318 page hardbound book with Army Builder Lite CD included
Written by Ken Carpenter
AEG 2001 $39.95 (US)
Review by The Ancestral Hamster of the Hantei <'_)`
The Daimyo Edition hardcover is the long awaited omnibus rules set for Clan War. It unites in one book the many rules and units which had previously been scattered through ten army books. It is also intended to be the definitive rules set for Clan War, clarifying a number of ambiguous situations and eliminating the large amount of errata in the original rules.
The original rulebook was marred by the lack of an index and a sketchy table of contents, making it difficult to locate a specific rule. The Daimyo Edition's table of contents has a detailed breakdown of rules by section, making referencing easier. The rulebook is divided into ten sections. The first introduces the game terms and mechanics. The second explains the crucial game elements (movement and manoeuvring, morale, tactical cards, and so forth). The third section is a detailed breakdown of the turn sequence and combat mechanics. The fourth details skills and traits. If you're playing the game for the first time, you could start playing immediately after reading the fourth section. (Owing to the high information content of the second and third rules sections, it would be highly advisable to play a game to gain familiarity with the mechanics before reading further.)
The remaining sections are Magic, Items, Special Rules, Forces, Army Construction, and the Appendices.
Magic has changed noticeably: the cost of spells and of shugenja has increased, and it is now easier to use "Counterspell" than it was formerly (TN 6, with modifiers based on Magic skill, rather than Glory).
The sixth section, Items, has all of the items in the game in one place. A number of new items have been added, including clan-aligned weapons for all the clans save Crane.
The seventh section, Special Rules, contains the Command Group rules, Flight, Void, and Naga rules, among others.
The eighth section, Forces, contains all of the factions published so far as well as the Unaligned. The specific family leadership packages have been dropped, so there is now only one package for each rank. Some units and personalities have been dropped and others have been changed. Some Experienced personalities have been added to bring the game's storyline up to the Day of Thunder.
The numerical strengths of the factions are:
|
|
The ninth section discusses Army Construction and building a tactical deck.
The appendices include rules for creating and converting personalities, a reference list for the Tactical Cards, unit rosters and an index. Existing players may be dismayed to discover that many tactical cards have changed wording, but the amended rules text have been provided in this section. Also, the card backs have not changed, so the old cards may still be used. You can buy the new tactical cards for greater convenience, but at a price of $15.95 (US) for a deck of a hundred cards this is not a trivial expense... especially if you want a "play set" of three of each card.
Dividing the book into thirds are two sections of colour pages with photographs of Clan War figures. The first colour section is a primer on painting miniatures, and is also a painting guide to the colours of the clans.
The second colour section contains a "historical" scenario between the Crab and the Crane, where the outnumbered Crane are fighting a delaying action against superior forces. Both Crab and Crane army lists and tactical decks are provided. Also in this section is are the game templates and a game reference sheet.
The Army Builder Lite software makes army construction easier, and full Clan War data files are provided. You can build, edit, and print out complete army rosters, including Tactical Deck composition. As AEG is no longer printing Force Cards, having detailed army rosters is now a necessity. The software is compatible with Windows.
This book is a must-have for the dedicated Clan War player, as it contains all of the rules and forces currently available. A novice Naga, Shadowlands, or Unicorn player would also be better off with this rulebook, since it gives each faction's full array of units and personalities and doesn't saddle them with figures they really can't use. Because of the $40 (US) retail price, however, a prospective purchaser should be firmly committed to playing the game prior to purchase.
CLAN WAR HARDBACK CONTRASTED WITH THE "BASIC" RULES IN THE BOXED SET
In the hardback only are:
The softback includes
The omission of the magic items (or at least the popular ones like a few of the weapons, fan of command, banner of fear, etc.) means you will probably not build a tournament winning army from the basic softback (but 3 photocopied pages solve that), but unless you have a clan with one of the special units (e.g. lions with the warcats, unicorn wardogs, unicorn horsearchers, shadowlands) then the special unit rules are not much to miss. Skirmishers are still of unknown value in an army in my opion - undoubtedly useful if there is lots of terrain on the board, but I'm not sure if they are worth spending the points on. All of the spells and duelling rules etc are in the softback. My major gripe with it would be on behalf of the Dragon player, with a number of dragon leaders/units able to have tattoos included within the sample provided, but these are regarded as magic items and thus not included.
Chris