Presuming
that Games Workshop's latest teaser video is not an epic troll of
misdirection it seems like Dark Eldar are the next army to the get
7th Edition treatment with pre-orders hitting Friday night
as usual. Now, since I don't follow rumour sites anymore (owing to
most commenters on the things being blisteringly insane) I have no
idea what's coming and that's actually kind of liberating. I think
the internet has rather robbed us of a sense of surprise with the way
companies tease (or spoil, depending on your point of view) future
developments for publicity.
I
mean, really, when was the last “HOLY SHIT!” moment you had
consuming any media? Mine was probably the first season cliffhanger
of Battlestar Galactica, off the top of my head.
But,
anyway, pointy-eared space sadists! The ones that make Romulans look
like cuddly wittle kittens. The ones whose plan to avoid eternal
damnation is to live forever fuelled by the pain of their victims.
Oh, yeah, if there's anyone left who hasn't noticed yet...
I
LOVE BAD GUYS!
Especially
in my wargaming. Oh, I'm forever thinking about picking a heroic race
for race this campaign or other but my fate is, quite simply,
dominated by the dark side. Forever. Yoda was right, its inescapable.
The armies I always go back to are Vampire Counts in Fantasy and the
Lost And The Damned in the grim dark future of the forty-first
millennium. The reason?
BAD
GUYS ARE FUN!
I
write background for my armies, lots of background and I should get
around to posting some because it would make great blog fodder. Bad
guys are just so much fun to write and, of all the “bad guy”
races in 40k (there is a lot of relativism going on in that
description) Dark Eldar offer all sorts of twisted options.
You've
got the Kabals themselves that are led by the Archons: a sort of
cross between feudal nobility and crime lords who lead the Kabals on
raiding missions, mainly to capture new slaves. Then there are the
Wych Cults, gladiatorial warriors whose performances (I kid you not)
involve slaughtering slaves and each other to provide the masses with
the psychic screams they use as food. There are the Haemonculi, who
are classic mad scientists. The Beastmasters are exactly what it says
on the tin and they have a host of lovely gribbly monsters that
accompany them. Then there are the multifarious hangers on who follow
the Archons: poisoners, snake alien bodyguards, flesh-eating ghoul
things and chained psychics.
This
is the problem, actually: every time I consider a Dark Eldar army I
find myself spoiled for choice when it comes to sheer, unbridled evil
fun of it all.
Perhaps
it is time to return to the grim darkness of the far future where
there is only war?
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