Review: Dust Warfare Rulebook

All behold Dust Warfare, the second coming, the saviour of wargaming... or is it just another tale of the Emperor's new cloths? Honestly I've sat amused the past few weeks, or months watching as many proclaimed Dust Warfare to be a Warhammer 40K killer. The next big thing. The best game ever. Will it be a Warhammer 40K killer? No I don't think so, the biggest threat to that particular franchise is Games Worshop themselves. Could it be the next big thing? Possibly, if Fantasy Flight games pull their fingers out and support it properly. Is it the best game ever? Well I guess you'll have to read on to find out won't you?

Product description

This little book is being touted as a hobby saviour by many, a way of salvaging something from the supposed 'inevitable' wreck that will be 40K 6th Ed, when it's actually a 143 page hardback rulebook, about the same size as a Games Workshop Codex or a Privateer Press army book. When I open it's pages choirs of angels can not be heard singing and I am not bathed in a warm light of pure goodness, the binding on the pages though is stitched and the quality is noticably higher than the books from many other game firms, so that's nice. The hardback cover of the book is a matte finish and the pages inside are fairly thick paper, finished in satin as opposed to high gloss, it is not a Holy tome descended from the heavens. The book contains a good level of fluff and it is interlaced with unit descriptions and special rules, it doesn't herald the dawn of a new age of enlightenment and prosperity for humanity. The core rules themselves start on page 26 and finish on page 50, meaning the rules themselves only take up 25 pages, so it's not as daunting a ruleset as the 143 page count might suggest. Special rules cover a further 8 pages, while battle set ups and scenarios take up 16 pages. The army lists for both the Axis and Allies factions take up roughly 14 pages each. At the back of the book are a number of pages designed to be photocopied and used as tokens and counters in the game. That's your lot, it doesn't give you the answer to the meaning of life, or cure caner or AIDs... it's a rulebook for a wargame, so can people please stop putting it atop a pedestal it's never going to be able to stay on?

It's getting Dusty round here

  
 

The Revised Dust Tactics Core Set.

OK so that title is an absolutely terrible tabloidesque pun, and yes it should be way beneath a quality Blog like this one. But, bad pun aside I'm really happy, I've got the revised Dust Tactics Core Set to review, and my copy of Dust Warfare. I'll be looking to do a few more Dust related articles in the next few weeks or so after I've had a bit of a blow out with both these games. For now you'll have to content yourself with some pretty pictures of me getting the contents out of the box...

Games that currently intrigue me: Dust Warfare

     
       

It's finally here!!!

Right, this article is sort of out of sync with the others in the series I've been planning. My aim was to do Dark Age next and then Dust Warfare... but SinSynn whinged, so as he'd say 'waddayagonnado'? Turns out bring the Dust Warfare article forward by a month or so and push Dark Age back a bit (sorry to all those of you who have asked me to cover Dark Age)! Just to be clear from the outset this article is NOT a review of Dust Warfare the game or rulebook, it's just my initial thoughts on things so please don't tell me I can't review a game on only one play through, I'm more than aware of that fact and that's not what I'm doing. So chill.

Dust Warfare is yet another game I guess that I've already sort of brought into, not directly mind you. More vicariously in the shape of Dust Tactics, the skirmish based board game that I own, and reviewed a few months back now. In it I discuss how I felt the game looked kind of strange to me on the board. Although I didn't think the game was bad per se, I didn't think the first edition starter set that I had was a very good introduction at all. I also felt that the game would have been just better accepting that it needed to be a wargame, instead of some weird board / wargame hybrid. So I did do a little dance and smiled when I saw that Fantasy Flight Games were releasing Dust Warfare finally. I actually think the profile cards for Dust Tactics actually have a lot of scope for variance and character, it's just that's not going to be fully realised on a board... the game has also been designed by Andy Chambers. He's sort of a personal hero of mine too.

Painted up the miniatures looks as good as anyone's

Company: Really? You need me to tell you who Fantasy Flight Games are? Where have you been for the last decade or so? OK, here goes. Fantasy Flight Games are based in Minnesota USA. They were founded in 1995 and have since gone on to become one of the biggest names in Board Games, RPGs and Card games. They have an increasingly impressive roster of games and have produced some highly popular games based off of Games Workshops IP, and continue in this Blogger's opinion to make better, more inventive use of said IP. They also have many other license agreements with other household name brands... well household names for geeks like me, such as Game of Thrones, Arkham Horror, Gears of War although the biggy they own, Star Wars, should be a household name for everyone. So seeing them make a move into wargames proper is a pretty big deal... well I think it is!!!

Do I get into Dust?

It most certainly can't have escaped most of my regular readers notice that I've been on somewhat of a board game binge of late. I'm sure I must have mentioned this a few times. Thing is I really am a wargamer and I told myself that after Gear of War, Super Dungeon Explore and Dungeons & Dragons: Legend of Drizzt that for me that would be it for quite a while, well unless Kingdom Death suddenly pops up at very short notice. You see although Descent Journeys in the Dark is beginning to be extremely tempting, as is Claustrophobia (if I could find a copy) I really don't want to divert my gaming away from what I love and that's painting cool miniatures and playing wargames. Although the Dust Miniatures are exceptional in some cases, its not really been enough for me to take the plunge. Plus on this blog I want to get back to writing about Infinity and few others a bit more.

Thing is the amazing alternative history world of Dust has always kinda had me interested. I've read some very mixed things about Dust Tactics though some people tell me its great, other people tell me its average at best, its this mixed messages I've been getting coupled with the expense of buying the game that put me off. However the world created by Paolo Parente and the miniatures themselves have always intrigued me. Because I think its fair to say they are a significant step up from the usual board game fair served up normally in that horrible rubbery plastic. No its more than fair to say that the Dust Tactics miniature range provided by Fantasy Flight Games is on a par with some of the best plastics on the market from more typical wargames companies.

The boxed game itself can be picked up for around £70 if you shop around a bit and to be fair that's a pretty reasonable price considering the components you get in the box and for what's in the box that's a very reasonable price. However there is another reason I was always drawn to Dust Tactics. There was a the rumoured wargame that was supposedly in joint production with Dust Tactics and would use the same lovely miniatures as Dust Tactics, in a proper tabletop wargame, it was believed to be called Dust Warfare. Initially I kept a close eye on the world of Dust waiting to see if this Dust Warfare would ever surface, and until very recently I'd have to say I was very disappointed with the fact it hadn't yet shown its face...