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I am getting old, but what edition was the Eye of Terror: Lost and the Damned from again?

3rd Edition.

Fantastic book. I miss my LatD.

I think a few folks here might appreciate this. Fanzine that looks like the good ol' White Dwarf:

https://herohammer-fanzine.com/

VBS wrote:
I think a few folks here might appreciate this. Fanzine that looks like the good ol' White Dwarf:

https://herohammer-fanzine.com/

This is amazing!

My copy of Hive War rule book shipped on Friday....I’m jonesing for it, man!

Never owned it before, and need to read all those rules and unit descriptions like....now!

I’m also seriously considering investing in a 3D resin printer. My mate’s one has my interest piqued.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I’m also seriously considering investing in a 3D resin printer. My mate’s one has my interest piqued.

Friend of mine has been printing some teeny tiny Wood Elf stuff recently. It looks pretty impressive given its size.

3D printing seems like the perfect thing for games on that scale.

Indeed. Tiny models print fast, and don’t require the resolution larger scales do.

But, the kit and kaboodle is around £500.

It’s not outside my pocket as such, but might wait for my annual bonus in June. Spesh as I’m rejigging the flat now I’ve got the spare room back, and as a result I bought a new sofa bed today.

The good news of course is like buying a new army, it’s pretty much a one-time cash sink. From there I will need supplies and the odd replacement part, but the main chunk of spending is all done.

It sounds like you have talked yourself into it right there MDG ..

I think they're great, for games like Epic especially. If you join some of the Epic FB groups there are tons of guys on there doing some mad projects, copies of the FW Heresy stuff, Admech armies and all sorts.

First need to setup my hobby room/home office, and get that settled in.

Fan of the original Necromunda game rules (and Outlanders). Simple for the most part and easy to use. Made for a generic game where everyone had a good idea of the threats carried by other gangs. So very few points were a disagreement could start...which meant quick and enjoyable games.

Got my gaming buddies back on board as I repaint and rebuild the terrain for a campaign as soon as COVID ends. For pictures check out my Necromunda painting log.

My two cents,

CB

I’ve now received the Hive War rule book.

Had a quick flick through this afternoon, but planning an early night, so will have a good old read tonight whilst tucked up.

You should do a Kyoto-style review, going over the content with page scans and whatnot.

Sadly, I have no scanner :(

I am however considering a historical review type thread on GW army selection methods through the ages.

No real point to it, but figure people might be interested.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Sadly, I have no scanner :(

I am however considering a historical review type thread on GW army selection methods through the ages.

No real point to it, but figure people might be interested.

"Y'all have phones, right?" - Blizzard

I remember my first game of 40k: Rogue Trader, at a GW shop. I was about ten years old. The table was green and had hills and woods, basically Fantasy Battle terrain.

It was 5 marines vs 8 orks from the plastic boxed sets, and they had printed some cheat sheets like this:
Orc with bolter - 4+ to hit, 4+ to wound, marine gets 4+ save. Heavy plasma gun - 4+ to hit, 2+ to wound, no save.

In RT instead of an advance or march, you could do reserve move after the shooting phase if you did not shoot, and each model was an individual even if they were part of the squad. The staff showed us a trick to protect our heavy weapons: have two infantry stand in front of it, move out so it could shoot, then reserve move back in so the opponent could not shoot it back. I am sure this little ploy got nerfed later in the edition.

So I was hooked and bought the rulebook. We got together for our first game without me actually having read it, and struggled without the cheat sheets - in the equipment section, the weapons profiles didn't say what roll was needed to hit! But I carried that book everywhere with me and must have read it a hundred times. I recently picked a copy and was delighted to read it again.

I was set for going in to Rogue Trader, and I remember being in Brighton at the time.

Finding the shop was a bit of a sod (tiny, twisting lanes), but we got there in the end.

Sadly, perhaps fortunately, they weren’t selling RT, as 2nd Ed was just around the corner. Think we might’ve picked up some Genestealer Hybrids for Space Hulk instead.

Personally, I have a lot of love for stuff that's older than I am, in gaming as well as in other walks of life.

While I started 'Hammering with the 5th-6th edition change of Fantasy Battle as a kid, twenty years later I'm still grabbed by the sleek design of Space Hulk, sheer creativity of Rogue Trader and Realms of Chaos, loving the way current Titanicus incorporates elements from both the original AT'88 as well as BFG and so on. Collecting older White Dwarves and rules texts is a dear part of the hobby that gives both joy and a good library of design ideas for my own projects (currently brewing up a hybrid RPG with elements of Space Hulk, Rackham's Confrontation and Chaos Gate, as an example).

