"I need your help TMP!" Topic

I want to create a fantasy setting (full of background) for warhammer ancients. That sounds counter productive…. But my friends and i don't like warhammer fantasy… We like the WAB rules the best.

I need your help making the following:

1. The setting
2. The lore
3. Army lists
4. A logical spell system that isnt OP
5. A map (potentially)

I know im asking a lot, but i would really appreciate the help. Any small amount of effort would really help me.
I want your help on this one, helping balance things and making a decent setting.
Armies i know i want (very generic!)
Elves, dwarves, orcs, goblins, kingdom of man?, barbarians.

Toss around some other ideas for armies in the thread.

Any ideas are welcome.
You can email me at aapch45 at gmail dot com

Thank you so much for even looking at this
Austin

Well, you'd have to adjust for WAB, but you might take a look at DARK AND BLOODY GROUND which is a campaign for PRIDE OF LIONS. The second half, GOLDEN GROVE AND BLACKEST BLIGHT, is 90& done and should be out this winter. The Druid's Wyldewood is sylvan elves plus woodsmen, halflings, centaurs, bearmen, etc and allied dwarves from Mountain Home., versus Moonglade's dark elves and their subject races of goblins and orcs and such. The second half is an invasion of Wyldewood by the undead.

There is a map (area movement) and setting and lore, and army lists in PofL terms, and spells from the PofL rules. So you'd have to make adjustments for WAB. But it might provide some of what you are after.

link

$8 USD on sale at WG Vault right now, for a color pdf. All you need to print, probably, is the map. The back cover has 14 flags, 7 each side, for units in the campaign. The preview shows the first 6 pp. including the map.

I would just replace ancient armies with fantasy roman dwarves ,Ork Gauls , Greek elves perhaps?
As for magic I would go way back to the original warhammer and have similar spells available to each race this way it is how you use them .
So they do not become OP if everyone can have them.
That my tuppence

Is it that you don't like the setting? Why not, and what do you want different? Or just the rules? Why not play WAB in Warhammer world?

andy

We don't like the setting or the rules. The setting feels cobbled, and the armies are really unbalanced at mid point range.
I have been playing for 5 years.

We just like the way WAB works.
We want a setting that is sort of custom, so it has its own specific flavor.

I want a setting that I can stuff into a D&D campaign, and play out battles with at the same time.

The pride of lions stuff seems interesting, but I don't think I want to use it for WAB.

Thanks
Austin

You might want to have a look at the Warhammer Fantasy edition that WAB is based on.

I think WAB was based upon WFB 4th or 5th edition. WAB is still my ancient rule system of choice and I have plenty of folks to play it with. While I have bought and like what I see in the Pride of Lions the advantage I have with WAB is all the people I would regularly game with know the rules so there is not an issue of trying to cajole everyone to use a different rule system. And believe that can be a battle all of its own. So I understand aapch45 is trying to figure out. We have regularly played games of WAB with 2-3k in points and always finished a game in less than two or three hours. One reason is that you do not have all the magic and extra special racial traits. So here is my advice aapch45…

As Feet up Now suggested find historical army lists in WAB that fit with the fantasy races. Early Imperial Rome for the Dwarves seems about right to me. You have you Barbarians well at hand with either the Celtic or German forces or if you really want to give them some bite make them a Viking force. But you can play with that on your own.

As to spells, keep it simple. In fact you can break spell casting into three basic areas of use:

Offensive:Fireball/Lighting Bolt/Ray of Death is a line of site casting with a range of 24 and treat as a ballista in terms of damage and any unit targeted has to make a panic test.Spell is cast during the shooting phase.

Defensive: Wall of force,ice, wind, etc. is cast upon a unit and gives a +1 armor save that cannot be modified by weapon strength and is only useful against offensive magic, missile weapons, and ranged war machines, i.e., catapult/ballista, etc. In regards a weapon that cancels saving throws, i.e. cannon or catapult then the unit gets just the +1 save.

Supportive: These are spells that boost morale or rally fleeing troops. In essence the mage targets the affected unit and gives it a +1 on morale and rally tests.

Each force/army can only have one wizard/sorcerer/shaman/magic user per 1000 points.

Offensive spells would be cast in the shooting phase and can only be cast once per each magic user's per turn.

Defensive spells are cast during opponent's shooting phase after targets are declared by opponent. Again only one casting per magic user etc.

