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
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. :)
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
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!
8)
Nothing to do with your query LGW......
But a very warm welcome to the forum. :)
Cheers - Phil
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!
Quote from: Leon on 17 April 2015, 09:02:31 AM
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!
8)
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
Quote from: Lord Greywolf on 17 April 2015, 09:42:10 AM
@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... ;D)..
But I don't think you'll find a friendlier and more knowledgeable bunch anywhere on the 'net'.
Cheers - Phil
Hello and welcome.
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 :D
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 :)
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.
Hi LGW and welcome to the forum!
Can you hear me all the way down there in NZ? ;D
Quote from: Lord Greywolf on 17 April 2015, 08:26:08 AM
My son who turns 7 in May really likes the Hill Dwarfs
Firstly, great to hear the young nipper's getting into gaming. :D 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.
Quotebut 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. :-\
QuoteI 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. ;D
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!
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!
D'oh, good idea Ithoriel! Play with smaller bases, need less figures :D
Those starter sized armies might get you a mighty mighty force!
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.
Welcome Lord Greywolf.
Like Ithoriel I play Warmaster ancients and have yet to take the plunge. But I must agree with him that smaller bases are the way to go.
Start with 50mm x 25mm with a quarter of the figures . Once your son is hooked and finances allow you can add more bases. if you wish you could then put 4 of your smaller bases together on thin card to make "normal" warband base.
Welcome from a fellow Kiwi
If you do go down the smaller bases less figures route and speak politely to the nice Mr Leon I'm pretty sure they will do part packs for the add ons ;)
Another economising thought, if you need to buy paint for this project look at the Vallejo paints, here http://www.pendraken.co.uk/Vallejo-Paints-c27/ (http://www.pendraken.co.uk/Vallejo-Paints-c27/)
They are significantly cheaper than you can get them in store in NZ, even allowing for postage
Hello LGW
On a further, further economising note, you could use the pdf version of the rules and the paper soldiers from Junior General (may the Dark Lord forgive me) until the readies are available for real armies. This way you can add in another father/son craft activity, settle on which armies you prefer and may even work out custom army lists:-
http://www.juniorgeneral.org/load.php?Period=11 (http://www.juniorgeneral.org/load.php?Period=11)
(http://www.juniorgeneral.org/donated/krein/orcs.png)
(http://www.juniorgeneral.org/donated/NonHistoricals/DirkTopdown/lizardmenferal.png)
Cheers
GrumpyOldMan
(Preview button still not working then....)
Elves too!
http://www.juniorgeneral.org/JClick.php?UID=260
And look, someone has done Leon The Dark Lord!
http://www.juniorgeneral.org/JClick.php?UID=11047
It looks like a subbuteo dragon
Hi Again
As a tip for small fingers and cutting out paper soldiers, print them out on inkjet Overhead transparencies (you don't have to cut them out then) and make sure any glue only goes under printed areas :) - and round off the corners. In some cases you'll have to work on the graphic to get the figures head to head instead of toe to toe for folding purposes.
The dragon is already set up for folding and the transparency cuts it down from a 30 min job to 5 min.
Also be aware that anything needing to be in white won't be printed :).
Cheers
GrumpyOldMan
thx for the responses guys really appreciate the help..
I really like the idea of smaller bases it would be a good start.
considering I have played DBA and DBA WWII [used pendraken WWII minis for that] but had to sell all of them when i shifted and had no gaming community to play with.
but now the kids are getting older its time to dive back in.
We play Star Trek Attack wing, Deadzone, Hordes, and Pulp-City Supremes. So we need some kind of small scale fantasy game and warmaster isn't cheap to buy into . i know i have looked into it. [Note: I played Warmaster back in the day i have a rather large Dwarf, Goblin and High elves armies]
This is a chance for me to play "Large" scale battles but in a small scale environment.
as for crafting together that's what Terrain is for we will be making 10mm scale hills, rivers, and forests.
now where would i got 50mmx25mm bases?
Cheers
LGW
If you're going for smaller bases, maybe 40x20mm would be better? You can then start small and upgrade to larger sabot 'movement tray' bases as you expand?
http://www.pendraken.co.uk/Warband-Fantasy-NEW-c36/Bases-Movement-Trays-sc321/ (http://www.pendraken.co.uk/Warband-Fantasy-NEW-c36/Bases-Movement-Trays-sc321/)
Quote from: Luddite on 18 April 2015, 09:25:44 AM
If you're going for smaller bases, maybe 40x20mm would be better? You can then start small and upgrade to larger sabot 'movement tray' bases as you expand?
http://www.pendraken.co.uk/Warband-Fantasy-NEW-c36/Bases-Movement-Trays-sc321/ (http://www.pendraken.co.uk/Warband-Fantasy-NEW-c36/Bases-Movement-Trays-sc321/)
who sells 40mmx20mm bases I like the idea of using the movement trays... this might work for me ...
LGW
Pendraken of course. :)
Have a look on the Pendraken index on left hand side of site and click 'MDF Bases'. ;)
I just bought some of the Pendraken 40x20 bases...There lovely :D
While small bases are good for minimising the number of figures involved. Beware that as Warband uses base widths as its means of measurement, that you might end up with a very fiddly game if you go with 4x2cm bases, where the exact positioning of stands starts to matter much more than it should.
If you go with 50x25mm then you can just put 4 together to get a 10x5 equilivant.
For all sizes of bases Pendaken can help you. I have no idea if there are any more local suppliers as shipping bits of MDF around the world sounds an expensive method!
Of course If I had known about Warband coming out when I ordered I might have ordered 100x50 bases instead
Did I gather you've still got the Warmaster armies you mentioned above?
You could go for just using those, either one base = one Warband unit, or two wide (on a piece of card for sabot!) = one unit...
Then get proper sabots or more lead as needed when you're happy it works :)
Quote from: toxicpixie on 18 April 2015, 10:50:36 AM
Did I gather you've still got the Warmaster armies you mentioned above?
You could go for just using those, either one base = one Warband unit, or two wide (on a piece of card for sabot!) = one unit...
Then get proper sabots or more lead as needed when you're happy it works :)
nah i had to sell off most of my games quite a few years ago when we moved from one of the cities to a small town and no gaming community.
will spend some time checking out the MDF bases
Cheers
LGW
Ah, that's a shame!
I'd suggest either 50mm bases so there's an easy trade up to "full size" bases in future (if you want/need to!), or 60mm by 30mm for a good size that doesn't take too many figures to look good, gives a bit of a less fiddly game for measurements, and can still be made nice & scenic and en mass without breakin the bank :)
Welcome from me Greywolf. :)
Like others have suggested, I'd be tempted to add some more bases to your order to "stretch" the units a bit. My Warmaster minis are based one strip to a base rather than two, for exactly the same reason.
How long is a piece of string?
Quote from: Leman on 20 April 2015, 02:16:04 PM
How long is a piece of string?
In my case...bloody infinite.
Some of them, some more of them...ooh, shiny! Some of them too!
Repeat until house is buried. :D
That's the spirit! :-bd
I on the other hand remain focussed on the task in ... Ooh! Squirrel!!
Speaking of shinny I showed my son the rest of the hill dwarfs and being an almost 7 year old he noticed the gyrocoptors.
So was wondering if I am to go the "spread out" format (eg 2x 50mmx25mm how many per base ? And then how packs of warriors packs would I need? (1 or 2)
As he really wants one of each pack would this be more expensive option?
LGW