How Small can Warband be??

[Lord Greywolf]

My son who turns 7 in May really likes the Hill Dwarfs but after adding all of the goblin and Hill dwarf army packs, gyrocoptors, goblin gaint crossbows , tokens rule book and two dice packs it tops £91.25 [$177.44NZD] this is really out of my budget so what I am wanting to know what would be the bare bones set up to get me and the son into Warbands.

I played warmaster years ago and this looks like it will be a far better game for some father son bonding.

can any more experienced warband generals let me know how I could make this more affordable...

Cheers
LGW

[cbr3d.com]

The basic Army Pack at £27 each will give a basic 8 bases a side including command.  This is great to learn the basics of the game, then it would be a case of just adding any different units as and when wanted.

The Hill Dwarf Army Pack contains:

3 packs of Warriors, 1 pack each of Shooters, Noble Riders, Command, Wizards and Cannons with crews. PLUS, 8 x 100x50mm MDF bases.

The Goblin Army Pack contains:

3 packs of Warriors, 1 pack each of Archers, Wolf-Riders, Command, Shamans and Bolt Shooters with crews. PLUS, 8 x 100x50mm MDF bases.

What is missing from the Army Packs are:

Rules  (£16)
MDF Dice Frames and Dice (£1.20 x 2 = £2.40)
Hit Tokens (1 either £2.50 or £3.00 depending on whether you wanted circular or semi-circular)

This would bring the total to start to about £75.

(I am assuming you have dice to roll for moves, etc.)

Of course the 'Hit Tokens' and 'MDF Dice Frames and dice' are really optional, if you were to make your own card hit tokens then the basic set price would come down to £70.

Hope this helps, and I am sure both you and your son will love it.   

[Lord Greywolf]

thx for the reply Fig.ht

i also got it down to £70 as i found some small dice i could use as wound markers in my collection but the postage cost of almost £20 [$40NZD] pushed the order into the "No basket" rather then the Yes basket.

i guess the really crappy exchange rate pound to New Zealand Dollar also doesn't help... not paying Vat helps but only so much...

Will need to work this out...

LGW

[Leon]

As you say with you being in NZ, we can knock off the 20% VAT, so 2 x Army packs and 1 x Rules would come from £70 down to £58.33.  With the shipping of £14.58, it would be back up to £72.91 altogether, so around $145NZD.

I've just checked the shipping on our machine and the NZ postage is going to be around £14-16 the mark, so the website charge is almost spot on for the actual cost.  There's not much we can knock off that, as the army packs are already discounted by 10% plus there's the free bases in them as well.

Could you go for the pdf option rather than the printed copy?  The pdf is only £10 from Wargame Vault and that would also remove some of the shipping costs?

My brother-in-law lives in New Plymouth, so I'm used to the hassles of getting anything from the UK to NZ!

[Techno]

Nothing to do with your query LGW......
But a very warm welcome to the forum.
Cheers - Phil

[kyussinchains]

I know it's a cop-out but what about using some 100x50mm bases and printing pictures on them to start with? (Shields for infantry, lances for cavalry, bows for missile troops etc) That way you can learn the game and more importantly build up your forces at a pace time and the finances allow, as you complete a unit, swap it into the army....

I know a lot of people use tokens to try out warmaster armies before committing, just a suggestion!

[Lord Greywolf]

As you say with you being in NZ, we can knock off the 20% VAT, so 2 x Army packs and 1 x Rules would come from £70 down to £58.33.  With the shipping of £14.58, it would be back up to £72.91 altogether, so around $145NZD.

I've just checked the shipping on our machine and the NZ postage is going to be around £14-16 the mark, so the website charge is almost spot on for the actual cost.  There's not much we can knock off that, as the army packs are already discounted by 10% plus there's the free bases in them as well.

Could you go for the pdf option rather than the printed copy?  The pdf is only £10 from Wargame Vault and that would also remove some of the shipping costs?

My brother-in-law lives in New Plymouth, so I'm used to the hassles of getting anything from the UK to NZ!

didn't realize there was a pdf version of the rules that could work we both use a tablet for other rules we play so adding one ore wouldn't be a hassle at all.

ok i put in the two army packs into the shop
Warband Hill Dwarf Army   £22.50   
Warband Goblin Army   £22.50   
Sub Total: £45.00
Postage: £11.25
VAT: £0.00
Total: £56.25 [$109.72]

so what else would i need? [will buy the PDF version of the rule book]

@Techno thx for the welcome been a lurker on here for a bit now. Have purchased a few of the Pendraken WWII tanks and infantry in the past when i played WWII games. looking for some fantasy style game now as my son and I have a lot of Sci-fi games.

