Mordheim: City of the Damned

[Wildeybeast]

The game we have all waited so long for looks like it is finally happening. Commence the dance of joy!

http://www.focus-home.com/index.php?rub=news&id=675

[Kirsten]

excited for this

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I wanted it to be an RPG.

I am disappoint.

[Bigred]

2014-03-26
MORDHEIM: CITY OF THE DAMNED UNVEILED WITH SCREENSHOTS (http://www.focus-home.com/index.php?rub=news&id=675)
Focus Home Interactive and Rogue Factor today proudly unveil the first video game adaptation of Games Workshop's cult classic Mordheim. Set in the Warhammer world's decimated Empire city, Mordheim: City of the Damned is a turn-based tactical game where you lead warbands into bloody and lethal skirmishes. The game blends RPG elements, fast-paced tactical combat and intricate unit customization in a time wrought by chaos and rivalry where only the strongest survive.

After the Comet of Sigmar crashed on Mordheim, the City of Damned turned into a terrifying battlefield where rival warbands fight fiercely for the control of key neighborhoods, looking for glory and fortune by acquiring the very valuable Wyrdstone fragments.

Pick your warbands from iconic Mordheim factions - Sisters of Sigmar, Possessed, Skaven, Mercenaries from the Empire, and many more - and lead your troops to battle. Recruit new units, equip them with enhanced gear. Evolve and customize your warband with the experience gained from each successful mission, transforming them into a terrifying force on the battlefield.

Devise the best strategy to annihilate your rivals. If you fail, some of your units might lose a limb... or worse. Keep in mind that in Mordheim: City of the Damned, a dead unit is lost forever! Consider the environment when formulating your battle strategy, exploiting the unique buildings, ruins or the layout of the streets. Deploy your troops carefully and anticipate the actions of your adversaries to set up ambushes! Organize ingenious battle plans where the talents of your units will be as important as your own luck during key moments of combat.

Loot items and weapons hidden in the ruins, or steal those of fallen opponents. Survive the dangers that abound in the City of the Damned and collect as many Wyrdstones as you can, but remain ever vigilant. Mordheim is one of the most treacherous places in the Warhammer world!

In these epic battles where fame and glory await, your strategy will definitely be your best ally! Visit the four corners of the City of the Damned to complete multiple missions in the solo campaign, or challenge other players in enthralling multiplayer modes.

Riches and infamy await you late 2014 in Mordheim: City of the Damned!

799879998000

[phil035]

hope this isn't a turn based game and is a full rpg though if it is turn based I hope its fun

[Wolfshade]

Mordheim is soooo much fun. You should all play it now! Plus I hope this game is equal to this.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Well, you can be Skaven, so I am happy.

[Larabic]

What formats is it coming out for? Will there be a Vs mode to have 2 or more bands fight? Really like Necromunda better then Mordhiem.

[eldargal]

I'm glad they are including Sisters of Sigmar, it's not being able to choose the gender of your troops but it's better than nothing. Hope they produce a good game.

[YourSwordisMine]

YES!!! TURN BASED!

I am a happy camper!

I am SO sick of real time strategy games... I wish to god they would die in a fire...

Turn Based is where it's truly at.

[Wolfshade]

YES!!! TURN BASED!

I am a happy camper!

I am SO sick of real time strategy games... I wish to god they would die in a fire...

Turn Based is where it's truly at.

+1

[miteyheroes]

Oh! Interesting...

[Pete Wolfchild Fenner]

For those with a good connection and quick reactions 'm sure real-time systems are great, but for a low tech guy like myself with poor reactions turn based is king.
More turn based games FTW!
I this is a hit I can only assume Necromunda should be just around the corner. Guess they were pushed toward turn-based after Warmachine got released in same format. Hope they both work well :)

[YourSwordisMine]

For those with a good connection and quick reactions 'm sure real-time systems are great, but for a low tech guy like myself with poor reactions turn based is king.
More turn based games FTW!
I this is a hit I can only assume Necromunda should be just around the corner. Guess they were pushed toward turn-based after Warmachine got released in same format. Hope they both work well :)

Warmachine is Turn based too?

