Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
That's... an extreme (and some might way unwarranted) reaction.

But accurate. And you could add some clarity about what you referenced. Was this RPG actively shut down with new releases after 6 months? Well, less that 6 months? If so, it has the record.

Irdiumstern wrote:
There's also Epicalypse: Play using the Apocalypse rules, using Epic Scale figures, and replacing inches with cm.
If you're wanting something with the more modern units of 40k, this is a solid bet. There's even a group doing Datasheets for the new units GW has brought out since Apocalypse dropped.

Because Epic is better with CPs and cards

The_Real_Chris wrote:

Irdiumstern wrote:
There's also Epicalypse: Play using the Apocalypse rules, using Epic Scale figures, and replacing inches with cm.
If you're wanting something with the more modern units of 40k, this is a solid bet. There's even a group doing Datasheets for the new units GW has brought out since Apocalypse dropped.

Because Epic is better with CPs and cards

Less cards than you'd have playing NetEpic or any other variant of the SM / 2. edition lineage

It's mostly up to taste on which scale you want the game to operate at. 40k for squad level, Apocalypse works nicely on company level, Epic Armageddon on battallion level, 2. ed Epic and Epic40k a step above that with their further abstractions.

 Gregor Samsa wrote:
Although indeed very fringe, warmaster is not going away despite GWs best efforts. It is fairly cheap to get multiple armies for warmaster, which allows you to easily rope friends in. It is one of my favourite rule sets by GW and I play it often.

Warmaster is in fact GWs much successful rules system in terms of numbers of settings and implementations. Mechanically its probably the best they have done in terms of concept and execution, though AT, EpicA and Bloodbowl are also good (even if Bloodbowl is showing its age, its interesting how league implementations of BlitzBowl compete with it). My favourite version is Blitkrieg commander, though cold war commander is also good.

Epic 40K is from a time when GW was more heavily influenced by serious war games rules writing. It had some problems, a bit half baked. But lots of potential. Would love to see a fleshed out model range for the game. But will never happen. It would be too cost effective for the consumer.

The game system got a second and much more loved lease of life when it was used as the basis for BFG. But yes - if you think an Epic army is 50-100 elements (bases, tanks, etc.) to get the price point GW likes for army buy in the price per ounce gets a bit silly...

I think the EpicA implementation is the best so far if you like infantry and armour, though has problems doing justice to Titans. There are some good tweaks you can make and some interesting stuff that would need a fair bit of playtesting and balancing that has been knocked around over the years, but with the game no longer having a central development point you can no longer do that without fragmenting whoever is left player base wise.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sherrypie wrote:


Less cards than you'd have playing NetEpic or any other variant of the SM / 2. edition lineage

It's mostly up to taste on which scale you want the game to operate at. 40k for squad level, Apocalypse works nicely on company level, Epic Armageddon on battallion level, 2. ed Epic and Epic40k a step above that with their further abstractions.

Well those cards weren't actually part of the gameplay, they were the ready reference system for army creation and rules reference. Everything could have been on paper but it was clearer to use cards. 40k/Apoc use CPs and cards to introduce a tactical layer you don't otherwise have in the game due to the constrained playspace and other rule interactions. There are also in Apoc and 40k design decisions that purely exist for model reasons that the designers were instructed to include (you too can decide on whether of not to have a heavy stubber on your tank and actually have this have an in game effect!) to engage people with modelling for the game. I really wanted to like it, but stuff like my Chimera being as tough as my Leman Russ (outside cards) and having to worry about the lasgun array just made me want to play EpicA instead.

The_Real_Chris wrote:

 Sherrypie wrote:


Less cards than you'd have playing NetEpic or any other variant of the SM / 2. edition lineage

It's mostly up to taste on which scale you want the game to operate at. 40k for squad level, Apocalypse works nicely on company level, Epic Armageddon on battallion level, 2. ed Epic and Epic40k a step above that with their further abstractions.

