Maxing your Oldhammer

So how do you go about getting the best out of Oldhammer? Is it just about being rosey-eyed about WFB 3rd ed. or drooling over the latest amazing ebay bargain someone got on a Leaping Slomm Twoface? Are we backing ourselves down a rather narrow passageway in celebrating all things Citadel and 80's? Heaven forbid, are we becoming as prescriptive as the current GW scene?

An unattainable goal for many aspiring Oldhammerers?

I don't necessarily presume to speak for others as we all have our own personal take on what Oldhammer means to us. However, there are certain trends I'll refer to and I apologise in advance for the sweeping statements I will no doubt end up making!

Let me address those questions in two ways. Firstly, our (well definitely mine!) apparent 3rd ed. and 3rd ed. era miniatures fetish. Don't get me wrong - I love all that stuff, as is somewhat obvious by much of the content of this blog. However, this is just the vehicle I (and many others) have chosen for my personal Oldhammer Odyssey because this was the stuff I always wanted to own as a kid. Unfortunately though, as a movement, it seems that concentrating so much on the collecting and painting of old Citadel lead that the perception of Oldhammer is becoming a little skewed. Just look at the difference in the number of posts in the WIP and Showroom boards to the Battle Reports board on the Oldhammer forum, as well as the content of many of our Oldhammer blogs.

This of course (the preponderence painting and collecting) is partly down to not having the time and in many cases, being geographically remote from each other to play many games. Of course there is the need to polish up our old collections models and get our various ebay binges painted up and ready for the table top too. However, Oldhammer is a way of getting the most out of playing the early editions of Warhammer. Its life blood must surely be in the act of playing and sharing the enjoyment of these games with an opponent and hopefully the GM running them.

A rare and wonderful thing - Oldhammer battle report from Nico's blog Realms of Chaos.
Yes that is Chaos V. Slann!

That's not to say that posts about painting and modelling old lead are a bad thing in themselves - the Oldhammer forum would be a dull place without seeing the wonderful work folk put on there and we know the motivational effect of receiving praise for and positive criticism of our efforts with the paint brush. Its more the case that its the relative absence of battle reports and discussions on approaches to game play that is the problem.

I've been doing a little research to see how the other half lives. If you know what Cheese Lists, Death Stars and Leadership Bombs are you'll know what I'm on about...

Now I'm not here to ridicule, criticise or badmouth others' interpretation of wargaming - most of this stuff is pretty unintelligible to me and I've never experienced it first hand myself. If that's how some folk like to roll then fair enough but its obviously not my cup of tea. I suppose the nearest I've been (or want to be) to suffering a crushing defeat at the hands of Skaven slave spam dual hell pits or a DE dual Hydra unkillable lord is playing games like Wolfenstein 3D online and literally not being able to stay alive for more than a few seconds unless I'd got lost in some remote and unimportant corner of the map - not fun!

Why venture into such apparently arid territory for Oldhammer? Well it seems there is a great deal of energy invested in these communities in working out the best ways to win, max out your army list and counter killer combinations in your opponent's army - all based on the regular playing and desire to win the game.

So I thought why not flip this on its head. 

Bear with me - I'm not proposing we begin endless debates on the best army lists to be mined out of the Warhammer Armies book - such a thing would be anathema to the Oldhammer concept that there are no Army lists, or rather that you shouldn't feel constrained in building a scenario or organising a game by the limitations enforced by such lists.

Nor am I suggesting that tactics for winning against various armies become a hot topic for debate.

And you thought your Space Marines were AWESUM!

Instead we need to talk more about "winning" at Oldhammer and by that I mean how do we go about organising, playing and making the experience enjoyable, fun and fulfilling for all concerned. 

Ideally we'd have lots of games that have been played and could be up for discussion in terms of what worked and what didn't. However, as we know, time and distance are a little against us for that. 

As a lot of us haven't played regularly or GM'ed a game for a long time and it seems to be a bit of a worry for some with the Oldhammer Weekend approaching, might I suggest we see more topics along the lines of tips for GM'ing. Ask the question - how do I set up/tweak a scenario idea to provide both players with a suspenseful and exciting experience? What makes a good scenario? Share ideas on cooperative play that might also have conflicting objectives to spice it up a little. Begin discussions on how to map hidden movement or use wandering monsters and third party forces. I know various folk have dabbled in this already, I just think we need moar! I would imagine the upcoming Oldhammer event will change this in terms of the amount of games that will be played over the weekend and I look forward to reading about people's experiences as players and GM's.

