BTB - Wheelbarrows and Other Questions

Hi,

My group recently discussed the ins and outs of wheelbarrows in BTB and some questions came up.

1) Can items (e.g. weapons) start the game in the wheelbarrow or must they be dropped into the wheelbarrow once the game begins? I think that they need to be dropped into the wheelbarrow at the start of the game.
2) Can warriors swap weapons and equipment mid-game using a wheelbarrow (e.g. one warrior drop an item into the wheelbarrow and another warrior pick it up)? Our group thought that this would be too hard to keep track off.
3) If a warrior leaves a wheelbarrow containing weapons or equipment and a warrior of another warband gets the wheelbarrow and keeps it until the end of the game then does the enemy warband keep the equipment? We think yes.
4) If a wheelbarrow is left unattended at the end of the game then does the warrior get the wheelbarrow back? We said yes the warrior would get the wheelbarrow back even if that warband loses unless the wheelbarrow was captured and held by an enemy warrior as per 3 above.
5) Can a wheelbarrow carry ladders? We said no as even small ladders would be too big and would fall out. Then we discussed whether the ladder could be strapped to the wheelbarrow but now we are getting into the realm of house rules (e.g. it takes a turn of doing nothing to untie the ladder before it can be removed).

Question 4 above also applies to ladders... if they are bought by a warband and used in a scenario and left behind then does the warband get the ladder back after the game. We said yes they do unless another warband is carrying the ladder at the end of the game. This then raises the question of if there are ladders placed on the map during initial setup and warriors are carrying those ladders at the end of the game then will the warband get to keep those 'free' ladders?


7) Is a powder keg cumbersome? The rules say that it is treated like a chest which is cumbersome except that it can explode.


Now some of these questions culminate with...
8 ) Can a warrior have a wheelbarrow full of blunderbusses and use one before discarding it and picking up another? Please say yes. Please say yes. My Gunnery School of Nuln warband will love you if you do!

Thanks!

The idea for the wheelbarrow was to interact with (treasure) chests, barrels and maybe ladders. Of course it could be taken and I always love to see people come up with ideas.

1. I am against strict rules when they don't make sense. Sure, start the game with stuff in them. Why not? Just because the rules don't allow it specifically? That would be lame. The only reason to forbid actions is when they are either unlogical or result in unbalances/unfairness. Neither is the case here I think.

2. Swapping weapons during the game is forbidden by the normal rules. The idea of the wheelbarrow is not to be a sublte way of circumventing the normal rules. So sadly I have to say "no" to this one. I don't say I like the fact that swapping is disallowed but the wheelbarrow definately doesn't affect it. If you generally house rule allowing weapon swapping then you can also do it with the wheelbarrow, of course.

3. Absolutely!

4. Erm.. no. If the wheelbarrow is abandoned (compare the wagon rules in the FAQ) why should one warband automatically get the wheelbarrow and another not so? Shouldn't chances to reclaim the barrow be equally high for both warbands? Of course, you could start calculating factors such as how many people know about the wheelbarrow, which models last saw it where, etc... For ease of gameplay, an abandoned wagon is lost and the winning warband should retrieve it.

5. I remember having this mind a long time ago, but I see it being complicated. It is probably best to say "no" although I could easily see the wheelbarrow carrying small ladders (when they are balanced properly, why not? I've done that in real life before).

6. This is somewhat difficult. We've had players who wanted to keep the powder kegs in the Horros of the Underground scenario so we had to explicitly forbid that. Similarly, players should probably not start taking the game board with them - this is not a Graphic Adventure game. Unless your group likes this. So I would say that warbands can only take those ladders with them that they (or another warband) purchased. Other ladders which were deployed as part of the scenario set-up are old, rotten, and though might do the job for the game they are far from trustworthy and not worth taking up (but should still be allowed to re-locate on the board).
Abandoned ladders should be treated similarly to wheelbarrows and wagons.

7. Yes, chest are cumbersome too.

8. This is so spectacularly cool, how could anyone say no to this? I love it!
Turn 1:
- Fire blunderbuss.
Turn 2:
- Shooting phase: Discard blunderbuss in wheelbarrow (if you are in contact with the wheelbarrow).
- Close combat phase: Pick up new blunderbuss from wheelbarrow (if you are still in contact with the wheelbarrow).
Turn 3:
- Fire new blunderbuss.

