The Future Of Combat Patrol: Learning From Spearhead & The Necessity Of A Mid Edition Update

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Rising Fades · StreamBeats by Harris Heller
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[@EmpireofWargames]

If you did not check out Spearhead yet, do yourself a favour and read up on it, especially if you are really into Combat Patrol. I think Combat Patrol is going to change big time, and I hope it'll happen sooner rather than later, because 11th edition is still ways off. If you have any thoughts on the topic, please share your opinion and thanks for watching!

[@Rook986]

We ran a combat patrol tournament at my LGS. It was so much fun! Everyone had a blast being able to play a couple games each day. We added a bit of narrative flair to it

[@EmpireofWargames]

That sounds like a lot of fun! I really hope more LGS consider offering Combat Patrol and/or Spearhead tournaments. You get to play multiple games, it's easy to setup, requires less space, and is still incredibly fun.

[@Malevodjia]

Spearhead seems very interesting so far! I hope this format to have a lot of success but also to be followed in the long term by GW. In spearhead so far, we got 2 terrain to play on, with their own rules cards, and I hope GW will releases more of them to add replayability to this format. Not only it will be a good access to the wargame universe for beginners if physical shops have demonstration table with all spearhead available to test (so it gives new players a glimps of the army look, rules and gameplay) ; but also for actual players to be able to play a faster game with the same miniatures we usually have in our 1000/2000 games, because lets be honest it is not always easy to have 4/5 hours time available to play (not including transportationand so on). Also I can see in tounament some Table for this format to be available for competitors who loose early their 1000/2000 games on a week--end event, they usually stick for the day then go back home, with this format they can actually stay at the event and play in a sort of alternate early looser competition bracket spearhead. And if GW adapt this to combat patrol in 40k it would be great. I do have a preference for AOS but I also have 40K minis, and it is hard to follow both game system at the same time, here you can have AOS players enjoy 40K with a smaller format, and vice versa. So finger cross GW will take some time to improve this format alongside with the bigger ones. Thanks for the video.

[@uwesca6263]

For me combat patrol should fokus on fun and easy to play. The balance should atleast be in a way that some combat patrols (world eaters) do not autowin against other patrols. From a game design perspective having more mission, deployement, etc carts (or rollable options) would be great to add replayability. Also something like warcry where both armies start with units in reserve that only arrive turn 2-3. Also give everyone sticky objectives but thats how i played it anyways. And recouring units should be a thing for certain factions. You could also use stuff like "unit comes back once at a turn of your choice" so there is a bit tactic to it. Actual list design: Idealy any faction has a patrol that fokus on the main theme of the army and then another one (atleast have rules for it) for a second playstyle of the faction. Like tyranids have with their main list and then they have the whitedwarf lictor list. But it shouldnt be white dwarf limited. i like the 4-5 units size. But only one of them should be a character and if possible always have a centerpiece model of some sort. Two of my favorite patrols are the old ork and the current tyranids one.

[@baneofbalor5881]

The inherent problem with combat patrol is that, even with the new releases, some boxes are just way outclassed by others (purely from a rules perspective). They have obviously tried to balance the boxes in terms of the number of miniatures. It seems like 20 minis is the average, but that makes a big difference depending on factions and units. Take the sisters box, for example, and compare it to some of the others. The tau box has 2 vehicles, the csm has 10 chaos marines and posessed, the world eaters have 20 berserkers and a mounted unit. There is nothing in some of these boxes (like the sisters one) that can deal with some of those units 10 battle sisters does not equal 10 chaos marines, 5 sacrosancts cannot deal with a vehicle, and 10 arco-flagellants might, be able to deal with one of those, but you likely loose the unit along with 1/3rd of your army. I'm just using sororitas as an example because i know them best, but I'm sure there are some other extreme asymmetries between the different boxes, but I can't see that sisters box winning against any of the other combat patrols, all things being equal. It's especially frustrating because, you could easily fix it by adding 1-2 penitent engines...

[@Kingofdragons117]

Wait do we have rules for the Sisters box yet?

[@christianknaack4190]

Aos spearhead reinforcements only come back one time

[@EmpireofWargames]

You are correct. I was under the impression that some armies (Skaven) could bring back untis multiple times, but the showmatch was somewhat chaotic so I might have understood things wrong.

[@randomstuff7047]

why not play kill team, warcry, or star wars if you are so desperate to play with fewer units and a smaller board? combat patrol shouldn't and hopefully will never be a "competitive mode" it is for beginners, just accept it or wait 2 years for 11th and maybe a revamp.

[@HappyDuude]

Because people want to play an army game that is still accessible, quicker to build/paint, and can play a game that doesn't need the whole afternoon

[@Ghislain82]

Combat Patrol absolutely should be balanced for competitive play. The only reason not to do so is being lazy. New players want to know that they can pick any box and have a fun time playing. Being outclassed by your opponent because you picked the wrong box is a negative play experience all around. If you lose because you still need to learn, it means you can continue playing your favorite box and just improve your gameplay to have fun.