Vanguard
About
TO BE FILLED
History
In November 2017 Mantic ran a Kickstarter for their new fantasy skirmish game Kings of War: Vanguard. A game that will instantly draw comparisons to Mantic scifi stablemate Deadzone.
Vanguard uses single based minis from all the Kings of War armies, typically heroes, and some infantry as grunts, with cavalry backup. Vanguard can be played as a one off game, a stand alone campaign, or tied into Kings of War campaigns, where the results of the Vanguard battle impact the Kings of War battle, in terms of units available, deployment, etc. Excitingly, the project has funded the first Mantic minis for both the Northern Alliance and Nightstalkers, as well as replacements for the unfortunate first generation Basilean men at arms, and a slew of other yet to be modeled but already listed in Kings of War heroes. Plus a massive 18cm tall plastic giant, which turned out to be even bigger than it sounded! Vanguard released to retail in November 2018, and the free edition of the rules and war bands are available from the same page Mantic lists all their other free rules.
Whilst set in the Kings of War world of Pannithor, the rules for Vanguard have more in common with Deadzone than they do KoW. Vanguard uses D8s instead of D6s, alternate activations and the 'two short/one long action' system used in Deadzone (and several other Mantic products), but it is not simply 'Fantasy Deadzone'. In addition to moving, shooting and fighting in melee players can use their Command Pool, a resource generated each Round by rolling custom dice. Command can be used in a variety of ways to enhance your warbands fighting abilities, from adding additional dice to combat rolls and activating several models at once, to clearing fatigue from exhausted soldiers and activating powerful special abilities.
Vanguard's scenarios have players performing a variety of 'fantasy black ops' style missions such as freeing a prisoner, burning the enemy's stores or assassinating a commander in his sleep. There are currently 12 such scenarios in the main rulebook.
As of January 1st 2019 all factions from Kings of War are represented with 'starter lists' in the main rulebook or downloadable from Mantic's website. The starter lists give players around 10 unit options and any special rules which apply to that warband, enough to make them playable.
Characters
- Sister Arvenia (abbess)
- Narahkt (Blood-Masque)
- Sanya (Naiad)
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