The instruction offered in the HoHo rulebook is:

"These new cards, when added to the Call to
Arms Deployment cards that already deploy
Goblinoid units, make up sets of Goblinoid
Army Deployment cards that allow players to
field a Goblinoid force in either drafting mode."

Is there any further detail about how the Goblin CtA cards were intended to be mingled with the Original CtA cards? I assume the intention is to mix the additional 4 Goblin only cards included in HoHo with the 3 (Decks A and B) or 4 (Deck C) Goblin/Human cards from the Original CtA. This would lead to the same mercenary style of play with OCtA, with the roles of Humans and Goblins reversed. I assume the same style of play is intended, either impromptu (pick one of the decks, draw four - no specialists) or organised (shuffle together two of the decks, draw four - yes specialists).

However, I believe most of those who have stuck with the game were expecting to be able to field Goblin only armies. One can do that by using only the cards included in HoHo, but that tends to give rather strong armies, and only uses units from HoHo along with select units from Marauders and Skirmishers. None the less, that is how I have been playing CtA games using goblins - take two of the groups of 4 cards from HoHo, shuffle them together, then play as one would with organised mode.

Any thoughts that can be shared about the reasoning behind the deployment cards in HoHo ending up as they did? Any further detailed rules about how best to use them? And, as long as I am firing away with questions, the one I would most like to hear an answer for: will there be similar cards for the Dwarfs and Humans?

I would be interested as well. I hold out hope for Battlelore - I love the game, but am slowly losing interest after Creatures and Heroes - the rules books seem hastily thrown together and lacking some level of clarity or thought.

Heroes just isn't clear on some points of interaction between heroes and artifacts, hero artifacts and units and skills and units. And it is quite simply badly laid out.

Creatures seemed totally thrown together - when they obviously had the opportunity to include the updated creatures rules as a forward to the small rules book.

Hopefully these are just an indication of teething issues and we'll hear more on the BL front in the coming months. We shall see!

Cheers,

Giles.

I want some official answers about this too. Also I agree about the no-so-good manuals of HoHo and Dragons/Creatures. I hope that they start to give BL more attention now that Batttles of Westeros is out of the gate.

Or at least tell us that BL is dead and be done with it. This silence is killing me. I'd like BL to continue as it is my favorite game. At this point I just want to know if they are doing something about BattleLore or not?

I won't bother with BoW either way btw. I haven't bought HoHo yet as I'm waiting to know if the game has a future. If it hasn't then there is no need to bother with an all-Goblin army isn't it?

Some other recommendations about BL.

Start an official FAQ or living rules page with input from the designer. This game is broken in so many little pieces with the quantity of its expansions that even veteran players have difficulty remembering some rule details.

FFG, make an announcement about the game's status and let us know if it has a future.

FragMaster said:

For what it's worth, whether it be in spite of or because of (and likely somewhere inbetween ) FFG's involvement in releasing HoHo, the units themselves are wonderful additions to the goblin army, and though I believe the CtA cards for the goblins could stand some tinkering, there is a "complete" goblin army now within the game.

For me, BattleLore has a future, but what I don't know is how involved I will need to be in creating that future. If FFG stops right now, I will need to get the Dwarves and Humans caught up to where the Goblins are, and then see about developing other races to similar ends. I would rather pay FFG to work with Richard Borg and put out a game that everyone agrees is the "official" way to play BattleLore and I continue to wait patiently and see what they do do to that end. However, if FFG have already made up their minds about what that particular future looks like, I would like to hear about it.

I agree toddrew. It would be good to know a little bit more about what the intention is.

The list of races that Richard Borg has got in the wings was fantastic, I would love to see them as additions to the game. I would like to see this game continue to grow with more races.

I'd love to get an insight as to what's happening. It would be a shame to let such a great game slowly die... there's room enough for both Battlelore and BoW. They are as you say, two different games - so support both with new releases.

Hearing some of the answers on the D6 podcast got me a little nervous. Throw us a bone or put us out of our misery please and sell off Battlelore so someone can pick it up and add in the races that were meant to be in it!

Cheers,
Ben.

What D6 podcast? of course, nothing mention on the Day 1 of GenCon - go figure...but of course they keep hyping that OTHER BL (cough cough) game!

