New Ubiquity Rules- Not Happy!

[Raya]

The new muster rules (v2.08) are out and I have to give some feedback on the ubiquity rules- I think they're terrible, and a detriment to the game. Specifically, they hobble the game at higher gold costs to the point of unplayability. I’m using 2000g as an example here; previously, the only minimum unit you’d need was 1 mainstay. It’s now risen to 3 mainstay, 2 common. This causes so many problems:

1) Darklands is still a game in its infancy. Unlike well-established games like WHFB and Warmahordes, most people don’t have a huge collection they can play around with. Due to the price of the models, and so many of them not being out yet, everyone I know who’s been starting the game has planned an army list and bought accordingly. The new rules now mean that all our armies are now invalid at higher gold cost. Mine- which was complete 2000g force- is now completely unplayable.

2) It kills variety at higher points. One of the main things that attracted me to Darklands was how much variety you could have in your lists. Take the Brythoniaid for instance: although from the same realm, you could easily have a pure human list, or a mono-dyndraig list, or even a mono-dynwocor list. You could base armies on a theme, and it was fantastic. These new muster rules mean you can no longer do that. Previously taking a non-human commander meant their matching non-human unit became mainstay, and thus fulfilled your minimum requirements. Now you’re forced to take a mishmash of units just to make your force legal (especially with effective size sucking out your points), and due to what counts as common, everybody will be taking the same thing. For armies with not much development (eg Vras) this means those players are stuck taking multiples of the exact same unit.

3) It will lead to ridiculous builds. I’ll use my own force as an example here: in 2000g previously I had a sronax commander, leading a unit of sronax. This fulfilled my minimum mainstay requirement, was a nice solid unit and looked fantastic on the battlefield. Now I have to take 3 separate units of 3 sronax each, except that the commander doesn’t have the authority to command them all, meaning he’s leading two separate blocks (who can’t join up as a single unit) with the single other sronax now following the warlock. Absolutely stupid and just makes things even more complicated.

4) It punishes players who use monstrous infantry. Let’s be honest, one of the big appeals of Darklands is its monstrous infantry. When Mierce first launched, the trolls and the dyndraig were amongst their earliest models, and they caused massive excitement in my gaming area. Historical wargames are ten a penny, but the MI really makes Darklands stand above the others. Except now you can no longer make viable armies based on them- see points 2 and 3. It’s especially punishing for players who had been building up their forces with this objective (see point 1). The effective size rule is another twist of the knife, as you now need a minimum of 3 models per unit. Good luck with fielding 9 vassals with their 2 commanders, let me know how many points/money you have left over afterwards.

5) It just doesn’t make sense. Take the rare choice, for instance- why is there a minimum rare choice for cataclysm battles? The clue’s in the name- it’s rare, as in something barely seen. A rare choice being compulsory doesn’t make sense. Same with common/uncommon units; if they’re compulsory, it defeats the point of their ubiquity. Players shouldn’t be forced to take these supposedly elusive units. It just smacks as forcing players to purchase multiple different units instead of the same ones they like using.

In a nutshell, I think the new ubiquity limits are absolutely awful. They don’t scale to large battles, make list building a chore, and are incredibly punishing. I’ve spent several hundred pounds on my Darklands force, and now it’s completely unplayable. All that money, wasted. I’ll be honest, this has made me seriously consider giving up on the game; I’ve spent a lot on a game that technically isn’t out yet, and I’m not willing to spend even more to essentially restart my army from scratch. The variety is what really attracted me to Darklands, but if it’s turning into a game of mass infantry and draconic restrictions, I might as well stick with Warhammer Fantasy.

For all doom and gloom, some suggestions as how to improve this:

- Reduce the minimum mainstay. I actually liked the previous amount (1 min for skirmish/battle, 2 for war, 4 for cataclysm), since it gave a solid core to your force without throttling it.

- Reduce minimum common. Say, 1 for battle, 2 for war, 3 for cataclysm.

- Get rid of uncommon/rare minimum ubiquities. They don’t make sense anyway.

- Bring back the old rule of having commanders making their kin mainstay, instead of common, since it reduces the pressure on what counts as mainstay and gives more flexibility on who the general is.

Please sort this out Mierce; I really think these new ubiquity rules are a step in the wrong direction, and just too harsh for a game that has previously given players a lot of freedom and variety in building their force. I'll admit I'm pretty furious that my army- which I've spent ages planning and painting- is now unlikely to see play, but even putting my personal feelings to one side, I don't think these ubiquity rules are balanced or fair.

[Dave Fraser]

Can you post up your old 2000g force? Would help in seeing just how bad things are for you.

[Raya]

I don't have the full list/points with me, but in a nutshell:

Mammax Untain
Sronax Untain
Gabrox Warlock
5x sronax with command
Mallox
Feleox

My theme was a full beast list, a thundering avalanche that smashes the puny man-things in the name of Baalor. The warlock was letting the side down with his tiny base, but he was there to mainly make up the last few points. This force has a lot of weaknesses, but it's fun and thematic.

In the new muster rules, this no longer works. The sronax untain is a commander, so the sronax are common instead of mainstay. The mammax untain doesn't even make other mammax mainstay, so he can no longer be the general. Bumping him down to tain level allows my sronax untain to become general, and thus make sronax mainstay, BUT to fulfil minimum requirements I need 3 separate units of 3 each, for a total of 75 authority, way over his. Which means all three characters have to be rejigged to command a sronax unit. But that leaves me with no common units (as there's no mammax unit), so I have to drop either the mallox or feleox and buy either 2 units of 10 gabrax or a gabrox, on top of the extra 4 sronax. So that's up to an extra £256.42 just to meet minimum requirements for an average 2000g battle.

You can probably see why I'm smarting over the new rules. I just think that at higher gold levels the ubiquity levels are harsh.

[Rob Lane]

The new muster rules (v2.08) are out and I have to give some feedback on the ubiquity rules- I think they're terrible, and a detriment to the game. Specifically, they hobble the game at higher gold costs to the point of unplayability.