[Wildeybeast]

I'm glad they are including Sisters of Sigmar, it's not being able to choose the gender of your troops but it's better than nothing. Hope they produce a good game.

Let's just hope the Sisters are better than they are in the actual game.

[eldargal]

Let's just hope the Sisters are better than they are in the actual game.

Well they should be if they balance things right, hopefully they will. It isn't like it is a direct port of the tabletop game.

[Wildeybeast]

Teaser trailer is out.


http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=py7rpUz0eIw

[miteyheroes]

Shiny!

[eldargal]

Looks like there might be wimmin outside the Sisters of Sigmar, so yay. Looks nice.

[Kirsten]

I will be all over that

[Kirsten]

just purchased the early access that went live this evening. downloading now, will hopefully get a game before bed, otherwise it will be tomorrow, but if you are hesitant about buying and want to know anything, pop a question here and I will see what I can do.

[Wildeybeast]

Cool. Let me know what it is like. My steam is playing up at the moment, so I can't download it currently.

[Kirsten]

right, done my first skirmish. I will post my initial impressions as they came to me loading and playing.

*Note that when I loaded the game, the 'Tutorial' section was blank, so I just launched a skirmish not knowing what was what, I though,t it is Mordheim, can't be that tricky. after the skirmish I discovered that if you mouse over the word 'Tutorial' a list of them appears. main menu wasn't clear at all, but my impressions are based on not having done the training, so I expect a few of my problems to be cleared up by that.

right now you can choose to play as either the mercenaries, or the skaven in a skirmish against another player online or a computer opponent. you cannot at this point choose equipment or members (presumably you must be able to in future). you have a choice of four maps, and day time or night time, with a random deployment or choose a zone. I went random and didn't get to deploy my own people, no idea if you can choose if you select the other option. it takes aaaaaaaaaaaages to load the skirmish.

once it finally did load, I was presented with a view of the back of a ogre filling most of the screen. moving the mouse moved the view around the ogre, and with a lot of buildings surrounding him, it was hard to see much of anything. hopefully you can adjust the view point somehow. I was expecting something more like XCOM, but it is a third person viewpoint. the Skaven went first, alternating individual models between the computer and myself. you cannot of course see the enemy move and don't know where they are, so I spent a good minute or two looking round the edges of the screen trying to guess what meant what whilst my ogre stood oblivious to all and I wondered what was going on :p

when my turn to move a person came, there was no clear indication of how far I could move or what I could do. you get a series of little blips under the character name which turned out to be action points, but it was quite hard to see what those actually translated to in terms of moving and acting. I spent a couple of turns moving about before I got to kill some skaven. unsurprisingly it was shooting attacks first, my crossbowman and handgunner both hitting and doing damage. damage is more like a standard RPG than warhammer, it wasn't one wound and roll on a table, each attack does a varying amount of damage and the target has a certain number of hit points. Missile attacks do massively more damage than melee attacks and seem like the way to go. my crossbowman, handgunner, and captain with two pistols did nearly all the damage over the course of six turns, whereas two of my melee dudes attacking one skaven two on one failed to do any meaningful damage in three turns of combat. where a missile attack did between 20 and 30 damage, a hit with a mace did between 5 and 10. each rat seemed to have 50+ hit points, so hand to hand combat seems like a total waste of time right now. aside of course from my great hammer equipped ogre who mushed a few, doing 80 damage with one hit at one point.

