Halo: Ground Command ships tomorrow edition

>halo and 40k have bad fanbases
booooy howdy you should take a look at some of the other things out there today.

Any info on how the system itself works?

I'm glad that you asked user, here is from the creators:

>To start with, I think it’s important to tell everyone the mechanics we have carried over from our Fleet Battles game. That way everyone can have a handle on some of the terms I will be using in the upcoming article.

>Firepower Rating and Halo Dice – As with Halo: Fleet Battles we use Halo Dice along with the Firepower Rating Table to control modifiers and drive the statistics in the game.

>As with H: FB, we use Firepower Rating 4 as our starting point with the Rating modifying up and down accordingly. This means that when rolling a Spartan Die, a TWO result counts as two hits, the ONE result counts as one hit, the NEAR MISS result can be re-rolled if you have rolled a TWO, and the SKULL result is a definite miss. Certain weapons will gain a positive bonus to the Firepower Rating whereas Terrain conditions and Scenario effects might cause the Firepower Rating to suffer a penalty.

>Statistic Profiles – We have used a simple visual presentation mechanic to show people the various statistics used by Units. These cards will be large enough to fit in your hand and should have all pertinent rules (as well as paraphrased notations about Loadouts, etc.) on them, making reference in H: GC even easier.

(Cont.)

>Commanders and Command Dice – As with H: FB, we use the Command Dice for each Faction to drive the Command and Control side of the game engine. The Command/Attack/Defence symbols allow players to execute orders from their Commander’s Profile Card that can often be the difference between success and failure in battle.

>Just like in the Fleet Battles game, we assume these lofty individuals are far removed from the action taking place on the battlefield, but their orders can be issued with immediate effect!

>In the beginning, there will be two Generic Commanders – one for each side, after which Named Commanders and Heroes can be fielded to add more narrative depth to games.

>Right, that’s the elements that we have carried forwards from Halo: Fleet Battles covered, lets talk about the innovations that you can expect in Halo: Ground Command.

>Halo
>Computer game

Kek but you're right on the other parts. They should have made a 28mm skirmish game.

Now this is the bread and butter of fleet battles:

>Reaction
>The first and most important new part of the game is Reaction Fire. Halo is at its core a First Person Shooter (FPS) where the action is fast and furious, gunfire rains down from all sides, and death is an ever present companion! Of course that can be difficult to translate to a tabletop where we need the structure of Game Turns, Activations, Segments, Actions etc. to allow us to create the structure of the game itself.

>To change this, we have created a Reaction Statistic for each and every element in H: GC to allow us to represent a persistent form of Overwatch where every element on the table is assumed to be engaged in the battle at all times.

>The Reaction Statistic has two numbers shown as X / Y on their Profile. The X number is used if the Unit hasn’t Activated yet, and the Y number is used if the Unit has Activated. If you want to react to an enemy activation simply roll 2D6, add the results together and try to equal or beat the relevant number… if you do, you get to fire in your opponent’s activation, either at the start of their move or at the end!

>Attempting a Reaction is not without risk however as you are only permitted to attempt a single reaction to an enemy activation and whether you succeed or fail you gain an Activation Marker as a result, meaning that you have to choose your Reacting Units carefully! Sometimes it is better to React with a Unit that has already gone, especially if the Unit has a relatively good Y-React number….. Warthogs for example excel at this, creating mini-fire-bases upon which the UNSC can base their advance/defence. Sometimes you might be unwilling to React, as it will affect your ability to surge forwards (since making a Reaction attempt gives your Unit an Activation Marker that effectively halts any chance of taking a Movement Action!)…. This means that the simple rules for Reaction brings the tactics of the FPS to the tabletop.

(Cont.)

>As you might expect, not everything has the same React X/Y.

>A Spartan. the paragon of war for the UNSC, might be capable of multiple feats of arms in a turn, firing in all directions as he/she attempts to defend a wounded soldier, but a ponderous Hunter is far more measured and lumbering, taking time to line up shots and gear themselves for combat. This is represented by the Spartan having a React Score of 5/6, whereas a Hunter Unit is limited to 10/13.

>Sharp eyed gamers will notice that the Hunter’s Y-Reaction stat is technically impossible on 2D6! This is intentional (Hunters are pretty slow at reacting once they have acted) ….. but through careful marshalling of Commanders and Orders it IS possible to lower a Unit’s Reaction Stat to a point where the Hunters COULD pull of a once in a blue-moon-reaction…. making the impossible, possible… and cementing them into legend.

>How does this change things?
>Think about the other wargames you have played. Each attempt to be cinematic, trying to bring you into the action, but how many truly achieve that lofty goal? All are stymied by the need for Game Turns, Activations, Segments etc.…. With Reaction Fire, everything is technically in the game and can respond…. Assuming you can roll high enough on 2D6 of course!

>In a FPS you don’t hang around waiting for your opponent to move, shoot or charge before you get your turn, and then find yourself taking off your models before they got a chance to do anything! ... And in Halo: Ground Command you don’t have to… Instead you have the chance to blast them to smithereens with SMGs, Plasma Rifles and Rocket Launchers, holding out against impossible odds!