Before we go any further, let me clarify this - they're a detriment to *your* version of Darklands - the game *you* want, which is not necessarily what I, as the creator of Darklands, want. I'm not trying to be offensive here - I just want to make that point.

I’m using 2000g as an example here; previously, the only minimum unit you’d need was 1 mainstay. It’s now risen to 3 mainstay, 2 common. This causes so many problems:

1) Darklands is still a game in its infancy. Unlike well-established games like WHFB and Warmahordes, most people don’t have a huge collection they can play around with. Due to the price of the models, and so many of them not being out yet, everyone I know who’s been starting the game has planned an army list and bought accordingly. The new rules now mean that all our armies are now invalid at higher gold cost. Mine- which was complete 2000g force- is now completely unplayable.

This is one of the reasons why I'm doing this now. I'm doing these changes exactly because it's in its infancy - the full rulebook isn't even out yet.

I get that you and many others have planned an army list and bought accordingly. I understand it's painful, especially with such a host as you wish to go for. There are no words I can give you that will make up for that. All I can say is that I believe it will make Darklands a better game and give players better games. Surely that is something that will make up for that?

Would you, for example, have sacrificed a couple of things from your Warhammer army to make Warhammer a better game for everyone?

2) It kills variety at higher points. One of the main things that attracted me to Darklands was how much variety you could have in your lists. Take the Brythoniaid for instance: although from the same realm, you could easily have a pure human list, or a mono-dyndraig list, or even a mono-dynwocor list. You could base armies on a theme, and it was fantastic. These new muster rules mean you can no longer do that.

You would have struggled to do a mono-dyndraig or mono-dynwocor host beforehand.

Previously taking a non-human commander meant their matching non-human unit became mainstay, and thus fulfilled your minimum requirements. Now you’re forced to take a mishmash of units just to make your force legal (especially with effective size sucking out your points), and due to what counts as common, everybody will be taking the same thing. For armies with not much development (eg Vras) this means those players are stuck taking multiples of the exact same unit.

You're not forced to take a mishmash of units by any means [I would suggest that your example host was a "mishmash" of units, to be honest]. If you want to go down the theme route, you still can.

3) It will lead to ridiculous builds. I’ll use my own force as an example here: in 2000g previously I had a sronax commander, leading a unit of sronax. This fulfilled my minimum mainstay requirement, was a nice solid unit and looked fantastic on the battlefield. Now I have to take 3 separate units of 3 sronax each, except that the commander doesn’t have the authority to command them all, meaning he’s leading two separate blocks (who can’t join up as a single unit) with the single other sronax now following the warlock.

A quick scribble later:

Sronax Untain - 284 - 2x units of 3x Sronax - 618
1x unit of 3x Sronax - 309

(you can put the third unit of Srónax under another commander easily enough)

That's 1,211, giving you 789 gold to spend still.

What's wrong with that? You can make out the centre unit to 5 and still have gold to spare, and I defy you to tell me that three solid blocks of Sronax don't look better and play better than just one. Each has full command, too, which you wouldn't have had before, which means they'll stick around longer and hit harder. Your theme is not only intact, it looks far better.

Absolutely stupid and just makes things even more complicated.

No need for that comment dude. As for being complicated - it's no more complicated than before, I've just changed the amounts. In fact it's quicker, because you know a minimum ubiquity unit has full command so you don't need to work it out.

4) It punishes players who use monstrous infantry.

Why does it? Exactly how does it punish them? You can take lots of monstrous infantry if you wish, still. If anything, it makes people more likely to take more monstrous infantry.

Let’s be honest, one of the big appeals of Darklands is its monstrous infantry. When Mierce first launched, the trolls and the dyndraig were amongst their earliest models, and they caused massive excitement in my gaming area. Historical wargames are ten a penny, but the MI really makes Darklands stand above the others. Except now you can no longer make viable armies based on them- see points 2 and 3. It’s especially punishing for players who had been building up their forces with this objective (see point 1).

Yes you can. I totally and utterly disagree with you. We've built hosts specifically so that could still happen. We've done it with all of the kindreds. Why do you think you can't?

The effective size rule is another twist of the knife, as you now need a minimum of 3 models per unit.

If that's what you want to take, lots of monstrous infantry, why is that a twist of the knife? If your theme is Srónax, you're taking more Srónax.

Good luck with fielding 9 vassals with their 2 commanders, let me know how many points/money you have left over afterwards.

789 gold... loads of gold. More than a third of your host gold unspent. I'd say that's a fair amount.

5) It just doesn’t make sense. Take the rare choice, for instance- why is there a minimum rare choice for cataclysm battles? The clue’s in the name- it’s rare, as in something barely seen. A rare choice being compulsory doesn’t make sense.

It does to me. In a cataclysm - an apocalyptic battle - generals will seek out the rarer monsters and creatures and bring them to battle. That's where I'm coming from. Makes perfect sense to me. Don't you think it would be a shame to see a Cataclysm without at least one big monster?

Same with common/uncommon units; if they’re compulsory, it defeats the point of their ubiquity. Players shouldn’t be forced to take these supposedly elusive units. It just smacks as forcing players to purchase multiple different units instead of the same ones they like using.

I disagree. In larger battles, generals are more likely to bring rarer units to battle. It doesn't smack of anything except the likelihood that the larger the battle, the more different units he will take.

In a nutshell, I think the new ubiquity limits are absolutely awful. They don’t scale to large battles

Yes they do. I don't know why you think they don't.

make list building a chore

No more than before, in mine and others' experience; in fact, many people are happy that they have to think a little more about the theme of their host, rather than chucking together a list with no thought.

and are incredibly punishing.

I disagree. I don't believe that. If I did I wouldn't have put these restrictions on Darklands.

I’ve spent several hundred pounds on my Darklands force, and now it’s completely unplayable. All that money, wasted. I’ll be honest, this has made me seriously consider giving up on the game; I’ve spent a lot on a game that technically isn’t out yet, and I’m not willing to spend even more to essentially restart my army from scratch. The variety is what really attracted me to Darklands, but if it’s turning into a game of mass infantry and draconic restrictions, I might as well stick with Warhammer Fantasy.

