It’s almost lunchtime, so I guess that’s time for a new edition of Warhammer 40,000 then…
Honestly, it doesn’t seem but five minutes since 9th rolled up but that’s age for you, and while we’re honestly quite jazzed for 10th – the free data cards and rules, and the apparent abandonment of Codexes as a “must have” mean we might conceivably be looking at the first genuinely playable free edition of 40k – we all know that whatever the speculation about the contents of the box set, it’s going to COST.
It’s also a racing certainty that whatever the rules rewrites, it’s still going to be hamstrung by the phased IGOUGO turn system, and then a lashing of special rules to negate the inherent clunkiness of said system. We’ve written before about the design constraints that 40k appears to be under, and the reason why they can’t simply scrap it and move to something more elegant and free-flowing (our opinion, of course- YMMV).
But what if they could? One of the best systems I ever played as a nipper was an unassuming small unit skirmish set that came with an A5 dot-matrix printed rulebook and about a dozen miniatures in a nondescript cardboard box, set in a cyberpunk future of the early 21st century – I know, you have to smile, right? That said, they don’t mention COVID or Twitter…
I’ve been racking my brains for months on and off trying to remember what it was called – little did I know Jim had got his considerable Google Fu on the case, and so for my birthday rocked up with this:
Combat Zone from EM4 miniatures! He reckoned he was 90% sure this what I’d meant and after having played a couple of quick pickup games to figure the rules out, he’s nailed it, this feels every bit as fast and fun as I remember from circa 1993!
So much so that I was inspired to do (drumroll please) an “unboxing” video, as these seem to be all the rage on YouTube- hopefully I can figure a way to post it here…
So, onto the game itself- players alternate model (not unit) activation (although overwatch is a tactic you can use), and each model has a set number of Action Points that they can spend doing various things – the better your troops, the more action points they get. The instructions on firing are a little convoluted, but a couple of read throughs and you’ll be good to go.
Interestingly, the focus is on individual models for things like Panic reactions – a model only panics if they get hit, but are apparently fine seeing their friends gunned down all around them.. which I suppose matches the tone of 80s action films.
Like any system, it’s a bit clunk initially but by our third game just pushing the models around the kitchen table using books and salt shakers for terrain we were getting right into it – now with the models assembled and ready for priming, you can expect a few battle reports as we play through the campaign in the box.
If you’re in the mood for a quick blast of sci-fi skirmish.. and arguably what Necromunda should have been.. I thoroughly recommend throwing the £25 or so down to get this box set, you’ll enjoy it. And I’m pretty certain you could stat up basically any 40k army for this, and if you really wanted to the models in the box would make a fair set up for Necromunda itself at a fraction of the price!
Stay thrifty and see you soon – Combat Zone can be found on the EM4 site here
Skinflint Games 
That looks like a good deal to me! 🙂 I’ll look forward to reading some game reports!
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I’ve got this box unopened on my shelf, I should really get going on it!
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