Formations are back to the battlefields of Pannithor in Clash of Kings 2022 so I wanted to quickly talk about how much I love them, some of my personal favorites, and the ways I think they really add to the overall great design of Kings of War in general.
Formations were introduced in the “Edge of the Abyss” campaign supplement back in 2017 and then included in Clash of Kings updates during the rest of Kings of War version 2, but were dropped from the late 2019 release of version 3. For those that need a refresher, formations are a specific collection of choices from an armies list (heroes, units, monsters etc…), a set of unique benefits granted to the formation, and a cost associated with including the formation in your army. The new Clash of Kings 2022 book includes one new formation for each of the armies in Pannithor (even the unloved ones, looking at you Ratkin Slaves), so regardless of what faction you play you’re getting something.
When formations were announced as being a part of the contents for this new Clash of Kings book, I saw mixed responses with some folks basically questioning why they exist. Grenade like questions lobbed across the internet battlefield like…
“why doesn’t Mantic just design things better?”
“Are they just trying to sell models nobody wants?”
“Why don’t they remake the Elves instead of messing around with more rules, they’re so old?”
“This game doesn’t need formations and anyone who disagrees with me is a butt face!”
I might have paraphrased those questions and statements a little, but you get the point. I wanted to take a moment and go over why I think formations are an excellent addition to the game and why I welcome their return to our battlefields after their short hiatus away. Once I’ve hopefully convinced you of why formations are such a good idea (or managed to convince you I’m a raving lunatic not to be trusted) I’ll highlight a few of my favorites from the Clash of Kings 2022 release.
They give designers an area to experiment
Formations give an excellent space for the designers to really stretch out and try some interesting things. Because of the guardrails already put in place by the rules around formations (they can only be bought once per army, cannot be allied in, must use the entire formation of none of it), and the ability to add or change restrictions in the normal list in the formation text, designers have a ton of control about how a formation can be used. This control lets them be more aggressive with special rules, buffs and to ultimately try sometimes really wacky stuff (just look at the Ratkin Slaves formation example later).
See with 28 armies in the game (yeah seriously, how the hell did we get to 28 armies dear lord) adding, removing or balancing anything is like playing Jenga on a speed boat being driven by a Gur Panther on coke. You might be as careful as you can, but there is still a good chance things will all come crashing down. If you change a unit you have to make sure it works and isn’t overpowered at any of the available sizes (things that might help a regiment break when applied to a horde), that it doesn’t help enable degenerate strategies that hurt the game, doesn’t throw internal and external balance out and doesn’t mess with one of the other roughly two million other armies if it is allied in. Lets be honest, if the Rules Committee misses something with a normal unit, there are folks in Texas and the North of England just waiting to spam 12 of them into an army and crush a lot of other players’ hobbies.
This environment means the designers have to be relatively conservative in their changes, and for the most part this is good. It creates a balanced game that isn’t taking huge chances with each release that would knock the meta way out of order and that serves the community well, but leaves out some of the more fun stuff I know a lot of people still want to see in their fantasy wargames. Formations mitigate a bunch of that risk and allow new ideas and interesting concepts to be experimented with without seriously threatening the overall balance of the meta. You can’t spam them, you can’t ally them and their use can be carefully regulated by packaging together exactly what is needed to keep them balanced. Sure some will be more powerful than others, but there is only so much that they can affect things, and that is another tool in the toolbox for designers I appreciate.
They help drive themes
While the percentage of Kings of War players who are Olde World refugees is shrinking, and the amount of folks having a real go at centering their army and its lore in the world of Pannithor is slowly growing, there is still a lack of connection I feel between the armies on the table, and the lore of the game. Formations in a small way help add some of that connection back in.
Formations give an easy to insert block of narrative and theme to drop into your Kings of War armies. Stumped on how to theme your Twilight Kin army? Base something on the “Crew of the Black Hydra” formation and do a nautical/pirate theme. Looking for some interesting multi-base ideas for that Herd army you’ve been planning? Take a look at “The Silent Hunt ” and model them up as Softhoof’s tribe of ambushing guerilla warriors striking from the darkest depths of mother nature’s home. Formations give these digestible little chunks of the narrative and lore of Mantics world and directly attach them to units in the game and I find that incredibly useful and inspiring.
