Topic of the Week - Your favourite edition of classic WFB

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Daeron
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Topic of the Week - Your favourite edition of classic WFB

Post by Daeron »

Greetings Tyrants!

Warhammer was discontinued a few months back now, and.. its successors are battling for attention. While the loss of Warhammer is still recent event, I hope it has been long enough for the initial shock to wear off and for people to find new ways. Before Warhammer fades away in history, I wanted to discuss its various editions one last time.
And that is: which is or was your favourite edition of WFB. Which editions did you play? Which grabbed your attention? What did you like about them and what not?
Would you like to go back to that edition if you could, or would you like to keep it on the shelf?

Let us know!
Ming
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Re: Topic of the Week - Your favourite edition of classic WF

Post by Ming »

My favourite edition rulewise is probably 7th; even if I admit I appreciated the changes 8th brought.
Problem with 8th ed. is power creep. That problem existed in every WHFB edition, but I think it run out of control in 8th, when later armybooks came in.
The first edition I played is 3rd. I remember it fondly, but it was flawed, and umbalanced. Nonetheless I spent countless hours of fun with it.
My favourite edition fluffwise is 6th. In our Armybook Druchii are described as stern warriors who have been wronged by their high cousins, and spend their life with martial discipline and anger to right that wrong. Nothing comparable to the cartoonish villains they were in previous edtions, and subsequent. Khaine is the only god. Which I prefer Him to be.
... and Justice for all!!!

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Re: Topic of the Week - Your favourite edition of classic WF

Post by Calisson »

My favorite ruleset was patrols!
Closer to roleplaying, quicker games, lots of fun.
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Re: Topic of the Week - Your favourite edition of classic WF

Post by Amboadine »

I will always have a soft spot for 3rd edition. This is the one I played the most, as I had far more time and friends willing to play back then. Overly complicated looking back, but seemed to be fine at the time and I could relate nicely with its collation with WFRP 1st edition.

Of the newer edition, my love of playing WFB came back with 8th after a lull during 6th and 7th mainly due to lack of time.
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Red...
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Re: Topic of the Week - Your favourite edition of classic WF

Post by Red... »

4th for the enchantment of the game. It was the birth of the fluff era and everything seemed exciting and new and fresh. The magic item cards were silly from a balance point of view, but they gave you so much choice. In fact, choice was much more present than now (both more and less than 3rd, but that's a different story). Unfortunately, though, the game lacked any balance and was rightly dubbed Herohammer, a reality that became even more heightened in 5th ed (by which time i had, temporarily, moved on).

7th from a precision point of view, and because that was when most of my friends played it most so I got the most games. Building an army was a finely tuned art: 14 was the perfect number of Blackguard, for example, arrayed in two ranks of seven. But if you took an extra one or two, then you had backup if you lost any casualties. Or you could take a couple less, as a unit of 7 in the front rank and 5 in the back rank still gave you two ranks and a 7 wide frontage. The tiniest details mattered, whereas 8th became more of a throw masses of models into units and see what comes out.

8th for actual fun and a sense of strategic epicness. While in earlier editions, the game oriented so heavily around the charge and which front rank wiped out which, which involved high strategy but lower levels of fun, 8th edition made it more fun and less winner takes all. Yes, your blackguard might wipe out two-thirds of the enemy's unit, but they still got to roll some dice back and do some retaliatory damage. The game also offered a very effective rock-paper-scissors balance: big units trumped small units, small units trumped magic and artillery, and magic and artillery trumped big units. Getting the balance right was pivotal. But the precision was down a bit and sometimes games descending into a big melee clump fest in the middle, or were resolved in turn one when those S5 dwarven stone throwers scored a bunch of direct hits and annihilated everything. My friends also stopped playing as much, so I got less air time with it, which was a shame.
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Re: Topic of the Week - Your favourite edition of classic WF

Post by Haagrum »

For me, it's a toss-up between 4th and 8th.

Back in 4th edition, I was a Skaven player. I had been collecting Skaven since the previous edition, in which any army going up against High Elves or Chaos was basically fighting an uphill struggle most of the way. Guess who my regular opponents played... Then, 4th edition landed. Suddenly, my troops were useful - in particular, warpfire-throwers went from being terrible to must-take match-winners. 4th edition brought in the concepts of the Winds of Magic, different spell decks for various races (people learned to fear the spell Plague), and the concept of armour save penalties for high Strength hits. Importantly for me, I was no longer required to take 70 models of slaves and clanrats before I could start choosing the rest of my army. It was the first to feature true army books (which, after the game-breaking but excellent Slaves To Darkness and The Lost & The Damned books, was a great leveller), and while there was a strong whiff of Herohammer about it, it was a refreshing change. There was also no Overkill rule, which meant that a unit champion could be sacrificed to automatically either drive off or rout an attacking character on a flying monster. There were also a couple of brilliant items for beating such heroes - the Black Gem of Gnar and the Heart of Woe were my favourites.

Also, anyone who lamented 4th/5th edition Herohammer possibly never played 3rd edition, when there was no universal way of modifying armour saves and it was not difficult to get a 1+ save on a top-level hero, and one model could rip through an entire army without much trouble unless countermeasures to such models were taken.

As for 8th edition... aside from some of the movement-related shenanigans, laser-guided cannons, and disparities between army power levels (particularly in respect of magic lores and armies which were either Tomb Kings or hadn't received a recent update), there was a lot to love about 8th edition. The random charge distance was a fantastic idea. "Step up" rectified the silliness of 7-man Swordmasters units wiping the floor with infantry, and combined with the removal of charging resulting in always striking first, meant that there was a reason to take large units again. Steadfast made infantry armies viable and discouraged over-reliance on heavy cavalry, which had always been overpowered (in my view). March-blocking was weakened without becoming useless. All in all, it was a much, much better game that favoured tactics over rule exploits in a way that earlier editions had not.
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