After many years absence, I am finally getting round to collecting and laying 40k again. I was first properly introduced to 40K in 1992 playing Rogue Trader over the school lunch hour on rickety desks (the old type with folding lids and ink wells) with a small force of unpainted Orks against a couple of squads of Squats. These battles were particularly brutal affairs, and I remember one particular incident where in my desperation to beat the seemingly invincible stunties, I ran my Orks in the midst of an enemy squad and pulled the pins on their frag stikkbombz, in a vain attempt to take some of them with me.
Its the stories that really make the game of 40k: acts of extreme heroism or chance such as Gretchin taking down a super character, or an ordinary trooper seeing off hordes of enemies and coming out alive. Although the old games of Rogue Trader were fun, the rules we pretty clunky in places, so I have landed at the last sensible version of 40k - second edition, which has most of the randomness and detail for a great game, while being a little more streamlined than the old RT skirmish game. Many might ask why play an edition of the game 15 years out of date?
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| Second edition boxed game |
With the advent of 3rd edition 40K the games developers took out all of the character and much of the detail out of the game that I love, while simultaneously increasing army size under the pretense that larger games are more fun. This made it much more expensive to get into the hobby, and a lot less fun unless you solely enjoy playing competitive games. As a teenager those competitive instincts were strong, but as a game for adults who are primarily interested in a bit of fun, escapism, and great stories, third and later editions simply fail to deliver.
The most disappointing rules change post 2nd edition was the greater degree of abstraction, removing the tenuous but necessary link between the tabletop game and perceived realism (whatever that may be in a fictional universe). The worst culprits were revised cover and armour saves, and other annoyances such as harmless grenades and slow vehicles that couldn't move or fire. Loss of overwatch, hiding, and meaningful psykers really destroyed the game that was, and ultimately led to me departure from the hobby for a decade.
So now I am back: collecting, painting and gaming like never before. Second edition 40K really is a great game, and I would urge anyone with a copy to give it a go - it would be great to have a wider community of gamers again, beside the stalwarts at the Eastern Fringe Forums and Heart of the Heresy Forums. I would also like to mention Game Club 40k2 - the existence of this site has given hope and reassurance that we veteran gamers are not alone!
