# Warhammer 3e Demo Experiences -OR- How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bits



## Asmor (Nov 15, 2009)

So last night I got to play a Warhammer 4e demo at a new game store called Toys n Things in Danvers, MA. The demo was run by the shop's owner, a guy named Evan.

Things started off a bit rocky-- this isn't a game you can just quickly peruse the rules and start playing. I imagine that it would run vastly more smoothly if you're playing with someone who's already familiar with the system, but of course since it's not even available for purchase yet that's a luxury we did not have.

[sblock=System]WFRP3e (just WFRP from here on out) uses a system reminiscent of Descent, a dungeon crawl board game also put out by FFG. Indeed, from a glance, you'd be forgiven for thinking WFRP is a board game and not an RPG. I'll speak more about that later, however.

The game uses color-coded polyhedral dice of standard sizes, but with non-standard faces showing symbols, combinations of symbols, or blanks.

Let me give you a quick example of how you determine your dicepool. Let's say I'm using my Might Blow action.

1. Check the roll type. Mighty Blow is Weapon Skill (strength) vs. Enemy defense.
2. Since Weapon Skill is based on strength, I check my strength score. I maxed my strength out to 5, so *I take 5 blue characteristic dice* (characteristic being the term for your character's 6 attributes).
3. Next, I look at my stance. I'm playing my character recklessly, and am currently 2 deep into the reckless side, so *I trade 2 blue characteristic dice for 2 red reckless stance dice*.
4. Since I've got one point of training in Weapon Skill, *I take 1 yellow expertise die* (not sure if that's the actual name).
5. Since I've got a specialization with great weapons and I'm using one, *I take 1 white fortune die*.
6. I look at any talents or special abilities I might have. For example, my character had a charge talent, which added 1 white fortune die during the turn I first engage an enemy, and also as a dwarf I had a racial grudge ability which gives me 1 white fortune die against greenskins (orcs and goblinoids) or enemies who have damaged me.
6. Finally, the GM tells me to *take 1 purple challenge die*-- the default amount for most tasks. I'm not sure if this is correct, but keep in mind we were learning as we go and it took a lot of time just to figure out this much.

So ignoring special abilities, I've got: 3 blue, 2 red, 1 yellow, 1 white, and 1 purple die. I roll them all and as long as I get 1 new success (pretty likely), I succeed.[/sblock]

[sblock=Dice]

Please keep in mind that this is all from memory, and in particular quantities of things may be off. Descriptions of what all the faces mean are below.

*Blue characteristic dice:* 8-sided dice with several blanks, a couple successes, and one boon.

*Red reckless stance dice:* 10-sided dice with few blanks (maybe just 1?), a couple failures, several successes, and some combination success/boons. These dice have the potential for great success, but AFAIK they're the only 'good' dice which have failures.

*Green conservative stance dice:* Much like the reckless dice, but instead of failures these have delays. Thus, when you're in a conservative stance, you'll do well but it might slow you down.

*Yellow expertise dice:* 6-sided, 2 boons, 1 success, 1 righteous success, 1 sigmar's comet, 1 blank.

*White fortune dice:* 6-sided, 3 blank, 2 success, 1 boon.

*Black misfortune dice:* 6-sided, has blanks, banes, and failures, not sure of quantities of each but I'd suspect a mirror of the white dice.

*Purple challenge dice:* 8-sided, has failures and banes, including faces with double failures and banes. Also has a chaos star. Not sure if it had any blanks, but probably had at least 1.[/sblock]

[sblock=Dice faces]These are what all those terms above mean.

*Successes and failures:* Successes (hammers) and failures (crossed swords) cancel each other out on a one-for-one basis. As long as you have 1 net success, your action succeeded. Extra successes are frequently beneficial. I don't think extra failures make you 'fail worse.'

*Righteous Success:* A righteous success (hammer with a +) counts as a success AND you roll another die of the same type (which AFAIK is only the yellow die, but I wouldn't be surprised if there are some on the stance dice which I've forgotten).

*Boons and banes:* Boons (eagle symbols) and banes (skulls) cancel each other out on a one-for-one basis. These don't have any effect on their own, but can trigger abilities on cards. For example, one of your attacks might do extra damage or ignore armor if you roll some number of boons, but it might fatigue you or take longer to recharge if yu roll some number of banes.

*Sigmar's Comet:* Like boons, does nothing on its own, but certain actions will have really big effects with sigmar's comet. Think of them as semi-analagous to critical hits.

*Chaos Star:* The bad version of Sigmar's Comet. These are like critical failures. Worth noting that I don't think Sigmar's Comet and Chaos Star cancel each other out, but it's entirely possible they do and I just missed it.

*Delay:* Never actually read what this does, since I wasn't using the conservative stance at all; but I suspect it probably adds delay counters to your actions, essentially making you wait an additional turn before you could use them again.[/sblock]

[sblock=Actions]You get a number of basic action cards (things like block, parry, melee and ranged attack, etc) which represent the normal things most characters can do. In addition, depending on how many creation points you reserved, you get some number of extra actions. These are the special abilities that make your character stand out-- spells, interesting attacks, etc.

The actions I chose were Might Blow, Troll-Feller Strike, and Judgment of Vengeance.

Most actions have some pre-requisities. Block requires a shield, for example, and melee strike requires a melee weapon and for you to be engaged with an enemy. I never got to use my Judgment attack because the reckless side (see below) required you to be suffering an insanity, and despite my convincing arguments, the GM did not consider the presence of an elf in a party to be 'an insanity.'

All actions are double sided-- there's a red side and a green side, corresponding to reckless and conservative stances. I don't have any examples of the differences in effect on two sides of the same card, but my Judgment's conservative side required me to be suffering a critical wound instead of an insanity.

The actions will have a number of lines with costs on them. For example, an attack might say:

1 success: +1 damage
3 successes: +3 damage
1 boon: +1 damage and ignore the target's armor soak value
3 boons: +3 damage
1 bane: Suffer 1 fatigue

That's entirely made up, by the way, as I don't remember any of the cards well enough to reproduce them that well.[/sblock]

Ok, so now that that's out of the way, here are my impressions.

I really enjoyed the game. In the interest of full disclosure, this didn't come as much of a surprise to me; I was excited about this to begin with, I just couldn't pass up the Dr. Strangelove reference in the subject. 

I haven't been following the game much, but I've seen a few people complaining about the board-game-ization and that's about what I'd expect. And to them I say: get over it.

Yeah, the game uses a bunch bits that look like they belong to a card game. Yes, there are cards and tokens and chits. And you know what? That's freaking awesome.

As games, RPGs haven't actually advanced all that much in the past 30 or so years since they've been invented. Systemically-- absolutely. But when it comes down to it, they're all basically just a bunch of stuff on a piece of paper, and that's not terribly compelling.

Lots of people already bring board gaming elements into RPGs. In 4th edition, for example, most people I've gamed with happily use power cards and they use tokens to keep track of their healing surges, as opposed to keeping track of them on the character sheet.

"But Asmor," you cry, "how does this help the roleplaying?" It doesn't. And there's no such thing as a mechanic that does help with roleplaying. Roleplaying is, ultimately, free form, and protesting the design of an RPG because "the mechanics detract from roleplaying" makes about as much sense as protesting the architecture of the White House because you don't like whichever politician happens to be living there at the time.

So all this is to say that I really enjoyed the game. The system had a pretty nasty learning curve, but I think that's in large part due to the fact that no one knew how to play. It offers something new and innovative, and you really owe it to yourself to give the game a try at least once.


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## Pseudonym (Nov 15, 2009)

Asmor said:


> So last night I got to play a Warhammer 4e demo at a new game store called Toys n Things in Danvers, MA. The demo was run by the shop's owner, a guy named Evan.




What? D'oh!  I live only a few blocks away.  Wish I had known about it.


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## gamefiend (Nov 15, 2009)

Very happy to hear how that went.  It was interesting in that I went from blech on it, to very interested once I finally got someone to talk to me at FFG during gencon.

I like the dice mechanic but it seems that it can get pretty fiddly and slow in play.  Is this something you think might go away quickly with familiarity or is it just a "cost" of the game?

Are you going to pick it up, and if so, when are we going to play?


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## frankthedm (Nov 15, 2009)

The _dice_ effects do actually sound interesting. They also sound like they build off of the Doom/Descent dice system.

I really like the option of defence/offence hardwired into the system.

Are the dice faces carved in, or are they just printed on like the doom dice? Those doom dice wore away far too fast for rpg use.


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## Meek (Nov 15, 2009)

The dice and cards mechanics sounds incredibly interesting, but at the same time I feel like I would totally forget to pick out this many dice and this many dice, and I'd probably lose some of them along the way...happens to all my board games. Thanks for the write-up. I wouldn't have anyone to play it with and it's too expensive for me, but I really like the sound of it.


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## Deadline247 (Nov 15, 2009)

I was very impressed by my demo yesterday and will be buying the game as soon as possible. 

It is definitely a roleplaying game (and definitely NOT a board game) that simply swaps out pens, paper, and on-the-table reference books and replaces them with cards, counters, and new dice that track and contain all the same info.

There's nothing to be scared of!


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## frankthedm (Nov 15, 2009)

Deadline247 said:


> It is definitely a roleplaying game (and definitely NOT a board game) that simply swaps out pens, paper, and on-the-table reference books and replaces them with cards, counters, and new dice that track and contain all the same info.
> 
> There's nothing to be scared of!



and what about minis, movement and tactical positioning in combat?


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## Asmor (Nov 15, 2009)

One thing I forgot to add above, I really hope they release a set of dice as a standalone product, because while there are enough for any given person to roll everything they'd need at once, the game was slowed down a lot just by having to hunt down the dice every time it was your turn.



Pseudonym said:


> What? D'oh!  I live only a few blocks away.  Wish I had known about it.




Though I knew about the place previously, I actually found out about the demo from FFG's website. Sorry. I know the guy's interested in running it as an ongoing thing, so I'd go down there and talk to him if I were you.



gamefiend said:


> I like the dice mechanic but it seems that it can get pretty fiddly and slow in play.  Is this something you think might go away quickly with familiarity or is it just a "cost" of the game?




It was a bit fiddly. Even after I finally deciphered what to do, I found myself having to say. "Ok... 5 blue dice, wait, no, 3 blue dice, 2 red dice... and... a yellow for training. Oh, and a white for specialization. Wait, are any of my talents relevant? Hey, how many purples should I roll, one?" I could see it going faster with more experience, but I'd actually recommend keeping some scratch paper with a list of all the dice you need for your more common actions.



> Are you going to pick it up, and if so, when are we going to play?




Eventually, and if/when I do I'll totally run a one-shot or something for you guys. The cost is a bit prohibitive, though, but I _do_ have a birthday coming around at the end of the month...



frankthedm said:


> I really like the option of defence/offence hardwired into the system.




Worth noting that everyone starts with a stance track that's 5 pieces long. Everyone gets a neutral piece, and most get 2 red and 2 green. Some start with 3 of one and 1 of the other. You can expand your track in either direction as you advance your character, though obviously I didn't read much about the advancement rules.



> Are the dice faces carved in, or are they just printed on like the doom dice? Those doom dice wore away far too fast for rpg use.




They're inscribed, shouldn't be a problem.


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## Henry (Nov 15, 2009)

Thanks for the report, Asmor! It helps clarify a lot of the bits and pieces I've seen online like the seminar videos and such.

Unfortunately, it still doesn't sound like a game I'd like. It seems to take everything I didn't like about the die mechanics of Shadowrun 1e through 3e (having multiple different metrics to check to figure out if you succeeded or not) and "turns that up to 11", to borrow a phrase. In Shadowrun, it was a dance between the number of successes, the size of those successes, and in opposition to the number of successes your opponent got. If I have to roll more than about 6 dice to figure out if I succeeded and by how much, it's too offputting to me as an RPG.

If it's for the sole purpose of playing the game (as in Descent), that's fine to me, but in an RPG, it takes me out of the RPG and focuses me on the dice too much -- almost like using the game Liar's Dice as a resolution mechanic to an RPG, it's too distracting to me.


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## Oni (Nov 15, 2009)

How long did it take to resolve a turn on average?

How long did it take to resolve combats?


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## Derren (Nov 15, 2009)

More importantly, what support for out of combat abilities does that system give?


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## JoeNotCharles (Nov 15, 2009)

Sounds like as a DM it would be really hard to balance.  It doesn't take long in most games to figure out exactly what chance of success a player has for a given target number or number of successes (obviously it's easiest in percentile systems like CoC or WFRP1 and 2), but for this it sounds like a lot of work just to figure out how many dice a player rolls, let alone how much each colour is "worth".


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## Agamon (Nov 15, 2009)

Henry said:


> Unfortunately, it still doesn't sound like a game I'd like. It seems to take everything I didn't like about the die mechanics of Shadowrun 1e through 3e (having multiple different metrics to check to figure out if you succeeded or not) and "turns that up to 11", to borrow a phrase. In Shadowrun, it was a dance between the number of successes, the size of those successes, and in opposition to the number of successes your opponent got. If I have to roll more than about 6 dice to figure out if I succeeded and by how much, it's too offputting to me as an RPG.
> 
> If it's for the sole purpose of playing the game (as in Descent), that's fine to me, but in an RPG, it takes me out of the RPG and focuses me on the dice too much -- almost like using the game Liar's Dice as a resolution mechanic to an RPG, it's too distracting to me.




This.  Sounds cool, but the 4e fights are draggy enough without fishing for different colored dice depending on different situations.  Ugh.


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## SteveC (Nov 15, 2009)

Meek said:


> The dice and cards mechanics sounds incredibly interesting, but at the same time I feel like I would totally forget to pick out this many dice and this many dice, and I'd probably lose some of them along the way...happens to all my board games. Thanks for the write-up. I wouldn't have anyone to play it with and it's too expensive for me, but I really like the sound of it.




For what it's worth, figuring your dice becomes pretty easy. You have a stance, and what we did was pick up a dice of the appropriate type for each step you've moved. My dwarf was aggressive +3 all the time, so I held onto three red dice. Your total basic pool is equal to your ability, so I had two other dice. If I used a skill I was trained in, that was a yellow dice. I knew that typical difficulty was one purple die, so I just kept one of those around me. The GM had additional dice he could throw in representing luck and effort so he threw those over at me when he wanted to.

When my turn came up, I knew how many dice to pick up, and the GM threw any extras he wanted my way...and I rolled. It was very fast after about the third time I did it.

--Steve


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## Ariosto (Nov 16, 2009)

> in an RPG, it takes me out of the RPG and focuses me on the dice too much



which goes directly against the method -- one of "forgetting" the rules as much as possible -- the designers of the original advocated. ("All the players have to do to play the game is to make decisions about what their characters are going to do and how they are going to do it. This is easy. The players simply pretend to be their characters and use their imaginations to guide their actions as if they really were in the world described to them by the GM.")

The game was not really "about" combats, so much as intrigue and mystery and horror; the portfolio basically was that of Call of Cthulhu rather than D&D (which wasn't really a "combat game" either yet).


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## Deadline247 (Nov 16, 2009)

frankthedm said:


> and what about minis, movement and tactical positioning in combat?




WFRP3's combat does include character icons, but combat is not tactical in the way D&D is. There are basically three ranges (close, medium, and long) and that's it. We did "flank" a creature once in order to get an extra fortune die from the GM, but we didn't bother moving the characters around...we just said we were doing it. 

It was actually quite fun in it's simplicity...and I'm a fan of tactical combat.


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## Donovan Morningfire (Nov 16, 2009)

I had been hoping to give the game a try yesterday (my FLGS was running a demo as well, but I got stuck at work instead).

From reading the OP's post about how the game looks to play out, I'll definitely be giving this a pass.  I'm not big on board games these days, and WRFP3 sounds more and more like a glorified board game.


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## Deadline247 (Nov 16, 2009)

Good Lord...the "it's a boardgame" meme is so beyone ridiculous. Seriously.


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## darjr (Nov 16, 2009)

I read the intro adventure so I can run it around here (pm me if your in my area and are interested) and I didn't get a boardgame feel out of it.

I must admit to not being much of a board gamer.


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## Herremann the Wise (Nov 16, 2009)

darjr said:


> I read the intro adventure so I can run it around here (pm me if your in my area and are interested) and I didn't get a boardgame feel out of it.
> 
> I must admit to not being much of a board gamer.




Can you expand upon this?

I think a lot of people are fearing the transition from pen and paper RPGs to "simplistic" or overly linear stories and rulesets. What was once a direct conduit into the imagination becomes something more about the pieces and the dice, rather than the characters and the story/action.

In effect, how differently does 3e play compared to its ancestors? I'm not talking about the dice and pieces used to aid but the actual "role-playing game" part of the deal.

Is the most "board-gamey" element of this 3e purely just the box it is delivered in?

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## Ariosto (Nov 16, 2009)

> In effect, how differently does 3e play compared to its ancestors? I'm not talking about the dice and pieces used to aid but the actual "role-playing game" part of the deal.



Those are bound together, I'm afraid. In irruption of Yahtzee would be a bit jarring if one had expected Diplomacy.

The Warhammer FRP apparatus previously involved mainly the GM setting a % chance of an outcome, resolved by rolling a couple of decimal dice. That's about as straightforward and intrinsically uninteresting as a hammer or saw, and for just the same reason.


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## Asmor (Nov 16, 2009)

Henry said:


> Unfortunately, it still doesn't sound like a game I'd like. It seems to take everything I didn't like about the die mechanics of Shadowrun 1e through 3e (having multiple different metrics to check to figure out if you succeeded or not) and "turns that up to 11", to borrow a phrase. In Shadowrun, it was a dance between the number of successes, the size of those successes, and in opposition to the number of successes your opponent got.




I don't think it's anywhere near that complicated. At its core, all you need to do is make sure you get more successes than failures.


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## darjr (Nov 16, 2009)

First, I'm going from memory from a single read through.

Somebody else said it best. We play RPGS that have different mechanics all the time. The adventure read like a traditional kind of adventure with very different mechanics. Many of the things in it were dependent (for good or ill) on those mechanics but in the end I think something very much like it has been run in every fantasy RPG I can think of.

There are NPC's with their own motivations and stats, there were monsters with theirs, there were non combat issues that the players had to deal with and there were lingering consequences depending on how they went about things. The things that happen were very deadly as well. The monsters were PC killers. There were points when the DM would have to make judgment calls and consider how the game was going up to that point. There were things that needed detailed descriptions and explanations by the DM, because otherwise the PC's wouldn't have enough information to even carry on, just like an RPG. There was even discussion about what to do when the PC's jumped the rails, not if.

To even get close to a board game I think you have to blur the line at the start of the argument and use board games that have many rpg elements or options, like custom characters and campaign rules.

Is it a boardgame like Settlers? NIMHO.


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## darjr (Nov 16, 2009)

Ariosto said:


> ...straightforward and intrinsically uninteresting as a hammer...




Say that to a cooper, or a upholsterer, or even a carpenter.

