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Author Topic: Any of you guys 3rd Edition fans?  (Read 1612 times)

Offline KTG17

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Any of you guys 3rd Edition fans?
« on: May 13, 2019, 08:43:12 PM »
Hi, I am new here and primarily here for Warhammer Fantasy Battles (http://warhammer-empire.com/theforum/index.php?topic=53028.0), but I have been a fan of 40k for a lot longer. I first discovered 40k via Dragon Magazine of all places, with seeing an ad for Rogue Trader. Well, I spent the next year drawing beakie Space Marines for the next year without knowing much about them. Then some friends and I got into Adeptus Titanicus/Space Marine v1, played the hell out of that, and eventually tried out the 28mm scale version of battles. I thought Rogue Trader in those days was an absolute mess, and I was so thankful for when 2nd Edition was released and my friends had a great time with that game.

I eventually got out of the hobby, sold just about everything I had, only for years later a new group of friends were interested in getting into what was now 3rd edition, so I had to go out and buy all the old models I used to have.  :eusa_wall:

I remember 3rd Edition being pretty controversial at the time, as a lot of people complained about it. Truthfully, my group didn't stick with it for long, and while I collected here and there, I really didn't get much else, nor play, until 6th came along. While I think the Dark Vengeance set is pretty impressive, the rulebook is pretty hard to read, and I didn't want to buy all the new codexes, so the few times I played it we just stuck with what is in the set.

Around the time 8th came out I lost all interest in current 40k. Hate Primaris Marines. Hate no template weapons. There are some cool models coming out, some of which I used to replace my older models, but some of them are larger than the old models and I feel like everything is getting really cramped on the gaming table. So recently I sat down and looked over my 3rd edition rulebook and realized how great 3rd really was. Most importantly how comprehensive the rulebook is, especially with including get-by army lists in the back of the book (the last time we would see this). If you think about how expensive it is just to get into ONE army in 40k is today, at least with that rulebook you had enough rules to try out multiple armies. I know the edition suffered a little from codex creep, but there were also a lot of new armies released back then.

Anyway, its motivated me to hunt down all the old Battleforce sets (not the square ones, but the rectangle ones) to keep forever. Even the armies I had no interest in back then. I just feel 40k is changing, and not in ways I am crazy about, and I can see the day GW moves on from Space Marines as we know them for whatever they can feel they can make the most money on. Creative Destruction and all.

I still have my 2nd Edition set, but I think that is more complex for new players (especially my friends) and all the cards and chits are a pain. I don't know enough about the 4th ed or 5th rulebooks, but in order to play those you had to have the codexes. I am really past collecting all of that.

Anyone else think fondly of 3rd edition? When was the last time you played it?


Offline Von Zorn

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Re: Any of you guys 3rd Edition fans?
« Reply #1 on: May 17, 2019, 09:31:23 PM »
A mate and I had a game of 3rd Edition 40k not so long back although it wasn't a traditional battle. We did a sort of co-op scenario where we each had a squad of Space Marines who had to clear our some Tyranid nests. It was more or less a way for us to re-familiarise ourselves with the rules after so long, but we had for a long time talked about how we'd like to go back to one of the earlier editions of 40k for various reasons. One big one is that armies were more sensibly sized back then. Today's mid sized games were massive battles back in the day - so something like a Start Collecting box would be a core force rather than the bare-bones starting block that they might be today.

Several aspects of 8th Edition were not to our tastes really. The game, whilst easy to play with its core system, seemed complex in other more "gamey" ways (a lot of optimising Command Points and unit combos, with unit special rules everywhere). I can see the appeal but it's not for me. I prefer a more narrative and cinematic game, and with things like vehicles not having a facing and characters being arbitrarily protected from being fired at (if I recall) the cinema was a bit lost for me.

We plan on playing some more 3rd soon. Well, it's on the to-do list anyway!  :happy:

Offline neverness

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Re: Any of you guys 3rd Edition fans?
« Reply #2 on: June 09, 2019, 09:53:45 PM »
I have been kicking the idea around to maybe replay all the previous editions starting with Rogue Trader. Maybe try the campaign from Chapter Approved, and up through the Battle Manual era before moving on to 2nd and 3rd. I have all the books, and most of my collection is complete for each edition. I just need to find the right person in my locality who can pull it off with me. Most of my friends tend to sell off or part with their rules stuff as editions change. Anyway, it might make for a fun series of blog posts if I can pull it off...

A bit more back on track, yes, I was a 3rd edition fan, but not until after all the armies got their codex properly released. Using the rulebook lists vs as Codex list was woefully unbalanced, so if you do decide to play a retro game of 3rd ed, make sure you have a codex for each army! Also beware of "3.5" as some armies got revamped books as time went on.

Offline Michael W

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Re: Any of you guys 3rd Edition fans?
« Reply #3 on: June 15, 2019, 02:47:28 AM »
I haven't played 3rd in ages, but I definitely have plenty of nostalgia for it as it was my starting edition for 40k.  I agree about the reasonable battle sizes and the coherency of the rulebook.  It definitely had its flaws, but I don't remember a lot of wildly unbalanced games.  And I loved my Initiative 3 Salamanders.  :)

My gaming group uses (my) homewritten rules system now for 40k games, but 3rd is definitely the rules core that it is drawn from (with a lot of fluff/inspiration from 2nd).  And if I ran across some gamers who wanted to use 3rd I'd probably jump at the chance.
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Offline BAWTRM

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Re: Any of you guys 3rd Edition fans?
« Reply #4 on: August 10, 2019, 06:33:41 PM »
3rd edition is also the one I started with with the Armageddon campaign, got myself one of those great deal Ork army boxes and seriously expanded from there.

Bit disappointing that nowadays you get 8 of the very same old Ork boys where you got 16 for the same price back in 3rd ed days.  :icon_sad:
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Offline GamesPoet

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Re: Any of you guys 3rd Edition fans?
« Reply #5 on: August 10, 2019, 06:41:39 PM »
Must be the cost of plastic has risen. :icon_wink:
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