They create big army building choices
Are you going to use the formation? This is one of the first things I ask myself when assessing the 17 new projects I’ll be starting after Clash of Kings 2022. Formations are usually a decent investment in points, and take armies certain directions by choosing them. I like this about them, they’re not often no-brainer additions to a list that every army has (at least not this year, looking at you Basilea of 2019) and therefore create fundamental army list creation questions and I enjoy that.
This is not to say they force you into things or create cookie cutter lists, but they give early paths towards how to build the list (with or without them) that I appreciate. If you look at the Riftforged Orcs formation previewed on Dash28 last week, “The Iron Boots” it uses 3 regiments of infantry. Now this starts to encourage the list down a Multiple Medium Units (MMU) direction as it gives you a very solid start, but doesn’t require it. If you’re going the 2-3 hordes of infantry approach, then you’re probably leaving the formation and its points investment at home.
They encourage lesser used units / sizes
There are a lot of unloved units kicking around the mustering fields of Pannithor giving pleading doe eyed looks at each general that passes through trying to build an army. Usually it is a profile that works at one size, horde for example, but is considered weak or underused at another unit size like regiments or troops. The designers can’t buff the basic profile without throwing the usable unit size out of wack, but still we want to see some variety on the board. Formations allow the Rules Committee the ability to show some love to some of the lesser used unit sizes or combinations, without changing the whole units profile. This can, if done well, increase the variety of units on the table and the diversity of armies which I view as a big plus for the game.
Brinton’s Favorite Formations
Now these aren’t meant to be the “best” formations or necessarily the “power picks” but more the ones that jumped out at me as fun and something I’d be excited to try out on the table.
Undead
This is everything I want a formation to be. It looks useful on the table but not overpowered. It’s thematic as heck getting players to field massive shambling hordes of zombies and a Goreblight together on the battlefield. And most importantly, makes me think about painting new units for an army I told myself I wouldn’t touch until at least 2023.
Do Zombies really need Phalanx? With Undead Giant Rats, their natural Life Leech, Iron Resolve and Rally are they really that much harder to shift than the tarpit they already are? I’m not actually convinced, but that is why I love it. The best formations for me inspire you to add it to your army, but also are right on that line where you’re not 100% sure it is worth it, but it still looks fun as hell. I know I’m going to want to try it with some different item loadouts and see if Zombie Legions are the new way forward for my previously small and elite Undead.
Order of Green Lady
Strongest formation in the book in my opinion. It takes units the army already wanted to take, and just straight up makes them better. The Wild Charge is useful for breaking deadlocks and giving that extra smidge of range when needed but the real boost is from the Devoted. The Thunderous Charge aura gives the Water Elemental hordes a great damage profile with TC1 & CS1 and bumps the Greater Elemental up to armor crushing TC1 & CS2. Because the boost in TC comes from the Devoted, it allows the units in the formation to further boost their profile (if needed) through items without worrying so much about upping the normally low Water Elemental punch. The hits the unit gets will now actually stick against Def 5 units from the jump without additional boosting from items. The units already boast Strider as well so knocking that TC out will be even harder without Phalanx or other tricks which means they’ll usually be charging at full power. Get these lads charging off a hill and you’re really bringing the hurt.
Inspiring on the Devoted also brings added utility to the hero as she is still free to take additional magic items and spell options without having to use up the Inspiring Talisman slot. These formation specific bonuses coupled with the already improved Greater Water Elemental makes this formation for me, the power formation of the 2022 book. It also is one of the reasons we should all get used to being stomped on by animated puddles and punchy knights for the rest of the year because the Order of the Green Lady is not messing around.
