40Korigins

GW and Forge World Confirmed for Origins

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Tue, 21 May 2013 12:48:00 -0400

Yep, thats right, you read it here! Forge World and GW are both in attendance at Origins this year! Forge World has confirmed on their events calendar, so start saving now and come join us at Games Workshop's return to the independant convention circuit!

40k Team championships June 14th 2013

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Thu, 21 Mar 2013 08:41:00 -0400

Hey all! The 40k team championships will be on June 14th 2013!

While I have tried to be comprehensive here, I'm sure you will all have questions, so comment and let me know, I will answer as best I can!

We are using the FULL 6th edition rules, with a few exceptions. No mysterious terrain or objectives to keep things moving, and fortifications are limited to the Aegis line and accessories for it. Any missions that call for variable amounts of objectives will automatically have the maximum number possible.

1000 points per player in 2 player teams. These teams are formed the day of the tournament at sign in, just let us know who your partner will be, or if you need a team mate. We will have at least one spoiler army available if we get an odd number of players.

The allies chart in the core rule book WILL determine any effects and wargear that effect your teamand cross to your partner's army, so having a good alliance is beneficial to you.

Forgeworld Imperial armour units that are stamped as "40k approved" are allowed as a 0-1 rare selection in your army. This means only 1 of each type, not 0-1 units. So you CAN have more than one, they just need to be different models/units. (ie. only one caestus assault ram, but the same army can also have a deathwind drop pod, but NOT a second caestus. Also, any proxies for these models MUST be cleared in advance and be obvious what they are, no plastic drop pods used as lucius or deathstorm pods. No regular drednoughts used as contemptors. The models MUST be obviously not the normal version. We can and will disallow unclear conversion work from a game if we have complaints or concerns about it, so be prepared people!

1 HQ and 1 Troop minimum required, and only a single force organisation chart per player.

NO allies by a single player, thats what your partner is for!

Each mission will have 3 levels of scoring. The primary objective, kill points, and secondary objectives. The primary objectives and kill points are win/loss/draw, not by count. So you either have more kill points and win the kill point objective, or you lose it, not add 7 kill points to your total. W/L/D rules here. The secondary objectives DO add a single point each to your total here, so you can win objectives, lose kill points and then add the secondary bojective points as a tie breaker. We will track the secondary objectives as a means to a tie breaker in scoring at the end of the tournament as needed, so KEEP TRACK!

You will need to have the following with you the day of the tournament:

5 PRINTED copies of your army list, one for you, one for opponents, and one for us to judge from

army book, rule book, dice templates tape measure (duh)

Any Imperial Armour units used MUST have a copy of the Imperial armour volume used on hand, no photocopies please. If the unit you use is in multiple versions of the IA books, the most recently published version is the correct one.

Your army needs to be painted to a three color minimum. We won't turn you away for not being painted, but you wont win army awards without it!

I plan on registration from 9:30am to 10am and dice rolling by 10:30am, so be prompt!

I look forward to seeing you all there!!

2013 40KOrigins Annual RTT June 15th 2013

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Sun, 03 Feb 2013 21:30:00 -0400

Hey all! Shadowvast here! The Annual Origins RTT is approaching rapidly. This year we have all kinds of changes in store beyond the tournament, so come and check all the new stuff out! The RTT will be held on Saturday the 15th of June. I have listed all of the tournament details below. Dan Corbett and GTA are back this year in a big way as sponsors, and Dan will be helming the RTT just like last year.

2000 point armies

FULL 6th edition rules used with the following exceptions:

single force org. only please, allies are allowed per the allies matrix in the main rulebook

terrain will be pre-set on the tables, and no random terrain effects (though objectives still use the mysterious rules)

Standard mission rules (linebreaker, first blood etc...) apply

Imperial Armour units ARE allowed IF they are marked as 40k approved, and you are using the most recently published version of the the rules. You MUST have an actual copy of the rules you intend to use (no pdf or photocopies), and the actual model in question, no proxies please.

Please make sure you have the following with you at the tournament:

5 copies of your army list, armybuilder, excel, word whatever, but no hand written please.

painted army, 3 color minimum (we wont turn you away, but you lose big on paint score if its not painted)

tape measure, army codex, and and other rules you need to play the models in the army you bring

Dice, (DUH) any other markers you may need to play, like pain tokens, or wreck markers/craters

More details incoming, but if you have questions in the meantime, comment and ask away, We will answer as quickly as we can!