Well those cards weren't actually part of the gameplay, they were the ready reference system for army creation and rules reference. Everything could have been on paper but it was clearer to use cards. 40k/Apoc use CPs and cards to introduce a tactical layer you don't otherwise have in the game due to the constrained playspace and other rule interactions. There are also in Apoc and 40k design decisions that purely exist for model reasons that the designers were instructed to include (you too can decide on whether of not to have a heavy stubber on your tank and actually have this have an in game effect!) to engage people with modelling for the game. I really wanted to like it, but stuff like my Chimera being as tough as my Leman Russ (outside cards) and having to worry about the lasgun array just made me want to play EpicA instead.

I know, but still, the amount of cardboard in pre-2000's GW games was sometimes quite hilarious. Apoc's cards are one of those things that are pretty simple to adjust on the players' preference without impacting the base game too much, and even unchanged, are still limited in number and effect unlike the 40k stratagems, which can often feel quite "gotcha" as they appear out of thin air. I'm not disputing that EpicA is by far the superior game of the two, but does also require a bit more thought put into it.

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
Epic 40K is a cautionary tale in edition change. The 1997 release salted the earth for existing players while not offering enough for newer ones. While the game mechanics were laudable, the game deliberately stripped out the flavour of the previous editions. It was DOA.

As a micro-armour player I liked the scale of Epic and have plenty of armies, but getting players was a problem. I am happy for those who keep it alive through various means, but I would be very surprised to see GW bring it back. It would need a wide range of SKUs to be viable and I just don't see the interest.

What made Epic 40K DOA was the stupid decision to reduce the amount of models the army box sets had, think they went down to 2 sprues... while increasing the price. It meant that Epic 40K was just too expensive to get into. The army box sets previously had I think 8 sprues if not more.

It was GW showing their greed.

Shame as Epic 40K is one of the best versions of Epic GW have ever made.

That said I strongly doubt that GW will ever do Epic again sadly.

 stonehorse wrote:

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
Epic 40K is a cautionary tale in edition change. The 1997 release salted the earth for existing players while not offering enough for newer ones. While the game mechanics were laudable, the game deliberately stripped out the flavour of the previous editions. It was DOA.

As a micro-armour player I liked the scale of Epic and have plenty of armies, but getting players was a problem. I am happy for those who keep it alive through various means, but I would be very surprised to see GW bring it back. It would need a wide range of SKUs to be viable and I just don't see the interest.

What made Epic 40K DOA was the stupid decision to reduce the amount of models the army box sets had, think they went down to 2 sprues... while increasing the price. It meant that Epic 40K was just too expensive to get into. The army box sets previously had I think 8 sprues if not more.

It was GW showing their greed.

Shame as Epic 40K is one of the best versions of Epic GW have ever made.

That said I strongly doubt that GW will ever do Epic again sadly.

Correct. It was also mind-boggling why they would change the base form of infantry. Seemed to me as a nudge to old Epic players like me:
"Hey dude, we don't want you here."

So I never spent a dime and focused on 40K and WHFB instead.

They basically convinced people they can play epic sized games using 40k models, why would they ever go back to Epic scale?

As for Epic, Warmaster etc being "alive", they're as much alive as other long OOP games that happen to have enough fans to produce 3rd party models- those in the know have a steady source of models and online contacts to support a playerbase, but it's not "alive" in that a brand new person won't just pop into the shop or even type "epic models" and buy into it easily. You either have to know someone that knows or you spend a lot of time figuring it out, at which point you might as well have doubts if this is worth the effort.

A decent sized Epic army from Onslaught or Vanguard is a cheaper starting point than your 1561-model Ultramarines army, but it's cool that they recognize that some people's Warhammer collection does indeed let them play Epic. Some crazy people play Adeptus Titanicus with their 40k scale Titans!

Cronch wrote:
They basically convinced people they can play epic sized games using 40k models, why would they ever go back to Epic scale?

Apocalypse was clearly intended for rare once- or twice-a-year events where players can spend all day on a game to use as many of their shiny toys as possible together. That's not practical for people to do every week, which is why AT & AI exist and Apocalypse is no longer on sale.

There's always going to be a market for games that take less than 3 hours to setup & play, and don't require the entire car to transport your models.

 Strg Alt wrote:

 stonehorse wrote:

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
Epic 40K is a cautionary tale in edition change. The 1997 release salted the earth for existing players while not offering enough for newer ones. While the game mechanics were laudable, the game deliberately stripped out the flavour of the previous editions. It was DOA.