Is there a condensed version of this? The advertising-speak is aggravating me with it's obfuscation, and I am sure I am missing details because of it.

The most note worthy thing is that you can react to your opponent’s action, but you only get one reaction per enemy activation and whether you succeed or not, you lose your ability to surge forward.

There are 2 stats for the reaction mechanic, one that applies if your unit has gone already and one if it hasn't, the latter is obviously smaller and you determine success by rolling 2D6

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I was scared that we wouldn't get the standard Mark V, but that appears to be all we're getting, which is A-Okay by me.

They wouldn't be able to justify some of the game's larger assets at that scale. At 15 mm, a Scorpion tank or a Wraith are actually manageable, along with a good number of infantry. Battles can take place that reasonably depict the kinds of battles you can expect from the Halo Game or books, barring 117 soloing armies and the massive battles that occasionally take place.

At 28mm, you get pretty much exactly 40k at that scale and that over-clutters the table. And if you're expecting to compete with 40k at the same scale and expect people to invest just as heavily into it, you're not going to make much money. 15mm is pretty good for the scale target they want to hit, not Epic's tiny dots of massed infantry flooding the table amidst giant robots and tiny tanks, but a few good-sized small vehicles, maybe a heavy vehicle or two, and a good number of infantry to fill out the team.

Because HaloClix did SO WELL.

Well, has any Clix done well?

enough that they kept making the damn things for ages with a lot of varieties.
heroclix especially.

They pump out varieties but they die off pretty quickly. HeroClix is perhaps the most enduring.

I bet the whole Clix thing is someone's baby and they just keep pushing for it to get IPs or WizKids just throws some money at it and a new IP every once and awhile to see if they can actually make something of their investment. They've got a few other more successful revenue streams.

Wha'ts the best alien race and why is the Jackals?

>>Halo
>>Computer game
Technically, he's not wrong.

That is a really funny way of spelling Sangheili.

Because they will have the best accuracy stats abs I've of the best reactions stats?

Exactly, 15mm is just the right size where you can actually identify the individual squads you have and give them detail, while still having super units that won't require your first born as payment.

>Not calling them Kig-Yar
I bet you still call the San'Shyuum the Prophets.

>It's still cool to hate Halo

Oh Veeky Forums ...

Big fan of Mgalekgolo so I'm glad to see you get a couple in the starter.

For what I seen I like halo, why people hate it? The armour of the SPARTAN and normal guys are cool, like the aliens.

As someone who generally only plays Flames of War, I need to invest in a lot of brightly colored paints for the Covenant. I can't say I'm not excited for this though, especially once ODST units come out. Drop those tiny fuckers all over the table just to raise a little confusion and buy me some time

Because it's popular and because people erroneously believe that it ruined first person shooters.

In reality games that copied Halo with no understanding of what made the game work are what ruined FPS games.

You can see the exact same thing with Gears of War and God of War.

It's funny that certain games get a pass in that regard. No one blames Diablo for the literal legions of shitty Diablo clones that are out there or Command and Conquer that also has it's fair share of fecal copy cats.

I Joe that eventually you can drop cyclops and tanks with your ODST.

It opened the way for chads, dudebros and contards

What are all of those things and for what reason should I spend any time worrying, complaining, or thinking about them in general?

I'm pretty excited, pre-ordered it as soon as it came out, and I also ordered a phantom and a pelican, now just waiting on the ground command and an order that had a CAS, CPV and Valiant class ships for my fleet battles collection.

Good luck having a pelican at 28mm, the thing in 15mm is already a foot long. Not just unplayable, but honestly completely unaffordable too for any average player. Think of the Thunderhawk, a staple of the lore, but how many people have one? Same thing with halo, pelicans and phantoms are integral to the story and setting.

I don't get people who want to pay wargames in anything else other than 15mm, do they enjoy 30 FPS videos too?

Exactly, not only that, but they plan to eventually release Scarabs, can you imagine that on a 28mm scale? Implausible, unplayable, and unaffordable.

Somebody else who plays fleet battle, praise the forerunners

What would be something good to use as an objective marker for fleet battles?

That makes 3 of us at least. I just finished up my covenant fleet from the starter box and I'm playing my first game Friday.

I was thinking of having it on a much smaller scale. A few squads with one or two heroes. Like the old Rogue Trader.

I bought the starter box but I've only painted a few ships. Not really feeling the hype when they're making a new rulebook already.

Yeah, that was disappointing and kind of killer the game for some people, I blame the valiant honestly.

I think someone should tell those Mythic guys about it so they know they can actually have rules for models and shit now.

I see a Zealot. How good are they at stabbing shit with a sword? And how good are they at taking a hit?

They should be pretty good, but the game got shipped today so expect stats and what not to be available by next week, any user willing to do a PDF of the rule book?

The only fandoms that needlessly and autistically inserts there fandom into everything as much as 40k fans are 2000s era furries, sonic the hedge hog, bronies and invader zim.

And I say as somene who has been buying and playing 40k since 2003

Also WH40K must always win at everything ever.

bump

>oddly scaled
15mm is very well supported for sci-fi.

