Some thoughts on Age of Sigmar

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matt9872
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Some thoughts on Age of Sigmar

Post by matt9872 »

After my initial distaste at the release of Age of Sigmar, a game replacing the much loved game I have only recently gotten into, I feel I'm slowly starting to get my head around it. The purpose of this post is to share my thoughts on how Age of Sigmar is intended to be played and thus creating a sense of balance which many have identified as lacking.

The key element of this game is during the deployment phase. In order to make the most out of this game, one has to, in my opinion, get out of the habit of making an army list prior to the battle. The idea behind it is to take your collection of models, the size of which depends on how much you want to take and potentially use. This is opposed to making a 2000 point list and purely taking those models along. The idea behind Age of Sigmar is to use deployment to counter the units which your opponent is placing in front of you. In this sense the army you are using in the battle is only determined once the deployment phase is over. You place a unit of Ogres, I place a unit of Wildwood Rangers to counter it, and so on: you use your collection to counter, one at a time, what your opponent is deciding to deploy. You don't need points algorithms if you are simply deploying an army which you feel is best placed to beat what it sat opposite it.

What are people opinions on this?
overtninja
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Re: Some thoughts on Age of Sigmar

Post by overtninja »

Rather than keep lists in your head when you go to play AoS, it's better to keep possible unit combos, interactions and possible multi-unit strategies that you can make use of with your collection when you deploy. Other than that, knowing your opponent's army well enough to consider possible counters and what sort of combos and strategies they could be fielding against you is useful as well.

There's a neat interplay between reactionary deployment ('this unit of x models will beat his last deployment in a fight') and proactive deployment ('this unit of x dudes will combo well with my other units to form the basis of an effective force') in AoS to make things interesting and require a good amount of thought. I don't think going too heavily on reactionary deployment is advantageous, because you want your deployed units to interact well and support one another, and if you deploy solely by reaction you are letting your opponent play the way they want and hoping you can counter them, rather than fielding units that help you dictate the terms of the engagement. You want your opponent to feel worried about some of your units, rather than always being worried about what they are fielding.

I also actually like that the process of playing the game, once deployment is settled, is straightforward and not a 3.5-hour slog. The more games you can potentially play in a system, the better hang you have of it, and the better your can potentially play the system. It's possible to get 2-3 games of AoS played in an evening, rather than 1 game of, say, 8th edition.
Jezandu
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Re: Some thoughts on Age of Sigmar

Post by Jezandu »

People also need to get out of there head the sparce battlefields you would have played during 8th addition. Get the table decorated with loads of scenery as you no longer have to move your troops in silly large clumps that don't fit through gaps. Bridge fights, alleyways, various buildings that can be fought on different levels, try them out and see the difference!
Duraska
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Re: Some thoughts on Age of Sigmar

Post by Duraska »

To me, the biggest failing of Age of Sigmar is when you try and do "pick-up" games with strangers. Half the time you'll either bring a way stronger list, and feel bad as you crush your opponent, or you'll end up playing a guy who drops nagash and a bunch of VC troops that are absolutely indestructable due to synergies.

Finding a way to balance lists is very hard... this "kinda" works http://scrollbuilder.com/ (using the "Pool" system), but it still doesn't handle some of the insane synergies and summoning that can occur.

If you're playing against a buddy, Age of Sigmar works pretty well. It's entertaining. If you're taking models to a shop and hoping to get a game in... be ready for dissappointment, 8th ed worked soooo much better.
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Re: Some thoughts on Age of Sigmar

Post by PGP »

They killed it. You can see this by following any whfb army sites. Nobody is discussing anything. Updates every second week for anything. I have not written anything since age of sigmar came out. Gw made a test with whfb, how well this type of easier rules attract new customers as the old customers are not buying anymore the main money makers:figures. It seems they finally found a saturation point for figure price. I think they tried to make the game more like wh40k, which sell quite well still. At least the old guard are not buying it. I wish they decrease the over risen ridiculous high figure price and put the more complex rules again in, but they probably do not. It seems that you need Games Workshop to make scene viable, internet communities are not enough. It might be that the backup is the mmorpg type of system (like upcomig total war warhamner), where you buy virtual figures. Byte is a cheaper to manufacture than plastic mould.
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