Discussion Warhammer Wild West as an alternative setting? Brainstorming

Pleased to see this thread has been raised from the dead, I loved this alternative setting.

Given that this game will be skirmish-oriented and revolving more around ranged combat, it might be a good idea to look at the original Necromunda rules for inspiration - Necromunda gangs were historically designed in a similar way to the gang structure ideas we talked about previously, with a Leader, regular Gangers, Juves and Heavies, and it involves similar mechanics of revolving primarily around shooting but with a bit of melee involved as well - though we want to make our own game, porting over some rules for things like ammo rolls, climbing, falling e.t.c might be a good idea to save time and effort.

 

...it appears I have been summoned


I would have to check the old rulebooks to see if anything is similar in Mordheim before, doesn't ring a bell.

In the following thread the ideas you put forward seem pretty good, but I feel like it could be OP/ open to too much abuse for a skirmish game? I have seen 'stealth' implemented these ways:

• "sneaky" units such as Dark Elf Assassins or Goblin Fanatics were hidden inside a regular combat unit, and would spring out when an enemy got too close or charged. The opponent knows their is an assassin/fanatic on the board, but not which unit until it is too late
• Genestealer cults in 40K have an interesting deployment setup, they place counters on the table to represent units, and only after the 2nd ish turn they actually deploy their units on the table. The opponent knows where the units are, but they could be a regular unit, a character, or even a tank, and they wouldnt know until subsequent battle rounds.
• super sneaky assassin units like Wood Elf waywatchers have their "stealth" represented in game by being really hard to hit, basically a souped-up permanent cover save. Kinda like our chameleon skinks too.

I feel like these solutions (in all likely hood the last one) would be more balanced ways to make stealth work, or at least easier to use on the tabletop?



On another note, how vertical would a game of Wild West Mordheim be able to be? Most western towns I have seen on a table top setup are maybe one or two story buildings at most. The biggest thing I like about Mordheim is the potential for some epic terrain setups. I will need to ponder this.

 

I'd certainly like to contribute to this, though how is it possible to get authors to collab? Do you send us an invite or something?

 

I have done so, and it now allows me to edit any of the articles on there - I'm now part of the 'Editorial Team'

 

I have had the most brilliant idea for implementing a skirmish wargame system for our Westhammer setting!

For a while I’ve been analysing the Victorian Sci-Fi Skirmish game In Her Majesty’s Name in this thread here, but for some reason it’s only now I’ve just thought that it would be perfect for Westhammer, especially given there will be some Steampunk elements in the Westhammer world, principally because the profiling system used for creating gangs, or Companies as they’re called in this game, is so customisable - we can create a Company for pretty much every race we’ve talked about on this thread using the IHMN list-building system, and the skirmish rules are suitably fast-paced and dynamic for a fun game to be played out in just a couple of hours.

The chaps who wrote it have created a website with some summary sheets and extra material that can give you an insight even if you don’t have the rulebook (though I got the rulebook this Christmas so I should be able to answer any questions anyone may have on it).

 

Here’s a an example IHMN roster for Rangos, based on your original roster:
Figure: Skink Priest
Pluck: 4+
FV: +1
SV: +2
Speed: +1
Cost: 46 + Powers
Talents/Powers: Fearless, Leadership +2, Intuitive, Inspirational, up to 20 points of Mystical Powers,
Equipment: Sacrificial Dagger (Fighting Knife), Priest’s Staff (Quarterstaff)

Figure: Saurus Warrior
Pluck: 4+
FV: +3
SV: +0
Speed: +0
Cost: 26
Talents/Powers: Fearless
Equipment: Saurus Club (Axe), Shield, Saurus Scales (Brigandine)

Figure: Skink Fighter
Pluck: 5+
FV: +1
SV: +2
Speed: +1
Cost: 18
Talents/Powers: Intuitive
Equipment: Bow, Skink Club (Club), Skink Scales (Jack)

Figure: Kroxigor
Pluck: 3+
FV: +5
SV: +0
Speed: +0
Cost: 59
Talents/Powers: Fearless, Terrifying, Tough
Equipment: Kroxigor Club (Great Axe), Kroxigor Scales (Chain Shirt)

Figure: Skink Handler
Pluck: 5+
FV: +2
SV: 0
Speed: +1
Cost: 16
Talents/Powers: Intuitive
Equipment: Spear, Skink Scales (Jack)

