Warpath – The Rules
July 4, 2011 by dignity
Video Sponsor: Wayland Games
Ronnie, Alessio and Andy have a discussion about the Beta Rules for Warpath and the process behind their creation.
Get the Rules here:
Beta Discussion Groups here:
Also if your a Backstage Pass holder you can download a set of Unofficial Markers & Templates we created.
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I have only one thing that stood out to me as a little odd, and im hoping this will get addressed, maybe with more army lists being released. That is your Zap special rule. Same as with KoW, i find it a bit bland, that there is just one spell that all units with the same special rule throw out. I appreciate you guys trying to keep it simple, but we only ask for a little more variety with KoW magic flinging, or warpath’s psychic alien shockstorming, or what have you. Right now it just seems samey all accross the board.
other than that game is looking awesome, i really hope we can get some teasers to some more planned races in the near future
i really wanna see the models for this 🙂
indeed ^^
Sounds good so far looking forward to more coverage on the game this week. I take it all these videos were filmed around the time of the Turn 8 a few weeks back. Every video I have seen Ronnie in he looks tired. It must be all that frantic plastic boxing they do over at mantic. Great effort so far though from them. Im holding my breath to see what the Forgefathers look like.
I think Ill comment on that sentence by sentence, but not as a rant just as sort of a juxtaposition between what they say and what they actually achieved
1.”If you think of modern warfare you dont think of blocks of troops, you think of people dispersing as much as possible[…]” – You have to stay in a max distance of 5″ to the leader and 1″ to another model of your unit which is kind of piled up
2.a “I mean what you are talking about really is scalability” – Yes it is kind of scalable because when it comes down to the game no matter how much figures you have its actually not a mass miniature based game ( meaning that each miniature counts) but a profile based one where only the profile is important. Because in the end if you have 100 miniatures ( split up into lets say 10 units a 10 men ) or if you have 10 miniatures ( split up into two teams ) you dont actually play with 100 minis what you do is that you almost play with just 10 ( some exceptions from that rule yeah I give you that ) the leaders of the unit and actually that is the problem ( I know I mentioned it before but I wanted to respond to this video specifically ) …it is scalable because it doesnt really matter that you have more miniatures on the board! as it will always come down to a single profile per unit that could easily be represented by just one figure personal profile. If this is for good or for bad is up to you .
2.b “You pile damage on units until they dissolve” which basically means: besides influencing the nerve test damage actually has no effect on the unit or its effectiveness on the field , its ( the damage) basically just sitting there in the back until it really kicks in and the whole unit is gone at once. which once again means …you could represent the whole unit – that uses one static profile – by one figure.
3.”a unit fights a unit [speaking of close combat]” – so even in close combat its still one profile and you only need to get one model into contact and the rest just moves up , it doesnt matter WERE in that combat your special weapons are or where your guys stand, which models they have in contact and whatnot – again you could just resolve this with just one model.
some quotes that stand out for me
Allessio:
“Actually there are no individual modells[…]” – see point 2.a
“You never remove things” – see point 2.a and 2.b
to solve your heavier weapon problem : just DONT make it possible to stick a heavy weapon in every unit, so that it is clearly separated in those that hunt down tanks (maybe in even smaller units containing just a leader and a weapon – a “weapon team” one would say, and yes that would expose them to fire but that is the same in real war you try to take out the anti tank weapons first and youll shoot at them if you can spot them) and those that fight infantry. Combined with your rules of LOS of vehicles …I mean that they cant just shot in every direction because they have a certain direction they are facing (which I think are just the right thing to do ! so huzzah for that ! ) that would be a relatively realistic scenario – because you anti infantry guys would have to protect your heavy weapons guys against enemy infantry, whilst they try to sneak up to a tank and shoot him from an angle he is not facing at.
so these are my two cents and again I am not ranting or trolling, I am just pointing out. Hopefully impartial enough. And yes I promise, this will be the last time I emphasize this whole “you-can-play-this-with-one-model-instead-of-an-unit”-thing. It just really bothers me because I am not sure if we need another game that is fast and easy, I would rather like to have a game that is tactically really challenging but in a big scale ( I know its a herculean task to come up with something like this ^^but: GO ALESSIO GO ! ) and I somehow hoped for warpath to be this game 🙁
so long
Seb
@partisan – these are clear and well made points. I too like the fact that as I fight my units get smaller, you get a very visual sense of how the battle is going.
I also understand the aim of warpath (and kings of war) is to create something super clean and to do that you HAVE to remove detailed/complex rules. I truly believe they are doing a great job, and this game style is not quite right for me.
Plus remember we’re not paying 30+ pounds for the rule book and 15+ pounds for an codex…
Saying that the models look very interesting. Now need to go and make up all the zombies and ghouls I got from mantic for my non gw [almost] warhammer army.
I’ve heard the 8th race is from a world of cheese – lead by Emporer Darrell – The Rancid…
Can’t wait to see some of the Mini’s :). Really hope that revealing won’t be a backstage event :).
I am a little fed up with Mantic allready though.
Out of the last two orders, i have had bad paint, 2 items missing and had to keep emailing them because they didnt answer!
The last order i am still waiting for over 2 weeks now.
Ill be sticking with something else i think.
I put a large order in with Mantic and had no problems considering it had to Travel to the other side of the world to get to me in Australia took 3 weeks from the time i placed it to arrive. No company will always be perfect with picking orders or replying straight away to forum post/emails give them a chance to iron out there dispatch/warehouse issues before giving up on them completely. 🙂
I am more interested in the concept of the ‘universe’ mantic are producing, the models , there fine looking at KoW , I know they will do a good job, its the factions and the backstory I am interested in.
