Ran our first session last night and have a few questions re npcs.

As I understand it henchmen are divided into groups the same size as the players, with wounds equal to T*number in group. They gain a bonus fortune dice to hits equal to the number of them in the group.

I'm running a very small game with two players. One is playing a pit fighter (str5, greataxe wielding combat monster who seems to deal and average of 14+ damage pre soak) and the other is playing a messenger (pretty balanced).

Last night I threw two packs of henchmen each of 2 mutants at them:

1. Is it correct that both packs share the same pool of A/C/E regardless of the numbers and the amount is what is liisted in the monster entry. This seems pretty weak.
2. The pitfighter dispatched his "pack" in one swing and even the messenger, who has little by way of combat manouvres, cut through them like they are paper. Is there something I am missing? It just seems waaaaay to easy to chew through henchmen (which i suppose is the point but takes away the gritty nature of combat and makes it more high fantasy???) . Should i be increasing the numbers of them or using them as individual combatants with their full wound quota?
3. I also understand that they all share the same pool of active defences (dodge parry etc) and special attack actions. Is this correct or is it each "pack" of henchmen has it's own pool of moves.
4. If not should i be removing one recharge token per pack?

I'm trying to keep combat as gritty as possible and its likely I have misunderstood something in the rules so any clarficiation would be appreciated. Failing that advice would also be welcomed.

Thanks in advance

Don

I think you are following the henchmen rules correctly but I think your use of them might be your problem. I do not think any fight should be all henchmen, they are meant to be mowed down. Instead take yourself two groups of 2 beastmen henchmen, a couple of ungors and a gor. Henchmen are there to add threat but not be the focus of combat. Maybe that is not a good example, think of the movies right, the heroes are cutting through enemies left and right and then they run into the hero of the other side and now the fight is on. The henchmen pose a threat but not to the same degree that other creatures do. They are there to make your players feel like bad-arses, but there should always be someone around to remind them there are other big boys in the pond.

My view is that the henchmen rules allow you to choose the style of your game. If you want a high-fantasy action movie style, use loads of henchmen and a handful of boss creatures. If you want it gritty, avoid henchmen.

• All creatures of a type, henchmen or otherwise, share the same special actions, and you remove a single recharge counter from each action per round, not per monster or group. I suspect the intention here was to cut down on the use of more complex special actions, but if that doesn't concern you it's easy to reduce the recharge values or remove one counter per monster/group.
• As written, all creatures receive all basic actions including active defences that they qualify for. Recharge rate is somewhat ambiguous, as it's not clear whether creature basic actions follow the same rules as special actions.
• It's not specified whether creatures receive one A/C/E pool each or per creature type, but most people seem to be playing it as one pool per type to match the special action recharge rule.

My personal preferences would be to avoid the henchmen rules except for swarms of small creatures, use a single A/C/E pool for all enemies in an encounter, cut down special action recharge rates for multiple creatures, and remove active defenses from most monsters but compensate by giving them an extra point of defense. Most of these changes are for resolution speed though - you may prefer to make your monsters more individual at a cost of more record-keeping.

And for Grittyness...

The Gotrex and Felix novels thats is probalby the fantasy warhammers flagship of novels is gritty and grimy, but they always cut fast through the totally nobodys, but have hard times with the leaders. High Fantasy and Dark Fantasy is not different on the heroic proportion of the protagonist, but how the world is portrayed.

Henchmen should be used mostly in the very big fights, when a sort of epic feel should happen - think Skaven Slayer, in the beginning of the book, Gotrek and Felix meets several foes, and non really easy, but in the grand battle at the end, they hack fast through nobodys to get to the big fight.