I agree that it's taken for granted, but the modern day hammer in its many, many forms is an amazing piece of technology that is changing and evolving to this day.

I think, in some ways, it is so with dice mechanics and the understanding of probabilities. Is the new mechanic more complex, yes, is it worse than the olde one, I'm not sure, it depends, I haven't made up my mind yet.


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## pogre (Nov 16, 2009)

I think I'm selling this game to my groups as the new Warhammer Quest campaign. I think the expectations for WFRP are just different than this game delivers. It seems like a great game, I think for me I just had to let go of it being a pure RPG and embrace it as an Advanced Heroquest or Road to Legend type game.


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## Korgoth (Nov 16, 2009)

Henry said:


> If it's for the sole purpose of playing the game (as in Descent), that's fine to me, but in an RPG, it takes me out of the RPG and focuses me on the dice too much -- almost like using the game Liar's Dice as a resolution mechanic to an RPG, it's too distracting to me.




This might be a bandwagon worth jumping on. I think I'll do a rewrite of Pathfinder / D&D 3.75 that gets rid of dice altogether and uses a full game of croquet as a resolution mechanic. The game comes in a POD (r) storage system and includes over 2,000 styrofoam packing peanuts as well as a full croquet set*. Also a selection of beanie babies (tm) to use as character models. It will be the first role playing game to cost _one million dollars_ but it will be worth every penny. If you complain about the price, you're just a hater. This game is revolutionary**.

* - Yes, _one_. Don't be greedy.

** - No, I'm not turning D&D into a lawn game. Quit repeating that meme.


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## Ariosto (Nov 16, 2009)

But, Korgoth, the lawn game is really a return to roots -- to the noble tradition of H.G. Wells (another designer who dismissed dice) in the yard playing his Floor Games and Little Wars, with a straw boater to keep the sun out of his eyes. Be proud of your straw boater (or beanie, as you may prefer)! Be proud enough to deny it up and down when the haters claim it's _like _a lawn game. That's tantamount to saying it's _just_ a  sporting amusement.

Of course it's not. You'll still have the fundamental necessity of a "role-playing" game, which as everyone knows is _paperwork_.

The accessories and resolution techniques are just aids to the experience. After all, what says "deep, dark, dangerous dungeons and bloody mayhem" like balls and wickets and a well-tended green?

Well, brightly colored piles of plastic and glossy CGI naturally. But WotC and FFG have been there and done that, and you're trying to deliver the one thing most important in a pseudo-medieval game of vaguely Tolkien-ish fairy folk murdering each other in holes in the ground: innovation!


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## delericho (Nov 16, 2009)

Thanks for posting your impressions. It's now pretty clear that not only will I will not like this game, but I would actively _hate_ it.



Asmor said:


> "But Asmor," you cry, "how does this help the roleplaying?" It doesn't. And there's no such thing as a mechanic that does help with roleplaying. Roleplaying is, ultimately, free form, and protesting the design of an RPG because "the mechanics detract from roleplaying" makes about as much sense as protesting the architecture of the White House because you don't like whichever politician happens to be living there at the time.




This is simply not true. Rules-light and rules-heavy RPGs give rise to very different game experiences, and the differences are not purely mechanical. The one does a poor job of emulating the other.



Asmor said:


> It offers something new and innovative, and you really owe it to yourself to give the game a try at least once.




Not at an RRP of £80, I don't!


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## malkav666 (Nov 16, 2009)

Looks..different.

I don't think I will buy it. If one of my players wanted to fork over the high cost of entry and run it , I guess I would play. But I have no intention of paying this price for a boardgame (yes I kn ow some folks are crying about the meme of that statement, but they can get over it).

It does not look like a bad boardgame, just not one I will invest my money into. I already have some WHFP books, to use if I want to tell a story in that world.

love,

malkav


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## BryonD (Nov 16, 2009)

pogre said:


> I think I'm selling this game to my groups as the new Warhammer Quest campaign. I think the expectations for WFRP are just different than this game delivers. It seems like a great game, I think for me I just had to let go of it being a pure RPG and embrace it as an Advanced Heroquest or Road to Legend type game.



I'm seeing it the same way.

They went so far with it that it becomes a decent board game with RPG elements.  It isn't going to get my RPG itch, but it doesn't really seem to worry about it.


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## AllisterH (Nov 16, 2009)

But there's no "board" elements to this...If I'm reading the OP correctly, it has less tactical elements than even 1st edition D&D.

Maybe my definition of boardgames is different...but all I'm getting is that this RPG is akin to old school vampire - bucketfuls of dice (an exagerration).


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## Rel (Nov 16, 2009)

Thanks very much for posting your experiences!  I'm still kind of on the fence about this but I'm eager to try it out.

I don't really want a game where the fiddly bits get in the way of the game.  But I'm not at all clear that this is an actual problem with WFRP3.  Yes, the dice mechanics sound a bit cumbersome when you read about them.  But I've played a lot of Descent and if I described those dice mechanics I think they would sound cumbersome too.  And yet, in actual play, they are easy and elegant.

I also think that it sounds like the dice might be the primary method of "complicating the system in a good way".  What I mean is that we could have a combat system where we flip a coin and on a heads I hit and tails I miss.  I try to hit the monster and it tries to hit me and one of us better hope we flip a lot of heads.  I think that would get old fast so a system needs some "good complication".  d20 gets this from rolling a d20, feats, spells, magic items, etc.  WFRP3 might simply add the good complication by the dice pool reflecting your combat actions in the way that other systems require you to add up a bunch of different modifiers.

What I'm saying is that I think a lot of us (certainly me) WANT a bit of complication in our combat system to make it interesting and give us options.  If WFRP3 does it with dice then that's fine by me.  The real question is how that aspect interacts with the rest of the system.

Honestly I'm much more interested and curious about what the expectation is regarding the PC's lot in life and the sorts of adventures they are expected to go on.  To me WFRP has always been a game about being a lowly Ratcatcher, Vagabond or Peasant who must make his way in a world where starvation, disease and an angry pig are very real threats to life and limb.  Like literally someday somebody will ask you, "How'd you get the wooden leg?" and you'll say, "Well see, there was this pig..."  To me, that very grim n gritty type of game is what I really enjoy most about the WFRP world and I'm hoping the tradition is continued in this edition.


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## Phaezen (Nov 16, 2009)

So, in essence the system is a dice pool, with a slight variation of failures canceling successes, with the chance of minor (boon/bane) or major (SIgmars Comet/Chaos Star) effects depending on the ability you use.

Character stats and abilities are tracked via cards instead of pen and paper (or an app).

Sounds interesting though, hope to have a chance to look at the game sometime.


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## AllisterH (Nov 16, 2009)

Phaezen said:


> So, in essence the system is a dice pool, with a slight variation of failures canceling successes, with the chance of minor (boon/bane) or major (SIgmars Comet/Chaos Star) effects depending on the ability you use.
> 
> Character stats and abilities are tracked via cards instead of pen and paper (or an app).
> 
> .




That's exactly what I'm getting here as well.

It seems like a fusion between the card based SAGA system and those bucketful of dice RPGs like Vampire and any d6 derivative.

Still confused as to why it's called a BOARDGAME.


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## Agamon (Nov 16, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> Still confused as to why it's called a BOARDGAME.




People make assumptions based on:


It's made FFG (who made Descent)
It all comes in a big board game-style box
Characters a tracked with cards and bits instead of pencil and paper
The dice have symbols, not numbers

I clearly see now that it's not a board game, but I also clearly see that it isn't the WFRP I know and love either.


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## jadrax (Nov 16, 2009)

For something that is not at all like a Boardgame, it contains an awful lot of bits of painted cardboard that you lay flat on a table and move tokens about upon. I think its that huge amount of tactile resource tracking that gives it a Boardgame _feel _to many people.


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## UngainlyTitan (Nov 16, 2009)

It sounds interesting  but also very different to WHFRP as I remember it. I only played and DM'ed 1st edition WHFRP and the thing I really liked about it was, once one was familar with the system, one could run a game without reference to the books except for chargen. 
This version does not appear to have that simplicity. So I have a couple of questions about the feel of the game.
Is is a dangerous to the PCs as the old warhammer?
Is it still careers based? (can you be a rat catcher?)


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## jadrax (Nov 16, 2009)

ardoughter said:


> Is is a dangerous to the PCs as the old warhammer?



No.



> Is it still careers based? (can you be a rat catcher?)



Yes (If you buy the expansion with rat catcher in).


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## Korgoth (Nov 16, 2009)

Agamon said:


> People make assumptions based on:
> 
> 
> It's made FFG (who made Descent)
> ...




Is _Munchkin_ a boardgame? Is _Dominion_? They're both discussed on BoardgameGeek at least.

Well... WHFRP3 is obviously a card game!


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## Asmor (Nov 16, 2009)

Rel said:


> Honestly I'm much more interested and curious about what the expectation is regarding the PC's lot in life and the sorts of adventures they are expected to go on.  To me WFRP has always been a game about being a lowly Ratcatcher, Vagabond or Peasant who must make his way in a world where starvation, disease and an angry pig are very real threats to life and limb.  Like literally someday somebody will ask you, "How'd you get the wooden leg?" and you'll say, "Well see, there was this pig..."  To me, that very grim n gritty type of game is what I really enjoy most about the WFRP world and I'm hoping the tradition is continued in this edition.




I can't say very much about the tone of the game, since I played it only briefly and didn't look at the rules or fluff in very much detail at all.

However, Evan (the GM) did say that the game billed itself as a game of heroism, which did seem like a departure to me.

That said, there's a huge deck of critical wounds, another deck of insanities, one of magical backfires, and a fourth deck that I don't recall which I think also had some nastiness in it. Basic careers are fairly similar to the assortment available in 2e, though notably absent is the rat catcher (and by extension his small, but vicious, dog).



Phaezen said:


> Character stats and abilities are tracked via cards instead of pen and paper (or an app).




No, you still have a character sheet which keeps track of all your stats.

The cards only track your talents and actions, sort of akin to D&D's feats and powers respectively.

The reason they're provided as cards is because you need to manipulate them in various ways as the state of the game changes. Some talents, for example, are always on, while others have to be expended when you use them. You can also lend your talents out to the entire group by moving them to the group sheet, which is basically a simplified character sheet giving the character of the group as a whole (things like Swords for Hire, Band of Thugs, etc). For actions, you need to flip them over to the correct side depending on your stance and need to place delay markers on them to keep track of how long before they can be used again.


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## crazy_cat (Nov 16, 2009)

delericho said:


> Not at an RRP of £80, I don't!



Agreed.


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## Agamon (Nov 16, 2009)

Korgoth said:


> Is _Munchkin_ a boardgame? Is _Dominion_? They're both discussed on BoardgameGeek at least.
> 
> Well... WHFRP3 is obviously a card game!




No, it's an RPG with some board game bits.  There's cards in the game?


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## Korgoth (Nov 16, 2009)

Agamon said:


> No, it's an RPG with some board game bits.  There's cards in the game?




I was being a bit cheeky. But yes, I think that all your maneuvers/attacks are on cards, and I think wounds/criticals and other things are on the cards, too. Like you get hit, so you draw a card; if it's a critical you flip it to the critical side and whatnot.

If one were to seriously argue that the game is a hybrid (I don't care, because I loathe it too much to want to spend much time thinking about it), I think that the strongest argument would be that it's a rpg/card game hybrid; but as I was pointing out the line between "board game" and "card game" is awfully blurry these days.


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## Ariosto (Nov 16, 2009)

"Good complication"? Maybe for some other game.

Maybe not so good for tabletop RPGs in general. How much do people really want to grub their hands with such complication -- and how much do they prefer to leave it to a computer? Trying to compete with video games on the machine's terms is a losing proposition, I think.

Or is the perceived rival-cum-model the tabletop wargame? There was always a fine line between the two hobbies, and the cutting-edge wargamers have rather blurred it. So, is this really a regression back toward the state in which RPGs are just a subtype of wargame?


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## AllisterH (Nov 16, 2009)

Ariosto said:


> "Good complication"? Maybe for some other game.
> 
> Maybe not so good for tabletop RPGs in general. How much do people really want to grub their hands with such complication -- and how much do they prefer to leave it to a computer? Trying to compete with video games on the machine's terms is a losing proposition, I think.




I take issue with the mistaken belief (IMHO of course) that mechanical complexity has anything to do with competing with computer RPGs. 

One of the most simple RPG systems is GURPS (roll 3d6 for everything) yet  it was the basis for the FALLOUT CRPGs.


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## Ariosto (Nov 16, 2009)

> One of the most simple RPG systems is GURPS



*Rolling On The Floor Laughing My Ass Off!!*


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## Ariosto (Nov 17, 2009)

Assuming, though, AllisterH, that I were to agree with your characterization -- with just what "mistaken belief" in particular are you taking issue? You're a bit vague on that point, or at least on the presumed relevance of GURPS.


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## AllisterH (Nov 17, 2009)

Ariosto said:


> *Rolling On The Floor Laughing My Ass Off!!*




????

GURPS is one of the most simple mechanics around. Exactly what is "complicated" about the dice resolution system in GURPS?

Original edition Vampire has a finnicky dice resolution system. GURPS? Not seeing it.


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## Ariosto (Nov 17, 2009)

Ah, well, if by "RPG systems" you mean "choices of dice to roll", then the one in GURPS is only more complicated than all those involving but one or two dice.

Granting that, what exactly are you asserting as to competition with computer RPGs? 



> One of the most simple RPG systems is GURPS (roll 3d6 for everything) yet  it was the basis for the FALLOUT CRPGs.



What happens to be "the basis for" a CRPG is an entirely different matter.


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## AllisterH (Nov 17, 2009)

Ariosto said:


> Ah, well, if by "RPG systems" you mean "choices of dice to roll", then the one in GURPS is only more complicated than all those involving but one or two dice.
> 
> Granting that, what exactly are you asserting as to competition with computer RPGs?
> 
> What happens to be "the basis for" a CRPG is an entirely different matter.




No, I asusme it was you that was asserting that finicky dice resolution systems are trying to be computer like.

I'm simply stating that given the underlying mechanic in Fallout, dice mechanics/complexity has nothing to do with computers.

EDIT: GURPS is still less complicated than Alternity for example and the latter uses two dice to resolve actions.


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## Ariosto (Nov 17, 2009)

What I have in mind is that electronic computers handle some things much more efficiently, but are handicapped next to humans in other pursuits. Some people still prefer to do by hand a lot of computation, but I think that even 30 years ago that was a minority among those who might be interested more generally in "hobby games". For every one who delights in the arcana of _Aftermath_ or the drudgery of _Drang Nach Osten_, I think there are several who look at that and think, "I find the underlying subject interesting, but the complications under which it's buried are labors I'll gladly leave to a machine."

Indeed, it seems to me that the industry's decline is due in no little part to its having been inflated at first by people who saw it as the closest thing to what they really wanted -- what computer games now deliver.

Neither mechanics-heavy RPGs nor computer games deliver what another demographic wants. The "story tellers" and "immersed role-players" are often enough at odds with one another, but both groups seem to me primarily interested in what _humans_ bring to the table. The computer has advantages in catering to "pure game" enthusiasts.


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## ProfessorCirno (Nov 17, 2009)

As much as I've liked FFG, this simply sounds like too much of a departure and too different from the WHFRP that I loved.  I actually do hope FFG is successful with this and brings new people into the game, but it's not for me.


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## FunkBGR (Nov 17, 2009)

I like to try things, so I asked my local game store to participate in the demo. They did, and basically I got set up with the advance copy to run said demo. I'm comfortable with WFRP2e, so I sat down with the rulebook and took a hard look.

At first, I was skeptical - I didn't know how it would translate. But once I actually got people at the table playing, it was AWESOME. Basically, you get rid of pencils at the table and use cards instead. Nothing stops you from going back to the old way, however. 

I dunno, I had a really good time running it, and the people that played really enjoyed it too. 

It definitely convinced me to put money down on it, and I'm going to honestly try to get more people interested by hosting a game at the same game store.


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## DMfromdimensionX (Nov 17, 2009)

I've gone back and forth on this game. I loved 2ed and when i heard FFG was re-doing i was really hoping they would put the team from Midnight on it, clean up the magic a bit and ad some of their own flair but keep it in the same spirit as the 1st and 2eds. So obviously i am very dissapointed. 

   On the other hand it sounds like a fun game once you get a feel for it and some of the ideas like a party sheet and the stances seem very interesting. 

   What its boiling down to for me though is that i live in a fairly small town and just finding enough people for a regular D&D game is hard enough. I really doubt i would be able to fill a group who for a new RPG with so many fiddly bits. So if someone else bought it i would be willing to play and see how it feels but spending my 80$ on it would almost certainly wind up a waste of my money.


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## Jhaelen (Nov 18, 2009)

Korgoth said:


> I was being a bit cheeky. But yes, I think that all your maneuvers/attacks are on cards, and I think wounds/criticals and other things are on the cards, too. Like you get hit, so you draw a card; if it's a critical you flip it to the critical side and whatnot.



Well, using a deck for something like critical hits is something I'd actually consider to be elegant compared to the 'traditional' approach of rolling dice and looking up the result in tables.

I'm similarly intrigued by the dice system. If you're interested in generating more than just a binary success/failure result, such a special dice pool _is_ an easy way to do it. Being able to influence what kind of dice get used for your pool adds the necessary tactical element.

If it wasn't for the high price point, I'd definitely get the game.


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## UngainlyTitan (Nov 18, 2009)

The game itself sounds interesting but too pricey for me, as it is unlikely I would get to play it. ALso it sounds a bit departure from the original for me to go for it on nostalgia reasons.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Nov 18, 2009)

I generally like the approach of adding or substracting dice instead of applying modifiers to dice rolls or using tables. Of course, my first RPG was Shadowrun - which in some ways did that well, in other ways failed spectacularly. Shadowrun 4E finally got that right, but it seems Warhammer even does get a step forward - no subscructation of dice, complications add dice with negative consequences.

I think the Warhammer dice resolution system is pretty sensible. You don't have to calculate, only to count. Apperently, you also don't have to look at tables - you can use cards.


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## Korgoth (Nov 18, 2009)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:


> I generally like the approach of adding or substracting dice instead of applying modifiers to dice rolls or using tables. Of course, my first RPG was Shadowrun - which in some ways did that well, in other ways failed spectacularly. Shadowrun 4E finally got that right, but it seems Warhammer even does get a step forward - no subscructation of dice, complications add dice with negative consequences.
> 
> I think the Warhammer dice resolution system is pretty sensible. You don't have to calculate, only to count. Apperently, you also don't have to look at tables - you can use cards.




I'm afraid I simply cannot imagine why someone would want to count and manage little symbols (comets, hammers, green clovers, etc.) when they could use _numbers_ instead. Beautiful, crystalline, pure numbers. Have we lost an appreciation for their loveliness?


