Through the Breach...and Back Again...

Oh, snap!  GMort is back!

Hello again...I'm sure you've all missed me a great deal...and to be honest I've quite missed all that hate mail that used to appear in my inbox after I wrote an article...

A Bit of Background.
For those of you who are unaware, 40K used to be somewhat of an obsession for me. I played 40K, wrote lists for 40K, blogged about 40K, read books about 40K and periodically just for a break I played a RPG based around 40K. 5th Edition was (for me at least) the best system that Games Workshop had created. It was streamlined, fast, fairly easy to pick-up and teach to others and supported a wide variety of army types (admittedly Mech was the most prevalent) and was a massive improvement over 4th...

4th Edition                                                5th Edition

...of course it wasn't perfect. A few minor tweaks here and there and a bit of intelligent army design to increase the viability of foot armies was all it needed. So we all anxiously awaited version 5.1 and instead we got version 7.0 with some bits of the Fantasy book thrown in for good measure. I did give it a go however...but after thirty or forty games I had to conclude that you couldn't build a balanced army using it and that I just didn't enjoy it...at all...and suddenly there was a big hole in my hobby as my dedication to a single system suddenly seemed like a bit of an 'all my eggs in one basket' scenario. It was also around this time that Games Workshop seemed to have developed a distinct desire to keep people out of their stores unless they were a 13 year old boy who wanted to buy whatever the last thing they released was...and even then they didn't seem to want him to stick around afterwards.


Fortunately at this traumatic point in my life a couple of acquaintances of mine (one a dedicated hobbyist who used to work for Games Workshop and the other a former Games Workshop store manager) decided to open their own FLGS which stocked a wide variety of different companies product ranges, had gaming areas and painting areas and pretty much had the atmosphere of the GW shops that I used to enjoy hobbying in. So I now had a place to do my hobby but no hobby to do...

Some of my friends who had abandoned 6th edition far earlier than me were already playing other games systems (Warmachine, Malifaux and Infinity mainly) and of the choices I went with Malifaux due to the relative cheap 'buy-in'. A rulebook, starter box, extra blister and a deck of cards came to about £40 (about $60) which to be fair wouldn't even buy you a 40K main rulebook.

For my first 'Master' I went with this guy,

He's basically Jack the Ripper only after he kills the unfortunate 'Ladies of the Night' he brings them back again as zombies...what he does with them afterwards is probably best not thought about too closely...

Yes I know...new game system and I'm still going with the forces of evil but to be fair Malifaux has more than it's fair share of villains, it's good guys it's short of. The system itself was fairly simple to learn and the use of the cards is fairly intuitive though I still ask people what they rolled rather than what they flipped...a habit I'm unlikely to get out of any-time soon, lol.

That was five months ago and to be honest I haven't looked back. The small model count means that I actually bother to paint a complete crew...

 ...and the individual nature of the models helps remove the boredom factor that used to occur around about generic Space Marine twenty seven. Seamus's usual 'signature' followers are Zombie Hookers Rotten Belles and though they all have the same rules there are three very different models to represent them and this is the case with most of the models that your likely to take multiples of.

So I've got a place that actually encourages me to do hobby and a system that does the same and I'd like to share some of the aforementioned system with you over the next few months...as long as the powers that be want me back that is ;-)

Thoughts and comments are (as usual) most welcome.