Sadly though, for Humans!! (not the anticipated maybe new races)

Code of Chivalry

www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=165

I don't mind really, keeps interest simmering, pushes releases out into 2011, I'd suspect if they wanted to wrap up BL then one last heave in a christmas run up would have been more logical.

more humans and presumably human only CtA cards means all the base set races are now fully resolved leaving the way clear. Though another release of these three (other than reprints of the older stuff) and yeah that'll be the straw camel interface time

Chris

To me, the Horrific Horde, Bearded Brave, and now Code of Chivalry were all necessary releases in order to finish up the Goblin, Dwarf, and Human armies respectively. The CtA cards being the most important part (though I still am not convinced these were handled in the best manner - at least not with the Goblins, and presumably a similar treatment is occurring with the Dwarfs and Humans). The template has been made for more races to be released for the game. I have no idea if that is what is intended or not, but it is certainly set up to do so.

Yeah, while I don't consider this expansion an auto-buy, I do agree with Todd that this expansion is necessary as it completes the current races.

I'm not sure what will come after but I wouldn't be surprised if it was a new "core set" that offered just the map, card decks, dice, and non-figure bits. The set would likely have a small contingent of Human figures for a reduced down "starter" version of the game with the intention that the player would expand by picking up the larger race packages. This would put the core game back out there and reduce the overhead problems FFG was worried about.

I would say after that, the next new release would be new races and whatever other direction they plan on taking the game. I can't imagine FFG starting a new brand new race or key mechanic expansion without addressing the "no core set" issue. Maybe I'm wrong and the current BL population can sustain new content but I would think they would want new blood to get in on the system while pacifying the current owners.

I'm going to repost what I wrote on the announcement page rather than rewrite it, but my hope is that the next thing we'll see is an FFG Base Battlelore set.

Fantastic! Great stuff FFG.

My bold hope for Battlelore is that with the Army Packs released for the Dwarves, Goblins and Humans, FFG will announce a new base set with a full 'base' human army in it's own vision. After this base armies for the Goblins and Dwarves so that the army packs can be retrospectively used to bolster the 'base' armies. This would allow FFG to really create a unique architecture around the way the want Call to Arms to operate through the game.

Also - new armies, scenario decks of CtA cards or a campaign system using the CtA decks, new terrain, race specific hero packs... all good.

However, my vision is probably wildly different from FFG - nevertheless, any news is good news! Keep 'em rolling FFG!

Cheers,

Giles.

To me this would see a fuller incorporation of the CtA system throughout the game. Of course - I don't expect my wild fancies to reflect reality in any way, but it would be cool (to me at least).

Cheers,

Giles.

caradoc said:

Giles, I am not sure if my vision for CtA is wildly different from yours , but that is my hope too - that CtA would come to play a large role in the system as it moves forward. I was expecting the CtA deployment decks that were to be released for the Goblins and Dwarfs to be "complete" decks that didn't reference the original CtA decks at all. Now I am hoping that the cards included with Horrific Horde are just "transistionary" in that they are meant to utilize CtA with the Goblins in a temporary way until FFG makes the shift towards releasing full armies in a big box type expansion that includes full CtA decks respective to that army, with original CtA being the way to do mercenary style of play. Anyway, as you say, Giles, likely wildly different.

And, Chris, I thought that may be a direction they were going as well, and if they did release the base game with the "full" human army and all the game bits, that would be an elegant way of addressing their problem. But, also, I fear, wildly different from what will come, perhaps.

Yeah well, nothing looks to change too soon as they just announced that they are taking the French Core set packaging and re-purposing it to English.

Like the dwarf and goblin expansions that came before, this looks to be an excellent expansion for someone just getting into the game and is a superb model for future army-based and race-based expansions. Nice, self-contained and complete.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure what it offers the longtime player who has already invested in the existing products, especially if you're not someone who uses the Call to Arms system. It's hard for me to justify spending $40 on extras of units I already have, a small handful of new units, and a mere 4 scenarios. (If I played much CtA maybe I'd feel a bit different.) I've wrestled with the same dilemma with all three army packs and have ultimately passed on them all. So ... pretty sweet package, but not for me.

I totally understand DDG's reasons for moving forward in this way and the way cost and manufacturing problems is going to impact their approach to the game. I can't knock it. It's just that it leaves me behind.

That said, as soon as a new army pack is released, one that doesn't repeat material I have, I'm there. Elves, undead, whatever. I'm there.

