Tract of the Tarrasque: The (Legal) Modification

Nice, thanks Tried, great fix.

200 pt Arena, I like it.

Well yes. That would be very cool.
But I was hoping to build to that...

Oops. Damage control.

Insofar as you are a repeat winner of the event, I've no qualms with putting you off your game.
Now wait til I add back morale checks for bloodied units.
mwahahahahaaa!

(Which is, incidentally, coming as a variant format).

Yes, morale checks add a nice strategic element to the game that many appreciate. I also suggest we add 8x critical damage and an extra die roll before the game where both players roll a die and if one rolls 20 and the other rolls a 1, the one rolling 20 automatically wins the game 200-0. This would add interesting tactical elements too.

Bad matchups are bad matchups, independent of the format.

Full blow assault is not a way to garner new players.
That is, by now, pretty much proven.

Nor is it particularly satisfying as a tournament format, since games frequently do not resolve within 1 hour. Perhaps the floor rules should be redone to permit 90 minutes/round, and this might address the issue.

These Formats, btw, are for inclusion as standardized options in a new tome. The best of the old and a few of the new will be in there. Some of the more astute will realize that a championship can be set up such that each round is played in a different format (with or without a different map). This makes warband building an exercise in analyzing complex possibilities.

As far as arena being not tactical, that's a bit of an overstatement.
Its not been played tactically because it has never been treated tactically. Its been the fun cousin. This by no means indicates that this necessarily has to be the only role, however. I suspect it could be very tactical, and the meta would lean down considerably in the 'right' play environment.

For example, last year's championship warband? (choose one). It probably has an Arena Equivalent.

That said, the 'fun' aspect of arena is still a plus. I get beaten by players I consider less experienced all the time with Arena. And I am pretty sure they get a kick out of beating me.
Of course, it doesn't keep the Illuminati on top. But that's not my goal.

In my experience Arena matches tend to have as much strategy as you decide to put there. Of course, if you decide to build a team that is very straightforward in what it is trying to do (melee chargers on Crossroads), your playing is more simple and requires less planning. There are quite a number of great "tech" or "gimmick" bands out there, though. If you want to play mindless melee rush, the Arena suits you likely the best of all formats. Which is not to say that those bands will be very successfull. And, as noted before, some very cool pieces become playable in Arena (check out Skeletal Tomb Guardian, for example, which is pretty much unplayable in Assault due to its low defenses).

While Arena might, or might not become the official "World Champ" game, nothing is preventing us from doing a serious full fledged Assault tournament as well. We can call the winner a "moral champion" (pun intended) if we like. In the end, even though we play for "honor", the title is really somewhat secondary to being able to get together as a group and play, right?

I know I spend about the same time planning my Arena 200 team and my Arena 500 team as I do on my Assault 200 when I know we are playing these formats when we arrange our EU champs. Nothing changes for me, really. In the end, we just want people to enjoy themselves. Championship tournaments are rarely the place to introduce new players anyway, or are they?

**"It should also be noted that the "Illuminati" are the people who keep the game alive."**

True, but alive and on life support.
28 players worldwide engaging in the highest levels of competitive play. And at least two are the children of players. In reality, its probably something like 24 families.

I have other projects doing on, at least one of which has a publisher onboard. So I need to know where to put my resources. I have at least two big projects that are directed to expanding DDM, but I need to also calculate how many people will benefit from each use of time.

As far as all the worries about a way forward goes, its pretty unlikely that Arena would become 'the' game pushed forward by the guild. But to have one season that featured this format it in an attempt to build a player base (and only then introduce the more complex parts of the game?).

I really don't see why people have such a profound problem with that.

[1] I'm not positive it carries very little strategy. I would agree that very little strategy has been put into it to date. But, for example, if there was to be a rotating map schedule with one tile per player to modify each map? I'm pretty sure the strategy ramps up.

[2] I think the notion that one version of DDM is 'adult' and the other is not, is, at its simplest level, offensive.