Saturday 16 June 2012

A Fond Farewell To Fifth Edition

Everyone of course is rattling on about the upcoming sixth edition, and I am of course eager to see what is in store. I am hopeful that the little annoyances of fifth edition go away (cough, Grey Knights, ahem) but that we still keep a fun game system. I am also eager to see where the story advances, as I find the whole Time of Ending thing to be fascinating.

My First Crazy Project...
However, this is not to say that I have not loved fifth edition. I can barely remember third edition, so can only really compare fourth and fifth. I never liked kill points, I thought they were just dumbing down so that people wouldn't have to work out what a half strength unit of 135 points was worth. I hated those games where I would annihalate my opponent, leaving him with a solitary marine and yet somehow he'd win, as he'd picked off more minor (supposedly expendable) guardsmen squads than he had in his entire army. But on the whole I tought fifth was an improvement, and moved the game forwards. Before all the wound allocation shenanigans came in and soiled it a little I thought wound allocation was a good system. No longer would the sergeant with power fist and trooper with meltagun just coincidentally "happen" to be the last guys to die. You could still help keep them alive longer by allocating on other targets, but random chance could take a dump on that guy and there was nothing you could do but try to minimise the odds. I liked that.

So what next? Well with 3k of Orks and planning to paint more, and a stupid amount of Guard, I have no doubt I will adapt my game to whatever 6th edition throws at us. But that only works for my core stuff... there are some special projects that I doubt will ever see the light of day again. Namely, armies/forces that have been specifically designed and built with 5th in mind. Mainly, I am talking about my Winds of War projects.

I have been attending Winds of War for the past few years and have always tried to take something special. It may not be all that competitive, with fluff as the driving force behind the design, but it has been a legal combat patrol force and it has been fun.

But what will sixth bring? Will combat patrol even exist as a concept? Will it be in the same format? As codexes get updated to match 6th, the units I previously had at 500 points may now exceed it... or perhaps not meet the total... they may even move to a different FOS, rendering the army illegal.

So to bid farewell to these forces that may not see the light of day, I make this post. In it is a gallery of the forces I have taken to various Winds of War events (and an Escalation evnt to boot) The 2000 point force probably has enough in it to be able to enter 1750 point events in the future despite what 6th brings, but I doubt the combat patrols will make it off the display shelf.

Escalation Army
Marbo Fett
Halo Marines In Action
Kens Halo Army

Penal Legion - aka Captured Rebel Scum



Whatta ya hear Starbuck?

Marines, we are leaving!

Get away from her you Bitch!
Are you alive?
 Farewell fair friends. You have provided me much entertainment, and hours of talking points.

7 comments:

  1. I can't see your combat patrol armies being made redundant by the upcoming sixth edition, The points value of stuff isn't going to change, it'd be a fairly large step for GW to start updating points values via a FAQ.
    Still, love the gallery though, those Halo marines were epic, the rest of your themed armies are brilliant as well.

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  2. Ah but if they change the way the FOC works then it could render the combat patrol illegal. Likewise, a change to the combat patrol rules would have the same effect, such as saying two troops required, 750 points, or various other minor variations could render the force illegal. We shall see.

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  3. Likewise, allowing large vehicles in combat patrol would render my current lists useless, as they are not designed to deal with heavy armour...

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  4. I think that they will stick to the FOC, also means that you'll have room to squeeze some anti tank weapons in.
    Or this could be the chance to start some more wacky armys :-P

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    1. Oh I certainly intend too... it's why next years Winds project hasn't made it off the drawing board yet... I want to see what they do to army selection for the Orks first. Plus if flyers are allowed in combat patrol a couple of interesting new options open up straight away...

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  5. Really liking the alien style Marine force, very cool :)

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    1. Thanks. That was Imperial Guard. Sentinal (obviously) Storm Troopers in APC and then a priest and two squads penal legion (representing the religious convicts of Alien 3 - I hate to go there but I needed something to round it up to 500 points :oP)

      Have been tempted to add one of those elysian drop ships to the force - if only they could drop off a chimera instead of a buggy...

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