment out of mordheim differently than others. I enjoy filling a theme and having exotic heroes, even though they may not be efficient. Others enjoy stomping everything in their path with perfectly crafted heroes and lucky advancements.

Anyone who refuses to play another gamer because of the way they play IMO isn't playing in the spirit of the game. It's not about winning, it's about having fun. And even though I may go 1 win 8 losses, I'm betting 7/9 of those games were tons of fun.

Back to topic: I just did a once over on the dwarves and I don't really see a power gamer issue there. Now I've never seen them used but I look for things that can get quickly out of hand (Carnival of chaos brutes for example). The man catchers are 25 gc for a double handed weapon that is strength as user. Its a way to get more money, unreliable at that. If I were a power gamer I wouldn't bother with it (maybe one guy). The informers cost only 15, which may be on the shy side. I could see 'em costing 20 or 25, but this is hardly game breaking. I'm sure the designers had a reason for it. Chaos dwarf Lad's got talent is not out of whack, as the henchmen are comparable to swordsmen. The spell list seems to have its usual range of quality from total crap (Earthquake) to really good (Spirit of Hashut).

You have to remember that the M3 can be a real pain. They should never get the charge they want, and should always be charged. The opposing player can control the board pretty easily with that kind of speed. Their ranged is subpar (Handguns for dwarves, bow/sling for informant, not top notch quality here). Since they are slightly more expensive and significantly tougher than average, eliminating their strength is the path to easy victory. Just charge 2 on 1 (You dictate the charge if you're playing right). If they are always charged by 2 models you can nullify their serius injury roll modifiers. If they play 2-3 players who feed then you're in trouble because they'll probably be across the board resiliant ASAP. That toughness 5 will make things pretty boring if achieved too early.

rain9441 wrote:

Anyone who refuses to play another gamer because of the way they play IMO isn't playing in the spirit of the game. It's not about winning, it's about having fun. And even though I may go 1 win 8 losses, I'm betting 7/9 of those games were tons of fun.

Actually, I did not mean that I'd refuse to play in case I know there's a high risk of losing (that would be stupid etc. indeed), but a "rules abusive" player who does not really contribute to the fun of the game. The statement rests on following quote:

smoore wrote:

...not after an abusive player has ruined the campaign for other people. I have a rules abusive player with over 10 years experience at mordheim and he has already expressed intrest in this warband.

Well, anyway, it's personal preference.

Von Kurst described that player exactly. He has in the past been a successful pro magic player, exploiting rules is a hobby. He isnt doing anything the rest of
us cant do. He just comes up with it first and has the uncanny ability to make it work.

Its not a public venue, he is a long term friend kicking him is not an
option and wont be. There are close friends of mine I refuse to play games
with, we just dont click together at all in games, yelling matches are
common. He isnt one of those people.

Werekin too had two pro magic players (#1 in the UK or something) in his group (not sure they were playing the Chaos Dwarfs themselves though). Don't know if this counts for anything really...

As has been stated now numerous times, from sitting back and reading the rules, many others don't have the impression that there is a way to abuse the warband list. If you still don't want to allow it, then that's fine. But if you do allow it, then please let us know if you actually encounter a situation where the Chaos Dwarf player achieves to accomplish an abusive power loop or something. It is in the interest of everyone to tell about these things so they can be fixed. Of course something can always slip our attention, but usually you can't tell this from mere looking at the rules. And if you arrive at a point where the Chaos Dwarfs engine is too strong, you can simply override its effect by house ruling the benefits differently (lets gc and XP earned). Since the gamer in question even announced his plan you can easily agree on house ruling it slightly if he achieves it. If your gamer is interested in playing a certain warband I wouldn't deny him. And personally, I am very very curious if he actually achieves to break the warband after announcing it.

Eliazar, Cianty & Horatius pretty much covered everything.

By 'boldly' prompting original poster Shawn to lay all of his cards on the table, well, let's just say he was good enough to give enough of a broader explanation which has allowed the root of his topic to be explored.