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## Herremann the Wise (Nov 19, 2009)

Korgoth said:


> I'm afraid I simply cannot imagine why someone would want to count and manage little symbols (comets, hammers, green clovers, etc.) when they could use _numbers_ instead. Beautiful, crystalline, pure numbers. Have we lost an appreciation for their loveliness?



I don't know. The mathematical-side of me (teaching the subject for over 15 years) is very much looking forward to working out the mathematical framework that this dice system is tied to. I can imagine a certain level of anticipation of the result that you don't get with a straight die roll. The fact that you the player knows straight away whether you have succeeded and by what margin is pretty cool... elegant even. D&D's linear core mechanic is OK but spice... life... and all that. While this game has been derided in terms of its boardgame bits and dice mechanic, I'm yet to read anyone say that the actual gameplay is crap; kind of the opposite really. 

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## darjr (Nov 19, 2009)

Uh.. since when are numbers not symbols?


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## Asmor (Nov 19, 2009)

Korgoth said:


> I'm afraid I simply cannot imagine why someone would want to count and manage little symbols (comets, hammers, green clovers, etc.) when they could use _numbers_ instead. Beautiful, crystalline, pure numbers. Have we lost an appreciation for their loveliness?




Speaking as a math major (graduated, but it feels weird to call myself a mathematician), I hate numbers.  Ok, that's a lie, I love numbers; I hate arithmetic. 



darjr said:


> Uh.. since when are numbers not symbols?




Since always! Of course numbers aren't symbols! Numbers are abstract concepts.

Now, there are these things called numerals which are symbols to represent numbers. But numbers themselves? Not symbols. At least, not in the sense you're thinking. Certainly a number *could* be a symbol, just like a flag is a symbol. 13, for example, might be considered a symbol for bad luck. But that's an entirely different meaning of the word symbol, and I'm assuming you meant symbols as in glyphs.


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## darjr (Nov 19, 2009)

So the numbers on the dice are symbols... or not?

Are they not symbols that hold some abstract meaning?


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## Plaguedguy (Nov 19, 2009)

From what I've seen of the game thus far (admittedly very little) it feels a lot like a self-contained roleplay game more than a traditional RPG. Something more on par with 'host a murder' and similar games. There seems to be more room for collective storytelling, but at the same time I wonder how much room exists for mechanical variety and expression.

I'd be willing to learn and play the system. This new approach to RPG design is certainly interesting. 
The price however is a sticking point for me, and I can't see myself making the initial investment.


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## arscott (Nov 19, 2009)

Got a chance to play on sunday, and loved it.  I'll be picking this game up as soon as I finish my current campaign.  Not familiar with previous editions of WFRP, so I can't speak to thematic concerns, but anyone who avoids this game because it looks like a board game is doing themselves a disservice.

The dice system is simpler than it looks--it'll be second instinct by the end of your first session.  This feels like the sort of dice rolling you do in story-emphasis games like World of Darkness or 7th sea, rather than more combat emphasis games like D&D.

The only use of cards that seemed boardgame-like was being dealt three possible careers from the career deck and choosing one.  But apparently, previous editions did the same thing, only with percentile rolls.  In general, cards seem to replace things that would be on randomized tables in other games (i.e. critical hits), or are entirely non-randomized and put in card form purely for ease of use (i.e. action cards)

Had a chance to look through some of the rule books.  I'm pleased to say that the Wizard and Priest books are 75% setting info, and only 25% rules.  Presumably the other too books are a bit crunchier.

responses to specific posts below the fold:
[SBLOCK]


frankthedm said:


> Are the dice faces carved in, or are they just printed on like the doom dice? Those doom dice wore away far too fast for rpg use.



carved in--and far more deeply than I've seen on most other dice.  The dice themselves seem to be made of a harder plastic that your average rpg dice too.


frankthedm said:


> and what about minis, movement and tactical positioning in combat?



cardboard character standees--if your familiar with the character markers from arkham horror, these are the same thing.  Looks like there was one for each career, plus a number for various monsters.  Movement was very abstract--you were either at long range, medium range, short range, or engaged in melee.  The action cards tie into this--My archer had a covering fire ability that gave penalties to all enemies in an engagement, and a sneak attack ability whose target must be engaged with an ally--and being bow abilities, they both required me to not be engaged myself.



Derren said:


> More importantly, what support for out of combat abilities does that system give?



By itself, the dice pool system adds a lot of character to out-of-combat skill use--where in D&D, you might just roll a climb check to climb a steep mountain, in WFRP3, you have to decide whether you're going to be reckless (and potentially risk injuring yourself) or be conservative (and risk delay) the GM can assign fortune or misfortune dice to checks--theoretically not much different than the ubiquitous +2/-2 modifiers in D&D, but the tangibility makes them much more obvious, and I expect it will have players paying much more attention to the circumstances of their actions.
Talents (especially reputation talents) and special actions add to this.  So far, one of the coolest things I have seen in the game is an out of combat action card.  Action cards are all double sided, and you choose the side corresponding to your stance--In this particular card, the reckless side of the card had "drunken carousing", while the conservative side had "formal diplomacy"


pogre said:


> I think I'm selling this game to my groups as the new Warhammer Quest campaign. I think the expectations for WFRP are just different than this game delivers. It seems like a great game, I think for me I just had to let go of it being a pure RPG and embrace it as an Advanced Heroquest or Road to Legend type game.



This strikes me as wrong-headed.  People coming to the table expecting to find the WFRP they know and love _might be_ disappointed by the changes in the new edition.  But people coming to the table expecting Warhammer Quest _are bound to be_ disappointed.


ardoughter said:


> It sounds interesting  but also very different to WHFRP as I remember it. I only played and DM'ed 1st edition WHFRP and the thing I really liked about it was, once one was familar with the system, one could run a game without reference to the books except for chargen.
> This version does not appear to have that simplicity. So I have a couple of questions about the feel of the game.
> Is is a dangerous to the PCs as the old warhammer?
> Is it still careers based? (can you be a rat catcher?)



You can definitely play this game without the books once you're familiar with the system.  Anything you'd conceivably need to look up is now on a card.  It's still career-based (though apparently the rat-catcher isn't in the core set).  At my table, there was a human agent, a high-elven scholar, a wood-elf scout (me), and a dwarven coachman.[/SBLOCK]


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## Herremann the Wise (Nov 19, 2009)

Asmor said:


> Since always! Of course numbers aren't symbols! Numbers are abstract concepts.
> 
> Now, there are these things called numerals which are symbols to represent numbers. But numbers themselves? Not symbols. At least, not in the sense you're thinking. Certainly a number *could* be a symbol, just like a flag is a symbol. 13, for example, might be considered a symbol for bad luck. But that's an entirely different meaning of the word symbol, and I'm assuming you meant symbols as in glyphs.



I still remember my *4th grade *teacher getting aggravated at the class (we were all nine year olds at the time) because we could not grasp the difference between a numeral and a number. She wrote the "number" 5 on the board and repeatedly tried to convince us that this was not a number, resorting to her jumping up and down and throwing her chalk at the board in complete frustration. It's stuck with me to this day funnily enough - there are some things a nine year old just simply does not need to know I suppose.

It's like the look on a fifteen year old's face when you tell them parallel lines can in actual fact meet... the realisation that they've been lied to for so many years as if you were finally telling them the facts about Santa. Or trying to explain the concept of infinity... you know journey, not destination...

I love maths

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## darjr (Nov 19, 2009)

Me to.

My point, I guess, is that level of symbolic manipulation needed for either dice methods isn't that far different.


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## darjr (Nov 19, 2009)

Dice roller - FAN MADE TOOL


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## Ssadral (Nov 19, 2009)

Wow... I went into this totally expecting to hate 3e. I even have watched the videos but they did nothing to convince me that I even wanted to try it.

Though, now I can see a ray of light and are rethinking things.

The dice was a turn off... but after reading things here, I like that it replaces +/- that most games have. The symbolism certainly doesn't bother me as I know you will get used to it. I play my fair share of Memoir '44 and the dice have just become background and easy to read at a glance. I suspect the same will happen here.

As, far as the cost. Well I just dropped $90 on the big box Carccassone game. considering what I got with that dropping $100 (most likely less at Amazon or Chapters) doesn't seem that bad especially when you compare getting the 3 books for D&D 4e is roughly the same. The only real difference is that EVERYONE will have to buy the whole set, even if your a player that wants to own it.

Still interesting. I guess I'll keep reading threads like these and reserve judgment.


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## Asmor (Nov 19, 2009)

darjr said:


> So the numbers on the dice are symbols... or not?
> 
> Are they not symbols that hold some abstract meaning?




I'm saying _there are no numbers on dice_. Numbers don't exist in any physical way. There are _numerals_ on dice. 



Ssadral said:


> The only real difference is that EVERYONE will have to buy the whole set, even if your a player that wants to own it.




My suspiscion is that they don't expect more than 1 copy to exist within any given group... Or, perhaps, they expect only the GM to buy it, though maybe they're hoping that multiple GMs will each buy their own copies.

In any case, I really don't think they expect players to buy the set, which is certainly a departure from the traditional business model. I'd like to see some sort of "player pack" which just has the main rulebook, dice, and maybe more character sheets.


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## Korgoth (Nov 19, 2009)

Asmor said:


> Speaking as a math major (graduated, but it feels weird to call myself a mathematician), I hate numbers.  Ok, that's a lie, I love numbers; I hate arithmetic.




Ah. I'm a philosophy guy. I love the pure formality of numbers... each one as if uniquely its own species, like the very angels themselves.


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## Herremann the Wise (Nov 19, 2009)

Korgoth said:


> Ah. I'm a philosophy guy. I love the pure formality of numbers... each one as if uniquely its own species, like the very angels themselves.



Bah unique?! There's an infinite number of the little bastards like demons in the Abyss. Angels?!
Philosophy major huh?...Sheesh!

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## Trolls (Nov 19, 2009)

Warhammer 3e has me very interested. I'm not that familiar with the Warhammer world (though I did play 40,000 back in the day), so it's really just the mechanics that have caught my eye. I don't know if I'd have seriously considered buying the game a couple of years ago, and I think my experiences with 4e have lead to that change of heart. RPGs don't have to be arcane.

I know some people like to be huddled over a set of open books, scribbling notes on bits of paper. But that's not how I like my games anymore. For me, it's about the time at the table, not the time at a desk, and I don't care what departures from tradition a game takes to make the experience more fun. Warhammer 3e seems to exemplify that.

That, and I'm a sucker for good presentation! 

I just wish there were some demos running in the UK. It's worrying to spend £70 on a product without trying it out!


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## delericho (Nov 19, 2009)

Ssadral said:


> As, far as the cost. Well I just dropped $90 on the big box Carccassone game. considering what I got with that dropping $100 (most likely less at Amazon or Chapters) doesn't seem that bad especially when you compare getting the 3 books for D&D 4e is roughly the same.




According to Amazon UK, the RRP of Warhammer 3e is £80, while the 4e Core Rules gift set is £60. That strikes me as a fairly big difference. (And, incidentally, the RRP of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition was £25.)

It's also worth noting that Amazon offers a significantly greater discount on the D&D set than the Warhammer box. In effect, the D&D 4e core rules are about half the price of Warhammer.

I'm not inherently opposed to big, expensive RPG purchases. But if I'm going to be convinced to make that purchase, the company involved really needs to blow me away with their presentation. It's too expensive for me to buy it unless I'm sure I'll both like it and use it heavily. Neither of these things is true of Warhammer 3rd Edition.


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## Angellis_ater (Nov 19, 2009)

delericho said:


> According to Amazon UK, the RRP of Warhammer 3e is £80, while the 4e Core Rules gift set is £60. That strikes me as a fairly big difference. (And, incidentally, the RRP of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition was £25.)




However, does those 60 pounds include dice? Character sheets? Sure, the three core books are about 60£, but the boxed set of WHRP is more than just books. It is dice, character sheets, counters and a crapload of other stuff. 

Just pointing these things out.


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## delericho (Nov 19, 2009)

Angellis_ater said:


> However, does those 60 pounds include dice? Character sheets?




The dice used by 4e can be considered ubiquitous amongst the gamer population. Only brand-new gamers will need to buy a set (at about £5), and they can then use them in every other RPG out there.

Character sheets can be downloaded freely from the Wizards website. Even for people who don't otherwise have access, libraries provide access to the internet and printing facilities for a matter of pennies.

So, yes, I believe that £60 includes everything that is needed to play that the average gamer wouldn't otherwise have.

By making use of custom dice that can only be used for this one game, FFG have increased the price point of their game. That is a reasonable decision to make (one that I disagree with, but fair enough), but it does mean that they'll suffer by comparison.


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## Jhaelen (Nov 19, 2009)

Korgoth said:


> I'm afraid I simply cannot imagine why someone would want to count and manage little symbols (comets, hammers, green clovers, etc.) when they could use _numbers_ instead. Beautiful, crystalline, pure numbers. Have we lost an appreciation for their loveliness?



I guess, you don't have any mathematically challenged players in your group then. In my group there are two players that have problems adding two digit numbers to single digit numbers. One of them uses a calculator to add her d20 results to her bonus, the other doesn't use any calculation aids but is as often wrong as not, forcing me or other players to check all of his calculations. Both slow the game down quite a bit.

They'd _love_ it, if they just had to count symbols (and me and the rest of the players, as well)!


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## Ssadral (Nov 19, 2009)

Asmor said:


> My suspiscion is that they don't expect more than 1 copy to exist within any given group... Or, perhaps, they expect only the GM to buy it, though maybe they're hoping that multiple GMs will each buy their own copies.



I think a more likely scenario is they are going to release the books separately as well as the fiddly bits, after a predetermined amount of time has passed. Otherwise your going to have some pissed off gamers when they lose some of their fiddly bits, or the get ruined etc. No one is going to want to buy another whole set to replace a few items.

Just a guess of course. But, it is the one thing that is making me hesitant about getting it. I need to know if it will get that kind of support.



delericho said:


> According to Amazon UK, the RRP of Warhammer 3e is £80, while the 4e Core Rules gift set is £60. That strikes me as a fairly big difference. (And, incidentally, the RRP of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition was £25.)



Ah, I was going by Canadian Amazon prices.

Warhammer 3e: $62.97
D&D 4e gift set: $66.12

Both have free shipping so your just paying tax on the two amounts.

So, at least for us it is _cheaper._


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## orangefruitbat (Nov 19, 2009)

*Amazon Canada*

Where did you see the link on Amazon.ca? I can't seem to find it on the Canadian site.



Ssadral said:


> Ah, I was going by Canadian Amazon prices.
> 
> Warhammer 3e: $62.97
> D&D 4e gift set: $66.12
> ...


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## Mathew_Freeman (Nov 19, 2009)

Thanks for the in-play review, there is some interesting information there.

Sounds like a fun game to me, and I'd be happy to give it a shot. Personally, I couldn't care less whether a particular game is "board-gamey" or not, I'll take it on it's own merits.


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## crazy_cat (Nov 19, 2009)

delericho said:


> I'm not inherently opposed to big, expensive RPG purchases. But if I'm going to be convinced to make that purchase, the company involved really needs to blow me away with their presentation. It's too expensive for me to buy it unless I'm sure I'll both like it and use it heavily. Neither of these things is true of Warhammer 3rd Edition.



Agreed, £5 for a PDF of a game I'm not sure about is one thing - but a big initial outlay like this requires that I be convinced this is something I really want and am going to enjoy and get some use out of.


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## darjr (Nov 19, 2009)

Quest for Fun!: Warhammer Fantasy RolePlay Follow-up

I know there are probably lots and lots of other reviews, but I thought it was interesting to get the pov of a guy who might have to sell the thing.


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## Pickles JG (Nov 19, 2009)

Mathew_Freeman said:


> Sounds like a fun game to me, and I'd be happy to give it a shot. Personally, I couldn't care less whether a particular game is "board-gamey" or not, I'll take it on it's own merits.




I do find the "boardgamey" comments odd. RPGs have been around for 30 years & overwhelmingly used dice & pencil & paper for mechanical stuff. This game uses exceedingly odd dice cards & counters for the mechanical stuff. Surely though that's nothing to to with what makes a game a role playing game?

This one sounds a lot like DD4 with actions on cards &c though without the tactical minutiae I adore. 

Anyway there are demos of the game at Fanboy3 in Manchester on Saturday & Sunday where I will be trying it out.


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## Ariosto (Nov 19, 2009)

> This one sounds a lot like DD4 ...



Maybe so. That didn't grab everyone in the "DD" world -- and _this is supposedly *WFRP* "3e"_.

I guess we have seen what happens when that factor -- what is (or is not) actually recognizable in "brand recognition" -- gets neglected.


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## ProfessorCirno (Nov 19, 2009)

Ariosto said:


> Maybe so. That didn't grab everyone in the "DD" world -- and _this is supposedly *WFRP* "3e"_.
> 
> I guess we have seen what happens when that factor -- what is (or is not) actually recognizable in "brand recognition" -- gets neglected.




That's kinda my issue with it.

I'm sure it might be a great game, but it just doesn't look like Warhammer to me.


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## pedr (Nov 19, 2009)

delericho said:


> According to Amazon UK, the RRP of Warhammer 3e is £80, while the 4e Core Rules gift set is £60. That strikes me as a fairly big difference. (And, incidentally, the RRP of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition was £25.)



It's worth noting that there is no VAT/sales tax on books in the UK, whereas WFRP isn't going to count as a book, so VAT is chargeable. If you had to pay VAT on the £60 core books for D&D you'd have to pay £69 now (more in January when the rate goes back up).

Of course, you could criticise FFG for producing a game which doesn't take advantage of favourable tax rates, but the difference in price is at least partly due to government decisions as well as those of FFG. Having said that, I'm not sure why the UK RRP is £80. FFG board games which have an RRP of $50 in the US (such as BSG) have a UK RRP of £35, which would suggest a £70 RRP for a $100 game.


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## Ariosto (Nov 19, 2009)

So, the big question would seem to be how many people are eager to fork out for this new dice-and-cards-and-etc. game system.

Perhaps I missed it, but I don't recall any demand for such a thing from *Warhammer FRP* fans; the 2nd edition seems to have been well received, especially -- but not only -- by those who saw it as at last fixing shortcomings (e.g., in magic rules) that had been evident ere the first edition went out the Workshop door onto the sales floor.

The enthusiasm for this novelty seems to me more from folks who have no previous great interest in WFRP. Will they now put their money where their mouths are?


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## Herremann the Wise (Nov 20, 2009)

Ariosto said:


> So, the big question would seem to be how many people are eager to fork out for this new dice-and-cards-and-etc. game system.
> 
> Perhaps I missed it, but I don't recall any demand for such a thing from *Warhammer FRP* fans; the 2nd edition seems to have been well received, especially -- but not only -- by those who saw it as at last fixing shortcomings (e.g., in magic rules) that had been evident ere the first edition went out the Workshop door onto the sales floor.
> 
> The enthusiasm for this novelty seems to me more from folks who have no previous great interest in WFRP. Will they now put their money where their mouths are?