I still think there are problems with units being defined as ‘running off’ or breaking there nerve…thats fine , but sometimes people DO die in combat , this is like saying people get scared of big bangs and then run away.
if a model/unit is hit and it doesnt make the saves for the damage , it shouldnt be on the board after…this would also impact on the unit coherancy and the amount of dice able to shoot later..which I dont feel has been addressed.
From the sounds of some people it seems that they where hoping for Infinity in a grand scale. The reality is as much as Mantic is pushing for this game, its the models that will matter as that will be the revenue for them. Lets stop pretending what this is. Most will buy for the cost of fielding a cheap 40k army. Even the lists are almost carbon copies of codex choices. Yes they are written different but we all have brains and know the truth.
Im sorry for this rant, but for some time something just didn’t feel right. I could never put my finger on it until I watched this video. It’s this sense of pride and arrogance of giving GW the middle finger. Im no big fan of the company, but I would expect better from its competitors.
No more copy cat models with a tweak, your more than capable for coming up with your own unique designs. I do believe mantic can take the high ground still.
Once again sorry for the out burst, it just needed to be said.
Well I don’t know if “no copycat models” is a good thing or not, I mean an orc is an ork is a scarren is a Jiralhanae is an Oni, and lets face it we want our brutish savage warrior race alien guys, we want Space Dwarfs and we want PIIIIGS! IIIN! SPPAAAACE!(well maybe that’s a step too far) The thing is, doing other stuff with the races and creating unique other races and interesting human elements is what will keep warpath moving after the copycat start, but to get it going they’ve started with a solid base that we know roughly what’s going on with. Weather you got the information from warcraft, warhammer D&D, LOTR or runequest, you know what a dwarf is, you know what an elf is, you know what an orc is, you know what they’ll be about you dont need to get yourself invested in a bunch of fluff(which is good cos its not done yet..) to play them, but if they had started with Fishmen or Lovecraftian squid aliens they’d be on an uphill start.
I have to say I can’t see any sense of pride in giving GW the finger over warpath specifically(though Orcie on the blog with his mallet and GW orc models probably bleeds through a bit…) I’m not going to deny the possibility its there, given that the two gents in the video pointedly no longer work for GW, I don’t know them or the reasons behind that so I wouldn’t say “oh Ronnie/Alessio doing this because its the opposite of what Mark Wells/Mat Ward would do!”. They’d have to be extremely petty individuals to set out to make a new game just to flip off their old boss, cos frankly if it backfires it’ll cost them a helluva lot of money, time and energy for what? A sense of smug glee that they don’t work at GW now? I’ve never worked at GW, that should make me the happiest guy on the planet by that logic, but no I’m just a guy rambling on the internet at twenty five past two in the morning…
No offence but those Space Dwarfs look different and unique. They’re not biker dwarfs in space, they’re the real deal.
still dwarfs and actually dwarfs in space? …Squats anyone ? Its been there before its more about the whole idea that never changes not about the specific look of that idea ^^
GW had their chance and blew it with me. I Love Dwarves, and after they removed Squats for Weeaboo Tau and always keeping the new Space Dwarves (Demiurg) like a teaser for the fans is really a dick move. Also the way they banned everybody that asked about them on the forum. If GW fanboys and GW themselves whine, I can only say they have themselves to blame. All the price hikes and crap they pulled and the shit is.. if they had a Space Dwarf Army.. I probably would already have bought it ages ago.
So GO MANTIC! GO! Even if I can use this as a Demiurg Army by using Space Marine rules with some special rules borrowed from SpaceWolves and/or Salamander. I finally have my Space Dwarves again!
Squats were more like garden gnomes on bikes in space.
They share nothing – at all- with the design images of forgefathers , you may as well call them eldar copies, they bear as much resemblance.
Does anybody know: will there be Warpath Undead??
I hope there is! (as long as its real undead and not Necrons)
ps. apologies for shedding no light on your question
I’m confused by Alessio’s description of the movement rules. That is, that you only need to measure the leader’s movement and then position the rest of the squad around him within 5″, even if that means some figures move more than their Speed value. This directly contradicts the way the rules are written, that each figure is moved a distance of no more than their Speed value. Are they getting mixed up with the Alpha? I’m curious because I didn’t see the Alpha and I can’t imagine any other reason this would be so incorrectly described.
If we go by Alessio’s version in the video, in theory a man who is 5″ behind the leader could then be positioned 5″ in front of the leader after the move, giving a movement of 10″ plus their Speed value (assuming they didn’t move at the double or charge). Now there’s running, and then there’s RUNNING! It just doesn’t seem correct and flies in the face of the written rules.
Otherwise, I’m very keen to give this a go!
Again AWESOME Mantic, Love the Corp Ideal. Please tell me that at the end of the hole chain of comand in the corp trooper forces there’s a big dumbass Banker Exce/Ceo ( in space ) that can be hit by my free loving sniper ( pretty please ). Shadow Run in space love it . My friends and I are going nuts on the rules, but using GW minis is shall i say not right. Can’t weight till the Warpath Minis come out. looking forward to that day.
Alternative targeting?..I like that idea. Being able to split the units fire assets is a more realistic way of viewing it, it would happen in the ‘real world’ 😉 When a target reveals itself, it’s opportunity, the more targets engaged the better. imho.
On the matter of splitting fire i would suggest the following.
Command points: each round you roll a D6 and determen the amount of command points for this round (this represents how good the communication through the sound of gunnfire, disrupted communication systems ect. can be given.)
with this command points you are able to perform some special commands to units, like splitting the fire, moving faster insted of fireing, digging a barrikade quickly ect.
This is sounding an awful lot like AT-43, which is not really a bad thing. I’d suggest that Alessio goes out and grabs himself a copy of the AT-43 rulebook to see a good example of a sci-fi unit-based game that focuses on unit leaders, splitting fire, etc