With a New Edition Looming, I’m Being Seduced by Horus Heresy Again

Warhammer: The Horus Heresy was the first wargame I wrote about professionally. Having done some tabletop RPG pieces for Dicebreaker (RIP), I successfully persuaded editor Matt Jarvis to let me write about Games Workshop’s big new release of 2022. Horus Heresy is commonly referred to as 30K because it’s set ten millennia before 40K. Also because referring to it by the abbreviated subtitle is a bit dodgy.

Contrary to what I wrote at the time, 30K is not a good game. While I stand by my positive early impressions — and I still maintain that it’s better than 40K 9th Edition — some glaring balance issues swiftly became apparent and were never really addressed. The inscrutable positioning of special rules meant juggling at least two big hardbacks at the table, and the whole affair is clumsy and cumbersome in lots of ways that it really doesn’t need to be. It’s nothing that can’t be fixed with a like-minded opponent and some house rules, but compared to the slick presentation and regular balance updates of the latest editions of 40K and Age of Sigmar, Horus Heresy ends up an absolute disaster.

On a personal level, I realised that I just didn’t have the time or attention span for the kind of large army 30K requires. A standard game needs a much bigger army than AoS or 40K, and I don’t think I’ve got that in me anymore. I love painting a single space marine, and I quite enjoy a single squad, but dozens of basically the same guy over and over? Plus vehicles and such? That’s a recipe for an unfinished army and an ever-growing Pile of Shame Opportunity. I could paint minis for a bunch of different skirmish games instead and have a much better time doing it. I also wouldn’t get a lot of opportunities to play the damn game. I play most of my games at home, and neither of my regular opponents have any interest in collecting and painting a 30K army. I’d get maybe three or four opportunities per year to play at meetups with friends from further afield. Not really worth the expense or effort.

So, why can’t I stop thinking about Horus bloody Heresy?