"AoA question for Thane" Topic

Thane, I forget if I've asked this before, and if I did I've certainly forgotten the answer, so:

I notice that most (well, all) the battle reports I've seen for AoA use "official" armies, either from the book or the web site. Is this, well, expected amongst the active AoA community? Would a custom army raise eyebrows at a tourney or a bring-and-battle? The game does have pretty solid design-your-own rules, which is one of its main appeals for me, but they don't seem to get used much for some reason…

Rich

To make a short answer long:

People make their own stuff up fairly frequently, but the "official" armies cover what is generally available in miniatures pretty well, so that is why you generally see "official" armies in the battle reports.

Also, a lot of player built armies eventually have become "official". The AoA support page has 10 player made armies on it, and thats maybe half of the army lists I've seen people make. There are pictures of at least four of them in the Players Armies section.

It should be noted too that I take pictures out of maybe ten games a year, but get around to writing reports for them maybe two or three times a year, if that. We generally play 2–4 games locally each saturday, so a lot happens that never graces the website.

We almost never nix anything. One guy made an army of "Helvetians" specifically trying to min/max the system, so everything was 49/99 points to stay just under elite, and we played against it and whacked it pretty bad. Brett Manus and Rob Eskeridge locally have both made a fair number of home-made armies, and a lot of people have made their own troop types for their armies. One player has built a "horde" army, which is mostly based on base 4 minotaurs, trolls, and ogres.

For Tournaments, I insist on "official" units, but often make units "official" a few weeks before if they are obviously part of a theme. For instance, a local player made some orc wolfriders, completely in line with the stats for medium cavalry, so I didn't see a problem with them becoming "official".

"Officiallity" is really more about keeping a theme for armies than worrying about cheese, though there have been a few things I thought were out of line in terms of min/maxing.

So shortening the answers:
I notice that most (well, all) the battle reports I've seen for AoA use "official" armies, either from the book or the web site. Is this, well, expected amongst the active AoA community?

No, its just coincidence that they've been passed over. I'm going to go check that now.

Would a custom army raise eyebrows at a tourney or a bring-and-battle?

At a tourney, yes, but at a regular game, no.

The game does have pretty solid design-your-own rules, which is one of its main appeals for me, but they don't seem to get used much for some reason…

They really get used a lot locally. Most players have a favorite something or another they make up stats for, and several have whole armies.

Two to four games every Saturday? Sigh. Where do you live, Thane? Maybe I'll move there and escape the land of Warhammer Fantasy Battles…

Thanks for the timely answer, as always. BTW, I did get a chance to try both the technomancy and plague spell lists over the last few months, and both seemed to work all right. I note that Reload + Heavy Cannon = Counterspell Reload at every opportunity… :)

Rich

Albuquerque. As in, "must have made a wrong turn at…"

Its pretty easy to convert WHFB players to AoA, IF you can get them to consider the idea of trying something else at all. Thats the hard part. In general, running a "Demo" seems fruitless. I think there is too much pressure or expectation involved. Or something else weird about the psychology.

If you have one friend you can game with around a cluster, you can have good luck inviting people to play with you. No pressure or expectation, just a "hey, come run some troops with us".

If you don't have a partner in crime, the best approach might be asking a player who is sitting on the sideline of a game for a favor, as in "Hey, will you try this out with me? You should be able to use your own figures." Or even have two armies ready to go, and let them pick what they want to play.

Don't even make comparisons with WHFB, at least negative ones. If there is any fan in them at all, it will put them off.

I hope that helps.

I'm familiar with the general principles of, um, convincing people to try new games, but after managing a series of game stores for the better part of a decade, I have a hard time working up the enthusiasm to do so, especially at a game store where I'm most likely to find new blood. The situation isn't greatly helped by the fact that none of my local shops carry AoA despite my having offered to run games if they did so. GW, Privateer, and to a lesser degree Rackham rule the fantasy crowd around these parts, and getting people to try new rules…well, it feels like work, to be honest.

So, how's the job market in Albuquerque, anyway? :)

Rich

Yeah, and thats my fault. I don't have a good system to get it into stores. Stores want to go through distributors. I envy places where big gaming clubs exist.

If you want to send me the names of potentially receptive stores, I can try to get them to carry directly.

The market here is great! If you are a mexican day laborer, a road construction crewman, or a government research scientist. I'm not sure if its real good between those extremes though.

The place could use one more gamestore though, somewhere along I-25 :)