It's the number one RPG seller on Amazon at the moment - although what that's worth or says could mean anything. I think you're right in terms of appealing to a wider/different market than previous.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## Ssadral (Nov 20, 2009)

orangefruitbat said:


> Where did you see the link on Amazon.ca? I can't seem to find it on the Canadian site.



Gaahh... sorry. Somehow, when I was looking at the .ca site it switched to the .com site without me noticing. I thought I was going crazy trying to find it again at .ca

So, those quotes were for the US.

The D&D 4e gift set is $76.23 cdn.

So you can extrapolate that the WFRP 3e will be around $75 cdn. That is if Amazon.ca follows the same kind of formula that Amazon.com does.

Again sorry for the confusion.


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## AllisterH (Nov 20, 2009)

Now here's a statement that might seem contradictory given my earlier posts.

I *hate* this dice resolution system. I, as a player or DM, LIKE knowing my odds before I roll the dice and I'm not seeing this system as easy to roughly calculate on the fly (and yes, I disliked intensely Shadowrun/Vampire bucketfull of dice for the same reason)

Secondly, what happens if I lose a couple of dice (and knowing myself, this _WILL_ happen)? Surely I don't have to buy the entire game once again JUST for dice


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## jadrax (Nov 20, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> Secondly, what happens if I lose a couple of dice (and knowing myself, this _WILL_ happen)? Surely I don't have to buy the entire game once again JUST for dice




Dice are available for sale separately, but only in a pre-selected pack.


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## jadrax (Nov 20, 2009)

Herremann the Wise said:


> It's the number one RPG seller on Amazon at the moment - although what that's worth or says could mean anything.



Amazon sales ranking for pre-orders are notoriously wonky, until its on sale and actually shipping I would not trust them at all.


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## arscott (Nov 20, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> I *hate* this dice resolution system. I, as a player or DM, LIKE knowing my odds before I roll the dice and I'm not seeing this system as easy to roughly calculate on the fly (and yes, I disliked intensely Shadowrun/Vampire bucketfull of dice for the same reason)



For dice pool systems, I've found an "expected results" gauge to be more useful -- for example, In the storytelling system, you can expect one success for every three dice you roll.  A similar system can apply to WFRP3 dice (though the multiple die types and various resulting symbols obviously make things more complicated.)



jadrax said:


> Dice are available for sale separately, but only in a pre-selected pack.



Yeah, but any flgs worth their salt will bust open some of those packs and sell the dice as singles.


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## Hand of Evil (Nov 20, 2009)

See all thes post and no where do a see a "grim world of perilous adventure or dark and gritty".  The system does not appear to generate that atmosphere but more pulp adventure.  I am not saying that is a bad thing but that is not WFRP; pulp heroes have a bounce to them, gritty heroes don't.


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## wolff96 (Nov 20, 2009)

Ariosto said:


> Perhaps I missed it, but I don't recall any demand for such a thing from *Warhammer FRP* fans; the 2nd edition seems to have been well received, especially -- but not only -- by those who saw it as at last fixing shortcomings (e.g., in magic rules) that had been evident ere the first edition went out the Workshop door onto the sales floor.




As one of the Warhammer FRP fans, I can speak for myself and my group:  We're not going anywhere.  I'm going to be checking the game out if I get a chance, but purely for my own curiousity as a system-junkie.  

There's only one problem with 2e in our humble opinion:  It's hard to find the books since they went out of print!

-----------------------------

I realize why FFG has made this decision.  I can even empathize with their need to turn a profit.  But I (as a consumer) can't stand the whole "expansion pack" mentality that seems to have enveloped gaming lately.  One could argue that it goes back a long ways -- especially with the GURPs _library_, but to use a current example:  D&D 4e releases new books all the time.  (D&D 3e did the same thing at slightly less regular intervals, this is edition non-specific.)

New classes, new monsters, new options.  As a company, this is good strategy as long as you can maintain interest.  ESPECIALLY when the new options are for players.  There's always been a lot more players than DMs, so it increases possible revenue.

I'm not telling anyone anything they don't already know here, I'm sure...  but a big part of the fundamental identity of Warhammer are their terrible starting careers -- your destination and ambition are what matters, not where you started.  

But if I can't even be a Ratcatcher (with his small, but vicious dog) without buying an expansion pack, that's kind of a big deal to me.  Maybe that's just me.


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## DMfromdimensionX (Nov 20, 2009)

I totally agree with wolf96. 2e was great and did not need any update system-wise. I said it before in this thread, FFG should have just put the team behind the Midnight setting on doing expansion areas, monster guides and adventures. Maybe an expanded Campaign guide 2 with more equipment and careers that focuses on another area of the old world, bretonnia or kislev maybe. 

   But totally revamping a system that was great and satisfied its fans and turning it into some sort of cross between hero quest and magic the gathering just doesnt feel right to me. While it might be a fun game it doesnt look or feel like warhammer IMO. And i never particularly liked any board games or card games anyway. So FFG bringing those elements in is a big turn off for me. 

    I know they lost a regular Warhammer purchaser in me with this one and no one else i have talked to that liked 1e or 2e is interested in this either. They might bring in new fans, but its gonna have to be enough to build an entirely new fanbase from scratch.


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## Ssadral (Nov 20, 2009)

arscott said:


> Yeah, but any flgs worth their salt will bust open some of those packs and sell the dice as singles.



Really? Why in the world, you as a game store owner, would open prepackaged dice- specialty dice for one game- to sell them individually, when you could sell the whole pack of dice even if the customer only lost/needed one or two of the dice in the pack?

Breaking open the dice pack makes absolutely no sense.







DMfromdimensionX said:


> But totally revamping a system that was great and *satisfied its fans* and turning it into some sort of cross between hero quest and magic the gathering just doesnt feel right to me. While it might be a fun game it doesn't look or feel like warhammer IMO. And i never particularly liked any board games or card games anyway. So FFG bringing those elements in is a big turn off for me.



Well, I think this is the point. They already have hardcore fans, and any company loves their regulars, but there are two things at work here that most companies know. Even though there is much teeth mashing and hand wringing by their loyal customers, about things like, we don't need a new system, the feel I got from Warhammer is taken out by this new edition etc. is usually short term and most dedicated fans will buy into the new edition. Some won't, but that segment is so small that point number 2 will make up for it.

Secondly, Warhammer 3e was created to bring new blood into the fold. And, making a big splash like this they have the gaming world all a buzz and people who had never considered Warhammer before are now looking at it. And, as many dedicated fans they may lose, is made up ten fold by new blood.

You see it all the time... with the biggest example being D&D 4e.


----------



## DMfromdimensionX (Nov 20, 2009)

Ssadral said:


> Well, I think this is the point. They already have hardcore fans, and any company loves their regulars, but there are two things at work here that most companies know. Even though there is much teeth mashing and hand wringing by their loyal customers, about things like, we don't need a new system, the feel I got from Warhammer is taken out by this new edition etc. is usually short term and most dedicated fans will buy into the new edition. Some won't, but that segment is so small that point number 2 will make up for it.
> 
> Secondly, Warhammer 3e was created to bring new blood into the fold. And, making a big splash like this they have the gaming world all a buzz and people who had never considered Warhammer before are now looking at it. And, as many dedicated fans they may lose, is made up ten fold by new blood.
> 
> You see it all the time... with the biggest example being D&D 4e.




   Warhammer is a different beast then D&D though. The first edition came out in 86, since then there have been a total of 2 editions, with this 3rd forthcoming. Compare that to what 4 or 5 official editions of D&D and countless D20 spinoffs?  Many of those years in between 86 and now the material was totally unsupported and survived only on fan publications as well. 

    D&D players are used to jumping editions and having serious company support and consistent new products. Warhammer players are much more comfortable just using a core book and all thier own work and telling the parent company to take a long walk off a short cliff, granted games workshop made some pretty boneheaded decisions that necessitated this but still warhammer players on the whole dont feel a great need to go along with whoever holds the license and play a core, supported game. 

   Assuming that a majority will eventually jump ship just because most D&Ders jumped to 3.5 (4th ed is still much debatable about whether a majority are gonna jump to it, or stick with it if they do) is working with a faulty baseline logic that the player bases have similar expectations. When it comes to bringing in new players, i honestly dont see people who like a traditional roleplaying game of any stripe taking this and turning it into their regular long term game of choice for campaigns. Some people are interested, some of those will buy it. But will enough who buy it, have enough interest that they will continue putting money into the expansions that a company needs to be able to sell to thrive? Personally i dont think so, its a niche, of a niche market that they are going for with this and i think its gonna bite them on the butt.


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## JRRNeiklot (Nov 20, 2009)

Ssadral said:


> Really? Why in the world, you as a game store owner, would open prepackaged dice- specialty dice for one game- to sell them individually, when you could sell the whole pack of dice even if the customer only lost/needed one or two of the dice in the pack?
> 
> Breaking open the dice pack makes absolutely no sense.




It makes a lot of sense.  I'm already losing money by buying from a local store instead of from Amazon or other online retailer.  I buy from the lfgs because they go out of there way to do things Amazon won't or can't.  Being nice enough to sell me the ONE die I need instead of forcing me to buy a 6 pack will get me to buy the next $40 book there instead of for $24.95 elsewhere.


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## Mournblade94 (Nov 20, 2009)

After I played this, I wonder how much of 4e success has influenced FFG.   I don't know why FFG changed the mechanics so drastically but it is another RPG distilled to Board game.  We already have that with 4e; now you can choose between 2 fantasy board game/rpg's.  I don't see how this is going to help FFG especially since 4e is simpler.

For fantasy board games I vastly prefer Talisman over WHFRP.  Granted the mechanics are not similar.

I didn't play through the whole demo, I left halfway through and decided reading comics would be a better way to spend my time.

Just another reason to be thankful for PAIZO, HERO, and mutants and masterminds...


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## Asmor (Nov 21, 2009)

Mournblade94 said:


> I didn't play through the whole demo, I left halfway through and decided reading comics would be a better way to spend my time.




Wow. That seems terribly rude to me. Walking out in the middle of an RPG session and leaving everyone else hanging? Lame.


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## BryonD (Nov 21, 2009)

Ssadral said:


> And, as many dedicated fans they may lose, is made up ten fold by new blood.
> 
> You see it all the time... with the biggest example being D&D 4e.




Reference please?


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## Mournblade94 (Nov 21, 2009)

Asmor said:


> Wow. That seems terribly rude to me. Walking out in the middle of an RPG session and leaving everyone else hanging? Lame.



It was a demo.  The purpose is to try the game.  If the game is lame I am under no obligation to waste my time.


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## Asmor (Nov 21, 2009)

Mournblade94 said:


> It was a demo.  The purpose is to try the game.  If the game is lame I am under no obligation to waste my time.




Demo or not, it's still a game session with all the social baggage that entails.

It's no different than walking out in the middle of a one-shot con game because you decide you don't like the system.


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## arscott (Nov 21, 2009)

Hand of Evil said:


> See all thes post and no where do a see a "grim world of perilous adventure or dark and gritty".  The system does not appear to generate that atmosphere but more pulp adventure.  I am not saying that is a bad thing but that is not WFRP; pulp heroes have a bounce to them, gritty heroes don't.



looking through the criticals, insanities, and miscasts, it still seemed pretty damned gritty.  Admittedly, we came out of our example combat pretty well off, but that's less about having bounce than having not actually fallen--We soundly routed a surprised and outnumbered group of foes--And I can't think of many gritty systems where that doesn't amount to 'handy win'.



wolff96 said:


> As one of the Warhammer FRP fans, I can speak for myself and my group:  We're not going anywhere.  I'm going to be checking the game out if I get a chance, but purely for my own curiousity as a system-junkie.
> 
> There's only one problem with 2e in our humble opinion:  It's hard to find the books since they went out of print!



Really?  Half the hardcovers are still available directly from the FFG web site, and the entire collection is in PDF from RPGNow.


> I'm not telling anyone anything they don't already know here, I'm sure...  but a big part of the fundamental identity of Warhammer are their terrible starting careers -- your destination and ambition are what matters, not where you started.
> 
> But if I can't even be a Ratcatcher (with his small, but vicious dog) without buying an expansion pack, that's kind of a big deal to me.  Maybe that's just me.



The basic careers in the core set are :Agent, Agitator, Apprentice Wizard, Barber-Surgeon, Boatman, Burgher, Coachman, Commoner, Dillitante, Envoy, Gambler, Hunter, Initiate, Mercenary, Messenger, Roadwarden, Scout, Soldier, Student, Thief, Thug, Troll Slayer, Watchman, Waywatcher, and Zealot.  I think that's a pretty appropriate mix of cool and terrible, even minus the ratcatcher.


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## kaomera (Nov 21, 2009)

Asmor said:


> Demo or not, it's still a game session with all the social baggage that entails.
> 
> It's no different than walking out in the middle of a one-shot con game because you decide you don't like the system.



Personally, I don't want to play in a convention game with someone who just doesn't want to be there. I've done it, both as a player who's expectations where just not being met and opposite such a player, and it's awkward & uncomfortable in both cases. I'm not suggesting that anyone should storm from the table or anything, but sometimes it's more polite to excuse yourself at the first break than to sit there, clearly not enjoying yourself, trying to be polite. (Especially if the GM is going to keep trying to engage you in the game, when it just isn't what you want or expected.)


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## jadrax (Nov 21, 2009)

kaomera said:


> Personally, I don't want to play in a convention game with someone who just doesn't want to be there. I've done it, both as a player who's expectations where just not being met and opposite such a player, and it's awkward & uncomfortable in both cases. I'm not suggesting that anyone should storm from the table or anything, but sometimes it's more polite to excuse yourself at the first break than to sit there, clearly not enjoying yourself, trying to be polite. (Especially if the GM is going to keep trying to engage you in the game, when it just isn't what you want or expected.)




Yes. There is nothing that is going to kill a game faster than someone sat there who feels forced to endure it rather than wanting to play it.


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## Gort (Nov 21, 2009)

I don't think you can have been very interesting in "trying the game" if you didn't even give it a whole session. Sounds to me like you had already made up your mind and just wanted to be passive-aggressive to people.

*sits down, rolls up character*

"Not for me!"

*sits in corner, reads comic books*


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## AllisterH (Nov 21, 2009)

DMfromdimensionX said:


> I totally agree with wolf96. 2e was great and did not need any update system-wise. I said it before in this thread, FFG should have just put the team behind the Midnight setting on doing expansion areas, monster guides and adventures. Maybe an expanded Campaign guide 2 with more equipment and careers that focuses on another area of the old world, bretonnia or kislev maybe.
> 
> But totally revamping a system that was great and satisfied its fans and turning it into some sort of cross between hero quest and magic the gathering just doesnt feel right to me. While it might be a fun game it doesnt look or feel like warhammer IMO. And i never particularly liked any board games or card games anyway. So FFG bringing those elements in is a big turn off for me.
> .




From what I understand....this is kind of the reason _WHY_ FFG decided it wanted to produce a 3e.

Apparently, FFG was NOT the company that actually released 2e and Black Industries (a subsidary of GW) basically mined out all the good material already.

Thus, all the high revenue products that came out in the first two years were already done and there is little for FFG to exploit in the 2e world.


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## DMfromdimensionX (Nov 21, 2009)

They might say that but there have 20 years of novels and they have hit tons of areas that BI didnt. Maybe it wouldnt have gone on for 5 or 10 more years just on supplements and adventures but then neither will this thing they have produced in its stead.


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## darjr (Nov 21, 2009)

DMfromdimensionX said:


> They might say that but there have 20 years of novels and they have hit tons of areas that BI didnt. Maybe it wouldnt have gone on for 5 or 10 more years just on supplements and adventures but then neither will this thing they have produced in its stead.



I don't think they got the novels. Black industries kept those.


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## kaomera (Nov 21, 2009)

Gort said:


> I don't think you can have been very interesting in "trying the game" if you didn't even give it a whole session. Sounds to me like you had already made up your mind and just wanted to be passive-aggressive to people.



While this may indeed be the case the player may simply have had vastly different expectations from what the experience turned out to be, even if purely because of the mechanics. Someone who hasn't been following the news on the FFG site or ENWorld could easily have expected something much more like previous editions (I've see a report that at least one GM was not aware of the magnitude of the mechanical changes until he got ahold of the demo material). For some players a significant change in mechanics is going to ruin the experience. Some people just don't like percentile dice, others don't like dice pools, and some may even dislike rolling d20s.

I got pretty much this same response (although for somewhat opposite reasons) when I left a CoC game at a con some years ago. The immediate assumption was that "Oh, he's a D&D player, so of course he's not willing to enjoy anything else." The thing is, I had played and run CoC before, and IMO the scenario this particular Keeper was running was a hack-and-slash dungeon crawl with a few inaccurate Mythos references thrown on top.

Anyway, to get off of this threadjack, WHFRPG3 looks kind of spiffy, but after playing 4e I'm not as excited as I could be about the physical components. It might be an interesting experience, and I'm open to trying it, but I'm not shelling out the price they're asking to do so and I reserve the right to find it unappealing. I'd probably want to watch a game in action before I tried it. One of the local gaming stores might end up with a "play copy" (several of the regulars have stocked up quite a selection of Euro-Games that are available to play), so maybe I will get to see it in action at some point.


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## AllisterH (Nov 21, 2009)

darjr said:


> I don't think they got the novels. Black industries kept those.




Personally, I'm unclear as to what the value of the license is....FFG couldn't produce novels, they have the license after all the main and big expansions have been produced by Black Industries.

What exactly was FFG planning on? Given that I imagine the license wasn't cheap (I figure only the WW and D&D campaign worlds would be more expensive),  in retrospect, we should have expected a 3e distinctly different.


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## Mournblade94 (Nov 21, 2009)

Gort said:


> I don't think you can have been very interesting in "trying the game" if you didn't even give it a whole session. Sounds to me like you had already made up your mind and just wanted to be passive-aggressive to people.
> 
> *sits down, rolls up character*
> 
> ...




That would be an incorrect assessment.

After 2 hours of playing you can have an adequate feel of how the game plays.

Ifigured it went without saying I withdrew gracefully.  Most people would.  A demo is not like a con game.  The demo is trying to sell you the game.  Where I thought I was getting a stremlined wfrp game I was infact getting a more complex talisman.  I was not sold.  I had no preconceptions as I knew nothing about the new edition.

It is no more rude to skip out on a demo, than leaving a car dealership after a test drive


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## Herremann the Wise (Nov 21, 2009)

Mournblade94 said:


> It is no more rude to skip out on a demo, than leaving a car dealership after a test drive



Sort of like taking it for a spin, going halfway around the block then politely getting out saying you'd prefer to walk back to the dealership. Not rude, but maybe just a little weird. Obviously we can all be a little weird at times.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## Gort (Nov 22, 2009)

Mournblade94 said:


> Ifigured it went without saying I withdrew gracefully.  Most people would.




