Good threads regarding casual play?

[ekoxe1]

The stuff on the site is great, but a lot of is obviously geared towards playing "competitively" even though it seems like a lot of people play with their kids in a more casual setting, and thats definitely what i am mostly interested in (like 99%, only an academic interest in theoryscape type stuff), is there a good thread somewhere, or some old threads or links to stuff relating to that, I've seen the "themed army" thread but not much more, would love to hear more from people who play casually and perhaps make stuff up, proxy in things, pretend units are other units, the kinds of armies and maps and stuff they do, especially if they came to the game late and realised they couldnt (and shouldnt) lay out too much money on buying X copies of loads of units just to be able to build competitive armies of every type. Maybe people have cool ideas or variants which implement "singleton" only armies, or just whatever stuff would not fit in "competitive" Scape

[Tornado]

We used to use random armies quite often back when we still played classic.
There is a thread that has a bunch of random army lists.
I know my old ones for classic are there and some of my old C3G lists also I believe. Those are severely out dated.

[Marro_Warlord]

I build "Defend the Fortress" maps and the like. I really want to run a long-standing RPG-esque campaign, but I've got nobody to do it with. I would recommend something like that, or try creating your own scenarios. I once played a great 3-player Capture The Flag game with Glyphs of Brandar. I don't have much in the ways of Common Squads, and my only real competitive armies I can make are Stingers/Q9/Raelin, and 4th Mass + Knights. I would suggest drafting armies, as that could be pretty cool and fun. Sometimes, I do extremely large flat "Plains of Death" maps with 1000 or more points per side, you could try that out. I would also suggest looking at a few threads about role-playing games, @TheAverageFan did a nice one if I remember correctly. If you want to get even more casual, I would try mixing AotP with 'Scape.

[Grishnakh]

All my superhero cards and terrain is well suited towards casual play. I've always felt that there's an argument towards this concept of whether you see this game as a board game or a miniature combat game. Most of this site appears to be geared towards board game, thus competitive play. There are a few of us here that don't subscribe to that style and enjoy more of a creative style to our gaming. Creating scenario themed terrain, rules to throw objects, and elaborate story themed games is what keeps me involved in Heroscape. In other words, Heroscape is and can be much more than a board game. So there is material here. You just have to dig a little bit for it.

[wriggz]

The reason. you don't see a lot of formal discussion on non-competitive play is that it is hard to write about non competitive play.

The best examples are likey found in the official rule books. Both sotm and bftud master sets have Excellent scenario based play. You might want to start there.

Drafting or School yard pick is also lots of fun especially if you come in with a limited selection. You might find this is the most fun since the draft is as interesting as the game.

Finally just keep poking around the "other modification" section and you are bound to find something that tickets your fancy.

PS Don't knock the competitive article too much. Knowing how to use an army is as important in fun games as it is in competitive.

[Grishnakh]

You got me thinking. I wonder if anyone else on this site has ever played a non balanced game? In other words where one side has more points than the other on purpose. I've done this mainly to fit certain story driven scenarios. Playing an unbalanced game, especially when you're handicapped point wise, can definitely be both fun and challenging. I guess many might consider that idea fits mainly into the "casual" game style of play. But there's nothing that casual about it. I always try to win in situations such as this. Anyway, just some thoughts.

[TheAverageFan]

Originally Posted by Grishnakh

You got me thinking. I wonder if anyone else on this site has ever played a non balanced game? In other words where one side has more points than the other on purpose. I've done this mainly to fit certain story driven scenarios. Playing an unbalanced game, especially when you're handicapped point wise, can definitely be both fun and challenging.

Pretty much any scenario including the castle is highly unbalanced point-wise at my house. I've also done scenarios playing on height or some other good terrain advantage and fight infinite waves of enemies, just to see how many it takes to bring your army down.

I like experimenting in scenario and casual play. A lot of non-competitive units like the Shades and Deathstalkers fare much better in different game modes, so I like to mix it up a lot.

~TAF

[Porkins]

This map is really cool. A campaign style thing you can play with your kids:

The Sunken Crypt

[sword4hire]

I think it is misleading here that competitive = tournament grade.

As long as the armies are closely matched, games can be pretty competitive.

The coolest thing, to me, about Heroscape is that you can play however you want. All heroes? All squads? All melee? Pre-made? Draft? A combination? Thematic? Mixing genres? Go for it. All will work.

The point system fails in a few instances, but most of the time, if points add up and units have complementary units they are designed for with them, battles should be pretty fair.

