I finally ordered it from my FLGS today. Are you guys getting much use out of Omens of War? Players using it?

Any of you played the scenario?

jh

For reference: p.14

"The Severe Injury Card
This set introduces a new type of critical wound card, the Severe
Injury card. They look just like any wound card on the back and
are designed to go in the Wound deck, but they are slightly different
to the standard critical wound on the face. Severe Injury cards
are identified by a skull watermark, a severity threshold (marked
as a blood smear icon), and the Severe Injury trait. Since they are
shuffled into the wound deck like any other critical wound, a PC
may acquire one in the same way as any other wound or critical
wound.
Severe injuries are divided into two parts: a basic effect and a severe
effect, which is located below the severity threshold icon. The
basic effect of the severe injury is always applied while the wound
is face-up – just like any other critical wound. However, the wound

may worsen as the character is subjected to additional abuse, ultimately
bringing its severe effect into play. When the total severity
of critical wounds (including Severe Injuries, and including the card
in question) equals or exceeds the severity threshold, the severe
effect is also applied. If the total severity of critical wounds later is
reduced to less than the severity threshold, then the severe effect is
once again ignored as the character slowly heals.

Healing Severe Injuries
Severe Injuries are healed just like any other critical wound, with
one exception: if a character still has any non-Severe Injury critical
wounds remaining, he cannot recover from a Severe Injury. In essence,
Severe Injuries must be healed last.
Some Severe Injuries may become permanent. If this happens, that
injury may not be healed at all.

Permanent Injuries
Some Severe Injuries may become permanent. This, regrettably,
means precisely that: a character who receives a permanent injury
is stuck with it for the rest of his life.
When a Severe Injury first becomes permanent, place a tracking
token on it. This token indicates that the wound is still unhealed,
and it therefore counts as a critical wound and follows all the
normal rules for criticals, with one notable exception: it may never
be turned facedown. While in this state, the wound is still raw,
bleeding, and weeping fluids. Like all critical wounds, it is an active
and pronounced danger to the character’s life. When it is finally
healed following the normal rules, remove the tracking token and
place the injury off to one side. The wound has closed, the scar has
formed, and the injury no longer threatens the PC with death…
but its effects will linger forever. Once healed in this way, the Severe
Injury no longer counts as a critical wound. It does not cause the
character to count as critically injured; it does not contribute to
the total number of critical wounds when checking to see if a PC
has died. It does, however, count as a wound card that will never go
away - in effect, the character’s wound threshold has been permanently
reduced by one.

There may be a number of ways to ameliorate the effect of the card,
but the card is never returned to the pile. For example, if a character
gains the “Severed Leg” injury and it becomes permanent, his leg
has been cut off. He will never again have both his legs. However,
he may acquire crutches or a prosthetic such as a peg-leg, which
may allow him to regain much of his mobility.

Some of the permanent injuries described on these cards can have
diverse and far-reaching effects, far too varied to be listed on the
card or to be encapsulated in simple dice effects. If nothing else,
anyone sporting an obvious physical defect such as a missing eye or
limb can expect to be impaired socially and greeted with revulsion
by anyone unused to such things. (Penalties of Δ or worse on
Social actions, for example.) The GM and player should use common
sense when adjudicating the exact affect on play."

Mortal Wounds from Hero's call are not Severe Injuries. They are regular critical wounds with a severity of 4 that must be healed before any other critical may be healed.

The new action cards have come in handy, the players love the additions to the fighting styles. Mounted combat rules was also important to the players, so those are good to have.
For me as a GM the new Khorne-creatures and actions are a good addition to my repertoire of bad guys.

Haven't played the scenario, but I'll probably use it as an "on the road happening" when the group is out traveling since I believe it would fit as one.

So as an answer, yeah we're getting much use of the stuff in OoW.

Nope. Only one player took the duelist style.

Most of my players run around with one hand weapon. Surprisingly, no card is a one-hand weapon style card. I just don't get it.

