Fast game play with more models that act like X-Wing ships. On the spot planning and moving but more skill involved when moving and doing things becuase you don't always just "Move, do X and shoot".

As an Armada player this hits home becuase of the planning but as an X-Wing player you have the advantage of knowing the movement and the predictions.

Painting is also something fun for you all to do and they are pretty easy to paint.

I just like rank and file fantasy minis games more. I wasn't that excited about X wing (it's cool, but nothing about it really got me that excited)

I can't wait to try Runewars

I guess I'll take a shot at giving you some reasons to try this out.

#1 - Runewars adds a strategic element that isn't always there in X-Wing. TIE Fighters are pretty maneuverable. Rune Golems aren't. In X-Wing, you generally need to anticipate and plan one or two turns out at the most. After all, you can always K-turn. In Runewars, you'll learn to plan out farther, which will just make you a better gamer/player overall. In this way, Runewars is more like Armada... but still has the flexibility of sacrificing your other actions to "strafe" one direction or do an about face. In that sense, positioning errors will likely be far easier to 'fix' in Runewars than in Armada.

#2 - FFG has made changes to the distribution model of their upgrade cards. In X-Wing, unless there is a play restriction ("Scum Only"), any upgrade can go on any ship with the appropriate slot. This means most players end up buying opposing faction ships that they'll NEVER fly just to get a few upgrade cards. I bought a U-Wing for the Pattern Analyzers. I doubt I'll ever use the actual U-Wing. In Runewars, upgrade cards come in two flavors... faction upgrades that are only usable by a certain faction and neutral cards that can be used by anyone. If you buy, say, all the Skeleton faction boxes, you'll get all the Skeleton faction upgrade (obviously) and ALL of the neutral upgrades. FFG has said that EVERY neutral upgrade will be available in at least one box for every faction. In that sense, you'll never have to buy outside your chosen faction unless you want the models.

#3 - Ignoring list building/theorycrafting/forum complaining (which are present for most games), X-Wing is an almost entirely community based activity. From a gaming standpoint, Runewars is also a community based activity. BUT... Runewars offers something that X-Wing doesn't and it's entirely optional. Runewars miniatures can be assembled in minutes and is playable right out of the box, but offers potential hours and hours of hobby activity if you want to paint/convert the models. I never though I'd be a painter, but with Youtube videos as a guide, I've actually gotten pretty good and quite enjoy it. Sure, some people repaint the odd TIE Fighter, but it's rare and the ships are pretty small. With Runewars, you'll be able to roll into a tournament, lose every game and still walk away feeling like a winner if you have a well painted army that people compliment all day.

#4 - It's not actually that expensive to start. A 'standard' sized list is 200 points, much like how the standard X-Wing list is 100/6. A core box is $99.95... less with any number of discounts (I paid ~$80 for mine). If you can talk a friend into trying this out with you, you can each buy a box and swap human models for undead models. That leaves one person with ~200 points worth of undead and the other with ~200 points worth of human faction models, each with enough upgrade cards and trays worth of models for a fairly big variety of lists. Do you want two 1x2 trays of Archers or one 2x2? So, you can get a full, legal sized army, including all the templates and whatnot, with tons of list building options for $100 retail. With X-Wing, you CAN build a few decent lists for $100 retail, but being forced to spend $40 of that on a core box really limits your options. If you do manage to build a full, viable list for $100, you'll have very little flexibility. In that sense, I submit that Runewars is cheaper to start out AND gives you a lot more bang for your buck than X-Wing does.

#5 - Different missions. Point bid works just like it does in X-Wing to determine first player. Each player brings a mission and a deployment 'map' card. First player gets to pick either one of the two missions OR one of the two deployments. If the first player picks a mission, the second player get to pick deployment and vice versa. So, you get to pick the rules of engagement or the battlefield, but not both. Every game will be a little different. With X-Wing, every game is more or less "kill the other guy before he kills you". In can be a ton of fun to have a variety of objectives.

To summarize...

1. It's more strategic and will likely make you a better gamer.
2. You'll never have to buy a Daqar (Rebel) unit to get an upgrade for your Waiqar (Imperial) dudes.
3. The painting and modelling aspect gives you things to do when you're not actually playing or list building. More bang for the buck.
4. It's pretty cheap. ~$100 retail each for two people gets full sized armies with lots of list building options.
5. Different missions and deployment 'maps' means you're not playing the same game over and over.