I wouldn't take anything said here personally guys. On a similar note, my intention is never to insult anybody on the forum! When the inevitable werewolf comes out in my writing from time to time, rest assured that the bark never leads to any biting. Look at Cianty, he is still in one piece.

Another time I may impart some experience of the Black Dwarfs. There were two such warbands which fought in my last campaign! My dinner smells like it's burning so it'll have to wait for another time to regale BTB lovers.

We do good work here folks. Keep it up and stay focused on the prize. The four fabled artefacts of Chaos can and will improve your warband leader's quality of living.

On a parting note, where as the Mordheim supplement & rules are more of less fixed, Border Town Burning is more similar to the Blood Bowl rules. We have been running something of a Living Rulebook policy. Rather than changing the download version though, we are collating suggestions, improvements & feedback until such a time that we can justify relaunching the book as an 'enhanced' download. You might have noticed the competition we are running. This is a great chance for everyone to generate something which the original developers missed! There's no guarantee that everything that appears on the web site will end up in the campaign book of course, but we'll always consider expanding to accomodate for brilliant ideas, whenever then fit.

Regards,

Werekin.

B-)

[quote="werekin"]By 'boldly' prompting original poster Shawn to lay all of his cards on the table, well, let's just say he was good enough to give enough of a broader explanation which has allowed the root of his topic to be explored.[/quote]

I love how I'm at fault here for not pointing out my own abusive player at the start, whom by the way reads these forums (only as a lurker right now I think, I have another player that is posting). Could that be so I didnt have to deal with one of my best friends after I told the world he's a rules abusive schmuck? While concern about him using this warband is involved and directly led to me reading the BDs closely on the day that I posted I would have read it eventually and come to the same conclusions. I am deciding which warbands to use for a new campaign. It starts friday after next (see http://teuse.net/games/mordheim if you are interested in seeing what we are doing). The root of the topic should be whether or not the rules can be abused as they are written by whom and when isnt relevent.

I really liked Horatius's reading that the OOA warriors dont enter the engine until after the battle is finshed, and that the BDs do not get the equipment from those fed to it. I think both of those should be more clear in the rules if thats the way they are ment to be played. I understand that it might be hard to pull this off, really expensive to start with and most players cant would never be able to accomplish it. I'd love to see a mechanism where the capturing dwarf has to walk the captured warrior back to the engine (like many of the chest carry scenarios) or that the mancatcher can only be used on one warrior per game unless some other action is done, like spending a turn to bind the capturee and leaving him on the ground, much more easily rescued.

I think the ideas presented help eliviate some of the problems I am worried about. However my greatest concern in the rules is the 100% removal from the enemy warbands roster. One of the things this friend has taught me is that to win a game you look for the small rules that allow you to fundamentally change how the game works. In magic you look for rules that let you draw your whole hand at once, or deny the other player a turn. I think this is one of those types of rules. Explicitly pointing out that rule to everyone at the start and how it might effect the game is a great idea too. Another option would be to only feed the warrior to the engine only on a serious injury roll that would remove them from the game anyway, more like the Possessed capture rule but happening on an 11-15 also.

I'd love to test these and find out im wrong. I'm trying to get the player in question to run a secondary campaign where we can use just about anything out there fair or not just for this reason. And if we every do test them be sure I will have extensive notes on everything that goes on.

My understanding is nobody is at fault.

Regarding equipment Shawn, I believe the existing rules are clear on who can use what. You just have to know where to look to find what. There is a lot of information scattered across a number of fantastic publications.

All of the issues highlighted above are all but a handful of the many subjects which were mulled over in our own development of this warband.

Both the (joint-)winner of my Nemesis Crown campaign and the most tactically minded tabletop gamer I could sign-up for the Border Town Burning campaign elected to play with the Chaos Dwarfs. This made things quite interesting! The warband list evolved from the start to the finish of our epic campaign which I organised. Both players developed their warbands in their own style and theme. They were quite different!

