"Successors to WHFB?" Topic

After Alexander died there were many Successor States, and many wars [this pleases wargamers]. We've a similar situation with the death of the classic Warhammer Fantasy Battles game after 8th edition, replaced by the Age of Sigmar [seems to be a more skirmish based approach].

So, what are the most popular successors to WHFB?

KINGS OF WAR
My understanding is that in my area anyway, most have gravitated to this, and I very much like it. It works great – perfectly, really – and Alessio Cavatore deserves credit for a smooth game. Of course, it does not have the same characterful rules exceptions that mark WHFB [and made it unplayable at times].

OLDHAMMER
This is an alternative, if one wants to play around for fun with the old rules. Personally, I am working on the occasional game of 5th ed., using armies that are a bit silly like Night Goblins, and those that are more straightforward like Empire. I think this will scratch my "old school warhammer" itch.

HORDES OF THE THINGS
This is a unit-based fantasy version of DBA, and it has lots of fans. The mechanics are VERY streamlined, and a game should play in an hour or less. It may not always gel in basing with heroic 28mm, but that can always be overcome.

THE NINTH AGE
Just found out about this, it is clearly an attempt to keep WHFB going, and the web site is very well done. The GW IP protection issues seem to be skirted around as close as they dare.

ONE-PAGE RULES
They have skirmish, One-Page Fantasy, and One-Page Regiments. Another obvious attempt at succession. I've heard some good things, but have only just begun checking them out. Uncertain if they can beat how clean Kings of War plays. On the good side, the mechanics seem to be similar in all three levels of play, so that's good.

So what do you think of these, and what am I missing from the list.

In my mind, a true "successor" game plays with my WHFB units "as-is" and has similar overall mechanics, like units are resiliant to a lone hero attacking, but a hero attacking with a unit can break a unit, etc.

Welcome your thoughts.

Oathmark?

Great list. I would suggest adding Oathmark, by Joeseph A. Mccullough. I've been using it to play with my classic 5th-6th edition WHFB figures, and am really enjoying it. Modern, streamlined mechanics that give me the right fantasy feel….

Oathmark

Oathmark. Tried the others on your list and now I play Oathmark.

Anyone want to add a link or any more data to the "Oathmark" vote?

Amazingly, I've never heard of it at all.

From my limited exposure, Kings of War gets some play around here.

GW's Lord of the Rings (the battle game) just leave out the magic…

War and Conquest

Warmaster.

Oathmark is sold by North Star. Not sure why you need a link. Typing ‘Oathmark rules' into Google will give you loads of info

To answer the OP, rather praising a rule set regardless of what the question was (the norm with wargames forums) – I'd say that 9th Age is probably the most widely played of the WFB in the London area. As I have no knowledge of the gaming scene in other parts of the world I cannot comment on what is popular in say New York, or SoCal. The game is a clear successor to WFB using the same type of detailed army lists and customisation options. It has army lists which are familiar and seem better balanced if a little less exciting than their WFB progenitor.

Hordes of the Things is so far removed from WFB in terms of game design and ethos that I cannot see it as a successor to WFB. Its really a fantasy game intended to appeal to the DBX player base

Oathmark has a similar approach to WFB it uses – individually based figures in units rather than elements . This gives it a rank and flanks feel . Combat resolution requires that you roll 1D10 ( rather than D6) per figure to a maximum of 5 dice. You then have to beat the defender's armour value to score a kill , you add your fighting skill to the D10 roll. Unlike WFB where you decide how many figures you want in a unit, Oathmark caps the unit size in multiples of 5 with each figure, infantry or cavalry having a 25mm frontage. Some interesting ideas are that units with shield may shielwall, forgoing attack advantages for increased defence and that a missile unit may shoot over another infantry unit in front of it if it within a certain distance.

This means that if you use a movement tray you can figures based for WFB without having to rebase. The game has some issues with elves being so expensive that they are difficult to make viable unless you take allies. The game is faster than WFB but lacks the same scope for customisation that WFB had. Its easier to play as there are fewer special rules however, at the same time the special rules often lent certain armies a particular flavour or playing style which is lacking in these rules and which certain players felt created depth and introduced a learning curve.

