Ramblings on: Warmaster
Some of you may have noticed a few days ago I posted an article on the painting project I decided to take up which was a copy of Battle of Five Armies. As I mentioned in the article BoFA is just Warmaster in Lord of the Rings clothes. The reason why I picked that game, and also decided to write this article, is to share some information on what I think is one of the tightest and well designed army command games. Many people do not realize that Warmaster is actually a system. Much like the Command and Colors system, the Warmaster system is flexible enough to cover a range of many topics.
The brainchild of Rick Priestley was born onto the world in 2000 and somehow managed to break it free of the typical Games Workshop mould of constant rule updates/changes, codex creep, rules compiled across several different formats…etc. Priestley has created a system which has become an often overlooked gem. The flexibility of the rule system has allowed the Warmaster system to be taken to the Lord of the Rings setting, and also on a history lesson through time. Currently there are three versions/settings (Warmaster; Ancients; BofA) for the Warmaster system and some may be surprised to hear that across the Warmaster system there are well over 50 different and legal army lists within their respective systems and dozens more fan created lists.
As I mentioned there are three systems currently out: Warmaster is the system adapted to the Warhammer Fantasy setting; Battle of Five Armies is the system adapted to the Lord of the Rings setting; Warmaster: Ancients is the system through the ages representing armies from Biblical times to around 1000AD give or take a hundred years or so. Today I’ll focus on Warmaster though because that is the only one that receives any support (as little as it may be) from Games Workshop and is the most accessible of the three for new players.
Warmaster is abstracted. Let me make that clear because the level of abstraction may make people uncomfortable with the game. Mechanics like movement, close combat and command all have nuances to them which go against the typical GW cannon. If you don’t have a problem with the level of abstraction then what you will find in Warmaster is a very tight and clean game which rewards positioning of troops and leaders and those who know when to pick their fights.
Warmaster is like many other games where you pick and army list, line up and fight. Here would be my only gripe about the game. Units are all pretty similar to each other between army lists. Stat lines are copied between army lists and just about every unit is within one point of the average for the stat up or down. The redeeming factor is many units have special “character” rules associated with them that do add enough to keep it from feeling like both sides are lining up the same armies across from each other. I would have liked to have seen a wider range in stats and character between the army lists, but overall it works. The game isn’t about who can build the better army lists like other GW games, but who can position and maneuver their army better to get the favorable match-ups.
Command to me is the heart and soul of the game. Though as I mentioned command is abstracted and since command is the core to this game the abstraction trickles down to other aspects of the game. When creating your army list you need to get characters. These are the generals, heroes and wizards or in other words the guys that issue orders and get your troops moving. Each character has a command stat which is used to order the troops around. To issue an order you nominate the character issuing the command, calculate modifiers (these would be if the unit has taken damage, distance from unit issuing the command, if enemies are nearby…etc.). Two d6 are rolled and if the dice are equal to or below the modified number the command is successful, if it is higher than the command fails. There are two catches to this. First is after a successful command being issued to a unit another order can be issued as well (at a modifier). This allows units to move multiple times during a turn. The second catch is once a character fails a command that character cannot issue anymore commands for that turn and if you fail with your general then no more commands can be issued at all during the turn, so you’ll want to save your general for last whenever possible. This sudden failure is an abstract way to represent command lines breaking down and momentary chaos while communication channels are reinstated. Now you may notice that with poor selection on how and what order to issue orders could result in a large chunk of your army not moving. This is the abstraction that people may have problems with.
A few other abstractions which should be pointed out are the multiple movement of a unit. There is not a max to how many orders can be received by a unit so in theory a unit has unlimited movement during a turn but the modifiers will eventually end that. So people may be frustrated when a unit moves three times and then the unit right next to them cannot move forward once.
The other thing is combat. In this game when units engage you roll dice until it is done. Units push and battle back and forth (there is an interesting mechanic here to give a visual representation of the tide of battle going back and forth but I’ll let you discover that). This battle goes on until one decides to break of combat or until one side is eliminated. So with the movement and combat and how those are resolved you get a feeling that keeping things moving in time with one another was not high on Mr. Priestley’s list.
As I mentioned the Warmaster system has three different versions with each set having rules unique to the setting. For example BoFA has slightly different flyer rules and Ancients does not have magic. I’m not really familiar with Ancients and I’m sure there are some other differences but I don’t know what they are offhand.
Overall the gripes I have with the game is the armies at times do feel very similar to one another and sometimes the abstraction gets frustrating when a few bad rolls immobilizes your units for a turn or two. But I will say that because of the lists being very similar it usually means the player with the better control over their army will win. With the command system, that threat of suddenly having your machine of war grind to a halt in the back of your mind does keep the player for overextending their forces and leaving units vulnerable to attack. So if the negative side of the abstraction outweighs the positive side, then it isn’t for you. For me the abstraction is what makes this game the gem that it is.
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
‘Til Next Time - Happy Gaming
LvT
Great review - I too am a big warmaster fan. I have a couple of comments on your statements:
1. I really like the fact that stats are very similar - It keeps things tight, and is in my opinion the number one reason that there hasen’t been constant rule changes to try to balance things out. Like you stated, the various specialty units with various special rules keep unit and race character intact.
2. I really wouldnt say the command structure, or anything in this game is “abstract”. Rather, I would say that it is war observed from a great distance. Everything from fighting to issueing commands “feels” like you are viewing the action from afar, and simply cannot control or even see every little instance that happening in the thick of battle.
“…issueing commands “feels” like you are viewing the action from afar, and simply cannot control or even see every little instance that happening in the thick of battle.”
And that to me is what makes it abstracted. The dice roll for command represents a laundry list of what could have caused the command not to be received to to be received by the unit. When a lot of possibilities of what could have happened are all lumped together into one roll that to me is abstraction.
Another thing I see as an abstract mechanic used in many games is the initiative roll. This is another roll which has a laundry list of what could have happened to swing the battle momentum from one side to another is lumped into one roll. But for the sake of gameplay and to keep the game moving everything is boiled down into one roll instead of bogging the game down in tiny details which would be a truer representation of who really would have the initiative.
Oh I see - I see “abstract” as a game concept that has no base in the real world, like checkers or YINSH.
And that is accurate for the genre of games. Abstract to me is taking a bunch of things, boiling it down into something simplier. Note that does not mean less complex. For example a game like checkers is similar to Warmaster where it is a battle of position and placement. So I see checkers as an abstract way to represent battle lines fighting against eachother.
I’ve always thought that abstract games could have a theme placed on them (for example look at Through the Desert) so it loses the “abstract” genre title but there are still abstract themes in the game because it was based off the game Go which is an abstract game. I’m not sure when abstract got tied to theme or lack there of but to me abstraction is is the boiling down of components into purer state for sake of gameplay.
Of course I should say that my definition of Abstract may be different from others.