"Non-GW fantasy miniature battles" Topic

I'm not a fantasy player but am thinking about a convention for miniature gaming (Historical and Fantasy) I've noticed a number of beautiful fantasy figures (28mm) that are not produced by GW. As I understand it, only GW figures are allowed to be played in GW wargaming. I would like to include those that don't have GW figures as well as GW figures. How would I appeal to those who do not have GW figures? Do they also use Warhammer? Are there other rules these non-GW figure users use?

I would like this convention to be as inclusive as possible with the stipulation that it is for miniatures only.

Rich

You can have a warhammer tournament without requiring that GW figures be used for it. I've run those before myself.

As pictors said, you can have Warhammer and WH 40K games with whatever figures people want to use, if it is not a GW sanctioned event.

Adepticon dropped the GW model requirement for Warhammer Fantasy events last year. The Indy GT circuit has always allowed the use of non-GW figures in their events.

Thanks guys. That's the way I'll go.

Rich

But don't forget to check out other rules systems as well; there are a number which you might like.

Off the top of my head (and not recommending anything in particular):

Armies of Arcana is intended to be a head-to-head competitor with WHFB (e.g. A Really Big Skirmish with 1 fig=1 man). Lots of people here praise it highly.

Fantasy Rules! uses multiple figs on a base, and is also popular.

Hordes of the Things, or HOTT, is the fantasy version of DBA: multi-figs on a base, fast play.

Warmaster is GW's 10mm system of really big battles, using units made up of stands of multiple figs; stands are removed as a unit takes damage, which both tracks damage and weakens the units effectiveness. Rules are free, and lots of companies make suitable 10mm fantasy ranges. (6mm will also work well with this system.)

Mighty Armies is a 15mm multi-figs per base system, on the order of HOTT.

Splintered Light is a 15mm system (1 to 1, IRCC), which is growing in popularity and has a great line of miniatures, too.

The various Wargods rules and minis are also popular (Wargods of Olympus, Wargods of Aegyptus), and fit in the 1 to 1 category.

And there's also Warmachine, sort of fantasy steampunk game with 1:1.

I almost forgot Confrontation from Rackham. Elaborate minis, also a 1:1 system, I believe.

That's by no means the end of the list.

Others will need to comment on the quality, availability, and value of these various systems (Warmaster is the only one I play, and I love it), but they're all worth looking at.

Parzival, I expect by "Splintered Light" you mean Song of Blades and Heroes, which is fantasy skirmish 1:1, and for which Splintered Light markets 15mm warbands.

Splintered Light (my son's company) also is developing a mass army system PRIDE OF LIONS (authored by me).

And I agree: there's a LOT of good systems out there worth trying.

How about Bladestorm? I still use that set on occasion when I'm not paying Warmachine or AT-43.

Oh, I almost forgot to add the old AD&D Battlesystem rules, you can get those for real cheap on Ebay and it's a good ruleset too.

Reaper's game WARLORDS

I play Bladestorm also, but it isn't a great system for tournaments, because it requires bookkeeping – You have to keep track of hit points – which is annoying. Still, the game has a lot of strengths.

Rich Knapton,

I'm the publisher of Song of Blades and Heroes that was kindly mentioned above. If you are interested in running an event with Song of Blades, I could send you a free copy of the rules. To get an idea of how the rules work, you can read the reviews on songofblades.blogspot.com

You can contact me at andreasfiligoi@gmail.com

And of course, you should always allow people to run their own rules sets. Allowing these homebrew rules are critical in attracting many GMs and players, judging from the conventions I've attended over the years.

They can't force you to use GW figures outside an official GW event/shop. However if you want battles not skirmishes then seriously consider Warmaster (now a 'Living Rulebook', so free as mentioned above).

link

A bag of 30x10mm from Pendraken will make one unit up for £3, as opposed to the £0.80 GBP to £1.00 GBP a fugure you need to pay for 25mm, and it looks so much more 'huge army'- a 'brigade' of 4 units is a block of 120 figures (my Romans look good like this- 6x2 on a base gives a frontage of 36, and a depth of 4).

Although there are an Ancients set of WM rules, they are easily converted to any pre-gunpowder period- I have used them for War of the Roses, and there are conversions for ECW, ACW and Napoleonics on the 'net. In fact "Bl**zKr**g C*mm**der" is a WW2 attempt (Please pass my bargepole).

Download a copy of the original Chainmail game from the 70's. The game's fantasy section was so good it spawned D&D.