Well, it's not turning into a game of mass infantry if you don't want it to. You can take loads of monstrous infantry - more than before, in fact, as gold costs have gone down and you now get free command.

For all doom and gloom, some suggestions as how to improve this:

- Reduce the minimum mainstay. I actually liked the previous amount (1 min for skirmish/battle, 2 for war, 4 for cataclysm), since it gave a solid core to your force without throttling it.

It didn't go far enough. People maxed out on Uncommons and Rares, leaving mainstay an afterthought and common barely looked at (your host is a perfect example of what I wanted to avoid, I'm afraid). That's one of the reasons I've done this. These restrictions have not throttled anything except ensuring hosts look like hosts and not a mish-mash of this monster, that sorcerer, that monstrous infantry unit of 1.

- Reduce minimum common. Say, 1 for battle, 2 for war, 3 for cataclysm.

I'm sorry, that's not going to happen.

- Get rid of uncommon/rare minimum ubiquities. They don’t make sense anyway.

They do to me.

- Bring back the old rule of having commanders making their kin mainstay, instead of common, since it reduces the pressure on what counts as mainstay and gives more flexibility on who the general is.

Some commanders do make their kin Mainstay. It's all dependent on the kindred and how they fit together. Srónax are meant to be pretty rare. That's why Srónax Tains don't make them Mainstay.

Please sort this out Mierce; I really think these new ubiquity rules are a step in the wrong direction, and just too harsh for a game that has previously given players a lot of freedom and variety in building their force. I'll admit I'm pretty furious that my army- which I've spent ages planning and painting- is now unlikely to see play, but even putting my personal feelings to one side, I don't think these ubiquity rules are balanced or fair.

I understand that that they are harsh on those who have sorted their armies out; I knew that some people's purchases would be hurt. Yours is clearly one of the bad ones - your build is esoteric to say the least!

Look, all I can say is that I apologise that it makes your host invalid, but I believe the new restrictions are balanced and fair and ultimately in the best interests of Darklands the game. Bear in mind that you are looking at this from the perspective of *your* host and *your* purchases; I have to look at this from the perspective of a) what is best for Darklands and b) all the different hosts, players and purchases. These changes make armies that don't max out Uncommons/Rares more competitive.

Surely that's a good thing?

I believe the new restrictions are balanced and fair, and certainly in the games we have playtested hosts have looked more like hosts and the games we've had have been far more balanced and fair than they were before.

I don't do anything for Darklands (the game) without thinking about it or playtesting it thoroughly. I've playtested these rules and built hosts around them, as have the playtesters - I laid down these new restrictions a couple of months ago - and Darklands is a better, fairer and more balanced game for them, in my view and the majority of the playtesters.

All I would end on is this - if these changes make Darklands a better game for everybody, and hurt your host, have I - as the game's creator - done the right thing? Or should I swap it back so that your host is not hurt, but Darklands the game is worse for it?

I don't know how many games of Darklands you've played, but I've had rather a lot and I've played in and observed two tournaments in which a) min/maxing Mainstays/Uncommons & Rares leads to a poor experience for most; and b) hosts that look terrible on the battlefield - like a game of Hordes and Warmachine, and not something that I wanted Darklands to be.

These changes stop that. I ask that you take a deep breath, ignore how you feel about the new restrictions and think about what you might need to do to make your host (theme?) viable - and then play Darklands with that host (use proxies if you haven't got the miniatures you need). I guarantee you will have a better game than before. If you don't want to do that, that's entirely up to you.

Again, I believe these changes makes Darklands a better game for everyone. I am not going to please everybody all of the time, and this might be one of those occasions. But I have to stay true to my vision of Darklands.

Cheers
Rob

[Dave Fraser]

I don't have the full list/points with me, but in a nutshell:

Mammax Untain
Sronax Untain
Gabrox Warlock
5x sronax with command
Mallox
Feleox

In the new muster rules, this no longer works. The sronax untain is a commander, so the sronax are common instead of mainstay. The mammax untain doesn't even make other mammax mainstay, so he can no longer be the general. Bumping him down to tain level allows my sronax untain to become general, and thus make sronax mainstay, BUT to fulfil minimum requirements I need 3 separate units of 3 each, for a total of 75 authority, way over his. Which means all three characters have to be rejigged to command a sronax unit. But that leaves me with no common units (as there's no mammax unit), so I have to drop either the mallox or feleox and buy either 2 units of 10 gabrax or a gabrox, on top of the extra 4 sronax.

So that's up to an extra £256.42 just to meet minimum requirements for an average 2000g battle.

The best I can come up with is either as set out by rob putting in 3 units of 3 Sronax, personally I'm not a huge fan of triple the same so not really for me, so instead I've gone with a unit of Gabrax and a gabrax tain to fill the mainstay requirements
I know this doesn't fit your desire for all monsterous but I was looking for a cheaper way of hitting the requirements than the price tag you're currently sat on.

Sronax Untain (uncommon) 284
3 Sronax (mainstay) 309
3 Sronax (mainstay) 309
Mamax Tain (UC2) - Hired as an individual, I think this is possible now 277 (had to drop from UT to fit points even vaguely close)

Gabrax Tain (common) 71
10 gabrax (Mainstay) 220
Mallox (UC2) 298

Gabrax Warlock (UC) 58
5 Gabrax (common) - Think these stay common as not above 1/2 unit size 110
Feleox (UC2) 160

Total 2096 and no spells So Unfortunately it's hard decision time on what to drop no, obvious choice would bet hte feleox as that gets you pretty much there in a single step.

I realise this introduces 15 infantry to your list and an infantry character which is a change from what you were targetting but that lot would only cost you:
1 Sronax £23
15 Gabrax £54 (Metal KS price, this gets you 20, so could use one as the tain to)
1 Gabrax Tain £12

That makes it £89 for a playable force, which I do accept this doesn't totally fit your theme but there was already the exception in there in the warlock so him having a few buddies wouldn't totally wreck it for me.