There is one thing i don't understand. Horrific and Bearded comes with 40 units and a full deck of CtA cards for dwarfs the price is $40,- This exp. comes with 4 new units and 6 cards. Wy is the price the same $40,- and getting less...

Correct me if I'm wrong - but I don't recall an expansion (FFG of course) that had the human infantry in them. Obviously this one probably has the human calvary units [makes sense]...

Cab

Shoegaze99 said:

I'm interested in the other side of the question...how self-contained and complete are these "army packs"? I play a lot of CtA and am very interested in the CtA cards. As somebody who has only Goblin Marauders (not Skirmishers), how useful are the CtA cards in HoHo? That is, how many of the HoHo CtA cards have units from Skirmishers? I don't know what units are on the cards (if anybody knows where these are posted or can let me know, that'd be great), so can't really tell if this is a useful expansion without both the smaller goblin ones.

Also interested to see if the CtA component of the dwarf and now human army packs require other (now OOP) expansions. Not exactly sure why FFG wouldn't have made a completely stand-alone product if the others aren't readily available (or for the non-completists among us!).

What do you all think?

the hoog said:

If you only own Goblin Marauders and don't want to do any proxying of units, etc., you would be limited to using two of the four cards for each deck (cards 8 & 9 of each deck; A, B, & C). Now, here is where there is a lack of direction in the rule book, but, depending on what you are trying to accomplish, you could choose to a) mingle those cards with all of the original CtA pennant decks - giving you a smaller chance of drawing those specific cards and almost certainly guaranteeing an army consisting of human and goblin units, b) remove the human only cards from the OCtA decks and add those two HoHo-only cards to each deck - giving you a larger chance of drawing the "new" cards and still almost guaranteeing a human & goblin army, but with a greater chance of a higher concentration of goblin units, or c) only use the 2 HoHo cards for each deck and either selecting 4 from the 6 or simply choosing 2 of the 3 decks - this would create a draw of goblin only units, but would either necessitate the use of levy tokens or proxying units to field a rather potent army consisting of 1-4 ogres, 1-6 hyena riders, 2-5 halberdiers, 0-4 lizard riders, and 2-7 blue short swords; 16-17 units total for any configuration. There are other ways to play, but without using any of the units (slingers and red spear bearers) one wouldn't be able to use cards 10 & 11 (save B11) without either using levy tokens or proxying.

The Goblin CtA cards included in HoHo contain the following units:

A8: red ogre, blue hyena rider, green lizard rider, 2x green halberdier

A9: blue hyena rider, 2x blue short sword, red ogre, green halberdier

A10: blue hyena rider, green slinger, 2x red spear bearer, blue short sword

A11: green slinger, green band, green ostrich rider, green lizard rider, blue hyena rider

B8: 2x blue short sword, 2x red ogre

B9: green lizard rider, 2x blue hyena rider, blue short sword, green halberdier

B10: green halberdier, 2x red spear bearer, 2x green slinger

B11: 2x green ostrich rider, 2x blue hyena rider, green lizard rider

C8: 2x green lizard rider, green halberdier, blue short sword, red ogre

C9: 2x blue hyena rider, 2x blue short sword, green halberdier

C10: red ogre, 2x green slinger, 2x blue hyena

C11: 2x red spear bearer, 2x green ostrich rider, green halberdier

the hoog said:

So, this is the question that puzzles me. I wish FFG would explain the thought behind the decision to integrate CtA the way the did with the Goblins, and presumably the way it will be integrated with the Dwarfs (Bearded Brave) and the Humans (Code of Chivalry). What I was (still am, to a degree) hoping was that these releases are transitory in nature, leading to FFG producing a base/core game that included the "full" human army and their CtA cards along with all the bits and markers, while the Dwarfs and Goblins would become "big box full army" expansions, that included figures and CtA cards. Then the stage would be set to introduce other races in a similar fashion.

Thanks for the info, toddrew, that's really helpful. Looks like proxying would be a reasonable approach, actually (though I'm not sure how you'd replace the red spears). And half the cards are useful anywaypretty well designed, I think.

Guess we'll just have to wait and see on the rest...

the hoog said:

If you're up for it, making some home made banners would be a way to go - I just use some of the tokens to mark out "units that aren't what the banner indicates." Instead of levy tokens for those cases where I run out of a particular figure, but still have the appropriate banner, I use the approriate figure as the banner bearer and then supplement the remainder of the figures with whatever happens to be leftover.

Stumbled across some original artwork for Code of Chivarly here:

http://artofgastonbros.blogspot.com

We've already seen the foot knight on the expansion's cover, but this site does give a much improved view of a calvary unit - less the shield....