In a way, yes characters were very centric back in the days, my gaming group went so far as to add some limitations on the game:
No unridden large monsters
No allied characters or warmachines except Dogs of War
No Power 3 spells
Magic Items with a points value of more than 50 cannot be included
Magic Items with a points value of more than 50 cannot be included
Only one war machine, for each regiment in the army
No Fly High
With these changes the game was much more like a game of real strategy where troops mattered, it was an easy fix, army selection became more balanced & no more spells that won games by themselves, but were still useful enough to use.
Games Workshop themselves saw the problem of Warhammer 5th edition & made some tournament restrictions of their own:
But what if you want to play the game as is? Is it unplayable? No, because even if you do play the game as it is, with all the beardy stuff, there are still plenty of ways to combat herohammer.
For starters, champions, back in these days, there were no such thing as overkill in challenges, which means that a lone champion with 1 single wound could bear the brunt of the attacks that Chaos Lord with Blade of Darting Seel & Potion of Strength inflicting 10 automatic S8 hits just made, it doesn´t matter that the champ dies, the champ will lose 1 wound & you will win the combat by just having a standard, a musician & some ranks, making the character lose frenzy & actually have a big shot of breaking him (CR 4 if full ranks vs CR1, he has to roll under 7 not to break). So champions seem like an autoinclude in any unit you think will see combat. Even with the 5:th edition changes that added overkill, the overkill was a max +3, so a lone champ dying means max 4 combat resolution, which means you would still win if you have a musician in a fully ranked unit with a standard.
& what about magic, well there were of course Dispel Scrolls, the Destroy Spell scroll, Talisman of Obsidian, Talisman of Fire, War Banner of Mork, some other protective Shields & banners, really the only way the opponent can get any spells through is if he uses Total Power or the Forbidden Rod (which had an errata in White Dwarf, making it less powerful), a level 3-4 wizard with 3 scrolls & maybe Talisman of Fire on some important unit should see you through most spells for a mere 100 points + the wizards cost.
Then of course there were a bunch of Magic Items which were meant to deal with these powerhouse characters without needing to be in any arms race, just look at the following Magic Items:
Black Amulet - Rebounds wounds onto the attacker on 4+. 50 Pts
Chaos Runeshield - Negates enemy magic weapons in basecontact, Chaos only. 50 Pts
Ring of Corin - Removes magic items with a cost of less than your roll. 50 Pts
Tress of Isoulde - Hit & wound on 2+, no armour saves, Bretonnia only. 35 pts
Van Horstmann's Speculum - Shift stats with those of the attacker. 35 Pts
Black Gem of Gnar - Lock wearer & 1 opponent in time until someone rolls a 6. 25 Pts
Heart of Woe - Explode when killed, causing hits on models closeby. 25 Pts
Not to mention these wonderful items made to combat heroes on flying monsters:
Talisman of Ravensdark - Flyers hit on 6's only, riders may not attack. 50 Pts
Sky Arrow of Naloer - May be used vs creatures flying high, causes D6 S10 hits. 30 Pts
So what if a Bloodthirster kills your hero, he just killed himself as well when facing that Black Amulet, or he may not fight at all due to Black gem or Talisman of Ravensdark, you get the idea, it was very easy to avoid the arms race by just using the right tools instead, you can give these cheap items to mere champions & it won´t cost you a fortune, 2 - 3 champions in your army with say the Black gem, the Speculum & maybe Sky Arrow of Naloer or the Black Amulet will stop the powerful enemy heroes in their tracks, usually for a mere 1/5 of the cost, not only will they be able to remove them, even if they fail, they make sure that the opponent will lose combat due to only causing 1 single wound in combat.
If you look at my tournament Empire army, you´ll see that it was designed to combat powerful enemy characters by using 3 scrolls, the Black gem & The Heart of Woe, it meant that my average humans, who aren´t powerful (or even average at all), could go toe to toe vs Daemon princes & mighty champions of Chaos, making them fear average Joe.
There are of course some units which are great at taking care of characters as well, Goblin netters & War dancers excel at keeping a character locked in combat for ages. Giants are great fun as well, if they should happen to eat a character he won't get any saves, yes it's random, but imagine the face of your opponent when the giant eats his Necromancer lord!
Unbreakable cheap troops are really nice as well, Flagellants cost a mere 10 Points each, with a Toughness of 4 they´re quite durable, 20 of these will hold up a character for a couple of rounds, even if he has some mates with him, cheap roadblock that can actually fight as well. Slayers fill the same role as Flagellants, although a bit more expensive they are also more useful if the character is riding a monster!
So what is my point with this rambling, well I just want to point out that herohammer can be beaten, using troops & lowbie champions, once you´ve done this a couple of times, I bet your opponent will Think twice before including his Bloodthirster in every 2000 points skirmish, maybe the High Elf lord lets the Dragon stay at home next time, fearful of wasting too many points on something that might do nothing & when he starts realizing this, then he will most likely put his lord inside a unit with a champion of his own, now you have a proper wargame about troops instead of what has wrongly been called "Herohammer"
No Fly High
With these changes the game was much more like a game of real strategy where troops mattered, it was an easy fix, army selection became more balanced & no more spells that won games by themselves, but were still useful enough to use.