The other option I noticed on reading over your rejiging it again is to split out your Sronax across diff commands. Once you've taken the Sronax general the Sronax units remain Mainstay even under different commanders if you wanted toget your common fix relatively cheaply you could take a couple of Gabrax tains. Or even a Gabrox in somewhere (probably need a Gabrax tain still to fit this though as I think about it).

Sronax Untain 284
3 Sronax 309
Mammax UT 277

Gabrax Tain 71
3 Sronax 309
Mallox 298

Gabrax Tain 71
3 Sronax 309
Feleox 160

Puts you at 2088 so again something needs dropped to fit into 2000.

Purchases for that would be:
4 Sronax £92
2 Gabrax tain £26
Total £118

And only runs 1 more infantry than you had before. Depending on what you dropped I guess you'd be putting a warlock back in but can just split one of the monsters off the Gabrax tains to give him a warband.

[Dan Pratt]

1) Darklands is still a game in its infancy

This is the best part! By participating in Darklands you are getting in at the ground floor of something very special. You get to be involved in the evolution of this entire process. Jumping in at the beginning of a new game as big and unique as this one and expecting no big changes to pop up is like going down a water slide and expecting to remain dry. I've been following Darklands since 2013, gold costs and stats have fluctuated, new units have been developed, base sizes have changed, rules have been refined, etc., etc. This certainly is not WHFB or Warmahordes: irrespective of the nature and tone of your feedback, you've received a patient and thorough response from the creator in less than 24 hours. I encourage you to temper you indignation with the understanding that changes such as these are likely motivated by a desire to preserve the integrity and vision of this game.

2) It kills variety at higher points

I've been playtesting various 2000g hosts under these rules and it has been very enjoyable. There is quite a lot of variability among the kindreds in terms of what you can use for mainstays (especially within the Fomoraic) and how you go about constructing a host. I just played these two hosts against each other this past weekend:

Brythoniaid - Gwynedd

TERYN (General) (UC) 113g
-Armour
10x TEULU w/ full cmd (M) 270g
10x RHYFELWR w/ full cmd (M) 120g
GWYFERN (R) 471g

UCHELWR (C) 65g
-Bow
10x RHYFELWR w/ full cmd (M) 120g

PRIFDYNDRAIG (UC2) 210g
5x DYNDRAIG w/ champ & banner (C) 440g
-Armour

DEWINDRAIG (R) 199g
-Fiery Wings
-Fire of Gwaelod
-Ignite

Mainstay: 3
Common: 2
Uncommon: 3
Rare: 2

Total: 1,999g



Fomoraic- Baalor

UNTAIN OF BAALOR (General) (UC) 162g
-Shield
12x WARRIORS OF BAALOR w/ full cmd (M) 420g
-Shields
MALLOX (UC2) 298g

TARVAX TAIN (UC) 129g
-Heavy Armour
5x TARVAX w/ champ & banner (C) 325g
-Armour

GABRAX TAIN (C) 71g
10x GABRAX w/ full cmd (M) 230g
-Armour
10x GABRAX w/ full cmd (M) 230g
-Armour

WARLOCK OF BAALOR (UC2) 134g
-Secreted Armour
-Blizzard Blind
-Cold of the Deeps
-Shardlings



Mainstay: 3
Common: 2
Uncommon: 6
Rare: 0

Total: 1,999g

I feel that both of those lists are diverse, versatile, and fun. There were many man-sized models running around and few bigger things, much like you can imagine in a real-life Darklands battle.

Also, remember that as time passes and the game gets fleshed out further, there will be increasingly more options to choose from for units.

3) It will lead to ridiculous builds

I am playing Darklands for a long list of reasons. One of them is to precisely get AWAY from game systems where ridiculous builds are the norm. In tournaments for these other games, you see many people bringing very similar lists designed to be unbeatable (i.e., power-gaming). One of the great features of Darklands is that everything has an equalizer; flyers can be grounded by the weather, big monsters can be whittled down by masses of weaker infantry (as constitution drops), the diverse set of tactical options can thwart any foe. Have you tried playtesting a few different builds under the new rules?

4) It punishes players who use monstrous infantry

You can still pack in a lot of mean monstrous infantry under the new rules. Try it and post a battle report!

5) It just doesn’t make sense.

These ubiquity rules create hosts that look and feel more realistic and true to the historical element of this game. The mainstays, the core of the host, should outnumber all other ubiquities instead of being taken as a perfunctory unit of 5 soldiers accompanying an overabundance of monsters and sorcerers.

[Alex (ÉgB)]

Reading this thread (and the creator's response) satisfy me, although I'd like to ask for a new Érainn mainstay unit to be a priority in the next KS to help soothe me further

[Rob Lane]

Reading this thread (and the creator's response) satisfy me, although I'd like to ask for a new Érainn mainstay unit to be a priority in the next KS to help soothe me further

Sleanagh will come... one of the playtesters has pointed out the difficulties around the Érainn right now and I've mitigated against that slightly (or will in the next iteration of the Érainn muster).

Cheers
Rob

[Raya]

Thanks for the reply Rob, is nice to have player feedback acknowledged instead of leaving them shouting into the void. I get the impression though you’re dismissing what I’m saying as the opinions of a butthurt fan. Granted I am pretty butthurt, but personal feelings aside, my point still stands that from a mechanics perspective, the new ubiquity rules are restrictive and don’t scale for larger size games. Heck, your own rule system even works against it.