Well, quite. Gamers tend not to be "most people" when it comes to social graces  It's probably just my jealousy talking - peeves me that there aren't any playtests in the UK while you US guys can just walk out on yours!


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## arscott (Nov 22, 2009)

arscott said:


> For dice pool systems, I've found an "expected results" gauge to be more useful -- for example, In the storytelling system, you can expect one success for every three dice you roll.  A similar system can apply to WFRP3 dice (though the multiple die types and various resulting symbols obviously make things more complicated.)



Just to follow up on this, here are the expected successes and expected boons/banes for the various dice:

Successes:
Blue +1/2
Red/Green +3/4
Purple -3/4
White +1/3
Black -1/3
Yellow +1/2

Boons(+)/Banes(-):
Blue +1/4
Red/Green +1/8
Purple -1/2
White +1/6
Black -1/6
Yellow +1/2

Notes:
The values for the red and green dice are rounded slightly, for ease of use and to keep them consistent with each other.  Sigmar's comet is considered to add 1/2 success and 1/2 boon for the purposes of this chart, while the chaos star is counted as a bane.


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## Maggan (Nov 22, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> What exactly was FFG planning on? Given that I imagine the license wasn't cheap (I figure only the WW and D&D campaign worlds would be more expensive),  in retrospect, we should have expected a 3e distinctly different.




The prevailing theory is that the RPG license was thrown in with the more lucrative board game and card game licenses. Easier for GW to manage one company, and a chance for FFG to try the Descent approach with WFRP.

Myself, I'm curios what they'll do with the WH40kRP line.

/M


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## C_M2008 (Nov 22, 2009)

From what I've heard and seen this game seems awesome. 
It seems much more suited to the style of play I want (RP heavy with occasional *short, non-tactical *combats) than the last two editions of D&D. I really like the innovative take on dice rolls, and it seems like it will quickly become second nature.

I haven't played any warhammer games before but the game still sounds like an rpg and plenty gritty to me.

I'll certainly be placing a pre-order for this as well as the adventurer's kit and a couple sets of extra dice.


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## jgerman (Nov 22, 2009)

arscott said:


> Really?  Half the hardcovers are still available directly from the FFG web site, and the entire collection is in PDF from RPGNow.





False. 

There are about 30 published items for the system. Less than half of them are available direct from FFG, not all of them are hardcovers and that excludes the core book, which you'll note is not available.

Less than half are also available through RPGNow. They never finished bringing them out and now they will not. The PDFs are available for a 'limited time only'.


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## Emirikol (Nov 23, 2009)

*Asmor, thanks for the write-up*

Asmor,

Thanks for the write-up.  I enjoyed running the demo here in Colorado.  The system is nice and the backgrounds are concisely written up (religions, schools of magic, reikland) and a couple nice maps.  Like all the systems I've run over the years, I've made up a few house rules for my style and to eliminate stuff that could get lost.

I've got good background material from 2E and 1E stuff, so it wasn't hard to whip up a scenario in the empire (I'd forgotten what a good bit of background was in Sigmar's Heirs .  So, I'm ready to run 2 slots at GENGHIS CON in Denver, CO.


Since there wasn't even so much as a single WFRP-TWO event at GenCon, I was pretty pessimistic about the future of this game.  There's a lot of bitching and groaning from 1e vs 2e or 2e vs 3e, but not a lot of courage at making it to game conventions to expand our beloved hobby.  I applaud any of you who step up to run WFRP (any version) at conventions and game days.

All the best,

Jh






..


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## frankthedm (Nov 23, 2009)

C_M2008 said:


> *short, non-tactical *combats



Non-tactical combats?! Heresy!


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## Asmor (Nov 23, 2009)

frankthedm said:


> Heresy!




No, that's the 40k game. This is about the fantasy RPG.


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## CapnZapp (Nov 23, 2009)

Maggan said:


> Myself, I'm curios what they'll do with the WH40kRP line.



Probably nothing spectacular? (As in, publish the third rulebook but using the same rule set as in the two first ones. Specifically, not giving it the WFRP overhaul in the foreseeable future)


----------



## CapnZapp (Nov 23, 2009)

darjr said:


> I don't think they got the novels. Black industries kept those.



Black Library, but right you are.


----------



## CapnZapp (Nov 23, 2009)

Emirikol said:


> Since there wasn't even so much as a single WFRP-TWO event at GenCon, I was pretty pessimistic about the future of this game.  There's a lot of bitching and groaning from 1e vs 2e or 2e vs 3e, but not a lot of courage at making it to game conventions to expand our beloved hobby.  I applaud any of you who step up to run WFRP (any version) at conventions and game days.



But isn't it normally the publisher who organizes play events (at least at the biggest cons)?

The fact FFG sat on a new edition totally explains why they didn't set up any WFRP2 events, without the lack of any such events suggesting anything like a pessimistic future.

Unless, of course, you are specifically thinking of the second edition, and not the overall Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay game line.


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## Vyvyan Basterd (Nov 23, 2009)

CapnZapp said:


> But isn't it normally the publisher who organizes play events (at least at the biggest cons)?




Not in my experience. Other than the RPGA, most game events are run by fans. There are some demos in the dealer's room, but the main playing floors are filled with people like you and me running the games they enjoy.

Edit: In my experience with GenCon.


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## Emirikol (Nov 24, 2009)

CapnZapp said:


> But isn't it normally the publisher who organizes play events (at least at the biggest cons)?  The fact FFG sat on a new edition totally explains why they didn't set up any WFRP2 events, without the lack of any such events suggesting anything like a pessimistic future. Unless, of course, you are specifically thinking of the second edition, and not the overall Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay game line.




Sure, I understand that sometimes companies will run games, but the other 98.67525% of the time it's up to the fans to run games at conventions. 

If the fans don't care enough (or there aren't enough fans) to run games at the largest game conventions in the world what does that say?  (this is my weak attempt at trying to guilt more GM's into running games at cons 

BTW, here are some more pix from our demo.

jh


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## Rel (Nov 25, 2009)

I sure am diggin' the character card that guy is holding in the 2nd and 4th photos.


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## Emirikol (Nov 26, 2009)

Rel said:


> I sure am diggin' the character card that guy is holding in the 2nd and 4th photos.




Yea, that's one of those "new careers"    Don't you love photoshop?  

jh


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## jdrakeh (Nov 26, 2009)

BryonD said:


> Reference please?




From the FFG website. . . 



			
				FFG said:
			
		

> The response so far has been overwhelming! *In fact, we’ve already sold out of the first wave of the WFRP core set*.




Also, a link.


----------



## Cam Banks (Nov 27, 2009)

I bought a copy of the game. I posted the following over at RPG.net:

It's a great looking game, all the components and books feel good, and I have to say that despite all of the uproar over the fact that it has special dice, stand-up counters, play aids, etc, this is still very much a role playing game. In fact, I will go so far as to say that it really doesn't need all the component stuff, which I feel are there primarily for people who want a tactile/visual sensation to go with their game and like bits and pieces to help deliver rules info.

You could write up a character using a traditional pencil and paper character sheet just as you may have done in previous editions. The only thing you'd really need are the dice, and I don't find that too odious. If you were so inclined you could make more of your own using blanks.

It's a strong entry into the fantasy gaming market, it's priced accordingly based on what you get in the box (which weighs a ton), and I look forward to seeing the line's development. I give it an A for first impressions. I'll wait on an overall grade until I play a few games and try out more of the details.

Cheers,
Cam


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## Mark (Nov 27, 2009)

Paul ran the demo at Games Plus which coincided with the last Chicago EN World Gameday -





Funny, perhaps, that we were playing a game of Descent just about ten feet away -


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## Ssadral (Nov 27, 2009)

For those who have it. How important is mini's with this edition? Can it be played without mini's easily? (Not as the, yes you can play D&D 4e without miniatures) but play without miniatures with no loss in combat etc.

The dependence of miniatures that D&D 4e has is what prevents me from ever buying it.

If Warhammer does not have this same dependence then it becomes even that much more appealing.


----------



## Trolls (Nov 27, 2009)

Ssadral said:


> For those who have it. How important is mini's with this edition? Can it be played without mini's easily? (Not as the, yes you can play D&D 4e without miniatures) but play without miniatures with no loss in combat etc.
> 
> The dependence of miniatures that D&D 4e has is what prevents me from ever buying it.
> 
> If Warhammer does not have this same dependence then it becomes even that much more appealing.




I don't have the game yet, but from what I gather of the previews, minis aren't even a part of the game.

Relative positions are abstracted as a simple close, medium or far range. The counters etc. are just for ease of visualization, so you can remember who is near or far, and what terrain effects might apply (if any). There is no battle grid.


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## Cam Banks (Nov 27, 2009)

Trolls said:


> I don't have the game yet, but from what I gather of the previews, minis aren't even a part of the game.
> 
> Relative positions are abstracted as a simple close, medium or far range. The counters etc. are just for ease of visualization, so you can remember who is near or far, and what terrain effects might apply (if any). There is no battle grid.




Bingo. You don't need minis at all. If you used them for the game, it'd be as replacements for the stand-up character tokens that are only used in an abstract sense. You could probably run the game without those, too.

Cheers,
Cam


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## Iron Sky (Nov 27, 2009)

Ssadral said:


> The dependence of miniatures that D&D 4e has is what prevents me from ever buying it.




Are you talking about dependence on minatures or on grid-based combat?  We've been running 4e since before it came out without minis with no problems at all (we use magnets on a whiteboard).

I would say 4e has 0 dependence on miniatures, but 95% dependence on grid-based combat.


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## Ssadral (Nov 28, 2009)

Iron Sky said:


> Are you talking about dependence on minatures or on grid-based combat?  We've been running 4e since before it came out without minis with no problems at all (we use magnets on a whiteboard).
> 
> I would say 4e has 0 dependence on miniatures, but 95% dependence on grid-based combat.




Both. I like my combats abstract. I've tried the grid/mini's thing and I just don't like it. To me it is too jarring to stop and go to a board to act out combats... it really disrupts the flow that I like to maintain.

I'm sure there are many, many people who really enjoy grid/mini's I'm just not one of those people.


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## DMfromdimensionX (Nov 28, 2009)

jdrakeh said:


> From the FFG website. . .
> 
> 
> 
> Also, a link.




You'll notice though that there is no mention of how large the first print run was. 
It also says that a large number of those are being sold to hobby stores throughout 3 different countries. 

   A hobby store buying the game does not mean it is being accepted by the general consumer base or that there wont be a giant box of fiddly bits on the bargain shelf in a few weeks.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Nov 28, 2009)

DMfromdimensionX said:


> You'll notice though that there is no mention of how large the first print run was.



I just had a Déjà Lu!

To paraphrase Indiana Jones: "We do not follow sales ranks to find succesful games and a _sold out print-runs _ _never, ever, marks a succesful game_"


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## CharlesRyan (Nov 30, 2009)

So, my take on things after a quick read of this entire thread is that opinion is sharply divided--among people who haven't actually tried the game. Among those who have, it's (not without exception) very positive.

And very much "it's an RPG, not a board game."

Can't wait to try it myself!


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## Gothmog (Nov 30, 2009)

I'll preface this by saying that I'm a HUGE fan of WHFRP2.  During the latter half of the dark years 3.x was king (2005-2008 or so), my groups got our fantasy fix from WHFRP2.  We had a ton of fun with the system, so when they announced WHFRP3, I was skeptical.  

I bought a boxed set last week, and read it through, then ran a session this last weekend.  All I can say is WOW!  This is an amazing system, highly innovative, and very true to the Warhammer Old World.  It does things a little differently than WHFRP2, but its still a grim world of perilous adventure.  In the old WHFRP2, you really only had to worry about two negative consequences for a character, injury/crits/death and insanity.  In WHFRP3, fatigue, stress, strain, crits, and insanity are all possible, and it takes a pretty careful balancing act to keep a character alive.  PCs (and most NPCs) won't be killed by one blow, but the system is very deadly.  In the game I ran Saturday night, one PC out of four died in a beastman ambush, and other had suffered 3 critical hits that put him out of action for around a week.  The stance track is also a great innovation and adds a whole new dimension to character actions and roleplaying.  While I was a little worried the dice would be troublesome, after about an hour of play everyone understood it and really liked the whole success/failure, boon/bane system.  The cards and their variable effects based on the numbers of successes, boons, and banes are a lot of fun too, and since the system is a little more open to interpretation, I let my players describe the effects of boons/banes, which really immersed them in the game.

The only thing I miss from WHFRP2 is the vast number of careers and some of the religions/colleges of magic.  However, this looks to be remedied over time, and its painfully easy to translate old careers and spells into the new system.  Anyone who says this is just a boardgame clearly hasn't read the rules or played WHFRP3 yet.  It doesn't try to be WHFRP2- it is its own beast, but in spite of that it still captures the feel of the old WHFRP games.  Overall, its a great system that is tons of fun, and deserves to be judged on its own merits, rather than preconceived notions of "what WHFRP is supposed to be".  (Gee, that sounds familiar for some reason).


----------



## Rel (Nov 30, 2009)

Great post, Gothmog!  You've got me looking forward to it more than ever.


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## frankthedm (Nov 30, 2009)

Briefly looked at the box and contents at Games Plus on Friday. Content quality looks great though I'm concerned how much the booklets might suffer wear and tear. When I cracked open the caster book, I found the rules quite intimidating looking, though maybe i was just frazzed from black Friday driving. _Honk! Honk! Squeeeeel.. CRUNCH!_

A steep learning curve can be surmountable, and the game has old world flavor up the wazoo. My main concern was and still is though the lack of tactical placement in minis based combat. Big fan of that, though it's not for everyone since making a single mistake of moving an inch too far can easily kill someone and or the whole group as the foes funnel in through the gap. But the Conservative / Reckless stance system sounds like it might be a respectable replacement. 

I'll be splitting the cost with another gaming group member for the box.


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## Asmor (Dec 1, 2009)

CharlesRyan said:


> So, my take on things after a quick read of this entire thread is that opinion is sharply divided--among people who haven't actually tried the game. Among those who have, it's (not without exception) very positive.
> 
> And very much "it's an RPG, not a board game."
> 
> Can't wait to try it myself!




Funny, that almost perfectly describes a lot of the early D&D 4th edition chatter. And to only a slightly less perfect extent describes the early D&D 3rd edition chatter as well.

Not that that means anything one way or another. It's also probably prudent to point out the likelihood of selection bias-- i.e. that those who sought out the demo were likely disproportionately in favor of the game before trying it.


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## CharlesRyan (Dec 1, 2009)

Asmor said:


> It's also probably prudent to point out the likelihood of selection bias-- i.e. that those who sought out the demo were likely disproportionately in favor of the game before trying it.




Acknowledged. Still, even among a predisposed sample, a strong positive reaction can be meaningful. If the game sucked, or was truly boardgamey, or was just meh (especially at its price point), I'd expect to see signs of that through the bias.

I'm certainly not saying it's for everyone (what game is?). I guess my point is that, when a game makes a radical departure from the norm like this, it's worth checking out before making up your mind. And when the majority of the people who _have_ checked it out are saying good things, that might carry more weight than the naysaying of those who haven't. . .


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## Emirikol (Dec 1, 2009)

frankthedm said:


> I'm concerned how much the booklets might suffer wear and tear.




Since I expect the base rules to get a lot of use, I'm going to protect mine with one of these:







Back in the 1E D&D days, we used to make book covers out of paper grocery bags and decorate them with all manner of gaming graffiti..

jh


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## AllisterH (Dec 1, 2009)

Heh....

Things are getting heated...

Counterpoint from FFG about an ICV2 review of WHFRP3E

Ok, I never once saw the 4e D&D designers come out this strongly against a review...


----------



## Korgoth (Dec 1, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> Heh....
> 
> Things are getting heated...
> 
> ...




Translation:
"We want our game to be controversial, but if you don't like it you suck. It is supposed to be a controversy with just one side to it... the side of servile flattery."

Also, "Our game is so innovative that everyone loves it and the reason this guy gave a negative review is because of a sour grapes conflict of interest liar liar pants on fire how's my Al Franken impression liar liar!"

My impression of FFG has gone into the toilet lately, and this childish screed by their CEO only makes it worse. If this is what their CEO is like I can only imagine the attitude of the company's employees.


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## DMfromdimensionX (Dec 1, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> Heh....
> 
> Things are getting heated...
> 
> ...




And he wasnt even very hard on it. I smell the stink of desperation. Someone should also tell the guy from FFG that theres nothing "innovative" about recycling mechanics from board games they have been putting out for years.


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## Vyvyan Basterd (Dec 1, 2009)

I have to agree with his main point though that the reviewer has not played the game. I find such reviews worthless. It would be tantamount to a movie reviewer seeing the trailer and writing his review.


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## Rykion (Dec 1, 2009)

Here's a link to the actual ICv2 review since I didn't notice a link in this thread: ICv2 - Review of 'Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay'

There is no mention of gameplay at all in this "review."  It doesn't indicate the reviewer has actually played the game.  There really isn't anything that even indicates that the author read the entire game.  It incorrectly states the character cards replace character sheets.  It's entirely opinion without any information to illustrate the author's view beyond the game's price and the boardgame components.  I would be upset with this review both as the company that made the game, and as the website that published the review.  

I haven't played the game, or decided to buy it or not.  That review didn't help me make any kind of decision.


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## La Bete (Dec 1, 2009)

Vyvyan Basterd said:


> I have to agree with his main point though that the reviewer has not played the game. I find such reviews worthless. It would be tantamount to a movie reviewer seeing the trailer and writing his review.




The editors response is very interesting. To aggressively summarise (as others have above), "yes we should have disclosed conflict-of-interest and yes it was a bit content free, oops we'll try to do better." 

Relevant sections:

"As to whether Bodden's relationships with the previous versions of WHFRP should have been disclosed, yes, it would have been better had that information been included with the review, and we'll be more careful to include that kind of background information in the future"

And

"With regard to the content of the review, we'll grant that there's less in the review about gameplay than in most game reviews we run (mostly by the same writer as this one), but we do find the review to be a generally good summation of the reactions some will have to the game"

ICv2 - Christian Petersen, CEO of Fantasy Flight Games, on WFRP Review


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## Saint&Sinner (Dec 1, 2009)

I found it fun to play and easy to run as a GM (other than making a commitment to getting all the materials to the play-space). The game will be a lot more fun when its more complete (full list of basic and core advanced careers, all the types of wizards and priests).


It doesn't go far enough though in the social sphere. I'll have to hack in some elements to make that as fun as the combat. A shame really since without the ability to make the cards my contributions are going to look a little shabby...


----------



## OchreJelly (Dec 1, 2009)

Thanks for all the demo reports.  I was pretty neutral about this game, but hearing some of these positive demo reports has piqued my interest.  I always tend to keep an open mind when it comes to games / mechanics.  

The way I see it, if WFRP's dice system was what DND used for 20 years, and then 4E suddenly introduced a D20, some people would talk about how the D20 "breaks immersion" and all that just the same.  Gimmist bits / concepts always get in the way until you get used to them.  

