This turns out to be an issue for those that love fluff and/or who need inspiration to get them working on their latest model. It's not so great if you want something beefy to munch into.
New this Month: Fortress of Redemption; Space Marine Megaforce; Ork Megaforce; Empire Brigade; Orc and Goblin Brigade; Extensions for the Realm of Battle Game Board, and; the (apparent) reissue of the large army cases.
Pages 14-17 -- White Dwarf - A Year in Review: This is basically an excuse to go back over some of the material of the last year. Nothing new if you've been reading all along.
Pages 22-29 -- Old War Stories: A review of "Dave and Jerm's" Warhammer campaign and their thoughts over the matter. Good stuff if you are running a campaign, either Warhammer or 40K. Provides ideas for your own games and a number of examples of units in various stages of construction and painting. The last part turns toward adapting these ideas to 40K, even including some bits on using Battlefleet Gothic in campaigns.
Pages 32-35 -- Look to the Skies: Phil Kelly provides his thoughts on playing defense in Planetstrike. He goes into all the most straightforward tactics such as setting up fire zones and protecting objectives. He also goes into much of an entire page talking about the new Fortress of Redemption and how cool it is.
Pages 36-37 -- New Planetstrike Stratagems: Really a continuation of the last article I list then separately because these represent a real rules add-on for Planetstrike (as opposed to just tactical recommendations). Included are new stratagems for every race such as the Tau "For the Greater Good" (if a leader dies you get to be fearless for d3 turns) or the Orky "It's Raining Orks" (deep strike d6+2 regular orks anywhere and treat them as separate units).
Page 39 -- Fortress of Redemption (Rules): Here are the rules for the new Fortress (duh). Lists everything you need to play it (except for a points total -- just like all Planetstrike models).
Pages 40-43 -- Andy Hall's Game-A-Week: Just what it says this article is all about Andy's experiences trying to reach his own particular endurance challenge. Nothing here all that amazing, but it can be inspirational when it comes to psyching yourself up to play more.
Pages 44-47 -- A Tale of Four Gamers: Theeeey're baaaaack. We get more updates for what these four studio players are up to. One is working on Crimson Fists, the next his Chaos Marines (adding some bastions), the third has put aside Eldar for some Warhammer Chaos Warriors, and the last is still working away on his orks (including a fighta-bomma). Again, it's just more inspiration.
Pages 48-71 -- Blood and Sand Battle Report: The big game of this issue, it's great if you are into Lord of the Rings (and just pretty pictures if you are not). It does include some extra rules and scenario rules which is a nice change from an issue so far primarily devoted to fluff. The battle report itself goes on for a while and has plenty of details and photos.
Pages 73-75 -- Standard Bearer: Jarvis is off for the month so John Blanche steps in to write about how and why he does his models. He's a skilled artist so the article is worth reading, but still in the same vein as the rest of the "less filling" material this month.
Pages 76-77 -- Crimson Fists Showcase: A quick few pages showing of some painted Crimson Fist marines. Really just an excuse to show off Fist bits you can buy.
Pages 78-87 -- Modeling Workshop - Strongholds: Finally something more directly helpful this article gives you a lot of details for how to put together and then paint the new Fortress of Redemption. At the end it also gives a few pages on doing the same for the Empire Coaching Inn for Warhammer. The first part is quite handy if like me you have a Fortress waiting to get done.
Pages 92-93 -- The Fort: This is a two page scenario for a defender in his fortress fighting off attackers. Can be used in both Warhammer and 40K. If nothing else this allows you to play with Planetstrike bastions without actually using Planetstrike.
Pages 94 -103 -- 'Evey Metal Masterclass - Vermin Lord: A surprisingly long and detailed treatment on how to do up a Vermin Lord. Agreeably they convert the model into something a bit more impressive and then go into step-by-step painting. A real treat is the treatise later on dealing with "directional lighting" -- that is, how to paint a model to represent it being lighted from a particular direction. This is my pick for the most useful (at least if you paint) article in the issue.
Next Month -- Bugs!
A while back I picked up a set of Parlimentary troops for Warhammer English Civil War from Warlord Games. The miniatures aren't too bad, especially for the price. Let me give you a look:
This first picture is of the bases they come with. They are serviceable, but I think I would go to the trouble to use GW bases inside.
These next two are of a wider and close up view of a sprue of infantry men. You can make 20 shotte and 20 pike from the whole box. That's enough for a modest infantry unit.
This final sprue is the command squad. That makes for a full 40 man squad. As you can see the quality is straightforward, but rather nice. The main limitations is in the options, but there are other ways of making models unique if you want. Otherwise, played out of the box you get a group of minis easy to paint with a good quality result. You won't win painting compositions with them, but they are only $30 or so.
If this stuff interests you then you can hit the banner below to go check out this box set on the Warlord Games website. Be sure to check out the rest of their offering as well.