Caboose said:

Am I the only one that is being irritated by the constant hype of Battles of Westeros that FFG is putting out. It's getting ridiculous! I'm sitting to my computer waiting to see NEW products in their 90 second-video of the first day and the first game that we see in the video prominently is this OTHER BL {cough cough} game. WE KNOW THAT THIS IS OUT ALREADY! Enough with this game. FFG has better games that got less attention.

It looks like they are trying so much to force upon us this game so that they can safely kill BL since we'll all be happily jumping the BL wagon and getting to the OTHER BL wagon. I refuse to do that. Even if they do kill BL I'll keep playing with it. I'm not going to buy BoW.

It's really irritating IMO. I'm not really interested in BoW but even a little bit of interest I had when they revealed it has faded away because of all this hype about this game. They had other games that were more interesting than this {Starcraft, Runewars} and they didn't try to promote them so hard as they are doing with this one. Are they afraid that it will tank otherwise because of the BL fans uproar? What are they afraid of? Why so much hype about BoW? They are trying to bury BL without losing money by transfering players from the "old" Bl to the "new" BL? I guess we will never know.

Meanwhile, they KNOW that there are many people that want answers about BL's future and all we get is silence which does more harm than good.

I love FFG but this ordeal with BoW they are putting us through is really irritating me.

I agree!

Cheers,

Giles.

Caboose - The D6 Gen podcast on BoW. One of the hosts asked some questions about Battlelore and the guy seemed really nervous and didn't really answer anything. The way he spoke during that section instilled no confidence whatsoever. I really got the impression that its BoW all the way.

He also mentioned that Christian Petersen has addressed "their" (with their meaning people that love Battlelore) questions with that article when BoW came out. Not so I say.

How they expect people that like a fantasy game to jump ship onto what is essentially a medieval game, I have no idea. If they really wanted that, wouldn't they have chosen Middle Earth instead of boring of Westeros.

I still hope that we see Richard Borg's races etc... for the game. I just don't think we will at FFG.

Cheers,
Ben.

Thanks for the info Ben, if I could bring myself to be charitable to FFG I would say they don't want to let anything out of the bag whilst they're finishing off the new base game set configuration, but I'm not feeling charitable. It would be great if Mr Borg could release his stuff as pdf's so we could print off and shove into pockets or what not. There's enough 15mm minis out there.

but meh, my kids got me out of bed at 4 this morning so I'm feeling knackered.

Chris

I feel sorry for Richard. He had all these races lined up and great ideas here:

and then Christian Petersen slapped him on the wrist in this post here , the most pertinent bit cut and pasted below:

Q: Will the classic BattleLore game continue to be supported?
CP: Yes. We are working on new releases as we speak, one of which will be announced on the FFG site in the near future.

Having said that, I want to make a clarification on the expectations for BattleLore. Last year, Richard posted some ideas for “future releases” for BattleLore. Unfortunately, some fans took this post as canon, and are now expecting these specific releases. I think it important to note that while they were well-intended ideas of Richard’s, they did not fall in line with FFG’s vision. What we’re working on with Richard currently has no relation to anything in that old post, but something entirely new and different.

Richard has put a lot of time and effort into the game and I really just feel bad for him. FFG appear to be disrespecting the intent and idea of the game and I think its a real tragedy.

I rue the day that FFG got its hands on Battlelore. They just haven't supported it like it should have been.

Before you say "there have been four releases from FFG, what are you whinging about", they included three almost identical dragons, three creatures (two of which are reused sculpts), the Heroes expansion that was already in the works at DOW and Horrific Hordes (which is essentially two new units).

Fantasy Flight has made some great games, but I will be really thinking hard before buying anything from them.

Lets all try to get over BoW .....it's an excellent game & the fate of BL is going to depend on if FFG can get the base game reprinted at a resonable price & not on BoW.FFG hypes it latest reslease,especially if there "In-house games "bashing BoW for no other reason than its getting FFG Buzz is rather pointless.I'm sure if/when FFG has something for BL(besides retreads of Gobbos & Dwarves) they will do some PR.

I also would love for FFG to come clean on BL with some specifics(BL has been plagued by lack of Info ) but I hardly think it beacuse it because their so focused on BoW.

OD

Old Dwarf said:

I totally agree with Old Dwarf.

