They might look like, but in many fundamental ways they aren't. For one the TO&E for each version is different, some of which is due to GW changing unit sizes like formations of three becoming formations of four and Marine Battle companies.

MadMagician: think of it this way. Core formations in E:A are the equivalent of company cards in SM2. Support formations are just like support cards, except you can't take five of them for each core formation. Two or three is usually the limit. Upgrades are kind of like Special cards, but usually are only attached directly to the core formation and you can usually have more than one upgrade, unlike special cards. Does that help any?

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"I don't believe in destiny or the guiding hand of fate." N. Peart

No. In SM2 a Marine Battle Company is one Tactical, one Assault and one Devastator detachment.

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"I don't believe in destiny or the guiding hand of fate." N. Peart

The main difference in style is due to the alternating activations. in previous editions you activate the whole army, so everything hammers the enemy as you plan. instead now you have a series of small tactical engagements which build up as more units activate and the turns go on into your grand strategic plan to both effect your objectives and disrupt the enemies cohesion.

You still have the, say, grand flank attack - except now the enemy will try and disrupt it and you will have to reinforce and sustain it.

Battle Company 850
Special) Librarian 100
1) Veteran Detachment 300
2) Veteran Detachment 300
3) Bike Squad 150
4) Land Speeder Squad 200
5) Predator Squad 200
Total 2100

So your army above in the current system would be

Battle Company breaks down into-
Tactical formation - 6 stands of tactical marines and 3 Rhinos - 300
Tactical formation - 6 stands of tactical marines and 3 Rhinos - 300
Devastator formation - 4 stands of Devastators and 2 Rhinos - 250
Assault Marine Formation - 4 stands of assault marines - 175
Librarian - just replace one devastator or tactical stand with your Librarian stand - 50 points
Bike Squad - 5 stands of bikes/attack bikes in any ratio you like - 200
Land Speeder Squad - 5 Land speeders - 200
Predator formation - 4 predators - 275
Total 1750
Veterans - are these terminators? If they are 'merely' marines I would simply turn them into tactical formations as above, so 600 more points of troops.

Of course there is nothing stopping you taking your netepic army and using it as is in the new system - just break the company up into the formations above. That way you will have bigger/smaller formations as they don't translate exactly but it won't matter to much in friendly games where you tailor your forces to give a fun rather than ultra competitive game!

Veterans are PA Marines, so they would be Tac Marines.

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SG

Ghost's Paint Blog, where everything goes that isn't something else.

So throw in a pair of thunderbolts and a pair of warhounds and you have a 3000 point army

Don't say that! Characters are added to units. They don't replace them.

I think he means using the old "Librarian Stand" model the OP has to represent the Devastator-unit-with-Librarian... purely in a physical model sense...

Hmm, I posted a thank you last night but it disappeared


THank you all so much for your help, I need to go back and re-read and digest some of this. I am sure I will have more questions, but thank you all for your help so far!

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MadMagician
Epic Tyranids

Hey madmagician,

I totally get where you're coming from, the idea of formations zipping from one side of the board to the other in a single turn really took some getting used to compared with many other wargames. The weapon ranges seem so short compared with the effective movement. I had very much the same response when I started playing E:A years ago. But... keep at it. The game is really very subtle and you will learn what a formation's abilities are and what the threat ranges are. Overwatch and careful positioning can dominate enemy movements and a good player can set up multiple cascading attacks that can really devastate an unprepared enemy army.

Then again - an American M4 carbine has an effective range of 50 yards against the traditional soviet block body armour (a very old standard, ain't NATO snappy, saying that its what your self respecting insurgent back from holiday in Pakistan likes to wear if given a chance). Given Epics 15 minute time frame how far could you move tactically compared to that range?

The high movement rates compared to weapon ranges are one of the strong points of the EA system. It forces you to move and maneouvre your forces rather than line everyone up and blast away. Alternate formation activation rewards the use of reserves. It shares features from many of the best historical war game systems (and gathers and streamlines them in a marvellous fashion, IMHO.). Keep at it Madmagician! EA is subtle, but very rewarding once you get into it. I've played for a few years, and am still just plodding along, but constantly learning as I go.

In all honesty, while it sounds like a lot of folks are enjoying it, E:A lacks almost everything I got into epic for, simple rules, easy army creation and massive battles. The 3-5k Tourney system is not very appealing to me, that seems more small scale skirmish not "epic Battle". And quite frankly IMHO the army building system sucks and makes no sense whatsoever, so far I don't like much about it at all. It seems like it is a game custom built for min/maxers and not something that can be enjoyed by casual gamers.

While I do appreciate all of the help from the forum, I am going to go back to my SM2/NetEpic hole and get out of your hair! There is no need for me to look like a troll and list all of my grievances against the system. Farewell E:A players!

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MadMagician
Epic Tyranids

Well, that 3-5k guidance is intended so that you can play a game in 2-3 hours. You'd need all day for bigger games.


Nah it makes a lot of sense. It's just different for each army, so that not every army has to fit into the same kind of organisational structure.
So Marines are quite free to select what they choose, but IG are much more restricted, for example.

SM/2 was a bit more "one size fits all".


Not at all. I'm a pretty casual player, for example. I know guys that downright hate the tournament style of gaming who enjoy E:A.


Stick around the forums though, we have a Netepic section, and the painting section in common between all of us. :-)

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

A fair criticism. It's not tiny, but it's not as big as it might be.



See, I really don't get what your problem with it is. Especially since you seem to be using the Space Marines, which is probably the simplest of the three basic army lists. You pick the detachments you want, and pay what they cost. You give them some upgrades if you want, or not, and pay what those cost if you did. That's it. No multiplication, no tiers of dependencies, nothing of that nature - just pick the units you want and pay for them (with the obvious ally limitations).

What could possibly be confusing you?



*Blink blink* What?

Games custom built for min-maxers don't give ties to whoever has the next birthday. Honest.



Like the man said, there's a big blinking NetEpic section. Well, not really blinking, I suppose. But still, plenty of opportunity to stick about.

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