Example: whether moving into combat or across a battlefield, movement is the same basic principle: one warrior moves to wherever, then each warrior of the unit moves so the unit remains in join distance. So the unit doesn’t move as a block, rather individual pieces forming a whole. This is fine for skirmish games, but breaks apart at larger ones that force you to take infantry. Say you’re playing Fomoraic at cataclysm level. That requires a minimum of 10 mainstay, 6 common and 4 uncommon. Assuming you’re taking the minimum size for unit, this still equates to 100 gabrax, 48 gul-gabrax and 12 sronax. In a game of no movement trays. 160 models, not counting nobels/rares/anything extra, that you’re moving individually. If you’ve even had the misfortune of playing Warhammer Fantasy with someone who forgot their movement trays, you’ll know how fun this is.

Cumbersome movement aside, the huge number of compulsory units just make large battles unwieldy. Large points battles encourage players to go to town and use the big stompy things they don’t get to in smaller battles. At cataclysm level in Darklands, only needing 7 compulsory units gave you ample opportunity for this. Now you need 21 compulsory units. The new ubiquity rules just bog the game down the larger battles you play, and that’s before getting into the monetary cost.

The ubiquity limits also don’t work on the small end of the scale. There’s a 500g difference between encounter and skirmish, but 2 extra compulsory units you need to take. This gives you no room to play around with your force, since by the time you’ve bought the compulsory units you’ll have barely any gold left. The sheer amount of compulsory units required means smaller battles will be the same limited amount of available units every time. Compare this to the previous rules, where your 1 mainstay and 1 commander for skirmish level could easily squeeze in <375g, giving you much more freedom to use different types of units in a 999g game.

It also makes thing difficult for players wanting to move up to the next size level of games. Say I’m a fledgling Fomoraic player with a skirmish size force, and want to have an extra 500g to get up to the next level (battle). In the previous edition, as the mainstay requirements were the same, and the max for everything has increased, I have a lot of freedom to choose what I spent that 500g on. I pick a dainoch and a warlock. Which at £69.33 isn’t a stretch to buy, I get a cool new monster and job done, I can play a bigger battle. In the new rules however (assuming I’ve already met the basic requirements for skirmish), I now need an extra mainstay, an extra common and an extra uncommon, presumably with an extra commander to handle their authority costs. Based on what’s available in the webstore now, that’s 10 gabrax, 1 gabrox, 3 sronax and a gabrax tain, totalling at £192.78 (presuming I bought the discounted 5x gabrax herd and I’m happy with the extra banner bearer). This costs way more in gold, so I have to drop something else I already had to fit in these minimum requirements. A more expensive compulsory choice compared to the cheaper one of my personal choice.

This is one of my major worries about the direction the game is heading in. Now, I love Warhammer Fantasy, but I will hands-down admit that half of what killed it was the expense (the other being GW mismanagement). The starting costs of an army were too great, so new players couldn’t start without massive investment and older players rarely bought anything. In Darklands 1200g (battle) is a fairly small but still decent sized battle. But again, using a basic Fomoraic list from the webstore: 3 mainstay (3x 10 gabrax), 2 common (1 gabrox), 1 uncommon (3 sronax), 2 commanders (gabrax tain), costs £357.08. Going back to what I said in the previous paragraph, the new ubiquity rules force players to buy multiple infantry units each time they want to go up the scale, instead of a chunky monster or noble to fill up the points. This make the game extremely inaccessible to new players once they find out the cost. Why should they drop several hundred pounds on a niche game with a small fanbase where they need to buy multiples of the same unit, when they could for instance just play something like Malifaux, where for £50 they get a complete force in a popular game with an active fanbase and multiple tournaments? Say what you like about quality comparisons (personally, I'm not a fan of Malifaux), but people are still going to vote with their wallets.

These new rules have already cost the game new players; I do a lot to encourage people to play Darklands (my opinion on wargames is that if I get someone to play today, I have an awesome opponent tomorrow), and one person in particular was keen to start, planning out his purchases so he could scale up and play me at different levels. When the new ubiquity rules were revealed, he’s dropped it like a hot potato. In his words, “why should I spend even more money buying infantry when I already have a Warhammer army?”. Even the players I do know aren't happy; those with larger forces don't want to rebuild their entire army, those with smaller forces don't want to buy effectively a second army to play at the next size level.

The whole crux of my argument is two points:

1) From a mechanics perspective the ubiquity levels are limiting at small points, unwieldy at large points.
2) It makes the price of the game too high for starter players.

Even if my list was pure gabrax horde spam, I'd still think the ubiquity requirements were too harsh. Rage about my own list aside, I genuinely think the new limits are a detriment to the game as a whole.

(one more thing, another reason why I think it's not been entirely thought out- the effective size rule for units. Why have a unit listed 1-20, then have an extra rule saying the minimum size is half the max? Why not just list the unit as 10-20, for saying you can't take a unit <9?)

The best I can come up with is either as set out by rob putting in 3 units of 3 Sronax, personally I'm not a huge fan of triple the same so not really for me, so instead I've gone with a unit of Gabrax and a gabrax tain to fill the mainstay requirements

Thanks for your suggestions Dave, appreciated. Dropping spells isn't a massive issue for me anyway, since the warlock only provided a pathetic bit of ranged support when his head didn't explode (useful, but not a game breaker). I'll look into it, but tbh, judging by the responses I've been hearing, this may have killed the game in my area. I've been collecting for the intent of playing, but if that's not happening I'll be holding off purchases for a long while. Thanks for your help though, they're some great suggestions.

[Jonathon Chester]

(one more thing, another reason why I think it's not been entirely thought out- the effective size rule for units. Why have a unit listed 1-20, then have an extra rule saying the minimum size is half the max? Why not just list the unit as 10-20, for saying you can't take a unit <9?)

This is because units have to be 50% of maximum to count to the ubiquity minimum restrictions. For example I could take 5 Rhyfelwr as mainstay but I'd need a unit of 10 to count as one of the three minimum choices.

I would like to offer some counter points as I do feel you are making completely valid observations:

1) metal infantry will reduce the cost of the game by a significant proportion. Granted it's still not hugely cheap but there are savings there.

2) you talk about needing hundreds of models for cataclysm but you can negate this by taking choices that counts as multiple choices for example Helwr being common 2. These help with my first point as well.

