Mantic Games: Mhorgoth’s Revenge review
The Mhorgoth’s Revenge Battleset contains everything you need to build and play your own Fantasy Battles, including two complete armies and a copy of Mantic’s new ruleset written by Alessio Cavatore.
The Mhorgoth’s Revenge Fantasy Battleset includes; Kings of War Ruleset, Dice, 25 Dwarf Ironclad Warriors including Command, 20 Ironwatch, 1 Ironbelcher with crew, 20 Skeletons including Command, 10 Revenants, 10 Ghouls, 15 Zombies, 1 Balefire Catapult with crew, Undead and Dwarf Poster Guides, Undead Sticker Sheets, 3 Mantic Points & enough 20mm bases for all the models.
First impressions
The first thing that hit me on opening Mhorgoth’s Revenge was just how full it was, I had a quick count and there are 33 sprues in this box.
(OK, calm down… We need a level head for this review, using three exclamation marks is never justified – Ed)
On closer inspection
OK, deep breath, lets get stuck in to the box contents.
What you get in Mhorgoth’s Revenge is basically just over 100 miniatures, some dice, a Mantic journal, background information on the 2 armies & a copy of the long awaited Kings of War rule set.
I won’t dwell too long on the quality of the individual miniatures as most have already been reviewed on the blog previously (see existing Mantic reviews). In general Mantics miniatures have been well received at Big Orbit Games, the contents of this boxed set, Undead and Dwarfs, particularly so. All of the miniatures contained in Mhorgoth’s Revenge have received ratings of 7/10 upwards. Highlights include the Skeletons & Zombies for the Undead and the Ironclads for the Dwarfs.
On to the rules, the first thing you’ll notice about them is that this is not Warhammer, i.e. you’re not looking at a five hundred plus page rulebook. The Kings of War game is intentionally being kept simple and it’s parred down, 12 page, rules make for a faster game.
As a result the Kings of War rule set won’t appeal to everyone, some people will just want to play a more involved/complex system but it does make for an interesting change if Warhammer is the only system you use currently.
Areas where the rules differ substantially from Warhammer are close combat and casualty removal. In close combat each side only attacks in their own turn, this also does away with the need for an initiative attribute. With regard to casualty removal, this just isn’t done at all, damage caused to a unit is recorded and used during nerve (rout) tests, should the unit fail it’s nerve test it is removed from play, until this point it fights at it’s original strength.
One final thing I’d like to add about the Kings of War Rules is that I love the open source approach being taken by Mantic (the rules are available free online – here) and I’m very interested to see how the rules develop in the coming months and years.
Summary
Mhorgoth’s Revenge represents spectacular value for money and if you are thinking of starting a Dwarfs or Undead army you could do a lot worse than starting right here.
The Kings of War ruleset, offers a quick play, simplified alternative to Warhammer and it will be interesting to see how this open source rules system develops.
All in all, this is a great starter set and gets a whopping…
Overall score: 9/10
Pick up the miniatures from this review at Big Orbit Games and save 25% off RRP*.
*Accurate as of 15th November 2010