WL System Discussion (Split from Karkarions)

[wildger]

The kickstarter project unfortunately was too successful. This is really bad for all three Reaper games. If there is no news, players will simply move onto the other games.

[psyberwolfe1]

The kickstarter project unfortunately was too successful. This is really bad for all three Reaper games. If there is no news, players will simply move onto the other games.

 

 

I actually sat down with Ed and chatted with him about the Game side of Reaper. They discovered that modeling GW’s constant stream of new material hurt them as a company. The first 2^nd ed book went gang busters which made way for the Savage North book. The theory is creating a product that will be always useable is a better bet than screwing with the game every three months. The thing to remember is that Reaper is a miniatures company first that came up with a decent rule set. Lack of novelty is not what is hurting this game.

[joshuaslater]

I'm still just scratching the surface with Warlord. I've got many more armies to buy and paint!! I'm not fond of the idea of a Karkarion faction, but others might dig it.

 

I don't think Reaper needs to jump the shark.

[wildger]

I actually sat down with Ed and chatted with him about the Game side of Reaper. They discovered that modeling GW’s constant stream of new material hurt them as a company. The first 2^nd ed book went gang busters which made way for the Savage North book. The theory is creating a product that will be always useable is a better bet than screwing with the game every three months. The thing to remember is that Reaper is a miniatures company first that came up with a decent rule set. Lack of novelty is not what is hurting this game.

 

I am thinking about scenarios, battle report, development of stories and hopefully and eventually a campaign system. I don't consider it as "screwing" the game since there is no rule change. You simply cannot expect fans to do all these works. Eventually, they get burnt out.

[nytflyr]

this is probably my only gripe about warlord, as it is not a generic system so you cant just build your own factions, it always has to be a proxy of some other (legal) army

[psyberwolfe1]

I am thinking about scenarios, battle report, development of stories and hopefully and eventually a campaign system. I don't consider it as "screwing" the game since there is no rule change. You simply cannot expect fans to do all these works. Eventually, they get burnt out.

 

I'll deal with each of your points. Scenarios and campaign system are about the same. Reaper doesn't have a dedicated "game department." That was a job Gus took for a few years and now he's busy with the store. Second most scenarios are some twist on the basic "Pitched Battle." If I'm at a loss for scenario I'll dig out one of my other games and adapt the scenario. Pretty easy. Third Campaign/scenario books are the least successful product in the gaming industry. These books just cling to shelves and never move. These are books that require you to have other books to use and so only fans buy them. Also not all fans buy them because if they add no new value, i.e. I can do it myself, then there is no incentive to buy and, by extension, to make.

 

As for story writing, Reaper is a miniatures company; not a publishing house. The one Warlord Novel was written by a freelance writer, and the Warlord Fluff was written in the same way. So stories will always start life as fanfic.

 

Battle Reports are better left in the hands of the fans. GW only produces 12 a year; and Privateer 6 while a casual Google search will produces thousands of hits. At Bell of Lost Souls we have battle reports down to a science, and will knock two or three out in a week at times. The keys to a good BatRep are painted figures, nice terrain, good descriptions of the action, and a steady film hand. This would go a long way to helping Warlord, but Reaper doesn’t have the capacity to do this in a meaningful game-effecting manner.

 

None of this is hurting Warlord. The big problem is Warlord isn’t particularly evocative. Warhammer Fantasy Battles has beautiful distinctive figures and amazing fluff. War Machine is the same. Warlord is very average with plain backgrounds and generic looking figures. I love Reaper figures, but other than Werner Klocke’s style, Warlord doesn’t have a distinctive look or feel. The background/fluff is neat but it is, at the core, generic fantasy.

 

The “generic-ness” of the game is its biggest problem. Then we have simple rules that are just complex enough that at first pass look daunting. Don’t believe me? Remember the first time you looked at a Warlord stat card/block and then tell me it wasn’t daunting. In fact it takes two full pages of text to describe it and how it works versus Warhammer’s half page. Then all of the special abilities and powers with the spells make the game difficult to commit to memory. Then there are certain things in the game that are over powered in an un-fun way. Domination, Darkspawn Gate, and Teleport are a few of many.

 

Don’t get me wrong Warlord is a fun and interesting game, but it is competing against better made games. (e.g. GW has lots of production value and is pretty; Privateer is the most solid set of rules in the industry.)

[OMGoblins]

I'll put my 2¢ in.

 

I am a new customer of Reaper, before the Kickstarter I never bought an unpainted miniature from any company and I must confess I didn't even know about Reaper. I don't frequent any flgs anymore and none of my friends who play pathfinder use any metal miniatures. I myself have some interest in rpg's like Pathfinder, but I do not and haven't played them. For me the real joy has been wargaming. I certainly had RPG use in mind when I bought into the KS, but what really excited me was the prospect of using them for wargaming, for Warlord.

