Facilitating Fun: Thoughts On The Veto System

Good morning gamers,

If you're like me, you love the Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game. Maybe it's because you love Tolkien's lore from the books (having reread the four main books again recently, I can tell you that rereading the books can reveal things you missed in previous reads). Maybe it's because you loved how Peter Jackson portrayed the original trilogy (and, for fewer of you out there, the Hobbit/bits of the appendices). Maybe it's because it's got great core mechanics that allow players to interact with each other (most of the time).

But sometimes, scenarios can get in the way of a fun game. We've all been there - we've stared down gunlines in To The Death, seen a Balrog on Contest of Champions, or had to face Goblin-town on Storm the Camp. In each of these scenarios, we know it's going to be an uphill battle to get a draw - and we've kissed winning goodbye and aren't looking back for fear we'll cry. Yep, sometimes scenarios are the problem with the game - and while we can look at the 18 scenarios we have on the whole and say, "That looks pretty balanced," we still have that one scenario or two that we're like, "I don't really want to play this scenario with my army."

The Matched Play Guide helped with this some in two ways: first and foremost, there were new scenarios handed to us, which makes random generation of scenarios less likely to draw the one or two scenarios we don't want for a particular army (though let's face it: no matter what the odds are, you'll still draw Contest of Champions when you have Galadriel from Lothlorien as your army leader - it's just meant to be). Second, we received "pools" so that tournament directors can pick the "kinds of scenarios" they want to play (while simultaneously being able to justify omitting other ones that prove problematic). Thanks, GW, we're all grateful.

But if scenarios are either randomly generated or pre-determined, you still could face an army that is optimized to perform well (or "automatically win") at one or more of the selected scenarios. And if you haven't poured the time, thought, and sometimes money, into getting a similarly optimized list, you could walk out of a multi-game tournament and feel like it was a waste of your time. While we could complain about scenarios until the end of time, the Aussies came up with a solution that appears to be working around the globe: the Veto System.

What's The Veto System (And How Has It Been Used)?

There are differences in how the Veto System is used, but the fundamentals are simple: players are handed three scenarios instead of one (either determined the day of the event or sent out ahead of time) and each player takes a turn "vetoing" one of the scenarios. Whatever scenario is left is the one the players will play.

I first heard of this method of selecting scenarios in the Conquest Champions League Tournament on the Conquest Creations YouTube channel - you should check out the stuff Jacob is doing there if you haven't done so already. In the four games that have been released (to date) in that series, players were handed three scenarios that appear to have been picked at random (they appear in different pools from the Matched Play Guide).

The Veto System has also been discussed on other MESBG sites - including the Unexpected Podcast (both a general review of the Veto System idea within the greater context of "how to fix broken Legions" as well as a nuts-and-bolts discussion of one of Rythbyrt's prospective lists for our GT) and as an option for fixing "skew lists" on Sharbie's Against All Odds blog. Reviews of this system have not all been positive - something we'll get into a little later - but on the whole, it seems to be the consensus that it's the best approach to "fixing scenarios" without actually going in and house-ruling changes to scenarios themselves (or making up your own).

We recently held our annual Grand Tournament here at TMAT and we tried the Veto System out - and in general, people liked it. The way we did it was within the pool system - so the three scenarios you had to consider were all "the same kind of mission" and players had to think about the nuances between the missions. Of the three tables that ran each round, many of the scenarios were the same (2 Breakthroughs in Round 1, 2 To The Deaths in Round 2, and 2 Divide and Conquers in Round 3). This may be due to army composition (most notably big heroes and infantry-heavy) that may make certain scenarios seem too risky (like Contest of Champions or Reconnoitre). Players knew going into these missions, though, that they had to be able to play kill things/control things/get somewhere missions regardless of what they vetoed. So, that was a thing.

If I had to answer the question "why the veto system," the simple answer would be that it gives player the ability to exercise some control on the games they play. If you want to take Denethor or Galadriel as your army leader and don't feel good about Contest of Champions (though both can do just fine in that scenario if you're planning ahead with your list building), you can just veto it. If you don't want to play against Goblin-town on Storm the Camp, you just veto it. If you don't want to face a heavy shooting list on To The Death, then don't.

But don't be fooled - there are unintended consequences of running the Veto System. I won't say that any of them are bad, but they do change the game a little bit - let's look at a few of those ways now.

What Limitations Does It Have?

The first unintended consequence of running the Veto System is that armies don't have to plan for every scenario. This is especially true if you have pools known ahead of time - you can just say, "Well, I don't like Storm the Camp in general, so I'll pick between Reconnoitre and Divide and Conquer." Or perhaps you could be one of those players who thinks, "Well, I play X scenario all the time but have never played Y or Z scenario - so I'll veto X so I get something new." Both are legitimate reasons for vetoing a scenario (the latter doesn't seem to be a competitive reason, but it's a reason) - and if you're thinking about scenarios before you create your list, it could impact your list writing.

I think that this pre-game planning/knowledge is okay - especially for new players. Yes, they'll need a working understanding of all the scenarios in the pools that will be used, but if you sit down for 15 minutes with the scenarios and your army list, you can get a pretty good idea of what kinds of scenarios your army would be okay with - and which scenarios you really don't want to play. Is there a fundamental difference between Breakthrough and Domination? Yes. Will it matter for most armies? No.