I'm curious to hear more about the tactical play, like how the three distances are handled, how you can perform flanks etc.  Most importantly, I'm curious as to how long a typical encounter takes, in real time.  It sounds like it would move pretty quickly w/o the grid.


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## AllisterH (Dec 1, 2009)

DMfromdimensionX said:


> And he wasnt even very hard on it. I smell the stink of desperation. Someone should also tell the guy from FFG that theres nothing "innovative" about recycling mechanics from board games they have been putting out for years.




But that's the main argument from the FFG guys...

You don't even NEED miniatures and boards since the combat isnt tactical AT ALL a la 4e.

The packaging of the material is certainly different but from those that actually played it, it certainly isn't a board game. 

It's a RPG that uses the bucketful of dice resolution sstem (still leaves me cold) and uses cards a la SAGA and 4e to track powers and conditions but there's no boardgame element I can see to it from the demo reports.


----------



## ProfessorCirno (Dec 1, 2009)

I'll admit, the good reviews and, more importantly, mention of it still being a gritty game, have gotten my hopes up.  While my finances certainly aren't at a level where I can drop close to a hundred bucks into a new game, I'll admit I'm more interested to see how this turns out.

As for the review bit...

CEO: You didn't even review the damn game!
Editor: No no, it was a _review of the reviews!_  You just need to think more meta about it!

If I wanted that kinda crap, I'd go hang out with the students at the Academy of Art.  If someone reviews a game, I expect a review _of the game_.


----------



## DMfromdimensionX (Dec 1, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> But that's the main argument from the FFG guys...
> 
> You don't even NEED miniatures and boards since the combat isnt tactical AT ALL a la 4e.
> 
> ...





 I meant the funny dice and cards. I dont see anything board gamey about it either. Makes me think more of magic and its ilk then a board game with all the cards.

 What i took from the review was that it looked so bad he didnt want to play it. Its unprofessional but it does reflect what some people are gonna think when they open the box.


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## Herremann the Wise (Dec 1, 2009)

DMfromdimensionX said:


> And he wasnt even very hard on it. I smell the stink of desperation. Someone should also tell the guy from FFG that theres nothing "innovative" about recycling mechanics from board games they have been putting out for years.



Or it seems you want to smell the stink of desperation - or just stink in general perhaps? You are right that the review wasn't that poor - it was completely bland and completely uninformative to someone wishing to shell out the dollars for it (perhaps the intent of the reviewer)? I think as someone wheeling out their new flagship product, Clark had every right to be disgusted by the review, to the point of questioning the integrity of the reviewer. I imagine he would have swallowed a savagely poor but more detailed and informed and informative review rather than what effectively amounts to a disinterested glance at the box contents.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Dec 2, 2009)

Herremann the Wise said:


> Or it seems you want to smell the stink of desperation - or just stink in general perhaps? You are right that the review wasn't that poor - it was completely bland and completely uninformative to someone wishing to shell out the dollars for it (perhaps the intent of the reviewer)? I think as someone wheeling out their new flagship product, Clark had every right to be disgusted by the review, to the point of questioning the integrity of the reviewer. I imagine he would have swallowed a savagely poor but more detailed and informed and informative review rather than what effectively amounts to a disinterested glance at the box contents.
> 
> Best Regards
> Herremann the Wise



The review to me looked to me like something that could have been written 1 or 2 months ago, just by looking at the available promo photos and reading a few forum entries. As a reader I was disappointed that it didn't add any useful information. 

Are there some more informative reviews out there? Or are those reviewers still too busy playing the game?


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## delericho (Dec 2, 2009)

ProfessorCirno said:


> As for the review bit...
> 
> CEO: You didn't even review the damn game!
> Editor: No no, it was a _review of the reviews!_  You just need to think more meta about it!
> ...




Yeah, that review was completely worthless. Not only does he not talk about any actual gameplay experience (which, frankly, is a must in a review of this sort), but he doesn't even talk about his experiences when reading the rules - were they well laid out and easily explained? Or were they badly laid out and impossibly complex?

The FFG guys were right to be annoyed. The editors of ICv2 should have been similarly annoyed - it must surely be bad for the credibility of their site to post content-free and worthless reviews?


----------



## OchreJelly (Dec 2, 2009)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:


> Are there some more informative reviews out there? Or are those reviewers still too busy playing the game?




Here's another one (apologies if this was linked earlier in the thread):
WFRP Demo Event - A Demo Success Story | Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Core Set | RPG Geekdō

Not a true review but another comprehensive demo review.


----------



## Jhaelen (Dec 2, 2009)

delericho said:


> Yeah, that review was completely worthless.



I have to agree. After reading it, my first thought was: can you really call that a review?
It doesn't provide any information I couldn't get by spending five minutes on the FFG site.

I guess either the author had an agenda and/or didn't have any time to prepare or write a proper review.


----------



## delericho (Dec 2, 2009)

OchreJelly said:


> Here's another one (apologies if this was linked earlier in the thread):
> WFRP Demo Event - A Demo Success Story | Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Core Set | RPG GeekdÅ
> 
> Not a true review but another comprehensive demo review.




That's a much better review, and actually is almost enough to persuade me to check out the game. (The barrier remains cost - with no demos running in the area the only way I can test the waters is by putting down £80, and I won't do that unless I'm sure I'll like the game.)

I particularly liked that the author of the review here was not totally one-sided - he included both things he liked and things he didn't in his review. Though one thing I didn't like quite so much was that it was very difficult to tell how much of the group's enjoyment was because the system was good, versus how much was down to a GM who really made it sing. I guess that's very difficult to pin down, though.


----------



## OchreJelly (Dec 8, 2009)

Another review posted:
In the box | Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Core Set | RPG Geekdō

This one is not a demo review, but a review of the rules / components.  It seems to provide a pretty good assessment of the more fiddly bits.


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## BryonD (Dec 9, 2009)

I've changed my mind.

Several of the early promos strongly created the image in my mind that the game was fully "in the box".  I got the idea that you could pull out the character cards and there is your character all pre-built for you, ready to go.  And when you get done playing you put everything back in the box.  Next time you play the same stuff is there again, waiting to start at the beginning.  Just like any other board game.  

Clearly that was not a good representation of the materials.  
So I no longer see it as a board game.  I stand corrected.

Ironically, it has gone from being a board game that looks really interesting to me to be an RPG that doesn't.


----------



## Gort (Dec 9, 2009)

That's what expansion packs are for.


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## Blustar (Dec 11, 2009)

I don't have a review for you guys, not yet anyways, and I've not played it yet ( still reading) but some initial thoughts...

!. The rule book is definitely not the best and very vague and I was beginning to get that " oh crap, this is Megatraveller!!!! 1000 pages of errata" feeling. But I crashed the FFG boards and tried to figure out what the hell was going on and I'm glad I did.

The game is really innovative and interesting and the really ironic bit...besides the interface, ( stances, dice pool, party sheet, fatigue, stress, etc) the game feels and plays very "old school". FFG really put a lot of faith in the GM with this game and gave him/her great tools to placate his players. (fortune dice) Ways to adjudicate seemingly complex actions with ease and with interaction from your players to boot! 


This game really harkens back to Basic D&D in it's simplicity...There are no rules for swinging from a chandelier, swimming in plate armour, fast-marching through deep snow, or whatever. There are guidelines but the rules pretty much put it in the hands of the GM. It actually encourages the GM to say "yes" to their player's hair-brained ideas. Mostly because the rules allow the GM to fairly decide these things on his own. It doesn't even have modifiers for Ranged Weapons, like close, medium, or long range. 

No magic items!!!! ( OK there was one in the included adventure!!!) No phat loot!!!! WTF!!! lol

4ed told it's players to slip your DM a note on what phat loot you would like to see in the next dungeon.

The interface is complex though with having to track stress and fatigue, stances, but I think it will be worth it once learned. I know it will be a chore because the rulebook is unfortunately very vague on certain points. A FAQ from FFG is on the way or so I hear.

I think this game might not make it because of the hurdles ( price, vague rules, It's a Boardgame!!!, etc..)but I do know it will have a strong cult like following. It's an exciting and innovative RPG that captures the Warhammer Universe perfectly and it will gain it's adherents. If you're into old-school gaming with  a modern interface then this is it...the GM light shines bright in this game.


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## Thanee (Dec 11, 2009)

BryonD said:


> I've changed my mind.
> 
> Several of the early promos strongly created the image in my mind that the game was fully "in the box".  I got the idea that you could pull out the character cards and there is your character all pre-built for you, ready to go.  And when you get done playing you put everything back in the box.  Next time you play the same stuff is there again, waiting to start at the beginning.  Just like any other board game.
> 
> ...




Yeah, the first impressions definitely make it look like a boardgame, but it isn't.

Havn't played it yet, but got the box and read some of the rulebooks so far.

It definitely has some very interesting and as far as I can tell also new approaches (the dice mechanics look nice, also the stance system and the abstract distance measurement).

The biggest problem I can see is that the game materials might prove to be a bit of a restraint, because you basically need cards for all the maneuvers (sorry manoeuvres; is it just me or is the british spelling of that word just plain weird; probably not for the brits out there, I suppose ) and talents, items (especially items) and whatnot, which makes making up your own stuff more difficult.

Havn't played it yet, though, as I said, so this is purely theoretical as of now.

Overall my impressions from looking at the box are definitely positive. 

Bye
Thanee


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## Asmor (Dec 12, 2009)

With respect to the character's action cards, at least, the cards are absolutely not required. You could do just as well printing them out. The cards are never shuffled. In fact, the only way they take advantage of being a card is the fact that they're double sided, so one side's conservative and the other's reckless. And you could even replicate that by printing out your stuff double sided, since all your actions will always be in the same stance.

Really, you just need a place to stick some counters to mark how long until the power recharges.

All the other character-centric things would work just as well printed out. The only things that really need to be cards are the wound deck, the miscast deck, etc, and you don't really need to get any more of those.


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## Asmor (Dec 26, 2009)

Finally got a chance to sit down and read the Tome of Adventures (analagous to DMG)... and I think this one page should be sufficient to make any roleplayer salivate for WHFRP 3e.

http://asmor.com/images/post/09-12-25/whfrp3edicepoolinterpretation.jpg

btw, the pic is rather large, so if your browser resizes it to fit screen it may be illegible. Just zoom it in to actual size.


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## Ashtagon (Dec 26, 2009)

Asmor said:


> Finally got a chance to sit down and read the Tome of Adventures (analagous to DMG)... and I think this one page should be sufficient to make any roleplayer salivate for WHFRP 3e.
> 
> http://asmor.com/images/post/09-12-25/whfrp3edicepoolinterpretation.jpg
> 
> btw, the pic is rather large, so if your browser resizes it to fit screen it may be illegible. Just zoom it in to actual size.




That actually really really puts me off the whole game concept.  I don't like the idea of having to do advanced study to figure out my dice rolls. Throwing dice oughtn't be that complicated, seeing as it is a fundamental aspect of just about everything in the game (I'd assume it is fundamental, anyway).


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## Asmor (Dec 26, 2009)

Ashtagon said:


> That actually really really puts me off the whole game concept.  I don't like the idea of having to do advanced study to figure out my dice rolls. Throwing dice oughtn't be that complicated, seeing as it is a fundamental aspect of just about everything in the game (I'd assume it is fundamental, anyway).




You don't _have_ to. It's simple enough to just blindly figure out the result of the roll (more hammers than crossed swords? You succeeded. More birdies than skulls, or vice versa? You've got boons or banes). But the option's there.

In practice, I doubt you'd do this terribly often. I can see doing it for the first couple rolls of a brand new game, then pulling it out every once in a while for particularly spectacular results, the killing blow on the BBEG, etc.

But I just absolutely love the idea of every roll having a story built into it. It feels so marvelously holistic.


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## kaomera (Dec 27, 2009)

(Apologies if I get any of the terminology wrong, I don't actually own the game, and while I have two friends who are really enthused about running it we haven't gotten together for a session yet.)



Asmor said:


> You don't _have_ to. It's simple enough to just blindly figure out the result of the roll (more hammers than crossed swords? You succeeded. More birdies than skulls, or vice versa? You've got boons or banes). But the option's there.



But just the basics involves picking out the right set of dice from 6 different kinds, and then interpreting the results from 8 different symbols? (I think those numbers are correct?) It's not as bad as I had initially feared - being able to pair off most of the results so that you only have to deal with successes _or_ failures and banes _or_ boons certainly helps, but that's still pretty involved for a single die roll. In combat I know that handles both hit / miss and damage, but I can do the same thing in 4e by making an impromptu "die pool" out of my d20 and whatever I need for damage dice. I think the real question is going to be how much "action" a single die roll encompasses.

It seems to me that each die roll is meant to be more interesting / meaningful; if that's the case can we expect to be making fewer rolls overall? I'm also wondering about the odds: how likely is it for a typical roll to succeed? That's probably a lot more important in combat, where a miss means a longer fight and more rolling.

(One thing that kind of bothers me, if I've got this right, is that "reckless" dice apparently have several negative options not on normal / conservative dice, but still have the same total number of successes - they're just bunched up. Wouldn't that tend to make the reckless stance strictly worse than any other?)



> But I just absolutely love the idea of every roll having a story built into it. It feels so marvelously holistic.



I'd be interested to know if there is (or can be) any story built in to the process of gathering / rolling the dice. My worry is that the extra complication on that end of the process is going to end up overshadowing any extra cool story bits.

One last thing - how does managing all of the cards work out in actual play? I'm thinking that the abstract positioning / range system will free up a bunch of table real-estate compared to 4e (and I think actually playing at / around a real table is going to be vital for WHFRP3; no lounging around the living room in comfy chairs / couches...), and the limit to how many active "talents" (?) a character has at once should help... I've just noticed that in 4e it's real easy to get a bunch of cards / chips with various ongoing effects / statuses and it becomes something of a nightmare to keep them all arranged / organized / on the table and actually apply them to appropriate rolls. I'm especially worried about conditions and critical wounds, since that's the kind of thing that's liable to end up getting missed, and going back and retroactively applying them is gonna kinda suck...


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## Angellis_ater (Dec 27, 2009)

My biggest question is - how does the abstract ranging system work, can you give a few examples of "flow". Does the game handle stuff like flanking/combat or is that not even present in the game?

One part of me desperately wants to try to use WHRP3's abstract system for 4E too...


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## Asmor (Dec 27, 2009)

The range system is honestly not that hot. More complicated than it needs to be, methinks.

Ran my first game of it last night, and sort of glossed over the distances with the exception of engagements. I was surprised how much trouble my players had with the concept of an engagement.

I think in the future, I'll probably create simple tactical maps using large zones, where anyone in the same zone is close range, adjacent zones are medium range, and farther away is long range. Takes a maneuver to move between adjacent zones, and any zone can have any number of engagements and un-engaged units.


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## Angellis_ater (Dec 27, 2009)

Using zones was how I first imagined it would work when it was described to me, but then I realized it was something entirely different - tokens representing intra-personal distance or something like that, right?


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## Asmor (Dec 27, 2009)

The way range works as written, characters in close range of each other are all in the same 'area' and can engage in melee with each other but are not necessarily so engaged. In D&D terms, they'd all be within a single move (i.e. five or six squares) of each other.

Medium range is a little bit farther, and this is when things start to get a little nebulous. It costs one maneuver to move from medium to close range or vice versa. You represent that two people are at medium range from one another by putting one token on the table between them.

Long range is significantly farther than that, across a large battlefield for example. You mark long range with two tokens, and it costs two maneuvers to go from long to medium range.

In theory, I think it works perfectly well, but then again I've got a good mind for abstractions. In practice, I think it's needlessly cumbersome and some people have a lot of difficulty reconciling the fact that the differences in range are sort of exponential rather than linear (i.e. that long range isn't merely 'double' medium range).


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## DMfromdimensionX (Dec 27, 2009)

Asmor said:


> Finally got a chance to sit down and read the Tome of Adventures (analagous to DMG)... and I think this one page should be sufficient to make any roleplayer salivate for WHFRP 3e.
> 
> http://asmor.com/images/post/09-12-25/whfrp3edicepoolinterpretation.jpg
> 
> btw, the pic is rather large, so if your browser resizes it to fit screen it may be illegible. Just zoom it in to actual size.




That page and picture completely turns me off. I cant stand the idea of tons of different dice with tons of different rules about what you roll and why. Seems like a giant swingy pain in the butt to me.


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## Jhaelen (Dec 27, 2009)

DMfromdimensionX said:


> That page and picture completely turns me off. I cant stand the idea of tons of different dice with tons of different rules about what you roll and why. Seems like a giant swingy pain in the butt to me.



Yet all of those 'tons of dice and rules' fit on a single picture. Interesting trick


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## Trolls (Dec 27, 2009)

One quick question for anyone that has the game:

How integrated is the setting into the system?
Could I use the game for another fantasy setting, like FR or Eberron?


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## arscott (Dec 28, 2009)

kaomera said:


> But just the basics involves picking out the right set of dice from 6 different kinds, and then interpreting the results from 8 different symbols? (I think those numbers are correct?) It's not as bad as I had initially feared - being able to pair off most of the results so that you only have to deal with successes _or_ failures and banes _or_ boons certainly helps, but that's still pretty involved for a single die roll. In combat I know that handles both hit / miss and damage, but I can do the same thing in 4e by making an impromptu "die pool" out of my d20 and whatever I need for damage dice. I think the real question is going to be how much "action" a single die roll encompasses.



Once you've learned the basics, the different kinds of die don't really factor into the difficulty of assembling the dice pool.  You just grab dice for your characteristic and stance, dice for your skill, and dice for spending fortune.  The fact that some of those are blue, some red or green, some yellow and some white just becomes second nature by the end of a session.



> It seems to me that each die roll is meant to be more interesting / meaningful; if that's the case can we expect to be making fewer rolls overall? I'm also wondering about the odds: how likely is it for a typical roll to succeed? That's probably a lot more important in combat, where a miss means a longer fight and more rolling.



misses are surprisingly rare in combat (maybe one in four attacks miss), and combat is over pretty quickly.  



> (One thing that kind of bothers me, if I've got this right, is that "reckless" dice apparently have several negative options not on normal / conservative dice, but still have the same total number of successes - they're just bunched up. Wouldn't that tend to make the reckless stance strictly worse than any other?)



The reckless dice have banes on them, but they also have more boons than the conservative die.  Both the reckless and conservative dice have their special drawback symbols (exertion and delay respectively) while the characteristic dice do not, but they also have more successes.



> I'd be interested to know if there is (or can be) any story built in to the process of gathering / rolling the dice. My worry is that the extra complication on that end of the process is going to end up overshadowing any extra cool story bits.



I've found it useful to narrate the circumstances as I gather up the dice pool--describing how the darkness makes spotting a target difficult as I assign a misfortune die to an archer's attack, or describing an opponent's attack as exceptionally skillful as I spend their expertise.  I think it works especially well when I describe how the side effect of some previous action (boons or banes on previous checks that went unspent at the time) now aids or hinders their current attempt (fortune or misfortune dice).