3) in large games you don't have to move your entire host in one single move which doesn't force one player to sit twiddling their thumbs plus cataclysm is the darklands version of apocalypse in 40k. A massive game for an all day battle where you fight using pretty much entire collections.

I'm not going to say this is perfect but in the end Rob does listen to people and if you offer good points he will consider them.

[Skull king]

@Raya - I understand your initial dislike of the new ubiquity changes, as a Fomoraic player I was quite off put by the fact that my monstrous units needed to have monstrous 'generals' to get them into mainstay.

To be fair, these new rules are made to reflect the game as it stands from whats been funded through the Savage Hordes 2 kickstarter. The webstore is behind what has been sent out to kickstarter backers, but they are in the process of catching up to them.

My previous list which I had created using the old muster rules became invalid, but I've worked to create new ones that do, and I've found that I've been able to keep most of the previous monsters & monstrous units I had (had to trade the Mammox tain for a Moraine sorcerer, and a Gabrox) , and even added more thanks to gold changes, and ubiquity changes in certain units. You can check it out here. Link to Old List

I would suggest you try building some lists, and see how close you get to your previous ones, and please post what you've created, as we can't see if there's some thing off, by you just mentioning units in a paragraph. Many people (including Rob, the games creator (as you've seen)) are willing to chime in and explain how certain things work, and how to build certain hosts the way you want.

I think we'll see new characters, and units which will alter the units we have's ubiquity and authorities in the future. For instance, what if we got a Sronax tain special character, who's special rule was if he's a commander, he made Sronax mainstay, and Sronox common? It would solve a lot of problems you seem to have, and he'd probably be ubiquity Unique + Uncommon. If you take Belech, he eliminates all your mainstay requirements, which is great in a cataclysm game, then all your monstrous tains (who are of course not the generals thanks to Belech) are making all their monstrous kin Common makes more sense. That means you're just filling your six common slots, 4 uncommon, and Belech's already taken care of the Rare requirement. Now granted, that's only for Fomoraic, but with sell swords like Alix allowing you to bring in almost any monster from any army as a combined Unique + Uncommon (2) (because she's binding to the beast, so you don't use it's ubiquity, only hers) , or Golgog Goat eater bringing in almost any monstrous unit for the same cost, you can see where things start to have some extra room.

Please post some lists of hosts that you or your friends would like to build, with specific figures you have or want, and lets see what we can make!

[Rob Lane]

Thanks for the reply Rob, is nice to have player feedback acknowledged instead of leaving them shouting into the void.

I am not in an ivory tower - players will always be able to talk to me about what is bothering them!

I get the impression though you’re dismissing what I’m saying as the opinions of a butthurt fan. Granted I am pretty butthurt,

Which, I'm afraid, I cannot ignore as the reason behind what you are saying.

I'll put it another way. The playtesters all know that if they are critiquing their own hosts, I take what they are saying with a pinch of salt. I will still listen to their arguments, but I cannot ignore that they have a vested interest in what they are used to playing with / purchased. There is always, always resistance if something changes their army, their love, what they've put so much time and effort into. A lot of the time they cannot see why I have made changes, because love is blind! I do not make changes for the sake of it - I make changes to improve Darklands, not to make it worse.

One of the rules for them is this: "If you're emotional about something, you care too much about it. You need to be objective, not subjective." You are emotional about this, as you've said so yourself!

but personal feelings aside, my point still stands that from a mechanics perspective, the new ubiquity rules are restrictive and don’t scale for larger size games. Heck, your own rule system even works against it.

Example: whether moving into combat or across a battlefield, movement is the same basic principle: one warrior moves to wherever, then each warrior of the unit moves so the unit remains in join distance. So the unit doesn’t move as a block, rather individual pieces forming a whole. This is fine for skirmish games, but breaks apart at larger ones that force you to take infantry. Say you’re playing Fomoraic at cataclysm level. That requires a minimum of 10 mainstay, 6 common and 4 uncommon. Assuming you’re taking the minimum size for unit, this still equates to 100 gabrax, 48 gul-gabrax and 12 sronax. In a game of no movement trays. 160 models, not counting nobels/rares/anything extra, that you’re moving individually. If you’ve even had the misfortune of playing Warhammer Fantasy with someone who forgot their movement trays, you’ll know how fun this is.

I'm sorry, but I don't agree. You're talking about a "problem" that just isn't there - we've never, ever found it a problem moving units in any size of battle for one simple reason: the most you're moving at any one time is 20, because once you've done that you move on to something else or your opponent has a go. You don't sit there while your opponent moves all of his host - this is not Hordes and Warmachine, where you sit there for an hour while you watch your army being destroyed, or some god awful game (names dare not be mentioned) where you sit for two hours while the French are moved before you can shoot them.

Darklands is "I move a unit, you move a unit" - it takes one minute to move a unit of 20 miniatures at the very most, and that's if someone is being extreme or has to to traverse rough ground.

As an example, Adrian here has just moved ten miniatures, not rushing. It took him 15 seconds. Double that for a unit of 20. Try it yourself.

Do you really think this is a problem?

Cataclysm is a day job anyway. I'm sorry, but that's an extreme example and one that is not correctly applied. Most games of Darklands will be around 1,500 to 2,000 gold, and there has never been any problem with moving miniatures, ever. Do you really think that we would not change things if we saw that?

I hate with a passion games that make you wait while your opponent takes an age doing something. Darklands is not like that and Cataclysm is not like that.

Cumbersome movement aside, the huge number of compulsory units just make large battles unwieldy. Large points battles encourage players to go to town and use the big stompy things they don’t get to in smaller battles. At cataclysm level in Darklands, only needing 7 compulsory units gave you ample opportunity for this. Now you need 21 compulsory units. The new ubiquity rules just bog the game down the larger battles you play, and that’s before getting into the monetary cost.

Again, you're playing a Cataclysm. A Cataclysm game is an all-day, let's go mad situation and the movement examples hold no water, as I proved above. Have you ever played a Cataclysm game? I have, and it's nothing like what you suggest. I'm sorry but you are wrong here!