As a micro-armour player I liked the scale of Epic and have plenty of armies, but getting players was a problem. I am happy for those who keep it alive through various means, but I would be very surprised to see GW bring it back. It would need a wide range of SKUs to be viable and I just don't see the interest.

What made Epic 40K DOA was the stupid decision to reduce the amount of models the army box sets had, think they went down to 2 sprues... while increasing the price. It meant that Epic 40K was just too expensive to get into. The army box sets previously had I think 8 sprues if not more.

It was GW showing their greed.

Shame as Epic 40K is one of the best versions of Epic GW have ever made.

That said I strongly doubt that GW will ever do Epic again sadly.

Correct. It was also mind-boggling why they would change the base form of infantry. Seemed to me as a nudge to old Epic players like me:
"Hey dude, we don't want you here."

So I never spent a dime and focused on 40K and WHFB instead.

You mean the conversion to the "battle line" base instead of the square? I'm pretty sure there was some language specifically saying the older square format was perfectly fine.

I miss Epic. I thought it looked amazing. Loved the scale of battles it evokes. I have very little left of my old collectiin, but I still have 2 Imperator Titans, one on sprue and one assembled and primed, I think. I might have a couple bettleback Warlords too. Haven't opened that box in a long time.

 xttz wrote:

Cronch wrote:
They basically convinced people they can play epic sized games using 40k models, why would they ever go back to Epic scale?

Apocalypse was clearly intended for rare once- or twice-a-year events where players can spend all day on a game to use as many of their shiny toys as possible together. That's not practical for people to do every week, which is why AT & AI exist and Apocalypse is no longer on sale.

modern 40k armies are basically 2 or 3x the size of 3rd edition ones, and include all sort of Epic-only previously models like airplanes and superheavies. The spectacle of fielding those big pieces is already in 40k. GW would obviously rather keep pushing people to expand their 40k collections than start much easier to manage epic.

All later Epics could use the previous models. By the time we get to Armageddon, the basing is entirely freewheeling as long as you're not over 4 cm or under 0.5 cm in any direction. Square, rectangular, round, banana, all fine.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:

 stonehorse wrote:

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
Epic 40K is a cautionary tale in edition change. The 1997 release salted the earth for existing players while not offering enough for newer ones. While the game mechanics were laudable, the game deliberately stripped out the flavour of the previous editions. It was DOA.

As a micro-armour player I liked the scale of Epic and have plenty of armies, but getting players was a problem. I am happy for those who keep it alive through various means, but I would be very surprised to see GW bring it back. It would need a wide range of SKUs to be viable and I just don't see the interest.

What made Epic 40K DOA was the stupid decision to reduce the amount of models the army box sets had, think they went down to 2 sprues... while increasing the price. It meant that Epic 40K was just too expensive to get into. The army box sets previously had I think 8 sprues if not more.

It was GW showing their greed.

Shame as Epic 40K is one of the best versions of Epic GW have ever made.

That said I strongly doubt that GW will ever do Epic again sadly.

Correct. It was also mind-boggling why they would change the base form of infantry. Seemed to me as a nudge to old Epic players like me:
"Hey dude, we don't want you here."

So I never spent a dime and focused on 40K and WHFB instead.

You mean the conversion to the "battle line" base instead of the square? I'm pretty sure there was some language specifically saying the older square format was perfectly fine.

I miss Epic. I thought it looked amazing. Loved the scale of battles it evokes. I have very little left of my old collectiin, but I still have 2 Imperator Titans, one on sprue and one assembled and primed, I think. I might have a couple bettleback Warlords too. Haven't opened that box in a long time.

Epic 40k introduced the strips, which I think look a lot better. In the Epic 40k rule book it says either strip or square are fine to use xnd don't make a massive difference.

It's obvious that GW uses digital models as a part of their production process now. If they were smart, they would find a way to auto lower the resolution of some details while perserving/pronouncing specific ones. Essentially semi-automate the conversion of current to epic sized. They could send out or buy a 3D scanner the missing core files.

