Battleground Games Forum
Games Workshop => Warhammer 40K => Topic started by: Chase on March 25, 2010, 01:28:53 AM
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Kevin Nolzn had a great idea, so I'm using it.
I would like to use this thread as a place for people to post a list of stuff they DID NOT like about this years Megabattle.
Please post your comments in list format at some point in your post. List anything you'd like... Game play issues, the way it was handled, run, rules issues, rules changes (har har har), problems with the venue, food, special rules, terrain, objectives, scoring, whatever.
Personally, I would have liked the event to:
Start later and run later.
Have more space.
Not have the Doomsday Device activate turn one and blow up turn two.
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- Making Judgement on Rules
I figure I'd start with a big one. Involving everybody in rulesmaking is nice, however it is not feasible to do efficiently in an event of such a large scale. While posts can and should be made for people to voice their opinion on a certain rule decision that needs to be made, I am in full support of having a "panel" of the most experienced/fair players, led by Derek and Chase which discusses the rules. Have players from either side to ensure fairness, but I would go so far to say that it is a necessity that as this annual game continues to grow a small group needs to be formed to make the decisions.
It's been on the boards, but I feel that the day of the game, the morning as everybody is sipping their coffee trying to understand why they're awake at such an ungodly hour, Derek needs to get up on a chair and give a talk to everyone that your entire army may die instantly. This is Apocalypse, and it's even the extreme of that.
I know that last year as my two reavers were assaulted by Forge World greater daemons and effectively removed from the game because they would become stuck in close combat, I was rather disappointed. However I remember that it is a game where things like that will happen. Tactics are often thrown out the window. This year when Nick's Emperor was rendered useless on the one turn that it actually was able to fire everything it had because of Steve Riley's asset, I could tell he was disappointed but thankfully he kept his spirit up, even though he had spent months building it.
Apocalypse on this scale is different than everyone else. You may lose everything on the board in one round of shooting and watch helplessly, but hopefully you can remain having fun. I know people lose spirit after things like that happen, which is why I think a day-of talk would be useful to keep it fresh in people's memory, also to get people excited about the day that's about to unfold.
Hotel Steve D. was an excellent choice for this size battle. If it expands, I'm assuming we'd move into the Grand Ballroom if we stayed here. Hopefully an employee won't jump over Nick's titan and break off one of the castle turrets with his foot as he tries to get in a door without asking Nick to move it next time. :(
Finally, I did NOT like that there was no battlecry this year.
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Personally I did not like the leader model. Fluff wise I thought it was stupid to have 30 of literally the same guy running around on the table just in different costumes. I was so opposed to this that I almost just put an icon of nurgler glued horizontally to a base just to spite people but I decided against it and wasn't a dick.
Idk that's just me and I don't think anyone even went for those models... that's just me though
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- I wanted my dice to roll better? Is that one allowed?
- Not be opposite an Emperor or massed superheavy army.
- No effective 36 inch minimum range for the Emperor.
- More room is a good one, with adequate table space to muster and place casualties.
- I would have liked refills on the ice-water pitchers when they ran out mid afternoon.
- I disliked the mobile objective rule to the point I found myself ignoring the rule. At one point in the battle I had a choice between using my mobile objective to defend the stationary objective, or to have him charge across the table towards the enemy Emperor titan with the sole motive of dying in no man's land. It seemed so stupid and out of character to care where the model died that I defended the fixed objective.
This of course likely cost Order the battle.
There is a notion that Derek and Chase must create objectives as motivation for the two forces to fight one another. I frankly doubt it. Put the armies on opposite sides of the table and they will start fighting without artificial and unfluffy rules that make no sense. I would like to experiment with far simpler and straight forward scoring next year. - The Black Emperor was built in a week and looked like it was built in a week. Solid attention to craftsmanship and allocation of adequate time by scratch builders would be appreciated.
- There were some very effective stratagems used by Disorder on the lunar table. I know other players have grumbled about other stratagems and data sheets on other tables. At some point we ought to start listing the possibly too powerful stratagems and data sheets and considering if they should be weakened or eliminated. I'm not quite ready to start that process yet.
