Wagon fight

How to counter wagons? A wagon full of crossbowmen can be a good thing but how can be countered as hitting with ranged attacks is randomized and melee attacks need a natural 6 to hit.r question: how to counter wagons? A wagon full of crossbowmen can be a good thing but how can be countered as hitting with ranged attacks is randomized and melee attacks need a natural 6 to hit.

I saw this on facebook, but avoided it because facebook discussions are typically not very informative.  And, well, its wagons which I find to be easily abused because no one really wants to read the rules and even if you do read them important things are hidden away in tables or at the end of long paragraphs that seem to be about something else.

The easiest counter to a wagon is to enforce the rules as written because the wagon is written as a death trap.  If your group is not doing this, then you are pretty much stuck with what you have until you get tired of the abuse and agree to use no wagons.  If your group does do this you will soon see NO wagons because they are rolling death traps.

For example on facebook you mentioned that the wagon is not moving just sitting there shooting.  If you read the entire wagon rules you will notice that it doesn't matter if its moving or not for many of the negative results.

Also in melee the crew are the ones you need 6s to hit, if you apply the rules as written.  The draft animals are just standing there.  So charge a horse because you don't need to wound the horse to cause an out of control roll, just hit it.  Or send a guy with a big axe to attack the wheels which will be hit automatically.  Bad things happen to a wagon with a damaged wheel, moving or not.  

Loss of control happens to a wagon whose draft animals are hit (not wounded, hit). So shoot at the wagon a lot.

Or run up and try taking control of a horse, that will be a surprise!  This tactic requires good initiative and leadership (elves are really good at this... naturally.)

Finally if its just sitting there, don't be where it can shoot you...  Force it to move.

My problem is that in our group I have a Merchant caravan warband and I fought two battles with skavens (two different players). I conscientiously read all the rules and any forum post before making the warband/playing. I also represented my roster sheet to the others, gave links to this site and other sources. I known what they will be capable and what are the risk. Honestly. First player almost beat me but the lucky merchants was saved by the skaven morale. Other player wasn't that lucky.
After the game (and another with his possessed) he said we need to houserule the wagons as it can not be beaten with any tactic. I like playing fair that's why I give any info and source to help understanding the wagon rules (which I really like although it is a huge risk) but really do not want to represent any tactic by myself to how to beat my warband.

Well, now after Von Kurst's post, if you link this thread to your player group again, there should be no more arguments

We are going through our first brush with the Merchant Caravan (which I don't expect to end well for the Merchants...)

I can empathize with your dilemma (as I was the first in our group to use a wagon for a Halfling warband a few years ago...)  During the campaign the halfings in the wagon did really well because mostly the other warbands ignored it.  None of them read the rules for it, few of them shot at it (but when they did, they would hit halflings, really, I might as well have just let them target the halflings because they always hit them, which always went poorly for halflings...)

Things really went down hill when the vampire started picking on the wagon though.  That first round of hitting on 6s doesn't matter much in a fight between halflings and vampires...

Also how do warriors in the wagon shoot at their own horses when a dreg decides to ride one?

Skaven against wagon (or Possessed against wagon) ought to be a horrible match for you.  The Possessed should be able to last a turn of hitting on 6s as should skaven for that matter.  And they have enough attacks to HIT on a six of two, which is usually not what a human archer wants.

All that said I am much in favor of house rules for wagons, because the current rules are confusing, contradictory and just plain off putting.  The wagon is T8 which means it has the toughness of a house or a warship in Warhammer terms which is just nuts... Even if it is a death trap.

We have done some touch-up house ruling on wagons.
Yes T8 is just nonsensical: a Troll or something (a S5 monster) should be able to pretty much wound it without difficulty. We set it at T6 and the wheel at T5 (so models with double-handed weapons can take good whacks at it).
For Treasure Carts we set it at T5 (and wheel T5), which then makes a good correspondence to WH Fantasy chariot stats.

And yes, the damned thing is a death trap especially if it starts running into obstacles. We lowered the D3 hits on the vehicle from collisions to S5. We also changed the 'Driver' skill to allow you to re-roll any one roll from the Out of Control table, even one of the sub-rolls (or secondary rolls).

Because of the risk of losing it, and the struggle to understand how the hell can a simple farmer's wagon cost so much damned money, we lowered the price to 70gc (draft animals sold separately). Cart we did it at 35gc cost and needing only 1 draft animal, so its cheap for people to buy and experiment with vehicle rules if they wish.

The thing is, if you have limited (or no) shooting weapons and you are up against a vehicle loaded with crossbowmen, then you really will have to try a mad dash towards it and poke the draft animals and hope for the best. Otherwise they will be very tricky to deal with. On the other hand, scenario diversity, especially to secure objectives out of deployment zones, can force a wagon out of its shooting bunker position at the back. And in scenarios where you have to secure lots of stuff around the table, stationary troops on a big clunky wagon can be a liability.

I wonder how much it would help if the rules were simply laid out a bit better, and summarized? They are too scattered and have too many sub-rules to afford to not do that :/

Been lurking too long but had to ask. How would you handle shooting a blunderbuss at a wagon? I hilariously could see an argument for hitting whatever horses, wheels, wagon, driver, or passengers the blunderbuss crosses. Can also see argument for hit wagon once and randomize where it gets hit.

Blunderbuss hit all valid target in its range. Do not think it needed to randomize targets. Maybe give a -1 strength to representthe chassis protection.

Welcome to the forum Jhoniten.  

Blunderbuss: +1 to hits whatever the template crosses.  Blunderbusses are great for shooting at vehicles in general (boats or wagons).

I never asked Athanatosz, what setting are you playing in?  Mordheim or Empire in Flames?  When I ran the hobbit wagon train, it was Empire in Flames.  We are campaigning in Mordheim at the moment.  My tables are not very wagon friendly.

@Nuno-- thanks for listing your house rules.

Well we play from a lot of settings. Player with lower rarting choose a roll table then roll for the map. Mordheim rulebook, blazing saddles, Eif, Btb, annual 2002, and 2 other maps made by myself.

yeah again +1 to Template Weapons hitting everything under the template. we ran into this last game with a mortar and a cart full of powder kegs. it wasnt pretty!

@Nunos cart rules definitely help!

there also needs to be more detail with the number of animals/what type of animal is pulling the cart.
a rhinox towing the wagon creates all sorts of questions. not to mention we let our undead player pull his cart with 4 zombies so he can use the corpse cart model....

Athanatosz wrote:

Well we play from a lot of settings. Player with lower rarting choose a roll table then roll for the map. Mordheim rulebook, blazing saddles, Eif, Btb, annual 2002,  and 2 other maps made by myself.

That's a fairly unique approach

I really Like to launch a campaign but we lack player number (3-4 active now). So we just play against each other and when a new player come some of us start a new warband to play with him in fairplay. (also we improved the underdog bonus +1 treasure for the warband after every +1 exp)

I sympathize with the problem.