Campaign 2011 - month 0

Ok, so I'd got a wish list and I had to put it all together. It was about October and I needed to get everything ready for the 4th January (our first game). Sounds like a lot of time, but for me (inveterately lazy) it really wasn't. Particularly as I was being a bit ambitious:

1. Write the rules
2. Create a map using the GW plastic Mighty Empires tiles, make customised tiles (such as coastal tiles and special map features), make customised buildings (Brettonian temples and the like). And of course, paint it all.
3. Make enough generic terrain for four tables. You'll see from the rules I wrote for determining terrain, this would have meant a huge collection of terrain, particularly as I didn't actually own any in the first place. What I did have was a whole bunch of trees and woodland (tons actually, because I once had an idea that I wanted to create a table for a skirmish scenario covered entirely in forests). But not much else, a few walls and bits and bobs. No buildings, no rough terrain, no rivers, no Anvils of Vaul, no Acropoli of Heroes. So it would be a massive undertaking.
4. Make a website and/or newsletter for the group so that I could make the month-by-month admin more interesting.
5. Complete my own Dark Elf army.

I admit, it was too much. But hey, dreaming costs nothing.

NEWS CRASH: Just two days before the first game, our Bretonnian player declares a change of allegiance and decided he'd rather play Skaven instead - Warhammer isn't his first love, so faced with building and painting a whole new army of Brets or using his son's existing Skaven army, he switched to the latter). I couldn't really argue (it's not like they owe me anything), so I just had to go along with it. It threw out the good/guys bad guys split, but we'd just have to work with what we had.)

In the end, this is what I managed:

1. The rules. Since the campaign started, the rules have had seven revisions while we play-tested everything, but they've settled down now and are working pretty well. This version of the rules is more of a historical record, presented here for the sake of completeness (Word document):

Campaign rules v1

Incidentally, the current version of the rules is here:

Campaign rules 2011

I won't regurgitate them at length here, but I'm really pleased with what I came up with. In brief:

• I reckon I pretty much answered everything in the wishlist and gave us good scope for characterful, narrative gaming.
• I'm chuffed with the terrain placement rules, and they work really well. Note that the there was a consensus in the group that mysterious terrain was stupid - not so much for the unpredictable consequences it has on your game, but for the whole silliness factor (Pop down to the river, will you darling and get a pail of water? No mummy, I can't because it's a raging torrent of raw Light Magic).
• I wrote the rules to suit a narrative - the taking of Mortendorf, and gave the two teams rules that would suit their character. The Forces of Order (FoO) have special rules that reward a collegial, defensive game, while the Forces of Destruction (FoD) are rewarded for looking after number one (which is as it should be). I made the FoD better at gaining gold (eg enslaving), but gave the FoO more options to spend their gold usefully (eg trade).
• I'm chuffed with the schedule, particularly the use of chaos gods in ascendancy. I had no idea what those games would actually entail, but it just opened the door to customise rules, invent scenarios and play one-off games that would keep it fresh and interesting.

2. A "temporary" map. I laid out the tiles and photographed them. Then worked on the image in photoshop to create what I thought would be a temporary solution. Actually, the map has proved so useful in this format that I never got round to making the map in real life, and don't see a reason to.
Take a look at the map here (pdf, 1.2MB):

Campaign map - month 0

I wanted to divvy a few territories out first to get things started and establish a foothold in the narrative, and since the FoO guys are outnumbered I gave them more. I also spread the FoD guys around the map, but kept the FoO close-knit. This fit with my vision of how I wanted the narrative to go - a nice community of allies, keeping the alliance on good terms, with pockets of nastiness growing in strength and forming their own alliances.

I also added in a four special territories: Mortendorf (which could never be conquered, until the last game, where we could fight a big seige battle); Todbrucke and Karak Gorg, which boost mine production and add a little bit of tactical spice into realm-building; and Bal Dur, which grants the owner the permanent ability to field mercenary armies (ie, armies of different races). I had the idea for Bal Dur because I figured twelve months committed to playing the same army can be a bit boring, so it's fun to dig out an old army every now and again. In the event though, Pete said he wouldn't have his Beastmen army ready in time, and asked if he could use Skaven instead, so I started him off owning Bal Dur, which allowed him to use Skaven, High Elves or anything else he liked while he was building his army.


3. The terrain didn't happen, but by using the bases of my forests (sans trees) I could represent other terrain features fairly adequately. A few 40K craters and some Arcane Ruins were pressed into service to represent a whole host of things, and so far we've managed quite well. It's still an area I have to work on though.


4. Well, the website never came off. But what I did start to do each month was include more and more fiction into the communications (i'll include some as we go on). I don't know if anyone reads it, but it gives the whole thing character and makes the admin a little more interesting. I also discovered that it's useful to put all the details down into a spreadsheet. I send it out the players each month - no one reads it I'm sure, but damn it, they should!

So with all that, we were ready for month 1.