(Sung to the tune of Baby Got Back by Sir Mix-A-Lot)
I hate Mael-strom and I cannot lie!
Even though other brothers still deny
When you pull out those cards
On the very turn one and the points go up to 9?
I get hung
Wanna jump off the cliff
Cause you know the game is already done
Those Maelstrom make me swearin
Cause random sure ain’t fair-in
Oh baby!
I wanna 52 ya
Reecey and G tried to warn me
Those cards you got
Fill me with Khorne-y
OOOOH Maelstrom goodness
You say you love that game
Well screw me tattoo me
Cause the game is over and we haven’t even played…
Oh yeah, Captain phAt in the house! Can you dig it! Can you feel it playah! How are you all feeling about book Maelstrom missions now that we’ve settled into 7th ed?
I’ve found the maelstrom of war missions to heavily increase my Interest in 40k. The R
Eternal war missions to me are very much old hat. It does happen sometimes that the opponent or you get a ton of points T1. But what’s the difference with that and being nuked by competitive flavour of the week T1 in an Eternal war mission?
To me. Its a lot of fun and rewards mobility. My local area has this static meta going which thanks to Maelstrom is forcing more interesting gameplay and use of the movement phase! Golly gee wizz!
Pretty much the same for me, my whole local group only play maelstrom now, it’s way more fun and interesting…. nice work on the rap though:)
Same in my area. Majority of the people playing the Maelstrom missions are having a blast. It does make static gun lines have to become more mobile which in my book makes a better game 🙂
Yet another in this camp, I’ve only played non-maelstrom games when tournaments don’t use them. They’re by far more fun to play than a Eternal War mission… I was yet again reminded how turns 1-4 don’t matter against Eldar this past Sunday in Eternal…
Yep, Maelstrom all the way for me too. Sure, you can get bad missions (or good ones) but that’s part of the game.
I like to think of it in the same way as dice rolling. Sometimes you get sixes, other times they are all ones. Actually, with my dice, usually all ones, so bad missions don’t matter 😀
Have to say though, usually we modify the maelstrom (ditch impossible tacos immediately and replace) to eliminate the worst issues.
I prefer the modified maelstrom like BAO run addin them in as a secondary works really well if u cap it n give people the chance to discard cards they cant do
‘sup playah?
Pretty gay
Gosh, you’re pretty clever though.
Oh cool are you psychic?
Why thank you!
I am loving the the maelstrom missions. They are definitely not for tournament play, but they have added a much needed mix into the play for my friends and I. True, it does happen that someone will score big early, but I have seen comebacks and even late game wins. I always hate when people write the game off after turn one. When I first started playing the best piece of advice I got was always play it out, you never know what can happen.
I also hate maelstrom missions. I feel like there are two separate games going on. And when one back field biker unit just zips back and forth every turn to capture numbered objectives, it is just not cinematic or immersive. Maybe I don’t play enough to get bored with eternal war missions as some others have but so far my only experience with maelstrom has been negative. Regardless I am still enjoying 7th a lot.
The local group seems to like them.
I’ve heard a lot of people like them and I do like the concept, but most everyone that says they like them also says they modify them to make them better like allowing the discarding of impossible objectives or more discards at the end or many other modifications. This song is about having to play 5 maelstrom games in a row straight from the book. It was rough at many times. I played Dr. Insanotron on round 4 and he just got the right missions (number of tac cards = objectives controlled) with his right army (BA fast scouting) and scored 8 points plus first blood first turn. My turn I get….one card. Woot. Game over right then pretty much. I heard many many things just like this and it was a bit frustrating. Straight Maelstrom can and often are very unbalanced.
Ok you want a balanced competitive wargame, and you choose 40K?!
What a Joke.
What I want is a chance and I’ve had way to many games that where the game was decided turn one. Sure that can happen in regular games with alpha strike and whatnot, but at least I have mitigate and react and work to make the game a game.
It’s a fun change of pace from your more standard games. I like the variety that Maelstrom throws into the mix.
We played a straight maelstrom tournament at our store last month and the general consensus was ‘lets never do that again!’ The FLG and ETC versions of modified maelstroms are great but the format from the brb is just too stupid. No reason to play games that can end on a single card draw with no game interaction turn 1…its like playing versus those net lists people malign all the time but times 10.
I’ve only played one game of Maelstrom, straight BRB rules. I nearly tabled my opponent yet still ended up losing 8-14, most of those points for my opponent coming in T1+2. I don’t even count that game in my W/L ratio as it was so ridiculous.
Any of you taken a peek at the first iteration of the Tactical Cards for Adepticon? As individual cards (objectives) go, they’re all pretty solid. What is unknown is how they will be incorporated into missions.
http://adepticon.org/wpfiles/2015/201540Ktocards.pdf
Otherwise; I regret being optimistic and preordering the GW maelstrom cards. They’re bad. Implementation into the missions isn’t that great either.
I think everyone is jumping on the Maelstrom debate and not recognizing how well done this was. Good Job CaptainA!
Tanks buddy!
Right?! I could totally sing along with that beat while reading it.
I kinda want to do a video…
As much as I like Maelstrom missions, I really want to see this happen. Let me know how I can help make this a reality. 🙂
Maelstrom is fantastic as long and some provisions are put in place to prevent randomness from totally determining the game. For example, throw out impossible to achieve cards with no penalty, a and never, ever, ever play the one where you each start out with 6 cards and the number decreases each turn. That mission, in my experience, is beer anything but one player being irrecoverably buried in points turn 1. All the others are great though. Also, while appreciate silly and clever renditions of popular songs, I can’t help but feel that this article is a wastes of space on what I generally consider to be one of the best sites for 40k articles. Oh well.
I will agree on that broken mission type. I was really down on Maelstrom Missions because we played that mission first and the game was basically decided by our starting hands. The more I play the more I like them, but I would have liked to see a mechanic for “impossible” missions, and some more thought and balancing put into both the missions and the cards. I have also found out that I am much better at playing to objectives than wiping out my opponents so I have been winning a lot more since 7th 🙂
However I found the rap lyric entertaingly dumb and well crafted, and I cant really wrap my head around the concept of waste of space on a website…
I have had bad experiences with the cards, they are kinda lame. But the BAO style turn by turn thing I like… only feedback would be to make sure there aren’t missions which 2/3 Kill an enemy unit 😉
As per typical GW (and I include Space Hulk, most codex tables, unbound lists…) Cool in theory, but a couple of common sense thoughts away from being useful as written.
I love the games! Maelstrom Rocks!
Maelstrom a definite improvement over Eternal War, but like Eternal War, need a few house rules to work. (Objective placement rules, Discard card that are impossible).
Maelstrom makes gameplay matter more than Eternal War where pregame strategy and list building is more dominant. I’m not saying that list building doesn’t matter in Maelstrom, just that it has slightly less influence than in Eternal war, and anything that promote gameplay is good for 40k.