Obviously this ignores the rest of the manufacturing process, which is all accounting and logisitics. I doubt the pencil pushers would say it's worth using up valuable production resources. However, access to the digital models for all of the core units shouldn't be an issue.

I am very hopeful that it will, I only buy official products and nothing would make me happier than to have a new edition + amazing new models for Epic.

With AI/AT already being out and about, I think it's not to far a stretch to say that it's at least an idea they've considered!

I think we will see it again.

AT has proven popular, and not just from its healthy discount boxes during the blink of an eye they’re available.

Whilst I’m still and will always be misty eyed for 2nd Ed Space Marine, I think Epic Armageddon eclipses it in terms of rules. It took the interesting elements from the otherwise a bit rubbish Epic 40,000 (which proved better suited to BFG), and merged them with 2nd Ed Space Marine.

I particularly liked the weapons having Anti Personnel (AP) and Anti Tank (AT) stats. This created a pleasing change in how useful different units were. Whereas in 2nd Ed, you could, eventually, plink even an Imperator to death with mere Bolters.

When we do see it return, I hope they bring back 2nd Ed Space Marine’s army selection. Company card, up to five Support Cards, and up to one Support Card. It allowed flexibility in terms of combined arms, without making the game unwieldy. Of particular note is that each Card could easily be made from a single blister (for metal stuff like tanks) or from a single plastic box.

See, Epic brings something to the table 40K doesn’t. And that’s the feel of being in charge of a wider, more strategic campaign. That it has a far more accessible entry price is no bad thing either.

Do I think we’ll see the plastic boxes as good as they used to be? Honestly, no. Each game system needs to be able to fund its own future after all. But on the flip side, we likely won’t see oddities such as the Stompas boxed set, which provided units for…welll….Space Marines, Orks, Eldar and Chaos. And Mole Mortars for Squats and IG.



Yeah. That was an odd one! Great if you collected multiple armies or had friends you could split the cost with - but not something I’d expect to see repeated in the modern day.

At a bare minimum, I’d be happy if a given plastic set comprises enough models for a complete Company Card. Certainly I don’t want to have to buy multiple to field a given Company Card.

^I didn't realize Space Marine had a 2nd edition. Or is that the same thing at Titan Legions? (I have TL, not SM.)

Titan Legions was a big box expansion that came out during Space Marine 2nd Ed.

Yeah. The original spun off from Adeptus Titanicus. Not sure which years it was available.

But 2nd Ed was around 1992/1993ish.

Frankly, I’d be surprised. The game has had multiple chances, and has never caught on. And don’t say ‘Wahhh, GW didn’t support it!’. They most certainly did. People yawned. Epic is an idea that sounds better in theory than practice.

 totalfailure wrote:
Frankly, I’d be surprised. The game has had multiple chances, and has never caught on. And don’t say ‘Wahhh, GW didn’t support it!’. They most certainly did. People yawned. Epic is an idea that sounds better in theory than practice.

...except it's still going strong with tournaments in UK, Australia, Canada, France and other places, sees active fan development in multiple branches, has spawned a thriving 3d modeling and sculpting community, is desired enough to keep multiple third party vendors in business, is always pined after in forums and social media by people "who'd totally buy into Titanicus if it included tanks and infantry", Epic: Armageddon is one of GW's most applauded rulesets and historically sold way over expectations and was mostly pulled due to internal shenanigans at GW and so on.

Like, what?

 the_scotsman wrote:
anyone can have any epic miniatures they want for a micro-fraction of what it costs to build a 40k army.

3d printer and you could probably make 3 epic armies with a single half-liter of resin.

That's why I don't think it will happen. I'm the first person to dismiss "3D PRINTING WILL KILL GW!!!" but when it comes to Epic, at such a small scale it wouldn't be difficult at all for your basic printer to mimic details pretty much perfectly.

The only way I see it happening is if they go for some weird scale like 17-20mm.

 Sherrypie wrote:

 totalfailure wrote:
Frankly, I’d be surprised. The game has had multiple chances, and has never caught on. And don’t say ‘Wahhh, GW didn’t support it!’. They most certainly did. People yawned. Epic is an idea that sounds better in theory than practice.

