Next Wargame

I love Warhammer but I'm growing tired of the same old scenery. What wargame should I jump to? Warmachine? Infinity? I really like the modelling and lore aspects of a given wargame. Your-dudes armies and all that. Interesting factions.

What do you recommend, Veeky Forums? Also what kind of fanbase does your given recommendation have?

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Well to be completely honest there is no your dudes aspect to infinity or to Warmahordes, on top of the fact that the lore for both is as shallow as a kiddie pool

Infinity. Great rules, interesting fluff and the best models in the industry.

Warmachine/Hordes is one of the best GAMES on the market. However, beyond painting your models, the Your Dudes aspect is lacking. You can't customize at all (Beyond adding some more dudes to a troop, or adding solo models that may add rules to specific units), and conversion guidelines are very firm compared to 40k.

The Your Dudes/customization aspect comes from building lists. Each Warcaster/Warlock brings an unique combination of abilities, spells and a once-per-game Feat ability that can turn a game around. So while you can't customize your models a lot, you can make a list that suits you. It's not quite the same, but it's what there is.

The fluff comes second to the game, but it's pretty good, if a bit hard to find.

Wait, Warmachine has actual restrictions on changing how the pieces look?

Yes, in order to avoid confusion as to what a specific model is supposed to be. Assuming you're playing an equal or more skilled opponent, mistakes are very punishing. And mistaking a model for another because of an unclear conversion can have dire consequences on your game plan.

You can read the guidelines here: privateerpress.com/organized-play/tournament-conversion-policy

Note that the golden rule of conversion still applies. If your opponent can tell what it is without help, then it's probably fine. The most important rule I think is that you can't change a weapon's type. If a warjack has an axe, you can't put a sword on it, but you can change it into a different axe.

There are some people who take a long step further, like Menace's Mecha Legion of Everblight, which have been decreed perfectly tournament-legal models.

Ah, this seems to be tournament policy, not actual gaming policy. Yeah, I don't give a shit about pro play.

On the other hand, how's Infinity? They do seem to have some pretty fucking top-tier models.

Yeah, it's primarily for competetive play. For casual play at your local store/club there's no conversion restrictions whatsoever (though keeping models recognizeable is probably still for the best, so don't put swords on your axe-wielding dudes for example)

I can't talk about Infinity, since I have litterally no clue what it's all about except muh asian-inspired sci-fi, but maybe is still around.

Infinity is the best game that you will find no other players for.

Seriously, there's like three other players in my entire fucking state.

Yeah, there are more MALIFAUX players than Infinity players in my area. Thats crazy.

It's easily my favourite war game. The rules are great, it's a skirmish game, it's actually pretty cheap, the fluff's a very nicely done mix of cyberpunk and sci-fi, and the sculpting's just been going from strength to strength lately.

Remember a lot of the war nouns are only differentiable because of their weapons. Of course, the golden standard is showing the figure to the TO, and if they figure out what the figure is, it's fine. And that's only in the official tornaments. I've used German WW2 figures to proxy Storm Blade Gunners before and nobody batted an eye, and that was a steamroller event.

Hardly shallow. For one, Warmachine has decades of RPG supplements and books behind it. The Witchfire Trilogy, for one. And they've been putting out fluff in the books and NQ for years now. Infinity's got some great fluff as well, and it's got a range of RPG books coming next year as well. Infinity also has nothing in the way of a your dudes aspect, although comparing any game to 40k in that respect is ridiculous.

WM rules such Mk3. We will see if the errata fixes anything.

They really shat the bed, and the game is dying because of it.

Huh my meta is exploding (haqq joke).

Our last slow grow at my store added 4 new players, so we are up to 14 semi regulars.

>MALIFAUX
Speaking of toxic communities....

>Infinity also has nothing in the way of a your dudes aspect
I don't see how this is true. You can do as much background work as you want, similiar to 40k. The models are less interchangable, but conversion work and weaponswaps are not too difficult.

Personally I find the crisper design is better than interchangeability when you are playing with less than 20 models.

>Of course, the golden standard is showing the figure to the TO, and if they figure out what the figure is, it's fine.
Have they ever had problems identifying unconverted models?