I don't think this is unfair. Blunderbusses aren't cheap and there is still a chance of losing the model who controls the wheelbarrow and seeing an enemy run away with it, or even use it.

I love the Idea of wheelbarrows being useful tools. I think using them to move heavy and awkward items is what they are made in real life and having them in game do the same thing not only makes sense, but it adds some realism.

I thought about reworking the Lure of Fortune Objective for Skaven they would be collecting Wyrdstone, and trying to bring it home. I was thinking that they could use wheelbarrows as well as carts or wagons. There is something about Skaven running around with wheelbarrows that I find funny, and cool.

Yeah, I like the Skaven Fortune objective idea. It definately makes sense. Thinking about it now I do wonder why we hadn't thought of that before as it is a very good and sensible twist to the Lure of Fortune objective.

Thanks Cianty.

I'll have to look back at the rules for abandoned wagons as you mentioned to refresh my memory.

Sorry to double post... can ladders be given to henchmen? Generally the rules are that henchmen cannot get equipment unless stated otherwise but ladders (and also wheelbarrows for that matter) feel taht they shouldn't just be excluded to heroes.

*takes note*

The rules for wheelbarrows already include Henchmen but not the ladders. I will fix this.

Where might I find these wheelbarrow rules?

Welcome to the wonderous world of the BTB supplement.
http://bordertownburning.de.vu/

so the wheelbarrow can be loaded with a ton of items and any model pushing it can swap between those items with ease. This means I could exceed the normal "no more then 2" rule?

Also the way it sounds I can charge away from the wheelbarrow and another model could walk up and start pushing it and gain accsess to the items in it?

Pervavita wrote:

so the wheelbarrow can be loaded with a ton of items and any model pushing it can swap between those items with ease.

Actually I stated the exact opposite above. The wheelbarrow is not for circumventing rules what you carry as a maximum or how you can swap weapons in combat. It's for transporting stuff. Picking up items, unloading, whatever... all these actions are not sped up by a wheelbarrow (and why should they?).

#8 above with the blunderbuss is where I got that. it's why I'm asking about it as it gave me the impresion that you could even though I got the impresion you could not from #2.
hence my question.

The idea for the wheelbarrow is to let models transport items. How you can use these items doesn't differ from a situation where you would e.g. place a treasure chest on the board with weapons and have the models use these. I'd say the wheelbarrow (while used) is a piece of miscelleanous equipment assigned to (owned by) the respective model while all itemes on/in the wheelbarrow are items not belonging to any specific model/belonging to the scenery (like a chest lying around "belongs" to the scenery). Moving your wheelbarrow affects these "external" items on the whealbarrow.

Effectively you can of course have you model switch between halbards, spears, two-handed weapons (using the normal rules + exchanging personal items between the model and the wheelbarrow) but I don't even think that is that useful. Except for the blunderbuss trick mentioned above. The main idea for the wheelbarrow was to allow transportation of chests (which occour in various scenarions) without having to use two models. Feel free to introduce house rules to make them more useful if you like. I think it'd be cool to have a number of models across warbands using wheelbarrows for all kinds of situations like transporting weapons, treasure chests or whatever players come up with (friendly warriors with double leg amputations!!).

Why would skaven need use of a wheelbarrow!? I have not encountered a wyrdstone artefact (or chunk of cheese!) so cumbersome as to require transport by 'barrow! Hmm perhaps if the 'Tainted Items' guidelines (from Corrupted Characters) are being applyed to all artefacts & treasures encountered then wheelbarrows could offer additional benefits... Maybe even help a Witch Hunter to avoid gaining an unwanted random mutation!

I'm not so sure it's a great idea to encourage a player to fire more than the requisite quantity of shots from a blunderbuss. *scratches beard*

I am pretty surprised that none of the players (Strigany River Pirates especially) in my current campaign have cottoned on to pushing wheelbarrows around the Marienburg docks! Not only moving chests, but barrels, coffins and cadavers. Multiple revenue streams are available in the City of Islands and Bridges. Not every necromancer can afford the luxury of a corpse cart!

ok so you were more meaning with #8 as a house rule/cool idea but not the intent.
that makes sense and makes the wheelbarrow make sense.