2012 - Six Months of Game Change

We're coming up on halfway through 2012 and it already seems like a year where my gaming world is turning upside down:

• We kicked the year off with the announcement of D&D Next, also heralding the end of 4th Edition. As this is our main game around here it was a pretty big deal. We've already seen one round of playtest material and I expect this will be a major area of focus on into next year.

• In February many of us were introduced to Marvel Heroic Roleplaying from Margaret Weis Productions, which turns traditional supers gaming on its head. It's strangely compelling as it's a kind of game I typically am not big on, but this game clicks with me and forces me to think about game mechanics in a different way.

• As of a week ago we learned that Warhammer 40,000 6th Edition will be out at the end of this month. When we're not playing RPG's 40K is the miniatures game of choice around here and an edition change for it is another big deal. The silence on this one from Games Workshop has been extreme, and I think it's comparable to the level of secrecy that WOTC placed around 4th Edition D&D. That didn't work so well for them, we will see how it goes for GW.

Those are the big surprises so far. Things I know about for the rest of the year:

• I'm looking forward to the Emerald City Box Set for Mutants and Masterminds this summer. I may go ahead and start the Apprentices out on the EC Knights adventures just to give it a whirl later on.

• I'm looking forward to the wave of supporting material for the Marvel Heroic RPG. There are supposed to be 3 more big events with multiple supporting books for each one.

• ICONS Team-Up will hopefully be out some time this year. Still crossing my fingers on this one.

• Traveller Prime Directive is now scheduled for a GenCon release - action-oriented old-school Trek with a decent ruleset should be a lot of fun. 

• Right now I believe the last scheduled D&D 4E release is Menzoberranzan, scheduled for August as well. I'm looking forward to closing out my collection, as much as one can look forward to the end of production for any game one likes very much. 

On a local level:

• With the main group I started a Star Wars Saga campaign, ended it, and fired up a new 4E campaign instead
• Dove into M&M 3E and began making plans for a campaign
• Began bringing my old Marine and Ork armies up to speed to be ready for a new edition - this is an ongoing project.
• Introduced the Apprentices to Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Pathfinder, M&M 3, Marvel, and Next

Every year brings change, but 2012 has brought edition changes to two of our main games and brought in a previously unknown contender that we really like. We've still managed to play a lot of games, but I'm starting to wonder what else is coming in the latter half of the year. In 1998 we saw new editions of Shadowrun, Mechwarrior, and Warhammer 40,000 (3rd Edition) which were all in heavy rotation at the time. In 2000 we saw new editions of D&D and Warhammer Fantasy Battles which actually spurred us to play even more of both games. Heck, in 2008 we saw new editions of 40K and D&D release about a month apart, so this isn't new and it could be worse! I'm not sure how this year will end up but I am cautiously optimistic that things are moving in a positive direction. Assuming that whole Mayan thing turns out OK.