Frostgrave, Halo Ground Command and other tabletop minis

[TREX]

Looking very good. I ve been building so much the last few days I had to stop building terrain. Then I caught myself making a whole warband worth of figures out of heroclix and greenstuff. I am going to get to finish my first game and then do the mausoleum scenario tomorrow. I really do dig your setup @Hahma

[TREX]

Ok guys. So me and my one brother got to finish our first game of frostgrave. It was a standard game with no special rules. It ended with both our wizards and apprentices plus a good 8 of our guys knocked out. I first got 2 treasures off board. I knocked out his apprentice early along with his thief. We had a fairly decent battle with 2 of each of our thugs with him killing both of mine. He then killed another thug of mine that was contesting the treasure up on a rampart of one of the castles. He also knocked outmy apprentice with his wizard. I then tried to kill his wizard with mine. Failing but following up with a deathblow from one of my archers. His archers finished off my wizard and then my archers took down both his archers. The game finished when his treasure hunter made it off the board leaving the last one to me. We ended with 3 treasures each. I rolled well getting 450 gold and 2 grimoires of spells i already knew. I sold both of them and took home 950 gold. My brother got 2 scrolls and a magic item along with 140 gold. He ended up selling all of it for 500 gold. 640 gold total. I only lost one thug. His thief has to sit out one game. We both opted to get an inn. We both also bought a kennel and carrier pigeons for our base. I was able to level 2 times. I enhanced my leap spell and added 1 to my fight stat. We are playing the mausoleum next. I was also able to make a bunch of cool figure mods for the game. Pics to come.

[Hahma]

Sounds like a very bloody game there TREX, and you got a lot of money

We haven't had more than one or two warband member knocked out per side in a game, and the last game with Chris was the first time an apprentice (his) was taken out. Though over 5 games, I have had some bad postgame rolls to permanently lose guys, so I am a little more cautious because while losing a 20GC thug or thief isn't so costly, losing 80 or 100GC guys eats up your money quick. Losing an apprentice or wizard would be worse yet.

We play with a lot of cover options, so you have a better chance of getting out of LoS of opponent range attacks or spells, or at least get better modifiers from intermittent terrain or standing against cover.

It gets more interesting when you have the random creatures show up after picking up a treasure. Sometimes you don't roll the 16+ in a game, and sometimes you roll it more than once. Having them come in at a random board edge also can make your strategy change.

The next game my daughter and I are going to play is the 1st of 3 scenarios in the Hunt for the Golem campaign in Frostgrave Folio. So this one we will set out 5 corpse markers each, following the normal treasure placement rules. When you get into contact with one, you search it and you roll on a chart and can either get 1 of the 6 treasures (replace corpse token with treasure), the corpse can be one of 2 zombies and engage you right away, it could be the one survivor that will join your warband if you can heal him, or it can be some notes on the Golem.

[TREX]

I forgot to mention why we had such a bloody battle. At first we weren't really sure of what tactics we should play, and since we are both adamant death match style players of other games we started to knock each other out. At about halftime of the game we realized that we weren't going to get any extra perks off of killing each others guys with our warband so I was getting ready to back out and play a little more tactfully instead of aggressively. After a few strokes of luck my brother started knocking out my other characters and once he knocked out my apprentice, it became apparent that to get the super high up treasure it would be easier to knock out the other guys rather than go up a 18.5 inch high tower. So the bloodshed commenced. Luckily only one of my thugs died and my brothers thief was knocked out for a game. I'll have to say that this game is a bit more rewarding after the game, and much more immersive than some of the other games once you establish a base and level up your wizard. Its just super fun.

[TREX]

We also use the cover system provided with the rules. At first I thought it would be kind of complex but its really easy to call the +1,+2, or +4 modifier for cover, and also count the +1 modifier to the defender if the shooter moved. We are going to try to plan for a four player game getting two more of my brothers into the game while our warbands are still fairly low in level.

[Hahma]

Yeah, now I recall that you asked about benefits of taking out opponent's warband members. Just the wizard gets XP'S for taking out a wizard or apprentice, until you start using captains who get xps for taking out enemies. But in the situation you had with the tower, it may help to eliminate some of the competition

The cover and intermediate terrain modifiers are pretty easy. The only rough part is sometimes getting a good view, depending on where the figures are, and when to give the benefit of the doubt sometimes. But I try to be as fair as possible when judging if something is between ranged attacker vs defender. Heck, that's why I like to put out so much terrain of various sizes.