- In the weeks preceding the battle, Derek and Chase, rather than hold free and open discussions in which everyone participated, chose to consult with a very small select group of experienced players. As the date of the next mega battle approaches and last minute decisions must be quickly made and shared, secret conspiracies by select groups might again become necessary. Until time becomes short, I would far rather have the discussion remain free and open.
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To be fair I have a widely known lack of patience and it's hit its limit.
People and their bitching about everything that annoys/may kill them or otherwise "isnt fair".
Secondly More room would have been nice.
Thirdly 8am is really really early for most of us. I certainly wouldnt mind 10-10. I dont know if this was venue enforced or just something the store came up with.
To be edited later if I'm told I sound too much like an asshat.
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Mostly Logistical, I ran into no rules issues during the game.
Timing was not quite what I expected. I don't mind starting at 8. But finishing at 8 was unexpected and disappointing.
Lunch... I know the idea was that we could all be more careful about lunch. But halfway through a shooting phase 1/2 the players disappeared leaving the other half stuck. That needs organizing better.
Players being spread out across the table. If you are going to spread out too far, then you MUST allow the people on that section to fight your models for you. I lost track of how many times I asked are we done yet and was told now, I'm waiting on player x....
Coffee ran out mid afternoon :(
A great day all in all.
Cheers,
Alan
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Not a huge fan of the 8 am start (or getting called that people are bailing at 7:00am ;)). 10-10 sounds quite reasonable.
Not a fan of deli meat style but it's adequate (I'm in different but I also know the range of food is limited for such a venue so it's all good).
Agreed on the coffee bit.
Agreed on the water bit.
Not have Mike show up Thursday night to build an Emperor Friday ;).
Something learned from this year which I hope everyone does: Clever use of stratagems can render any super heavy or big monster useless.
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- The Black Emperor was built in a week and looked like it was built in a week. Solid attention to craftsmanship and allocation of adequate time by scratch builders would be appreciated.
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You were just looking at him from the wrong side. If you looked at him from the side of chaos, for example, he looks much better.
Also, you fielded a Frisbee. Your argument is invalid.
Haha, just kidding. Don't worry, were I to field the Black Emperor again, he'll be much improved.
Bigger! Blacker! More Emperor!
Anyways, here's my list of things we could improve upon next year.
1.) The Superheavy arms race is a valid concern. although teamwork and solid strategy certainly helps, the team that fields more superheavies tend to have the advantage. Don't think about your ability to kill a superheavy. Think about the superheavy's ability to kill things compared to a mix of units that cost the same points. For example, when I found myself deployed across from this eldar player, and a Tau player, I pretty much (with not inconsiderable help from my teammates) wiped out their forces by turn 3.
It was really fun. I had a great time doing it. But it was also pretty broken. We should probably address this for next year's megabattle.
2.) We should definitely not think about limiting datasheets (titans are technically a datasheet, but for this discussion let's pretend they're separate). Even stratagems we should take great care in limiting. We had some epic level drama over the disruptor beacon stratagem, something that didn't have any affect on my table, and I would imagine was similarly impressive on the planet surface. Really, these things aren't as bad as you'd think. Not when your side can field a reaver titan.
3.) I think one reason the atmosphere was much better this year is because there was far less whining on either side the day of the event. We should make this a rule. NO WHINING.
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3.) I think one reason the atmosphere was much better this year is because there was far less whining on either side the day of the event. We should make this a rule. NO WHINING.
"Thou Shalt not Whine" It works :)
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The only thing i would like to see is a time limit for turns. Atleast on the moon I seemed to be the only on trying to keep the game from stalling.
Also I think that models that were hastily prepared should be left out as they take away from those who spend weeks and months working on some very good models such as Nick's titan.
Lastly I'm probably the only one who will take this stance but I love the 8-8 time schedual.
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- The Black Emperor was built in a week and looked like it was built in a week. Solid attention to craftsmanship and allocation of adequate time by scratch builders would be appreciated.