 

My interest all started around 5-6 years ago with the Dungeons & Dragons Miniatures game. I'm only 22 so I was a teenager at the time, I'm not even sure how I got into it at first, but I loved playing. Personally I didn't really prefer the booster format, but it was great for booster tournaments, I had a blast going to tournaments and games at my flgs. I wasn't familiar with painting miniatures and didn't really have the time or money to get into that. The PPM aspect of the game was great, I of course knew vaguely about 40k and knew there were "other" games, but the cost of the miniatures, the painting aspect, the terrain/different movement type and the "complex" rules all kept me away from getting into anything else. When DDM went under I was basically SOL on a hobby I really really enjoyed.

 

Now, it's pretty clear to me that Reaper has a good thing that could be great in Warlord, but that it is, seemingly, very low on their priority list. Now that is just from what I see in my opinion and I can think of a number of explanations for that, all speculation on my part. As a new customer to Reaper stemming from the KS I just see a ton of opportunity to make Warlord huge. I sincerely hope it will see some love and care and attention in the coming months as things perhaps slow down.with the Bones KS. I think Warlord got a big boost with the release of a number of models in the Bones format and I think that could really be "thing" that sets it apart from GW/Privateer. If you are talking say $50-$150 to get anything from a small to very large Warlord army whereas you could spend at *least* double on those other games, it would really widen the customer and more importantly player base. Yes Warlord is "generic" but that just helps widen the appeal of the miniatures giving them more than one use, not to mention the very generous proxy rules. It really seems like Reaper wants Warlord to succeed and I think it just need some attention and not an overhaul, but a face-lift.

 

FYI I just think Warlord could do much better getting out there to the players. Having a fragmented information base between this site and reapergames, not having complete information online, no real new information (I mean the first 3 articles on reapergames are from 7/2011 to 10/2010) and the forums just seem so inactive. None of my flgs have anyone playing Warlord, just 40k Warmachine and Hordes. But I can just see a butt-ton of opportunity and promise for this game.

 

Thanks for listening to my rant,

Tracker Dunn

[wildger]

People purchases 40K, for example, mainly because the game is so popular that you can find someone to play with anywhere, not simply because the models are nice. The old figures from 2nd edition is not better than any Reaper models at present. On the other hand, Reaper makes some very interesting figures that no other company cares to produce. If "generic-ness" is a problem, then it is time for Reaper to improve the quality of the scultpure. Afterall, it is a miniature company, isn't it?

 

Warlord rules may be daunting but this is no comparison to Malifaux, Heavy Gear Blitz, etc. It is like elementary school level comparing to high school education. I am extremely surprised that psyberwolfe has no problem with the tremendous amount of spells, magic items and upgrades for WHFB but has issues with the number of special abilities instead. When a simple game like Song of Blades and Heros, using only generic figures, is able to gain much more world wide popularity than Warlord, there is a problem.

 

This fundamental problem lies entirely with Reaper. Warlord has some die hard fans that cannot be matched in other games. I learned that the 2nd edition was mostly driven by fans. You had Mark who produced 87 episodes of Reaper Minis TV on you tube. Fans wrote a campaign. Tactic guides are supposed to be written for each army. At one time, there was even a kickstarter project for a computer game for Warlord. What has Reaper done to help to make the game more popular? Correct me if I am wrong but that was close to nothing.

 

For years since I joined the forum, Reaper has emphasized that it is a miniature company. It has very limited resource for games. Yet, against advices, it produced CAV1 which failed eventually, tried again with CAV2 and fell flat on the face. There was then even a talk about making CAV3 at one time. The fact is that you cannot expect "generic" robots to sell well without a rich story background and a set of popular rules. I'll be very surprised if Reaper can make money selling CAV models these days. You do not see the same with fantasy figures mainly because there are many role-playing games that need these figures. Yet, Reaper does not seem to learn from their repeated mistakes. It lauched the ill-fated Reich of the Dead. The game never takes off ground. A complete waste of time and effort from a company that already has very limited resources.

 

I choose not to mention the other popular game, Warmachine, at this time. It has a very different theme. However, I like to remind the management team, especailly psyberwolfe, that Privateer Press started off as a very small company with only a handful of staff. Their success again does not simply rely on the miniatures alone.

 

The cheaper "bone" and "generic' models will not last long despite the success of the Kickstarter campaign. Far more miniature painters decide not to take the opportunity because they simply do not like the cheaper bone resin and generic looking models. Warlord is not a perfect game. It has its weakness. However, putting some effort into it to gain more poplularity will in turn keep the sale of your fantasy figure up longer in the future.

[psyberwolfe1]

Wildger I should point out I did win the Warlord Tournament at RCON 12. (Actually tied with the winner of the Saturday Bracket.) I have no problem learning rules and commiting them to memory, but being a playtester and rules junkie I've developed the sense for what keeps players from playing a game. For example d10s are a bad dice type and are a boundrary for game entry. I've got over a dozen people to buy armies for Warlord, and their criticism (and why they won't play with me anymore) is the rules are bad, and the game is not evocative. The generic-ness is my gripe.

 

You will find no bigger fan and critic in me. I love the game, but I will quickly point out the games problems. Reaper's games are and will always be secondary to their main line of business. That is a jagged little pill to swallow but once you do then many problems will go away.

