Frostgrave, Halo Ground Command and other tabletop minis

[Hahma]

I only have the one neoprene mat and it's 4x4. Like you said, they are more manageable for 3+ player games. For 2 players, we adjust the treasure placement from board edge and warband starting points by 6 inches to accommodate the bigger area, so entry and exit points are still based on a 3x3 footprint.

My buddy Chris has several 4x4 and 4x6 mats, and likewise adjust as needed for games. I love the mats because they offer a neat backdrop so to speak and are easy to put out and store. They aren't cheap though, but I think it's worth having some. I may look for a jungle or swamp one at some point for more tropical setting games.

[LilNewbie]

The neoprene mats are awesome! I used to scour fabric and hobby stores for nice looking felt sheets to cut down to size (many, many years ago) but the neoprene mats are so much better and mostly accurate in size (the production process can cause a little less than perfect dimensions (1/2" off, etc.)) but they still work great! I have two futuristic 3x3s I found on sale at MM (they look like stone/concrete with a few hazard markings at the extremities) and two Tundra 3x3s from Frontline gaming that I got a great deal on during their prerelease sale. I just cover up the hazard markings with buildings/terrain and the stone/concrete looks perfect for freezing inner city fighting that occurs in FG.

Newb.

[Hahma]

I got my 4x4 snow and tundra mat from Frontline Gaming when they had that preorder special. Love it!

My buddy Chris got a bunch from https://www.gamemat.eu/us/ when they had a sale. They have a lot of neat terrain sets too.

[Tornado]

Do folks/figures actually go to all those cool looking places on the map?


Is the treasure hunt aspect the main reason for exploration?
Is there a high ground bonus for combat?

[TREX]

Originally Posted by Tornado

Do folks/figures actually go to all those cool looking places on the map?


Is the treasure hunt aspect the main reason for exploration?
Is there a high ground bonus for combat?

The main reason in frostgrave for a typical game is for gathering gold/treasure and xp. I far as I know there is no high ground bonus. There are modifiers on line of sight and for ganging up on a figure with multiple models.


The players control to an extent where the action takes place by where they put the treasure but some scenarios that have creatures and special rules will pull players to different places.

[TREX]

@Tornado, for people that have any kind of terrain or minis from heroscape or other games, I highly recommend just getting the starter manual for 16-20 bucks. This game is really quite fun and immersive.


EDIT: I myself have picked up every expansion manual except the latest alterior motives set just because I haven't got to it yet. I also plan on picking up their next game with the same type rules.

[Tornado]

I already have my own system.

Always looking for inspiration though. My system currently does not have a high ground bonus either.

I have not tried a capture the flag or retrieve the treasure scenario yet but that is high on my list.

[TREX]

Originally Posted by Tornado

I already have my own system.

Always looking for inspiration though. My system currently does not have a high ground bonus either.

I have not tried a capture the flag or retrieve the treasure scenario yet but that is high on my list.

What do you mean? Designing a game of your own? Sounds fun.

[Tornado]

Originally an RPG my friend and I created almost 20 years ago but I converted it to miniature play a couple years ago. We have been running it at Gen Con the last few years with last year being the first miniature style event.

This year was supposed to be King of the Hill but it looks like I will have to cancel the event as no one else is attending this year it is too much to run by myself and we have stopped playtesting it so it is really not quite GC ready.

I was considering running the ship to ship battle we did last year but even that is tough to run solo. Real bummer to bail out on GC 50 but both my friends had stuff come up and had to back out.

The system is called Heroes or Dead.

[Hahma]

Originally Posted by Tornado

Do folks/figures actually go to all those cool looking places on the map?


Is the treasure hunt aspect the main reason for exploration?
Is there a high ground bonus for combat?

Yeah, for the most part, they can go to all those places. When you deploy your warband, you can put them anywhere up to 6 inches from your board edge when using 3x3 surface, but within when playing on a 4x4 surface, you can put them between 6 and 12 inches from your board edge to adjust for the size difference.