I do think FFG gave the stimulus for all the interpretation that puts BoW as the main villain of the lack of investment in BL. that's because FFG's decision to make BoW a "BL Game", and also because of things said when BoW was released. I do admire the openess in which they expressed their point of view at that time. including telling us how difficult it will be to get a BL reprint at reasonable prices.

what I do not admire is the decision to stop investing in BL, IF FFG HAS MADE that decision. that is not plain to us yet. when FFG announced BoW and made those statements about BL, there were some ideas from fans to ways in which BL could be brought back in good prices. I think those were great and largely practical ideas.

FragMaster said:

I totally agree - and then as someone above said, it is pretty sad when FFG says they are NOT listened to Richard's ideas but their own...HELLO? I think Richard knows more about the game and direction than FFG ever did - and they don't want his input?? Gee, can you say DEATH to the product line??

So much for FFG really supporting BL if they don't listen to the creator!! Knew this would happen, namely after that cough cough version of BL came out..FFG had NO INTENTIONS to support BL ever! Just used it as fodder for their own games.

Though I am not surprised the thread has taken the turn it did , not my intention to have yet another thread dwelling on what may or may not be going on with BattleLore (especially in regards to Battles of Westeros). While I would love to hear from either Richard Borg or FFG about the Goblin Call to Arms cards, would anyone else care to share how they have been implementing them - especially if different from what I outlined in the original post?

toddrew said:

I'll tell you as soon as my expansion gets in my hands! :] or I'll share the question...

I agree the rules are a little vague in the area of the additional cards.

For Golbin only army I basically make sets of 7 using only the golbin cards;

A Deck A11,A10,A9,A8,A5,A6,A7

B Deck B11,B10,B9,B8,B1,B2,B5

C Deck C11,C10,C9,C8,C1,C3,C4,C5 (I forget which C I out to make an even 7)

Merry, a smallish wrinkle with doing what the HoHo rulebook suggests by combining the Goblin CtA cards with the originals that have goblins upon them is that the C deck from the original has four goblin-bearing cards (C1, C3, C4, and C5).

A larger wrinkle is that those same cards also have human units upon them A possible solution there is to translate the human units to goblin counterparts. A straight translation for weapon-types is possible for all but one of the units: the red mounted humans on C5. I would go with Ogres , but any red would do. Regardless, it would be cool to get an "official" way to handle this so players don't have to discuss/bicker an agreed upon solution (though that discussion/bickering can be fun too ).

I just want to say i agree.

The rules for how to use the new CTA-cards needs to be elaborated to work.

Has anybody contacted FFG directly about this?

diaper said:

Sorry, had to laugh at this one.

More to the point would be - has ANYONE heard anything BACK from FFG??? Don't hold your breath though!

Cab

I agree, Cab. I really like FFG's games and think their customer support (read: Thaadd) is incredible. However, the way FFG is handling BL is very disappointing. I understand the issues with reproducing the Base Game and all, but a little news would be good. BL is way too good a game to see it go away. Hopefully they can figure out how to repackage the base game soon.

I keep thinking, "any day now, there will be something on the front page, teasing us about the upcoming dwarven army pack. . ."

. . . but I won't be holding my breath.

Glad to make you laugh, Caboose

But more seriously, I have contacted FFG through the contact form ( http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_atencion.asp ) with questions about why there has been so little information about upcoming BL stuff a few times, and while I haven´t gotten the answers I wanted, they have always answered.

The company also seems to have a not overly complicated adress structure for email adresses so if someone wanted to mail for instance Rob Kouba, or Executive Developer Corey Konieczka, or Executive Producer Michael Hurley directly I don´t think it would be to hard to figure out their adresses.

And i really do think FFG need to say something, preferably release new rules, about how to use the new CTA-cards.

The way it is described in the rules (just ad them to the decks already featuring goblin cards) seem to make for very large decks and a very random deployment, which don´t really let "players field a goblin force in any drafting mode" (qouting from the HoHo rules).

diaper said:

hmmm - they're probably going to end up putting a Spam filter on their inbox for BL queries. I've asked/suggested they use the Bearded release to let us know where they're going with BL or AT LEAST that they are noting our comments, queries and suggestions.

Certainly the comments I have read are overwhelmingly positive and constructive, it would be criminal not to have them considered. The business principle of keeping existing customers happy, usually with a simple effort at communication has been around since the days of the 'promised' paperless office, but given the amount of trees that commerce still consumes, I guess we, as a race, still have some way to go in following our own best advice