Oops - wrong one!

I recently reread Dr Bargle's excellent article on the Pathetic Aesthetic in Old School Gaming. This kind of intelligent and self-deprecating debate is great too. Personally I love it as an intellectual exercise but the argument is a strong one and the pathetic aesthetic is essentially key to getting the right flavour for Oldhammer gaming - for this see especially what he says about the Magnificent Sven and Lichemaster scenarios. Further exploration of the ways these ideas could be put to practical use as a GM would be another valuable avenue of discussion.

In fact all that talk of RPG's has got me thinking and I've long been enamoured of the idea of including elements of them on the tabletop. There is some excellent material at Oldhammer as RPG for gaming in this way - either going down the line of playing 1st ed. as an RPG or adding meat to tabletop characters in the form of random characteristics generation, character progression and injury charts. I rather like the idea of taking some lowly character and playing a series of scenarios that widen in scope as he/she advances, until they either meet an untimely demise or retire with their ill-gotten gains.

Influences from other sources is another valuable topic - personally, having finally tracked down copies of the Advanced Fighting Fantasy books, Dungeoneer and Blacksand,  I'd love to translate them to the table top somehow - possibly using 1st or 2nd ed. rules and stats.

Fighting the Trolltooth Wars would be another good one - either from the two evil and warring Wizard's point of view, or from some lowly Captain in there armies, be that Hill Goblin Chieftain or Rhinoman Officer.

Think of all the fun you could have putting together and converting the miniatures for Zharradan Marr and Balthus Dire's Chaotic forces together from umpteen different manufacturers!

I'll wrap up my long and rambling post by doing my bit for Oldhammer style meta-gaming - here are a few scenarios I posted some time ago on the Oldhammer Forum. I can't remember whether or not I ever put them on the blog so either way here they are again. For the sake of giving some form to the possible forces that could be used I used the Warhammer Armies book for the various troop types - feel free to use whatever is in your collections though!

Bluster's Last Stand

Bridge Over the River Whye

The Engines of Avalone

Here's a more basic scenario from when we were thinking about putting together a retroclone WFB

The Battle of Wunoewun

Enjoy and do share your thoughts on the matter - perhaps we could even have a set of rules that has its tongue stuck firmly in its cheek on how to be a good Oldhammerer like this send up of WAAC players!

Stop - Its almost Hammer Time!

Yes folk the big day is almost upon us!

Yep - I am this excited!

In four week's time we will be descending on Nottingham for a weekend of Oldhammer antics at the Wargames Foundry.

Hammer Time - Old World Style

Dark clouds hang over the troubled kingdom of Ramalia as King F'yar marshals his invading Orc Tribes against the weakening Alliance of Men, Dwarves and Elves. Will Orc's Drift hold or will its defenders' failure see the Goblinoid hordes free to descend on the capital, Palesandre? As you might guess I'm quite excited about running Orc's Drift - the first time around it was for a bunch of lads and lasses at the Explorer Scout Group I used to help out at. They were keen and enthusuastic and it was great to give them a taste of wargaming and we all  had a blast,  but I'm keen to see what a bunch of Oldhammerers will make of it. I for one won't feel I have to hold back a little with the GM controlled characters as I did with the young'uns because of their inexperience!

Although I probably won't have masses of time away from Orc's Drift I'm also really looking forward to seeing the Realms of Chaos ringing with the clamour of battle in a huge free for all between Khorne and Slaanesh. Orlygg's Bring and Battle game is going to have some seriously twisted warbands and there looks to be some fantastic painting and conversion work happening on the various participants blogs!

Coop is running a Rogue Trader showdown in which you can enter a squad of Space Marines - sorely tempted by this one but time is against me alas! Again I'm sure the table will look a treat with Marines old and new duking it out.

Then there's the Rumble in the Jungle game that I hope to get some time off Orc's Drift for - a mad melange of Lizardmen, Norse, Slann, Amazons, Pygmies, Undead Pirates, High and Sea Elf expeditionary force and whatever randomness gets spewed forth from the dimesion of the Black Yungon! The object of the game will be to raid the Pygmy temples and get away with whatever treasure you can.