*EDIT*

1. If you want to use a model from the Imperial Armour books but no one makes a model for it (ex. the chaos dredclaw pod) a proxie may be used, but you need to make it clear with your opponent before each game begins.

2. FAQs have been released, you need to have printed copies of those handy if they effect your army

3. New Codex WILL be released before our tournament. In order for a book to be legal it MUST be availablea full 30 days before the tournament.

Warhammer 40K FAQs Version 1.1 are Out

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Sat, 08 Sep 2012 04:40:00 -0400

Without any real fanfare Games Workshop has come out with version 1.1 of these FAQs, including (most importantly) a FAQ for the main rulebook itself. Considering the general disappointment with the first go around these 1.1 versions are certainly a step forward, although they still aren't the sort of "start from scratch" versions (as opposed to just using the old v5 FAQs and adding to them) that would be ideal.

One true improvement is that they've gotten better in describing the exact values of powered weapons so now you actually know how useful they are. So, for example, we now know that Burnas are AP3 when used as Power Weapons. We also know (although this isn't as new) that a Chaplain's Crozius is essentially a AP4 Power Maul. Have to say that's a bit disappointing as not being able to ignore 3+ armor sort of, IMHO, makes a Power Weapon not a Power Weapon. After all, the whole point was to negate armor and the way it greatly reduces the damage a unit receives. This one change makes the Chaplain significantly less appealing as a character as he's now a LOT less effective against Power Armor (basically, the amount of damage he could do against such protected enemies is now ONE-THIRD what it was before).

Another disappointment, although this is more a matter of personal taste, is that they qualified what Space Marine chapters could take. The way that they listed the SM vehicles in the rulebook suggested that chapters with older books (like my beloved Dark Angels) might have access to the new stuff -- such as Storm Ravens, for example -- that wasn't around when the codex was written. Well, this FAQ update flatly quashes any such hopes. So, no Storm Ravens or Ironclad Dreadnoughts for Dark Angels.

I figured that would be the case, but the one clarification that does suprise me (since I bought the model) is that it specifically states that the Storm Talon is ONLY available for pure Space Marines from the codex of the same name and not for ANY other SM chapters. This is strange as it was common knowledge that you could use the flyers (not to mention many of the other units not available when a given codex was written) at GW Stores. Plus, I think a lot of people in and out of GW simply assumed that the Storm Talon was available to every Space Marine chapter. To find out that it's not is a bit shocking.

I guess the real acid test comes when the Dark Angel codex comes out. If suddenly they get the Storm Talon, Raven, and other momentarily verbotten units then I guess this all turns into another case of the infamous "Storm Shield Debacle" (where for a while the Storm Shield for newer chapters was save 3+ all the time, yet for the older chapters the EXACT same piece of wargear was only 4+ and only in CC) where some Marines don't get what others do for no other reason than "because". But, if they don't get these new toys at all I think the shock will be much greater. One, why would GW give up the chance to sell that many more boxes of expensive (and popular) models? Two, if Dark Angels don't get such things then just want exactly do they get, particularly in the case of flyers?

If you play Space Marines, aren't Grey Knights or Blood Angels, and
hoped to be able to play with Storm Ravens, better luck next time

And, three, it will bring back the old sour feelings that came with the old DA codex. That one was the first of a short lived change in GW design philosophy which amounted to "less is more". That is, the DA book added no new models or really any rules to the DA. If they had kept with that philosophy for later books then okay, but instead they quickly reversed course and book-after-book was filled with bunches of cool new toys and rules. That left we DA players feeling short changed. The up coming DA book is GW's chance to rectify things and make Dark Angels worth playing again using the actual DA rules (as opposed to, as many DA players do now, using other Chapter's rules as "Count as"). I just hope GW doesn't blow it with DA and just produce another empty re-telling of the same basic rules as before. I want to read the new codex and go "Wow!" Mind you, not necessarily in terms of power, but at least in terms of options and possibilities. We'll have to see if that's the case.

In the meantime enjoy the new version of the FAQs. While they still aren't perfect at least they are a needed move in the right direction and hopefully indicate that GW will be updating them on a regular "every-few-months" basis.

Retro Warhammer or Warhammer 40K anyone

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Fri, 31 Aug 2012 17:44:00 -0400

In thinking about next year, I got to thinking about the history of these games and the different editions.

So I am wondering - would anyone be up for a early edition game? Say 1st Edition of either or 2nd? 3rd anyone?

