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Hmm. If GW did make prepainted models, everyone would repaint them anyway.
So, unless GW has had their head in a sandcastle for the past.... ever, then they won't make prepainted.


Of course, we can't quite rule out the sandcastle theory..........

I can't wait for Space Hulk no matter what the changes are. I'll end up using Chaos Terminators anyways . Unless of course the scale is drastically different. Fortunately I don't think that they will change the scale.

It's Space Hulk, one of the greatest Specialist Games ever released. I've even got it on my cell phone, that's how badass it is

Well they might be "redoing" it like some other games. New rule book($50 online only) and maybe some tile sets that will be overpriced if not in a box deal. Maybe they'll go back to charging $60+ to get the book/tiles/models.

Or maybe they will surprise us and actually release a specialist game that is supported again beyond the intial release like they used to do before stupid LoTr

NO! You can't invoke the 'specialist game' tag! Look what it did to Battle of Five Armies, and LotR was their baby at the time.

Better as a 'supplement' to 40K as in Cities of Death and whatever else is coming down the pipeline and keep it 'mainstream'. The tag 'SG' is just a tombstone.

*** Can I start a thread because I have my 4-69th Post? Heh, heh, heh. ***

Er, was Space Hulk ever a "Specialist Game"?

Wasn't Space Hulk long OOP by the time Specialist Games showed up?

Long OOP yes. It was never a Specialist Game.

BYE

Whatever, you know what I mean. Supplement wouldnt work as a title since it isnt a supplement. Its a whole different rules set. How about I just call it Special Game then?

How 'bout we just call it Space Hulk, and hope we get simple plastic minis in the correct scale and a set of rules that takes the best of 1st and the best of 2nd.

BYE

H.B.M.C. wrote:How 'bout we just call it Space Hulk, and hope we get simple plastic minis in the correct scale and a set of rules that takes the best of 1st and the best of 2nd.

BYE

Sadly that is highly unlikely UNLESS it is only sold in the online store. If it is an actual splash release in the stores....it will not use any of the old rules because that will confuse players

Why, exactly?

Space Hulk was a very simple and very tactical game. And why would you bother re-releasing it if you were going to make a completely different game?

BYE

H.B.M.C. wrote:Why, exactly?

Space Hulk was a very simple and very tactical game. And why would you bother re-releasing it if you were going to make a completely different game?

BYE

Because it's GW and will likely provide them with more cash.

If it uses the best of the old rules, or even brand new rules... I won't care because it's Space Hulk. I can't see why they would move TOO far away from the old system though.

Heh, from the sounds of things, people seem most excited about the possibility of new sexy terrain in the box (I dont blame them! That would be amazing)

H.B.M.C. wrote:Why, exactly?

Space Hulk was a very simple and very tactical game. And why would you bother re-releasing it if you were going to make a completely different game?

BYE

People seem to think this will be a box release. Box release would entail
Models(hopefully to size)
Tiles
Rulebook

Since Battle of Five Armies they have not released any new starters for the "specialist" games(yes SH was before Specialist games, but it is easier to simple call it a specialist game for now) and even went so far as to discontinue Battle Fleet Gothic Starters. When Necromunda was updated, they received
A new rule book, but still used mainly the older rule sets
Some new Gangs, not all of them where redone, but they did keep them Pewter

I do not see Space Hulk receiving a box set w/ out it being released in a box like starter. They don't seem willing to do that unless it is actually being released in the stores as well, example...look at the "rerelease" Gorkamorka. A lot of people thought new rules due to the new Ork Codex coming out and it was just a pdf of the old book. If that was the case, and they wanted to use it as a way to introduce people into the game like Mordheim use to do(skirmish introduction), than the rules need to remain close to the basics of the rules. Which would imply, to me at least, no 1e or 2e rules really.