Games Workshop themselves saw the problem of Warhammer 5th edition & made some tournament restrictions of their own:
But what if you want to play the game as is? Is it unplayable? No, because even if you do play the game as it is, with all the beardy stuff, there are still plenty of ways to combat herohammer.
For starters, champions, back in these days, there were no such thing as overkill in challenges, which means that a lone champion with 1 single wound could bear the brunt of the attacks that Chaos Lord with Blade of Darting Seel & Potion of Strength inflicting 10 automatic S8 hits just made, it doesn´t matter that the champ dies, the champ will lose 1 wound & you will win the combat by just having a standard, a musician & some ranks, making the character lose frenzy & actually have a big shot of breaking him (CR 4 if full ranks vs CR1, he has to roll under 7 not to break). So champions seem like an autoinclude in any unit you think will see combat. Even with the 5:th edition changes that added overkill, the overkill was a max +3, so a lone champ dying means max 4 combat resolution, which means you would still win if you have a musician in a fully ranked unit with a standard.
& what about magic, well there were of course Dispel Scrolls, the Destroy Spell scroll, Talisman of Obsidian, Talisman of Fire, War Banner of Mork, some other protective Shields & banners, really the only way the opponent can get any spells through is if he uses Total Power or the Forbidden Rod (which had an errata in White Dwarf, making it less powerful), a level 3-4 wizard with 3 scrolls & maybe Talisman of Fire on some important unit should see you through most spells for a mere 100 points + the wizards cost.
Then of course there were a bunch of Magic Items which were meant to deal with these powerhouse characters without needing to be in any arms race, just look at the following Magic Items:
Black Amulet - Rebounds wounds onto the attacker on 4+. 50 Pts
Chaos Runeshield - Negates enemy magic weapons in basecontact, Chaos only. 50 Pts
Ring of Corin - Removes magic items with a cost of less than your roll. 50 Pts
Tress of Isoulde - Hit & wound on 2+, no armour saves, Bretonnia only. 35 pts
Van Horstmann's Speculum - Shift stats with those of the attacker. 35 Pts
Black Gem of Gnar - Lock wearer & 1 opponent in time until someone rolls a 6. 25 Pts
Heart of Woe - Explode when killed, causing hits on models closeby. 25 Pts
Not to mention these wonderful items made to combat heroes on flying monsters:
Talisman of Ravensdark - Flyers hit on 6's only, riders may not attack. 50 Pts
Sky Arrow of Naloer - May be used vs creatures flying high, causes D6 S10 hits. 30 Pts
Locked in time, again....
So what if a Bloodthirster kills your hero, he just killed himself as well when facing that Black Amulet, or he may not fight at all due to Black gem or Talisman of Ravensdark, you get the idea, it was very easy to avoid the arms race by just using the right tools instead, you can give these cheap items to mere champions & it won´t cost you a fortune, 2 - 3 champions in your army with say the Black gem, the Speculum & maybe Sky Arrow of Naloer or the Black Amulet will stop the powerful enemy heroes in their tracks, usually for a mere 1/5 of the cost, not only will they be able to remove them, even if they fail, they make sure that the opponent will lose combat due to only causing 1 single wound in combat.
If you look at my tournament Empire army, you´ll see that it was designed to combat powerful enemy characters by using 3 scrolls, the Black gem & The Heart of Woe, it meant that my average humans, who aren´t powerful (or even average at all), could go toe to toe vs Daemon princes & mighty champions of Chaos, making them fear average Joe.
There are of course some units which are great at taking care of characters as well, Goblin netters & War dancers excel at keeping a character locked in combat for ages. Giants are great fun as well, if they should happen to eat a character he won't get any saves, yes it's random, but imagine the face of your opponent when the giant eats his Necromancer lord!
Unbreakable cheap troops are really nice as well, Flagellants cost a mere 10 Points each, with a Toughness of 4 they´re quite durable, 20 of these will hold up a character for a couple of rounds, even if he has some mates with him, cheap roadblock that can actually fight as well. Slayers fill the same role as Flagellants, although a bit more expensive they are also more useful if the character is riding a monster!
So what is my point with this rambling, well I just want to point out that herohammer can be beaten, using troops & lowbie champions, once you´ve done this a couple of times, I bet your opponent will Think twice before including his Bloodthirster in every 2000 points skirmish, maybe the High Elf lord lets the Dragon stay at home next time, fearful of wasting too many points on something that might do nothing & when he starts realizing this, then he will most likely put his lord inside a unit with a champion of his own, now you have a proper wargame about troops instead of what has wrongly been called "Herohammer"
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