I could see where a crappy paint job on a poorly cast Privateer Press model could end up hard to identify...

Wot? Where?

I have exactly the same problem

I really want to love warmachine but all their models look like shit and the lore is against army building. The game is fun, unlike 40k though.

Nobody in my town plays infinity.

Wut, the Iron kingdoms are fun as fuck, plenty of fluff if you like that.

Warmachine/Hordes has very interesting lore IMHO, with a nice take on fantasy industrial steampunk and magitek. It also has a very solid ruleset that makes it ideal if you love the crunch aspects of the game. And while it has balacement issues, they're absolutely diminutive compared to those of Warhammer 40k. Yeah, there are 'top tier' factions and 'trash tier factions', but that doesn't make for an auto-win, and most importantly, most factions have lots and lots of units and synergies worth playing instead of forcing you to use always the same 'cream of the codex' stuff to be competitive.

Unfortunately it is the complete opposite of a your-dudes game. You can't customize your units the way you could in Warhammer: they all have fixed equipment and the most you can do, for troop units, is to choose between two sizes (ex. 5 or 7 men) and/or to add unit attachments; also some unit attachments, several solos and ALL 'army leaders' (warcasters/warlocks) are named characters with no customization option.
On the bright side, what is lackluster in customization is repayed by the wide variety of playing styles offered. Each caster is pretty unique, having their own toolbox of spells and abilities and a unique feat to cast once per game that pretty much defines how to run their army.

The "your dudes" factor stems from the possibility to customize your units from either a gameplay perspective or a modelling perspective, possibly both. So being able to give them customized equipment, just to say one.
Your preferences on the 'crispier design' are aesthetic, they have little to do with them qualifying for "your dudes" value.

Take my advice guys.

Infinity rules aren't so great. I played for one year the game. I played with the old and new edition so I know the changes.

N3 is a step forward the right direction, but in the long run you understand that Infinity rules often are just a clusterfuck, the game is really dice dependant and all the army at the end goes with more or less the same things cause internal balance is really messed up.

It's a shame cause I really liked the miniature (Nomads here that loved Gecko :3 ), but if you play enough time you discover pretty fast that Infinity is a cool game, but not a good one.

>Also what kind of fanbase does your given recommendation have?
Read page five and decide if you really want to be part of the Warmachine community.

Granted it's not in the newer books, but the old players are still around...

>Infinity also has nothing in the way of a your dudes aspect,
This is wrong. Nomads faction enables you to even use Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Reapers Were-Armadillo miniature without being lore breaking.

My major gripe wit Infinity is more that the designs look very samey to me. I have a hard time telling the factions, units and the weapons apart from each other.

The models themselves are great quality though.

>rules often are just a clusterfuck, the game is really dice dependant and all the army at the end goes with more or less the same things cause internal balance is really messed up.
I think you talking about Knight allies in all armies.

Warmachine is good, but "your dudes" aspect is limited. You can make conversion, ofc, despite what others said in this thread. Esp. if they're well executed. But you wouldn't be able to make your own warcaster (army leader), for example.

Infinity is more "your dudes" friendly, in my opinion. There are even models that you construct yourself (rule-set, stats etc). But for some reasons I haven't encountered that many heavily converted armies.

Malifaux even less "your dudes" than warmahordes, I think.

> what kind of fanbase
Heavily depends on your local meta. You wouldn't play in my, right? Go into your LGS and look around.

The models look like wh40k knock off, I'm looking at other games to run away from 40k not to with the same ugly designs

>customize your units
In my experience wargear is so unbalanced that everyone generally takes the same builds, and it ends up being the same a the non customizable games.

The uniqueness of 40k armies is way oversold, since marines all tend to look the same.

>the game is really dice dependent
Infinity is the least dice dependent game I have ever played, and I've consistently played over a dozen.

>I think you talking about Knight allies in all armies.
Lol. I think we can all agree that Warmachine is unbalanced, but 40k is so unbalanced that balance is just a figment of your imagination.

Please re-read my post and point out where I mention fucking Warhammer 40k.