Now if they did not do a box set for it and simply released some new tiles...and a new "updated" rule book than great. i would expect a lot of the old rules still in the game and there would be much rejoicing amongst veterans

edit: This also got me thinking...maybe they will be using this to ease into Planet Strike(or whatever the next Apoc expansion is called)? Link it back w BFG even...hardie har har...GW linking the game systems again. har har har

livingregret wrote:Since Mordheim they have not released any new starters for the "specialist" games

Battle of Five Armies received a Starter Box.

Platuan4th wrote:
Battle of Five Armies received a Starter Box.

Alright missed that one and i'll even update my post

I think we're wrong to think of it as a Specialist Game. I don't think that's how GW look at it either.

BYE

You should not think of this as a 'specialist game' release.

When GW sold the rights to many of their games to Fantasy Flight, they held the rights to their 'board games' that use miniatures, such as Space Hulk.

Space Hulk is treated as a stand-alone board game with miniatures that will indeed be released as a boxed set.


And HMBC: What were the positives of 2nd edition? I can't think of a change they made that I didn't hate.

Personally I'm praying for just a return to 1st edition with some of the variant weapon rules from Deathwing (like Assault Cannons, Lightning Claws, Thunder Hammers/Storm Shields, etc) and maybe a totally new psychic system in some advanced rules section.

Oooh, and I would totally love if they added rules for like a Broodlord or something like that.

I didn't see what the big difference between the two was aside from a cleaner set of Heavy Flamer rules. Sure, 2nd Ed didn't have the turn timer, but that's more of a personal preference thing.


And for the love of all that is holy, who in the Emperor's name is HMBC????????



BYE

I reckon it'll be standard scale figures, probably a simple recut of the AoBR Termies plus a couple of heavy flamers or similar, and stealers similar to the Macragge box - cheap as chips to make the moulds, nearly all the design work is already done.

Here's the sneaky sales angle - the back of the rule book will have advanced/optional rules for other weapons and biomorphs not in the included figures, and ever so subtle hints that you can buy the apprpriate model from GW.

Here's the other sneaky sales angle - there will be really cool plastic floor tiles, so that people like me will be forced to run out and buy three sets

I'm not so sure they care about terminator markdowns in a plastic set considering the AOBR terminators and the sheer cost effectiveness of that entire box.

And why would you bother re-releasing it if you were going to make a completely different game?

Name recognition and the preservation of concept. I personally think it will be a new game, more in line with the current ruleset. I fervently hope its a highly tactical game though, 40k needs a small scale tactics based ruleset. Killteam was crap and apocalypse took everything that could have been tactical in a largescale battle and threw it out the window.

I agree, ShumaGorath.

Every set of cheapo terminators sold to an new player is a player wanting more SMs for the rest of his army.

yakface wrote:And HMBC: What were the positives of 2nd edition? I can't think of a change they made that I didn't hate.

Personally I'm praying for just a return to 1st edition with some of the variant weapon rules from Deathwing (like Assault Cannons, Lightning Claws, Thunder Hammers/Storm Shields, etc) and maybe a totally new psychic system in some advanced rules section.

Oooh, and I would totally love if they added rules for like a Broodlord or something like that.

2nd ed had a few things that weren't bad. Viewed from the perspective of somebody enamored with 1st ed, it is easy to see why it is so reviled.

They were basically two different games, but the 2nd ed was still quite good because it offered challenging game play, if not more so than the 1st ed because of those damnable shooting dice. In short, it was the streamlining done to 2nd ed. that some people liked. The other was the sheer improvement of miniatures and graphic quality over the 1st edition of the game.

But there is a lot of splitting hair on opinions over the two editions. For example, the genestealer expansion was utter dreck. GW was just riding the coattails of the Origins award they won in '89 for deathwing expansion expecting to win big on that past merit.

I think that if GW can add the options that were offered in 1st ed, and still keep the quick gameplay of 2nd ed., then I beleive the new game will be better than the sum of its previous parts. Its a tough thing to draw that fine line. But if GW really want this game to sell well beyond an initial print run, it will have to be more than simply announcing to the public that SpaceHulk is back.

