Saturday 3 August 2013

Luck Vs Skill

Right,

At the end of last week i embarked upon a game with a borrowed army. Never the best idea when you are playing a talented, tournament player who fields a power list and you are fielding an army that you have no experience with.

Thus, my Empire army got absolutely slaughtered by some pointy eared High Elves.

Now, luck always plays an important part in a game of Warhammer and while i had good luck in some places (my magic was effective) i had bad luck in others (my war machines were ineffective, i rolled a double one on a breaktest meaning my opponents expensive cavalry was held up by 1 handgunner in a turn i should have been shooting at them with two hellblasters and thirty crossbow's!) and in other parts it was the rarest type of luck: average!

Overall, it mattered little because i think even had i been blessed with good luck my list was ill suited to stop a huge amount of white lions and dragon princes ripping my men to pieces but i had a good, fun game!

What i did take away from the list however was the question: How much is Warhammer a game of Skill?

Lets break it down for clarity:
Chess is PURE skill - there is no randomness involved in any aspect of the game.
Dice is PURE luck - there is no skill involved in any part of the game (concerning the results).

Warhammer is a game based on dice and therefore luck but, considering the rules, you can do things to stack the luck in your favor.

Anyone who played 7th Edition Warhammer Fantasy Battles will know that it involved a lot less "randomness". Charge ranges were double your movement and magic was powered by the level of your wizards. In a nutshell, you cavalry always charged infantry and if you sunk a load of points into your mages you had powerful magic phases.

Now, the game is much more random.

My opponent was lucky in the fact he only had a single mage because, in five turns of rolling for winds of magic, he never scored above a 5! (Bearing in mind i had two mages and three warrior priests channeling dispel dice). I on the other hand who had put a few more points in the magic phase (or been forced to by my VERY limited selection of models) never scored below a 9. Therefore, all was well and fair in the world.

But consider a game i watched recently when a Vampire player rolled snake eyes for his magic in subsequent turns while his opponent, armed only with a single level 2 mage, rolled a 12 and a 10! Result: not much necromancy going on in that quarter!

As most of the game is based on dice rolls, you expect good and bad luck: its part and parcel of wargaming. But should key elements of the game be so severerly punished due to a single, unlucky roll?

Some people would say yes: after all, 7th Edition Warhammer was dominated by Dark Elves using superior movement values to outrun other armies and fear causing Undead/Daemons being immovable from key objectives.

Some people would say no: is it really fair that your powerful cavalry unit led by a thousand year old Dark Elf Dreadlord is unable to charge the 10" to the unit of pathetic humans because you consistently roll snake eyes on your charge distance?

Me? Well, i'm in the middle! I like the idea of the randomness - i play chess and i like the skill involved, i play blackjack and i like the chance. Warhammer gives me a nice middle ground. Of course, when the dice rolls go against me, i believe that it shouldn't work like that. When my opponent fails to cast any spells or finds his infantry are unable to charge across open ground (clearly they forgot their boots), then i think it is the best thing in the world!

Anyway: interesting tangent finished!

I now have to plan where my General has been on his Grail Quest and which, mysterious female he has met along the way!

Kindest Regards

Viscount "Wolf" Blackwood