Unlike WFB which is an IGOUGO game, Oathmark uses alternating IGOUGO.

Oathmark uses the standard Tolkein races, so if you have Skaven, Ogres, Chaos Warriors etc you will have to proxy these as something else.

One other thing- Oathmark seems to me, to have a dark ages feel to it whereas WFB aimed at a late medieval/renaissance feel albeit one where there the threat of chaos and humanity was under threat from "evil" races.

Oathmark is a very playable game

warhammer renaissance. i have not played but read through a bit and i have heard good things.

it is only available through the facebook group. booo.

-clark

Oldhammer is the obvious answer just play which ever version(s) you. If I want to play Warhammer I'd rather just play 2nd edition than some clone of the last edition of WFB.

This is a unit-based fantasy version of DBA

Do you mean element-based?

Interesting. I'd have thought that Kings of War would be popular in the UK, since it is a UK company with a very generous attitude about what minis you use.

Also, KoW – the black book edition, which may be 1st or 2nd – is one of the best written sets of rules.

Not a peep about Oathmark or 9th in the Philadelphia metro area that I have heard – then again, I don't get around the way I used to.

As I was saying on my thread before a new one magically appeared revolving around similar topic…

KOW does not allow for natural unit degradation or adaption, unlike WFB.

This makes KOW an unworthy successor, until the issue is rectified.

In WFB, particularly earlier editions, you could have any sized unit you like. Down to 5 (or less?) Men. Though later editions I think it's 10. But they could still drop to less than 10 during a battle.

I remember a WD battle report where one empire militia man was man of the game after the rest of his unit died, and he valiantly fought on.

Not in KOW:

"Roll up, roll up. Come and see…the magical disappearing legion. Watch in horrified confusion as its entire mass simply vanishes from the field of battle with no trace."

"Well, now, I heard stories told long ago of just such an army as that one over there."

"Where?"

"Strooth! Strike me 'roon! Where ever did it go?"

I get the business approach to having your customers glue models on to big bases.

"But, today I want 2 troops, not 1 regiment," Tommy's head drooped as he made his way back to the store. It was soon lower still as the store had sold out of the models he wanted.

"Dang kids, keep gluing them to boards, old doors and things. It's hard enough to keep them on the shelves, let alone a hinged contraption like one of those," said the man at the store.

So on…

The one-page rules get my vote. Easy to get, easy to understand, easy to play. To have all the rules on up to 6 printouts create a good flow of the game.

Sebastian

I'm experimenting with DBx rules right now. Trying HOTT, also have D3H2 (HOTT for DBA3), and am looking at the A Game of Knights and Knaves series. The downside is the existing player base sticks to 60mm elements – without rebasing, and using movement trays, WFB figures are a better fit for 80mm or 100mm elements. So I'll be doing my own thing with my co-players and we'll have a dilemma when we want to expand our group or try tournaments. But the game systems are heavily playtested so the gameplay should be satisfying.

Back in the 2010s, after getting bored with Age of Sigmar, we tried Kings of War. I thought it was a good fit but it turned out a number of the local WFB players were heavily invested in the model-specific special rules, and felt KOW was too simple. I am out of touch with those players ATM, but it feels like Ninth Age is perfect for them.

Personally as I've gotten older, I'm sick of being limited to 1:1 scale. I don't want to paint 100+ miniatures just to have an army, I want to play more than one game in a day, I want to re-use figures I already have, and I was never any good at juggling special rules. So I'm looking for simpler gameplay and fixed size elements where the figures are representative.

I think GW have answered the topic question already.

The old world (or is that olde?) is meant to be out before the next ice age.

Why was this not in the op list???

Very poor research if the company who made the original game wasn't checked first.

And the winner is, the old world, as it is the only true successor to WFB, as poor as it may turn out to be.

Anyone got any new info on it?

I would look at the Horus heresy to see what GW can still produce, it seems to be very popular , as providing a better balanced game than the current 40K.
It will be interesting to see what version of the rules the Old World will be based on, until then I am happy to stick with 6/7/8th edition.