I really wish I knew what to expect from this re-release. Something completely new? Something rehashed? *shrug* I don't know, but my current project for SpaceHulk might have to be put on hiatus until I find out.

I hope they DON'T put Dark Eldar, Imperial Guardsmen, etc in the new edition. Space Hulk started going south when they messed with the formula, adding things like Genestealer Hybrids with guns and such. The 1st edition and maybe the first expansion were good; everything else was a mistake, IMO. That was one of GW's true classics, and should get a similar treatment that Talisman did, recently: a visual facelift, with the merest tweaking of the rules.

Space Hulk does NOT (IMO) need GW-style "support" in the form of an endless parade of rules expansions that unbalance the game and ruin its atmosphere. I believe it should be a stand-alone product.

I agree that Space Hulk should be a stand-alone product - that allows two players to field a single Elites unit against several mini-Troops units.

H.B.M.C. wrote:
And for the love of all that is holy, who in the Emperor's name is HMBC????????

C'mon now. You have an acronym for a name. You can't expect everyone to spell out what your name stands for in their head everytime they type it (although I do sometimes) and if I don't 'spell out' your name when typing it then it just becomes 4 letters, the middle two seem to be every easy to mix up when typing quick enough.

It's the bane of your screen name, you just have to live with it.

H.B.M.C. wrote:I didn't see what the big difference between the two was aside from a cleaner set of Heavy Flamer rules. Sure, 2nd Ed didn't have the turn timer, but that's more of a personal preference thing.

See, that was the wrong thing to say to me, given my affection for the perfection of the original game (sans expansions) compared to the abomination (okay, maybe that's a *bit* harsh, but you get the point) of 2nd edition.


The first edition of the game used two basic D6s for firing a storm bolter. If you were moving (or firing the first shot standing still) you needed a '6' to kill a stealer on either of those dice. If you stood still and fired a 2nd shot at the same stealer, you now needed a '5+'. If you kept standing still and firing at the same stealer you could get all the way down to a '3+' to kill.

Now, if you put that same terminator on overwatch, anytime he fired and rolled doubles, the gun would jam.


In 2nd edition, someone made the terrible decision to change this perfectly elegant system (I'll discuss likely why in a second). Instead they made 'custom' dice for firing. 4 sides of these dice were 'misses', one was an 'always kill' side and one side was a 'kill when standing still' side.

Essentially that means no matter how many times a termie stands still and fires at the same stealer, the best he can ever get 'to kill' was a 5+ (as only two sides of the dice have potential 'kills' on them).

This idiotic change to custom firing dice also meant they had to include ANOTHER die in the game, the 'jam' die, which is only rolled when firing on overwatch and provides the same chance to jam as rolling doubles on 2D6 (i.e. a 1 in 6 chance vs. a 6 in 36 chance).

So not only is the 2nd edition shooting system less elegant, it also makes your standard termies with stormbolters MUCH less reliable. In 1st edition if you stand and fire at a single stealer with all four of a terminator's APs, you can nearly guarantee that stealer will be dead. In the 2nd edition of the game it is not entirely uncommon to fire standing still four times at the same stealer and miss all four times.

So why in god's name did they do this? Well, I do have a theory. If there was one flaw (more of a 'quirk' really ) with the core game of 1st edition it was that once a Genestealer player played enough times he realized that the Heavy Flamer's one big weakness is that it only affects a piece of the board. That means in certain areas of the board where there are multiple 'smaller' sections near each other, a good stealer player can often space out his models one per section to guarantee that the flamer can only kill one stealer a turn until the flamer runs out of ammo.

This is a very 'gamey' tactic that does tip the balance of the game heavily towards the stealers in some scenarios.


In 2nd edition, they introduced a flamer that affects individual squares instead of an entire section. These new flamer rules, besides making the marine player's turn take longer (which may have led to them deciding to get rid of the timer), also made the heavy flamer MUCH more powerful in that you could kill EXACTLY the models you needed to kill and block EXACTLY the squares you needed to block while still leaving space open for your marines to run past.