So... there are a handful of reasons I think an X-Wing player might like Runewars. BUT... to properly sell you on the idea, I need to know the following.

Why wouldn't you want to give this a shot? If I know what specific objections you have, I can try to overcome them. Without knowing why you haven't already pre-ordered, all I can do is list off reasons that I'm excited.

3 hours ago, banjobenito said:

Greetings! Ah, what a time to be a game's fan! The expectation in the final week before release! The open vistas, the wild-west of an unknown and undefined meta! The endless easter eggs that will be yours over the next few months! I congratulate you, Runewarrior, on being in the right place at the right time.

I, however, am not one of your ilk. I fly tiny ships and go 'pew pew' for a living. So to that end, as a sucker always open to a new avenue of losing all my money to plastic crack, I come here to ask you a simple question: Why should I (and my fellow squadron pilots) join you?

Can those among you who know the two systems give me a sales pitch as to how RMG improves upon X-Wing? Why it scratches a different itch? How the patched game mechanics work? (For example I'm a little worried that the wonderful maneuver system will make actually engaging in close combat a bit of a fright fest - in X-Wing you just have to get your opponent in arc - in RMG you need to make base to base contact.)

In all seriosuness, it's probably an important topic, really. I'm guessing RMG will need FFG customers to be seduced over into playing it in order to make the game viable, as early adopters - it can't just be predicated as a business model on poaching disgruntled GW players - especially as AoS seems to have recently staggered to its feet, tucked its entrails back inside its stomach cavity, and be making a decent fist of being an actually good game.

Yours, pewpewingly,

Banjobenito

You get to command tiny armies and clap coconuts together!

Just now, Soulless said:

You get to command tiny armies and clap coconuts together!

Where in Terrinoth did you even get a coconut?

*cue argument about the relative airspeed of laden vs unladen Rocs*

2 minutes ago, Tvayumat said:

Where in Terrinoth did you even get a coconut?

*cue argument about the relative airspeed of laden vs unladen Rocs*

It's an upgrade card for the elves.

KrisWall, what an answer, thanks ever so much! You've filled in a lot of the blanks for me already, and I don't see how I can realistically not trial this game in the near future!

In terms of my misgivings, I suppose I have three. 1) the miniatures are quite static, and the sculpt quality, while good, isn't up to modern GW or Corvus Belli, as far as I can see. That's a minor point really, as rules trump this concern all day every day. 2) The maneuver system works so well in X-wing, but i have my doubts as to how well it'll translate to formation fighting. Eg two formations wheeling past each other and having to turn and fight over the next two rounds, when both sides really did want to engage in combat, but just miguessed. 3) The game is going to cost me time and money, and I can only realistically play two systems I think. That means I'd have to dump Armada in all likelihood. So in a sense, Runewars is competing with Armada for a spot in my gamerheart. Strange, but there it is...

BTW i'm very keen on formation fighiting, painting up an army, and new mutations of proven excellent mechanics. So I guess I'm pretty close to jumping in!

17 minutes ago, banjobenito said:

2) The maneuver system works so well in X-wing, but i have my doubts as to how well it'll translate to formation fighting. Eg two formations wheeling past each other and having to turn and fight over the next two rounds, when both sides really did want to engage in combat, but just miguessed.

The Reform action allows you to rotate your unit about its centerpoint to face a new direction. This limits the amount of wheeling past each other and looping around for another try.

There is also the Shift action, which allows a unit to move forward, backward or sideways. Together, these make it feel a lot more like armies of soldiers, rather than vehicles with great speed and momentum.

4 hours ago, banjobenito said:

Greetings! Ah, what a time to be a game's fan! The expectation in the final week before release! The open vistas, the wild-west of an unknown and undefined meta! The endless easter eggs that will be yours over the next few months! I congratulate you, Runewarrior, on being in the right place at the right time.

I, however, am not one of your ilk. I fly tiny ships and go 'pew pew' for a living. So to that end, as a sucker always open to a new avenue of losing all my money to plastic crack, I come here to ask you a simple question: Why should I (and my fellow squadron pilots) join you?

