A New 40K Convert?

By the time I played my first game of Warhammer 40,000, Bryce had been looking for someone to play against for some time. It seems that 40K has a tendency to instill a missionary-like zeal for converting others to the game. Within a few months, Jonathan, a friend of mine with whom I walk to the bus stop and whose brother used to play both 40K and Warhammer fantasy had started to show interest. At about the same time, another coworker, Kevin, who enjoys painting the Lord of the Rings figures, also expressed interest. Soon Bryce and I were incorporating Jonathan and Kevin into our games. The best part is that neither Jonathan nor Kevin showed any interest in any of the armies that Bryce or I were playing. Kevin wanted to play Dark Eldar and Jonathan wanted to play Orks. This has led to a lot more variety in our games. In fact, the growth of our little cabal encouraged Bryce to build a new Imperial Guard army. The Imperial Guard had always been his favorite army, but with no one to play with, Bryce had sold off nearly all his figures.

This past Friday took an even more interesting turn. Bryce and I successfully convinced our boss, Carl, to participate in a game. His first game was a 500 point fight between my Ultramarines and a Tau army borrowed from Bryce. Usually my Space Marines don't have a whole lot of luck in such low point games, especially when I have few heavy weapons while the Tau are fielding three Broadside Battlesuits. Usually I'm forced to do a Pickett's Charge, in which I march the Ultramarines across the table while taking heavy fire from the Tau's guns. This is horribly costly and I rarely have any Marines left for the assault. However, this time I teleported a Terminator squad within close range of the Tau forces. Despite the strength of Carl's army, and the coaching he got from from Bryce, the Ultramarines were able to hold their own.

A Space Marine Terminator Squad: Not something
Xeno scum wants to find on its doorstep
[Models by Games Workshop]

After the first game was called, Carl's Tau and Jonathan's Orks faced off against Bryce's new Steel Legion Imperial Guard and my Ultramarines. It was a pretty evenly matched game, with the Imperial Guard and the Tau handling the long range shooting while the Space Marines and the Orks fought it out in close combat. Vastator participated in the game, although it's main gun met an untimely end from a Broadside's gun. As we often do when it gets too late at night for Bryce and I to remember the rules anymore, we finally called the game before either side was annihilated. Although the combined Space Marine and Imperial Guard forces were left with more points on the table, we had no way to counter the remaining Broadsides. Thus, we called it a draw.

It's expected for Guard and Marines to form
alliances, but I can't really see an Ork-Tau alliance
[Models by Games Workshop]

The purpose of the night's game was to introduce Carl to 40K in the hopes that he would enjoy it. We may have succeeded better than we thought we would. Our unconverted coworkers could only shake their heads when they caught the boss discussing the game with Kevin the following Monday. Even better, Carl has decided that the Tau are probably not for him, but that he's very interested in the Necrons. He's even done some research on the army. I had been thinking of playing Necrons after completing the Ultramarines, but I will gladly let a new player have dibs on the army of his choice. If Carl does indeed become our Necron player, we will have a thoroughly diverse little 40K club.