I'm not speaking of WH40k. I'm speaking of what people usually mean when they mention 'Your dudes' factor, which is customization options for your units.

Warmachine is about the most balanced game among those that are popular on the market and actually played in FLGS.
I'm not saying it is perfectly balanced since you can clearly see Cygnar has a much easier life than Skorne, but compare it to the ridiculous chasms between units and armies in pretty much any other wargame.

>Warmachine is about the most balanced game among those that are popular on the market and actually played in FLGS.

This is absolutely not true. The only games it is more balanced than is the GW and Spartan games, and it is about tied with X Wing.

Infinity, Malifaux, Guild Ball, DZC, Armada, Kings of War all have league nights at my FLGS with 6-15+ attendance and are way more balanced games.

>I really like the modelling and lore aspects of a given wargame. Your-dudes armies and all that. Interesting factions.
Same here, OP, and I honestly haven't found a single other game that does the same sort of thing as the Warhammers do. I'd like to play something else, but it's hard to care when there's no real way to make an army my own in other games.
I guess it's because unlike Warhammer, which threw a setting together over some beers and then built rules to try and reflect the lore they'd come up with, these other games are designed clinically and bottom-up, rules first? Which probably makes for a better game, but a less "interesting" one.

Game depend on dice more than other games.

When you roll your dice you know only the target number which you have to roll less, but that means nothing.

You can have BS of 17 and rolling 3 dice, but that means nothing because if your enemy roll 2 for dodge with a 12 on his score that means that you will hit only in the range 1 - 7 , but that something you can't know until your enemy rolls. And worse you can't make an average out of your enemy roll beacuse he roll just one die! On one die statistic mean nothing.

So everytime you rolls are blind cause you don't have all the information you need.

I made torunaments and a lot of games, I have seen people cursed the dice because they can't fucking remove one single wound ARM 1 because he continue to doge everything.

I have seen basic trooper killing Intruders in ARO thanks to a nice crit and Tag armor shreded like nothing against basic guns.

Yeah this sort of things happen in alot of game, but God in infinity this things happen alot more often.
Even in 40k I have seen less luck involved than Infinity.

This thing callin - dynamic.

Dude, you clearly don't understand how probability works, or are just bad at math.

If you are rolling 3 dice, needing 17s to hit with a rifle, against an enemy who needs 12s to dodge, you have a 84.54% of doing 1 or more wounds, 55.00% of doing 2 or more and 18.52% of doing 3 or more, while the dodger has a 6.18% of suceeding.

While I am sure your anecdotal evidence feels really important inside your head, the truth is Infinity has way less bad luck than other games because there are a lot of rolls and they are all pretty low in importance, compare to say, going first in 40k, or rolling high to assassinate in Warmachine, both of which could be auto-wins.

>Your-dudes armies and all that

Sorry man, but that's not what you'll get out of Warmachine or Infinity. They're much smaller scale than 40k, being based out of a few nations or star nations, so there's less of the 'infinite possibilities for Your-Dudes.'

>lore for both is as shallow as a kiddie pool
Nice b8, m8. Lore for both is as good or better than 40k, but has no giant blank spots for you to fill in with your-dudes.

Yeah. Since actual competitive games can be run with chess clocks, you need to be able to identify enemy pieces at a glance. That means 50% original model + no weapon subs, or organizer permission. Nobody gives a fuck at the casual level, it's only for tourneys and organized play.

Malifaux used to be huge locally prior to the 2e update. Wyrd fucked that up something fierce, because the whole community died and had to be rebuilt from scratch.

>a lot of rolls and they are all pretty low in importance
>low in importance

All the hacking rolls that can mess with TAG, HI;

All the rolls against glue weapon, dodge against template weapon;

All the Infiltration roll that can mean the difference between having enemy on your deploy turn 1 or them starting at theyr table edge;

All the roll to take an objective;

Infinity as a fuck ton of single important rolls and more you go on with the game mor eimportant they become cause you start to have less order and so doing something in one go instead of wasting 1-2 or more order can be the difference between winning or losing.

You can make all the nice talk about if you need 12 or less on the dice you have a 60% chance, but the truth is that there are a lot of Action that roll just one die and that screw the game really hard.