Warhammer 40,000
Embrace Your Inner Nerd
For a couple of years, Gabriel and I have played strategy games. We started with chess and Risk. We then tried DND minis, Heroscape. DND minis is a fine game with a long history dating back to the first TSR wargame Chainmail. Warhammer’s been around since I was in junior high. It started as a fantasy wargame with metal minitiatures. The Warhammer franchise has grown quite a bit and hit its zenith with branding when their Lord of the Rings minis hit the shelves around 2000.
I think we may have hit our sweet spot with Warhammer 40,000. Unlike the other wargames, Warhammer is sort of a total package. Games Workshop sells unpainted metal and plastic miniatures. You do the rest. So far I’ve only got one set of troops and it took me 3 weeks to paint them. But time would virtually disappear when I was painting. Gabriel took decidedly less time, he’s only 11. It’s a lot more fun than I imagined before I started. The game itself is a gas, with more intricacy and nuance than DnD minis.
The army building and selection is a time intensive and laborious process that is not a trivial undertaking. The miniatures are more expensive and the preparation and care taken in painting the models is as deep as you want to go. I felt I did a pretty good job painting my first set. I will have to take some macro shots and post them soon.
I chose the Eldar as my army. I have to be honest I chose them purely on aesthetics. There are more powerful armies that are more aggressive with more straightforward tactical advantage. The Eldar tend to have more advantage defensively, at distance, or in hit and run tactics than straight on hand to hand combat.
Gabriel chose the Tyranids. The Tyranids rely on being able to close to hand to hand range and their typically superior numbers.
So far it’s been a good father son activity. He is learning to take his time on his painting, to pay attention to detail, and to see how a lot of hard work can pay off with a very cool looking miniature.
Note all shots from this post are from Games Workshop.
February 6th, 2008 at 10:53 am
It is good to see the nerdling-training progresses as planned…
February 6th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
I’m telling you though, he hits junior high and it’s all football and wrestling.