They don't really use mounts, so the mounted rules don't add much for us at the moment (but I imagine they will).

The actions are nice, they are and are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than anything created for the War Dancers or Sword Masters. Those systems, from repeated play, seem wonky and really need a reworking.

I honestly wish they would have just given those careers now advanced fighting styles, like the ones found in Omens.

Overall it is a great supplement. My only real complaint is I feel it is the weakest big-box supplement to date. With the need of monster cards, location cards, etc. there are too few of each type so it sort of blands out a bit. I also feel that nearly all the careers being advanced wasn't helpful (I would have liked a basic knight) as most won't ever see them or not until rank 2 at the very least. And there simply wasn't enough non-combat oriented stuff in it. Even SOF had stuff like servants, which allowed for rounding out the entire play experience rather than just Priests. Omens did not have that and I would have liked to have seen that format kept, rather than abandoned by FFG design team.

With all that being said, the merits speak for itself. The supplement is great. Have fun with it. They have yet to make a bad supplement. I just give this one 4 out of 5 rather than 5 out of 5 as I give the rest of them (though I don't own black fire pass yet).

Have fun and as always,

Happy Gaming,

Commoner

I have two players who both changed to their second career as Omens came out, and both picked careers from that.

Regarding the actions, they really enjoy those as well, our main fighter is still in an ecstatic about 3rd edition, and even more so with the new "styles".

I let my players redo their choices of actions (their first game), and a few of them traded in 1-2 action cards. Our fighter was considering going Two-Handed style, but went for Bulwark (Bulward?) instead. Later that very same session he also tasted the "grapes" of Omens, and got his left hand chopped of (severe wound). Lets be fair and say that he was VERY happy he didn't pick Two-hand styles... I've let him use a shield, but not use Improved Block for now, maybe in time he'll learn how to use it again, but for now it's downgraded to a regular block till he learns how to cope with not having a hand...

Group is hating me... fighter lost his hand, 2 people are suffering from the Plague (one has recovered from it, and is now immune, and two has passed enough Plague rolls for me to deem them immune as well) and our wizard keeps failing half his magic rolls (despite having the odds with him).

And they've only just entered their second career... Warhammer sure is a cruel world

Oh I should also add, that they've seen combat maybe 2/3's of the sessions, so despite not being very combat heavy campaign, they still love Omens.

It's not been "a run on the bank", but it has seen use.

- The player whose PC can ride and was looking for mounted combat etc previously really appreciates mounted rules etc.,

- The new action types to trade in dice were admired and one taken so far.

And the permanent wounds, oh lovely - the players haven't "used them" except temporarily (the elf archer not losing his hand - that was a real threat to have in play, fun times).

I've just recently started another campaign of WFRP3, incorporating all expansions to date (including Omens). One of my players rolled up a Dwarf Pit Fighter and went for the sword-and-board (bulwark) style. He took a few Bulwark actions as well as one of the Enhancer cards and has enjoyed them greatly. The rules for mounts will become useful shortly (once the PCs can afford mounts) as they have already mentioned being tired of traveling on foot everywhere and are less than excited about paying for carriage/riverboat fare.

I haven't gotten to pull any Severe Injuries on the PCs yet but simple knowledge of their existence has put just a little bit of fear in the back of their minds.

I'm also looking forward to using a few warriors and daemons of Khorne in the campaign's future.

So, yes, I consider Omens to be a very useful expansion, especially if you have any "warrior" careers in your party as there are lots of cool new combat options.

Having run a mere two sessions my viewpoint could be limited but...

1 - One PC bought a riding horse.

2 - A backup character has bought a draught horse (We are calling it a donkey).

3 - We had one of the Oman Crits come up for an NPC but it didnt matter as he was doomed.

4 - None of the action cards have been picked but none of the PC's characters are hard core close combat types.

Is it worth it? Meh, though its nice to have the complete set.

commoner said:

Eh? I'm glad they didn't add non-combat careers. It was, after all, the 'combat' expansion.