So I've been poking around FFG's new miniature system, Runewars . I've been hankering after a more traditional wargame to go alongside the Starwars duet of X-wing and Armada for some time, and have flirted with Age of Sigmar, only to be put off by the things that have always put me off GW's games.

Runewars seems like a step up in complexity from X-wing in some ways, but it uses so many familiar mechanics that I'm sure I'd feel right at home. Dials. staggered activations. Maneuver templates. Upgrade cards... And, of course, wallet-dessicating expansion system.

So count me as very interested. But I must confess, I'm also a little wary of buying into this new system. The lore seems pretty generic to me (Shiny humans! Sneaky elves! Naughty undead!). And I'm also a little concerned that the maneuver mechanisms might not translate onto a battlefield. In X-Wing, maneuver into arc is the essence of the game, but in Runewars it looks like base-to-base contact is going to be the key to thwamping your enemies. That's a pretty tight window of success, going by my experience in X-Wing. Finally, there's the viability of getting into another system; I love painting miniatures, and I love collecting, but timewise, I'm sceptical about how much tabletime I'll get, especially with a starting-from-scratch playerbase.

So Are any other fellow pilots considering the new game? Anyone else filled withe an equal measure of intrigue and wariness?

Seriously considering it, but I suspect the unpainted nature of it will put me off enough to not pick it up. Plus not wanting the expense of another system on my conscience.

It does look really good though.

Definitely interested. Will probably pick up a core set but wait a bit on going in on lots of expansions until I know that the player base in my area will be big enough to justify it.

Yes, this is a game for people into painting. Otherwise, best stick to X-wing.

Judgeing from my (somehow limited but still) experience with WFB maneuvering such blocks of units using templates..hell its not gonna be easy. It were tricky back in WFB when you could rotate as many degrees as you liked, now with fixed angles...guess getting THAT charge gonna be as tricky and as interesting as getting THAT shot in Xwing.

I myself considered it before i got myself into Sigmar - now it has to win my heart on the demo as im happy to sell AoS, or at least buy a starter instead of another AoS army, if Runewars turns out to be the thing. Especially with yesterdays reveal of the elves.

One thing that buggers me (cause im pretty sure ruleswise it will be alright) are the miniatures. For now...they feel so generic. Humans? Generic as hell. Even the golem is most "humanly" miniature they could come with. Undead? Little less but still generic. Lord on a maggot is something fresh. Elves...hmm...they does not feel Latari im used to at all. More like savages from the woods.

Also they lore is the thing im confident they will do right - they got plenty of this since Runeterra is there since Runebound that has like...10 years now?

Try thinking of it the other way round. If you constantly bump in X-wing, getting a successful charge will be easy in this.

It looks to generic to me... also one plastic crack addiction is enough for me ;)!

If it was prepainted I would buy it in a heartbeat, alas...

so not interested!


I also briefly considered Armada but the unpainted (and low quality) of the small ships put me off. I never understood this with Armada....the features on the small ships are similar to some of the small details on the X-wing ships, also the quality is much higher on X-wing. Seems like a different manufacturer. Just take the Tie Punisher as an example and compare, it is like two different worlds. The large ships are pretty and very tempting however....

I really like the look of the mechanics, and I'm a fan of the "blocks of infantry" approach to wargames, but the models being unpainted is a major barrier for me. I've got enough unpainted 40k, Dreadball, Kings of War, and other miniatures in my house to be very hesitant about bringing more unpainted plastic in. I'm very curious to give it a try though.

Sciencius, just so you know, the squadrons in Armada can be brought up to a playable level ever so easy: prime them black, dry brush them with a light grey, you're done. If you can be bothered, a spot colour to make them pop.

I'm actually quite okay with them being unpainted, as I love that side of building an army.

I'll also add to the 'minus' column a slight doubt about the plastic type they chose to cast the miniatures in: soft plastic. I mean, that's okay for board games and all, but the competition is so stiff in wargames these days, with amazing sculpts coming out of GW and Corvus Belli.

Jarval, you want to play a game sometime down at Athena? There's a demo board set up we could take for a spin...

Just now, banjobenito said:

Jarval, you want to play a game sometime down at Athena? There's a demo board set up we could take for a spin...

Sounds good. I'm really curious about the mechanics, just wary about another time and money sink...

Just now, Jarval said:

Sounds good. I'm really curious about the mechanics, just wary about another time and money sink...

Sounds like we're in exactly the same boat then! I too am really curious about the mechanics. FFG has two great games to learn from - Xwing and Armada - and the dial system seems to have been stepped up significantly in RMG. I also really like the units' initiative being tied to their choice of maneuver/action, so you can't know for sure where your opponent will be - unlike Xwing, where PS is static throughout the game. In RMG, PS is a spectrum, so some units are high, some low, but a high unit can choose a low move, and be trumped by a slow unit choosing a high initiative move. Even more poker like.

2 hours ago, banjobenito said:

So I've been poking around FFG's new miniature system, Runewars . I've been hankering after a more traditional wargame to go alongside the Starwars duet of X-wing and Armada for some time, and have flirted with Age of Sigmar, only to be put off by the things that have always put me off GW's games.

