Special Operations: Killzone

I have always loved seeing the creativity of wargamers. Be it converstions, house rules or terrain features that boggle the mind. In the absence of a desire (In this case a skirmish or smaller scale of 40k that doesn't take place in the hivespire of Necromunda) a game was created by Big Jim and B. Smooth. This is Special Operations: Killzone.

Now first off I'd like to point out that Necromunda is a great game. It allows me to withdraw to my young second edition playing self and enjoy the 40k universe while throwing unit coherency out the window. There is a drawback though. You are confined to the spire, never knowing the sheer joy of warriors that far surpass your own: Space Marines, Tyranids and Eldar to name a few. I'd also like to note that this is by far not the first 40k skirmish supplement that I've seen. My criticism is that most of them that I've seen are built off of the old Kill-Teams game from the back of the 4th edition 40k rule-book. This is alright if that's your bag but I just want to throw my guys at my opponent and have him throw his back without any of this "Oh no! We've alerted the sentries!" nonsense.

What Killzone does is introduce new army-book specific errata and new rules about moving/shooting/combat that streamlines the game even more. No longer do you roll for moving through terrain. Your gun that fires more than 1 shot can spread the shots out into a "Killzone." They also introduce new equipment upgrades that you can give to your models to improve their stats and give them new abilities. The equipment really adds a personalization to each model. "This is Sergeant Killsalot. He's a blademaster with close-combat accessories and he's here to mess you up!" You can then take this and model a figure with the appropriate equipment mods to really make your force stand out.

I think the thing that stands out about Killzone is it's playtime. To quote Harsh Rhettoric "You can play like 5 games in a night! It's awesome!" This is a boon for players that just don't have the time to play through a whole game of 40k or just have a super busy schedule. I'd really like to thank Big Jim, B Smooth and all the contributors that helped develop this game.