Free Dwarfs
So this is a super interesting formation for a couple reasons. First lets look at the Shieldbreakers. They got a price reduction, but this formation requires you to take the scout upgrade which puts them back at 140 pts per regiment, which isn’t bad. The formation gives them Nimble, which on speed 4 Dwarves is a little bit of a joke, but if anyone has seen a battle line of Gigas dance around with their Nimble, it can actually be super useful even with short legs, and when combined with Pathfinder and the ability to double move with a single pivot through terrain is suddenly quite quick over short distances. Natural sprinters and all that. Brutal is a great addition to the unit as well with its ability to deliver consistent but also limited damage, getting that additional point on the Nerve test can come in clutch.
What I find most fun about this formation though is the Dwarf Lord who gains Scout and Brutal. By granting the Dwarf Lord Scout, without using a magic item slot, you’re free to slide in that Wings of the Honeymaze and for a bargain 155 pts all in, you have access to a Move 10, Def 5 (wings), Scouting, Flying, 5 attacks + brutal little ball of absolute chaos that could easily be throwing down 1st turn charges or even just flying straight over their lines if the setup is there. This dude can get up to some absolute shithousery for a very small investment in points disrupting enemy plans, punking warmachines, turning off shooting and hunting down wizards along with the normal chafing duties a King with wings often gets. I love the possibilities of this stumpy little suicide warrior and can’t wait to use it.
Sylvan Kin
I’ll be honest here, I don’t know how actually good this formation is, but I really enjoy the idea that the all Scout armies are getting some choices beyond just trees and archers. The all tree army might still be straight up better, but from the hobby gamer in me, the ability to model and paint an Elf ambush force that actually has rules to play that way on the table gets me excited for this formation. Really looking forward to experimenting with armies containing this in the future.
Ratkin Slaves
Okay, so this one is freaking weird. Getting a Nerve boost and Vicious aura for a Slavedriver seems pretty straightforward and can make a sort of Slave Warrior battlegroup have a bit more bite (rat puns!). But we really get to the interesting part when you see the Slavedriver can basically just point at a unit (with the right keyword) and it poofs in a cloud of panicked rats and disappears. This creates a really interesting level of control over potential matchups where you can throw a cheap nerve block into an enemy unit, and whether the enemy cracks back and routs, wiffs or waivers your slaves, you know you can plan on that unit not being there the next turn and line up a second wave of attacks. Like a lot of these sort of clever tricks, I’m not sure how much that is useful in theory vs. build a list around, but I really like the swing the designers took here and look forward to seeing players really stretch out the uses of this special rule.
Also, Lowest of the Low is a classic Hardcore album by Terror and the breakdown in “Nothing to Me” is a jam and a half and still makes me want to mosh in my bedroom and stage dive into a couch.
Varangur
I think this is possibly an under-the-radar power formation right here. Horse Raiders with Melee 3 suddenly become a very interesting unit to me that brings a lot of control to a battlefield. Nimble, 14 attacks and Thunderous Charge 1 means they can easily get in position to punish opponents and with a decent shooting attack as well, you don’t need to rush them into melee as they can contribute while maneuvering to strike.
The Lord gets the absolutely amazing Aura of Brutal +1 and gets to break its own rule and combine that with a horse for maximum mobility. For a hard-hitting but low numbers army like Varangur, a mobile character bringing a Brutal aura to whatever fights need it most will be absolutely clutch, and really helps the classic Varangur style battlelines. I’m looking forward to being smashed by some Horse Raider based Varangur filth horde Garret Mercier unleashes on the scene in 2022.
Honorable Mentions
- Elves: Nimble on regiments of Drakons. Yes please!
- Ogres: If you’re taking more than one chariot unit it’s a no brainer. Is the foundation for my Ogre list coming in 2022.
- Empire of Dust: Chariots are back, and borderline good, this formation pushes them just onto the right side of usable in my opinion and makes for a different style than most current Empire of Dust armies. Paging Matt Carmack.
So those are my picks. Love em? Hate em? Got some of your own from the new book? Let us know in the comments or on the social media post as we’d love to hear from you.
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