Can those among you who know the two systems give me a sales pitch as to how RMG improves upon X-Wing? Why it scratches a different itch? How the patched game mechanics work? (For example I'm a little worried that the wonderful maneuver system will make actually engaging in close combat a bit of a fright fest - in X-Wing you just have to get your opponent in arc - in RMG you need to make base to base contact.)

In all seriosuness, it's probably an important topic, really. I'm guessing RMG will need FFG customers to be seduced over into playing it in order to make the game viable, as early adopters - it can't just be predicated as a business model on poaching disgruntled GW players - especially as AoS seems to have recently staggered to its feet, tucked its entrails back inside its stomach cavity, and be making a decent fist of being an actually good game.

Yours, pewpewingly,

Banjobenito

Ok Banjo!

As someone who has placed relatively well at larger X-Wing events AND has played RMG quite a big since Adepticon, I think I can provide you the answers you need.

1) Whereas X-Wing is some guessing where your opponent will go, RMG is very much about where and WHEN they will go. Every action has an initiative that you go at. A 3 move with a charge *might* be good enough to get you there but if your opponent has a charge move on an earlier initiative, you might be better off selecting melee (because unless you are the charger, a charge modifier does nothin'!)

2) RMG is all about objectives AND scoring. Sure, killing and not dying is job 1, but those objectives can be worth as much as 1/2 your army in points. And it's not what you kill that wins you games, it's also the trays you have left.

3) This is their Universe. Because it's their sandbox, they can create a unit to fill a niche they want to work with. They are not beholden to Star Wars to have a ship they can pigeon hole into being what they need it to be.

4) Asteroids and Debris is fun, but there are a bunch of different types of terrain and those types can do some good (or very nasty) things.

5) GOLEMS! UNDEAD! ELVES RIDING WOLVES!! (And we haven't even seen the demon worshiping Uthak!)

6) FFG is not doing the "buy a ship you'll never use to get autothrusters" thing this time. You buy in faction and get the neutral and faction specific cards. Neutrals seem to be repeated in each factions stuff so you won't be playing the buy and trade game.

Seriously, I have played about 6 games and am having alot of fun. Give it a shot. (or if you are in Chicago, PM me. I have 3 core sets, so we have plenty with which to demo)

In X-Wing you have to plot your exact moves... a sharp 2 turn to the left, a slight 3 turn to the right, etc. In Runewars, you plot a move and modifier but the direction isn't decided until the unit activates. You might have ordered a unit intending to turn left but when the time comes you're free to move right instead. That helps avoid some "whoops we just flew right by each other" moments.

Also, initiative is fixed in X-Wing, but fluid in Runewars. You have some control over when your units will activate.

26 minutes ago, banjobenito said:

KrisWall, what an answer, thanks ever so much! You've filled in a lot of the blanks for me already, and I don't see how I can realistically not trial this game in the near future!

In terms of my misgivings, I suppose I have three. 1) the miniatures are quite static, and the sculpt quality, while good, isn't up to modern GW or Corvus Belli, as far as I can see. That's a minor point really, as rules trump this concern all day every day. 2) The maneuver system works so well in X-wing, but i have my doubts as to how well it'll translate to formation fighting. Eg two formations wheeling past each other and having to turn and fight over the next two rounds, when both sides really did want to engage in combat, but just miguessed. 3) The game is going to cost me time and money, and I can only realistically play two systems I think. That means I'd have to dump Armada in all likelihood. So in a sense, Runewars is competing with Armada for a spot in my gamerheart. Strange, but there it is...

BTW i'm very keen on formation fighiting, painting up an army, and new mutations of proven excellent mechanics. So I guess I'm pretty close to jumping in!

#1 - Fair point. BUT... each tray of Infantry has four different poses. This is more than most of the Warhammer kits. Razor knife and glue and you can repose or swap the arms pretty easily. All of a sudden, you've increased your number of poses pretty dramatically. There are definitely easy ways to differentiate your models and make them unique. I'd just google "warhammer conversion" and you'll see TONS of tutorials on how to mod your models. PLUS, the Infantry Command Upgrade kits give you four new models to add to your units. Say you have a 2x trays of Reanimate models. Adding a few upgrades and you're swapping Reanimate dudes for Command dudes who look different. You're not going to be playing with 100 of more or less the same model with the same pose (as would often happen in Warhammer Fantasy).