Diving deep into various forms of Epic is maybe the hottest thing at the moment, with Armageddon tickling the tactical fancy but the siren song of wilder ID / NetE megabattles is getting stronger...

A question for you Doc and anyone else who can help:

I am undecided about picking up a copy of the 1st ed Battle Manual for £50 off ebay. I used to own it but need reminding what is actually in it.

The purpose would be twofold: for the joy of the artwork etc, although I reckon a lot of this is replicated in the 2nd ed Battle Manual which I have already.

Also for the rules, when I get round to playing 1st ed again (I will be modifying the core rules anyway). How much is combat rules, and how much just a list of the guns?

Ta


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I should say I have every White Dwarf from the era so don't need the Compendium etc, and have already decided against trying to use the Vehicle Manual in any way (although I would still love to own a copy if I ever find it at a reasonable price).

Hmm.. you know that's probably the book I know least about. I've had a read online and it sounds like the final Rogue Trader rules release and almost a proto 2nd-edition? i.e. most of the rules that are in there, and like you say the artwork and layout very similar to the core 2nd edition Battle Manual.

£50 doesn't sound like a bad price though as it looks like there have been copies going for a lot more! I wonder if it sold less at the time as people knew second edition was coming? I guess if you are trying to get a completionist set then it would make sense. If if its just for playing you could say it might pay just to get the 2nd ed. books if its a similar experience, and the core set rules are usually pretty cheap to get hold of.

 PaddyMick wrote:
A question for you Doc and anyone else who can help:

I am undecided about picking up a copy of the 1st ed Battle Manual for £50 off ebay. I used to own it but need reminding what is actually in it.

The purpose would be twofold: for the joy of the artwork etc, although I reckon a lot of this is replicated in the 2nd ed Battle Manual which I have already.

Also for the rules, when I get round to playing 1st ed again (I will be modifying the core rules anyway). How much is combat rules, and how much just a list of the guns?

Ta


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I should say I have every White Dwarf from the era so don't need the Compendium etc, and have already decided against trying to use the Vehicle Manual in any way (although I would still love to own a copy if I ever find it at a reasonable price).

I’ll grab my copy!

Here’s the ingredients page.

Thanks both, you have confirmed my suspicion that it's probably not worth it for me, cool as it would be to own a copy. The contents show 1/3 rules, many of which look like 2nd ed headers (parrying!) and 2/3 guns, but everything added since the RT core book was usually a weapon unique to a single unit.

Yeah 1st ed evolved sporadically and I think 2nd ed was really a tidy up, and a clean break from roleplaying, but the game had been heading in that direction since the first army list (I wanna say ultramarines?) - so like you say Pacific, once we get to this book, it's almost 2nd ed anyway.

There are some differences.

Weapons lack tank armour penetration profiles, as it was D6+S, rather than the far more complex one of 2nd Ed (Lascannons were 3D6 if memory serves? Maybe 3D6+6).

HTH is the same, except multiple rolls of 6 didn’t increase your score. I suspect that was introduced to 2nd Ed because with 1’s reducing your score, having lots of attacks could easily become a liability.

I say grab it anyway, if only for sake of completeness

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


I say grab it anyway, if only for sake of completeness

Aha! well now that's the thing isn't it... you can only have so many collections... my personal goal is issues 1-150(ish!) of White Dwarf... got about 100 so far, and £50 could buy me a very early issue or two.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
There are some differences.

Weapons lack tank armour penetration profiles, as it was D6+S, rather than the far more complex one of 2nd Ed (Lascannons were 3D6 if memory serves? Maybe 3D6+6).

HTH is the same, except multiple rolls of 6 didn’t increase your score. I suspect that was introduced to 2nd Ed because with 1’s reducing your score, having lots of attacks could easily become a liability.

I say grab it anyway, if only for sake of completeness

Having just checked, the Battle Manual has a summary of armour penetration scores at the back; the full rules for that were in the Vehicle Manual which came along a few months later. The armour penetration value of a weapon was D6 + Strength + variable damage. So a lascannon with S 9 and 2D6 damage had an AP of 3D6 + 9. Second edition removed the two special attacks allowed against vehicles and gave close combat weapons a bonus die based on the strength of the weapon.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
I managed to get a game of Epic Armageddon in the other night; my 1st edition-vintage Imperial Guard vs Space Marines. My presumably somewhat heretical Guardsmen were given a good shoeing by the Marines, with my infantry being driven out of the residential complex they were garrisoning by a detachment of Assault Marines.

