What's missing from Warmachine/Hordes - Part 2: Customization

[netdragon]

I've always thought that PP has a lot of potential using cards as customization tools. Here are two examples:

Warjacks

"Nemo, the Firefly is great, but what we asked for was a cheap Lancer without an Arc Node... can't we at least have our old Talons back?"
- Archduke Runewood

PP is already doing this with the Jack boxes, where you buy a chassis and are able to turn it into one of several configurations. It would be great to be able to have system cards, where you could pick your own chassis and customize its weapons.

PP already has something similar with Grind, which was very limited as a boxed stand-alone game, but proved it could be done.

Characters

"Really? Another Arcane Bolt drill?" [rolls eyes]
- Journeyman Warcaster Rhodes (before being expelled from the Academy)

Custom spell lists (complete or partial), custom abilities, custom weapons, mark-off effects (like Paymaster), the sky is the limit.

I know this could bring total chaos to the meta-game if done wrong, but it could be a very interesting route for future development.

[Dacian]

Just my humble opinion,

And refer to my sig if im way off, would that not be getting a bit close to what you can see in games like 40k, where characters/units etc are min maxed uber critters eggs and baskets as it were? I think full customisation has its place, and i believe that place is in the IKRPG. Though saying that and realising im in the homebrew forum, it wouldnt be a hard thing to come up with point costs etc to customise jacks or what have you. Eg
Chassis
L arm
R arm
Arch node
Special abilities
And assign each type a cost.

[Snipafist]

Just my humble opinion,

And refer to my sig if im way off, would that not be getting a bit close to what you can see in games like 40k, where characters/units etc are min maxed uber critters eggs and baskets as it were? I think full customisation has its place, and i believe that place is in the IKRPG. Though saying that and realising im in the homebrew forum, it wouldnt be a hard thing to come up with point costs etc to customise jacks or what have you. Eg
Chassis
L arm
R arm
Arch node
Special abilities
And assign each type a cost.

What Dacian said. If you want crazy all-out customization, go play Warhammer Fantasy or 40K. The unfortunate outcome of such customization is only one or two varieties sees any use and it's all min-maxed to hell. Less moving parts proves much easier to balance without a significant decrease in the fun of the game.

[netdragon]

Like I've said, I'm just showing what, IMHO, could be alternative development routes for WM/H instead of the actual "Big center piece" design we've been seeing with war engines and colossals (which I love, btw).

I'm not saying that I want "crazy all-out customization" (and I've already played WH and WH40K for years and I'm not coming back, thank you); I'm saying that some customization could be great. Also, I believe that this is not automatically a max/min situation where only one variation gets played, I do believe that given multiple relevant options, good players would benefit from the options customization would bring, and no only form the max/min. This route does indeed puts a lot of pressure to the design team, where they'll have to make measure how each possible combination affects the current metagame.

But, as my examples above, there are obvious choices that could be included. Small things like custom spell lists for Jr. and other magic-ability user characters, options to change fist-wielded weapons for warjacks, etc.

[terrashand]

See this is what character jacks should have been. You're allowed 1 custom jack/caster in a game. Im sure a decent point cost system could be thought of. Also, it would get players even more into the game and fluff. I see late coffee sessions discussing fluff and rules about "your" character jack.

One last note I'm not saying get rid of TH, Deathjack, Molik Karn, etc. Just saying that this option would be awesome to have. The character jacks in the game already could just represent interesting combinations for us to think about.

[Dacian]

That im not overly against, but when your talking about spell choice etc mebbe not.


The char jack idea is good, if it is limited to one model per battlegroup, etc.

Could have potential

2 cents