An eclectic mix of everything that fits nowhere else including miniatures, terrain, house rules, comics, lyrics and anything that doesn’t have a home elsewhere.

With the new tyranid release, the pending blood angels release and all the associated new models I am seriously considering cracking open the old genestealer cult army I have and giving it a makeover along with picking up some plastic veteran pieces and some deathwatch items to add some tyranid hunting units to my force. Using the bell of lost souls genestealer cult homebrew rules could be good, but I am tempted to go down the tyranid codex path and build upon my cult invasion force idea. Well I have the patriarch and magus along with hybrids and a whole host of genestealers. I can find similar unit types in the codex, and for carnifex and other huge creatures I have been thinking about the inquisitor scale purestrain genestealer as a basis. It would certainly keep in the feel of a cult invasion force of genestealers!

So what to do for the marines I have? Well until proper deathwatch rules come out again I was going to include a unit of deathwatch and simply use the sternguard veteran rules for them as they seem to be the closest to the rules they used to use. The other thing would be to add some more artillery on the form of a whirlwind or two or perhaps even a vindicator. But for my army I think I would add in a librarian to give me some chance of stopping tyranid powers and having some of my own to enhance my troops with.
My force will need more transports to cope with the new speed of the game, so rhinos look like the best bet. But I am being tempted by a reserve force of a couple of squads in razorbacks supported by a predator.

It may be time to revisit my old marine models once I get a couple of the new blood angel sprues to update the jump packs of my assault troops. (old metal jump packs don’t make for stable miniatures!)

Anyone got any ideas?

Rumours out of GD Germany are saying that the NEW version of Space Hulk is coming, and is due this year!

Above is the rumored cover art, but I am pretty sure it is not going to look like this. (the terminator flamer is wrong, it is first edition space hulk in design)

These are all from http://color-crayons.blogspot.com

* Possibly an October release.
* Possibly £60 or about $90 USD (this makes sense as it fits the price point of similar big box games such as Descent from FFG)
* 10 Terminators, all differently posed (though the uniqueness of each pose may only vary slightly, much like Assault on Black Reach Terminators)
* Terminator Captain with options for Thunder Hammer/Stormshield or Power weapon/Storm bolter.
* Librarian who’ll be ‘descending a set of stairs’
* Not sure about Genestealer stuff
* The tiles are going to be card.

Stuff that was sent to me that does tie in somewhat to the above info:

* Terminators will have 40mm scenic bases included, quite possible that they will be square. (the scenic bases rumor matches what we have seen regarding the Librarian’s ‘descending stairs’ rumor)
* The scale for the board spaces will likewise increase in size from the 30mm that Space Hulk has had for the past 2 editions to 40mm or 45mm square.
* The card tiles are said to be ‘embossed’.

I have no idea who sent me this, so take these rumors with the grain of salt that merits such anonymous info. If you have any info regarding the above please do not hesitate to comment and either confirm or dispute such rumors.

But if these do turn out to be true, then there are many things that these minor rumors do bring to light.

1. The rules are seeming to be based more on 1st ed than it is on 2nd ed. This is deduced by the inclusion of the Captain and Librarian. The rules are also changing because we see the Captain can now be armed with a Thunder Hammer/Storm shield. This option was not previously possible in 1st ed in any of its expansions. So we have at least a very vague glimpse into what the rules may look like.
2. The increase in base size for the Terminators and the possibility that they will be square makes sense if GW are to include scenic bases. Scenic bases for Terminators does not seem likely on a 25mm base, especially since the newer style of terminators do not exactly fit on 25mm bases to begin with. Also it makes sense because this is a standalone boardgame and square bases should have been included in the game originally anyways since facing is so important to the Space Hulk game mechanic.
3. Genestealers may likely share this new basing scheme. This is important because Genestealers will no longer topple over because of their high center of gravity versus their comparatively small bases they previously had.
4. The embossed card tiles may be a lackluster attempt at making the game marketable towards both the hobbyist and the boardgamer alike. Rumors about what the tiles are made of are so conflicting that it might be possible that the base game will include card tiles, but that there are plastic tiles made available through hobby shops or direct order for the hobbyists who play this game (which are GW’s main bread and butter nowadays. GW makes games to sell models, not models to sell games. This is GW’s frst attempt at an actual stand alone board game in over 15 years. I find it unlikely that GW will actually not try to make as much money off of this release as they possibly can. And that means making as much stuff for the hobbyists as they can).
5. The ‘embossed’ tiles also might possibly mean that they are vacuformed plastic tiles, much like what we saw with the 40K ‘moon crater’ set.

• Space Hulk down for September release
• The box set should contain 5 unique, character style plastic terminators
• It’ll have clip together plastic floor pieces

Okay, the 5 terminators seems cool, even if there is only 5 in the box, that is still good to see some individual models coming out. Perfect for conversions!(as we will all get more than one box…)

Fingers crossed, holding breath to see if these are correct!

With the recent release of the bell of lost souls genestealer cult codex, and the rumours I have been hearing of a spce huk revisit, it has been ticking over in the back of my mind that I should dig out my old copy of 1st edition space hulk with its expansions. The genestealer expansion with its hybrids was always a fun game, with the random weapons causing no end of shock, or in some cases, hilarity.

Of course, my memories focus on one game where some VERY lucky rolling for a hybrid with a las-pistol. Starting the turn by killing one of the terminators with the pistol, followed by killing I think 5 more terminators with a lightning arc psychic power leaving one sole librarian.

The hybrid died in the next marine turn, and the librarian went on to finish the mission, closing all the bulkheads and killing in excess of a hundred stealers that game.

So with that in mind, I saw the new plastic ghouls for the vampire counts and I thought that with a few swaps with some gaunts and stealers we may have some nice looking hybrids. Then it would simply take a few weapons pulled out of the bits box and a few bits of tech and clothes added with the green stuff to leave me with some awesome hybrids ready for hulk fighting.

The added bonus is they would make for interesting enemies in necromunda, 40k and kill team games. And for the boss for kill team, even though there are normal monsters, one of the hybrids converted to have a tentacle mouth and a few pieces of carapace shell along with a big weapon would certainly make for an iconic character to fight against.

Wether you use the BOLS rules or use ‘counts as’ to get them into other games, the fun is in resurrecting a long dead foe for your games.

Anything that adds flavour and enjoyment to your games has to be a good thing. If rumours of a new hulk game coming turn out to be true, this may be a good way to get an early start. (or may just want some interesting models to paint for the next golden demon contest)