It has been a big year of changes in my life with a
divorce, a new job, a new place to live, a new love, etc etc etc... As
such my hobby has taken a bit of a hit and my desire to keep my life together
has taken the front seat. That said, life has been amazing the last six
months or so and all is really good!
To my point, as I have effectively had my head in
the sand I feel like I have missed a few shifts in the ol war dolly scene down
here in Melbourne/ Australia. I also feel like some shifts that should
have happened have not and I am shocked about what is going on.
Case in point, Orktoberfest... I attended
Orkfest a few years back and (one personality clash aside) I had a blast.
It was early days into 8th and so the TO ran the event as a comp free event
and while it was disappointing that a few rules changes were made to make 8th
edition more like 7th, it was early days. This morning I thought it might
check the Orkfest pack (forgetting it was well into October.... Duh!) to see if
I could sneak in a quick trip up to play again. No such luck... I
missed it. I also took a good look at the players pack to be honest... I
was horrified. No missions, significant changes to the rules (magic dice
restrictions, unit size caps, victory point changes, infinite hills, etc...), no
comp and 20 players... This was not the event that I remember. Or
maybe it is... True I only played once... Maybe I just assumed it
would get better over time. I know it is just my opinion but I am pretty disappointed
that people aren’t over the switch to 8th by now.
Victorian events (cancon aside) have been the
largest of their kind in recent years.
The Victorian scene is continuing to grow and evolve. Over the years we have seen a variety of
events that mix up 8th without actually changing the rules or how
the game is played. New players continue
to come over from 40K and even occasionally from Warmachine, if they don’t come
out of nowhere and start from scratch.
I believe this is largely do to Victoria being the only place to fully embrace
8th edition within Australia.
8th is balanced (or is at least far more
so than 7th) with new army books that seem to generally avoid the GW
obligatory power creep. It works,
it is being fully supported and it is evolving… Sure it is not perfect but nothing ever is. 6th Ed of 40k seems to have missed this phenomenon but to be fair comp seems to have died in the process... C'est La Vie...
Now… Off to
Axemaster…