> One last thing - how does managing all of the cards work out in actual play? [...] I'm especially worried about conditions and critical wounds, since that's the kind of thing that's liable to end up getting missed, and going back and retroactively applying them is gonna kinda suck...



Critical wounds are the only thing I see causing problems here, being fairly common and relatively minor in effect.  Conditions are rare enough and powerful enough that they won't be forgotten.  Haven't seen enough insanities in play to know how they'll work out, and as you mention, the limit on talents make them easy to track.



Trolls said:


> How integrated is the setting into the system?
> Could I use the game for another fantasy setting, like FR or Eberron?



The magic of WFRP is rare and setting specific.  While I could see using this to run Greyhawk, FR and Eberron are both a little bit too high-magic to thrive under these rules.


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## Mark Theurer (Dec 28, 2009)

I have it and am still reading / learning, but if you're ok with the dice system, careers intstead of levels and having to build all of the D&D monsters for WFRP3 then I think it would be ok.  It's very far over on the abstract side of things rather than the tactical nature of D4, though.  We've been playing D4 since it came out and I love it for what it is.  I have a feeling that our sub-group that will be playing WFRP3 will also love it for what it is.  

So, back to your original question, I don't feel that the system is tied to the setting.  By default magic is more scarce in WFRP3 but you can either leave it like that or just choose to ramp it up a bit.  Also, for now, only humans can be what you'd know as clerics or wizards.

Mark



Trolls said:


> One quick question for anyone that has the game:
> 
> How integrated is the setting into the system?
> Could I use the game for another fantasy setting, like FR or Eberron?


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## Asmor (Dec 28, 2009)

Trolls said:


> One quick question for anyone that has the game:
> 
> How integrated is the setting into the system?
> Could I use the game for another fantasy setting, like FR or Eberron?




They're not really integrated, aside from tone (to wit: Warhammer is a dark and grim setting, and combat in this game is appropriately brutal and unforgiving).

Some of the careers aren't exactly generic (e.g. Troll Slayer), but they're pretty easily transplantable to any setting. The races, however, certainly are generic, and it should be pretty simple to create new races for the game.

If I do end up running an ongoing campaign with the system, I'm going to be setting it in Azeroth (the setting for Warcraft, which I find appropriate since Warcraft owes its origins to Warhammer...)


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## AllisterH (Dec 28, 2009)

Jhaelen said:


> Yet all of those 'tons of dice and rules' fit on a single picture. Interesting trick




*Heh*

I fully admit.

I just don't like "buckets of dice" game and 8 dice are 3 over my limit...

Even when I'm playing D&D and it calls for "roll 10d6", I will only roll 4d6 and add 21 to it.

It's irrational but I think Vampire 1st edition permanently scarred me...


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Dec 28, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> *Heh*
> 
> I fully admit.
> 
> ...



Dang. My proposed Shadowrun Fix would have cut the dice pool at 8 dice, anything more is converted 3 to 1 to successes. Seems that cutoff point is still too large for part of my hypothetical audience.


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## Filcher (Dec 28, 2009)

Well, Asmor's convinced me to buy a copy of WH3E. I don't have it yet, but I already wish you could buy more dice separate for the core rules. Amazon willing, it should arrive in time for a couple new years games.


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## Trolls (Dec 28, 2009)

Thanks for the input, guys. I'm very close to buying this game. I think I'd enjoy it, but I will have to find some players up for it. Which leads me to my next question:

How well would the game work play-by-post, assuming an appropriate dice roller can be found? 
It looks like it'd be much easier to do than D&D 4E, given less reliance on tactical positioning. Does that sound about right?


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## arscott (Dec 28, 2009)

The more abstract combat will certainly make PbP go a little bit smoother, and given how initiative works there will be a lot less of waiting around for player X's turn.

The difficulties are in handling the game specific randomizers (dice pool, critical wounds deck, miscast deck, etc.)  and, of course, that each player would need their own copy of the $100 game.

That said, assuming you have a decent gaming community, I don't think you'll have too much trouble finding players.  I've run a few one shots for friends and at gamedays, and everyone who's played showed some interest in contiuning the adventure in an ongoing campaign.


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## Jhaelen (Dec 28, 2009)

AllisterH said:


> I just don't like "buckets of dice" game and 8 dice are 3 over my limit...
> 
> Even when I'm playing D&D and it calls for "roll 10d6", I will only roll 4d6 and add 21 to it.



Now, that's something I can empathize with!

For me that was one of the selling points when D&D 4e was initially announced. Unfortunately, I had to find out they did not get rid of rolling buckets of dice at all. Then again, some of my players really seem to enjoy getting to roll lots of dice *sigh*.

I don't think actual dice pool systems are that bad, though. They are still reasonably quick to resolve since you don't need to add up the numbers (or symbols) - you're just counting them. They may get annoying if they also use exploding dice, though...


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## UngainlyTitan (Dec 28, 2009)

I love rolling buckets of dice in rpgs


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## C_M2008 (Dec 28, 2009)

Finally got my copy on boxing day. Still pouring through the books as of now.

The rule bits are fairly dispersed through out the 4 books, they could probably all fit in 30-50 pages (I hope they reorganize them and do a players guide like that). 

Poor rules organization is the only complaint I have so far, I'm running our First session on Friday (chargen hopefully won't end up eating the whole session) so I'll post a full review this up coming weekend after I've gotten a chance to run a session.


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## Asmor (Dec 29, 2009)

Filcher;5039708I already wish you could buy more dice separate for the core rules[/QUOTE said:
			
		

> Not available yet, but it's coming.
> 
> Not sure how I feel about the mix of dice. This page has a list of them. It seems like that should be enough for a lot of common checks, but in particular I'd liked it to have one more of each of misfortune and challenge dice. It seems like this pack is targeted squarely at players.
> 
> ...


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## Mark Theurer (Dec 29, 2009)

I don't really think that everyone HAS to have a copy of the game.  Sure, it would make most things easier if everyone had access to their own rulebooks and sets of dice but I would not say it's required.  I'm starting our campaign (3-4 players plus me as GM) this weekend with me being the only one owning anything.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Mark




arscott said:


> The more abstract combat will certainly make PbP go a little bit smoother, and given how initiative works there will be a lot less of waiting around for player X's turn.
> 
> The difficulties are in handling the game specific randomizers (dice pool, critical wounds deck, miscast deck, etc.)  and, of course, that each player would need their own copy of the $100 game.
> 
> That said, assuming you have a decent gaming community, I don't think you'll have too much trouble finding players.  I've run a few one shots for friends and at gamedays, and everyone who's played showed some interest in contiuning the adventure in an ongoing campaign.


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## Asmor (Dec 29, 2009)

Mark Theurer said:


> I don't really think that everyone HAS to have a copy of the game.  Sure, it would make most things easier if everyone had access to their own rulebooks and sets of dice but I would not say it's required.  I'm starting our campaign (3-4 players plus me as GM) this weekend with me being the only one owning anything.  I'll let you know how it goes.
> 
> Mark




The context of that conversation was an online game, which would indeed be a little difficult to pull off if not everyone had their own copy. It could probably be done, though.


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## arscott (Dec 29, 2009)

Yeah, was specifically talking about online, where lack of access to action, talent, and career cards would be amazingly awkward.

In person, one box works out incredibly well for a GM and three players, and can still work nicely for four or more.


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## DMfromdimensionX (Dec 29, 2009)

Jhaelen said:


> Yet all of those 'tons of dice and rules' fit on a single picture. Interesting trick




pretty much all of 3X boiled down to d20 plus mods. That would fit on one page too. Guess maybe systems have more to think about then what the first combat page says.


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## Mark Theurer (Dec 29, 2009)

Sorry about that, my bad.   Yes, for online everyone would need a lot more of what comes in the box for themselves.

Mark




Asmor said:


> The context of that conversation was an online game, which would indeed be a little difficult to pull off if not everyone had their own copy. It could probably be done, though.


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## Wrathamon (Dec 31, 2009)

C_M2008 said:


> Finally got my copy on boxing day. Still pouring through the books as of now.
> 
> The rule bits are fairly dispersed through out the 4 books, they could probably all fit in 30-50 pages (I hope they reorganize them and do a players guide like that).
> 
> Poor rules organization is the only complaint I have so far, I'm running our First session on Friday (chargen hopefully won't end up eating the whole session) so I'll post a full review this up coming weekend after I've gotten a chance to run a session.




I will have to agree... too many rules spread out amongst a lot of fluff and explanations. It is very easy to "read" into rules and think it means more than it actually is... one being leaving an engagement as a "free" action. it sounds like an OA (AoO) but really you cant do it at all, and the fluff is just there to explain why you cant... 

--

I'll just give my impressions in a long summary.


1. it's not a boardgame - You can play this game with out the bits with just pencil and paper. All you need are the fancy dice. (even then you can replace it with normal dice; you would just need a legend to explain what the numbers mean... which I dont think would be much fun)

2. There are some mechanics that are just difficult to get use to quickly and the rules as organized don't make it super easy. 


*Engagement and Ranges* I thought this would be pretty straight-forward. But, my group really had a hard time with it. Almost like when they took facing out of D&D.  It is completely abstract. You really dont need the standies but it helps if you really care about more than just what range you are in to your target, but where you are in relation to others. 

In D&Dish terms - 


An *Engagement *pretty much means you are baseing the enemy and can attack them with a melee weapon.

*Close *is you can easily engage the enemy - you are a "move action" away.

*Medium *you need to spend some "Fatigue" to engage an enemy, but you can move into close range easily. Taking a Full action to charge or double move sorta example.

*Long *you are far away and probably either need to spend some time or fatigue getting in range or use long range attacks.
The close and engagement stuff and how you move from one range to the next caused a bit of head scratching with my players, but really it was going so where is this guy compared to this guy? 

Questions where after i described a scene... the orc is at medium range on the stairs and the beastman is close to you... so how far away is the beastman from the orc? I would say medium... and they would have a hard time understanding that or visualizing it in their heads.

Another was...

_"i attack the boar with Mighty blow" _

and I would go...

_"you havent engaged with the boar yet..."_ 

_"But, i'm at Close range?"_

it got easier as the night progressed and after awhile some battles i didnt even use the markers. ​


*The dice* in combat weren't too hard to manage actually. The players (once they understood all the symbols) were able to get results fast. At times it felt like players wanted their own dice thou. 

It was in the non combat areas were "interpretation" was a bit harder for the players to understand.  This was a boon and a bane for me... heh

First, let me explain how dice work in non-combat encounters.


I guess this is WFRP skill challenges (and I like it) you describe the situation and the players tell you what they want to do. You form a dice pool almost the same way you do in combat.  Set the challenge level (how many purple dice) and see how many "good" dice the player gets based on their character (e.g. fortune dice based on their skill specialties) and how many extra "bad" dice based on what they are doing and any influencing effects that may be going on at the time (e.g misfortune dice because its raining). 

Player rolls and then let the interpretation begin...  not really, but for the most part its easy to find out if the player succeeded or not. Same as combat, but how well or what side effects occur you look to the boons and banes, comets and chaos symbols. For the most part you could just ignore them and just say they are just like hammers and crossed swords or you can roleplay more into it. ​
The bane of this for me was that players' expectations for a result based on the rolls might not be what I interpreted for the scene... and that caused a few "issues". I have a couple of non-roleplayer gamers and they didnt like the ambiguity of dice interpretation. 

The boon... Other players, really got into the "story-telling" aspect of it and so did I. I was able to describe the scene based on the dice and since it was random, they felt more connected to the events. 


*The Progress Tracks* for me this was the hardest thing to use... I really dont know why. It seems pretty straight forward but in execution I felt like just using paper (i.e. my laptop) 

Fantasy Flight Games [News] - Tale Telling Tools

This has a good explanation of how they work... really is just a DM aid to help keep track and give the player (if needed) a visual representation of progress.


*Initative* WOW did my players not work together here... (I like the mechanic for party tension... I think it was made for this!) 

The idea that if one character rolls high and one rolls low; the players dont go in a set order but can act independent of what they rolled, was like oil and water or Elves and Dwarves cohabitanting.  

In actuality, it probably would go over well with players that like to invest a lot of "teamwork" but for players that are more dare I say selfish... it came to "fine your rolled higher go first".  

I think with time they could get use to it but even when they accepted it, the time it took for them to figure out who goes first or acts started to slow down the game. I had to enforce time limits to keep the pacing.


*henchmen *- this isnt a new concept but the actual execution was hard for me to understand just by reading it.. only by playing it a few times did I get the idea of how it actually works. I would suggest before running a game, playtest combat by yourself

The main thing that I am still a bit unclear on is advancement - seems very different and losing things you had based on career switching (talents) I'm not sure how well it will go over with my players "if" we get that far.

there is more I could go over... but Im at work and need to leave... Sorry for the typos and grammar; need to leave before the Wife aggros!

 I didnt even get to the parts I liked!


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## C_M2008 (Dec 31, 2009)

Wrathamon said:


> I didnt even get to the parts I liked!




Will there be a part 2 then?


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## pogre (Dec 31, 2009)

I bought and we played a couple of sessions. I think the very reason a lot of people are going to LOVE this game are reasons I do not prefer it. It's a good game. The dice pools work. Most of the mechanics work well. The rulebooks take a bit to figure out, but they are usable. It is absolutely a rpg - I was ready for a Warhammer Quest type game and it is absolutely not.

So why am I selling my copy?

1. My players say they would rather play 2e. They do not feel this edition has really _beat_ 2e. Purely a subjective judgment on their part.

2. If 2e WFRP was akin to 3e D&D, 3e WFRP is akin to 4e D&D. This should be a huge selling point for a lot of folks. I think 3e WFRP does powers, actions, etc. arguably better than 4e D&D. There certainly is some solid innovation in the rules.

3. We love miniatures and terrain. I certainly could houserule this stuff in. However, it hardly seems worth the effort given #1. I'm shocked GW OKed this version that explicitly eschews miniatures in favor of cardboard standups with reference rings built into them. BTW - I'm aware no grid and no minis is a HUGE plus for a lot of folks.

4. The bits were overwhelming. I personally was hoping for a simple learning curve. My group is an experienced one that has playtested dozens of systems - (we were playtesters for 4e D&D and WFRP 2e to give a couple of examples) - we still had to take a lot of time to figure things out. For a lot of the mechanics the fun payoff just was not there for us.

5. I think the stat blocks are counterintuitive, even for a veteran WFRPer for me. Yes, I could figure them out, but they were not _handy_ or particularly short.

So, I think this is a solid game. Just not for us. I have all the 2e stuff and for our group the Pramas version of the game is the best one right now.

I think if you enjoy the innovations of D&D 4e this is probably the right WFRP choice for you.


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## Wrathamon (Dec 31, 2009)

C_M2008 said:


> Will there be a part 2 then?




would you want one?



pogre said:


> 5. I think the stat blocks are counterintuitive, even for a veteran WFRPer for me. Yes, I could figure them out, but they were not _handy_ or particularly short.




I totally agree. Part of the organization of the rules that I didnt like at all.


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## Filcher (Dec 31, 2009)

Got my box last night. Super stoked to to open it up then ... darn. 

I read the "basic" rulebook  and am still not really clear on how to run a basic combat. I'm sure it will just take the usual "test combat" to learn, but my enthusiasm is diminished. I want to have some friends over and crack some gritty fantasy heads, not spend the night trying to explain stances and conversion dice. (Let alone handing the specialized dice off between new players, or advancement ... ye gods.) 

If 4e lightened the DM's workload, this seems the reverse. I think it could be easy to play a PC, but GMing seems weighty.

I'm hoping after some sessions I'm wrong. But right now just looking at all the bits makes me want to say, "meh," and play some 4e.


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## Wrathamon (Dec 31, 2009)

Filcher said:


> I read the "basic" rulebook  and am still not really clear on how to run a basic combat.




Not sure if these will help... 

Fantasy Flight Games [News] - Combat Training 101

Fantasy Flight Games [News] - Combat Training 102

Fantasy Flight Games [News] - Combat Training 103: Putting it all together



Filcher said:


> If 4e lightened the DM's workload, this seems the reverse. I think it could be easy to play a PC, but GMing seems weighty.




You're correct. There is more weight on what the GM needs to do I think, opposed to the players being able to self rule situations.


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## firesnakearies (Dec 31, 2009)

Wrathamon said:


> would you want one?





I would!


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## Filcher (Dec 31, 2009)

Wrathamon said:


> Not sure if these will help...
> 
> Fantasy Flight Games [News] - Combat Training 101
> 
> ...




Awesome. Thank you for the links. 

And as for "workload," I'm hoping a lot of it is in my head. I feel like I could run any edition of D&D with my eyes closed. Hopefully just being new to 3e Warhammer is just that ... being new. 

But golly, it underlined for me how 4E spoils the DM.


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## Filcher (Dec 31, 2009)

That last link was key. Thank you. It helped to see combat in action.


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## Wrathamon (Dec 31, 2009)

*review part II*

Okay i guess I will continue...

Lets start at the beginning this time...



*Character Creation*

You pick from one of four races... basically a human, dwarf and two types of elves (halflings got the boot!)

You get a bunch of creation points to spend on all sorts of things... characteristics, skills, abilities and wealth. 

Boon - POINT BASED! 
I much prefer point based systems over random dice rolling. Very customizable. The specializations for skills took some players some getting use to. One just used the examples given... others wanted to make up their own. Then players would argue (hey look that party tension meter just went up!)​
Bane - Random Career Choices 
Okay they say in the rules you dont have to but from what I remember from 1st edition it was random back then also... even Race selection was!
We rolled with it, but in the future if we continue playing I will let them pick.​

*Action Cards & Stances*

Why a card? Why a Stance meter? It makes it much easier to organize and keep track of. That's it. You could in theory just say/write it on a piece of paper. 

