I don't know if it's just my experience, but the majority of tabletop gamers seem to play either historical or sci-fi/fantasy games. Sure, there are plenty of people that do both, but they seem to be in the minority. And that's absolutely fine. There's no sense in playing games or settings that you just don't find exciting or collecting models that bore you.
Yet historical games have elements that just aren't (or are very rarely) present in Fantasy/40k games, and vice versa. Some of these can really transform how we play our games , so it's always worthwhile keeping an open mind.
We didn't know it at the time, but this conversation started last year, when DGP were busy preparing for our 'Crow's World Massacre' event at Warhammer World. Every scenario was imagined and hand crafted specifically for the event, which meant they needed to convey the overwhelming assault of an Ork Waaaagh! whilst still being fun for the Imperials. No-one wants to just get steamrolled for two days straight.
What we needed was a way for the Imperials to still 'win' whilst always falling back, always giving ground in the face of Waaaagh! Grimtoof. We scoured every Warhammer resource we had to hand. White Dwarf, old rulebooks, scenario books, all came to one conclusion. Both 40K and Age of Sigmar are constantly striving for balanced games, when warfare is anything but.
You just don't get real-world generals agreeing to bring equal forces, and meeting at a set time, giving the other side time to set up before having at it (and if they do agree to equal sides, I can guarantee at least one side will cheat). Take the Battle of Thermopylae for example (dramatised in the film 300, if that name doesn't ring a bell). Three hundred Spartans versus tens of thousands of Persians and their allies makes for an awesome film - but how do you turn it into an enjoyable game?
What victory condition can you give the Spartans, who face an impossible battle? Or the Germans on D-Day? How about the Iraqi's being invaded? How do you make the unwinnable, winnable?
We took a look at the specific objectives set in each scenario in GW games. More often than not, they were the same thing; seize the point, destroy more than your enemy does, capture more objectives etc. They seem to contribute to the 'meatgrinder' feel of a lot of GW games - you can't do far wrong if you just get stuck in and take your opponent apart. Yet if the Spartans had 'just gotten stuck in', charging headlong into the Persians, they would have been slaughtered within an hour.
You could try changing how each side needs to approach an objective, for example. Give the attacking side a couple of bridges to secure, then ask the defending side the challenge of delaying the attackers, or by destroying a certain value of the attackers, before they pull back to preserve their own forces. The attackers still take the ground. You're giving the defenders a chance to win, and both players a really enjoyable scenario.
Giving each side entirely different objectives can revolutionise how 40K and AoS games play out on the tabletop, and feel as an experience. Each player then has the challenge of splitting their forces between achieving their own objective, and preventing their opponent from achieving theirs. Make one side's objective to hold a number of bunkers, whilst the other side has to capture a radio mast. Not only will it provide you with some great tactical challenges, but the result will practically write the next scenario for you.
And, of course, there's always the carnage of a last-stand scenario.
This sort of play allows you to unbalance the sides in terms of points or power levels beyond what Games Workshop are supporting with their own stuff. You're taking into account what each side has and setting objectives that are achievable. It allows players that have much smaller collections to take part in amazing games. It keeps your games feeling fresh.
We'll be incorporating these ideas more fully into our next campaign, so keep an eye on drinkingandgaming.com for updates as the next event develops, and for more details on the Crow's World Massacre. In the mean time, you can check out what happened here. Make sure you check out the audio recording that pops up - written by one of our players and professionally voiced!
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