Warhammer 40000

Warhammer 40000 is a game of tabletop battles involving armies of miniatures, set in a grim future where war is spread on a galactic scale. Although many of the in-game happenings are resolved by the rolling of various sized dice, it is really a game of tactical superiority, where the chance element must be factored in - in most circumstances it is representative of the abilities of your soldiers.

This is a hobby of mine which I have revisited every so often over the last decade. I would really like to start some sort of campaign started soon, anyone who is interested in this idea, let me know.

The current edition of the rules (4th Edition, almost identical to 3rd Edition) is probably the easiest to adopt, but as soon as the player wants to do anything more tactical than move forward and shoot, they fall sadly short. In the recent battles I've had, several rules have had to be improvised nearly every turn because the current rulebook does not even begin to cover the situations that crop up.

The second edition of the rules was far more detailed and satisfying to play. It is fairly obvious that the 3rd edition simplification was purely a cash grab - the first thing it did was make the existing literature redundant, so players had to buy the new books. The more insidious side of this was to make the game far more kid-friendly, as it is well-known that kids will spend way more money on a hobby/obsession than your average older nerd (who will make considered choices, albeit nerdy ones). This child-focus has caused many problems that I'm not prepared to get too upset about: they've watered down the sinister side of the Warhammer 40K back-story, created new and obscenely powerful forces, and generally made things more stupid...and expensive.

A selection of features removed between Ed2 and Ed3:

Troop abilities

• Overwatch - allowing soldiers to wait in ambush for enemies to pop out from cover
• Hiding - allowing soldiers to move covertly behind walls etc. without being shot to pieces
• Running - giving up the opportunity to shoot in order to cover more ground
• Breaking off - choosing to run away from hand-to-hand combat in the face of impossible odds
• Destroying buildings - using heavy weapons to destroy enemy emplacements
• Independent firing of special weapons - now a squad must all fire at the same target, whether or not there are better targets for its special weapons
• Fires - Things could be set on fire and stay that way
• Outnumbering - it was advantageous to mob strong opponents with hordes of much weaker troops.

Weapons and armour

• Grenade throwing - troops could lob various types of grenades instead of shooting
• Terminator armour had a 3+ armour save on 2D6!
• Weapons would occasionally jam or explode
• The shape of the weapon had an effect: swords could be used to parry, maces were more effective at crushing
• Variable wounds - weapons had a 'Damage' characteristic, determining the amount of wounds inflicted. Many of these did just 1 damage, but stronger/nastier weapons would do more, like D3 or D6 wounds.
• Sustained Fire - some weapons would unleash torrents of shells/plasma/goo into their targets - only one roll to hit was needed, and a spray of ammunition would affect the target squad

Vehicle Rules

• Vehicle speeds - vehicles could move in three different speed bands, all with different consequences
• Ramming - running things over, smashing up other vehicles and buildings
• Independent firing of vehicle weapons - now all of a vehicle's weapons must fire at the same thing
• Transports could drive anybody around - not limited to the squad they arrived with
• Vehicles reasonably hard to destroy - the ability to not be detroyed by somebody getting lucky with a small handgun
• Detail - shots hitting a vehicle would damage various different locations in different ways, for instance, you could immobilise a tank by destroying one of its tracks.
• Dreadnoughts could walk underwater.

Most of these are fairly important aspects of tabletop warfare, and certainly give the commander more flexibility regarding tactics. So for a better experience, I propose that all campaigns are fought using as many of the 2nd ed rules as possible.

Of course, most of this will be lost to the reader, assuming of course you have read this far. Warhammer is a terribly, terribly nerdy game to play and anyone who claims otherwise should look into their hearts or go on some mystical inner journey to find the truth.