For some, a big draw are really nice miniatures. I'm OK with less detailed miniatures because it makes them cheaper and easier to paint. I'm all about a fun gameplay experience.

I'm not gonna repeat info that you can read elsewhere but I'm gonna add some thoughts...

1) Fog of War - with the double dials, FFG has mastered this for a tabletop experience.

2) The game is a blend of the FFG SW Trilogy. Objectives and strategic experience (Armada), tactical (XWing - you can get "stuck in" by Round 2), and surges (Imperial Assault). I definitely think full games can go 1.5hrs and I think scaling down can make for fun 1 hr games.

3) Initiative (e.g., Pilot Skill) on your dials gives you a lot of options. Planning is what takes the time up and executing is the fun part.

4) I wonder what the Objectives will be and what terrain will do. With 8 Rounds, I'm guessing 2 Rounds will be used for moving around obstacles.

Oh, everyone that demo'd it, loved it as well... our wallets cried collectively.

1) Fog of War - with the double dials, FFG has mastered this for a tabletop experience.

I don't get this one.

I know Fog of War from RTS video games in which you have literally fog on the map everywhere your units do not have LOS to and I haven't seen this in Runewars or any other miniature war game I know. And if you're talking having to guess what the enemy is going to do well that's something you have to do in many games, yes it multiplies your actions but depending on where your unit is, what surround it and the situation of the game your playing in general not all of them are viable and your enemie knows that too.

So a standard game is 8 rounds of play ?

@Ice... if you compare to 40K, there is no fog of war. I guess this is mitigated by alternate activation tabletop games. But I like how you have to "lock" in what you are doing. LOL - I'm not a game designer or dictionary maker so YMMV with my terminology.

@Toq... yes, I believe games are 8 Rounds. At first, I was like... how can this be shorter than Armada. But Armada, you are always measuring ranges and trying to figure out movement with the ruler. In RW, it's a lot simpler... just decide who to shoot or execute your move (either left or right if not straight). It's pretty fast.

@Ice... if you compare to 40K, there is no fog of war. I guess this is mitigated by alternate activation tabletop games. But I like how you have to "lock" in what you are doing. LOL - I'm not a game designer or dictionary maker so YMMV with my terminology.

Still don't get where Runewars has Fog of War, maybe i'm dumb today.

If you mean you have to decide what to to before the round/actual playing begins, well i wouldn't call that Fog of War, you just have to better at guessing what the enemy is going to do than reacting to him and as said that is something many games have. in 40K you can react to your opponents turn sure, but planning ahead and thinking where best to put your units to screw with the enemy is also important.

I'm not so sure planning before moving needs that more thinking/tactics because i woudl say most of the time your unist and the enemy units don't have that many possibilities for a good move.

@Ice... if you compare to 40K, there is no fog of war. I guess this is mitigated by alternate activation tabletop games. But I like how you have to "lock" in what you are doing. LOL - I'm not a game designer or dictionary maker so YMMV with my terminology.

@Toq... yes, I believe games are 8 Rounds. At first, I was like... how can this be shorter than Armada. But Armada, you are always measuring ranges and trying to figure out movement with the ruler. In RW, it's a lot simpler... just decide who to shoot or execute your move (either left or right if not straight). It's pretty fast.

Pretty sure that is more rounds than Armada actually. But sounds awesome. I'm particularly excited to see the objectives move over from Armada. That is one of my favorite aspects of that game and one I really think X-wing would benefit from. Are you able to get some pics of the unit cards by any chance ?

@Toq... The cards have been spoiled in another thread. I didn't see anything new else I'd share for sure.

@Ice... if you compare to 40K, there is no fog of war. I guess this is mitigated by alternate activation tabletop games. But I like how you have to "lock" in what you are doing. LOL - I'm not a game designer or dictionary maker so YMMV with my terminology.

Still don't get where Runewars has Fog of War, maybe i'm dumb today.

If you mean you have to decide what to to before the round/actual playing begins, well i wouldn't call that Fog of War, you just have to better at guessing what the enemy is going to do than reacting to him and as said that is something many games have. in 40K you can react to your opponents turn sure, but planning ahead and thinking where best to put your units to screw with the enemy is also important.

I'm not so sure planning before moving needs that more thinking/tactics because i woudl say most of the time your unist and the enemy units don't have that many possibilities for a good move.

"Fog of war" is used differently in board games than in table-top games. For example, the whole command and colors systems upon which BattleLore is based was made to simulate the fog of war. In those games, you imagine that you are the commander of the army. Just because you want your troops to move to a particular area, the chaos of battle prevents your orders from getting where you want as quickly as you want. This is simulated by having only a small hand of commands you can issue. It represents the commands you are able to get through to your troops through the fog of war.

