Kings of War

[Red_SPAMbot]

At the start of the year, a friend of mine roped me into a new tabletop miniatures wargame. Knowing what horrible moneypits those things can be, I agreed to participate under the condition that I could build my armies out of LEGO. (Because minifig collecting isn't a money devouring rabbit hole at all... )

The game is Kings of War by British publisher Mantic Games. The game has expanded recently to ensnare the disenfranchised players caused by GW's move from Warhammer Fantasy to Age of Sigmar. It is a mass combat game where fantasy armies collide with all their sharp pointy metal bits and the occasional monster thrown in for good measure.

I quickly chose undead as my army's theme, for no other strategic reason other than I figured I could buy skeletons the cheapest. Over the next few months I scrounged Bricklink for convenient deals on armor and skeletal horses. My deadline was the end of July, when the local wargaming club would hold its annual grand tournament.

















Overall, Kings of War seems like a pretty good game. It plays pretty fast for a game about mass army combat. In fact it plays a lot like a skirmish game, in that it treats formations basically as large figures themselves. The fluff is a bit generic, but that can be expected somewhat since the game is meant to be very collector friendly. You can bring in different makes and brands of figures, and use "dynamic basing" to field little dioramas.

That feature was what allowed me to field a tournament legal force built from LEGO. Now, to those unfamiliar with the painting and modding miniatures wargame crowd, it was quite possible that my army could have been met with a collective "HOW DARE YOU!" I was ready to enjoy it either way. However, most people seemed to get a kick out out of my figs.

This was my first KoW tourney though, and my greenness showed. Most of my battles were very one sided, with me taking the stomping. I attribute this largely to the fact that when assembling my army, I was focusing more on gathering enough units rather than strategically spending my points to put together the most efficient force I could. Nevertheless I still walked away with the Rookie of the Year trophy, so there's that. Plus the tournament was held in a beer hall, and the steins were kept full all weekend, so you can't beat that.

We now return you to your irregularly scheduled BrikWars.

[lordintype]

Good on you for getting Rookie of the Year! I've got a lot of WHFB miniatures and might check the game out.

[Zupponn]

Mantic has always had some pretty nice models at a far lower price than GW will ever ask. I've heard their games are pretty fun too.

The biggest thing is that it's nice to see wargamers that are just out to have a good time and aren't all shitty about the Lego army.

[Steel_Valkyrie]

In my experience, wargamers for stuff like that fit into the same categories as MTG players. Those who will use every loophole they can find to win and spend as much as they have to crush their opponents and gloat about it, and those who play for shits and giggles as well as fun, and sometimes ignore tourney rules. My experiences with my badly-painted watchmaker fantasy high elf army were not good. Now, I just use them as D&D miniatures.

[Zupponn]

Hmm... I don't know if the comparisons to MTG matches up. Generally I hear about WH and its players saying "You can't do that", but in my experiences with MTG I see more "You can do that? That's awesome!" I know that there can be some real dicks in the MTG scene, but that's usually when you get to more competitive levels where you should expect it a bit.

[Steel_Valkyrie]

Nah, we have a small community at my school, and some of them are real dicks. No one would play against them, and so they would bitch about being 'Unincluded." no one really cared.