Fifth Edition Boxed Set Incoming!

With the Rulebook for Warhammer 40,000 Fifth Edition arriving in July, Games Workshop has released first official word of the companion starter V5 Boxed Set, to follow in September.

The new starter box will reflect many of the 'back-to-its-origins' qualities evident in Fifth Edition rules, by pitting the antagonists available in the very first Warhammer 40K 'big box' version of the game, the 1992 Second Edition, as the iconic Space Marines battle the Orks. The contents of this edition will put all previous 40K boxes to shame, however, with its model count--and *every* model in the box will be a newly-tooled, 'click-together' style version, designed to increase ease of assembly for players new to the game and the hobby, yet be indistinguishable once put together and fielded on a tabletop from the multi-part models available in add-on squad boxes. Ork players, already revelling in one of the best-received new codices in years, will get a new Ork Warboss, five new Ork Nobs, a unit of Ork Boyz and three new plastic Deth Koptas; Space Marine players will counter with a new Space Marine Commander figure, five elite Space Marine Terminators, the essential Tactical Squad, and an iconic Dreadnought!

Each will include additional bonus models (including new playable terrain pieces), dice, templates and all of the V5 essentials, as well.

The rulebook which will come with this starter box will be a condensed form of the stand-alone hardcover rulebook, available in July. It is described as abridged, but fully-playable in conjunction with a given Army Codex.

This frankly-spectacular box of forty-first millennium goodness will be available from your local stockist in September 2008, with an anticipated on-the-shelf retail price of US$60...a price which makes the contents look even more spectacular.

Two nearly-500-point starter armies and all the essentials for about sixty bucks: the fall looks to belong to the grim darkness of the far future. Place your order for one of the first batch of V5 Boxed Sets from your favorite Stockist.

New Citadel Paint System: A Hand Flamer of Your Own!

Games Workshop will release the most comprehensive hobby painting system in their history with the new Citadel Paint System this summer. If you have a comfort level with the Primers, Protective Coats, Foundation Paint and Citadel Paint colour ranges already available, you will find those items still available; to them, GW will add a specially-designed and fully-compatible Citadel Washes range, to add depth and highlights to your models...and the tool which will facilitate all of it is the new Citadel Spray Brush, designed to worth with each of these paint lines with as much ease as possible--and to look like a Warhammer 40,000 Hand Flamer, in the process (that would be a 'close combat weapon' variant to those who aren't Rogue Trader or V2 grognards).

The Spray Brush *should not* be viewed as an airbrush, and will not be marketed as one. Although the technical principles are the same, airbrushes allow a vast range of painting functions and capabilities (at a considerably greater price and level of complication). The Citadel Spray Brush should, rather, be viewed as a 'base-coating brush,' an implement to deliver primer coats and basic-colour base coats to squads, regiments and other numerically large blocks of models, quickly and efficiently. To that end, mixing instructions for every kind of paint in the various Citadel ranges will be included with the brush...and as they are all acrylics, the mixing medium remains, simply, water. The nozzle on the Spray Brush will also have discreet settings that will allow modelers to 'set' the amount of paint coverage they want at pre-determined levels; and the Spray Brush can be connected directly to a compressor, if the hobbyist chooses (or has access to), but can just as easily be operated by easily-connectable cans of GW Propellant. Feel free to insert whatever smart comment about Games Workshop now literally selling hobbyists 'hot air' if you'd like...but grand hobby comedy aside, the idea behind the Spray Brush, the ranges of paints, and the compatibly-designed propellant cans is to provide access to a tool like this--which can be of tremendous benefit to a hobby for which painting large numbers of models is a critical component--to the vast majority of hobbyists who are not adept with, or even comfortable around, a more-sophisticated tool like a higher-line airbrush. It is an intermediate step from brush painting exclusively to mastering single- or double-action full-feature airbrushes.

And, of course, at the end of the day...it is also a 1:1 scale Hand Flamer of your very own. What hobbyist doesn't secretly want that?

40K Fifth Edition Incoming...

The grim darkness of the far future...is closer than you think.

Warhammer 40,000 will see a new edition--the fifth rules set for Games Workshop's popular gothic science fiction miniatures wargame--in July, 2008, with the release of the updated rulebook in hardcover. This edition will be back-compatible with in-print army codex books and existing miniatures, to insure a smooth transition for hobbyists.

In addition to the hardcover rulebook, which will be a regularly stocked item, GW will make the V5 rules available in two special editions, available *only* at the time of the new game's release. The Collector's Edition will feature a multi-fold slipcase, a genuine purity-seal embossed cover, and will be printed in strictly-limited numbers worldwide. The Gamer's Edition will be a package including the regular hardcover rulebook along with special edition templates and an advance release of the new movement and action markers, all in a special 'ammunition crate' with foam inserts, which can subsequently be used for figure storage or transport, etc. Hobbyists interested in these special editions should pre-order from their regular stockists; as with similar special edition releases in past, they will be available in only limited numbers and when gone will not be re-released.