Interested in Warmaster

[Lester]

Me and my brother (who enjoy the hobby mostly between us alone) have recently shown interest in 10mm scale wargames. Liking Fantasy in general more than Sci-Fi or Historicals, we are considering Warmaster.

A few questions to those well versed on the game:
1. Is GW and eBay / Bater Town / etc. the only places to get Warmaster?
2. What is the average point size you play?
3. At MSRP (USD), what is the average cost of an Army at said point range?
4. How good or bad is the ruleset?
5. We also are considering how viable would be getting the Battle of the Five Armies boxed set and use it as their Warmaster equivalents (all those minis plus a Citadel Hill and it's a standalone game to boot). Anyone considered it?

[Geep]

Hi Lester

Let's see how I go-
1. Is GW and eBay / Bater Town / etc. the only places to get Warmaster?
Yes, in my experience. And from those three I almost never buy direct from GW (but then I'm in Australia, I'm not sure how badly GW screws over your prices).

2. What is the average point size you play?
From what I've seen the usual is 2000-3000pts. I think the game needs a minimum of 1000 (unless you use alternative rulesets like 'Warmaster Skirmish'), but can handle games of massive sizes (and bigger games tend to show off the game's tactics more).

3. At MSRP, what is the average cost of an Army at said point range?
Very much depends on the army. Empire, High Elves, Undead (Khemri) and Orcs and Goblins can all be found fairly cheaply on eBay. Dwarves and Chaos are also fairly common (and overall probably the cheapest armies as all units are expensive in points). Once you get into the extended army lists things can get pricey- Skaven need a lot of units and units for these armies come up less often on eBay. If you like the look of Kislev be prepared to sell your brother on the streets.

4. How good or bad is the ruleset?
I think it's quite solid. It tends to work better at higher point values and some people like to use the rules from Warmaster Historicals games (essentially a Warmaster update just without the magic).

5. We also are considering how viable would be getting the Battle of the Five Armies boxed set and use it as their Warmaster equivalents (all those minis plus a Citadel Hill and it's a standalone game to boot). Anyone considered it?
The BoFA box is great value and you are definitely not the first to use it. The rules in the box are the Warmaster rules (mostly), so it's a great way to get into the game and see if it's for you. You'll be able to find blogs on this site of people making Warmaster armies from the BoFA miniatures. The only real downside here is that the BoFA miniatures look distinctly different from the usual WM units of the same type, so it may get confusing if you mix and match in the one army. Also, the extended miniature range for BoFA (elven cavalry, Smaug, Hill Trolls and a few other things) can sell for a small fortune.

Finally, I suggest you check out this site, much more active in all things Warmaster:

http://www.tacticalwargames.net/sg/forum/index.php

[Spectrar Ghost]

Me and my brother (who enjoy the hobby mostly between us alone) have recently shown interest in 10mm scale wargames. Liking Fantasy in general more than Sci-Fi or Historicals, we are considering Warmaster.

A few questions to those well versed on the game:
1. Is GW and eBay / Bater Town / etc. the only places to get Warmaster?

There are a few alternative ranges (Kallistra, Pendraken) but nothing of the same quality as GW, IMO.

2. What is the average point size you play?

2k is the standard, though the game is designed for 2-5k.

3. At MSRP, what is the average cost of an Army at said point range?

Varies. Low model Count armies like chaos will run you in the $200 range new, high model count armies like Undead will run you $400 new. Some armies are easy to find on ebay, like Undead, High Elves, and Empire, some are rare in ebay, like Skaven and Araby.

4. How good or bad is the ruleset?

Amazing. It's a command based ruleset, i.e. the model rules are less detailed in order to concentrate on tactics more, but it's easy to learn, tactically complex, and runs smoothly.

5. We also are considering how viable would be getting the Battle of the Five Armies boxed set and use it as their Warmaster equivalents (all those minis plus a Citadel Hill and it's a standalone game to boot). Anyone considered it?

I've a buddy who uses BoFA Wolves for his VCs, they are scaled correctly. The rules are basically the same, IIRC. I've never played, though.

You also may wish to look at some of the other Warmaster based rulesets, like Warmaster Ancients, Blitzkrieg Commander, Cold War Commander, Future War Commander, and others. WMA in particular is more or less Warmaster with some lessons learned, and no magic.

[Lester]

We are also considering just getting the Battle of the Five Armies (or two) to test the waters on the system. With the Hobbit coming out soon, it looks very appealing.