As one campaign organiser to another, I would recommend being more attuned to monitoring when players fiddle (come on, everybody is tempted if not guilty of it!!) their characteristics & earnings, rather than abuse of the game rules.

I always find that the less time I spend concentrating on (winning) my own battles, the more support I can lend to the other campaigners and thus improving everyones campaign experience. By this, I mean that most players don't absorb the scenarios until they play them or read hand-outs & campaign rules in advance, so providing lots of ad-hoc assistance is vital to campaign success.

Good luck with your campaign Shawn!

Regards,

Werekin.

Quote :

werekin:I wouldn't take anything said here personally guys. On a similar note, my intention is never to insult anybody on the forum! When the inevitable werewolf comes out in my writing from time to time, rest assured that the bark never leads to any biting.

doesn't sound like you're taking much responsibility for your unbecomming behaviour, now does it?

Quote :

My understanding is nobody is at fault.

exactly the thing people say when they know they've been over the line

I am solving the fiddling issue. I spent a lot of time modifing a spreadsheet I found online to do all bookeeping with. Ill be keeping all the offical warband rosters, what exploration rolls, equipment bought sold etc during the game. It slows down the between game a little but we have already had a successful 5 campaign turn 4 battle run with the system in a few hours. The current spreadsheet is at Mordheim Warband Roster [http://teuse.net/games/mordheim/Mordheim_Roster_Sheet_latest.xls] It changes often and I'm sure there are lots of errors in it, mostly typos and items left out that sort of thing.

Regarding the topics at hand here, do any of you know the population of sheep in new zealand? Nope? well then that proves my point on the difference of opinions and claims that each other are being naughty or not taking responsability for their actions.

Once you all know that then you will be men... until then i'll newspaper the lot of you for being bad

*twack* *zap* pow* etc.


Ha, now lets see you lot make non nice posts after that

...or maybe Asp & Stu could have a meet up in a nice cozy alley for a Duel to the Death. A Battle Report with photos would be appreciated.

Every campaign includes players who are on the fiddle. If it's nothing horrendous then it's easy to turn a blind-eye of give suspects benefit of the doubt.

I'm some kind of traditionalist who encourages players to run their own admin on hard copy rosters. The latest 'forms' are excellent with possible exception to the lack of space to record Hired Swords on top of Henchmen in the warband. Most players find hirelings too great a drain on their income to maintain more than (or even just) one on any permanant basis in a long campaign, so it's horses for courses.

One solution is to run a systematic check on random players rosters. I do this on a weekly basis (like deck checks at CCG tournaments!) and although no penalties are received aside from correcting the game state, no-one wants to be caught with their pants down so the group behaves! Getting busted is enough of an incentive to promote honest campaigning.

Back to the original thread, okay wants a fight!? Come on I can take the lot of ya.

What I meant to say, is that the Black Dwarfs really come into their own in an Objective based Border Town Burning campaign.

Possession of an Engine of Chaos can allow a player who is also winning a respectable amount of battles to accrue his first 20x or so Campaign Points more quickly than other players, if he is also gathering a good number captives. Success in this allows the player to score his 2nd, 3rd & 4th Achievements first, thereby giving him a jump start on the other players.

In a typical Mordheim campaign, this strategical benefit is totally useless.

The list of narrative gaming considerations goes on. Part of the fun is finding all the subtle nuances that have been woven. The discovery is a big part of the fun of any narrative campaign. Like any good GM, a good campaign organiser should read material advance, to help be prepared when there is any funny business in his campaign, so well done for brushing up on content Shawn.

I don't hate Excel spreadsheets so much, although I should. Well, I use them a lot in my day job (finance/insurance).

There is a self-initiated spreadsheet on my laptop desktop containing much information concerning various published equipment, weapons, poison, artefacts, animals etc. Brilliant for player reference, although it's still far from complete (sorry!) at this time. Anyone care to finish it? LoL. Data entry sucks.

Regards,

Stuart.