School Wargames Club, need help chaps.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Gents and Ladies,
Lend me your ears...
I've 'volunteered' to run a Wargames club at school until mid May. I want to avoid the GW uber expensive trap, but want to run a Fantasy Campaign. There will be twelve players max.
At present I have in 10mm:
Halflings
Dark Elves
Goblinsx2
Medieval Humansx2
Barbarians

Which other forces should be included? What is iconic?
Thoughts involve:
Wood Elves
High Elves
Dwarves
Undead

What else should I use? I need a couple more army suggestions. The opening game will be 'King of the Hill' where everyone will have similar forces (General, Cavalry, spears, Bows, Swords). From there they will 'develop' units and/or skills. So for instance the Goblins would have access to many units of dross, but very few upgrades; whereas Elves would have a limited recruitment pool but would have many accessible upgrades. Artillery and magic will be highly limited.
Thoughts?

[Fenton]

I think I would include undead and another Elf army as they are traditional fantasy armies

[Maenoferren]

Agree with Fenton as well as dwarves.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Great, thanks guys.  Basically, I will need 12 mini armies that I can get stuff done for over Easter!
What should be choice 12?

[Fenton]

What about Orcs?...or is it too close to Goblin?

How about Amazons?

[Sandinista]

Trolls, ogres and giants always got me going as a kid (and dragons)

[Ithoriel]

Wot? No Chaos?

What rules are you planning to use?

With HotT you can let your imagination run riot. I ran a Giant, a Dragon and an Ent army at one time or another when I played HotT. Other rules may necessitate the use of more closely defined armies. Warmaster for example.

Lots of rules out there, though HotT and Warmaster are my favourites.

[Orcs]

I would go for an Undead Army and an elf one - Whichever is the quicker to paint.

What about Orcs?...or is it too close to Goblin?

How about Amazons?

Amazons is not good for young boys - They will get distracted

I am NOT getting involved with this, but I do like a good Goblin ! 


Orcs

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Thanks chaps.
I have two goblin forces already, but all other suggestions gratefully accepted. Amazing amazons are soooo off the list, as are Dark Wlf females, unless I can buy mulliputt in bulk and clothe them!
Orcs and trolls are planned goblin upgrades. Leon has suggested tribal lizards too.

I was planning to run either HOT or Hail Cheesy as this lot are bright and all mostly mostly play 40k. An intro game of king of the hill, then they will get to pick their own fights and I'll set up the scenarios. I just don't want them bringing stuff into school when some of their colleagues are 'light fingered'.  They are going to develop their own armies, so they could pick their own unit upgrades (from 'racial lists') eg Skeletons upgrade = lots more skellies, but pretty naff units, Dark Elves = choice of skills for surviving units

[OldenBUA]

Dwarves, Elves and Undead, for sure. For other armies, maybe Skaven Ratmen types? Lizardmen would work well too (and can be in nice bright colours).

Or since there are already medieval humans, maybe some Araby type opponents? Possibly with Egyptian mythology additions?

[get2grips]

Yup...undead for me too Will; crucial part of any fantasy game.  Could do a "wet dead" type army too; along the lines of EE's Vampire Counts.

[sebigboss79]

Undead High Elves and Dwarves are iconic for fantasy.

[Ace of Spades]

Yep, Undead, High Elves and Dwarves are a must! For the other one I would go for Ratmen or indeed the Lizards; at least there is quite some choice among the initial models and then some to keep it interested when you want to upgrade.

Cheers,
Rob

[burnaby64]

Interesting insight here on how times change! Thirty years ago, when I started to run the wargames club at my school, the lads were gaming

1. Napoleonics
2. WW2
3. Er....that's it.

The great thing is that, whatever the 'period', the hobby still has followers in that age group and the computer game does not rule supreme.

[Hertsblue]

Hmmm - wouldn't it be better to do something that might teach them about history?