Good idea to get the brothers in while you guys are still lower level.

I agree that there is so much neat stuff both during and after the games that make this game really shine. My daughter had 900+GC and part of her last postgame level up (to 7th level from 4th), was to spend 500GC on a Poison Dart spell grimoire and then learn it. Since she's a witch, there are no penalties for casting it. I can see that my Wall spell is going to be extra important now

[TREX]

We both leveled to level 3 on our first game. My brother ended up getting 370 xp and I ended up getting 300 xp. He got the extra boost due to his wizard taking out my apprentice. I actually successfully cast more spells. I made my leap spell easier to cast as one of my level ups. Then added +1 to my fight stat. I'm pretty stoked to be able to add a free warhound to my party from my kennel I bought. I also picked the INN so now I can have 11 guys in my warband. I also can get an animal companion and raise a zombie. I'm looking forward to our mausoleum play. I'll promise to get some pics out today or tomorrow. I'm working extra hours on top of my already busy schedule this week.

[Hahma]

Wow! You must have successfully cast like 15 spells. I think the most we end up with is 7 or 8. That must have been a super long game, like 8 rounds at minimum and being successful on every spell attempt except 1.

Ours only go 4 to 5 rounds at most and never get almost 100% success rate with spells.

[TREX]

Originally Posted by Hahma

Wow! You must have successfully cast like 15 spells. I think the most we end up with is 7 or 8. That must have been a super long game, like 8 rounds at minimum and being successful on every spell attempt except 1.

Ours only go 4 to 5 rounds at most and never get almost 100% success rate with spells.

We only really failed a couple spells each. The first half of the game we were shooting elemental bolts and such at each other, then I started using the leap spell and I think I was able to cast fleet feet once. The game lasted quite a long time from the high castles we had to go up to get the treasure off of. Our D20s were definitely on fire though. Judging from your surprise I'll have to double check to see if we miscalculated. I'm pretty sure we checked each thing that gave us xp off the list though. The next game should be much shorter as I removed the two huge castles off to see how it affects game play. I really thought it was awesome when I rolled for treasure. I rolled a 20 and a 19 to hit the gold jackpots with the grimoires and I just got lucky that I already knew the two spells I got so I could sell them.

[Hahma]

Well you get 50xp for each treasure you get off the board, so you should have gotten 150 xp's for that. The other 150 xp's had to come from successful casting of spells. You get 10 XP'S for each successful spell cast by your wizard and apprentice, so between them, you had to cast 15 successful spells. You can only cast 1 spell for each per round, so that's a max of 2 successful spells cast per round and thus a minimum of 8 rounds, but likely more since you lost your apprentice. So after the apprentice was knocked out of the game, you could get a max of 1 spell per round.

Then again, if your wizard took out some enemy soldiers, they are worth 40XP each. So that may be where the extra XP's came from, and not 15 spells cast.

It was shocking just because in 5 games, none of them came close to being that many rounds, even the last one where Chris and I combined 2 scenarios and the Ulterior Motives cards. The game still took a few hours, but it didn’t go very many rounds.

[Hahma]

@TREX

It was a good idea for you to choose the Inn and get a Kennel, that's what my daughter id. So she can have 12 warband members, as long as 1 of them is a warhound. The extra 2 is helpful in being able to cover more ground and use some guys to distract/occupy the opponent. I chose The Crypt to help my Raise Zombie spell have a better chance of working, so I can close the gap and have 11 warband members during a game. So if you have the Raise Zombie spell also, then you can have 13 warband members during a game if you succeed at that spell. Zombies are slow, so casting a Fleet Feet on them can help speed them up to normal guys. They can carry treasure, unlike animals, so that's helpful.

[TREX]

Im glad I looked it over again. I looked up how we messed up our points. The game did go long but our wizards were knocked out some 5 to 6 rounds in. We both got 150xp from treasure. He got 80 xp from my apprentice and 4 spells to put him at 270. I ended with 200. That lets both of us level twice. I just made the mistake of thinking wizards started at level 1 not 0.