You have to remember that this time around we actually play heroes, or would be wannabe ones at least, so the soldiers and merc's that players prtray are a little more than just your average grunt. Just heroes with humble backgrounds.
Adventurer's Toolkit - A First Look
It is a bit strange that they didn't make those advanced careers, since presently elves have no advanced careers at all. On the other hand, wood elves could still progress by going hunter to waywatcher, etc and continue developing how they like... Without the acolyte advanced career, the closest an apprentice wizard would be able to find would be maybe an Initiate with "Academic, basic" traits in common, and this would still require a complete deviation from his development path. Maybe they HAD to include things like Acolyte and Disciple as advanced careers, just to give priests and apprentices somewhere to go. Although priests have a few more options, since there are a few careers with the Religion keyword, unlike the Wizard keyword.
I suspect that's why we've seen advanced careers for the specialized classes (Acolyte, Giant Slayer, Disciple, for example) and not so much for the less quirky ones - who can just find a career with a similar focus to pursue.
UncleArkie said:
You have to remember that this time around we actually play heroes, or would be wannabe ones at least, so the soldiers and merc's that players prtray are a little more than just your average grunt. Just heroes with humble backgrounds.
Yeah, but still... the new mercenaries and soldiers might correspond to Veterans and Sergeants, rather than grunts, but that means they can still go towards captains and champions (and Thieves can go towards Master Thieves, Barber-Surgeons towards Physicians, Students towards Scholars, etc.). Waywatchers, Swordmasters and Wardancers are the best of the best, they can't go up any further, unless they introduce advancec careers that are basicly Waywatcher Champion, Swordmaster Champion, Wardancer Champion - which they might and I wouldn't complain.
They main problem, as I see it, is that if they're at some point going to include knights, they can't let them start as squires, so you start as full knight, which is gonna be REAL tricky.
Tricky how? Its a guy on a horse, there will be a few mounted combat cards in the box like trample, charge and sally forth and he will be a noble, no harder than playing say a pointy eared alien creature that sees humans as little more than very talented simians, kind og akin to us meeting a gorilla with farm and a sword, surprising yes, intresting mmhmmh at least until it goes all gorilla on us, useful ... Sometimes. Besides in your logic a captain who sits at a desk is better at combat than the grunt who spends his days in the mud and grit. Here we are talking raw potential, we are in farmboy wonder land here. As someone mentioned earlier we have to get out of the "advanced careers are better" mentality, beyond the priests and wizards casting better spells there is little difference between the basic and advanced careers, they offer the same amount of advances, they have access to the same skills and their career abilities are not superior. Besides 4 careers in a warrior type will have maxed out his weaponskill, then again 4 careers is something that will take a long time to get to, at a session every 2 weeks at average 2 xp a session, thats 10 months to a year of gaming and then some cus we will have a break or not be able to play for a while and so on.
I acceed your point about advanced carreers not necessarily being all that much better; I am not that up on the new system yet.
1) When I say captains, I mean captains like in the wargame, leading rom the front, like champions.
2) It feels odd for me for, say, a Waywatcher to go to Scout, since the wargame fluff specifically mentions Waywatchers as being elite scouts. And Wardancers and Swordmasters going to, say, Soldier or Mercenary feels to me like a step down. So they have nowhere to go. Waywatcher, Swordmaster and Wardancer seems like a goal to me, not a starting point.
3) A knight is a guy on a horse. So he needs a horse... and at least chain mail, preferably plate... and a lance (or cavalry hammer)... and a shield... and a hand weapon. Which means that if they do knights as basic careers, their special career ability would be that they start with vastly superior equipment or that they start with really good equipment and then they're forced by their carreer to spend a lot of points on Wealth.
But wasn't the whole point of warhammer, one of the charms of the original system not that not everyone was created equeal, squires and nobles started the game with wastly superior equipment than the rest, the apprentice wizard was weak(ish) but turned into a monster, the ratcatcher got a small dog and not much else and the our friend the student had some books that more often than not ended up fuling some fire somewhere in the wilderness.
I'm just gonna flog a dead horse of mine... What is up with this whole game balance obsession, it's an mmo thing, we don't have to have all members of the group fare equally in combat. Lets take the knight as an example, of course hes gonna kick some behind, so is the soldier while the student and barber surgeon just sorta concentrate on staying alive and out of the way of the combat guys, then later on in the town its time to research something important and then the student gets to shine, and later on its time to save the life of a noblemans daughter and the surgeon gets to shine.
