40K and Me, Part: Whatever

So, I am playing 40K now. Didn’t think I would but as long as I’m having fun, I’m in. I’m still learning the game and I expect to lose a lot, but so far I’m doing all right. Basically, I’ve decided I’m going to play it on my own terms. Primarily that means no tournaments or “competitive” type play (by which I mean just playing to win). I paint lots of miniatures and I like minis games, but my real hobby love is pen & paper roleplaying games. What this means for my minis gaming is, I always/often write up a story behind the game I’m about to play. Even if it a bare minimum of detail, I like to give the tabletop battle about to be waged some kind of context.

OGs (Original Gamers) who remember the old 40K: Rogue Trader from back in the day will recall that it was a curious blend of miniatures game and RPG. The scenario generator in the back of the book is a goldmine of ideas that you can still apply to the 40K tabletop today. And even if you don’t do that, you can still create any sort of storyline you like for your games, so that they’re not just another in an endless series of 1500pt slugfests over the same 1d5 objective markers. Just thinking about doing that bores me senseless.

Currently, my 40K mentor (if you will) Adan and I are playing a 3-scenario mini-campaign, his Alpha Legion Chaos Marines against my Rising Sun Marines. The idea is the Chaos boys have launched a raid on the Rising Sun homeworld to steal some of their geneseed. In the first action, which you can read about here, the Alpha Legion made off with some of the Chapter’s geneseed. What made this more than just a 1,000pt shootout was, for us, the story that came out of it. There were some heroes (like my Sergeant who we’ve given a WS/BS bump after his amazing knock-down, drag-out fight) and some goats (my Chaplain who lost the battle). Both Adan and I are excited about the next game.

So, this is how I mean to play 40K, with a focus on building the games around some sort of story. It’s clearly not the best minis game out there in absolute terms, but there is fun to be had with it with the right people and the right attitude.

You think you can take me? You gonna need an army if you think you can take me!

Airbrush!

Well, my friend Adan has lent me his airbrush. Basically I think he just wants to see what I can do with it and I mean to not disappoint him! I’ve never used an airbrush before so it may take me a little time to figure it out and get going with it. At any rate, I’m looking forward to seeing what can be done!

Bits Box Diving

On a whim, I rummaged around one of my old bits boxes (I think I have three or four buried in different places in my home). I had opened up one of my oldest and discovered a few things that hadn’t seen the light of day since university.

Some real buried treasure in there too. Here we go!

First is an old Space Marine Captain from the Rogue Trader days. This guy’s pretty cool as he has a bionic leg – obviously a replacement for the one he lost in battle. I could use him as a squad sergeant or captain.

Next we have a Zulu warrior and a Napoleonic French Grenadier. Don’t recall where I got these from or why. Seems I had a mind to paint the Grenadier, since I primed him and painted his face, then apparently lost interest.

Now here is a selection of 40K snotlings from around 1989 – 90 or so. I’ve always liked the wacky character of the Orks in 40K and used to have a sizeable number of them, including a few bases of snotlings. Check out all the plastic Mekboy tools! And I’ve got the top and bottom halves of a Boss there too.

This next one is a knight that I used in a Pendragon RPG campaign about 17 or 18 years ago. Not sure who made it – maybe Grenadier?

This fun-lovin’ greenskin is from the old Rogue Trader Ork Raiders set I think. I thought I’d painted them all but this guy apparently only got halfway basecoated. I also note that I used to prime white, and did it by simply painting on white paint! Urgh! Not anymore!

Now these are interesting. They’re character miniatures for the Shadowrun RPG, which I’m pretty sure were made by Grenadier. They look pretty good too – very crisp details and clean sculpts. Love the troll bouncer and the street shaman with the dreadlocks.

These are some old arm and weapon sprues for Orks and Marines (which is stamped 1992). I can certainly use those Marine weapons now.

Here’s an interesting one – the Yamato from the Star Blazers miniatures game. Unfortunately a couple of the metal fins broke off the stern and are gone. It’s otherwise in good shape.

There were some other interesting odds and ends in there – for some reason I have a number of plastic Warhammer skeletons. There are also some 30mm fantasy warriors that I have no idea where they came from. I also found a Crimson Skies fighter plane that was half-painted and some very old Battlefleet Gothic ships from the 1st edition of that game. Certainly the Marine captain was a good find. I’ll have to go through those other bits boxes too!