Certified Speed Freek

Ok, so, I play Games Workshop (henceforth known as GW) games, their two poster-child games being Warhammer Fantasy Battles, and Warhammer 40000.  Each game is fundamentally different, but uses a similar stat-line system, so that one player could start one, and go into the other with only a short primer.  Not that many people play both games, many of the WFB players I have met have held 40k in great disdain, claiming that WFB is 'more tactical.'  After looking at it for myself, I'll give fantasy this, it's a more balanced game than 40k is, this makes it more boring.
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Some fantasy players like to say that Fantasy is Chess, and 40k is Checkers.  Some 40k players like to say the inverse.  I disagree, fantasy and 40k are so different from chess and checkers it's impossible to compare them.  If I were to compare, I would indeed compare fantasy to chess (maybe, imagine a chess game with no board), but I would compare 40k to a chess game, with no board, and you can chose which pieces to bring.

Explore strange new points of view.

Seek out new understandings and interpretations.

Boldly go where noone who believes the same things as you has gone before!

I remember starting this journal with that in my brain.  I don't actually remember now, why I wanted to do it.  My reason has changed over the years I guess.  At first I just thought it was cool, but I couldn't draw, so I decided "I will get better at drawing, I will draw a webcomic!"

I also remember wanting to change the way webcomics are published.  I don't happen to like the one page per week model.  It's cool, and keeps people intrested, but waiting an ENTIRE WEEK for a page killed me (sometimes longer...) so I decided that my webcomic would be different, two updates, once midway though a month, once at the end, obviously this would require a breakneck pace, so I couldn't do color.  The other option was to do a 'chapter' over an entire month, but, people could get bored with me, and I'd lose intrest.

Then I wanted to expand my website development skills.  And that is more or less where I'm at now.  I want to be able to have a site that I can show to people, "this is what I have done"  if I end up taking winter quarter off (if I can find another job I probably will) I will build a portfolio website, but part of it at least will have a comic on it.

 

But have I forgotten why I really wanted to do a webcomic?  Was it for fame?  Fortune?  Something to do?  I still donno, but I'll never know until I do it.

I hear nothing but complaints about these, from a lot of people, but really, I'm ok with some metal models.  Toy soldiers used to be made out of lead and/or tin anyways, always have, always will be (somewhere).  There are a few metal bits that bug me, but, there are a couple of things that mitigate it in my mind. 

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Someone suggested that Warhammer40k tournament comp is often used to 'balance' the game, but I think this could be done much simpler with a few key rules changes.  They might seem small, but they affect the game in a big way for the affected units.

( I present four "Balance Rules" )

I'm just giving this a shot, some of these may be over-powered, others may be a bit underwhelming.  I haven't changed the points costs (directly) of anything, just given people some options.

In this case I mean Mech.

As I continue to play in 5th edition 40k, mech seems king.  Much like the armies in the second world war, generals of tabletop armies in 5th edition are starting to realize what mechanization can do for them.  Fortunately for players of '5th edition codexes' GW caught onto this, and gave most troops at least one very effective dedicated transport (maybe two, sometimes three).  Sadly, the older books still have way more expensive transports, some of them come with cool rules still, but mostly this means that they can't saturate the field with armor.

one of my friends put it best "Typical 4th edition thinking, 'a rhino tank for my troops? why would I buy that overpriced piece of crap?'"
( You can't kill the metal... )

In 40k, the Orks (greenskins) are a brutal race of space aliens who rampage across worlds and conquer them, Orks don't fight for guns, for money, for land, even for what they believe, orks fight because they were made to fight, and win.

Can the win on the tabletop though?  These are the common posts about the ork army (in order)

"Orks are broken"
"Orks are a Close Combat army"
"Orks Suck!"

( Now that last one hurts, I play orks... )

Well here we go, first article down, as you can see, I've got three more in my head, maybe I'll write them up next week, but tell me what you think, like the post?  Too much random thinking for LJ? (Should I sign up for blogger?  I've heard some horror-stories about that system...but there is a strong 40k blogger community)

This is a wargaming syndrome, though it applies to video games too.  Basically, Forumitis occurs when you go onto a forum to find answers, instead of a straight answer, people on the forum point out the obvious, or they tell you what was true in version 2.0, which would be cool, but we're in 5.4 now, that good old 2.0 advice won't help you.  Eventually, you get infected with this syndrome, as other people ask for advice, and you and other people point out what to use, but not how to do it.

This can confuse people and turn them off, and the smaller the forum, the more likely it is that you will catch it.  40k has a lot of this, especially since the community is very small, and there is no official forum.  So the question is, what's the cure?
( Read more... )I've thought about posting 40k stuff on this journal for a while, maybe other wargames too, but now I'm committed.  I'll even start today :P

So, I've been reading this novel this week.  I should note that I have read 40k novels before, but this is more of a 30k novel.

Fulgrim follows the story of a primarch.  For those who know nothing about Warhammer's sci-fi universe, I'll say this much, the Primarch's are the sons of the emperor, and are in turn the fathers of whole legions of space marines, they are legendary heroes, mighty soldiers, great artisans.

The book Fulgrim follows the story of one of these guys.( Read more... )

   All in all a neat read, but it's got a lot of grim-darkness in it.  I'll say that it's certainly better than the first two 40k novels I read.

You know, I play a couple of wargames, I've been to a few tournaments, but one thing bugs me.  There is this growing divide between 'competitive' and 'casual' players...but in reality I think this gulf only exists on the internet.

( This is a small rant about point of view )