Command vast armies of aliens and humankind on distant worlds.
It’s been a bumper time for fans of epic scale wargaming lately, and Mantic Games has got in on the act by Kickstarting an entire range – 8 factions – for their own epic system, Epic Warpath. I received the starter set, a couple of large resin models, and some epic scale building sets for review, and while I haven’t got everything ready for a game yet, it’s looking very promising!
The rules seem to be a nice mixture between old and new, using the command dice system from Deadzone and the order tokens pioneered in GW’s original Adeptus Titanicus and still used in their recent epic scale game Legions Imperialis. There are some nice twists here that make great use of the tokens to denote a unit’s status through the round, if some slightly confusing terminology (‘overwatch’ instead of ‘first fire’, for example). The order of the rules as presented is a bit clunky too, and I’ve tried to improve comprehension with my rules & reference. Of course, I’ll be able to talk a lot more about the system after I’ve played some games!
The miniatures look great and there’s a minimum of fiddly construction, which is good to see. For me the big draw here over GW’s latest offering is the variety and distinctness of the available factions – and the fact they’re all available up front. While GW seems obsessed with their Horus Heresy, Mantic is having fun putting space rats, dwarves, zombies and weird aliens together on the tabletop, and to me that’s far more enjoyable than civil war amongst space marines.
Right now I’m busy building and painting, but for more detail, check out my unboxing. More to come!
