A Tale of EIGHT Gamers
With the start of my new Tale of Challenge almost upon us, I can confirm that there will be eight participants this year! I'll still be tagging the posts Tale of Four Gamers, as that way they'll be grouped with the last one and any future ones... but the title of any posts will be TOEG related.
We have the following participants;
Myself - Guard
Rich F - Tau
Rich H - Space Wolves
Ken - Tyranids
Dan F - Dark Eldar
Rich P - Grey Knights
Scott W - Tyranids
Rob - Guard
I am of course building my army for Escalation so my first round is a nice easy 65 infantry O_o
Platoon Command; vox, autocannon – 45
Squad 1 – 5 all identically equipped; plasmagun and autocannon – 375
Penal Legion Squad – 80
Others will have till the start date to submit their planned 500 points to me, and I will publish them all when I know them.
The only detail yet to be tied up is what to do for the apocalypse event. There are several options for this, and I will be consulting the participants to see where they want to go with this one. Participants are quite welcome to vote here in the comments.
Anyway, options...
1 - Imperium stick. Pros - quick, simple, obvious, fluffy. Well, on the good side anyway. Cons - Tau gunline with Nids assault support... OUCH!
2 - Goodies vs Baddies - now this isn't too far from the above, but it puts the neutral Tau on the good side and MY guard (which given the theme of the army are not the nicest chaps in the galaxy) on the evil side. Pros - takes the Tau firepower away from the nids... Cons - puts all the horde armies on one side, making for an EXTENSIVE movement phase :oS
3 - Balanced - we put one nid on each side, one power armour on each side, one guard on each side, one xenos on each side. Pros - about as balanced as we can make it. Cons - not exactly fluffy. *Note can be even more balanced by the various pairs not knowing which side they'll be on till the day of the game or thereabouts.
4 - Rank based - We look at the challenge leaderboard and put 1st, 3rd, 6th and 8th against 2nd, 4th, 5th and 7th. Pros - last time I did this we followed goodies vs baddies route and the two players who were doing poorest ended up on the same side. At least this way the ones who have done best (and therefore have probably finished on time each time and had the last few weeks spare to do EXTRA stuff, as opposed to playing catch up on stuff they missed from their normal allocation, will be split up, hopefully keeping the sides fairly balanced.) Cons - again, not fluffy.
5 - Points based - Everyone should have 2000 or so points, but we can have a look at the totals that people are bringing to the apoc game and balance the forces that way. Pro - fair sides in points value. Cons - Could easily make up the points difference with strategic assets anyway.
6 - Random - Everyone turns up, I draw names out of a hat and that's the side you get. Points differences will be balanced with strategic assets. Pros - random nature makes it as fair as it can be, no design whatsoever. Cons - luck is a factor, you could potentially end up with the four smallest armies on one side...
Anyway, the apoc game won't be till about October so not really something we need to worry about yet but I would like to get the format down as soon as possible so people know what to expect in advance and won't accuse me of trying to bend things in my favour.
Do comment on your choices and gentlemen, start your brushes ;oP
We have the following participants;
Myself - Guard
Rich F - Tau
Rich H - Space Wolves
Ken - Tyranids
Dan F - Dark Eldar
Rich P - Grey Knights
Scott W - Tyranids
Rob - Guard
I am of course building my army for Escalation so my first round is a nice easy 65 infantry O_o
Platoon Command; vox, autocannon – 45
Squad 1 – 5 all identically equipped; plasmagun and autocannon – 375
Penal Legion Squad – 80
Others will have till the start date to submit their planned 500 points to me, and I will publish them all when I know them.
The only detail yet to be tied up is what to do for the apocalypse event. There are several options for this, and I will be consulting the participants to see where they want to go with this one. Participants are quite welcome to vote here in the comments.
Anyway, options...
1 - Imperium stick. Pros - quick, simple, obvious, fluffy. Well, on the good side anyway. Cons - Tau gunline with Nids assault support... OUCH!
2 - Goodies vs Baddies - now this isn't too far from the above, but it puts the neutral Tau on the good side and MY guard (which given the theme of the army are not the nicest chaps in the galaxy) on the evil side. Pros - takes the Tau firepower away from the nids... Cons - puts all the horde armies on one side, making for an EXTENSIVE movement phase :oS
3 - Balanced - we put one nid on each side, one power armour on each side, one guard on each side, one xenos on each side. Pros - about as balanced as we can make it. Cons - not exactly fluffy. *Note can be even more balanced by the various pairs not knowing which side they'll be on till the day of the game or thereabouts.
4 - Rank based - We look at the challenge leaderboard and put 1st, 3rd, 6th and 8th against 2nd, 4th, 5th and 7th. Pros - last time I did this we followed goodies vs baddies route and the two players who were doing poorest ended up on the same side. At least this way the ones who have done best (and therefore have probably finished on time each time and had the last few weeks spare to do EXTRA stuff, as opposed to playing catch up on stuff they missed from their normal allocation, will be split up, hopefully keeping the sides fairly balanced.) Cons - again, not fluffy.
5 - Points based - Everyone should have 2000 or so points, but we can have a look at the totals that people are bringing to the apoc game and balance the forces that way. Pro - fair sides in points value. Cons - Could easily make up the points difference with strategic assets anyway.
6 - Random - Everyone turns up, I draw names out of a hat and that's the side you get. Points differences will be balanced with strategic assets. Pros - random nature makes it as fair as it can be, no design whatsoever. Cons - luck is a factor, you could potentially end up with the four smallest armies on one side...
Anyway, the apoc game won't be till about October so not really something we need to worry about yet but I would like to get the format down as soon as possible so people know what to expect in advance and won't accuse me of trying to bend things in my favour.
Do comment on your choices and gentlemen, start your brushes ;oP
For sheer shits and giggles the names out of the hat on the day, downside is you could end up with the apoc vets all on one side. goodies vs baddies would be more practicle as puts you and me on the oppo teams and still has some variety in the armies, good side may have more guns but we will have DE and Nids flying towards us and pooping up below us so should balance well. unless the apoc additions throw too much points in but we can cross that bridge when we come to it. also knowing in advance lets you plan a little which as we saw from GW is kinda needed in apoc.
ReplyDeleteGood point about keeping the veterans on seperate teams, I hadn't thought of that in my considerations but it would be handy...
ReplyDeleteApart from drawing names out of a hat on the day I plan to have several weeks planning for each option... even the one that's based on rankings we'll know from about a week after round 4 ends, giving a few weeks before the apoc game to finalise the details.
Personally I'm not sure what if anything I'll add to my army... I was scraping the barrel with my codex options given the background I'm sticking to, and while I've got about 8 months to think about it I'm not sure just yet what if anything might fit in with the theme of my force :o/
It's good that we have got 8 players. Will make the games and apocalypse game easier to manage.
ReplyDeleteWith regards the options on the apocalypse game;
1) Tyranids with a Tau gunline? pretty much a non issue. Guard can out shoot Tau all day everyday. So the shooting power of guard with the counter attack of the wolves and knights? Probably be the bigger issue. :P
2) Not too bad on the movement phase, being as it will be 4 players all moving their armies together, probably turn out quicker then if the horde players were on different sides.
3) Balanced, doesn't sound like a bad idea. Fluff doesn't really come into as the Nids are unlikely to ally with anyone by fluff.
4) No real comments on this you've covered it.
5) Not a bad idea, stops anyone having a huge amount of apocalypse assets to make up for their low points.
My personal preference would be 2. I like the idea of good versus evil.