A Veteran Wargamer’s Kings of War Journey Part 1: Where Have I Been All Your Life?

It all started when I looked in my Salute goodie bag...

Alongside some leaflets, basing magnets and dice was a bag of sprues. Oddly, after 40+ years in the hobby, I didn’t recognise them...

Free Sample Sprue Of Abyssal Dwarves From Salute

...a closer inspection found I was now the proud owner of Mantic Games Abyssal Dwarf Infantry. News flash - Mantic miniatures are quality!

First Impressions

I’m sure I can’t be the only one who hasn’t given Kings of War much time. The issue was not so much the game; I love fantasy mass battles. Instead, it was a ‘sticky opinion’. Psychologically, once we make an initial judgement about something, it is very hard to change our minds. Our brains prefer consistency over change. I distinctly remember my first sight of the Elves released as Mantic’s first plastic fantasy miniatures in 2009, and let’s say they divided opinion. “Not for me” went into my brain and has been a firm barrier to anything Kings of War since then.

I watch the Weekender every week, so must have seen hundreds of previews of the latest Kings of War miniatures or rules updates. All of those got immediately ignored as they “weren’t for me”. Then miniatures sat in my hands, and I finally looked at them properly. Well designed, well moulded, minimal flash, no silly gribbly bits, skulls or spikes everywhere. Just what you want for building and painting a large army; they absolutely are for me after all.

So I like Kings of War Now, But Where To Start?

I went to OnTableTop and found the review of the 4th Edition rulebook.

4th Edition Kings Of War Rulebook Review

That looked very encouraging. I ordered one from Wayland, and it arrived in double quick time. What a fantastic quality product. I was blown away. It's hardback and full colour. Rulebooks need to have good balance for me. That means clear rules with good diagrams to explain things, tick. I like some pre-set scenarios and some lore to explain the settings, tick. Mostly, as a wargamer, I want to know about the factions and get some lovely army lists, mega tick.

Abyssal Dwarves VS The Northern Alliance

There are sixteen lists in the main rules and the remaining four, including the brand new one, are in the first expansion book. The setting, Pannithor, is high fantasy and all of the stalwarts are here: Men, Elves, Dwarves, Orcs and Goblins abound alongside elementals, dragons and all forms of mythical creatures.

Who To Choose?

Now time to do some more research and choose a faction, or more probably, factions.

The first place to go is the Mantic Games website. Sign up for a free account (you get 5,000 Mantic points, which are worth £2.50 for orders from the site). All the basics are here: where you find a line-up of 19 of the 20 factions with links to the range Mantic offer. Important to note that Mantic don’t offer a complete range for every faction. You will find options in army lists for units and characters that there are no official miniatures for. They are transitioning production away from metal to plastic/resin but now also offer STL files in an offshoot of the main site called The Mantic Vault. Some characters have never had an official miniature. There is a whole faction with no official miniatures, ‘The Kingdoms of Men’, where you are encouraged to use whatever you may already have, be they historical or fantasy, if they fit the army list.

The World Of Pannithor // Kings Of War

That might be hard for those used to GW’s approach to understand. Mantic puts as much emphasis on their game as their miniatures range. Sure, you are encouraged to use Mantic miniatures, but you can enjoy the game any way you want to. You can also download a free starter set of rules and a 300-page lore book for the world of Pannithor

Finally, a special mention for the Army List Builder: The Mantic Companion. This is an online tool that lets you work out your army lists for all of the factions. For free, you can make lists for any of the factions, and you can save two. That’s amazing! So, for free, you can get a working copy of the rules and enough fluff to get fully immersed in the setting and put together two proper army lists.

Games Within Games

Aren’t there different versions of the game? Yes, and this picture is being simplified as the game transitions from the 3rd to the 4th Edition. There were several different Kings of War variants: Vanguard, a micro skirmish with individually based miniatures; Ambush, a starter unit combat game and also a slightly bigger starter unit game called Champions. Champions is still current, but the others have gone, although the old Ambush packs can be a good source for cheap starter forces. [Editor's Note: Ambush is planned to return, but some boxes were illegal with the new list building]

Axel Tricklebrook Company Box Review

There is a 2-player starter box with the new hotness, Xirkaali versus The Trident Realms.

Claws In The Sand  // Mantic Games

There were several starter sets for 3rd Edition with different factions, and these can be a good place to start if you prefer those factions.

Learning Kings of War's Language

As I started widening my research, I had to get my head around a bit of new language. Not unusual; most communities have their own lingo. Firstly, players tend to abbreviate the names of factions and characters. So Scudku-Z’luk, the big bad for the Ratkin, is usually just “Scud”. [Editor's note: Not just abbreviations but nicknames like NomNom for the Ogre warlock Nomagarok]

Kings of War has a lot of competitive players, and they tend to be the most active online. The game “meta” is mentioned frequently. For the uninitiated, this refers to the "game beyond the game" (apparently it’s an acronym: Most Effective Tactic Available). It’s the way the game is played and the factions and army types that are commonly used. This is locally/regionally dependent, so in the UK the meta is different to the US.

Helpful Resources?

A helpful place to quickly look up anything is the fan-made Kings of War wiki.

YouTube

There are some great channels dedicated to Kings of War. I was looking initially at ‘how to play’ and army guides. The most useful were: “Death By Dragons”. Steve is the organiser of the Clash of Kings tournament in Nottingham. He has great starter guides to the factions and this video to help learn the rules in 20 minutes

From the US perspective, the focus seems to be very much on competitive play, and an example is the general comparison of factions from “Nerve Check”, which features Adam Ballard, the ‘World Champion’ who has his own channel called “Master Sight” where he does something similar.

Podcasts

There are some good ones, but the longer format and frequency of output often means they go into a lot of depth and aren’t really that useful or accessible to the beginner. [editor's note: although if you ask nicely Gerry will give you a list of his favourites.]

Facebook

There is the beginner-friendly: “Kings of War in the UK”, and you will notice a group called “Kings of War Fanatics” which is busy but probably not for the beginner.

Forum

Without an official forum, this one is excellent: Kings of War Forum. Mantic launched a Slow Grow challenge at the start of the year, and there are some useful posts here about developing an army from scratch.

So if you are looking for a summer project, perhaps starting with Kings of War 4th Edition should be the one. I’m off to pick a faction (or two) and build some miniatures.

Stay tuned for my next update as I explore Pannithor.

Article by zoidpinhead