Figure: Jungle Beast
Pluck: 4+
FV: +4
SV: +3
Speed: +0
Cost: 36
Talents/Powers: Terrifying
Equipment: Claws and Jaws (Fighting Knives)

Upgrades:
Any Saurus Warrior may replace his Saurus Club with a Spear (+1 point)
Any Skink Fighter may replace his bow with two Pistols (+2 points). If he does so, he may take the Gunslinger talent (+5 points)
Each Jungle Beast must take one of the following upgrades:
Salamander Fire (Strongman talent + Flamethrower) (+16 points)
Razordon Barbs (Counts as a thrown Spear but may split fire against multiple targets in the manner of a machine gun or flamethrower) (+15 points)
Any Skink Fighter may ride a Culchan (Horse) (+5 points). If he does so, he may take the Cavalryman talent (+3 points)
Any Rango model may have their non-firearm weapons Poisoned (+8 points per weapon)

 

In IHMN, if you roll a natural 1 on a D10 when making hit rolls, this is a Fumble - you have to roll the D10 again and if you get another 1, you can’t use the weapon you are using again for the rest of the battle, representing you dropping it, the weapon breaking during combat or something similar. Carrying more than one weapon allows you to be able to use another weapon if this happens, rather than having to fight unarmed which is a massive disadvantage.

Two pistols and the Gunslinger talent allow you to split your fire between multiple enemies, whereas with a single pistol (or two pistols without Gunslinger) you can only shoot a single enemy (in the case of two pistols you’d simply have a spare pistol in case your first one ran out of ammo or jammed, see Fumble above)

Irons?

I’d like to have both Saurus and Kroxigors because they’re the cooler elements of the gang and provide some combat muscle. A Company with wall-to-wall Skinks would get pretty boring after a while and would be unforgiving to play.

 

Fair, though I would like to see a couple of factions pack in more primitive weapons, specifically the Rangos, the Plains Beastmen and the Albion independents, to give a nod to the First Nations in the real world. Bows have their own rules in IHMN and they’ not as powerful as guns in these rules so their primitivity is taken into account.

I think motley mixed Companies should be the norm, as our Westhammer setting has most of the Fantasy races living side by side.

I’d be happy with one or two all-human companies such as the Order of the Silver Hammer, but I want the fantastical races from Warhammer Fantasy to have a lot of representation, because I feel that if you’re just going to make humans do all the donkey-work in a fantasy setting, what’s the point of having a fantasy setting at all when you could simply make it a generic medieval or western setting? (Game of Thrones, while you’re undeniably a good book and TV series, I’m looking at you).

 

I think cover bonuses in IHMN are applied in the same way as in other games like Warhammer Fantasy - in that game, for example, players don’t get improved chances of being in cover if they happen to have kneeling models in the unit (like some of the Wood Elf Glade Guard and High Elf Archers), otherwise everyone would be buying kneeling models. A Kroxigor model is pretty big anyway (up there with the largest models playable in this game), so cover that would hide a man-sized model wouldn’t be enough to protect a Kroxigor.

If we have to have a concrete rule, I’d say a model can only benefit from cover if at least half of it (when standing) is hidden by the cover, same as in 40K when judging whether units and vehicles can have a cover save.

Monstrous Infantry models cost a lot of points because they’re so strong in this game, so a company made up mainly of Monstrous Infantry models would be very small in number compared to a company of infantry models, making the matchup pretty balanced.

However, in one of the Companies defined by the authors, the Black Dragon Tong (based on Chinese Boxer Rebellion cells), they define in the company’s background that rarely more than one Yeti (a Monstrous Infantry size model) can be fielded in the Company, i.e. that only one should be taken in the company when forming a list. If we want to avoid the risk of having potentially OP Monstrous Infantry Companies, we should apply this rule to any and all Companies designed.

As for ‘who can mix with what’ limitations, this is up to us as the creators, because IHMN does allow us to include limitations like this if it fits in the fluff. For the Rango example, given that the Skink Priest is the leader model that you have to take, that already would fulfil the ‘at least one Skink’ rule for Kroxigors. As for the Witch Hunter example, wouldn’t the Order of the Silver Hammer only employ agents that are definitely faithful to Sigmar to avoid any internal conflict?

 

Only just saw this and have a question - why spend time reinventing Vaul, when we already have a Warhammer Fantasy god that represents the dark side of industrialisation, in the form of Hashut? The fact that he is often depicted as a bull makes him doubly appropriate for a Western setting.