I had a wizard as well, but little indication as to what spells he had. a couple of times I cast a debuffing sphere, and several times I concentrated, no idea what it did... only in the last turn when I ran up to a skaven did I discover that there was a lightning spell, the option wasn't there until I got close enough. If I had known, I would have sent him up front. the skirmish seemed to be massively stacked in my favour because all though we had similar numbers, I suffered no damage whatsoever from enemy attacks, and only suffered any damage at all because my hammer dude fell off a first floor ledge like a pillock...

as well as moving and attacking you have a few stance options. overwatch you will be familiar with I am sure, there is also a dodge stance, a parry stance if you have a shield, and an ambush stance, which is like overwatch, but for hand to hand combat. looked quite cool when a skaven dropped down from a building and one of my guys ran forward suddenly and smacked him.

as stated above, I did not play the tutorial so really need to do that next, but right now it is a pretty basic game. it has potential, but there is nothing there really for £23.99 (which includes 20% off for early access) the full price of £29.99 seems a lot to ask, even considering the full range of content promised when complete. four factions seems like a poor number for this sort of game, I would expect double that really. whilst I am sure there are plans for DLC races, it definitely needs a lot more on launch. there are currently no campaigns available so I have no idea how progression and injuries are handled, or how interesting they are to hook you.

graphically it is decent, I tried it on 'fastest' and on 'fantastic' and there was a clear difference. wont blow you away, but it works fine on either setting for what you want. I did find at one point that a dead body on the ground which was part of the scenery turned out to be an impassable barrier for my men, and certain holes in the walls clearly designed to be passed through, involved a lot of shuffling, sidestepping, turning round, and faffing to actually pass which was irritating.

[Kirsten]

ok, just done the first tutorial, definitely a must, it makes things much much clearer, there is quite a lot going on.

updating the above:

movement shows a blue circle around you at a distance that marks one 'strategy point' to move, move that far, you get another circle which denotes the next point cost. if you move back again to where you were, you get your points back, they are only spent upon completion, like keeping your hand on a chess piece. you have blue strategy points for movement related actions, moving/climbing/etc. and also for reloading weapons. then you have red offence points for attacking. a typical skaven might have four strategy points and two offence points. making a single melee attack costs two offence points, as does shooting. shooting so far still seems to be much more effective both in terms of accuracy and damage, my skaven in the tutorial with two warplock pistols had a 100% chance to hit every time he fired, and did more damage than the sword or spear armed guys, making him way more reliable.

each individual projects a zone around them. allies have a green circle around them which you can move through, but not stop in, and makes it very hard to get more than one of your people in to hand to hand combat with a single enemy because of narrow spaces. enemies have a red zone around them (think of it as being like keeping 1" away on the tabletop) and touching that zone locks you in combat.

It is definitely a game to keep an eye on, lots of potential I feel, despite my above misgivings, but perhaps don't rush to buy it unless you are a huge fan. wait and see how the updates pan out over the next month or two. first tutorial was fine, but the second has just crashed three times in a row and I haven't been able to try it.

[Psychosplodge]

Just been and read the steam page.
I think I'll wait for it to be finished and then probably pick it up at some point. But with the online bit you mentioned I wonder if there's a multplayer campaign option? Bols moredheim campaign in the future anyone? :D

[Kirsten]

possibly yeah, that would be a cool feature. they need to add elves and dwarfs though, I want to recreate my ludicrously kick *** tabletop shadow warrior warband...

[Psychosplodge]

Especially if you can track stats and upgrades properly for your warband, it could be awesome.

[Kirsten]

yeah, I do still have high hopes for the game. I found quite a few issues last night, but of course it is still early access, so I am not condemning the game before it is even finished. I wasn't massively grabbed by the initial skirmish, but once I did the first tutorial and understood what was going on a lot more, it raised my interest again. once you can start designing warbands yourself, having a proper campaign etc. it should be cool.

the maps certainly capture the feel of Mordheim very well, tumbling buildings, gibbets, weird mutated chaos-y bits, skulls, spikes, looked the part.

[eldargal]

Hows the situation re: wimmins?

[Kirsten]

well there are only the two pre-set warbands right now, no women in the empire, not sure about skaven...? :p

haven't a clue what it will be like when complete

[Psychosplodge]

It's probably far too early yet to make a judgement call. From the sounds of it its more like a demo at this point?

[Kirsten]

Pretty much