Please Step Away from the Tournament Table!

Hey guys and gals, Reecius here from Frontline Gaming to discuss the fluffier side of gaming!

So we’ve discussed tournaments and competitive play plenty. I wanted to talk about one of the other aspects of the hobby that I love: non-competitive game play and creating themed armies!

That’s right folks, when I’m not busy eating babies at tournaments, I love a good narrative game/campaign. I fancy myself something of a writer and really enjoy writing up back stories for my various armies and the characters in them (all of my armies have a name, and the main characters in them do too, along with histories based on game experiences and just my imagination). I also really enjoy writing narrative campaigns and creating stories about the games my friends and I play and it really is satisfying to me when they enjoy what I’ve made. At the store we’re gearing up for a narrative campaign to celebrate the release of the new Chaos Codex, which we are all super excited for. It will feature Chaos vs. the Imperium and one of our teammates has written some great background fluff for it.

6th edition has gotten my creative juices flowing in a HUGE way. I may not be in love with all the rules, but I am in love with the direction the development of 40K is going. I can’t say enough how much I enjoy allies as it allows us to do SO much with creating armies that speak to us on an artistic as well as competitive level. If you’re like me, you spend a lot of time thinking about cool lists you would love to make. I have spent entire days writing lists! Haha, not exactly proud of that, but my mind just loves to wander through the various stories of the game, cool ideas for converted armies, and themes to make awesome armies. Sometimes even just a single paint scheme or conversion bit will set off an entire new army in my mind, complete with back story!

However, if you are like me, physical realities of life prohibit me from bringing all of these cool creations to life. Time, money, etc. Plus, I am a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to making my armies and while I will never say I am the best hobbyist out there, I like to think my hard work ends up with really cool looking armies.

However, with allies we can now make smaller versions of an army and just use them as allied contingents in other armies! That is awesome. I always wanted to make a Samurai themed Marine army but I have a HUGE Marine army now and could never justify buying more marine minis just to have a different aesthetic. It always made me feel like I was being wasteful. Well now I can do it, guilt free, because I want to have Marine allies for my IG that match their paint scheme. Score! Also, if you have an idea for a cool force that maybe doesn’t warrant fleshing out into an entire army, you can just paint a few units. For example, using Mantic Forgefathers to make some Squat allies for your armies using Space Mainre (or whatever) rules. Cool!

Now, with the ability to combine armies, we can really go nuts and make armies that represent the vision we have in our minds for a cool army that is also effective on the table. I am just overflowing with ideas and at the shop we keep going back and forth with: “wouldn’t it be awesome to do this,” or, “man, I want to add some allies from this book!” etc. For example, I have always wanted to make an Adeptus Arbites army as I love the models (I still have some of the original models too, on display at our store!) but always held back as I didn’t want to invest the time and energy into make a conversion heavy army if it wouldn’t play well and didn’t have all the units I wanted in it due to the restrictions of a single codex. Well, now with combing IG and Space Marines, I feel that I can make a cool, sweet looking army that represents the fluff and actually plays well, too. Boom!

Now, with all of this awesome alliance craziness, you need a good reason to do battle beyond just testing your skills at a tournament. And while I play the majority of my games “competitively” as that is what I and my main gaming group find the most enjoyable, I do love a good game of Apoc! At our shop we play a monthly Apoc game and they have gotten to be really popular, with standing room only.

Our latest game was super fun, and you can watch the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5rczWn94f4&feature=g-all-u

For those interested, we had a base that was held by defenders and the attackers had to either destroy it or empty it of troops by game’s end in order to win. There were some other bells and whistles to spice it up, but it was very simple, which I find works best for Apoc. The game was just great fun, and it came down to the last roll of the dice! I won’t spoil the end for those who want to watch the video, but it was awesome fun.

We enjoyed it so much, that everyone wants to do another Base Battle, but this time with two bases and both sides will be simultaneously trying to defend their own base while destroying the other. At the shop, we’ve decided to have a Base-Off to see who can build the best base. It’s like a dance-off, but requires less coordination and a lot more glue.

So far, we’ve got an Imperial, Ork, and Chaos base in the works, and will probably have a 4th, as well. I will share pics of the project as it develops.

Our next Apoc game though, will be pretty dang cool! One of our readers built a truly impressive, 3 foot tall Emperor class Titan, and is bringing it in and much like an old school game of Ogre, it will be everyone else trying to take down the Emperor Titan! Here are some pics:

 

Lastly, a client we made some terrain for and his game club G3SC put together the most impressive Narrative Campaign I have ever seen. This seriously is a MUST see. So cool, everything about it is just extremely high quality. Check it out: http://www.g3santacruz.com/2012events/mestre/gallery/

And the YouTube video: http://youtu.be/-SK5fvOu2rE

So get out there, read some Black Library books (Night Lords Trilogy FTW!!) and have some fun with this great game of ours! Playing in Apoc games, Narrative Campaigns, and Tournaments helps to keep you a well rounded hobbyist as well as playing with both hammer lists and themed lists.

Happy gaming!