We are currently doing a 'tournament' with a bunch of well-themed weak armies. We don't associate people to the armies. Whomever wants to play it at the time plays it. Usually, it is just my son and me. Some of them, like Master Woo and his horde of monks and Ninjas, are really bad. But it is still really fun to give the old college try. Plus we get to bust out the figures that usually just sit in their boxes. Most of the games are very competitive.

When my son was small (4-5), we would even play single hero vs hero sometimes, and that was fun.

[kolakoski]

Well met!

I wrote this a while back:

Spoiler Alert!

There's Nothing "Casual" About It

Spoiler Alert!

Posted June 13th, 2011 at 01:34 PM by kolakoski
Well met!

The Gang of Four (+1) convened again for another exciting, hard-fought, nail-biting multiplayer game on Friday night. According to common Community parlance, it was a "casual" game, as opposed to "competitive." As can be seen from the description of the game, and the commentary that follows, that is an egregious misnomer (http://www.heroscapers.com/community...ad.php?t=36616).

As much as I have enjoyed the tournament experience, and hope again to do so in the future, especially to meet and compete against new people, or people I will only see at tournaments, the actual play is dry as dust, as compared to what our Gang regularly experiences on a typical game day. I have posted recently (http://www.heroscapers.com/community...ad.php?t=36396), suggesting a format within the standard tournament 1-hour time restriction. Now, I am thinking that the time limit itself is the problem.

The last tournament I attended was a 6-hour affair, at which I went 4-1 (http://www.heroscapers.com/community/blog.php?b=1777), and is fairly representative, with 5 games being played. I propose to lower that number to 2, with 3-hour time limits. Here's how it would work.

Suppose there were 20 competitors. All would play a scenario (like A Swell Party! (http://www.heroscapers.com/community/blog.php?b=1572), four to a map, with a 3-hour time limit. The winners would play each other in a 3-hour playoff game (while everyone else would be placed on other maps for the rest of the places). If there were an odd number of players, the scenario/map should be such that it can handle 3 and/or 5 players (so, with 21 players, either one 5-player game or two 3-player games in the first round). This concept would also work very well for team play.

Nowadays, a 5-Round time limit seems to work.

I didn't respond to this post earlier because I thought the OP's situation (limited collection) and his disclaimer ("I've seen the "themed army" thread but not much more, would love to hear more from people who play casually and perhaps make stuff up, proxy in things, pretend units are other units, the kinds of armies and maps and stuff they do, especially if they came to the game late and realised they couldnt (and shouldnt) lay out too much money on buying X copies of loads of units just to be able to build competitive armies of every type.") ruled me out as a respondent, as the Gang is fortunate to have tons of both. However, I can't help feeling that some of our Map/Scenario ideas might be of use . . . Our thread: The New York City Gang Of Four.

[Lord-IVD]

Somewhere in here is a great post that might apply to you ..I don't know where it is but the thing is ( I am one of these types of players ) HeroScape IS WHAT YOU MAKE IT !! the core rules give you the ability to do just about anything with anything ..Proxi's to Customs is part of what keeps this game going..I believe most of the people still playing it are doing it their way with house rules and custom figures. HeroScape can be played like Chess or as complicated as D&D with ligit figures or paper cut outs and that includes Land.. Just have fun..If you look up my main thread I am trying to share my relaunch of HeroScape club. There will be customs and scenarios.

[ekoxe1]

I think some of you missed my point, or maybe I made it badly but basically I am with you Lord IVD, I'm not confused about this, I'm just asking to see where there might be more threads of others talking about it. Maybe its like the other guy said, its harder to write stuff about casual play? Seems weird to me, I love reading stuff on other sites about families making games up with their kids, posting photos and session reports, ways theyve made armies out of what they had. I'm not dissing "competitive" play or "tournament" play, its just that for me, right now, my kids are so young that it really is an utter waste of time to worry about army synergies and buying 5 squads of this or that to "do it right", they just like the cool looking minis stomping round the board, and slowly they are seeing how dice rolling works and how a game might come of it.

I was more just looking as to whether maybe I'd missed a whole stickied thread or group or sub forum or web page where other people post stuff like that. I've found a few on other sites, I just expected this site to have more, but it seems like the content here is more driven towards "non casual play".

No criticism was meant or implied! Nor am I struggling to work out how to enjoy the game, in many ways I've been thinking about and playing "Heroscape" in other forms all my life, havent we all made up d6 based minis on a grid games since we were kids? I know I have. This thread is not "help me I dont know what to do with the stuff I have", its more like "where is more stuff posted by moms and dads enjoying their 5 year old running round the house threatening you with Tor Kul Na"