There's tons of other games going on too, including a chance to participate in the Forenrond's Last Stand scenario from the 3rd ed Rule book, a mega battle against Golgfag's huge Orc horde and various other engagements that have been organised between fellow Oldhammerers through the Blood Forum.

There has recently been a bit of a debate about the inclusivity of the event and Orlygg has posted a great article on his blog. Living in my little Oldhammer bubble - I usually just frequent the Blood forum, the LAF and all the fantastic blogs you chaps produce - I wasn't aware that Oldhammer had been noticed and what's more been somewhat misunderstood in some quarters.

Seeing sellers on ebay using the Oldhammer label to sell old lead made me laugh (but not necessarily at the prices!) but the misconception that Oldhammer is a set of rules and requirements that have to be met to participate is one that needs setting straight.

Now I haven't played much of the later editions of WFB or 40K, nor have I been part of the tournament scene so I don't have much first hand knowledge of what drove many other folk away from it all and into the arms of Oldhammer. 

However, what I do perceive from the occasional forays I have made into other forums that seem only to discuss the best combinations of magic weapons, Death Star units and constantly bemoan the lack of balance in the latest Army book is a mindset that needs a stringent set of rules and parameters that can be fine tuned so the ultimate goal of winning all the time can be achieved. 

Not my cup of tea I must say! Part of all this is also the need to make everything official so no-one can cheat and beat your uber army of awesomeness with something that's "not in the rules". This all smacks of little kids spitting their dummies out in the playground because little Timmy isn't playing fair and I didn't win! This is pretty much the polar opposite of what Oldhammer is about.

Oldhammer is an ethos - a set of beliefs and aspirations, if that doesn't sound too lofty and evangelical! It is about enjoying yourself and ensuring your opponent enjoys his or herself too. Its about revisiting simpler wargaming times and the minis you loved as a kid - or if you're not an 80's Citadel devotee like myself and others, its about using whatever miniatures you hold dear.

Oldhammer is the zen of wargaming (probably getting a bit carried away here!) - by that I mean its about being laid back about trivial things like having the "right" miniatures, making the rules work for you and your opponent (or better still letting the GM worry about the rules!) and achieving a state of inner peace because you don't have to win. Ritual worship of the false Gods of Game Balance, Rules Lawyership and Official Army Lists it is not!

So what is the thing I am most looking forward to about the Oldhammer Weekend? 

Chilling out with a bunch of mature, like-minded gamers who are there to enjoy each others' company, make new friends and have a great time playing the games we played in our youth. I for one don't want to get too militant about anything when we should be having fun!

I won't repeat too much of what has been said already as Orlygg has done a fine job of addressing the misconceptions that are apparently flying about the internetz. Instead I'll point you towards what some other Oldhammerers think about our ethos. Apologies if I've missed anyone else out there who has set out their thoughts on the subject - let me know and I'll add a link.

Faction Attraction

OK - looks like its Game on!

Here are pics of the NPC factions that I'll be controlling and the two Player Factions up for grabs for Mouse and Private Weird.

I'm posting them without background for now as I don't want to give away too much to either side, both in terms of stuff they might want to keep under wraps from each other and stuff I want to keep up my sleeve for later as well! Also I thought it might be fun to let the players flesh out their characters themselves - within the narrative framework I'll be supplying them with once they've made their choices.

So I'll let the pictures speak for themselves - the only thing I'll say is that not everything is necessarily as it seems...

NPC factions

The High Seer, Zargo Thrawl, and his Militia

Captain Habris and his Militia patrol

Feral Mutant and Poly-beast Pack 

Player Option 1

The Imperial Expedition

Player Option 2

The Polymorph Rebel Band with stranded Spacefarer

Let me know who you want to play as chaps and whether you have any issues representing the minis so far...

Things are about to get a bit Weird around here...

The night has been unruly: where we lay,

Our chimneys were blown down; and, as they say,

Lamentings heard i' the air; strange screams of death,

And prophesying with accents terrible 

Of dire combustion and confused events 

New hatch'd to the woeful time: the obscure bird

Clamour'd the livelong night: some say, the earth 

Was feverous and did shake.