The requirement would be a period correct army, and period correct rules. No using later edition figures or units.

Does anyone think this might be a fun way to spend a few hours? Give us a reply here please.

Dark Vengeance on Advanced Order

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Sat, 25 Aug 2012 05:00:00 -0400

It's finally here: The new 6th Edition box set. Or, at least, the limited edition version of the 6th edition box set. The only difference between it and the regular box set will be the one extra Dark Angels Chaplain (see the second picture below) you get with it and about $8. Being a Dark Angels player (if with a different chapter symbol which means some minor conversion work on my part) I definitely want to get this limited edition.

Here are some pictures of the new models. For the complete set please visit the GW website. All-in-all I think these look great!

But the guy with the iPad likes it

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 23:35:00 -0400

It was Mark Twain who said that differences of opinion make horse races, and we've certainly got that going on here. Ranillon's review of the digital Space Marine codex the other day was both negative and bombastic to say the least. But in the comments that he got, there was one excellent point made... that he was reviewing a digital product that he could not possibly purchase.

As the iPad owner here at 40kOrigins, I figure I better step up to the plate. So I downloaded the digital Space Marine codex today and have been giving it a spin.

Now I'm going to gloss over the issues of the codex being available only in English, and only on the iPad platform. Much press has been generated on this already and how it excludes a wide swath of potential customers. I'm also only going to address the pricing of it in passing. It's just as expensive as the hard copy, and that's unfortunate, but there we are.

What I'm worried about is the usefulness of the codex and how it compares to the hardcopy. it's laid out differently than the physical codex, so it's not like navigating a PDF, and takes a bit of getting used to. It's not quite as functional as I'd like, at least not until I get some practice in with it, because the various sections of the book are ordered differently.

However, my criticisms stop there.

At first glance, there are no links to take to to unit descriptions, weapon stats, and the like. But that's until you realize that pretty much every word is a clickable link. From the unit descriptions in Chapter 6 you can click to go to the army list entry, and by clicking on the unit name there you can go back to it's entry in Chapter 6. And with the exception of the flavor text, you can click on every weapon name and special ability in either location and you get a pop up which gives you rules and game stats. it took me a little while to catch on since nothing LOOKS like a link, but it's a very powerful feature.

And that's the bottom line. if I wanted to flip back and forth in a book, I can do that already. But a digital resource has the power to put every peice of information in your hands on one page, either by link or by pop up. And the Digital Codex takes full advantage of that.

The fact that the rest of the book reads like a full color advertisement is totally beside the point. we're used to that from White Dwarf magazine. And while i don't find much added value in having painted models presented to me in 360 degree rotatable views (because I could go to the GW website for that), you have to admit that having all that in the digital edition is pretty cool. And at 320mb for the entire book, they're not wasting much of my precious memory space on it.

I'll be interested to see what they do when the new Chaos Marine codex comes out in a few months. Specifically, will a digital edition come out simultaneously with the paper codex? if if does, i'll buy that one instead since I'm otherwise impressed with the functionality of the presentation of data in the digital edition. But if it doesn't... I'm going to be faced with a choice of waiting while my non-iPad friends have their rulebook while I waffle over whether to get the paper version, knowing I don't want to buy it TWICE.

I'll also be interested to see the pace of updates to the existing digital codexes (codexi?). They just added hull points to the space marine digital codex, so this indicates that major changes and errata will get picked up in a timely fashion. That's critical to digital editions since the whole POINT of them is to have all the information in front of your face all at once without flipping back and forth between different sources.

...

So my review of the digital codex is thumbs up. Yes the expense is disappointing, but given that it is MORE useful than the regular codex for the purpose of getting information quickly, I'm willing to live with that. It is more useful than the combination of a PDF copy and an internet connection, not only for pretty pictures but for the down and dirty of playing the game, and that's the key point. My only hope is that they port it over to android tablets at some point.

GW Goes Digital -- and Blows It!

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 00:58:00 -0400

Yes, yes -- I'm sure you've heard/read it before, namely that someone throwing a fit over how the new digital codexes from Games Workshop are supposedly so hideously expensive (that and that they are exclusive to the iPad -- hell, I can't even load the sample edition to my iPhone, that's how exclusive it is!). Which is to say that they are just as much in the virtual form as they are in the real world physical form. People have gone over how preposterous, even idiotic this is, listing out reason after reason. So, I won't repeat them. What I do want to talk about is the effect it's having with the already cynical fan base.