The ubiquity limits also don’t work on the small end of the scale. There’s a 500g difference between encounter and skirmish, but 2 extra compulsory units you need to take. This gives you no room to play around with your force, since by the time you’ve bought the compulsory units you’ll have barely any gold left. The sheer amount of compulsory units required means smaller battles will be the same limited amount of available units every time. Compare this to the previous rules, where your 1 mainstay and 1 commander for skirmish level could easily squeeze in <375g, giving you much more freedom to use different types of units in a 999g game.

You need to give me examples here. There is no point saying "this is this" without proof. I need proof to be able to change things around, if necessary. The playtesters were told this immediately. You have a problem with something? Play it. Then tell me it's wrong.

Let's take Fomoraic then, as it's an example you've used, at Skirmish level. One minute of scribblings later, I arrive at

Gabrax Tain - 71g - Common
10x Gabrax - 220g - Mainstay
10x Gabrax - 220g - Mainstay

That's all you need, about half your gold, and it's exactly what you're aiming for. You can add in a bit of monstrous infantry, or maybe a monster. A sorcerer, perhaps?

It also makes thing difficult for players wanting to move up to the next size level of games. Say I’m a fledgling Fomoraic player with a skirmish size force, and want to have an extra 500g to get up to the next level (battle). In the previous edition, as the mainstay requirements were the same, and the max for everything has increased, I have a lot of freedom to choose what I spent that 500g on. I pick a dainoch and a warlock. Which at £69.33 isn’t a stretch to buy, I get a cool new monster and job done, I can play a bigger battle. In the new rules however (assuming I’ve already met the basic requirements for skirmish), I now need an extra mainstay, an extra common and an extra uncommon, presumably with an extra commander to handle their authority costs. Based on what’s available in the webstore now, that’s 10 gabrax, 1 gabrox, 3 sronax and a gabrax tain, totalling at £192.78 (presuming I bought the discounted 5x gabrax herd and I’m happy with the extra banner bearer). This costs way more in gold, so I have to drop something else I already had to fit in these minimum requirements. A more expensive compulsory choice compared to the cheaper one of my personal choice.

That's a lot of money, but I do think you've gone to extremes to prove your point... so you'll forgive me if I go to the other extreme.

You need 1x more Mainstay, 1x more Common and 1x Uncommon.

So let's go 10x Gabrax to keep the theme running, let's add another Gabrax Tain for the Common and the extra commander required, and a Warlock for the Uncommon.

10x Gabrax = £30 (in metal) - 220g
1x Gabrax Tain = £7 (metal) - 71g
1x Gabrax Warlock = £7 (metal) - 58g

That's £44 to fulfil the necessary requirements, and adds 350g to the cost of your host, bringing it to around 850g. Just over half your host. The rest is up to you, and your money.

This is one of my major worries about the direction the game is heading in. Now, I love Warhammer Fantasy, but I will hands-down admit that half of what killed it was the expense (the other being GW mismanagement). The starting costs of an army were too great, so new players couldn’t start without massive investment and older players rarely bought anything. In Darklands 1200g (battle) is a fairly small but still decent sized battle. But again, using a basic Fomoraic list from the webstore: 3 mainstay (3x 10 gabrax), 2 common (1 gabrox), 1 uncommon (3 sronax), 2 commanders (gabrax tain), costs £357.08.

I will stop you there because you have to understand that these changes have been brought into play for the future, not the past. The future is metal infantry (much of which will be released in May), and the price you have quoted is wrong. I totally understand that in resin it's prohibitive, and that's why we've brought in metal infantry.

So let me get back to what I stated previously.

1x Gabrax Tain = £7 (metal) - 71g
10x Gabrax = £30 (in metal) - 220g
10x Gabrax = £30 (in metal) - 220g
10x Gabrax = £30 (in metal) - 220g
1x Gabrax Tain = £7 (metal) - 71g
1x Gabrax Warlock = £7 (metal) - 58g

That's £111 at retail (and you can get them cheaper than that if you go via Kickstarters or sales).

Going back to what I said in the previous paragraph, the new ubiquity rules force players to buy multiple infantry units each time they want to go up the scale, instead of a chunky monster or noble to fill up the points. This make the game extremely inaccessible to new players once they find out the cost. Why should they drop several hundred pounds on a niche game with a small fanbase where they need to buy multiples of the same unit, when they could for instance just play something like Malifaux, where for £50 they get a complete force in a popular game with an active fanbase and multiple tournaments? Say what you like about quality comparisons (personally, I'm not a fan of Malifaux), but people are still going to vote with their wallets.

I totally understand that, but you can't compare Malifaux to Darklands - you need far less miniatures for Malifaux than Darklands and it's a totally different customer base in my opinion. Certainly, when starting out, I did not say "I really want those Malifaux players to play Darklands". I had another game in mind!

People will vote with their wallets, I am sure - but I've just proved that you can get your 1,500 gold host going for around £100. Add in a couple of monsters and you've got your host. How much does an Age of Sigmar army cost these days? A Hordes and Warmachine army?

The cost of Darklands is not prohibitive and I think you're actually being a little detrimental to the game by using extreme costs to prove a point about rules.

People need to understand that it *doesn't* cost too much to get into Darklands, with or without these restrictions. That's the message that needs to be got across here. You do want Darklands to grow, yes? That's a rhetorical question - I'm sure you do - but many people reading what you are putting are going to think what you are saying is correct, which it is not.

These new rules have already cost the game new players; I do a lot to encourage people to play Darklands (my opinion on wargames is that if I get someone to play today, I have an awesome opponent tomorrow), and one person in particular was keen to start, planning out his purchases so he could scale up and play me at different levels. When the new ubiquity rules were revealed, he’s dropped it like a hot potato. In his words, “why should I spend even more money buying infantry when I already have a Warhammer army?”. Even the players I do know aren't happy; those with larger forces don't want to rebuild their entire army, those with smaller forces don't want to buy effectively a second army to play at the next size level.

