Sunday, August 30, 2009

Clever or what?

Just played my first game of 40K under 5th edition, having played a few games with 4th and decided that the game was perhaps a little broken. Well.. I actually quite enjoyed it, and am left with the impression that someone on their rules team has actually tried to be a little clever this time around. There is still the usual GW 'nonsense' .. I'm not overly enamoured of the GW model of codex/army updates that drives an endless cycle of updating broken armies that leaves other armies 'broken' in its turn. And as a less than regular user of their systems am often frustrated by the challenge of finding anything specific in their rules books versus codices, but...

Nevertheless there see to be genuine glimmers of cleverness in the new rules that i quite like. Te 'line of sight' system works far better than I thought it would. I like the fact that only troops choices can claim objectives.. there is some subtlety to that. The 'outflank' options for scouts and infiltrators adds an interesting dimension to the game, and the scenarios at the end of the rule book certainly make for some interesting possibilities, although i suspect that if one stuck with playing them, a short period of regular gaming would eventually lead to boredom. However there are enough other options around that creative gamers can use to make sure that that doesn't happen. For example I ran a clever little competition for a small group of boys who game at the school at which I work, based on a Daemon World, using suggestions from a WD.. a lot of fun was had by all.

So all in all I'd have to say I quite liked them.. and I'd play them again. Now, to dust off the Orks and Space Marines again..oh, and damn it all because of the changes to Codices, I need to buy and paint some more figures for both..THAT'S the part of the GW model that I dislike the most.


War of the Austrian Succession scenario ..

Adrian and I took the afternoon to play a War of the Austrian Succession game, using his 15mm armies and scenery...   it's too gorgeous ...