No one is surprised that GW is charging a high price for something, but these new digital codexes are -- psychologically at least -- on a whole new level. When I heard about GW going digital I expected to look at the price, think it was high, and then debate with myself whether or not it was worth buying anyway. Instead, when I saw it's price I was both astonished and appalled. There was no internal debate -- I instantly concluded it was way overpriced. In fact, it was so overpriced within moments my shock turned to anger.

Sure, that was just me -- perhaps I was just being overly critical. Yet, as I've read about this in blog after blog, people report the exact same strong emotional reaction. Likewise, go read the comments for the Space Marine codex on iTunes. 9 out of 10 are angry, outraged gripes over the price. While there are certainly those few who respond with "what's the big deal" I don't know if I've ever seen any GW product generate such a consistent negative reaction from person after person after person.

Now, put aside any questions as to whether or not the price is actually justified. What is undeniable is that this pricing scheme for digital products has been an unmitigated public relations disaster! So many fans are already up-in-arms over GW's constant, far-beyond-inflation price hikes that for many this latest fiasco is just final confirmation that everything bad they've suspected about GW is in fact completely correct -- that GW cares only about its revenue, that their business model is falling apart, that upper management is divorced from the concerns of their player base, that they've ceased to care about long term gaming veterans, etc. Whether these views are actually fair is beside the point -- among the average fan they are becoming established, "common" wisdom.

My strong suggestion to GW is that they quickly back-off and lower the price of their digital codexes to at least $30 (with $20 probably being the most reasonable) if only for the sake of public relations damage control. After all, isn't the real money in models? Why give people fewer reasons to by those new kits and figures when you could instead use going virtual as a way to draw people back in? A lot of damage has been done to GWs already fragile reputation by this tone-deaf sort of marketing. Merely coming out with justifications for the price (or remaining silent) isn't going to cut it. GW's share of the miniatures market has been steadily declining for many years now and despite its size it's not impossible for the company to mismanage itself into ruin. Just look at the fate of TSR if you don't believe me.

Then again, maybe GW being bought out by new ownership could be the way to turn things around. I just sure hope that doesn't turn out to be the only solution to Games Workshop's increasing financial and public perception woes. I love their models and games, but the company is clearly becoming its own worst enemy.

6th Edition and Origins 2013

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 21:06:00 -0400

Sixth Edition is out and changes many things in the Warhammer 40K universe. The rules changed more in this edition than the last 3 editions. We are already working to revamp our Introduction to Warhammer 40K and looking at the impacts it will have on other games we run.

Origins will be a bit different next year as well. GAMA realized it was too early, moving back in the calendar 4 weeks. So next year it is in between in Mid-June - late enough most schools will be out. The convention will be June 12 thru the 16th.

In the mean time many of us are going to the iHobby show in Cleveland in October, where most of the manufacturers show up and show off their christmas goods, and offer a few early christmas deals.

We will be posting event information plans ahead of Origins releasing information, so that you have time to plan for next year in advance.

Looking forward to seeing you at Origins 2013.

Origins GT 2012 Results

40korigins@adhenterprises.com — Sun, 24 Jun 2012 18:46:00 -0400

Here are the results of this year's (2012) Origins Grand Tournament (Victory Points in the parenthesis):

Bobby Blanding (VA) 5264
Nick savage 5106
David Nixon (va) 5013
Craig Collins (1) 4612
Will Pauley (VA) 4207
Nathan Montgomery 4093
Justin cress 3742
Jeremy archer 3624
Eric Furman 3595
Steve Olk 3494
John Loy 3455
Jason Garner 3429
Nick Soika 3398
Ben Stamm (1) 3007
Tom McFarland (stve/joe) 2781
Joe Miksa 2667
Stuart Moll (banzi) 2500
steve parello 2256
Andrew Weigler 2018
Adam James (VA) 2000
Jordan Heightshoe 1773
Sean Hoy 1615
Steve Beasley (stve/joe) 1561
Michael ST. Clair (banzi) 1408
Todd Heightshoe 1026
Kevin Parry (banzi) 780

Ben Stamm won sports with a perfect sportsmanship score

Eric Furman won the "steal" award with a beautiful Dark Eldar Army

Nick Savage took home best apperance with his Orks

The tournament was better than ever with a full house and a wide selection of armies. After doing this for four years now I think we can announce that 40KOrigins has become a lasting and successful going concern. Expect even more choices and bigger games for next year!