I can only state what I've said before - you don't have to use tons of infantry. You can still go for the monstrous infantry heavy host, with a smattering of infantry as support. Did you explain this to him? See my point about what Darklands is, below, and about growing the game, above.

The whole crux of my argument is two points:

1) From a mechanics perspective the ubiquity levels are limiting at small points, unwieldy at large points.

They are limiting (because they're limits) but you still have 500g in most hosts after fulfilling the ubiquity levels. Similarly, they're not unwieldy at large points - as I've proved regarding the movement above.

2) It makes the price of the game too high for starter players.

A starter player should go for an Encounter Host, which is £60 on the Kickstarters, and will be a bit more expensive as a release. The rulebook is £35. For me that means the starting cost for Darklands is comparable and often less than most other wargames of comparable size.

Even if my list was pure gabrax horde spam, I'd still think the ubiquity requirements were too harsh. Rage about my own list aside, I genuinely think the new limits are a detriment to the game as a whole.

I'm sorry, I disagree with you. I believe they will make Darklands a better game for all players, and that's why I've brought them into play.

(one more thing, another reason why I think it's not been entirely thought out- the effective size rule for units. Why have a unit listed 1-20, then have an extra rule saying the minimum size is half the max? Why not just list the unit as 10-20, for saying you can't take a unit <9?)

I have thought about that previously, and it's something I may still do, but equally I would like to give people a little more choice.

Just because you wouldn't contemplate purchasing a unit of 5 infantry doesn't mean everybody won't. Sometimes there's also a situation where you have gold left and you want to spend it on something else.


I'll leave you with something that I posted on the playtest forum, which I believe is relevant.

Most of the main realms for each kindred were never designed to be monstrous infantry only; Darklands should be man and beast together, always, and the beast plays a supporting role in the human realms. Darklands is historical fantasy - you should be fielding humans [or equivalent], simply put. [Khthones is the only realm that is not designed to be like that - although there will be human slaves at some point].

Of course, players had other ideas and wanted monstrous infantry only hosts; which is fair enough to a certain extent (and amusing when they still used human or equivalent sorcerers), but that's not really what Darklands is aiming at.

The new muster rules have caused an issue with these "monstrous realm" hosts, of that there is no doubt - but that is mainly because of a lack of choice more than anything. You can still go for a monstrous infantry host, but you will have to use humans to fulfil the restrictions - so, mostly monstrous infantry, with some infantry as support (kind of the reverse of the above). This is fine, and exactly what I wanted to achieve.

At lower gold levels I do understand that monstrous infantry fills up your host quickly, and one thing I may do is make the larger monstrous infantry Mainstay (2) to compensate somewhat. I'm not sure about this yet, I need to build some lists, but I *may*.

I'll put it another way: I'm happy enough that eventually players will be able to field monstrous infantry only hosts in the future, from monstrous realms such as Gwaelod, when I introduce some different units; but to fudge it now for the main realms and allow people to do this would mean a) I'm going against my original design, b) it's a fudge, and I hate fudges and c) I will have to back-fudge this when those other realms are introduced; and it's no small task, either.

This is the same issue for the new kindreds, too - i.e., the Érainn, Jutes and Atalantes suffer under the new restrictions because of a lack of choice - but those problems will eventually ease.

So for now - unless there is something that is totally unviable and a proper issue - I'm going to leave things as they are (barring what I suggested above about monstrous infantry filling up two Mainstay slots).

Cheers
Rob

[Alex (ÉgB)]

Rob - please don't change any unit limits to 10-20, sometimes 8-9 is all you can fit in of a unit to round out points or some such.

[Rob Lane]

Rob - please don't change any unit limits to 10-20, sometimes 8-9 is all you can fit in of a unit to round out points or some such.

I doubt I will, just wanted to explain why - don't worry.

Cheers
Rob

[Slinky]

Any chance of extending mainstay changing rules that currently only apply when a General to also working for commanders? E.g. Hrafnmenn jarls etc.

[Rob Lane]

I don't think so Pete - is there any particular reason why? Explain your reasoning fella and I'll consider it...

Cheers
Rob

[Slinky]

No real reasoning, it's just a bit painful adjusting my planned hosts

[Dave Fraser]

No real reasoning, it's just a bit painful adjusting my planned hosts

THis is something that varies between Kindreds and even some of the different creature types within kindreds. So I'd assumed it wasn't just a blanket thing and was designed for flavour/background reasons.

I notice that it hurts a little in my errain faction, is largely flexible enough to work around on the Khthones and the Albainn contrain some units and some done.

[socius]

I just can say it for the Angelcynn and Byzantii, but there nearly every unit can be mainstay. For those kindreds I dont see any problem, you have just to muster a few more commanders.

[Stu]

Just to clarify, does a unit fulfilling a minimum ubiquity slot have to be at exactly the effective size, or is the effective size just the minimum number of troops?

[Rick_Boer]

That's just the minimum number of troops you need

[Jonathon Chester]

You need half the maximum possible size of the unit to count as forfilling the requirements

[Alex (ÉgB)]

It's not clear though when I re-read it - I'd assumed to qualify as filling a ubiquity slot it would be effective size+. Then I re-read the Effective Size para and the talk about units being too big kinda threw me a little making me doubt it.

[Stu]

It's not clear though when I re-read it - I'd assumed to qualify as filling a ubiquity slot it would be effective size+. Then I re-read the Effective Size para and the talk about units being too big kinda threw me a little making me doubt it.

That's the part that's confusing me, it implies that a unit being larger than its effective size is also a bad thing.

[Rob Lane]

That's just fluff to explain effective size.

The two rules you need are:

"Thus, each unit of more than one warrior has an effective size, defined as half of that unit's maximum size (rounding up any fractions)."

"Each unit of a different profile that is purchased to fulfil a minimum ubiquity slot within a host must include enough warriors to fulfil that unit's effective size."

Cheers
Rob

[Stu]

Thanks Rob!