AoS Siege battles / rules / ideas

[Aginor]

Hey y'all!

I am pretty sure we discussed a bit of this in a few other threads already, but I want to make it a separate topic here:

Siege battles - whether they make much sense in a fantasy world or not - are awesome and play a big role in many fantasy stories.
So I had big hopes for the siege rules in the new GHB2017, but to be honest I was a bit disappointed. I had expected something like that old edition (8th? or was it 6th?) supplement for siege battles that someone posted, containing siege towers, siege weapons, and anti-siege weapons. Rules for destroying walls and gates and so on.


So what I am going to do here is I want to bounce around a few ideas that I have about that topic and see what rules I can come up with. They should fit nicely to AoS without changing basic rules and they shouldn't be too complex. They should be adjustable to many factions as well.



So here is some material. I will order it at a later point:

A lot of info about the old days, some good ideas there:
http://lustria-online.com/threads/warhammer-siege-with-lizardmen-tactica.11608/#post-203384

Seraphon tower and battering ram:
http://lustria-online.com/threads/artwork-from-total-war-warhammer-2-spoilers.20402/#post-209283


Random thoughts by me:

There should be defense towers of some sort. They would probably have the same amount of hit points and the same save to keep them balanced. Such as 12 wounds and a 3+ save against everything (also mortal wounds)
Walls would have 10 wounds and a 3+ save. All walls are immune against all ranged weapons (except when listed somewhere, like artillery stuff) and immune against rend except when it comes to siege weapons (see somewhere below).

Ideas for siege weapons, towers, and other fortifications:
- Skaven: Tower can warpstone-beam-whatever-overload one own model. That model gets a free move and then explodes for 1d3 mortal wounds to every unit within 6"
- Seraphon: static EotG
- Seraphon: static Arc of Sotek
- generic, all armies: fighting platform with mounted weapons
- generic: artillery tower
- generic: magic tower (casting arcane bolt on the nearest enemy unit)
- generic: healing tower (heals 1d3 wounds on the closest friendly unit within 12" or so)
- generic: battering ram
- generic: siege tower
- Death: Infernal Standard tower (they don't get healing towers but get a tower that works like a Wight King's standard or the standards that add 1d3/1d6 models to units. Doesn't have to be a tower, can be some graveyard for fluff reasons)
- Chaos: Demonic gate (spawns some demons. basically the same as the Death tower)
- Sylvaneth: Holy grove (could be the same as above, spawning free dryads to existing units or so)
- Destruction: static Idol (like Gork or Mork or whatever. Kills near enemies and buffs own ones or something. Basically take the rogue idol rules and remove the movement)


Then there would be some kind of upgrades to turn units into siege units. Something like:
Choose a Monster, that Monster loses its strongest melee attack but gains the "siege attack" which allows it to hit walls and other buildings with -3 rend or so.

There could also be some way of tunneling /counter-tunneling, but different to what we have in the AoS siege rules now since those are too basic for me.

Another way of causing damage to walls could be some sort of siege magic. A wizard knows a spell that can pierce through the magic protection of buildings, but if he uses it he cannot move in that turn and cannot cast other spells. That way armies without upgradable monsters or artillery could still have something as a ranged siege weapon. Thinking of some earthquake spell or something.


Those are my ideas for now, more incoming.
Feel free to post whatever idea you have and we might find a way to balance things.

 

[pendrake]

My first thought is that the terrain pieces used to represent walls and towers will need to support whatever rules exist that allow them to be damaged. Something to think about.

Rolling a bunch of dice and then a wall is removed and bare Tabletop replaced it? =Disatisfactory

Having walls / towers be impervious to everything, nothing can take them down? =Disatisfactory (also)

 

[Crowsfoot]

Like the idea, would different races have stronger fortifications?

Orks, wood and scrap cobbled together +5 save
Dwarfs, stone well built and tough +2 save
etc, etc

 

[pendrake]

Why would mortal wounds even be considered when attacking structures?

An ordinary, puny, hedge should be immune to mortal wounds.

 

[Aginor]

In AoS there is no armor penetration so mortal wounds are used whenever something is so strong it cannot be blocked by any means.
So if, say, a wizard or priest, would generate something like a high-energy pulse, laser, hand of god striking down, comet from the sky or something, that would cause unblockable damage to about anything imaginable.

Those are mortal wounds.

So structures have to be safe against them, because in AoS there are so many sources for mortal wounds (pretty much every spell and many weapons as well) that walls not hardened agaisnt mortal wounds would be no issue at all, they would be easily destroyable.

 

[Crowsfoot]

Why would mortal wounds even be considered when attacking structures?

An ordinary, puny, hedge should be immune to mortal wounds.

I agree structures should be invulnerable to MW.

 

[Crowsfoot]

In AoS there is no armor penetration so mortal wounds are used whenever something is so strong it cannot be blocked by any means.
So if, say, a wizard or priest, would generate something like a high-energy pulse, laser, hand of god striking down, comet from the sky or something, that would cause unblockable damage to about anything imaginable.

Those are mortal wounds.

With no save roll on structures you would just build a list full of capable MW, now take that away from structures and you need hard hitters and batter rams and siege towers, if you allow MW no one would use siege weapons.

Each race/ faction could have one dedicated siege weapon that you can include, that way you have a target to take out and focus fire on, while the attacker uses tactics to get the weapon in range.

 

[Aginor]

Yeah that's why I think structures have to have a save roll against everything, including mortal wounds, and be rend-immune.
Otherwise they won't stop any army from advancing.

 

[Crowsfoot]

Yeah that's why I think structures have to have a save roll against everything, including mortal wounds, and be rend-immune.
Otherwise they won't stop any army from advancing.

+4 save against MW and you could include reinforcement points that can be spent to repair the wall each turn maybe?