@kyussinchains i would normally do that but my son is at an age that "its ALL about the Minis" he loves seeing the tanks, supers, starships, on the table. it hurts my wallet alot but i am trying to get him into gaming so I can actually get some game time. Where I live there isn't any gaming clubs. Closes one is around an hours drive and only meet on a Monday night. then next closes is an hour and a half drive and most of those dorks play WHFB and WH40k which i abandoned a decade ago. so my kids are my opponents i do what makes them happy.

Cheers
LGW

[Techno]

@Techno thx for the welcome been a lurker on here for a bit now.  LGW

I often think that's the best thing to do !  
You'll have (hopefully) realised already, that there are a number of somewhat eccentric folk here (A phrase involving the words 'Pot, Kettle & Black' springs to mind at the moment... )..
But I don't think you'll find a friendlier and more knowledgeable bunch anywhere on the 'net'.

Cheers - Phil

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Hello and welcome.

[toxicpixie]

Welcome!

You could go with two starter armies, and maybe use printed proxies just for "extras" so you can try out the units before you buy them? That way you & your son only need to order what you want and what works for you, instead of being excited about something shiny then finding it's not what works in game for you

Also (and sorry if it dents Leons sales!), you can knock up some scratch builds for fantasy stuff quite nicely - a set of twigs and some lichen/clump foliage and modelling tweaking can make very effective treemen, for instance - possibly quite nice for a savage, nature elemental for Orcs. If the Dwarves summon or use earth elemental then artfully glued together piles of small rocks can look a bit "man like" as if some half formed rampaging stone creature. And any larger scale figures you might have or can get more locally can be painted up and based as giants or ogres. I can see a GW sized Orc coming up quite nicely in 10mm as a giant - I use some old GW Fomorians are such and they look good

[fred.]

Warband uses single unit bases. You can go fairly light with the number of figures on a base, and still having it looking good. This will stretch your army packs a bit further - this is particularly useful to get a couple more bases of core figures.

If you still have Warmaster figures they can be used - either with sabot bases - or with some rebasing if you really want.

With a Warband army you need a fair number of core units, but only a few of the optional ones. Its easy to get carried away with figures for lots of options, but then find you can't field them all.

[Chieftain]

Hi LGW and welcome to the forum!

Can you hear me all the way down there in NZ?   

My son who turns 7 in May really likes the Hill Dwarfs

Firstly, great to hear the young nipper's getting into gaming.     No doubt with your excellent fatherly guidance?

You will find Warband is perfectly suited to play by the younger chaps among us.  It's been written to be easy and intuitive to pick up so I suggest its a great choice of rules to start with.

but after adding all of the goblin and Hill dwarf army packs, gyrocoptors, goblin gaint crossbows , tokens rule book and two dice packs it tops £91.25 [$177.44NZD] this is really out of my budget so what I am wanting to know what would be the bare bones set up to get me and the son into Warbands.

...and we all have to game to our budgets of course.  As others, not least Leon himself, have pointed out, there are ways to maximise your investments on figures for Warband.  The base size will accommodate a mass of densely packed figures, but also will look great with a well placed diorama made up of fewer figures.  So this means you can build your forces based on your budget.  You could put a 30 pack of figures on one base, or spread them over two or even three bases and they'll still look good.  Don't forget the opportunity to pack things out with scenery too.   

I played warmaster years ago and this looks like it will be a far better game for some father son bonding.

There are many Warmaster players here, and a there's a lot of love for the rules still.  Pendraken also recently picked up the Warmaster-inspired 'Commander' set of rules so yeah.

I'm biased of course  , but I think Warband is a better game that Wamaster, especially for younger players.  Opinions will vary on that.   

Hopefully you and your son will find your Warband adventure an enjoyable one.  It would be great to see 'Lord Greywolf's Warband on a budget' as it develops!

[Ithoriel]

First up let me add to the chorus of "Welcome to the forum!"

Secondly, wanted to say I played my first game of Warband yesterday. We used Warmaster stands on 50mm x 25mm sabots (for which read blu-tacked to chunks of cardboard) and had no problems.

So, seems to me you could use 50mm x 25mm bases and a quarter the number of figures* and have a good looking and fun game. A sort of DBA Warband.

I'm sure we will have got some of the rules wrong somewhere but they are (as expected) good, solid, well-written rules and very playable.

Personally I prefer Warmaster but if I didn't already have the rules and figures for that I'd definitely be giving Warband a go.


*Don't tell Leon I suggested that .... Doh!

[toxicpixie]

D'oh, good idea Ithoriel! Play with smaller bases, need less figures

Those starter sized armies might get you a mighty mighty force!

[Bodvoc]

I use 6cm x 3cm bases with 12 infantry of 5 cavalry per base and then use 6cm as my rule of measure and it all works fine and less figures per base is cheaper.  I have played both WARMASTER and WARBAND and prefer Warband but each to their own.