Having searched with mixed success for various army lists, trying to suss out official unofficial and the rest, a glaring thought springs to mind:
Why has noone made an army list book with a selection of balanced, official lists encompassing all the cool lists not in the original rules (ie: various eldar, titan legions, feral orks, specific space marine chapters, chaos etc, etc) You could quite happily fit over a dozen great army lists in one affordable book, perhaps even throw in a selection intriguing scenarios?

The alternative seems the continued fragmentation of epic, along with GW not releasing anything for years on end. So how about it?

"Lack of demand" is always cited. Presumably that's why at my local club half a dozen players are already interested in getting into or returning to epic. Perhaps I digress- but a new, official armies book would be a great way to get epic back on the map. Perhaps we should be bombarding GW to act- we have tons of talented players and painters here to provide the raw materials for something special.

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Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.

I am at two minds with this.

On one hand, I like the idea. You have my vote

There is another part of me however that knows when a book is released, it will later need an errata. Then you will be coming to the net to print that out. While it remains 'live', it can be worked on and continually updated.

So a solution: print out the lists, bind them and hand them out to all interested parties. Instant playgroup from a little work and not that much money.

Cheers.....

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Frogbear is responsible for...
Previous World Eaters
Previous Emperor's Children
Previous Death Guard
Previous Imperial Fists
Previous Chaos Squats

Many of the lists are still evolving, so such a thing is trying to hit a moving target.

Moscovian spearheaded a book called "Raiders", available in pdf and in print, that details the Necrons, the Dark Eldar, and Minervan Tank Regiments, plus stories and scenarios; it's quite good!

I'm in the process of putting together "Black Crusade", a book that will contain Chaos Marines, Chaos Cultists, Cadians, and Ulthwé Eldar army lists.  (I'm also working on a scenario/campaign book called "Total War" and have a second army compilation in very preliminary stages for the Tyranids when they finally get done.)

And, it's actually quite easy to print out the lists and put together a folder of armies at this point, because things are still in flux.

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"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

A "Black Crusade" book sounds great.

Perhaps I am at cross purposes here though- my main concern is in how the Epic community brings all its threads together and reaches out to returning and new players. The new generation of net contributors has made for some top innovation and superb tangents, but it can present a bit of a maze.
My fear is that without the clout of a bigger, commercial body Epic will struggle to get new players and survive in the long term. I think we should be hammering GW on this one, and insisting they use the talent that's out there!

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Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.

Don't forget E&C's Mossino Campaign featuring the Death Korp of Krieg, which was technically the first fan made Epic supplement.  I'm still waiting to hear from him on the final print but the plan was always to put it into print as well.  

I like the idea of having a few army lists in each book to be honest.  It is nicer looking, easier to update, and easier to manage (working with too many army champs is like shaving a bobcat's @ss in a phone booth).  It also provides the fans with something that feels more like the original work of Armageddon and Swordwind.

Sure, it would be great if GW would pick up the ball again, but to be honest fans have been complaining for YEARS that they don't have enough control.  Now we do.  As long as GW manufactures the mini's I am content.

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author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

Definitely with you with the idea of having books of several army lists apiece. Meanwhile the hunt goes on for the feral orks list! Someone suggested the Swordwind supplemebt, but you guessed it, sold out.
In fact, what an odd reaction from GW's staff- in the sam e-mail they said "not enough demand" existed for epic- at least not enough to reprint stuff, and yet the books have sold out?
My apologies for rather naively reintroducing epic gamers heads to the brick wall that is GW, but we need to keep pressing them. W40k is massive right now- surely it's a no brainer that stacks of these players might also embrace epic scale?

Now, where's that bloody army list?...

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Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.

All the "official" Epic: Armageddon rules, including Swordwind, can be found on the "Specialist Games Resources" portion of the GW website.

Epic Resources

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"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

Yeah, the trouble is the one I want doesn't work.

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Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.

I just now "right click and saved" all the Swordwind pdfs and they opened fine.

What web browser are you using?

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_C....ces.pdf

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_C....ces.pdf

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_C....War.pdf

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_C....ing.pdf

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"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

To my mind, the community's best hope of reaching that consensus you're looking for is the Epic:Armageddon Handbook (currently 2008).

This document, particularly the blue-marked version that highlights the errata and community-accepted changes, is definitely a step in the right direction.

Standardisation is key to successful adoption--this is as true for gaming systems as it is in IT systems. The goal would be a single resource that contains all community-accepted rules and army lists (eg merged with Raiders). Also worthy of consideration is inclusion of the Scenarios book that's being discussed elsewhere in these forums as a final chapter in the Handbook.

If whomever is in control of the Handbook would step in here with their 2 cents and/or buy-in, that would be greatly appreciated.  

The problem with the handbook is that it contains several rules which didn't make the cut for the errata*, and so is out of date. If it's updated to reflect this then it becomes a useful tool again


*most importantly the MW barrage change.

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http://www.troublemakergames.co.uk/
Epic: Hive Development Thread

Do we know who is in control of the Handbook now and what the plan is going forward?

The Handbook is a great resource (it's what got me to make the initial plunge into E:A), and I think currently the community's best chance to achieve a single source of Truth for the game.

Thoughts?

The NetERC is in charge of the "Handbook" now, that's Hena, nealhunt, and myself (Chroma); the original designer, Markconz, has handed us all the files.

We've actually got an updated-with-errata version put together, based on the original layout files of the Epic: Armageddon rulebook, but now that GW has moved the Epic files to their main site, we're having to wait to hear from GW legal, or at least Jervis or Andy, about the "permissibility" of hosting/posting the file.

So far, we haven't had any response back, but we do not want to bring a cease-and-desist down on ourselves, or TacComm, or any other Epic sites.

Our eventual goal is to release a "NetEA" version of the rulebook, incorporating our recommendationa and the various other developments that have been going on, but, that too, waits on a response from The Powers That Be.

Since Epic: Armageddon is not (yet?) a dead game system in the eyes of GW, we don't have the wiggle room that NetEpic had at the time of its birth.

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"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

Thanks for the heads-up, Chroma. Appreciate it. Understand the legal situation, too--obviously, the best solution would be for GW to release an updated ruleset and resume support for the game with new miniatures.