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You were just looking at him from the wrong side. If you looked at him from the side of chaos, for example, he looks much better.
Also, you fielded a Frisbee. Your argument is invalid.
Haha, just kidding. Don't worry, were I to field the Black Emperor again, he'll be much improved.
Bigger! Blacker! More Emperor!
Big Blackie definitely gives you a base to build on. If you worked on him slow and steady over the course of a year, he could become almost sexy. ;D
Anyways, here's my list of things we could improve upon next year.
1.) The Superheavy arms race is a valid concern. although teamwork and solid strategy certainly helps, the team that fields more superheavies tend to have the advantage. Don't think about your ability to kill a superheavy. Think about the superheavy's ability to kill things compared to a mix of units that cost the same points. For example, when I found myself deployed across from this eldar player, and a Tau player, I pretty much (with not inconsiderable help from my teammates) wiped out their forces by turn 3.
It was really fun. I had a great time doing it. But it was also pretty broken. We should probably address this for next year's megabattle.
I did kind of notice your wiping out those Eldar and Tau players. Glad to hear your evaluation.
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I think that players who are spread way out should be constantly looking at their models to see where they are needed to roll dice. The guy playing Daemons on the planet table was MIA when I needed him to roll dice a lot.
Also, if people have to leave, I think they should probly pack up their stuff.
The guy that had the chaos emperor titan was suddenly playing the whole chaos side of the planet table in the last turn which I thought was weird, but no biggie.
Th last gripe I have is that I didn't have a Thunderhawk for my Marines. I'm gonna change that for nedt year.
I enjoyed myself very much and I love deli meat too, so it was good all around :)
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All in all, I didn't have much of a problem with any of the rule changes. I thought the way they were agreed on was fair, and the final call for all of the discrepancies behind each rule discussed was fair. But I do agree with Rob, that something of a panel of players, headed by Chase and Derek would be inevitably necessary as the Megabattles in the future continue to grow on larger scales.
What I did not like:
- Space was a little tighter than I would've imagined. Having stayed at that hotel previously, and even attended events there, I was expecting us to have the Grand Ballroom, and I admit was a little upset that it wasn't there.
- Coffee and Water service could've been better as well.
- Didn't hear about the guy stepping on Nick's Titan until the day after. I propose that if the same guy is working during our next Megabattle, we keep him the hell out of the ballroom.
- While this was irrelevant to the time we actually ended, because by this time, 2 out of the 5 Disorder players on my table had left, I would've liked to play longer.
Otherwise, the venue was fine, the food was above average, and the atmosphere was pleasant. Kudos to Hotel Steve D!
Things I did like:
- 8:00 am start time (I'm 100% with Jake on this). Seriously guys, it's one day out of a week when we have to wake up at a little earlier. Most of us get up earlier during the week for work as it is; one more day out of the year isn't going to kill anyone. Stopping the game at 8:00 seemed a bit early, but it gave us a chance to get dinner and actually spend time together after the game while it was still relatively early in the night. I had a lot of fun afterwards as well, and I'm sure that others would agree that the time we spent at Bertucci's that night was just as rewarding as playing in the Megabattle.
That's all for now! I'll chime in again if I think of anything else!
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8 to 8 start time was great in my oppinion. Id rather have time after to chill out and do stuff rather then stop late and going home and doing nothing. Its rough in the morning to wake up early, ill admit that. But later on it pays off.
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The only part I kinda of disliked was not being able to take the emperor down but that was expected.
Also the way lunch was handle could have been better with each table taking a lunch break and not just wondering off to the food.
Was fun fighting the titan but I thing the Towering Monstrosity might need tweaking to make it more fair.
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I thought for a while about what I did not like about this years battle and the issues I have with it and relized I couldent fit it all into the 50,000 or so words I get here on the forums so in summary. Alot.
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Painting
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Don't even start me on painting..... I spent 2 months trying to get a certain 2 people to paint for it to be rushed in a week...
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Don't even start me on painting..... I spent 2 months trying to get a certain 2 people to paint for it to be rushed in a week...