#2 - Remember that "fighty" units will usually be 2-3 trays wide, trying to hit another unit that is also probably 2-3 trays wide. You only need to clip an edge. As soon as you clip a unit, you "square up" automatically, making melee much easier to achieve than you'd imagine. It's sort of like blocking in X-Wing, but much easier. Blocking an X-Wing with a TIE Fighter requires a fair amount of skill. You need to know the dials and guess where your opponent is going. It's much easier to "block", or run into, a unit with a base as wide as two large X-Wing bases. Plus, the guessing game isn't super tough, depending on the unit. Where is the cavalry unit going to go? Probably charging forward. Where is the shooty unit going to go? Probably away from the fighty unit. I think you'll find that combat is comparatively easy to achieve versus blocking in X-Wing.

#3 - Can't help you here. Budgets are tough. I'd fall back on the advice that if you can rope in a friend and swap factions, this is "only" $100 (or less with discounts). If you don't like it, sell it on eBay. You might lose a bit of cash, but I think you'll like the game enough to shelf Armada (or at least scale back on purchases).

If you live near the DE/PA/NJ area, hit me up and I'll treat you to a demo game.

Painting and modelling can also be done with X-Wing to be honest, plenty examples here and on the net.

5 minutes ago, Iceeagle85 said:

Painting and modelling can also be done with X-Wing to be honest, plenty examples here and on the net.

True, but the majority of X-Wing models are pretty small and aren't designed to be painted or chopped apart. It's somewhat of a hassle. Runewars models are designed to be painted and have much better detailing. Having painted miniatures for literally decades (including a stint working for Games Workshop), painting a skeleton in armor and a ragged cloak is just more rewarding than painting a mostly featureless ball connected to two mostly featureless hexagons, i.e. a TIE Fighter.

Not to demean some of the amazing X-Wing paint jobs I've seen. Some people do a great job. I just don't think the overall hobby experience is as rewarding.

I can see your point but aren't most rebel ships at least as long as say a Space Marine is high? A d some would say featureless is good for freehands

1 hour ago, KrisWall said:

I guess I'll take a shot at giving you some reasons to try this out.

#1 - Runewars adds a strategic element that isn't always there in X-Wing. TIE Fighters are pretty maneuverable. Rune Golems aren't. In X-Wing, you generally need to anticipate and plan one or two turns out at the most. After all, you can always K-turn. In Runewars, you'll learn to plan out farther, which will just make you a better gamer/player overall. In this way, Runewars is more like Armada... but still has the flexibility of sacrificing your other actions to "strafe" one direction or do an about face. In that sense, positioning errors will likely be far easier to 'fix' in Runewars than in Armada.

#2 - FFG has made changes to the distribution model of their upgrade cards. In X-Wing, unless there is a play restriction ("Scum Only"), any upgrade can go on any ship with the appropriate slot. This means most players end up buying opposing faction ships that they'll NEVER fly just to get a few upgrade cards. I bought a U-Wing for the Pattern Analyzers. I doubt I'll ever use the actual U-Wing. In Runewars, upgrade cards come in two flavors... faction upgrades that are only usable by a certain faction and neutral cards that can be used by anyone. If you buy, say, all the Skeleton faction boxes, you'll get all the Skeleton faction upgrade (obviously) and ALL of the neutral upgrades. FFG has said that EVERY neutral upgrade will be available in at least one box for every faction. In that sense, you'll never have to buy outside your chosen faction unless you want the models.

#3 - Ignoring list building/theorycrafting/forum complaining (which are present for most games), X-Wing is an almost entirely community based activity. From a gaming standpoint, Runewars is also a community based activity. BUT... Runewars offers something that X-Wing doesn't and it's entirely optional. Runewars miniatures can be assembled in minutes and is playable right out of the box, but offers potential hours and hours of hobby activity if you want to paint/convert the models. I never though I'd be a painter, but with Youtube videos as a guide, I've actually gotten pretty good and quite enjoy it. Sure, some people repaint the odd TIE Fighter, but it's rare and the ships are pretty small. With Runewars, you'll be able to roll into a tournament, lose every game and still walk away feeling like a winner if you have a well painted army that people compliment all day.