Yes dear reader, War once more rears its ugly head on these fair shores. From across the World Pond come dark mutterings of strife and bloodshed.

Private Weird and Mouse have already thrilled us with the Battle of the Plain of Crows - a tragic tale of internecine civil conflict between two Dwarf armies.

More recently we were treated to the clash over Dimtree's Loot between the Ulysses Gang and Mykhul's Ork Boyz.

Well now I and Warlord Paul are in on the action thanks to Private Weird's suggestion that we put together and play some kind of scenario between the four of us! This thread is intended to serve as a platform to discuss possible narratives, armies and everything else we will need to conduct an utterly mad four way remote game through our separate blogs!

Edit -

Pics of some possible war bands added!

Eldar Pirates - T'ih Rex and his surviving crew strive to evade their Imperial hunters...

Imperial Army - Marooned by Warp storms, Captain Mendrake's squad must find a way of broadcasting the recall code to prevent the annihilation of what is actually a very promising recruitment planet...

Pirates - Urig Ellar, a rogue Psyker, and his gang of ne'er-do-wells, have fled to a backward world in the outer rim. Here he hopes to evade the attentions of the Inquisition and build a new fiefdom for himself.

Inquisitor Fang, Marine Captain Biggelz and Assassin Ximinez are hot on the heels of a Rogue Psyker - can they eliminate their target before the forces of chaos utilise him for their own nefarious purposes?

Infamous bandit, Robyn Cowl and her band of Jolly thugs - just think how much takings would go up by if they could lay their hands on one of those fancy bang sticks?

Aash Grillyems - Chief of the Nicto Tribe. Aash is determined to gain the edge over the Undead creatures that have plagued his tribe for months. Boomsticks would definitely help in this objective...

Cinis Verata, a feared Necromancer and the beginnings of his Undead horde - nothing must stop him in his preparations to raise ever more lost souls for his Army of Darkness...

Goddesses of Battle?

Just spotted some rather tasty Amazon proxies in Foundry's new Fantasy range for their Gods of Battle game.

I don't know much about the game - perhaps the Oldhammer Weekend down at Foundry might change that if a demo game is run and I get enough time away from running Orc's Drift and playing all the other games I  want to!

Of particular interest to me from an Amazonian point of view are the Lion Tribe Female warriors from the Thousand Tribes faction - definitely good Koka Kalim material.

There are also some rather nice Cavalry options from the Thousand Tribes who'd make very nice Chaos Thug Horsemen and women.

 Definitely a passing resemblance to the illustration from the Armies book.

Back to the Amazons though, and the Half Elves are another faction with some promising  options. They have quite a Native American feel to them but I'm sure with the right paint job I could Meso-American them up a bit.

With a little bit of Otoplasty, these ladies could make some good Tribeswomen to bolster the ranks. I wonder if it'll be possible to cherry pick the females out of the Vulture tribe packs?

More to add to the shopping list for the Oldhammer weekend!

Would this be Tournament legal...?

So the dust settles on another LPL - season 7 this time and the third year I have entered. It certainly proved to be a productive one and I definitely think I upped my game in terms of the volume of minis I painted up - often exceeding the minimum of five required to make up a team. I was dogged with photography problems in the earlier rounds as the ancient 2 megapixel camera I was using, in place of the nice new one we bought and promptly left at my parent's house, struggled to deliver the crisp detail I was after.

 



  

It was the first time I'd ever included a large monster like the Tortoise tanks and its Goblin crew. Not sure whether or not I'd painted cavalry for previous LPL's either?

 

Painting almost an entire Blood Bowl team felt good - plus the guys I'd painted the previous year were getting a little lonely! It was also nice to get some Dr Who stuff done as well - its been a while!

Hopefully I helped spread the word about Goblinaid a little with the mini-Kev and his fantastic Snorklings from Foundry.

Finally finishing off all the minis for the Kremlo scenario was great too and in fact I managed to get a few Lustrian themed entries in to keep my long running Magnificent Sven project ticking over.

Finally, although I don't really enter the LPL with any realistic hopes of getting to the number 1 slot (did you see the Battle Royale between the top tier guys - stunning stuff!), I was very pleased to come in the top half of the rankings and a few places higher than I did last year - must be making progress!

Cursing like...

... Fenric!