I work well under pressure!!
Things I did not like:
- Last Minute Rule Changes, lets try and get things set in stone (i.e big rulings) many months beforehand. To do this maybe set up a player council to deal with these issues so Chase doesnt have his head explode
- Water running out mid day
- Leaving mid game. I had suggested that since I still had my asset mid game I would move to the table down 2 people, but was shot down. While on a regular basis, moving is bad, but moving to help out a table that lost people mid game would not have thrown things in a complete tizzy.
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- Leaving mid game.
THIS. I think except for an emergency of some sort, players should do their best to stay for the duration of the game. Be a gentleman, don't screw your table.
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- Leaving mid game.
THIS. I think except for an emergency of some sort, players should do their best to stay for the duration of the game. Be a gentleman, don't screw your table.
QFT
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Why is everyone complaining about the water and coffee running out. I thought it was complementary from the hotel, so it would make sense they wouldn't refilling the water and coffee unless it was included in the cost of renting.
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Why is everyone complaining about the water and coffee running out. I thought it was complementary from the hotel, so it would make sense they wouldn't refilling the water and coffee unless it was included in the cost of renting.
True.
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Was i the only smart one to bring a 2 liter with me? :P
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Was i the only smart one to bring a 2 liter with me? :P
I brought water...and snacks.
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Why is everyone complaining about the water and coffee running out. I thought it was complementary from the hotel, so it would make sense they wouldn't refilling the water and coffee unless it was included in the cost of renting.
It's more so that it would have been nicer if it continued. It's moot whether or not it was complimentary, the point is that they stopped and people would have enjoyed if they were around longer.
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It just seemed to me that people were expecting it to continue.
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Why is everyone complaining about the water and coffee running out. I thought it was complementary from the hotel, so it would make sense they wouldn't refilling the water and coffee unless it was included in the cost of renting.
It's more so that it would have been nicer if it continued. It's moot whether or not it was complimentary, the point is that they stopped and people would have enjoyed if they were around longer.
Actualy they re-filled it twice. We did have more available to us we just would have to pay for it or you could have come to me like 90% of the other people and say "hey Steve D. Can you hook us up with more water?" and it would be done because im Steve D.
The only thing I didnt care for was a lot of the bickering and drama before the game. There were a few other things that bothered me but I will not say them here.
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There were a few other things that bothered me but I will not say them here.
It's alright, herpes bothers me too.
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There were a few other things that bothered me but I will not say them here.
It's alright, herpes bothers me too.
Just remember, its the gift that keeps on giving.
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Does any one else have anything they didnt like about the game and not the venue?
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Things I did not like:
- Last Minute Rule Changes, lets try and get things set in stone (i.e big rulings) many months beforehand. To do this maybe set up a player council to deal with these issues so Chase doesnt have his head explode
Yes. Let's try and keep my sperg'ing to a minimum.
On a serious note, I think we made a LOT of progress on the rules front this year. I am very happy with the choices and changes we made overall and felt like the game played out almost exactly how we wanted it to. I would expect almost everything to remain unchanged going forward. There's only one issue remaining that I would like to see cleared up.
I can promise that things will be a lot more refined and organized next year in at least this department. MUCH was learned. :)
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Chase,
We should teach you how to play 40k. Haha.
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Another thing I did not like was how difficult the "Hero Character" (white based character) was to kill.
This may or may not be a function of the amount of attention he was paid or how the players chose to play the game itself.
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Chase,
We should teach you how to play 40k. Haha.
Negative, but I appreciate the offer.
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Another thing I did not like was how difficult the "Hero Character" (white based character) was to kill.
This was very evident at our table, specifically between Nate's and Doug's Heroes. At the end of round 1, they went toe to toe with each other, and only until the end of turn 4 did Doug's HC finally win, with only 1 wound left. Hitting on 4's and wounding on 6's was pretty tough...
It was like watching Ali and Frazier going at it forever, before Ali finally won. :D
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Another thing I did not like was how difficult the "Hero Character" (white based character) was to kill.
