The Onslaught Awaits - Part 1

OUT OF REACH

Warhammer Fantasy Battles

I've always loved the idea of Fantasy and Fantasy Wargaming, but always thought it was a pursuit out of my reach, for two main reasons - the cost and time.
Firstly, it was just too expensive.
The thing that has always drawn me to fantasy wargaming was the concept of vast armies, with ranks upon ranks of soldiers - all ready to fight and die for their cause.
With the dominant fantasy wargame in Sydney being Warhammer Fantasy Battles from Games Workshop, putting together an army has always been a financially steep commitment.
Secondly, it would take too long to get the toy soldiers on the table.
Again, the multi-part plastic kits from Games Workshop look amazing and give you a lot of options to create and stylise your army - but assembling all those bits adds up, and that's just time I don't have, with full-time work and family. I'm not the fastest painter either, and although I do enjoy painting, painting troop units over and over again can get boring very quickly.


SUBSTITUTION

MERCS - Sci-Fi Skirmish Wargame

So I focused on sci-fi and skirmish wargaming for a while. I was heavily into MERCS and blogged about it over here, but with no local community support, I left that wargame behind. MERCS is a wonderful game and is really picking up steam in the US, but without anyone else here in Sydney to play with, it's been a lonely road.
I always found myself coming back to fantasy though. I bought Battle for Skull Pass a few years back and have the miniatures painted and sitting in a box in the cupboard. I recently bought the High Elf models from the Isle of Blood set, and they're great too. I guess the reasons I bought these sets and didn't start a proper fantasy army was because these are 'mini' armies - well priced with a range of miniatures included, that are easy to assemble and paint (usually single part models).
I gave up trying to read the rulebooks for these sets after about 5 minutes though. There was no way I'd ever be able to learn all those rules and get a game going, but my love for fantasy left me content to just have the models and spending time painting them.


Then I made two discoveries and quick succession that changed EVERYTHING.

To be continued...

Sync out.