Bot War – Where to Start

Friday morning and waking up late I had the urge for this article.  I really don’t write enough blog type articles on this page, I am just too busy these days despite that business seemingly not always achieving what I want to achieve.  Cest La Vie or such is life.

Bot War has been rollin for about 4 years now.  I never would have thought it would go for that long.  But I didn’t really think where it would go.  I thought it would either be huge or collapse, I never thought it would be a steady curve.  HA, goes to show how much I know :).

Over the years the question of where or how people should start Bot War often comes up.  I actually think the question comes up more now than it used to and I think its because there is so much stuff out for Bot War now it can be overwhelming for people new to the Bot War phenomenon.  I admit the game, lore and minis have grown at a fast pace this last 2 years.  I am not entirely comfortable at the speed myself.  Although now things are slowing very rapidly as the lore structure is established.

I find perception these days quite fascinating.  Perception is neither truth or lies but just a persons initial reaction.  Their gut feeling before either a truth or a lie is established for certain.  Personally, I feel these days that too many people are cool with just their perception of something and have little desire to find out what is truth or lie.  I say this because as a hobbyist of 30 years now, I don’t ever recall people asking how or where to start on other games.  And I mean those other games weren’t exactly easy to understand back then.  Who knows, only last night I was complaining to my daughter about how unnecessarily complex the Dominoes pizza website was for ordering pizza and giving up I just called the store for my order which was about 1000 times easier to do.  I mean why even have a website at all!

Anyway, back on topic.  For every game including Bot War, I think the best place to start is the 2 player starter set.   The 2 player starter set gives 2 forces, dice, energy points, tapemeasure, rulebook and cards.  Pretty much the bare bones of all you need to play.  As an additional I would add the card city terrain set.  This is because Bot War is a 10mm scaled game and it just doesnt have the same appeal to have giant robots running through 28mm scaled terrain.  Currently, the Turbo Edition set is the 2 player starter set for Bot War.  It comes with the 2 forces which are generic Valiants and COILS.  Both sides are evenly matched at 70 points per side.  Some thought has gone into selecting these forces and both play very differently.  COILS is definitely the more advanced of the 2 forces to use effectively.  The generic Valiants are a staple standard force in Bot War.  I say generic because Valiants do have battlegroup options now which specialises them a little more.  But in the starter set the Valiants are your easy difficulty level.  Playing the Valiants is quite simple and everything is pretty straight forward tactically.  Ducal is your powerhouse general, you will have 3 warrior types in Coldstart, Trafficstop and SuperCharger and then 2 light support Bots in RJ and Herbs.  Support could be energy supply or objective grabbing or even lending a hand in a close attack thats already engaged.

COILS on the other hand are not so simple.  The stat lines vary a lot more with COILS and understanding and using the COILS unit variations is crucial for success against the Valiants.  Usually, Ducal just dominates any new games, but COILS is the more powerful force in the box.  Just way harder to use.  Most important is Shogun and the 2 crawlers Mineshaft and Coredrill.  Shogun may look big but he can’t go toe to toe with Ducal.  But Ducal can be defeated nearly every time.

The 2 player starter set will introduce you to Bot War and allow for a friend to play as well.  It will give you everything required to play.  Adding the card city will give you 2 tables worth of terrain.  After this the individual faction starter boxes are the perfect way to explore your play style.  Like coordinating mixed forces?  Add Mindtwists Minions to your COILS forces.  Want to go all out aggressive in close attack?  Try Choppers Penitents Trashers.  But starting with the 2 player starter set I think is the best way to get a handle on Bot War.

-Happy Gaming