As for the waywatcher, well what if he moves into say, wardancer or emmisarry or thief, scout is not his only option. Also don't take the career so literally, he was a waywatcher that became a better waywatcher, playwise his fellow elves probably wont throw him in with the grunts, he just furthered his abilities.
I'm own with it not being totally balanced, it's just that I play Warhammer because I love the world, the background, the fluff and to me it feels odd that a Wardancer would become a Glade Guard (Wood Elf version of a Soldier) or a Waywatcher become a Scout. I'd like it more of you started as Glade Guard or Scout and then advanced. It's kinda like starting as a Seal or Special Forces trooper and then you can become a standard marine or army grunt - it feels odd to me. And while it can be kinda cool to have an Emissary who's a former Waywatcher or Wardancer, what if they want to better themselves? By the system, this requires them to enter a career that's a step down, fluff-wise, from what they were before. A Waywatcher should already be better than a Scout at all things, since they're elite Scouts. But then again, this is my view, heavily influenced by the wargame fluff.
And yes, a Knight wil not outshine a Barber-Surgeon when it comes to saving the baron's daughter or a Student when it comes to solving the ancient riddle - but if a Knight starts with a horse, lance, heavy armor and shield, they're going to outshine a Soldier in the area that's the Soldier's forté; combat.
But it would be appropriate to the role that he is playing in the role-playing game... Ok that was a bad pun, sorry.
That said, I think you still missed my point, what I was trying to say is that a waywatcher taking the scout career as his next tier is not "downgreading" to a lesser career or moving on to being something other than a waywatcher he's still an elite scout, at this point hes just using the mechanics of the scout card to emulate that he is now bettering himself as a waywatcher.
UncleArkie said:
But wasn't the whole point of warhammer, one of the charms of the original system not that not everyone was created equeal, squires and nobles started the game with wastly superior equipment than the rest, the apprentice wizard was weak(ish) but turned into a monster, the ratcatcher got a small dog and not much else and the our friend the student had some books that more often than not ended up fuling some fire somewhere in the wilderness.
I'm just gonna flog a dead horse of mine... What is up with this whole game balance obsession, it's an mmo thing, we don't have to have all members of the group fare equally in combat. Lets take the knight as an example, of course hes gonna kick some behind, so is the soldier while the student and barber surgeon just sorta concentrate on staying alive and out of the way of the combat guys, then later on in the town its time to research something important and then the student gets to shine, and later on its time to save the life of a noblemans daughter and the surgeon gets to shine.
As for the waywatcher, well what if he moves into say, wardancer or emmisarry or thief, scout is not his only option. Also don't take the career so literally, he was a waywatcher that became a better waywatcher, playwise his fellow elves probably wont throw him in with the grunts, he just furthered his abilities.
UncleArkie said:
As for the waywatcher, well what if he moves into say, wardancer or emmisarry or thief, scout is not his only option. Also don't take the career so literally, he was a waywatcher that became a better waywatcher, playwise his fellow elves probably wont throw him in with the grunts, he just furthered his abilities.
Quite right, and not just that, the careers are generally abstract because you won't be performing your day to day tasks as a waywatcher, for example, but off on an adventure. Whatever reason your character took a sabbatical, the day job defines you less in the wider world; enjoy the freedom! Career hopping has always been a hot issue; I can remember the 'gamier' players wanting to jump between duellist ( for the toughness advances), judicial champion (for the WS advances), and so on so they could clean up and become The Ultimate Warrior tm. A variety of adventures later, those kinds of players realise that their is more to life than another advance scheme!
UncleArkie said:
But it would be appropriate to the role that he is playing in the role-playing game... Ok that was a bad pun, sorry.
That said, I think you still missed my point, what I was trying to say is that a waywatcher taking the scout career as his next tier is not "downgreading" to a lesser career or moving on to being something other than a waywatcher he's still an elite scout, at this point hes just using the mechanics of the scout card to emulate that he is now bettering himself as a waywatcher.
Yes, but according to the fluff, a Waywatcher has already gone through being a Scout and can do everything a Scout can do, only better - it's like a Seal or Special Forces bettering himself by dropping out of the special forces and re-enlisting as an ordinary infantryman.