This may or may not be a function of the amount of attention he was paid or how the players chose to play the game itself.
On my table at least, I didn't notice this at all. On the highlands side, there were multiple dead Chaos heroes which nabbed us quite a few points. I don't think we had that much difficulty taking them down. On the swamp table, both mine and Dave's hero lived unhurt mainly because there was no attention paid to them. I personally think that the hero was perfect in creation.
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I felt like he was an awesome piece for players to play around and presented a considerable amount of options for players to take advantage of. It seems to me like many did not embrace the significance of the piece and it's value to the game, which is totally fine. The intent was to give each person something to play around (or not). I think we achieved that.
I heard many, many times that he was too difficult to kill or that he was completely ignored. Again, I don't know how much of this is due to flawed design (or desire) on my part (seeing as I wanted him to be tough to kill) or a lack of attention paid to how important he was on parts of each table.
Anyhow I'm glad to hear that, Rob.
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My problem with the mobile objective was in fluff. There was no attempt to create a story that went with the game mechanics, there was no motivation that made sense role playing wise. I'd rather not duplicate the particular mechanism in future years. I'd rather have more emphasis on tell-a-story rather than play-to-win.
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This is obviously not the place to debate this but the goal of the piece was to make sure that each person had something he could play around no matter what. How each player chose to do this was entirely up to him, but I feel like the potential for many things was definitely there.
Even if a person felt totally overwhelmed or that they couldn't contribute in any other meaningful way (maybe like the people having to face down an Emperor Titan, or something similar) they could still *game* around the fact that they can contribute effectively to their team from a loss management perspective.
The piece certainly served his intended purpose but I feel like maybe he was a bit too tough to kill. This would translate into him either being too good or too bad at his intended "job" (as defined by the player).
Fluff wise we made no attempt to justify the piece for several reasons. It was added simply as something for each person to play around.
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My problem with the mobile objective was in fluff. There was no attempt to create a story that went with the game mechanics, there was no motivation that made sense role playing wise. I'd rather not duplicate the particular mechanism in future years. I'd rather have more emphasis on tell-a-story rather than play-to-win.
I disagree. I made mine from a successor chapter of the Dark Angels, The Angels of Redemption. They hunt The Fallen as hard if not harder than the Dark Angels. It fit nicely with the theme of my army. It was also an aded bonus that Cypher was a mobile objective on the Disorder side that I was facing. I was trying to get to him to have the epic battle but I couldn't quite make it through the Thousand Sons that were protecting him.
With that being said, I do think that those character were difficult to kill. The armor saves were a bit too much . Perhaps a 3+/4+ would work out better with 3 wounds.
There really wasn't too much that I disliked besides my rolling. I had a ton of fun and look forward to next year. I think the Key for every one to remember is fun. Just put a bunch of stuff that you worked hard painting on theboard, roll some dice and enjoy yourself. One other thing that people should focus on is maybe not doing something that will inhibit the fun of others. I know that people want to field a bunch of cool stuff that blows up the world, but that is only fun for you for about 2 seconds. It will quickly become not fun if you have a pissed off opponent that just is shooting fire out of his/her eyes at you.
That's my 2 cents.
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Fluff wise we made no attempt to justify the piece for several reasons. It was added simply as something for each person to play around.
Noted.
I found that there were implied story lines in the table interactions. While you didn't spend a lot of time writing stories, the logic of the table interactions were easy enough to see, and if anyone wanted to write them up in a fluffy way, they could.
The fixed and mobile objectives, less so. They were game mechanics not part of a meaningful story. To the extent that this became painfully obvious, one might get suspension of disbelief problems, or a feeling of micromanagement. Certain styles of play were rewarded.
But this would be a taste thing. I'll just note it as one of the things I didn't like, acknowledge that others feel differently, and suggest that you might make an attempt at a theme or story line in future years.
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My problem with the mobile objective was in fluff. There was no attempt to create a story that went with the game mechanics, there was no motivation that made sense role playing wise. I'd rather not duplicate the particular mechanism in future years. I'd rather have more emphasis on tell-a-story rather than play-to-win.
