AoS review
Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2019 9:05 am
I had a game of AoS last night and thought I'd share my observations on it. My first ever game of AoS, so I probably missed some of the finer nuances. And my opponent only had played a handful of games himself. So by no means an expert either. This is mainly my own observations and by no means an in depth review. But I thought it may be useful for someone. I will make comparisons to Warhammer throughout, though I must say that it is a very different game, and it should be approached as such. I'll mainly do this because WH is my main tabletop wargame. I approached it as such as well. The comparison is more there to give an idea of how I experienced the game and to highlight my thoughts and feelings.
Just a radom game shot.
It is a fun game. Fun was definitely had while playing. Lots of dice were rolled and overall we had a good time. I'd play it again if it came along. The ruleset seems to promote a relatively relaxed approach to the game. While there is still measuring and units involved, there is also a bunch of finnagling and a reasonable margin of error in everything you do. Though perhaps if you play more competitively that disappears. But there seems to be less rules arguments possible then in Warhammer.
It's also an easy game to pick up. To give an idea of the setting. I showed up at my friends house (didn't bring anything, since all my models are somewhere in a box). My friend had an extra army (of sigmarines) I could use. I have a long time ago read V 1.0 of AoS, but since then the game has changed (and improved) a lot. A 15 minute (max) explanation later and I was good to go. The basic rules are straightforward. You get a turn, I get a turn. There's a couple of phases in a turn you take in order and there's a very limited number of things you can do.
Magic for instance is straightforward. All mages know the same 2 default spells and will know perhaps one or two extra spells. You simply roll 2 dice and try to get over a certain value, same with dispelling. No downsides, no miscasts and so on. easy and clean.
After the basics, everything you need to know is unit specific. And it is written in the stats of the unit. What roll you hit and wound on, armour save and so on. So for example no WS4 vs WS 3 calculations. You would simply always hit on 4+.
Compare this to WH where you probably want to read through 180 pages of rules (and remember most of them) to be able to get a decent game in. So anyone can pick up the game. It's probably ideal to play with kids. And as said, it's simple and straightforward. I'd estimate you can probably get 2 games in on a night once you get the hang of it a bit.
Also, it's much smaller in scope then WH. With a handful of units you can have a nice battle. WH only really starts working well at 1500pts and up. And if you really want to bring fun stuff then you're easily looking at 2400+pts. Which is a lot of models to purchase, assemble and paint.
It wasn't all good though. For starters, it may be that the basic rules are a lot more simple then WH. But somehow each and every unit has its own special rules. Of course, it doesn't help that I'd never even read the rules of the models before starting. But I had something like 8 different units. And each unit had at least 1 special rule or ability, which seemed very specific for that unit. And some of it even interacting with only very specific other units on my side. There are no regular warriors it seems.
It makes for an intricate rule set. But it also makes it so that it's very difficult to remember all of them. Even more so with multiple armies. As a casual player (with 1 game every month or every other month perhaps) I couldn't hope to begin to remember all of it, much less all the special rules of my opponents army as well. Which meant that we often forgot to implement some specific rule or would only find out after two turns in combat that I had some ability which would blow up half the unit I was in combat with.
To complicate matters, GW in all its infinite wisdom decided to give everything funny names. They should seriously consider firing (or just shoot at point blank...) whoever came up with all the nonsense. I spend all night looking at my units and their names, but I still can't remember any of it. No simple archers, wizards and longswordmen. Apparently I was playing with sequiturs, castigators and evocators and the like (yes, I had to look that up). Which is bad enough as it is. But it gets worse when you find out that your lord arcanum has a power that lets your sequiturs do one thing and another power that lets your sequiturs do something else and so on.
And then there was stuff that felt silly when playing. Things like shooting into combat with no downside (not even giving cover to your opponent), even if it's the unit in combat that does the shooting. Somehow being stuck in a combat by standing a little to close to a different unit that got charged. I saw a fair bit of abilities that felt overpowered (though if everything is then I guess nothing is). And if you're not very careful it can really end up being simply a case of piling models into a big combat in the middle.