So I live in a small community, far from any large metropolis, and I mostly play Wargames with my kids. Long ago, I never got into Warhammer although it did look fun, the cost of it, with the special models was to steep at the time, and from what I understand has only gotten worse.

Now, I have about 1000 painted fantasy miniatures, Mostly 15mm and some 28mm stuff I have for Dnd with the kids. I have been using the Old Battlesystem rules from DnD which for me works quite nicely… but it is out of print ( though still fairly easy to aquire a set.). even though I would like it to, Its not likely to ever take over, an dI know that.

I have asked myself the same question but with the caveat that I use 15mm and other than my kids, ( small town thing) what rule set should I consider as trying to Jump into the current warhammer version is out of the question (AoS), what ruleset should I consider.

THe Two obvious rule sets are KoW and Oathmark and Oathmarks campaign system could be a base for modifying, but still it needs modifying. Still these are basicly games that start with the Premise of Copying GW but with their own little spin, but still just the " bring your GW figures and play these rules instead.

While being invested in 15mm, I have always been hoping that somehow the different 15mm miniature manufacturers could somehow get together and create a ruleset for 15 mm miniature of all manufacturers. A few have tried rules for "their" minis but no single 15mm company has a large enough base to Make there company the end all, be all the GW is, but still I could hope for the 15mm ruleset to appear.

Im sure 10mm people are in the same spot, they love their 10mm minis but are relying on out of print rules to use their minis in a game.Warmaster. ( while I am invested in 15mm, 10mm has a lot of good to be saif for it also, as does 1:72 fantasy, (which are so confused at to even what scale they are, 20mm 25mm 1:72)).

I wish that a Miniature agnostic set of rules would appear that could get the traction to gain and hold a audience for a good long time. I was hoping Oathmark would be that, but I dont think its going to get that traction. Given GW's history GW is not the answer to the question with any new thing they may announce. What I want I dont think exists, nor may it ever, but we all can hope.

The world is in turmoil, and so is fantasy wargaming. I dont think either ones problems is going to get solved soon. Everyone is kind of in no-man's-land on both fronts.

@Albus … I think the issues with a company creating and selling a "Miniature agnostic set of rules that could get the traction to gain and hold a audience for a good long time" is that you don't make much money selling rules. You keep the lights on and people employed by selling miniatures.

What I want is the 15mm manufacturers to get together and create a ruleset based on all the participating companies rules. 15mm doesnt have a giant in the room to compete against in the 15mm market> What the 15mm mini companies need to realize is the the other 15mm companies are not their monetary competitors, but that they are are primarily competing against all the other scales. They want to take sales from the 28mm companies, and to a small extent from the 10 or 6mm fanatasy companies. They want to promote 15mm above their own particular brand, because if they can successfully get even 10 or 20% of the 28mm WHFB people to convert to 15mm then they all will be wildly successful, All of them, not just one or two of them. 15mm has a lot going for it over 28mm for a WHFB type game. ( so does 1/72 sometimes refered to as 20mm). While I Dont paint 10mm ( the default scale of Warmaster, 15mm I would assume paints up just about as fast, its big enought to see, ( 1/72 is slightly better to see) and it doesnt take much table space, is easy to store, and is still relatively inexpensive. THere is a lot of variety of miniatures available, and it is 3d printable ( with the right models) as well.

Albus Malum, what you describe will probably not happen.

The most widely played battle game for 15mm miniatures appears to be the DBx series, of which Phil Barker is the main author. Yes this is for ancients. The fantasy version is Hordes of the Things (HOTT) which has been around for some time.

Cribbing from my earlier post in this topic, HOTT is based on DBAv2. The latest DBA is v3. One rules writer, Thomas J. Thomas, has collaborated with Phil Barker to develop a free upgrade, D3H2 (HOTT for DBA3). Also, Thomas J. Thomas publishes his own DBx game series called A Game of Knights and Knaves, which has a fantasy variant.

Cerulucifus, You are most likely correct, but.. I can still wish cant I?

In the meanwhile, Ive never played the DBx game, and never really wanted to either. What I am using is Battlesystem, an other out of print game, but I am intending to make a combined version of Battlesystem for movement and such, and AD&D forthe combat.