Plague Brute

Such a happy smiling face! What happens when you find an old mono-pose Hellbrute laying around while you are building up your Death Guard?
 

That is in fact the model from the 2012 6th Edition started box set. Nice enough, but I wasn't really doing Chaos much at the time. So in the dark of the Pile of Shame it waited...

A deep dive into my bits bins and a little bit of green stuff, presto changeo! Parts from the (newest) Beast of Nurgle, Chaos Spawn, for the head and tentacles. Death Guard Marines for Plague sprayer under the power fist. Less a insane, raging, Chaos marine trapped for all time, and more of a insane, happy, daemon, ready to spread the love of Grandfather Nurgle.

Go Build Something

Reduce the Pile

A Rant (Pt. II)

 

>>>Well, this is a little awkward. I really didn't think GW would be announcing 40K Tenth Edition yesterday. I guessed the teaser was for a relaunch of Space Hulk using the fancy Gallowdark terrain. Oh well. Still possible...

I will give some thoughts on 10th as I get more details. On with the Show!<<<

You have 30+ years of 40K minis but the current edition ruleset doesn't tweak your twinkie? What to do?

A: Make your own ruleset! Well, that is an awful lot of work, so no.

B: Play an older edition! Sure, that does work, it's not like the Ordo Praecepta will show up and stop you. Well probably not, it's not like you can expect what they will do.

 

This big disadvantage of this is no official stats for newer units. So more work.

B2: This does include the last version of 40K Apocalypse, which was a very good ruleset. Shame it didn't really gain any traction.

C: Find some new rules that somebody else made! Yes. Let's do that.

There are only a few candidates for full 40K sized games. The market is skewed towards skirmish sized games at the moment, with many good choices. Which I will get into at a later post.

Wiley Games's well done Fistfull of Lead. It did start out as a skirmish sized game, but the Sci-Fi version Galactic Heroes includes vehicles for much larger battles. Wiley has just recently released a 40K conversion, Codex Galactica. I have not played this yet, but I am in the process of reading the rules.

The other popular ruleset I have played (a lot) is of course, Grimdark Future by One Page Rules.

It has grown a bit past one page in the last few years, but is still a very streamlined system with only a handful of special rules. OPR (One Page Rules) has done all the work in making stats for nearly all of the current 40K units, and is updating them. Just don't expect them to behave exactly like they do in 40K. 

If you are a Patron, you get access to the unit builder so you can add new units, or just re-do a unit that is more pleasing to you. A full review of these rules is just around the corner.

Brand new, and just completed their Kickstarter is Warsurge. It is a universal rulebook, letting you generate stats for all the models in your collection. It is supported by an App. I leaned about it after the Kickstarter had closed, so I didn't get in on it. I am very interested and will look into picking up a set of the rules and report back.

And of course, who knows what 40K Tenth Edition will bring later this year? More of the more, more special rules? Or a house cleaning like 8th (mostly) or something else? I guess we will see, and fairly soon too. I would really love it if 40K went a bit back to basics.

The Emperor Protects

But You Still Have to Do Some Research

A Rant (Pt. I)

 

Since 1990 I have played Warhammer 40,000. I picked up the hardcover Rogue Trader book way back when I was stationed out in South Dakota. Didn't really get into it fully until the famous Red and Yellow books came out.

Those two books helped 40K really turn into a miniatures wargame. And so the whole Warhammer "rules-not-in-one-place" syndrome was born. Not that this was a Games Workshop only problem, far from it. AD&D, Car Wars, Starfleet Battles (worst offender), and Battletech all suffered from this. Game companys are after all, a business. If they don't expand they can't make the sweet cash and will die. Fans of a system want more, and the companies are usually happy to provide. 

Then the Battle Manual basicly redid the shooting and close combat phases completely. It was kinda a beta test for 40K Second edition. It worked splendidly. A far more streamlined system. Let's not talk about the short lived Vehicle Manual...

 

Second Edition arrived and it was Good. All the rules in one glorious box!

The Codexes came out at a slow rate, but had all the info for your army. Sure the rules were still a tad clunky, and the Psychic phase card game was...a thing, but it worked. The special rules were few and mostly army specific.

Third edition changed a few base ideas (like AP) but was the same basic 40K. As more Editions came out, the special rules kept growing and growing. By 7th it was a teetering mass about to collapse under its own weight. 

8th edition base rules were much cleaner (and better in my opinion), but still the amount of army special rules was a bit much. And only got worse. Unless you were playing the same army a lot, the game crawled along  as both side had to keep looking at their Codex, Strategy Cards, and whatever other supplement that supported their force. It was a bit much for not that great a return on play.

And then 9th...Main rules much cleaner, for the most part.

The Codexes. Special rule modified more special rules. I do like some nice "chrome" for the individual armies, but Emperor's teeth, so many! Is not for me. It seems tailored for the competitive play crowd, and that's fine, but like I said not for me, or my small gaming group. Too many fine detail combos and other shenanigans. Plus more Campaign books with more special rules. Yikes.

So I've played a lot less 40K in the past year or so. But I still love the minis, the universe, and rolling dice to decide the fates of toy soldiers. What to do?

Find out next week.

The Emperor Protects

But His Scribes Can Get Out of Hand

Death Guard Footsloggers

 

Everybody's favorite disease vectors are nearing completion. I just finished up 25 power armored Plague Marines.

Quite a lot of fun to paint. Very freeing with the heavy shading. Building them was entertaining as well. I'm not real sure on the exact squad composition, but I'm sure I can field two-10 unit squads without issue. I just wanted to make most of the cool weapon loadouts.

Now it is time to tackle a fun little dreadnought modification project.

Go Sling Some Paint

Just Wash Your Hands After