Warhammer Rises From The Ashes

Warhammer is back, baby.

Thanks to the power of social media (Facebook, there's hope for you yet), a group of ex-Warhammer players in Japan have agreed to begin a warbands campaign at Pubcon in Shimo-Kitazawa. Playing under the Warhammer 7E rules but using the relatively more balanced 6E army books each player will bring a 200 point warband and grow it up to 500 by the end of the campaign. December has been set aside as a practice date, and the campaign proper will begin in the new year. Hopefully this will lead to bigger and better things, and maybe by the end of 2018 we will see full blown armies marching to the drums of war.

My Empire / Kingdoms of Men army snaking through a mountain pass against Omata-San's Neritican army. They are an original Mantic army composed of underwater fishmen, elementals and the like.

I am stoked, and am in the process of trying to decide what warband to take to the first meeting. Orcs? Dark Elves? Empire? High Elves? Bretonnians? Tomb Kings? So many choices.

This development has shaken up my miniatures road map, but in a good way. It has shelved my plans to create a Bolt Action force. My colleague Gareth has declared his intention to create an Italian reinforced platoon, and I was going to join him in a show of solidarity by creating either a Japanese or an Australian force of my own. I was motivated to do this by the lure of playing with more English speakers. Playing Deadzone, Kings of War and The Walking Dead with the Japanese guys is fun, but playing at PubCon allows me to be myself, not worry too much about cultural nuances, explain myself clearly and concisely, and drink a pint of beer while playing games. I hated being at the Koganei or Nerima club when everyone was laughing at some joke that sailed completely over my head thanks to my crappy Japanese. Playing with like-minded gaijin was my primary motivator for getting into Bolt Action, but now that Fantasy is going back into circulation at Pubcon I believe I can postpone, or even cancel these plans. I am more excited at the prospect of painting up some Fantasy miniatures than I am of putting together a Japanese reinforced platoon. Not to say that I wasn't excited - Bolt Action looks like a fun game - but Warhammer is my first love, and it looks like I'm coming home.

A closer look at Omata-San's Neritican army.

The return to Warhammer also helps my Deadzone proxy project, because if I had started a Bolt Action army I would have had to postpone work on my DZ miniatures. This way I can keep my two handed approach to painting and gaming. On the one hand I have fantasy, on the other I have science fiction, and what I paint is dictated by the next event on the calendar. On the days leading up to Koganei I paint DZ or KoW, depending on what's on; on days leading up to PubCon I paint Warhammer. This works nicely for me, and puts my hobby in a good place in terms of goal setting, painting and playing. It allows me to make inroads into my hoard of unpainted miniatures, rather than starting a new army in a new system and adding to that to my painting to-do list.

I'm sorry Gaz, but it looks like your Italians are on their own.