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so i was looking around the GW shop the other day and i happened upon battlefleet gothic the models look nice and it would be a blast to paint on to show off. Is this game worth playing or is it another blood bowl kind of thing.

GW has the rules for free on their site in supplements or something if you want them. Never played, though.

Battelfleet Gothic is a space combat game based in the Warhammer 40k universe. It is one of the specialist games, meaning that it is barely supported but the rules are free on the site. I have a few models and I have played a few games and it is fun.

Games Workshop Specialist and Unsupported Games is the forum you want to post in if you have any more questions about it.

When I started it was with BFG, and when you had to buy each new book. It's the only, anything I made sure was fully painted, and I have way more BFG than 40K.
If not for someone telling me they would play BFG if i started 40K I would not be here...and the rules for playing a mixed game of both were fun. To bad GW never gave it a chance.

RicBlasko wrote:When I started it was with BFG, and when you had to buy each new book. It's the only, anything I made sure was fully painted, and I have way more BFG than 40K.
If not for someone telling me they would play BFG if i started 40K I would not be here...and the rules for playing a mixed game of both were fun. To bad GW never gave it a chance.

They did give it a chance. It was a specialist game, so it was expected to have a short shelf life. But during its life, it got rather a lot of support, and even got some support after it was moved off shelves.

I'm actually kinda glad they've left it alone. The core rules are quite solid and, with the 2010 FAQ, all the forces are fairly well balanced(except Crons)

As long as GW leaves it alone, they can't mess the rules up

I enjoy it. The only problem I have with the game is how they handle normal weapon batteries, but my complaint won't mean anything if you don't know the rules.

the models look really good, i want to get a battle barge and paint it up like pre-heresy emprahs children

the game is alot of fun as well. its pretty tatical, and you dont need to spend thousands of dollars to get a decent fleet. i built a full imperial, chaos, ork and DE fleets for about 200$ each. mind, i also feature 2-3 bs, avg 8 cruisers and 10 or more escorts

There is no Battlefleet Gothic. The game has never existed. Nor will it ever exist. Now, please purchase this brand new 6th edition Warhammer 40,000 rule book, as well as Realm of Battle game board and corresponding paints, glues and hobby materials. You will come back when I click my fingers.. one, two, three...

I'm sorry, couldn't help myself

Seriously though BFG is a great game, although it can take a little while to get into at first, and it's likely your first few games will be at least 2-3 hours while you spend time looking at tables trying to work out how many dice you should be rolling. That being said, having capital ships slowly circle each other is really cool, and it has obvious potential to be used in campaigns alongside other systems.

It's a little difficult to get into these days, simply because the game is completely unsupported and the miniatures have had a massive price increase (way above even the other ranges) in comparison to when it was first released. Although, the rules are now available for free to download.

If you can live without the background I would probably go for something like Firestorm Armada which is still actively supported by the company that makes it (Spartan Games), has rules that are more intuitive and a bit faster to play, and you can buy a fleet for something like $40-45 or so.

I will say that, depending on what ship you order, it can take a while to get your ship. My buddy waited almost a month for his Emperor, they must have had to find the mold and make a new one.

i want to order a SM battlebarge and do a purple and gold or granite grey with crimson trim

Id actually love doing a Tyranid fleet if only the models werent terrible. I've seen people make them out of spare Tyranid bits, but they mostly end up looking like flying deathspitters/devourers/whatever with other bits stuck on.

eh! the nids looked . and don't bother with the GW tau fleet models go with FW ones if you get into tau.

Grey Templar wrote:I will say that, depending on what ship you order, it can take a while to get your ship. My buddy waited almost a month for his Emperor, they must have had to find the mold and make a new one.

More than that if I recall correctly...

It is the single greatest game they have ever created in terms of integrating their universe with actual game mechanics.

I have to say that I've been interested in playing BFG for a while - just a shame the ships cost a fortune and no one plays it

They arn't cheap, but you only need about a dozen escorts(3-4 packs) and 2-3 cruiser/battleships to play. So unless you want a huge fleet it shouldn't run you over $100

Gabrial Seth wrote:so i was looking around the GW shop the other day and i happened upon battlefleet gothic the models look nice and it would be a blast to paint on to show off. Is this game worth playing or is it another blood bowl kind of thing.

I was going to reply and say Yes, BFG is definitely worth playing.

But then I noticed you used Bloodbowl as an example of a game not worth playing.

Bloodbowl is a king amongst games, and you should feel bad for not liking it.

Kaldor wrote:Bloodbowl is a king amongst games, and you should feel bad for not liking it.

Whilst I entirely agree with the above statement, it is worth pointing out for the sake of clarity that Battlefleet Gothic is very different from Blood Bowl; it's possibly the closest GW have ever got to publishing a good tactical wargame. (So long as you stick to Imperial and Chaos fleets, anyway - the Tyranids and Necrons were rushed out without adequate playtesting, and are both horrendous.)

my memories of bloodbowl have been horrendous but not everyone has had that experience i played it about 5 years back and i did not enjoy it. I hope to order a SM battlebarge just because they look impressive.

In general i hear it is a good game, if you are looking for deep space combat thou i would probably try Firestorm Armada from spartan games, i hear it is also quite good and currently in production/supported.

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/games/firestorm-armada

English Assassin wrote:

Kaldor wrote:Bloodbowl is a king amongst games, and you should feel bad for not liking it.

Whilst I entirely agree with the above statement, it is worth pointing out for the sake of clarity that Battlefleet Gothic is very different from Blood Bowl; it's possibly the closest GW have ever got to publishing a good tactical wargame. (So long as you stick to Imperial and Chaos fleets, anyway - the Tyranids and Necrons were rushed out without adequate playtesting, and are both horrendous.)

Yes I agree on both counts. Eldar used to be pretty over-powered as well (I believe I read somewhere that Jervis Johnson was such a fan of the models, that he wanted them to excel on the tabletop )

Necrons were horrific, although to be honest I had pretty much stopped playing by the time they were introduced. IIRC my club banned them from being used, except for the occasional bit of fun when someone would play GM and come in with a single Necron capital ship during the middle of the game just to mess thing up

BFG is really good. It makes a great little collection possible for not that much money, especially if you collect chaos/imperial as they get the plastic cruisers. You can put together a 1.5k fleet for very little compared to a game like 40k, as you only need half a dozen ships or so.

The battle barge is a very good looking ship with nice rules. It excels in close range boarding and planetary assaults, as you would expect.

I find it a nice change of pace if I don't fancy playing 40k. Fleets are smaller and easier to transport too.

It looks like it, i didnt like the look of firestorm while it looks really good in some regards the models look a tad bit cheesy.

xxvaderxx wrote:Firestorm Armada from spartan games, i hear it is also quite good and currently in production/supported.

Pacific wrote:Firestorm Armada which is still actively supported by the company that makes it (Spartan Games)

I'm not sure exactly what you guys mean by 'support'.

BFG already has an extensive and complete range of models for all factions, and updated and freely available rules. How much more 'support' can you get? It's not like GW isn't selling the models, or the rules are out of print.