Supportive spells are cast during a player's movement phase during the rally segment, or during any phase in the player's turn when a unit has to make a panic/fear/terror test, or a moral test having lost a round of combat. Again the spell can only be cast once per turn per magic user in the force and a unit that still failed their test even with the spell cast on it cannot benefit from a second or subsequent magic user trying to cast a supportive spell.

To make a character a magic user costs 200 points.

How does that sound. I might do this myself.

That actually sounds pretty good whitemanticore.

I want to customize some of the lists and make it more fantastical.

So far so good.

Im expanding it to fantasy to draw more players in, and spice it up for my current players.

Thanks
Austin

I would suggest picking up a copy of the Armies of Arcana ruleset for the magic system and spell list. The casters for each army are able to select from a couple of available lists, and the spells are not so overpowered that they completely change the game (most unit buffs giving a +1 to attack rolls or defense rolls). Any powerful spells capable of wiping out half a unit have a chance of failure based on the magical defense of the unit it is being cast at, and can be dispelled by the enemy casters.

Since AoA is based on earlier editions of WHFB, it should be able to be imported as is. The point cost formula might even be compatible with WAB point costs.

For background and fluff, my advice to every early roleplay expedition (and this is roleplay) is to begin simply and let the history that you create add meat to the bare bones.
You are contented with the bedrock Western background of humans, elves, goblinoids, undead and perhaps demonic factions.

Within that tradition, the gnarlies and fey can have very little influence to overwhelming dominance. You may want a human base with very few and peripheral fantasy elements, all the way to a world where the 'other' is the absolute majority and humans are a rare oddity.

I will suggest as starting points two authors whose works are readily available. 'The Broken Sword' by Poul Anderson
link
and an essay by Robert E. Howard called 'The Hyborian Age', which can be found among other places in 'Conan the Barbarian'.
link
gutenberg.org/ebooks/42182
link

The Hyborian Age is useful as an example of world building; it is the fictional atlas and history of that hero's world, and everything Howard writes makes logical sense within the workings and structure of that world. I recommend it as an example, not a knock off. Your group will more enjoy your own creativity. Poul Anderson I recommend because he makes so much out of so few basics, all of which are classic myth of Western and Northern Europe and parts of Central Asia. It is incredibly rich although the ingredients are few and abstract.

If you have long term people starting this project, you might want to begin with a relatively unknown world which you and your players must discover and explore, and eventually fight over, just as an example. It would allow for serendipity and suspense, and the utility of a modular creation. Perhaps your known world begins in a caldera, and after you sort or flee that base, expeditions through crevasses or whatever lead your army or fugitives to – what? where? Is it in fact infinite?

Keeping it simple it usually keeps it fun and free.

On rules I heartily agree about Armies of Arcana for magical bolt ons. Just be careful the magic remains a heavy weapons section at most; not the tactical nukes that happens far, far too often.

Please keep us posted how it goes!

I actually found an old DND setting that I made in highschool. It has everything, I even invented a language for the world!

The world is nameless, but is divided into different countries already, the 2 main ones being Atroxis and Galderia. Galderia is your typical Roman style community, where atroxis is divided into different tribes who war with one another, and raid other nations.

I have some interesting races and race relations established in this world already, and a lot of lore written.

I think an orcs vs galderia game scenario would be interesting.

Orcs in my world actually have a relatively complex community, where the community is matralineal, and males function as hunters and breeders. Chieftains are picked by the biggest smartest females, and are typically used as breeding bulls when they aren't fighting.

Orcs and northern atroxians have alliances and do joint raids on neighboring human and goblin settlements.

The only "fluff" I have is a creation story, and relations between Atroxis, Galderia, and orcs.

Any additional fluff from you guys would be cool. There are your stereotypical fantasy races like dwarves and elves, and some that I made up like aldarites, which are desert-nomad bird people.

I'm working on converting wab lists to cover galderia, orcs, and atroxians.

Thanks
Austin

I need help with a map… my old map sucks.

Atroxis ia north of galderia, which is the westernmost portion of the world.

There are other minor (yet to be named) countries to the east, then a sea, and another continent which is on the other side of the sea.

The main continent should roughly resemble Europe, but with more extreme borders… idk how to explain exactly…

Any help would be appreciated
Thanks
Austin