So in my last game with Morgan, the black and white tile floor ruins was just close enough to the edge for me to put my Crossbowman there at the start of the game, and my buddy Chris did a similar thing in our last game. So there didn't need to be a ladder for them to get up there, as it could be assumed that they climbed. When my Crossbowman jumped down near the end of the game because of an agreement I made with my daughter to have me get all my soldiers off first, he took 5 damage of his 10 starting, because the height was 3 1/2 inches and you take 1.5 x height in damage when falling from 3 inches or more.

Now as for benefits from height, no there isn't anything like with Heroscape. The main benefit from height with a ranged soldier is having better LoS and be more of a threat. Ideal tables in Frostgrave should have a lot of LoS blockers and pieces that can offer different levels of cover. A figure defending against a ranged attack gets modifiers to their d20 defense roll for each piece of intermittent terrain that partially obscures the defender, as well as any piece of terrain that they are in base contact with. So if a ranged soldier has height, they will likely have less intermittent terrain potential to defending units. For example, my Crossbowman killed Morgan's Ranger that got a treasure at the top of the stairs on her side of the board. He was only partially blocked by the crate up there, so she only got a +1 to her roll to avoid getting hit. She already had a +4 because it was her ranger, for a total of +5. I had a +2 for my Crossbowman for his shoot. I rolled 18 to have a 20 total to her 17 total I believe. I won the roll and then you take the winning number of 20 and subtract the target's armor to get a month of damage. Then the crossbow does +2 damage. So the total damage was just enough to take out her Ranger. I later sent my man at arms (guy with red shield) up those stairs to grab that treasure.

Also, with regards to using various places of the map. Before the game, for most games, each player will place 3 treasure tokens, though in the last case it was 5 corpses each. You must place them at least 9 inches from your board edge with a 3x3 surface, or 15 inches on a 4x4 surface. Then, each treasure/corpse must be at least 6 inches from another treasure/corpse. So by the nature of the setup, treasure will be all over the place, and when you have different board setups, it makes for more variety. Also, you place the treasures before knowing which side of the board you will be entering from, so you can't game it to make it easier for yourself because after treasure is placed, you roll to see who gets to choose their entry side, of the 2 predetermined opposing sides.

The treasure hunting is the main point for exploring. You get 50 xp's for each treasure you take off the board, as well as getting some neat magical items or gold from each treasure. You want xp's for being able to level up your wizard and getting those benefits, but also gold to buy things and hire better soldiers, and magical items are mostly helpful and fun, but they can also be sold if you want more gold.

But there are other situations where a scenario will have other things that will add more to the exploration. There is one with a fountain that is in the center of the board and you get 100xp's if your wizard gets into base contact with it and spends an action to drink from it. Gives you incentive to go there, but it also pits him or her in danger. Also, of the wizard falls in or is pushed in the fountain, they are knocked out of the game and could end up dead or permanently wounded if you roll bad after the game.

There is also the one with teleporting discs that has treasure and when ending a figure's move on one, they may be teleported to one of the other 3 discs and possibly dangerously close to an enemy. Also, if your wizard gets teleported to another disc, they get 50xp.

There one where treasures aren't placed, but there are 6 columns on the board. You have to attack and defeat a column and it turns into a treasure.

Also, each time you pick up a treasure, you roll a d20 and on a roll of 16+, there will be a random monster/creature that will come out on a random board edge. Depending on what that creature is and where it comes out, that may change how a player plays and where they move to.

Then in the 2nd scenario for this little campaign I'm playing with my daughter, I believe there is incentive for you to get your wizard to interact with the granite golem.

Then of course there are a lot of other scenarios, and the Ulterior Motives cards set that change things up and add a lot of variety.

Sorry for the long answer, but there is a lot of neat things about this game that I'm happy to talk about.

[Tornado]

That is cool.

I like reading all the mechanical aspects of game play.
I steal all the best mechanics for myself.

[Hahma]

I remember you mentioning this game of yours Tornado. Sounds neat. Is your system similar to Frostgrave, where it's just a rules set and scenarios?