Re-recruiting a leader

My possessed just took out my friend's Thane (in his dwarf warband).

Can leaders like this never be recruited again? That is, you can never (with the exception of undead) purchase another hero, and that all must be promtions from "Lad's got talent?"

He's wondering if he could ever buy another Thane. I, too, would like to know if I could ever buy a second Possessed, etc.

Thanks!

This is covered in the rules under Death of a Leader. For the Dwarfs the answer is no. I'm not sure which warband you are playing since a Possessed warband allows 2 Possessed heroes. There are special rules for Vampires as well (undead can hire a new leader) and the 2005 rules review covers warbands with leaders that are spellcasters or clerics .

Naturally if you both want to re-hire a leader the answer is make a house rule. This seems common.

Though I never understood what that reason were. In Coreheim you can re-recruit such leaders, provided that they become your leader again, even if other warriros have gained a high Ld-characteristic since then.

So why is the rule there? What purpose does it serve?

Just re-read the first post. With the exception of a Leader which you must start the game with, any hero may be recruited at any time as long as you have less than 6 heroes and do not exceed the number of slots (2 youngbloods or 2 Possessed) available.

The Death of a Leader rule reflects that the Mordheim system is a campaign system and thus is not always intended to be balanced or fair. Losing your leader is a disadvantage to be overcome. That said a search will of Rules and Gameplay will turn up threads about what a crapy choice the Leader slot is for most warbands. These threads celebrate firing/death of a leader to make way for more talented individuals. Go figure.

We have long had a house rule where all warbands function like the undead: you have to play one game without your captain (thane, big boss, whatever), but then you can recruit another.

mweaver wrote:

We have long had a house rule where all warbands function like the undead: you have to play one game without your captain (thane, big boss, whatever), but then you can recruit another.

Good hosuerule that we used at first, but then we begun playing story campaigns and thought the perma-death of leaders were quite great elements in epic storylines and went with the official rules thereafter

Von Kurst is right - it's only the Leader you can't replace, other Heroes are available for re-hire. I always assumed it was because the warband would not accept a new leader coming on from outside -they would only accept one of their own taking over the role.

I've had whole story-threads develope from a Leader's death! For example...

When Mung-Qi was killed and turned into a Zombie by a Vampire warband (who leader of the cathayan pirate Orcs, the Gloomwyrms, in our Bell, Book and Candle Campaign) the Shaman Tricky-Tarka took over leadership but I painted a normal Orc Henchman in his distinctive facepaint and clothing and called him Yung-Qi. The other Orcs thought Yung-Qi was Mung-Qi re-incarnated and when he got LGT I swapped back to the Mung-Qi model, but he didn't get to be leader again as the Shaman's scheming kept him in charge!

Thanks a lot.

Regarding the possessed (and other heroes, for that matter), assuming all of your "hero slots" aren't full, you can buy said hero at the baseline price, but I was wondering about the actual leaders, and it seems like everyone handles this different.

I suppose we'll work on our own house rules, but for last night we used "perma-death."

Thanks!

I think it really depends on the style of campaign you and your friends enjoy the most. For a let-the-chips (err, bodies)-fall-where-they-may approach, then the official rule is spot on: you lost your hero? Gee, too bad, Septenarius (I'm skragging one of your champions, next!). If you want a campaign where no one is likely to be too hosed from the start, house rules can help a warband survive unlucky post-game serious injury rolls. In several of our more competitive/cut-throat campaigns, we have gone with every warband having one "Get Out of Death Free" card - you play it to keep a hero or henchman who has just died, according to the serious injury chart, alive. But it is a one-time only deal for each warband. We like this rule because it helps keep a warband from losing too many critical members in the first game or two. If a warband is trashed in the first game or so of a campaign that is going to last a long time, that is not a good thing for the overall health of the campaign.

In our campaigns we have a suite of houserules for the different warbands. Some examples:

Mercenaries and Orcs will promote the hero with the next highest Ld/Str into *being* the leader and he becomes whatever class the leader was and gains all their abilites.

Skaven and Sisters play a game without the leader and then hire a new one that then becomes the official leader again.

Undead follow their normal rules.

Possessed follow the now current rules, but at the time were house rules. We add that the leader gains Academic if they didn't already have it.

All the warbands follow something similar to one of those three options, but sometimes with tweaks here and there. For example, humans leader comes from the next highest LD; if a tie then XP, then STR whereas Orcs go to STR, then T LD then XP. In the wizard warband the leader goes to the person with the highest number of academic skills etc.

An interesting solution, O.

We have a house rule that you can repurchase that slot. But they won't auto become the leader, unless your warband list says otherwise.

So let's say I am playing Reiklanders and my Capitain dies then one of my heroes one with the highest Leadership takes over, and gaines the leadership skill, most likely it will be a Champion. Then I could purchase a new Capitain, but he won't take over, unless the Champion dies, and the New Capitain has the highest leadership or at least is tied for the highest.

Now Undead, and some of the Unoffical Warbands have alternate rules, like the Vampire takes back over, or Dark Elves the High Born has to lead.

I always thought that different races should treat it differently. I think that you would look at what the race values in leadership, then go from there. Some warbands would base it on Birth right, Toughest or Smartest, best actual leader, guy with money, Magical apitude. Figure out what the race would use then go from there.

These are all really great solutions and examples — great to see the house rules used by so many people.

We'll review them and find out what we'd like to do in our games. Thanks again.

I like your idea too, Rudeboy. Like Ordo Septenarius said, it is fun to see the interesting different approaches people take to tweaking some of the rules.