Betrayal at Calth - thoughts

By now, there are lots of rumours being confirmed about the impending release of the Horus Heresy: Battle of Calth board game. No doubt it'll be flying off the shelves like its Christmas or something when its released. I'm not in the business of posting pictures from other websites that probably violate copyright or embargo, so you can go and look these up for yourselves if you've somehow not seen them yet.

When I originally learnt of the game and the miniatures that it contained, I was truly excited! The sheer value of the miniatures contained inside the box in relation to what it would cost to purchase the Forge World equivalents in resin made this such a great deal - and a no brainer almost.

But now, I'm not so sure.

The lack of possibility for the contemptor dreadnought is a big issue for me personally. As you can see from some of my efforts with Forge World dreadnoughts, I really do like being able to pose the contemptors in a decent manner with running (and other) suggestive poses.

The image above is one of my Alpha Legion dreadnoughts that I'm yet to paint up. But I won't be able to get something like this out of the Battle of Calth. Sadly.

But what I would be able to get is a whole bucket load of Mark IV space marine armour as well as plastic Cataphractii terminators. I can't shake the feeling that these plastic miniatures will be released at a later date thought in a separate package. Equally, the Dark Angels and Chaos Marines from the last 40k starter set has never come along in a different set, so what would I know.

In terms of the board game itself, it clearly is in some kind of tile based vein. Perhaps something like what the extension such as Genestealer did for Space Hulk. The pieces look like they move across the board, fighting each other for territory, coupled with some kind of game specific damage and weapon ability mechanic. Obviously its Ultramarines and Word Bearers, but the pieces are all generic and need not be painted in those colours. 

Yet, although I was originally very excited to hear about the game and GW's foray in to the Horus Heresy with plastics, I'm still not certain if I'll purchase this game or not. I just can't make my mind up about its worth, whether I'll play the game, and / or whether the plastics will becomes available later and if they're exactly what I'm after - at least in comparison to FW's resin pieces. Therefore, I'm adopting a wait and see approach to this whole thing.