As an extension of the first point, if the Scenarios for each round will come from specific pools, you don't have to plan for a whole pool of scenarios. For some players, this will be a relief (no Heirlooms/maelstrom!) or a disappointment (aw man, no maelstrom!). But armies function differently if they need to be able to do maelstrom missions (one pool), if they have to get somewhere (one pool in particular, but bits and pieces of two others as well), or if they have to control multiple locations (one pool and bits of another).

If a tournament package says that the control-based pool (Pool 2) isn't going to be used, then you can expect players to bring armies that are smaller and more elite (like the Vanquishers if the points level is at/above 650pts) because they won't have to spread out and control multiple parts of the map. While random selection of scenarios could see a Vanquisher list not have to protect any objectives, knowing ahead of time that you won't have to do it can create a skew in the results of the tournament, favoring players who bothered to read between the lines of the tournament package.

If pools are not being used and you get three random scenarios (as was done for the Las Vegas Open - check out the Durin Show for some examples of that), chances are good that you won't get two maelstrom scenarios, two control scenarios, or two killing things scenarios. If this is the case, you can still say, "I don't want to play maelstrom" or "I don't want to control things" and just veto whichever one shows up. Ultimately, if you think certain scenarios are indeed the problem, as a tournament director, I have to tell you that planning ahead and forcing certain pools to be used made sure that certain lists didn't show up (because they knew they'd be hurting in at least one game out of three).

Third, if the Scenarios are from the same pool, players have to think about nuances in the Scenarios. The maelstorm scenarios (Hold Ground, Heirlooms of Ages Past, and Command the Battlefield) are pretty different from each other, as are the "weird" scenarios (Fog of War, Clash by Moonlight, and Assassination), but the killing things scenarios (Contest of Champions, Lords of Battle, and To The Death) and the control-based scenarios (Domination, Breakthrough, and Capture and Control) are pretty similar. How do you know which one to eliminate?

This kind of exercise is good - especially for experienced players. I mentioned earlier that for many armies, the differences between Domination and Breakthrough are pretty slim. I mean, it's five objectives that are each worth 1-2 pts vs. four objectives that are worth either 0-1 point, 1-2 points, or 2-4 points - and more so than Domination, you need to "be somewhere" vs. "being anywhere." Capture and Control looks pretty similar to both, except that the game can randomly end after one side is broken and you don't have to stay in contact with an objective to hold it. Those two things can have MASSIVE consequences for different armies.

Lessons Learned

Given our recent experience, here's what I've taken away from the Veto System: first and foremost, I like it. Having a choice of scenario means that you have more freedom in building your lists - if you KNOW you're playing To The Death, you want an army that will be hard to break and probably has a banner it can keep alive. Additionally, being able to choose the scenario allows you to look for nuances in scenarios that might favor you (like vetoing a game that has a random game length if you don't think you can be quartered). If you like playing to the bitter end (especially if you have one of those weird rules that allows you to not count as being Broken if you have a model alive), this can be a huge asset to you. Having choice puts the players in the driver seat more.

We did the veto system within pools - and I think this was a good move. Almost every version of the veto system I've seen has had randomly-selected scenarios in it - and this kind of structure, while interesting, allows an army to say, "I don't want to do control missions" and veto them. If you have two players - one who has a balanced list and is ready for anything and one who has <pick the list that you think breaks the game> - you could have the game-breaking list winning each round simply because it can say, "I'm just playing XYZ missions." 

Vetoing is powerful - and if you don't make all of the missions similar each round, you can have lists that "break the tournament" show up and ruin the fun of others. So don't let them do that - get a good spread of mission types for your tournament and make all the armies play all the different kinds of games. You can still bring your Goblin-town army or your Black Riders Legendary Legion if you want to - but the Goblin-town guys are probably being forced to play Lords of Battle or Contest of Champions (both of which could go disastrously) and the Black Riders are going to have to play a control mission (which could go disastrously).

One other thing that we discovered is that the down-time between games (especially if your game ended early) could be spent looking at who you're facing and what the scenarios are - and getting an idea for "what I don't want to play" (for one reason or another). Vetoing does add to the game time - but it doesn't have to be a big penalty. I would encourage other TOs to count on having longer-than-usual gaps in time - the players need to have some time to think about this before they commit to 2+ hours of playing a scenario. In an ideal world, they would think ahead of time about it, but let's be real - sometimes even those of us who plan ahead don't have a great idea of what we need when we get there.

Going Forward

I'm going to take straw polls before each tournament to see if my players want to use the Veto System - this keeps a tap on what they like to do (or if they want to change things up and have the scenarios known ahead of time). I will never use the randomly-determined system (it's just too much of a risk that someone won't have any fun), but either picking scenarios that exercise different army types or using the Veto System appears to be the best way to solve the "scenario problem."

What I really want to try is to also use the German scoring system with the Veto System - this doesn't change the scenarios, but does change how many tournament points you get based on the difference in score between you and your opponent's Victory Points for the round. If you can deny your opponent VPs, you can deny them Tournament Points too - which gives players another chance to be in the driver's seat (even if they think they have a match-up that they can't win).

I hope you enjoyed this little side post of mine - if you have thoughts on the Veto System, post them in the comments below. Until next time, happy hobbying!