 

[Aginor]

Hard to tell. Even with a 4+ save against mortal wounds I'd fear that spamming MWs would be far more effective for many armies than to actually use siege weapons/spells.

 

[Crowsfoot]

Hard to tell. Even with a 4+ save against mortal wounds I'd fear that spamming MWs would be far more effective for many armies than to actually use siege weapons/spells.

Hmmm, Mortal wounds against a structure can only be used while your within 3in of a siege weapon and 6in of an opponents structure.

Edit: 5000 posts!!

 

[Aginor]

Hmmm, Mortal wounds against a structure can only be used while your within 3in of a siege weapon and 6in of an opponents structure.

Edit: 5000 posts!!

Congratulations to being a Slann now!

@topic: I don't know. That is another layer of complexity. I am thinking of units like Bloodletters. Why should they be able to stab those walls with their mortal wound swords just because some of them are building a conga line 20 inches far, to some battering ram or siege tower?
That doesn't sound very intuitive.

EDIT: And it still bears the problem that there are armies with loads and loads of mortal wounds, while others have none except their wizards.
I still think that the approach with a save that works against wounds and mortal wounds is the best among the ones we have discussed yet.

 

[Crowsfoot]

Congratulations to being a Slann now!

@topic: I don't know. That is another layer of complexity. I am thinking of units like Bloodletters. Why should they be able to stab those walls with their mortal wound swords just because some of them are building a conga line 20 inches far, to some battering ram or siege tower?
That doesn't sound very intuitive.

EDIT: And it still bears the problem that there are armies with loads and loads of mortal wounds, while others have none except their wizards.
I still think that the approach with a save that works against wounds and mortal wounds is the best among the ones we have discussed yet.

You could make it that MW are only used if the model is attached to the siege weapon, the said weapon then gains the MW ability from the attached unit?

 

[pendrake]

MW and Rend [should] have no effect on structures. Those rules assume some squishy living or unliving thing is the target.

Also, against a stone wall [or any other structure] rolling to hit is beyond silly... A wall is an unmoving, unmissable target for a model standing next to it.

 

[Aginor]

MW and Rend [should] have no effect on structures. Those rules assume some squishy living or unliving thing is the target.

Also, against a stone wall [or any other structure] rolling to hit is beyond silly... A wall is an unmoving, unmissable target for a model standing next to it.

Not sure I agree. Missing an unmoving target is entirely possible, as every archer knows. With my bow I seldom miss a boar sized target at 25m, but I have missed a huge (life-sized) plastic stag at 50m. More than one. In fact I missed it five times before I hit it for the first time.

What I mean is: The hit value represents the skill of someone operating their weapon and the inherently good or bad precision of said weapon.
I still get what you mean, but that's a kind of inaccuracy that is common to all simplified game systems.

EDIT: The wound value makes no sense either in AoS: It is only dependent on the weapon and not on any other circumstances, such as the target or range.

In D&D Such things are highly complex and much more accurate to real life, which is why D&D is a VERY bad rule set for mass battles. It would take ages.

 

[pendrake]

@topic: [.......] am thinking of units like Bloodletters. Why should they be able to stab those walls with their mortal wound swords just because some of them are building a conga line 20 inches far, to some battering ram or siege tower? That doesn't sound very intuitive.

Using their precious, mighty swords:
1) 20 Bloodletters hacking at a 12 foot tall hedge...

2) 20 Bloodletters hacking at a 12 foot thick stone wall...


This is intuitive:
Case 1 dice rolls determine how long it takes them to hack through.

Case 2 dice rolls determine the number of swords permanently ruined per combat phase.

If they hit is never in question.

 

[pendrake]

Not sure I agree. Missing an unmoving target is entirely possible, as every archer knows. With my bow I seldom miss a boar sized target at 25m, but I have missed a huge (life-sized) plastic stag at 50m. More than one. In fact I missed it five times before I hit it for the first time.

What I mean is: The hit value represents the skill of someone operating their weapon and the inherently good or bad precision of said weapon.
I still get what you mean, but that's a kind of inaccuracy that is common to all simplified game systems.

I don't know how to make these words larger. So repeating them:

"...for a model standing next to it..."


(bold makes them a little bigger)

 

[Aginor]

Don't get me wrong, you are absolutely right, but the goal of this thread is not to touch the core rules but provide a way to fight against buildings which is at least _somewhat_ in line with the complexity of the rest of the game.

I'd love to include such rules, but IMO it wouldn't be fun if the rules for attacking buildings were three times the size of all the other rules together.
AoS players are used to roll hit and wound and not question those.
Making melee weapons auto-hit on buildings would tip balance extremely toward units that have weapons with a bad hit and a good wound value, I don't see a good chance how to balance that well.

 

[Aginor]

But let's just roll on with the idea anyway since I do kinda like it: If melee weapons auto-hit against walls, but we don't want a (kinda silly as you were right to point out) mass approach with Bloodletters, we should take a look at others.

What about making walls completely undestructable for normal infantry? I don't see how Ardboyz with their axes or even Liberators with their hammers (although we could argue about those) could have a meaningful impact on a fortress wall.

 

[Crowsfoot]

Don't get me wrong, you are absolutely right, but the goal of this thread is not to touch the core rules but provide a way to fight against buildings which is at least _somewhat_ in line with the complexity of the rest of the game.

I'd love to include such rules, but IMO it wouldn't be fun if the rules for attacking buildings were three times the size of all the other rules together.
AoS players are used to roll hit and wound and not question those.
Making melee weapons auto-hit on buildings would tip balance extremely toward units that have weapons with a bad hit and a good wound value, I don't see a good chance how to balance that well.

All I can think off is walls etc are only damaged by siege weapons and magic, all melee attacks fail as @pendrake says a sword would just break.