Not really fitting for Halo scale. Maybe for Master Chief and friends, but not so much for what we tend to think of Halo combat as like in general. Think about Halo Wars; infantry backed up by vehicles, larger battles having a good spread of lighter vehicles, infantry, and a heavy vehicle for good measure.

At 28mm, the granularity is pretty high, but the unit diversity is pretty low, at least for the UNSC side, not to mention the fact that vehicles get unwieldy at this scale and one of the biggest things Halo brought to the table was how easily vehicles meshed with the game. Plus, a single Spartan at that scale might not be able to showcase how much power it can pack without unbalancing the game. 15mm means a Spartan can bring the pain against a squad of infantry and still get their ass wrecked by a wraith's plasma mortar.

They like things and talk about them on the internet. And that's terrible.

There's potential for a Flood faction and a Brute Faction. There's also possibilities for mix-and-match sublists also, and potentially other human sphere factions: in the fluff, the Spartan program IIRC was originally to create a force that could suppress internal dissidents and there are suggestions of various civil conflicts. Expansions could also go down that route, portraying some sort of insurgent/guerilla warfare by irregular militias vs. UNSC in Ambush Alley style scenarios.

Brute faction? they split from the covenant?

No, they took it over and kicked anyone who didn't like them out.
Jesus, it was in the same fucking game they were introduced!

The Banished, and also post schism you got a lot of unnamed brute warlords trying to make their own turf, while a brute named Lydus that's trying to unite them all.

Btw here is a pic of the Pelican in all of its 312 mm of goodness

That thing is fucking massive. Any word on the units it'll come with?

Apparently they don't want to do bundles because it drives up the price and that's one of things that held fleet battles back, but I'll be sure to update as soon as I got anything concise, regardless the fun part is that that won't be the biggest unit in the game since they will have Scarabs of all kinds and never before seen covenant siege engines (pic related)

I just read on their facebook page, the pelican will come with Marine Riflemen (no word on squad/platoon size) and the phantom will come with grunt squads (and door gunners) and some elites as squad leaders

The Pelican model

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Look at these guys, leaving out the good pictures.

>33.4cm

are the rules for this more dystopian wars or more armoured clash?

Just shipped today, so I dunno yet.

Phantoms look silly from top down.

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Those flying bases on the ghosts are a bit much. More noticeable than the standard bases imho.

Did you play Halo 3?

Speaking of, any anons willing to scan the rule book?

I am vaguely interested, but I also thought Halo Wars was a good idea on paper so there's that.

I honestly won't want to get into it unless I can get some of the peripheral things like Alien Heretics, human rebels, or get a platoon of Spartan IIIs.

cool minis, don't give a fuck about the game, won't ever buy the minis

Spartan games will be Spartan games. They always fuck up and kill their own games through neglect and incompetence.

I'm surprised there are still people excited about Halo ground, no-one who knows about Spartan games should be.

I think it's just so easy for them to do the production at this point that the turnover must be simple as hell, so you can easily just grab an IP and go.

I guess most people will use the halo minis for other 15mm games and don't rely on the ruleset by spartan.

They look like Shadows, the covenant equivalent of a heavy truck.

Don't forget JoJofags.

The resemblance is uncanny

>Hochmeister
Seems like somebody asked google to translate Highmaster, instead of using a dictionary.

I'm not a big halo fan, got some nostalgia for Halo 1 and that's about it, and I've been out of wargaming for many years but simply as a model that drop ship is pretty tempting.

I was going to get the Colonial Marines Dropship from Prodos' AVP game but the way they have fucked people with the kickstarter I don't want to give them any more money.

Also this scale picture made me giggle.

>It looks nice but I doubt it will go very far. With only two factions and limited units it feels like they can only go so far with it.

Dude. It's Spartan. THIS is as far as they are actually going to go with it. Then they'll get bored and pump out another game system.

I mean fucking christ at Salute this year instead of putting all the emphasis on this, or Fleet Battles or their new simplified FSA and DW mini-rulesets they had ANOTHER brand new game on fucking display: A post 45 WW2 3mm game where all the theoretical tanks got built: So you have German Rattes being supported by Konigstiger and Maus companies whilst American Super-Pershings are backed up by British TOG's carried into battle by gigantic Tank carriers.

Honestly? It's kind of nice to see a post-45 WW2 game that DOESNT give everybody power armour and the Germans Zombies and Vampires. I'M LOOKING RIGHT AT YOU KONFLIKT 47.
But honestly? It feels like the only remotely sane people in Spartan left to found Hawk Wargames up the road.

I was a Kickstarter backer who put 1.3k into AvP and so far all I have gotten is one box.

Yes, yes they do

The worst thing is, I don't like the aesthetics DfC/DzC. So I'm stuck with models I don't like with a good company, or a terrible company with models I like. I also don't know anyone near me who plays either, but since the situation with DW is the same, it doesn't matter.

The idea for that WWII game was cool, but it being by Spartan kills it instantly for me. I'm not buying into another Spartan game. If DW makes a comeback, I'll play more, but a new system is a no go.

Shadows weren't that big in Halo 2.
These things are dwarfing hunters.

Forget hunters, these things are almost as big as a Scarab.