Perhaps FFG will release improved versions of the Weywatcher, Swordmaster, etc. in later expansions. In the meantime, you have to balance the career system with the fact that the characters are not actively working in their careers, they are adventurers. A Weywatcher that leaves his Wood Elf community can't become a more elite Weywatcher without returning to his people. First, that may not even be possible depending on the reason he left in the first place. Second, it puts him out of action from an adventuring standpoint for some period of time. So while he remains out in the world, he may have to become the Scout of the Party once he's completed his Weywatcher career, because that is the role that is open to him given his current circumstances. Yes, it is perhaps not as prestigious a career in the eyes of other Wood Elves as his brother who stayed home and became a Glade Guard, but it is his way of bettering himself as best he can while continuing to adventure.
mac40k said:
Perhaps FFG will release improved versions of the Weywatcher, Swordmaster, etc. in later expansions. In the meantime, you have to balance the career system with the fact that the characters are not actively working in their careers, they are adventurers. A Weywatcher that leaves his Wood Elf community can't become a more elite Weywatcher without returning to his people. First, that may not even be possible depending on the reason he left in the first place. Second, it puts him out of action from an adventuring standpoint for some period of time. So while he remains out in the world, he may have to become the Scout of the Party once he's completed his Weywatcher career, because that is the role that is open to him given his current circumstances. Yes, it is perhaps not as prestigious a career in the eyes of other Wood Elves as his brother who stayed home and became a Glade Guard, but it is his way of bettering himself as best he can while continuing to adventure.
Valid points, except that, by the fluff, a Waywatcher has already been a Scout and has now advanced to something better.
JacobKlunder said:
mac40k said:
Perhaps FFG will release improved versions of the Weywatcher, Swordmaster, etc. in later expansions. In the meantime, you have to balance the career system with the fact that the characters are not actively working in their careers, they are adventurers. A Weywatcher that leaves his Wood Elf community can't become a more elite Weywatcher without returning to his people. First, that may not even be possible depending on the reason he left in the first place. Second, it puts him out of action from an adventuring standpoint for some period of time. So while he remains out in the world, he may have to become the Scout of the Party once he's completed his Weywatcher career, because that is the role that is open to him given his current circumstances. Yes, it is perhaps not as prestigious a career in the eyes of other Wood Elves as his brother who stayed home and became a Glade Guard, but it is his way of bettering himself as best he can while continuing to adventure.
Valid points, except that, by the fluff, a Waywatcher has already been a Scout and has now advanced to something better.
Seems like your refusing to get our point here, taking the scout career does not necessarily make a waywatcher a scout, taking the scout career as an advance just represent that he is bettering the skills that he already learnt, there is no regression "back" to a being a scout, the two careers are almost identical anyway mechanically you could just look at it like the player taking the waywatcher career "again".
UncleArkie said:
JacobKlunder said:
mac40k said:
Perhaps FFG will release improved versions of the Weywatcher, Swordmaster, etc. in later expansions. In the meantime, you have to balance the career system with the fact that the characters are not actively working in their careers, they are adventurers. A Weywatcher that leaves his Wood Elf community can't become a more elite Weywatcher without returning to his people. First, that may not even be possible depending on the reason he left in the first place. Second, it puts him out of action from an adventuring standpoint for some period of time. So while he remains out in the world, he may have to become the Scout of the Party once he's completed his Weywatcher career, because that is the role that is open to him given his current circumstances. Yes, it is perhaps not as prestigious a career in the eyes of other Wood Elves as his brother who stayed home and became a Glade Guard, but it is his way of bettering himself as best he can while continuing to adventure.
Valid points, except that, by the fluff, a Waywatcher has already been a Scout and has now advanced to something better.
Seems like your refusing to get our point here, taking the scout career does not necessarily make a waywatcher a scout, taking the scout career as an advance just represent that he is bettering the skills that he already learnt, there is no regression "back" to a being a scout, the two careers are almost identical anyway mechanically you could just look at it like the player taking the waywatcher career "again".
Ahhh, okay, that I can live with.
Now I just want more advanced careers for all races. *G*
In the Wood Elf Army book both Waywatchers and Wardancers have advanced careers, Shadow Sentinel and Bladesinger. I believe that Swordmasters are able to become Blademasters.
So it is possible that a future expansion will cover these, or if not we'll make advanced careers ourselves
Quick question, is there a character keeper/character box in the toolkit? Just like the three in the core set to store cards and other components.
I believe someone said the box IS the character keeper box, or at least it's the same size as the ones included in the set and the empty space is filled with cardboard for shipping. Not having the Toolkit yet, I can't say.
Vaeron said:
I believe someone said the box IS the character keeper box, or at least it's the same size as the ones included in the set and the empty space is filled with cardboard for shipping. Not having the Toolkit yet, I can't say.
That is indeed correct good sir. Also, geif keeper box's.
The box is actually quite a bit larger than the standard Hero Keepers. I'm actually using it for all of the chits, dice and all that. I found a plastic sorting tray (for beads or something) that fits in PERFECTLY. Sweeeeeeet.