...except it's still going strong with tournaments in UK, Australia, Canada, France and other places, sees active fan development in multiple branches, has spawned a thriving 3d modeling and sculpting community, is desired enough to keep multiple third party vendors in business, is always pined after in forums and social media by people "who'd totally buy into Titanicus if it included tanks and infantry", Epic: Armageddon is one of GW's most applauded rulesets and historically sold way over expectations and was mostly pulled due to internal shenanigans at GW and so on.

Like, what?

That ship has already sailed. Let me translate your post for you ‘There is a small group of super hardcore keeping the game alive on the internet’. The game has had multiple chances to succeed. Another one won’t change the most basic fact - it isn’t a license to print money for GW. Those people saying ‘Golly, we’d buy it if only it had tanks and infantry, too’? Where were they, when the game they supposedly lust for, was, you know, actually available? Answer, they didn’t buy before, and won’t again. Everyone will praise how wonderful it was, but bottom line, Epic was a sales dud.

 totalfailure wrote:

 Sherrypie wrote:

 totalfailure wrote:
Frankly, I’d be surprised. The game has had multiple chances, and has never caught on. And don’t say ‘Wahhh, GW didn’t support it!’. They most certainly did. People yawned. Epic is an idea that sounds better in theory than practice.

...except it's still going strong with tournaments in UK, Australia, Canada, France and other places, sees active fan development in multiple branches, has spawned a thriving 3d modeling and sculpting community, is desired enough to keep multiple third party vendors in business, is always pined after in forums and social media by people "who'd totally buy into Titanicus if it included tanks and infantry", Epic: Armageddon is one of GW's most applauded rulesets and historically sold way over expectations and was mostly pulled due to internal shenanigans at GW and so on.

Like, what?

That ship has already sailed. Let me translate your post for you ‘There is a small group of super hardcore keeping the game alive on the internet’. The game has had multiple chances to succeed. Another one won’t change the most basic fact - it isn’t a license to print money for GW. Those people saying ‘Golly, we’d buy it if only it had tanks and infantry, too’? Where were they, when the game they supposedly lust for, was, you know, actually available? Answer, they didn’t buy before, and won’t again. Everyone will praise how wonderful it was, but bottom line, Epic was a sales dud.

How old are they?

Because it could be they were something like 10 then and 30+ now.

 totalfailure wrote:

 Sherrypie wrote:

 totalfailure wrote:
Frankly, I’d be surprised. The game has had multiple chances, and has never caught on. And don’t say ‘Wahhh, GW didn’t support it!’. They most certainly did. People yawned. Epic is an idea that sounds better in theory than practice.

...except it's still going strong with tournaments in UK, Australia, Canada, France and other places, sees active fan development in multiple branches, has spawned a thriving 3d modeling and sculpting community, is desired enough to keep multiple third party vendors in business, is always pined after in forums and social media by people "who'd totally buy into Titanicus if it included tanks and infantry", Epic: Armageddon is one of GW's most applauded rulesets and historically sold way over expectations and was mostly pulled due to internal shenanigans at GW and so on.

Like, what?

That ship has already sailed. Let me translate your post for you ‘There is a small group of super hardcore keeping the game alive on the internet’. The game has had multiple chances to succeed. Another one won’t change the most basic fact - it isn’t a license to print money for GW. Those people saying ‘Golly, we’d buy it if only it had tanks and infantry, too’? Where were they, when the game they supposedly lust for, was, you know, actually available? Answer, they didn’t buy before, and won’t again. Everyone will praise how wonderful it was, but bottom line, Epic was a sales dud.

There happens to be plenty of people who weren't able to make buying decisions for themselves 20 years ago. Also, Epic sold extremely well (400% numbers have floated around the web, but I can't verify how true that was. Point being, well above expectations) and was driven down by other factors (like the studio execs shafting the later production queues resulting in whole armies like E:A Chaos getting snipped before release) that eventually culminated in the Kirby era fiasco of nothing but space marines and their flagship games mattering. No marketing, shelf space or wide releases tends to be bad for games before widespread internet availability. Now? ANYTHING released by GW reaches massive audiences who are willing to buy stuff. Titanicus Warlord was GW's best selling model in 2018 and thousands of those were bought by people who already play Epic, same with Aeronautica planes. If they release GW quality plastics for 6 mm infantry, you can bet your house those will sell like hotcakes.

 totalfailure wrote:
Frankly, I’d be surprised. The game has had multiple chances, and has never caught on. And don’t say ‘Wahhh, GW didn’t support it!’. They most certainly did. People yawned. Epic is an idea that sounds better in theory than practice.

