The Legion walks again!

Had a game of Epic yesterday for the first time in a long long time (this one was for you, Bruce, you old warhorse)! Looking at my old models, I can see how far my painting has come over the last 20 years! But the old minis still hold up well and it all looks awesome set out on the table. I was very rusty with the rules. but as we played, it all started coming back to me. I absolutely love the grand scale – it’s like playing Apocalypse in 40K, only a lot more manageable! Infantry die like flies, whole tank squadrons get wiped out in one go… fantastic!

The Rising Sun Chapter of the Space Marines and the Legio Tempestus face off against the Death Guard led by Mortarion and the World Eaters near an Imperial city on the edge of the badlands.

Marines of the Assault company get to grips with a squadron of Chaos Land Raiders and are counter-charged by Bloodletters! In Epic, Assault Marines can actually kick ass!

Grey Knights take it to Mortarion! The demon Primarch’s plaguewind killed one stand before it burned itself out. In the ensuing combat, the Grey Knights almost took him down, but Mortarion destroyed the Emperor’s finest!

The Chaos Banelord Titan skulks behind a building. Good thing too, because when it finally emerged into the crosshairs of the Loyalist Warlord Titan…

ENGINE KILL! The resulting explosion destroyed a nearby building and entirely wiped out the World Eaters swarming at the traitor machine’s feet! AWESOME!

Ah, what a game! Many thanks to my friend Stephen for playing – it was fun to introduce him (he was 3 years old when I first started playing Epic) to an old game that laid the foundations for much of what 40K is today. Certainly Epic Space Marine was one of GW’s best designs. Too bad they’ve killed it off. But, as long as a game is being played it is never dead. In the far reaches of the galaxy, the armies still clash and the Legions still walk!

ENGINE KILL!!!

Epic follow-up and scout head chopping

Played Epic for the first time in about 6 years last Wednesday and reminded myself of how much I love that game (Bruce, if you’re reading this, this one was for you, buddy!) I got my ass kicked but the final VP total maybe didn’t reflect how close it was, at least until the last turn. But whatever excuses for getting whooped that I may make I still had a blast. A little rusty on the rules but hey, you gotta knock that off somehow. It was great to see the battlefield covered with troops and vehicles, maneuvering at a scale that makes a lot more sense.

In the past, I played Space Marines most often. In this game, my opponent Adan had the Astartes and I played my Imperial Guard army.

My big error was not covering my artillery company with supporting infantry – I’d have done a lot better if I had deployed my infantry company in range of the gun tubes rather than bottling them up inside the Capitol Imperialis (which I managed to forget to bring on the day, duh). Then when the Marines dropped right on top of my Basilisks and Bombards, I could have just blown them all away. Also, Hydra AA guns are a lot more useful against a Thunderhawk than an Ogryn squad (which I must admit I took just because I wanted to).

So while having my artillery park pasted was a big reason I lost, the big fight I came up short on was on one of the main objectives.

I had an infantry company deployed here, along with a heavy support detachment. The Marines came at me with attack bikers and some assault troops drop-podding in. I almost fought them off, and the battle went back and forth, until when I thought I had it, I got hit by another attack deploying out of Rhinos. By that point my company was nearly broken and when they did break, they blew their morale check and it was over. Had I made that morale check, I still had enough guys left that I might have been able to throw the Marines back.

So it was a great battle and a fun game!

In other news, I’m repainting my Scouts a bit. I’ve never been happy with the way they came out. The kumadori design looks good on the regular Marines, but on the Scouts, it just didn’t work so I’m re-doing them. Taking the kumadori off also fits with my fluff in that the Scouts don’t get to wear it until they’re full-fledged Space Marines. So, they’re getting normal fleshtones, except for the Sergeant who, as a veteran Astartes, has the kumadori. However, the Scout Sergeant model basically has the same head as the other Scouts, so he still looks like a “kid” Marine. I’ve removed the Sarge’s head and replaced it with a slightly trimmed down Marine head. I found one that actually looks like he has half his face replaced with metal, so I figure he’ll make a suitably grizzled old vet.

I’ll put pics of these up when I’m done in a couple days.

Five Epic Armies

Looking at my blog stats, the consistently most popular post is the one I did last year about my old Epic Space Marine collection. It shows up in the weekly top post stats every week. Over 2,300 views. Impressive.

I love that old game and though I haven’t played in years I would at the drop of hat.

But there is one secret about that post I haven’t let on – those seven pictures were only the tip of the iceberg, part of a set of 44. If you want to see all of the pictures I took of my Epic Space Marine forces, click this link! Enjoy!

Epic Space Marine

OK, back in the dark ages, roundabouts 1987, I bought a strange looking hardcover called Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader. It was bad, it was dark, it was British. But most of all, it was EPIC (in huge adamantium letters). I got myself a boxed set of Space Marines and Space Orks, kitbashed my own vehicles, and spent the waning years of the 1980’s playing 40K into the wee hours with my friends.

I liked it a lot but that EPIC feel of the setting always made me want to see huge battles between thousands of troops, clashing in those amazing John Blanche and Ian Miller paintings. The battles of the Horus Heresy beckoned. Plus I could never get over the way GW would call a squad or a platoon of troops an army. Twenty guys is not an army. I wanted more – a company at least, if not battalions!

The first EPIC scale GW game I ever saw was Adeptus Titanicus, which was all about the Titans. Then they started adding in the infantry and such with the game Space Marine. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was being drawn to 6mm scale gaming. When the second edition of Space Marine came out in 1991, I snapped that up and that was the beginning of about 5 or 6 years of very intense gaming.

I found an equally crazy opponent in Japan, my buddy Bruce, and he and I dove into this game whole hog. I remember our very first game we decided to play a 6000 point battle! It was a huge game and was like two conveyor belts rolling our forces toward a chasm of death in the middle of the table. We played every chance we could get. Eventually between us, we had several thousand points each of all the armies then available.

Those were some great games! I loved stepping back from the table in the middle of a game and seeing this huge vista of hundreds of troops, vehicles, and giant warbots crushing eahc other. I got to the point where I didn’t care about winning or losing, the only thing that was important was that I died well!

OK, I’m frothing. Lemme give you some pics.

These guys are standard 40K Marines done up in my Rising Sons Chapter colors. The banner is handpainted, including the kanji characters.

In this shot you can see my Imperial Army force. Behind them is my Tyranid Army, and on the left is my Titan Legion.

My always resolute Space Marine army. The big banner on the 40K minis was reproduced for these little guys.

This is meant to be an Imperial Inquisitor and his retinue. The Inquisitor is a Terminator with a Marine Sergeant’s head. Also on that base are a regular Marine, and Ogryn, a Ratling Sniper, and an Eldar.

Another conversion. This time, Commisar Yarrick for the Imperial Guard. I used an Ork Warboss claw for his arm.

The utterly awesome Imperator Titan. Absolutely DESTROYED everything that stood before it.

Bruce made this Nurgle Plague Tower for my Chaos army, entirely from scratch – scraps and bits from his bits box, and toothpicks!

When the price of the Tyranid Dominatrix made me balk, I made one out of a Warhammer horse body and bunch of Tamiya modelling putty.

One of my favorite minis – the terrifying Tyranid Bio-Titan. The goddamned thing would regenerate damage!

Second Edition Space Marine and its companion game Titan Legions remains my favorite iteration of the game. I never bothered with later editions. I will say that the NetEpic version of the game, which builds on 2nd edition, is excellent. You can find the NetEpic stuff at the EPICentre http://netepic.org/EPICentre/