I must say I still prefer Warhammer. WH is more a game of armies vs armies instead of a skirmish game. And while the basis is more complex once you know those basic rules you can understand how most of the WH armies work. And even if you've never seen the army across from the table before you'll understand how a model with a bow will work (roughly). So I think we'll mainly stick to WH. But it could be a fun addition for when we want something fast with dice and not too much complexity.
Rod
Just a radom game shot.
It is a fun game. Fun was definitely had while playing. Lots of dice were rolled and overall we had a good time. I'd play it again if it came along. The ruleset seems to promote a relatively relaxed approach to the game. While there is still measuring and units involved, there is also a bunch of finnagling and a reasonable margin of error in everything you do. Though perhaps if you play more competitively that disappears. But there seems to be less rules arguments possible then in Warhammer.
It's also an easy game to pick up. To give an idea of the setting. I showed up at my friends house (didn't bring anything, since all my models are somewhere in a box). My friend had an extra army (of sigmarines) I could use. I have a long time ago read V 1.0 of AoS, but since then the game has changed (and improved) a lot. A 15 minute (max) explanation later and I was good to go. The basic rules are straightforward. You get a turn, I get a turn. There's a couple of phases in a turn you take in order and there's a very limited number of things you can do.
Magic for instance is straightforward. All mages know the same 2 default spells and will know perhaps one or two extra spells. You simply roll 2 dice and try to get over a certain value, same with dispelling. No downsides, no miscasts and so on. easy and clean.
After the basics, everything you need to know is unit specific. And it is written in the stats of the unit. What roll you hit and wound on, armour save and so on. So for example no WS4 vs WS 3 calculations. You would simply always hit on 4+.
Compare this to WH where you probably want to read through 180 pages of rules (and remember most of them) to be able to get a decent game in. So anyone can pick up the game. It's probably ideal to play with kids. And as said, it's simple and straightforward. I'd estimate you can probably get 2 games in on a night once you get the hang of it a bit.
Also, it's much smaller in scope then WH. With a handful of units you can have a nice battle. WH only really starts working well at 1500pts and up. And if you really want to bring fun stuff then you're easily looking at 2400+pts. Which is a lot of models to purchase, assemble and paint.
It wasn't all good though. For starters, it may be that the basic rules are a lot more simple then WH. But somehow each and every unit has its own special rules. Of course, it doesn't help that I'd never even read the rules of the models before starting. But I had something like 8 different units. And each unit had at least 1 special rule or ability, which seemed very specific for that unit. And some of it even interacting with only very specific other units on my side. There are no regular warriors it seems.
It makes for an intricate rule set. But it also makes it so that it's very difficult to remember all of them. Even more so with multiple armies. As a casual player (with 1 game every month or every other month perhaps) I couldn't hope to begin to remember all of it, much less all the special rules of my opponents army as well. Which meant that we often forgot to implement some specific rule or would only find out after two turns in combat that I had some ability which would blow up half the unit I was in combat with.
To complicate matters, GW in all its infinite wisdom decided to give everything funny names. They should seriously consider firing (or just shoot at point blank...) whoever came up with all the nonsense. I spend all night looking at my units and their names, but I still can't remember any of it. No simple archers, wizards and longswordmen. Apparently I was playing with sequiturs, castigators and evocators and the like (yes, I had to look that up). Which is bad enough as it is. But it gets worse when you find out that your lord arcanum has a power that lets your sequiturs do one thing and another power that lets your sequiturs do something else and so on.
And then there was stuff that felt silly when playing. Things like shooting into combat with no downside (not even giving cover to your opponent), even if it's the unit in combat that does the shooting. Somehow being stuck in a combat by standing a little to close to a different unit that got charged. I saw a fair bit of abilities that felt overpowered (though if everything is then I guess nothing is). And if you're not very careful it can really end up being simply a case of piling models into a big combat in the middle.
I must say I still prefer Warhammer. WH is more a game of armies vs armies instead of a skirmish game. And while the basis is more complex once you know those basic rules you can understand how most of the WH armies work. And even if you've never seen the army across from the table before you'll understand how a model with a bow will work (roughly). So I think we'll mainly stick to WH. But it could be a fun addition for when we want something fast with dice and not too much complexity.
Rod