Sir, it is widely recommended that one doesn't post while drunk.

Space Marine/Titan Legions was GW's third game for a prolonged period, and was popular at the time.

Epic 40,000 had some great sculpts (and some iffy ones too, looking at you, Eldar Titans), but the shuffle to the rules definitely took away some of the popularity.

Epic: Armageddon, once the typos in the rulebook were sorted, had a great set of rules, but as this was the early Specialist Games era, there were limited resources available for releases in general, with few new sculpts - aside from the Feral Orks and the Siege regiment (whose name escapes me), I don't recall there being that much that was new released, and many factions never even made it back to being available to purchase. And this, lest we forget, is for a game that was selling ~400% of GW's internal estimates at the time.

Then someone cut the legs out from it even further, probably due to the Kirbyite focus on 40k Marines.

I'm not going to sit here preset a revisionist history that claims that the last two editions of Epic displaced 40k and WFB as the main game GW was producing at the time, but E:A was popular, at the very least. I have no doubts it'd've done better had all "core" factions been available, and if GW had actually continued to support it and the other Specialist Games, rather than killing off that studio, but what do I know? I was only playing the game at the time, and was involved with some of the community-led development of other factions.

Circa 1993 in my gaming ecosystem there was an active Epic (I think it was called Space Marine at the time) group that competed with the WW2 Microarmour group I played with for terrain at the FLGS. They had fun, loud games. As a university student I was already spending too much on WW2 Microarmour so I didn't join in but I thought their games looked fun.

Flash forward to 1997 and Epic comes out. As a fairly recent 40K player coming over from 1:285 WW2 this caught my eye and I dove in. None of the old guard Space Marine players, though, were interested. The game deliberately took out the flavour of the units/armies - the designer's notes celebrated that. Nobody was interested in playing. Sad panda.

It was dead on arrival. Nobody was playing. While I admired the system and the scale the game did not gain traction. My impression is that the company tried to keep it going, but I imagine the bottom line was an issue.

There are some fanatics playing - I tip my hat to them. If they are in Eastern Ontario send me a PM. I kept all my stuff and would be happy to roll some dice.

Gitdakka wrote:
Epic already has a pretty healthy community and rules are freely available. Its pretty easy to pick up and get started (at least with some of the factions).

I'm not really convinced that a GW reboot would improve anything. They would probably cluster the game full of strategems and such. They would most certainly rescale the minis in an attempt to make 3rd party minis and old collections obsolete, and thereby split the fans in two camps again. I think the game would remain more fresh if it is kept in the hands of the community.

Will just quote the above! Really active Epic community already if you check out the Facebook groups; I think with 3D printing and the new companies such as Vanguard and Onslaught selling proxies I don't think it has ever been healthier, possibly even when the game was on sale towards the end!

I did a guide some time ago which might be a little out of date now but will hopefully help anyone thinking of getting into the game
https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/751316.page

 totalfailure wrote:
Frankly, I’d be surprised. The game has had multiple chances, and has never caught on. And don’t say ‘Wahhh, GW didn’t support it!’. They most certainly did. People yawned. Epic is an idea that sounds better in theory than practice.

As much as I loved Epic, there's reasons it did not catch on.

My private tragedy: I used the original Adeptus Titanicus box to carry my army. Someone spilled a soda near it without cleaning up properly. The bottom softened and came apart while I was carrying it back to my car - right near a sewer grate. Many infantry and rhino models were lost to the drain.

The challenges of maintaining an army at that scale are myriad. I had turrets come off over a shag carpet and get lost forever in the threads. I had tails come off daemon knights that could not be repaired. On a positive note, I don't remember the paint chipping on a single model. But that was before I really knew how to paint, everything was a monotone and I didn't really care what it looked like.

The little, tiny frustrations become significant over time.