#4 - It's not actually that expensive to start. A 'standard' sized list is 200 points, much like how the standard X-Wing list is 100/6. A core box is $99.95... less with any number of discounts (I paid ~$80 for mine). If you can talk a friend into trying this out with you, you can each buy a box and swap human models for undead models. That leaves one person with ~200 points worth of undead and the other with ~200 points worth of human faction models, each with enough upgrade cards and trays worth of models for a fairly big variety of lists. Do you want two 1x2 trays of Archers or one 2x2? So, you can get a full, legal sized army, including all the templates and whatnot, with tons of list building options for $100 retail. With X-Wing, you CAN build a few decent lists for $100 retail, but being forced to spend $40 of that on a core box really limits your options. If you do manage to build a full, viable list for $100, you'll have very little flexibility. In that sense, I submit that Runewars is cheaper to start out AND gives you a lot more bang for your buck than X-Wing does.

#5 - Different missions. Point bid works just like it does in X-Wing to determine first player. Each player brings a mission and a deployment 'map' card. First player gets to pick either one of the two missions OR one of the two deployments. If the first player picks a mission, the second player get to pick deployment and vice versa. So, you get to pick the rules of engagement or the battlefield, but not both. Every game will be a little different. With X-Wing, every game is more or less "kill the other guy before he kills you". In can be a ton of fun to have a variety of objectives.

To summarize...

1. It's more strategic and will likely make you a better gamer.
2. You'll never have to buy a Daqar (Rebel) unit to get an upgrade for your Waiqar (Imperial) dudes.
3. The painting and modelling aspect gives you things to do when you're not actually playing or list building. More bang for the buck.
4. It's pretty cheap. ~$100 retail each for two people gets full sized armies with lots of list building options.
5. Different missions and deployment 'maps' means you're not playing the same game over and over.

So... there are a handful of reasons I think an X-Wing player might like Runewars. BUT... to properly sell you on the idea, I need to know the following.

Why wouldn't you want to give this a shot? If I know what specific objections you have, I can try to overcome them. Without knowing why you haven't already pre-ordered, all I can do is list off reasons that I'm excited.

*gapes* what he said. He obviously put way more effort into his response.

Also, in terms of the models... FFG has gotten MUCH better over the years. They aren't the same quality/detail as the latest batch of GW models, but they're pretty darn good (and tend to cost a fair bit less). They're also not even remotely fiddly like the Infinity models can be. The material is easy to work with and ISN'T brittle. The glued bits will stay glued and they're extremely resistant to shock... so if you do paint them, you don't need to store them in foam like delicate snow flakes. You'll be able to just dump them in a box. My Imperial Assault minis are all painted and are stored in a heap in the bottom of the core box (I know, I know... but it works). I've never had an issue. That couldn't happen with painted GW or Infinity models.

Just now, Lyraeus said:

*gapes* what he said. He obviously put way more effort into his response.

lol... Not really. I just believe in the product, currently play X-Wing and have several decades of sales experience. I wrote that off the top of my head. I could probably come up with another 20 reasons if I had to.

4 minutes ago, KrisWall said:

Also, in terms of the models... FFG has gotten MUCH better over the years. They aren't the same quality/detail as the latest batch of GW models, but they're pretty darn good (and tend to cost a fair bit less). They're also not even remotely fiddly like the Infinity models can be. The material is easy to work with and ISN'T brittle. The glued bits will stay glued and they're extremely resistant to shock... so if you do paint them, you don't need to store them in foam like delicate snow flakes. You'll be able to just dump them in a box. My Imperial Assault minis are all painted and are stored in a heap in the bottom of the core box (I know, I know... but it works). I've never had an issue. That couldn't happen with painted GW or Infinity models.

I'm always the guy saying this but...

The quality/detail argument is entirely subjective.

I personally dislike pretty much every GW sculpt they've released in the last several years. They strike me as overdesigned and FAR too busy. Runewars' sculpts are not even remotely of "lower quality", if anything, I think they're significantly better than anything being produced by any company that isn't a model maker first. FFG's sculpts are detailed, dynamic, and full of character without falling victim to the "Let's put more belts and pouches" or "Let's fill this skeleton horse with a bunch of skeletons" pitfalls that GW seems determined to dive face-first into.