Now, to draw the similarity between RuneWars (not Runewars) and fog of battle. In RuneWars, both players choose all moves for all units at the same time. Now, you could imagine that this just means that some units are faster than others. But you could also say that by having some units move earlier, it represents that the units were not where you thought they were, thus simulating a fog of war.

See, in your video games, once the battle starts, your orders are executed immediately and you can react quickly to what units are doing once you know where they are. The trick, as you said, is that you don't know where they are until you are engaged. In board games, you can "see" where all the units are at the start of the game, but restrictions and inefficiencies in commanding your units (like the command dial initiative system) help simulate the uncertainty and fog of war.

@Bud... thanks for being more eloquent... Uncertainty = Fog of War

Oh, the added uncertainty... in X-Wing, Pilot Skill is a known. In RuneWars, certain orders are faster than others and certain troops are faster than others. For instance, charging cavalry will always beat charging infantry which will beat charging skeletons (from what I saw).

In X-Wing you know who moves next based on pilot skill.

The dual dial and initiative/delay does add a lot of guess work. This would create a "fog of war" effect.

@Ice... if you compare to 40K, there is no fog of war. I guess this is mitigated by alternate activation tabletop games. But I like how you have to "lock" in what you are doing. LOL - I'm not a game designer or dictionary maker so YMMV with my terminology.

Still don't get where Runewars has Fog of War, maybe i'm dumb today.

If you mean you have to decide what to to before the round/actual playing begins, well i wouldn't call that Fog of War, you just have to better at guessing what the enemy is going to do than reacting to him and as said that is something many games have. in 40K you can react to your opponents turn sure, but planning ahead and thinking where best to put your units to screw with the enemy is also important.

I'm not so sure planning before moving needs that more thinking/tactics because i woudl say most of the time your unist and the enemy units don't have that many possibilities for a good move.

"Fog of war" is used differently in board games than in table-top games. For example, the whole command and colors systems upon which BattleLore is based was made to simulate the fog of war. In those games, you imagine that you are the commander of the army. Just because you want your troops to move to a particular area, the chaos of battle prevents your orders from getting where you want as quickly as you want. This is simulated by having only a small hand of commands you can issue. It represents the commands you are able to get through to your troops through the fog of war.

Now, to draw the similarity between RuneWars (not Runewars) and fog of battle. In RuneWars, both players choose all moves for all units at the same time. Now, you could imagine that this just means that some units are faster than others. But you could also say that by having some units move earlier, it represents that the units were not where you thought they were, thus simulating a fog of war.

See, in your video games, once the battle starts, your orders are executed immediately and you can react quickly to what units are doing once you know where they are. The trick, as you said, is that you don't know where they are until you are engaged. In board games, you can "see" where all the units are at the start of the game, but restrictions and inefficiencies in commanding your units (like the command dial initiative system) help simulate the uncertainty and fog of war.

Thanks for the explanation, but i would say there's a big difference between Battlelore where units only do the things i have cards for and RuneWars where they do exactly what i want just coupled to a initiave system and after your explaining of Fog of War i would say Battlelore is more Fog of War personally but then we all have different opinions and that is ok.

I thin following your explanation Warmaster did it best from all the games i know, in Warmaster your general, heroes and wizards could give orders to units which where close to them and to succed you had to roll equal or less than the command value of your faction.

EDIT: And about the guess work, well i think after some time you know the most important actions + initiatives of your enemies more so if you also play that faction too. And guess work is nothing new to miniature wargaming or gaming in general so for me it's nothing that new.

@Toq... The cards have been spoiled in another thread. I didn't see anything new else I'd share for sure.

Yeah there's some cards we haven't seen both sides of I believe.

@Ice... if you compare to 40K, there is no fog of war. I guess this is mitigated by alternate activation tabletop games. But I like how you have to "lock" in what you are doing. LOL - I'm not a game designer or dictionary maker so YMMV with my terminology.

@Toq... yes, I believe games are 8 Rounds. At first, I was like... how can this be shorter than Armada. But Armada, you are always measuring ranges and trying to figure out movement with the ruler. In RW, it's a lot simpler... just decide who to shoot or execute your move (either left or right if not straight). It's pretty fast.

Pretty sure that is more rounds than Armada actually. But sounds awesome. I'm particularly excited to see the objectives move over from Armada. That is one of my favorite aspects of that game and one I really think X-wing would benefit from. Are you able to get some pics of the unit cards by any chance ?

I think Ice means that, yes 8 rounds is more than the 6 of Armada, and yet the game length / gameplay is shorter.