Warhammer 40,000: Dark imperium

Band Of (Battle) Brothers

released OUT NOW! Two players

Publisher Games Workshop

It’s only been three years since the last edition of Warhammer 40,000 but a lot’s changed at Games Workshop in that time. Age Of Sigmar replaced the traditional Fantasy Battle with streamlined rules and a new continuity. It was a massive success that won over many a lapsed player.

Dark Imperium aims to repeat the trick, though it isn’t as radical. The backstory remains in place, albeit nudged along, but as with Sigmar, this is more accessible both in terms of its refined ruleset and in sheer cost. 40K had become a very expensive hobby to get into. Dark Imperium rectifies that by giving you everything you need to play, including the complete rulebook and two armies.

The setup is reassuringly familiar. Players move, shoot, wield psychic powers (simplified here) and engage in close combat – now more important. Of course, you can go deeper, with matched and narrative play options, as well as battle-forged armies and objectives, but it’s designed to enable players to raise or lower the complexity as they wish.

As ever, the models are stunning. The Death Guard field Plague Marines, assorted characters and two squads of Poxwalkers. The latter are easily despatched, but handy for bogging down enemy troops. There’s also an impressive Blight Drone – a daemon engine that makes short work of infantry.

But it’s the Space Marines fans will be excited about. The brand new Primaris models are bigger, tougher and altogether sexier than your standard Tactical Marine. The quality is such a improvement that they make existing Adeptus Astartes armies look weirdly squat. No doubt that’s part of the plan – it’s hard to imagine Space Marine fans resisting upgrading for long. But that’s okay. The quality of both the models and the game is so high that you won’t resent splashing out one bit.

Don’t want to pay to get the new rules? You can download them from the Games Workshop at www.bit.ly/40knewrules.