With you on the material, though. I LOVE FFG's PVC because it's light, flexible, and holds paint like that's its job (it is).

Well there is a non subjective way to look at miniatures like the quality of the sculpt and quality of the actual mini and more but to be honest we probably all rate minis by our own likings/standards.

And I personally never had lroblems with my GW plasgic minis losing paint, metal minis is a different story though.

55 minutes ago, Iceeagle85 said:

Well there is a non subjective way to look at miniatures like the quality of the sculpt and quality of the actual mini and more but to be honest we probably all rate minis by our own likings/standards.

And I personally never had lroblems with my GW plasgic minis losing paint, metal minis is a different story though.

EDIT: I feel like this rant was stupid.

I'm going to sum up: Me like'um FFG miniatures.

3 minutes ago, Iceeagle85 said:

Well there is a non subjective way to look at miniatures like the quality of the sculpt and quality of the actual mini and more but to be honest we probably all rate minis by our own likings/standards.

And I personally never had lroblems with my GW plasgic minis losing paint, metal minis is a different story though.

Aesthetic arguments aside, GW has the capability of producing very crisply detailed and intricate models. FFG's production capabilities are different. The material is different. You're not going to see the same sort of crisp detail. That's not necessarily a bad thing. GW prides themselves on being a model company first and foremost. FFG is obviously a gaming company. It shows in their rules. I'd much rather good models and great rules than great models and bad rules any day.

7 minutes ago, KrisWall said:

lol... Not really. I just believe in the product, currently play X-Wing and have several decades of sales experience. I wrote that off the top of my head. I could probably come up with another 20 reasons if I had to.

@ffg you should hire this guy. He is GOOD!

I play Armada and not X-Wing and even this makes me desire Runewars more... I must learn from you... Must draw more players.

Dropfleet Commander is a good price point and BEAUTIFUL sculpts.

5 hours ago, TallTonyB said:

As someone who has played X-wing for over three years, and been playing RWM since last July, I think I can shed some light on the differences for you.

To start off, one of the things I really like is the way engaging an enemy unit is handled. You have to run into the enemy, which in X-wing can be very finicky because of having to line up exactly where you hit because of arc being so important. In RWM when you hit an enemy you square up to them, meaning if it is obvious you are going to hit them, and you can see what side you will contact, you don't even really need to pay attention to how you would move along the template. You just square up to that edge and call it a day. You also don't have to pick up and mark the position of units to get the template down, because you never move through enemies. If you would run into them anywhere along the template, you hit them and then square up. It's much more elegant.

The other big thing is the variable initiative system. Your activation order is different every round based on the actions each unit is doing. This eleminates both the "PS race" that X-wing has experienced occasionally, and also eleminates the "activation advantage" that makes most big ships unviable in armada lately.

Speaking of armada, the scoring system from RWM is very much like armadas great scoring system of objective scoring mixed with kill scoring, which is the one big complaint I have with X-wing. 100/6 gets a bit repetitive after awhile and gives very little room for multiple vastly different squad compositions.

My experience in X-Wing is limited, but large in IA, and one thing I very much disliked about both games is opponents running away to avoid giving up points. I get that it is a strategy and it works, but it seems so anti-climatic. Keep in mind there is a difference between disengaging and "ahh my Interceptor has 1 hull left, I'm up on points and there is only 6 minutes left in the match, time to just drag this out". IA handled this in a few ways, first off was having objectives, but that didn't seem to be enough so they put in the individual unit scoring versus whole deployment card scoring. This has made it a much more enjoyable experience IMO and also tilted the meta slightly away from trooper lists which had semi-dominated to dominated since 4x4 was fixed. For many of the reasons you listed here I decided to stop pursuing X-Wing, I will still play in the casual events at my store just to use my stuff, and don't get me wrong X-Wing is obviously a very popular game, but RuneWars just seems to line up better with what I am looking for.

One thing I have loved about reading these forums is seeing how much FFG has learned from their other games and how they have incorporated that into RuneWars. It really does feel like the culmination of years of hard work on their various card and mini games.

5 minutes ago, FrogTrigger said:

...one thing I very much disliked about both games is opponents running away to avoid giving up points.

EDIT: Herp a derp