It's been a while! Dark Angels to the rescue!

Well, hello all of you out there!  I can't believe that it's been since just before the 6th edition of Warhammer 40K came out.  I whole heartedly apologize for this extended absence and I truly hope the next one is far shorter and far away.  After the new year, I struggled to find something to resolve to do.  (Part of the reason for my absense was the completion of a couple of life-long goals I had held, so I was a little fresh out of new ideas.)  So, that brings us to today.  The release of the new Dark Angels codex is adding fuel to that fire as well.  I think I'm going to have to resolve to resurrect this blog and periodically write to it.  I hope some of you are willing to come back and peruse!  I think I'm going to open the door to some of my other gaming hobbies from time to time as well to broaden my writing base. 

Well on to my first topic.  The new Dark Angels codex...
I will say that at first I was pretty disappointed with the codex because I foolishly fell into the hype of all the rumors.  And almost none of them panned out in reality (army-wide plasma twin-linkedness, plasma predator, 2-wound terminators, etc...).   But, that wasn't really the new codex's fault, it was mine for getting too excited about rumors (that well should have be taken with at least a pound of salt).  

Looking farther, I was actually quite pleased to see the army that I know and love is pretty much the same as it used to be with a few new units to bring them into the modern environment of 40K.  And I have to add, the new units are pretty flavorful to the existing fluff.  I'm also really excited to see the revisioning to the old 'intractable' rules, with the new "grim resolve".  This is what intractable should have been all along, showing resolute steadfastedness sometimes to the point of foolishness.  I am still looking at the codex as many of you are, and I'm sure there will be much to come regarding how it works out.

I am at the moment, somewhat saddend by one thing, though.  That is, I'm pretty sure my current company master is no longer able to be created by the new rules.  And as I am a pretty devout WYSIWYG player, I feel that he will be relagated to the hobby display case.   I'm really sad, because he's probably my favorite individual model in my army as is.  But, he's typically equiped with a Combi-Plasma, Bolt Pistol, and a Power Sword (which I have never found fault arguing was under his immense cloak that he'd draped over his shoulder).  The current state of the book means that I can replace only his weapons to get any special wargear additions, and unless you count grenades as 'weapons' (I know an arguement can be made.) you only begin with two, thus can only end with two.  Because his Combi-Plasma is so present on his model, that (for me) necessarily must be one of the two choices...  I just think of bad-ass commanders as two weapons melee masters.   So unless, I rethink the role of my commander, my current model is probably retired. 

R.I.P. Company Master

Commander with the drape.