I think they kind of had to make the basic marine less reliable because the heavy flamer was now so much more potent. If you left the storm bolter the way it was in 1st edition and just changed the heavy flamer all of a sudden the balance would be shifted way to far to the marines and you'd have to include more stealers on your blips to compensate.

But there are multiple problems with this. First of all: the revised flamer rules made the weapon feel way too precise. I mean, this is a freakin' FLAME-THROWER, you shouldn't be able to perfectly 'paint' exactly the areas you want to. It also added length to the game and made it harder for new players to understand how it worked without really adding any additional 'fun' into the game. . .which is kind of the definition of a crappy change to a game. Finally, it made the entire marine side rely on the heavy flamer. Once you ran out of ammo or, god-forbid the flamer guy died, the marine player is really in a world of hurt, which again isn't a good change to the game.


Finally, I would wholly disagree that the timer is just a personal preference. It is an integral part of the game for a couple of reasons. First, it helps to balance the marines. A marine player who can take as long as he likes to make his turn definitely has an advantage over a player who is timed, and I think the first game is definitely balanced to take this into account. Second, the timer actually creates fear and tension in the marine player which actually helps to instill some of the feelings in the player that the marines they are playing would likely be feeling.

For me, the first Space Hulk, because of the timer remains my favorite game of all-time because I've never played another board game that instilled me with that kind of excitement. Trying madly to finish your turn while the time ticks down is a crazy feeling. Alternatively, being the stealer player and maniacally announcing "30 seconds to go" when you know the marine player is never going to finish in time is simply a delight.


In short, I don't think there is anything 2nd edition added to the game that was positive while there are several things it most certainly ruined IMHO.

yakface wrote:You have an acronym for a name.

One that is very close to a very large banking corporation that most people have heard of (HSBC), and I doubt anyone has problems with that. And it only consists of four letters. People seem to get the H and the C right, so really what's so hard about B and M. They're even in alphabetical order for crying out loud. On the keyboard they're even separated by a whole other letter - luck letter N. No one's yet called me HBNC.

yakface wrote:The first edition of the game used two basic D6s for firing a storm bolter. If you were moving (or firing the first shot standing still) you needed a '6' to kill a stealer on either of those dice. If you stood still and fired a 2nd shot at the same stealer, you now needed a '5+'. If you kept standing still and firing at the same stealer you could get all the way down to a '3+' to kill.

Now, if you put that same terminator on overwatch, anytime he fired and rolled doubles, the gun would jam.

I don't have a lot of experience with 1st Ed, I'll admit that. I own both editions, and the expansions, but when I got them I jumped into the newer version first (for some reason my copy of 2nd Ed is French, so the guy supplied PDF of the English rulebook). You're probably right about the Stormbolter side of things, but for the exact 'gamey' reasons you described I still don't like the way 1st Ed did Heavy Flamers.

yakface wrote:But there are multiple problems with this. First of all: the revised flamer rules made the weapon feel way too precise. I mean, this is a freakin' FLAME-THROWER, you shouldn't be able to perfectly 'paint' exactly the areas you want to. It also added length to the game and made it harder for new players to understand how it worked without really adding any additional 'fun' into the game. . .which is kind of the definition of a crappy change to a game. Finally, it made the entire marine side rely on the heavy flamer. Once you ran out of ammo or, god-forbid the flamer guy died, the marine player is really in a world of hurt, which again isn't a good change to the game.

In the games I've played the Heavy Flamer guy was very important, and a huge threat to the Stealers, but the only times where his survival has been paramount has been when the objective of the mission was a room that needed burning. Beyond that he's been used more as a tactical tool - like a mobile wall really - and I just liked the way it worked.

yakface wrote:Finally, I would wholly disagree that the timer is just a personal preference. It is an integral part of the game for a couple of reasons. First, it helps to balance the marines. A marine player who can take as long as he likes to make his turn definitely has an advantage over a player who is timed, and I think the first game is definitely balanced to take this into account. Second, the timer actually creates fear and tension in the marine player which actually helps to instill some of the feelings in the player that the marines they are playing would likely be feeling.