Now I'm painting up some Eldar for a rematch, and trying to stay off Ebay ...

Armageddon is a great system for modern-ish war of fluid fronts, just had a game as well.

Tried out the EpicAU's 30k Mechanicum list against my brother who used my Death Guard legion, brutality ensued at the factory hub. While marines are fast and able to dictate where the hammer lands (like flying in some terminators that immediately busted my badly deployed Ordinatus), the sheer tenacity of the 50's killer robots and their endless rain of plasma mortar death kept the marines at bay until the bitter end where it turned out the XIV had lost too many men and beat a hasty retreat.

I definitely think marines got a power up between 2nd edition SM and Armageddon. Not only the armour saves (remember almost no infantry saves in SM!) but the blast marker resistance in armageddon makes them really survivable.

I wonder how much of it is because really the marines in 2nd edition SM were still the Rogue Trader-esque ones? I can't remember if 40k had switched marines from T3 to T4 by the time SM came out. They feel a lot more like the 'elite infantry+' in SM. You get the mobility from them all having rhino transports (which really is a massive advantage, you notice it in armies that don't have it) and the good morale factor, but the modest shooting and +2CAF isn't anything that special and they often get outclassed by other specialist infantry from other races.

I wouldn't really call marines all that survivable in EA, their infantry still dies in troves and there just isn't that much of it in the first place in my experience. What They Shall Know No Fear gives them just makes the battered remnants that they have after the madness of first engagements still act effectively, unlike regular troops who'll either be suppressed or just can't get their orders through. Combined with high initiative and good leaders that lets them keep the pressure up, but if the opposition doesn't yield to concentration of force the marines are going to bite the dust.

Which is right and proper. The times I've used Assault detachments, when I send them in unsupported against Imperial Guard infantry in buildings or against an Artillery company, they get gunned down by the defenders' firepower. On the other hand, if you shell the buildings first, make them all take cover and break up their defensive positions, you can storm in and butcher everyone with chainswords.

If you're using the tournament army lists, the infantry formations are smaller than Imperial Guard or Eldar, but they're more mobile and more resilient.

I quite fancy the idea of using EA rules but 2nd edition Epic army formations, for some really big games. My Imperial Guard army is all made up of 1st edition models. Looks cool, but sadly no-one has bothered to write an army list for "ordinary" Imperial Guard - just mechanised, armoured or siege regiments so I can't field a supreme command detachment despite having a cool idea for a command staff base.

Does anyone have any recollection of Advanced Space Crusade?

I can (very) vaguely remember playing some games in a store in the early 90s. Extremely gaudy looking board pieces but fairly detailed rules from memory, interesting in that it used a D12. And of course you had those awesome 80s looking scouts (which seemed to hang around for a long time) with the Bros style haircuts and earrings.

Got a chance to get hold of a copy for sensible money and wondering if its worth it.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
There are some differences.
Weapons lack tank armour penetration profiles, as it was D6+S, rather than the far more complex one of 2nd Ed (Lascannons were 3D6 if memory serves? Maybe 3D6+6).
HTH is the same, except multiple rolls of 6 didn’t increase your score. I suspect that was introduced to 2nd Ed because with 1’s reducing your score, having lots of attacks could easily become a liability.
I say grab it anyway, if only for sake of completeness

Remember the close combat results in 2nd edition were so variable! But quite good fun, I liked the feel of the individual 'duel' that happened when you had a couple of miniatures meeting up in combat, how some of the special rules played into that etc.it felt a lot more cinematic and less abstract as your Sergeant blocked a falling Goff axe with his chainsword, only to be blasted by another's pistol.
It worked well in the smaller size games of the days (and consequently in Necromunda too) but as the model count went up needed to be streamlined, so can understand why they made the changes they did in 3rd/4th edition onwards.

@pacific, I owned and played to death Space Crusade but never made it to Advanced. Best thing about it was the clip-in guns so you could change your load-out for each mission.

Bros scouts lol - I remember that boxed set with 'nids, scouts and maybe termies? for 40k, I think I had some bits out of that from a mate.

@the society
Wargames Illustrated is good for nostalgia this month as it's their 400th issue. HIstorical mostly but warhammer is mentioned a few times, and there's a discussion of old and new game mechanics which I found interesting. There's an article by Rick Preistly who is always good value.