Yes you are right that the Bones KS opened a whole world of opportunity for Warlord. Until Warlord has Starter armies and/or troop starters, this means spit. People are inherently lazy. Giving them some premade options where they can get right into the game and then discover the options later is the best choice. The bones figures are a perfect lowcost way to do this, but it won't be done.

[Shakandara]

I've got over a dozen people to buy armies for Warlord, and their criticism (and why they won't play with me anymore) is the rules are bad

 

I'd be interested to hear more about this perspective.

 

EDIT: But it probably deserves to be in a different thread. This topic has drifted rather far off the OP.

 

Little help from a Mod, maybe?

 

~v

Edited December 14, 2012 by Shakandara

[psyberwolfe1]

You're right that this thread is off topic now. We can pm or open up a real thread, but be prepared for a possible crap storm on a real thread. I'll promise to play nice. The other thing although I understand their gripes there really is no changing their minds so please ask yourself, "Why do you want to know?" Because as a messenger I particularly don't enjoy being shot.

[OMGoblins]

Sorry for the Off-topicness, I would love to start a real thread to talk with people, I think we are all in this thread because this forum seems so inactive. If no one starts one then maybe I will this weekend.

[joshuaslater]

The kickstarter project unfortunately was too successful. This is really bad for all three Reaper games. If there is no news, players will simply move onto the other games.

I disagree.

[MiniCannuck]

Hi all,

 

I was waiting for the thread to be moved before I chimed in.

 

I understand that game choice is a preference but I also think that there are ways of discussing "good" and "bad" games that isn't as subjective.

 

What drew me and my gaming club initially to Warlord was that we liked the models Reaper produced and loved having a system to play with them. We went pretty steady for a couple of months with the game but the enthusiasm eroded pretty quickly. The big issue seemed to be the closed nature to the army lists, the lack of variety of gameplay and the weak world concept.

 

Some people have written that the rules are bad. I don't agree with this position. The rules are fairly simple as long as you have cheat sheets for all the powers. However, it is obvious that an attempt to create balanced characters and lists went into the making of the factions. Personally for my gaming group, the only thing that really held the rules back was the lack of scenarios (which we made up ourselves).

 

I really like the models Reaper makes but do agree that there is nothing thematic about them that makes them all fit into a certain theme. There are a lot of great artists with their own sense of style (some more pronounced than others). Other miniature games have a definite edge since all their models are designed to fit into a certain style. However, where Warlord really lacks is in the story department. Warlord is a very basic and static fantasy world. There is little fluff for interaction between factions and no sense of history to the world. Factions seemed to have been "plopped" onto the map and no care was given to why they are there or how this affects the other factions. There are some sparks of story to be found if you look hard enough but nothing ties the world together.

 

From my observations as a miniature game collector, the game systems that have any form of longevity have to combine a good rules set with thematic models and a story/character/factions that people care about. If Warlord wants to maintain (or even grow) its fanbase, work has to be done to create a world that people want to play in.

 

There's lots in Warlord that can be built on - it's just getting the right people to do it.

[joshuaslater]

Hi all,

 

I was waiting for the thread to be moved before I chimed in.

 

I understand that game choice is a preference but I also think that there are ways of discussing "good" and "bad" games that isn't as subjective.

 

What drew me and my gaming club initially to Warlord was that we liked the models Reaper produced and loved having a system to play with them. We went pretty steady for a couple of months with the game but the enthusiasm eroded pretty quickly. The big issue seemed to be the closed nature to the army lists, the lack of variety of gameplay and the weak world concept.

 

Some people have written that the rules are bad. I don't agree with this position. The rules are fairly simple as long as you have cheat sheets for all the powers. However, it is obvious that an attempt to create balanced characters and lists went into the making of the factions. Personally for my gaming group, the only thing that really held the rules back was the lack of scenarios (which we made up ourselves).

 

I really like the models Reaper makes but do agree that there is nothing thematic about them that makes them all fit into a certain theme. There are a lot of great artists with their own sense of style (some more pronounced than others). Other miniature games have a definite edge since all their models are designed to fit into a certain style. However, where Warlord really lacks is in the story department. Warlord is a very basic and static fantasy world. There is little fluff for interaction between factions and no sense of history to the world. Factions seemed to have been "plopped" onto the map and no care was given to why they are there or how this affects the other factions. There are some sparks of story to be found if you look hard enough but nothing ties the world together.

 

From my observations as a miniature game collector, the game systems that have any form of longevity have to combine a good rules set with thematic models and a story/character/factions that people care about. If Warlord wants to maintain (or even grow) its fanbase, work has to be done to create a world that people want to play in.

 

There's lots in Warlord that can be built on - it's just getting the right people to do it.

I said the same things when the first edition came out. I see your point, but the real sales of the Warlord models come because they are generic enough to fit into most people's favorite RPG. It means Reaper stays in business, but it doesn't go boldly into an evocative setting like many game companies that have bitten the dust.

 

As for the original post about the Bones being "too successful" I just have confusion. Bones means the models will be less expensive and more people can buy into the game.