Tuesday, 5 March 2013

Going back to 40K - Part 1

So...I have a gigantic collection of Games Workshop miniatures and would like to do something with them other than sell them on eBay, wait for 7th Ed or use their boxes to prop open doors....

As mentioned in a previous post I am going to make a final attempt at building a balanced 'all-comers' list for 40K using the terribly, terribly unbalanced 6th Edition rule-set. Obviously making a balanced list using a 'throw every rule possible in a book and then add some more unnecessary ones' system isn't a particularly easy task and there are those people who (quite reasonably) say that Games Workshop don't really give a shit if it's possible to have a balanced competitive game using their system as the many little side boxes in their main rulebook seem to indicate.

There's also the additional issue that the current design concept for new codices appears to be designed around making you buy whatever model you didn't buy from the last codex* or purchasing whatever new model they really want to sell** from the new codex. Obviously there's always been an aspect of this *cough* Valkyries *cough* but it seems to be more commonplace now.

*Dark Angels being the big example of this.
**All Codices being an example of this ;-)

Of course we also have to deal with the primary 6th edition balance issue of Flyers. In my opinion you have three ways of dealing with the annoying flying bastards...

1) Take your own flyers.
2) Take a bazillion guns.
3) Take half a bazillion guns with the Skyfire rule.
4) Ignore them completely.

I'm not buying any new GW stuff so if I want to deal with the issue by taking my own flyers it would have to involve Stormravens or something my Forge World Chaos flyers can 'count-as'.


The bazillion guns option is always viable though the 'Skyfire' option will depend on the codex I use and the ignore them completely plan (though an option) will annoy me and also somewhat makes my 'build an all-comers list' plan a bit redundant.

Another problem is the fact that the new Chaos Daemon codex is a blatant attempt to sell more models and/or new models and to be fair they don't even seem to be bothering to deny it any-more. I haven't given it an in depth look yet, but even a cursory look shows that it has the potential to do to 6th Ed. 40K what the last Warhammer Fantasy one did to that system and unfortunately I don't have enough models to do a Daemon army anyway...not now anyway...One of the upsides is that the necessity to increase the amount of troops you take in this addition over the last one is a none issue as if I'm using a Marine variant (which I am), the one thing I'm not short of is Marines.

So either I'm being overly pessimistic (a possibility, admittedly) or just trying to give myself an excuse for failure in advance...


Still I've said it now and as Paris Hilton,Vanessa Hudgens and several other celebrities can testify to, once it's on the internet you can't really deny it happened...even if Vanessa Hudgens tried the denial angle to the bitter end, lol. So I'm going to have a go regardless...how I'm going to do it we'll discuss in the next post ;-)

Thoughts and comments are (as usual) most welcome.

3 comments:

  1. So far, honestly far too pessimistic and setting yourself up to fail. I have been playing 6th fairly constantly from release and find it a lot better than 5th.

    flyers are not the game breakers you make them out to be. Loads of ways to deal with them. In addition to what you said: twin linked is good as is out manouvering especially give how fixed flyer movement can be. Also the good old quad gun fortification or allies.

    Give it a go with a more positive attitude! I'll give you any more thoughts you want or dont want. But i completely agree with trying to cash in on new models but i figure most model companies have a similar approach!

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    1. Bits of 6th are better than 5th but the parts that are worse more than counter the few minor tweaks that they got right in my opinion.

      Most other game companies rely on the quality of the product to sell new models but unfortunately some of the new GW stuff is really quite average in appearance and their rules are wildly inconsistent.

      I'll give it a go but I can't see GW moving out of their current position of 3rd in my gaming priority list.

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    2. Also...I have had over 50 games of 6th Edition 40K so it's not like it was a 'knee jerk' reaction, lol.

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