Runewars seems like a step up in complexity from X-wing in some ways, but it uses so many familiar mechanics that I'm sure I'd feel right at home. Dials. staggered activations. Maneuver templates. Upgrade cards... And, of course, wallet-dessicating expansion system.

So count me as very interested. But I must confess, I'm also a little wary of buying into this new system. The lore seems pretty generic to me (Shiny humans! Sneaky elves! Naughty undead!). And I'm also a little concerned that the maneuver mechanisms might not translate onto a battlefield. In X-Wing, maneuver into arc is the essence of the game, but in Runewars it looks like base-to-base contact is going to be the key to thwamping your enemies. That's a pretty tight window of success, going by my experience in X-Wing. Finally, there's the viability of getting into another system; I love painting miniatures, and I love collecting, but timewise, I'm sceptical about how much tabletime I'll get, especially with a starting-from-scratch playerbase.

So Are any other fellow pilots considering the new game? Anyone else filled withe an equal measure of intrigue and wariness?

I was interested. But I don't have the time to paint myself. Also, I wouldn't have the money to buy an army and also pay someone to paint them for me. So for those two reasons, I didn't jump in and don't think I ever will.

30 minutes ago, banjobenito said:

Sciencius, just so you know, the squadrons in Armada can be brought up to a playable level ever so easy: prime them black, dry brush them with a light grey, you're done. If you can be bothered, a spot colour to make them pop.

I'm actually quite okay with them being unpainted, as I love that side of building an army.

I'll also add to the 'minus' column a slight doubt about the plastic type they chose to cast the miniatures in: soft plastic. I mean, that's okay for board games and all, but the competition is so stiff in wargames these days, with amazing sculpts coming out of GW and Corvus Belli.

Thanks for the reply - I just happen to belong to the not-enjoying-any-form-of-painting tabletop group of players ;-)

1 hour ago, Sciencius said:

If it was prepainted I would buy it in a heartbeat, alas...

so not interested!


I also briefly considered Armada but the unpainted (and low quality) of the small ships put me off. I never understood this with Armada....the features on the small ships are similar to some of the small details on the X-wing ships, also the quality is much higher on X-wing. Seems like a different manufacturer. Just take the Tie Punisher as an example and compare, it is like two different worlds. The large ships are pretty and very tempting however....

I did my time with 40k stuff, and while I could paint quite well, it was always a chore and I generally hated having to do it. Heck, it's part of the reason I got into X-wing; buy ship, play ship, done.
The Armada squadrons not being painted put me off just a bit at first, but I've quickly realised that it makes almost no difference to the game aesthetic. Having played a few games against someone who paints all of them, you don't really notice the unpainted vs painted unless you're actively looking at that detail. Squadrons in Armada are a bit like X-wing played on the scope of a radar, so you tend to view the squadron model more as an indicator of relatively tiny starfighters, than an actual trio of ships.

I've kickstarted Kingdom Death: Monster at the Satan level, so I'll have plenty of stuff to paint for the foreseeable future and then some.

And since I'm still really excited about X-Wing, I don't see much reason to get many other games right now.

After seeing my Warhammer army collect dust I am very excited to be able to potentially play a unit based war game without GW's stamp on it.

I still love the chain of announcements between Runewars and the GW/FFG breakup.

Also, now that Runewars is almost here GW has loosened their sale restrictions online. Councidence? I hope not. I also hope FFG burns GW to the ground.

31 minutes ago, Skargoth said:

I also hope FFG burns GW to the ground.

I will tell you what i always tell my 7yo daughter: use your brain. Especially before speaking in public.

Less competition on market equals less and worse games. What do you think is even most probable reason Runewars was designed in the first place? Hint: GW. And them retireing WFB that opened infantry blocks driven fantasy wargame niche open. We already had semi-monopolist period with mentioned GW, the went lazy and created stupid, expensive stuff and when people started to look for alternatives suddenly they again create awesome stuff in normal prices. Thats why let both companies live long and prosper. That is better for us - gamers.

For anyone who's interested, don't worry, @MegaSilver is buying plenty of Runewars and letting everyone else play with his stuff.*

*offer only applies locally

1 hour ago, NakedDex said:

I did my time with 40k stuff, and while I could paint quite well, it was always a chore and I generally hated having to do it. Heck, it's part of the reason I got into X-wing; buy ship, play ship, done.
The Armada squadrons not being painted put me off just a bit at first, but I've quickly realised that it makes almost no difference to the game aesthetic. Having played a few games against someone who paints all of them, you don't really notice the unpainted vs painted unless you're actively looking at that detail. Squadrons in Armada are a bit like X-wing played on the scope of a radar, so you tend to view the squadron model more as an indicator of relatively tiny starfighters, than an actual trio of ships.

Thank you for take the time to reply to my post :-) and thank you for your insight.

I am just a sucker for detail, this is actually what drew me to X-wing in the first place. I loved the models and started collecting them just for that purpose alone. My love for the game came much much later....

It's an awesome game guys!

Hey Mega, what elements do you enjoy the most about RMG?

I'm actually stoked about the chance to paint up some minis, but I don't know that I'll buy in. It's expensive, and the maneuver templates just don't seem to fit for a land game. Maybe for cavalry, but it seems weird for infantry.

Beeing a miniature wargamer I have no problen with painting and I probably get the core or the Uthuk box (or both), if I buy more only time can tell.