Boon - Stance Meter 
I actually like this a lot. As a GM i can easily see who is being cautious and who is being reckless. The players feel like they are making a choice (risk/reward) during combat. It just adds another layer. Again, do you need the bits? Absolutely not. Does it make it more elegant? Absolutely.​
Boon - Action Cards 
In 4e Power cards were a "good" idea but because my character kept leveling I had to always print out the latest card. It became tiresome. Here it works better imo. This is what the action does and has all the information on the different symbols and how they enhance the action when rolled. Also, you flip it over to get different effects when you are in a different stance! No one got confused.​
Bane - Sharing cards 
that's a problem with bits. If players have the same ability and there aren't enough cards then the elegance and polish of the game gets tossed out the window.​
You can check out some examples here
Fantasy Flight Games [News] - Getting Things Done

*The Party Sheet and Tension Meter*

Boon - Party Sheet
I love this! Again you could just say the group belongs to this organization (D&D did this) and you all get X benefits. The nice thing about the sheet is - its a HUGE reminder and its customizable. You get to add a tactic card and a reputation card (basically abilities that the entire group can use if they want to. And, players can be reminded that they have it and when its available to be used. Also you keep track of fortune points that are handed out and Party Tension!​
Boon - Party Tension
Very interesting idea... as a GM I like it. It might be a bit heavy handed (depends on the GM) but players get it. My players at first where like wtf but couple ticks on the meter and they started working together better. After so many ticks you get a negative side-effect. Like suffering fatigue or stress​

*Resource Tracking*

Bane - Lots of systems to keep track of
There is a lot of things to keep track off. If it wasnt for the bits... this would become a hated part of the game. Other games in the past have had more than just HPs to adjust. Champions had Endurance, Stun, Body and how many points you currently have allocated to your powers in your multipower framework... Too much resource management can take the fun out of a rpg. Is balancing your checkbook fun? (do people even do this by hand anymore?) The game has Wounds, Critical hits, Insanity, Stress, Fatigue, things with recharge tokens... I'm sure I missed something. It can be a bit overwhelming... but​
 Boon - Bits
The bits save it. Seriously, without all that stuff the game would probably be a complex mess. Other games have tried it in the past and some people like it, but a lot find it too much to keep track of and they cant focus on the game/story/action. This is where the player aids really come in handy. 

I would've prefer it to have been a pool that you pull from for fatigue/stress so I can panic and go crap I only have 1 left! Instead you need to compare your tokens to your characteristics to make sure you didnt go over.​

*Critical Hits and Wound Cards*
Again... you dont need cards. You could roll on a big chart. 
I find the cards to be better cause the rules are right there and its nice to track.​This too me is a big change from previous editions... the crits arent as deadly. I much prefer it. I like giving and taking crits. It provides impact but you're not wrecked as a player and you can weave a better story as a GM imo. In the past, most of my players havent liked Warhammer, because you died "randomly."​
*Buying Equiptment*
There really wasnt a huge list of gear. They simplified a lot. A Great Sword, Great Axe, Giant Hammer... are all the same weapon with different visual descriptions but the same stats. This makes it easy to understand and balance but you lose a bit of customization or granularity of other systems. Not to say you couldnt add that easily enough.​
*Magic Items*
This is the same from previous editions really... Magic items are RARE. Warhammer has never really had a ton of magic items. Whcih was always something D&D players had a problem with... Magic Loot is a D&D thing, I guess. They didnt really change that... not to say they wont come out with magic item packs. They do give you one in the sample adventure.​
*Recharge tokens*
Another tracking method that you really dont need bits for but makes it easier. It the game certain actions cant be done consecutively. Other games have had things you needed to keep track of (e.g. how many rounds it is activem, Durations, etc.)  This made choices more interesting for the player. What Defense action did they want to use for an attack because they might want to save it for the next one... etc. Also, the DM can put a Delay on certain actions when the player rolls a Delay symbol... which is something that I liked but I can see how players might feel like it sucks...​
*Random *
the game is way more random than 4e. It is much harder to calculate the odds that a certain action will work, how much damage you will do, etc. This is hard for certain players to like... they feel the game isnt as controllable. Others love it! I guess its the same for boardgames... games with lots of dice bug certain types of players. Party tension!!​


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## Wrathamon (Dec 31, 2009)

Filcher said:


> That last link was key. Thank you. It helped to see combat in action.




No problem!

The more workload is when to add fortune and misfortune dice... or how many extra challenge dice to add. It can be completely up to the GM... where in 4e it was easy for a player to go .. I have a -2 to hit here cause he has concealment, or I cant shift here cause of the terrain. or I have cover so my dwefense is +2.  it really isnt that hard but "certain" players may feel you're winging it at times. 


I am still wrapping my head around the things monsters can do! The extra dice you can add and how henchmen work. Also, how to balance encounters... this perhaps is the hardest thing at the moment.


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## firesnakearies (Dec 31, 2009)

Wrathamon said:


> Okay i guess I will continue...





Cool, thanks.  Nice review.


$


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## Filcher (Dec 31, 2009)

Do you have a sense of the scalability yet of the challenge dice? For instance, in a where it was straight math, I'd know what a -5 meant (give or take) and be able to judge its impact on the fly. I don't have that sense yet with the numberless dice. How significant is 1 challenge die compared to 3?


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## Wrathamon (Dec 31, 2009)

Filcher said:


> Do you have a sense of the scalability yet of the challenge dice? For instance, in a where it was straight math, I'd know what a -5 meant (give or take) and be able to judge its impact on the fly. I don't have that sense yet with the numberless dice. How significant is 1 challenge die compared to 3?




I havent played enough to master it yet - I'm still finding encounter balance to have a learning curve that I found in 4e to be very minor.

*The dice breakdown as follows*

Characteristic d8 (Blue): Success x4, Boon x2
Challenge d8 (Purple): Double Fail x2, Fail, x2, Double Bane, Bane, Chaos Star
Reckless d10 (Red): Double Success x2, (Success+Fatigue) x2, (Success+Boon), Double Boon, Bane x2
Conservative d10 (Green): Success x4, (Success+Boon), Boon x2, (Success+Delay) x2
Expertise d6 (Yellow): Success, Righteous Success, Boon x2, Sigmar's Comet
Fortune d6 (white): Success x2, Boon
Misfortune d6 (Black): fail x2, Bane

You can predict the odds a bit... 
Blue dice have a 50% chance of showing up as a success, while purple pretty much have bad stuff...  50% change of some sort of Fail, 25% of which being a double fail. 

you HIT way more often in WFRP 3e then you do in D&D 4e but how successful you are when you hit is a bit harder to predict.


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## Asmor (Jan 1, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> I havent played enough to master it yet - I'm still finding encounter balance to have a learning curve that I found in 4e to be very minor.
> 
> *The dice breakdown as follows*
> 
> ...




I'd disagree a bit... The damage you do is fairly static. Weapon damage + characteristic score (str or agi). The results you roll can modify that a bit, but usually don't add more than a few points of damage and I don't think I've seen anything that reduces the damage you do.

On the topic of dice, I think it's helpful to assign each die an 'expected value.' For example, fortune dice have 2 successes, no failures, and 6 sides, so an expected value of +1/3. Misfortune dice are the opposite, and have an expected value of -1/3.

Here are the expected values for each die, based on the faces you listed above (which look right enough that I don't feel the need to verify). If you actually want to use this info in play, I'd recommend just memorizing the success values. That should be fairly simple.


Characteristic d8 (Blue): +.5 success, +.25 boon
Challenge d8 (Purple): -.75 success, -.375 boon, +.125 chaos star
Reckless d10 (Red): +.6 success, +.3 boon, +.2 fatigue
Conservative d10 (Green): +.7 success, +.3 boon, +.2 delay
Expertise d6 (Yellow): +.4 success*, +.33 boon, +.17 sigmar's comet
Fortune d6 (white): +.33 success, +.17 boon
Misfortune d6 (Black): -.33 success, -.17 boon

*My statistics is a bit rusty, so I'm just estimating the effect of the righteous success (which explodes) as a +.07 to the successes on the expertise die. I suspect that should be reasonably close, if not perfect.

In general, any characteristic die (including stance dice) is inferior to a challenge die on a 1:1 basis. A conservative die is almost enough to cancel one out.


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## Filcher (Jan 1, 2010)

This is really helpful. Thanks guys. I hope to get a quick battle in before the parties tonight. 

Ah ... geekdom. It's all about priorities.


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## Filcher (Jan 1, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> Reckless d10 (Red): Double Success x2, (Success+Fatigue) x2, (Success+Boon), Double Boon, Bane x2
> Conservative d10 (Green): Success x4, (Success+Boon), Boon x2, (Success+Delay) x2





Exerting yourself risks fatigue, being conservative risks delay. Now this is starting to make sense. 

There is a lot of cool nuance, but it takes a little digging to get there. Thanks again for the help.


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## Asmor (Jan 1, 2010)

Filcher said:


> [/LIST]
> Exerting yourself risks fatigue




The reckless stance dice also have faces with 2 successes, as well as faces with failures, meaning that they tend to roll really, really well or really, really poorly.


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## C_M2008 (Jan 2, 2010)

Didn't play yesterday,due to holiday issues, but have made up a few characters.  We were really impressed with the speed of character creation though. In about 20 minutes I was able to help a player completely finish a character, not accounting for the RP elements.  I haven't seen character generation that fast since I played 2e D&D(core rules not skills & powers).

We decided to go random and rolled for race as well as doing the pick 3 for careers. The First person got a high elf, and chose scout as a career. 
I'm not gong to get terribly in depth as the process is well documented already, but it was quite simple and seemed fairly intuitive once we begun. The longest part was deciding which talents and powers to select.

In any regard it's a simple process with a fair bit of depth and customability although it seems like the 4 skills is going to be the choice 90% of the time, but that's really the only false choice I noticed. The speed is certainly an asset as well.  Color me impressed so far. 

I still hope to get my impressions down after we actually play, so hopefully next weekend I'll have something more tangible to add.


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## Filcher (Jan 2, 2010)

[rant]
The best thing about WHFR3e? It's keeping me from posting to all the inane edition war/sand box war/whatever war threads. I've actually won back hours that would have otherwise been spent in frustration, and this is now the one thread I read on Enworld. 

The worst thing about WHFR3e? The presentation of the rules. Atrocious.
[/rant]

I'm sure I must have misread the rules around stances and short breaks, so please correct me if I'm wrong:

Edit: Never mind. Figured it out.


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## Filcher (Jan 2, 2010)

Speaking of inane, I'm working on house rules for a game I haven't even played yet. 

Do you guys think it would be overly wonky to rule that PC crits on henchmen = immediate death? I like some of the dynamics that came with 4e minions, and I want PC crits to have a little more oomph. 

And also, I'm thinking of going to battle maps, just to help PCs imagine the terrain more clearly. Not so worried about movement, obviously, but want to encourage "I duck behind the rock wall," sort of play.


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## Filcher (Jan 3, 2010)

Finally had the chance to run my first session last night. Dice pool was a breeze and very enjoyable. Locating rules continues to be a major hassle, though the living index helps (http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/f...t/warhammer-fantasy-roleplay-living-index.pdf). I'm most impressed w/ the magic systems, though we haven't seen them in play yet. 

Today I'm photocopying the character sheets and blowing them up to full page size, and compiling a reference sheet.

Good gaming, all!


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## Wrathamon (Jan 4, 2010)

yes finding rules is a pain... even during character creation.

Note to other game designers. Box out or Bullet point your rules. I hate having to read paragraphs of descriptive text to find the one line that says what I actually need.

--

the magic system is interesting. The idea u have to channel to gain energy to power your spells. If you overchannel you''re at risk. 

Which i couldnt figure out if you can choose not to take all the energy you gain from the dice roll?  

I made an apprentice wizard to test out the rules. And I rolled crazy once and was over double my willpower and  had all the problems trying to maintain control of that much power. Magic system works very well with the dice pool system and their stress/fatigue system. 

 I think for new players the Bright order is probably the easiest to play, the Grey seemed the hardest imo. But, that is just from reading the spells and testing a bright order wizard in play. I could be wrong.

Overall finding where all the rules are is the main problem I have with the game and the stat blocks for the monsters. Playing a game is probably a lot more fun than running one... there are a lot of things to keep track of.

 I probably will stick with 4e, unless I find/create a summarized rules sheet.

Too many times questions came up and I was like I know I read about that somewhere... then couldnt find the rule or had no idea where to even start to look for a rule or if there was one for it.

 I just found the index online - so that might help.


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## arscott (Jan 4, 2010)

Asmor said:


> Reckless d10 (Red): +.6 success, +.3 boon, +.2 fatigue
> Expertise d6 (Yellow): +.4 success*, +.33 boon, +.17 sigmar's comet
> 
> *My statistics is a bit rusty, so I'm just estimating the effect of the righteous success (which explodes) as a +.07 to the successes on the expertise die. I suspect that should be reasonably close, if not perfect.



Your math on reckless is incorrect here:  they've got seven successes, and the two banes work to cancel out the three boons.  The result is:

Reckless d10 (Red): +.7 success, +.1 boon, +.2 fatigue

as for the statistics of the exploding die, you just don't count the exploding side when dividing (i.e., since one side of the d6 explodes, you just pretend it's a non-exploding d5).  your result ends up being correct for successes, but the boon and comet also have an increased chance of appearing:

Expertise d6 (Yellow): +.4 success, +.4 boon, +.2 sigmar's comet


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## firesnakearies (Jan 4, 2010)

I got a chance to try the game last night for a little bit.  It was awesome!

We had three players and the DM (who owned the core box as well as the toolkit).  Our DM was well-prepared, and had familiarized himself thoroughly with the rules, though he hadn't yet run or played the game.  Two of the players had no exposure to the game before we sat down, and the third was myself, who had previously read most of the PDF of the main rulebook.

We only had about three and a half hours, and we spent the first two making characters and figuring stuff out, the DM explaining how things worked and such.

We randomly rolled for race, and did the "draw three careers and pick one" method of making characters.  The other two guys ended up with a Human Bright Wizard Apprentice and a Dwarf Smuggler, and I ended up with a Wood Elf Thief.  We picked the Glory Hounds party card.

The DM launched us right into the adventure that comes in the box, and we got to play for about an hour and a half.  There was one combat that we got to, and we made a few other incidental skill checks.

The characters were awesome, the action cards were really cool, and there were tons to choose from.  All of the game components were well-made and gorgeous, and the system was very interesting, exciting, and smooth to play.  Lots of neat, innovative stuff going on under the hood, and plenty of opportunity for both tactical complexity as well as support for narrative play.

I really enjoyed character creation, and the combat was very fun and easy.  Everyone seemed to get the rules pretty quickly, and nothing felt confusing or overly complicated.  The unique dice pools for task resolution were VERY cool, and much less difficult than they might seem on paper.  That aspect of the system seemed brilliant and new and wonderful to me.

We barely scratched the surface of the game, but I was highly enchanted by it.  There's a lot of depth to it mechanically, as well as a rich support for role-playing and storytelling opportunities that I think is often buried or pushed aside by more restrictive gamist elements in many other RPGs.  But even for crunch-loving powergamers, the robustness of the tactical options available (especially the wealth of talent and action cards, and the way they work together) is sure to delight.

I want to play this game again, and often.  I think it definitely retains a strong Warhammer feel, even though it is very different from prior editions of WFRP.  The system is innovative, both simple and complex (each in very good ways).  I found it quite elegant, and the "bits" were great as well.  They enhanced and facilitated play nicely, and didn't get in the way.  The whole game as presented just worked together fantastically well, and was, as a complete experience, just a really great time.

All of us had a lot of fun with our brief exposure to the game, and I, for one, will absolutely be investing my money into this new product line.

I recommend the new Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay without reservation.


$


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## Wrathamon (Jan 5, 2010)

anyone who RAN it... not liking it?


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## johnmarron (Jan 5, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> anyone who RAN it... not liking it?




I ran the demo adventure, and enjoyed it.  I'm starting my campaign next week.  The NPC/Monster stat line takes alittle getting used to, and I hope they put out the monster abilities on cards eventually, but otherwise it went smoothly.  I found the ability to throw in fortune and misfortune dice instead of memorizing tables of set modifiers liberating.

For those having trouble finding rules, a poster on the FFG boards who goes by HedgeWizard has produced some great rules reference sheets.  You can download them at the WFRP 3E fan site Hammerzeit, here:

Hammerzeit! - The Unofficial Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 3 Fansite | Hammerzeit

Go to downloads then utilities, and look for the WFRP GM 2.0 .PDF

Very useful, and takes care of any organizational issues with the books (which there certainly are).

John


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## Wrathamon (Jan 5, 2010)

I created a power point that goes through character creation

not sure if anyone wants to check it out


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## Filcher (Jan 5, 2010)

Link?


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## firesnakearies (Jan 5, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> I created a power point that goes through character creation
> 
> not sure if anyone wants to check it out





Sounds interesting!  I'd like to see it.


$


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## Wrathamon (Jan 5, 2010)

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Charater Creation Cheat Sheet.pptx

let me know what you think and if I got anything wrong or missed something!


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## firesnakearies (Jan 6, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Charater Creation Cheat Sheet.pptx
> 
> let me know what you think and if I got anything wrong or missed something!





Looks good!  Nice job, thanks for sharing it.


$


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Jan 6, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Charater Creation Cheat Sheet.pptx
> 
> let me know what you think and if I got anything wrong or missed something!



Dang! I need to spread my XP around before giving it to you again!

Wasn't there a way to add your own material to the EN World download section? I seem to remember that, but I can't remember or find out how that worked...


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## Wrathamon (Jan 6, 2010)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:


> Dang! I need to spread my XP around before giving it to you again!




not sure what that means haha!

By doing this I learned a couple things that I missed when we first made characters.

There are so many little one liners that you can easily just look over.

the one thing I am still not 100% clear on is the racial skill. Do you get one for Free or do you just add it to your list of skills you can invest in?

I think you get one for free.


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## firesnakearies (Jan 6, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> not sure what that means haha!
> 
> By doing this I learned a couple things that I missed when we first made characters.
> 
> ...





You get it for free.


$


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Jan 11, 2010)

We had our first session last saturday. Only short-lived - my sister called me to get home before the snow would block all streets. Luckily it was just a test session with a small group so no real adventure was interrupted.

Well, the bad organization of the rules showed. But it was interesting nevertheless and we want to try more.


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## Emirikol (Jan 11, 2010)

Wrathamon said:


> anyone who RAN it... not liking it?



(I think I lost my first post, so here it is again)

I ran the DEMO again last Tuesday night.  All the players were new to WFRP3.  We've all played WFRP2 before and are all experienced D&D players.

It took 45 minutes to teach the game (teaching outline here:Jay H's Maptool Stuff)

The players took about 2-3 rounds of combat to get the system down.  Then it moved at a good clip (will be a little slowed b/c of lack of dice with 5 player game..until I get my extras in the mail!).  Since players only have 3-6 "POWER CARDS" each (race, career, talent(s), action(s)), that's pretty easy to manage.  I put all the basic actions on one sheet of paper since they don't need cards floating around.  I also put the maneuver list, universal effects, and "what you can do in one round" on their sheet too.

As a GM, it runs about 50% easier and 50% faster than my comparable D&D4e games as there aren't round to round tracking modifers.  It's about 75% more creative because you aren't trapped in rules, 5'steps, and the endless computing either.

Some things that sped us up:
1.  Creating Three new stats:  TOTAL SOAK, TOTAL DEFENSE value, TOTAL DAMAGE.  Having these pre-calculated and on an actual BOX on the character sheet helps IMMENSELY.  While only shaving off a few seconds from each person's turn (including the GM), those seconds add up over nights and campaigns.

2.  Tracking token-chits have been switched to easier-to manipulate acrylic gems.  Again, saving a second or two every turn adds up.

3.  I put the Party Sheet and "Location Details" on a stand up that everyone can see and instantly work with. (see my pictures in the other post).

I like the game and the system.  MUCH more roleplaying than I was used to with other game systems (not including WFRP2 of course).



jh


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