For me, the first Space Hulk, because of the timer remains my favorite game of all-time because I've never played another board game that instilled me with that kind of excitement. Trying madly to finish your turn while the time ticks down is a crazy feeling. Alternatively, being the stealer player and maniacally announcing "30 seconds to go" when you know the marine player is never going to finish in time is simply a delight.

I don't think it would be impossible to play 2nd Ed with a timer.

yakface wrote:In short, I don't think there is anything 2nd edition added to the game that was positive...

A nicer set of floor tiles and better plastic Termies.

BYE

HMBC is obviously Half of Marneus Calgar's Brother. I dunno, maybe just his head or something...

Pariah Press wrote: I hope they DON'T put Dark Eldar, Imperial Guardsmen, etc in the new edition. Space Hulk started going south when they messed with the formula, adding things like Genestealer Hybrids with guns and such. The 1st edition and maybe the first expansion were good; everything else was a mistake, IMO. That was one of GW's true classics, and should get a similar treatment that Talisman did, recently: a visual facelift, with the merest tweaking of the rules.

Space Hulk does NOT (IMO) need GW-style "support" in the form of an endless parade of rules expansions that unbalance the game and ruin its atmosphere. I believe it should be a stand-alone product.

Can I get an amen for brother Pariah Press? And to Yakface (now that I read his post) as well. 1st Ed sits proudly in my personal top 5 list of best games ever. 2ed? No so much.

I'm actually hopeful that they'll do exactly what they did with Talisman... In fact, isn't the most likely reason that GW's re-releasing Spacehulk is to reassess their rights to the game? I thought I read somewhere that's why the re-released Taliman.

Anyway, if GW doesn't make a lot of changes, I'll be all over buying a copy of the new Spacehulk. If they go for a wholesale revamping of things, or try to throw in all the later drek they rolled into SH, I'll pass.

Vale,

JohnS

I only ever played the first edition (I have two boxes) and the Deathwing expansion.

I also have two copies of WD 120 which had some extra rules.

The first edition rules were brilliantly well designed, possibly one of the best games GW ever did. No-one I knew ever found it a slow-moving game.

None of the expansion rules were necessary. Some of them were good additions while others were rubbish brought in only to sell more figures.

The heavy flamer flaw mentioned by Yakface is fairly minor. It is justifiable because it makes gameplay simple and quick and can be alleviated by good scenario design.

Kilkrazy wrote:I only ever played the first edition (I have two boxes) and the Deathwing expansion.

I also have two copies of WD 120 which had some extra rules.

The first edition rules were brilliantly well designed, possibly one of the best games GW ever did. No-one I knew ever found it a slow-moving game.

None of the expansion rules were necessary. Some of them were good additions while others were rubbish brought in only to sell more figures.

The heavy flamer flaw mentioned by Yakface is fairly minor. It is justifiable because it makes gameplay simple and quick and can be alleviated by good scenario design.

Here's my Space Hulk 1st edition flamer house rule:

Flamers can be fired in a 'wide spread' which not only hits the section they're fired at, but also one square of every section adjacent to the target section. However, this wide spread reduces the potency of the flames and models in this area are only killed on a 4+ instead of 2+.


I've found this solves the issue rather nicely.


The thing I hope most about this new set is that it contains larger tiles that are compatible with the new terminator basing scheme, even though it means all my previous tiles won't be usable with it (I'll accept that loss for being able to use prettier models more easily).

I would also love if they included one or two other Tyranid unit types, although I'm not expecting that to really happen.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Except those who want things other than Stormbolters.

Or don't want to have to off-load any Orks.

Or extra Marines they don't want/need.

Or want models that can be posed.

Or want to do their own Chapter using FW shoulder pads.

Or want to do Deathwing.

Or want to do Wolf Guard.

Trust me, the multi part Terminators still sell plenty!



Actually John, I can think of a lot of reasons to buy the Termy box over Battle for Black Lagoon.

BYE