What you're getting...
Campaign Rules
Four new missions
Advanced Flyer Rules for Dogfights
"Arena of Death" rules are for gladiatorial combat in 40k
Demon World Rules
...in 96 pages.
The book is very pretty, but depending on how you count it there are only 34 pages of rules. The rest is pictures and story. This says to me, "What do you really want out of this book?" Personally I wasn't disappointed. The first thought through mind was these are the campaign rules I would have liked to have had included in Planetary Empires but didn't get. Are you looking for advanced rules for some kind of multi-tiered "March Madness" style tourney? This isn't it. If your looking for rules and an example of how to do a campaign with a narrative using good 40k fluff you should be happy. Will you be happy with how much you'll pay for the book and how hard it might be to get your hands on a copy? No guarantees. My local gaming store was only able to get two. My thanks to my beautiful wife for hunting one down for me on Ebay. For the price (pre-Ebay mark up) I would have liked more meat on the bone from this book.
Why are the other rules in this book? I can only guess. The flyer rules or the gladiatorial rules would have been nice in an issue of White Dwarf, but I guess from a business perspective putting flyer rules in was a way to drive up demand. On flip side on that I think if it wasn't a limited run given the holiday timing of the release and the content I'm sure our lords and masters at GW still could have sold a (insert choice expletive here) of them.
My Verdict
I like the book, will use it, and am happy to have it. My personal advice (and take this for what it is) if you have to spend a 100 hours finding one and the only copy you can find is double retail that money might do you better by taking your significant other out to dinner and digging through your local gaming store's used bin with the rest.
I've flipped through it but haven't had the chance to really dig through it. I've been very tempted and it's right up my alley but I'm just wondering how much real use I'll get out of it. I'm sure I'll dig the fluff and all. We do periodical campaigns at my FLGS but that's all I can see, using it once and never touching it again. So, weighing buying that or something I need for my Chaos army, well my army has been winning out.
ReplyDelete