We Have Reserves: Difference between revisions

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** Even the Dark Eldar have reserves, in a weird way (though not usually in tabletop terms). Almost all of the Dark Eldar race are clones quickly and cheaply, with live born children (called Trueborn) are considered special and are pampered and taken care of (and get their own unit). Oh and if you kill one of the leaders, so long as they get some of the corpse (not all, some) back to the [[Torture Technician|Haemonculi]] within a certain amount of time (usually a day) then the Haemonculi can regenerate their entire body. So even if you kill the leaders, they'll be back later. Some Haemonculi have consider death to be an interesting experience. Reserves indeed.

** Just about the only faction that doesn't have reserves are the Space Marines. That said, they rarely need them, traditionally being sent in for quick strikes and special operations that the Imperial Guard can't handle alone (and if they ever ''do'' need reserves, they can just borrow some from the Guard).

* The Skaven from good old fashioned [[Warhammer Fantasy Battle]] have a racial rule called ''life is cheap'' which lets them bypass the game's taboo for shooting into close combat. Which doesn't seem quite that impressive until you realize they're one of the few armies with ready access to Gatling guns and flame throwers in the game's ~~medieval~~ setting.

* The Skaven from good old fashioned [[Warhammer Fantasy Battle]] have a racial rule called ''life is cheap'' which lets them bypass the game's taboo for shooting into close combat. Which doesn't seem quite that impressive until you realize they're one of the few armies with ready access to Gatling guns and flame throwers in the game's renaissance setting.

** This is a bit of an interesting example in that sacrificing their own troops is actually a necessity. Skaven are literally designed for it, breeding like the rodents they are based off of and eating more than the average human due to their high metabolisms. If not for this they would suffer from severe overpopulation and political instability (well, more than usual) as a result. Of course, this doesn't mean they aren't evil little bastards.

** In the background Dark Elves do this with slave troops (one story has them herd their recently captured slaves onto the battlefield where they shoot them down to serve as cover, interfere with the enemies cavalry and to demoralise the enemy (it works)) though it doesn't happen in the game itself.

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* ''[[Advance Wars]]: Days of Ruin'' plays this straight, with everyone you're supposed to dislike being shown treating their troops like, well, pawns in chess. Meanwhile, anyone sympathetic is guaranteed to give [[Big Bad]] Caulder a lecture on the importance of human life. (The one character who says nothing either way is decidedly gray in most other aspects of characterization).

** Hawke directly uses this line of reasoning before the battle Rain Of Fire, fought around an active volcano (to force the heroes into a land battle rather than an aerial one). And he's the most ''sympathetic'' of the villains.

** Meta example: Mech Spam tactics. These tactics involve taking advantage of the fact that, at most, one unit can kill a single unit per player phase by using large amounts of cheap, weak Mechs to block attacks on [[Glass Cannon|strong but fragile]] artillery units, which in turn can be used to kill units who attack the Mechs.

** Meta example: Mech Spam tactics. These tactics involve taking advantage of the fact that, at most, one unit can kill a single unit per player phase by using large amounts of cheap, weak Mechs (as in Mechanized Infantry) to block attacks on [[Glass Cannon|strong but fragile]] artillery units, which in turn can be used to kill units who attack the Mechs.

*** Keep in mind that it's "Mech" like in "Mechanised Infantry" not like in "[[Mecha-Mooks]]".

* ''[[Suikoden II]]'': Luca Blight kicks off the game by slaughtering his troops under a false flag.

* The ''[[City of Villains]]'' Mastermind Archetype, 'Traps' has a move that allows you to turn your own minions into walking bombs. If you're using Zombies or Robots, they just plain blow up, while more human minions such as mercenaries, thugs and ninjas - will try to put down the bomb and run away. Which doesn't always work very well, seeing as the bombs have pretty short fuses.