I disagree. I made mine from a successor chapter of the Dark Angels, The Angels of Redemption. They hunt The Fallen as hard if not harder than the Dark Angels. It fit nicely with the theme of my army.
That is a good example of incorporating fluff into the mega battle, but it was a Dark Angel thing not available to most other players. I'd like to see it done more.
There really wasn't too much that I disliked besides my rolling. I had a ton of fun and look forward to next year. I think the Key for every one to remember is fun. Just put a bunch of stuff that you worked hard painting on the board, roll some dice and enjoy yourself. One other thing that people should focus on is maybe not doing something that will inhibit the fun of others. I know that people want to field a bunch of cool stuff that blows up the world, but that is only fun for you for about 2 seconds. It will quickly become not fun if you have a pissed off opponent that just is shooting fire out of his/her eyes at you.
The Superheavy imbalance problem seems to be at the core of the above paragraph. I heard various conflicting snippets when in the store today. One Disorder player grumbled about facing a surplus of D templates on the Big Table, and it not being a lot of fun. (I sympathized, but...) A few talked about taking out titans as a fun aspect of the game that they'd like to play. A few people were talking about building titans for next year. Having superiority in D Templates does seem to give a side an advantage, so we are apt to see more escalation next year.
I'm not even sure what group is in the majority, the no-holds-barred folk or the keep-it-reasonably-balanced people. If I could figure out how many potential players prefer what, I might argue either for an Iron Man Table to keep the small number of folk who will spend all their points on superheavies happy, or a repeat of the no-titan underground table, where a few folks might want to go if they don't want to deal with the possibility of fighting an all superheavy opponent.
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I would expect to see something very, very similar to the Sewer table in terms of restrictions again next year.
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I wish we could have finished the game, so maybe more time? Though we could've played more efficiently... The thing that seemed to hold up the game most on the planet table was waiting for all the players who had their units spread out all over the board to walk to all the places they were needed, assess what was happening there, and then roll the dice they needed to roll. Heck, even when all they needed to do was roll dice, it still took a long time. It is for this reason that I wanted to throw any weight I have behind this:
"Players being spread out across the table. If you are going to spread out too far, then you MUST allow the people on that section to fight your models for you. I lost track of how many times I asked are we done yet and was told now, I'm waiting on player x...."
I'd even say, "If you're going to spread out at ALL beyond your initial starting point + a few feet beyond..." Perhaps an "I am bringing these guys over here to secure this objective and/or kill that unit. When they're done doing that or if you have any brilliant ideas, swing by during our opponents' turn to discuss" would be useful.
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I wish we could have finished the game, so maybe more time? Though we could've played more efficiently...
I remember that problem from 2009, but it didn't exist on the moon in 2010. Smaller tables and fewer players helps a lot. The table being small enough for "Hey Bob!" to get someone's attention helps.
I've considered suggesting a limit where one couldn't bring your troops on the table more than some arbitrary distance from one's deployment area. I've considered suggesting a limit on table size. I also have played in another store where they timed turns, where if you didn't finish a phase, it was left unresolved. One might assign 'whips' whose job is to keep things moving.
But there are downsides to all of the above. Trying to beat the clock resulted in a high stress game. Playing on a huge table is a large part of the attraction of the mega battle. Being able to reinforce an area of the table that needs help is part of the game. There are options, but we might want to be careful on which ones we might implement.
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a large problem for me since i was delaying the game was the lack of knowledge people had about their armies. when I was doing anything to a few players be it shooting or close combat they constantly had to look everything up and even by the end of the game still didnt know their own stats. i didnt like being yelled at to hurry up when it was not me holding up the game.
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a large problem for me since i was delaying the game was the lack of knowledge people had about their armies. when I was doing anything to a few players be it shooting or close combat they constantly had to look everything up and even by the end of the game still didnt know their own stats. i didnt like being yelled at to hurry up when it was not me holding up the game.
Don't worry. Even if you associate with people who don't have their codices memorized, you are still totally awesome.