What wargames do you play and why?

[udm]

I tried getting into Kill Team/40K but couldn't. Just not what I'm looking for in a wargame.

I dabbled in a bit of DUST Tactics/1947 before it went under (again). It's fun enough for platoon-level warfare.

X-Wing was fun until I realised I'd lost all interest in Star Wars.

Gaslands is alright but it has some really stupid rules like collision.

Battletech I'm still playing every now and then. It just doesn't get old.

But what I'm really looking for though is a game that's similar to Jagged Alliance or even X-Com, where it's got more simulationist systems (weapons with their own stats, fast-paced, individual miniature-level, stances). The closest I got was an indie game called Star Breach, but it's not granular enough. Oh well

 

[Caim]

One Page Rules

Been getting into this a bit more. The 3.3 update hit last week, and there's been two major chances:

- A new activation: Assault. This lets you both shoot and charge, but you get -1 to hit on both types of attack. This is useful for elite armies with fewer models but good quality ratings.
- Shaken units can still activate as normal, but they move at half speed, get -1 to quality and defense rolls, and can't hold objectives, and they get out of it by spending one turn doing nothing. This means that your units won't be rendered useless the second they get Shaken.

I've also looked into playing OPR through Tabletop Simulator. There is a mod that adds OPR stuff, but it's both out of date and there's lots of broken links that means it's not really usable.

 

[Arrowgrab]

But what I'm really looking for though is a game that's similar to Jagged Alliance or even X-Com, where it's got more simulationist systems (weapons with their own stats, fast-paced, individual miniature-level, stances). The closest I got was an indie game called Star Breach, but it's not granular enough. Oh well

Sounds like you're looking for squad-level tactical games, so maybe Advanced Squad Leader or Twilight 2000?

 

[Hell Swarm]

One Page Rules

Been getting into this a bit more. The 3.3 update hit last week, and there's been two major chances:

- A new activation: Assault. This lets you both shoot and charge, but you get -1 to hit on both types of attack. This is useful for elite armies with fewer models but good quality ratings.
- Shaken units can still activate as normal, but they move at half speed, get -1 to quality and defense rolls, and can't hold objectives, and they get out of it by spending one turn doing nothing. This means that your units won't be rendered useless the second they get Shaken.

I've also looked into playing OPR through Tabletop Simulator. There is a mod that adds OPR stuff, but it's both out of date and there's lots of broken links that means it's not really usable.

I really like Assault as a rule. I think it has potential to set up some really interesting game situations. Fanbase is being whiny about it, saying there's too many rules and it's too powerful for elite armies and bad for swarm ones. Won't make a huge difference either way and everyone knew mixed units needed a buff and this is exactly what was needed without adding too much bloat.

Shaken changes is nice. Losing a full turn was stupid. You could stun lock enemy units if you really wanted.

 

[Caim]

One Page Rules

Been getting into this a bit more. The 3.3 update hit last week, and there's been two major chances:

- A new activation: Assault. This lets you both shoot and charge, but you get -1 to hit on both types of attack. This is useful for elite armies with fewer models but good quality ratings.
- Shaken units can still activate as normal, but they move at half speed, get -1 to quality and defense rolls, and can't hold objectives, and they get out of it by spending one turn doing nothing. This means that your units won't be rendered useless the second they get Shaken.

I've also looked into playing OPR through Tabletop Simulator. There is a mod that adds OPR stuff, but it's both out of date and there's lots of broken links that means it's not really usable.

I really like Assault as a rule. I think it has potential to set up some really interesting game situations. Fanbase is being whiny about it, saying there's too many rules and it's too powerful for elite armies and bad for swarm ones. Won't make a huge difference either way and everyone knew mixed units needed a buff and this is exactly what was needed without adding too much bloat.

Shaken changes is nice. Losing a full turn was stupid. You could stun lock enemy units if you really wanted.

It's true that Assault is better for elite armies compared to swarm armies, but it balances out with how many units the swarms get and the sheer amount of dice they get to roll in lieu of the elite armies. Even then the armies that get the most out of it are the Custodians, a few types of Battle Brothers and some of the Titans, but those have their own issues.

 

[Hell Swarm]

It's true that Assault is better for elite armies compared to swarm armies, but it balances out with how many units the swarms get and the sheer amount of dice they get to roll in lieu of the elite armies. Even then the armies that get the most out of it are the Custodians, a few types of Battle Brothers and some of the Titans, but those have their own issues.

Won't Orcs get a decent chunk of change out of it? Tempted to try it this weekend with some Havoc bros. Got some bolt pistol and chainsword dudes I can use to hold an objective and bum rush any one moving in

 

[Caim]

It's true that Assault is better for elite armies compared to swarm armies, but it balances out with how many units the swarms get and the sheer amount of dice they get to roll in lieu of the elite armies. Even then the armies that get the most out of it are the Custodians, a few types of Battle Brothers and some of the Titans, but those have their own issues.

Won't Orcs get a decent chunk of change out of it? Tempted to try it this weekend with some Havoc bros. Got some bolt pistol and chainsword dudes I can use to hold an objective and bum rush any one moving in

Orcs have the ability that has them shoot at 5+ instead of their normal Quality, which becomes a 6 because of the -1 you get from assaulting. The -1 also applies to shooting.

This means that for trading in one-sixth of your hits in melee you get one-sixth of the shots you'd get from your shooting attacks. And when you have the same attacks for both shooting and melee, like the normal Ork Mobs do, this means that you break even. Sure Orks also have the Furious rule (sixes in melee get you an extra hit), but that's just on the charge, not the assault. This is supported by the existence of the Shooty rule, which does the same as Furious but for shooting. Several of the more elite units have these, but for the rest it's breaking even at best.

An example would be some kitted out Ork Pirates. Give them Ultra Claws for an A2 AP4 melee weapon to complement their A1 AP4 Deadly 3 gun. They're normally Quality 3+, so if you are willing to turn that into Quality 4+ for melee purposes you get three shots that on a 6 land two hits at a superior statline than what you gave up. Sure it's still not 100% certain, but that's the game. Also don't actually run this unit: this unit of Ork Pirates comes in groups of 3, have Defense 4+ with no Tough value and a 175 point cost, way too flimsy.

But for your example of the melee kitted Havoc Brothers: your quality of 3+ in melee becomes a 4+ in melee and 4+ shooting. 10 Havoc Brothers with pistol + CCW will go from 13.333 hits in melee to 10 hits to gain 5 pistol hits. And 15 hits that all have AP1 against a Defense 4+ unit is enough to, on average, wipe out a 10 man squad in one go. As long as what you trade in is worse than what you get back, it's worth it.

Funnily enough this also means that a standard Quality 6+ also gains from these changes, meaning that it's only the Quality 5+ that doesn't gain with equal weapons.

 

[Hell Swarm]

Sure Orks also have the Furious rule (sixes in melee get you an extra hit), but that's just on the charge, not the assault.

Assault is a charge still. All the abilities still trigger. The rules are needing to be rewritten right now as OPR being the genius furry autist he is didn't think people would remove models from the front of the unit so the 6" charge now fails to hit a target..

4+ to hit seems like it would also suffer quite badly from it. 3 to 4 isn't huge but 4 to 5 is starting to dip into goblin territory.