This has been building up for a while now.  It isn't sure what the actual issue Palladium Books is having, but they obviously aren't making the marks.  The nickname coined for what is currently going on: Gencon Suicide Pact.  Which means: Kevin Siembieda of Palladium decreed that RTT starter kits will be available by Gencon 2014.  Which was really no big deal with a December 2013 Kickstarter fulfilment date, even with a bit of slippage.  After all, this is what Palladium said during the Kickstarter: "  Risks and challenges
A project of this scope requires the successful collaboration of artists, sculptors, writers, game designers, and manufacturers. Managing this complex process and minimizing delays are the largest challenges we face in bringing Robotech® RPG Tactics™ to market. We have learned from past experience that success requires careful planning and a full understanding of the scope of the project. In order to facilitate the timely delivery of Robotech® RPG Tactics™, Palladium Books and Ninja Division have brought in a host of new talent to work on the project.

To help ensure realistic deadlines, we have completed the vast majority of our development before launching the Kickstarter. Sculpts for the game pieces are almost entirely complete. The rulebook and game components are deep in development and will be ready for layout soon. Our manufacturers are also ready and have reserved factory time for the project. This means that as soon as the project is funded, we can lock down a timeline with our manufacturers to get the game produced.

It is our commitment to you, the Kickstarter backers, that we will maintain consistent communication throughout the process. This means regular updates, product photos, and plenty of behind the scenes insight as we complete the creation of Robotech® RPG Tactics™." (Emphasis added)

They are still doing sculpts of pieces, getting approval and finalizing sprues.  Not "almost entirely complete".  Not "vast majority of development". 

I've been holding out for the sight of the Valkyries, since they are what will make or break the game.  Palladium cannot manage to assemble (or even get) the models and the heat got hot enough that they started throwing Ninja Division under the bus.  Ninja Division has retaliated by putting the models together competently....but they still partially assembled the models to make it seem there were now less parts than previously shown.  Add into this, each sculpt evidently has its own little connection to a flight stand, so each sculpt needs its own flight stand instead of generic ones for all sculpts....which means opaque flight stands instead of clear.....so flying Zentraedi Battlepods look like they either are losing something out their...or have something shoved up their....  Bad design choice. 

Enough, I've seen the Valks, they are crap, I'm getting out.

Battlefront (Flames of War) have taken over Dust Tactics, yes, I know, old news, but the trivia I've heard is that part of the divorce with FFG limits Battlefront from "reducing the value" of the Dust Warfare product they still have on hand....which means Battlefront with their Flames of War mentality cannot touch the actual game they'd love to fiddle with.  Instead, Tactics is getting "warfarized" a bit.  BF has been doing a lot of good, they now have multiple specific battle boxes for each faction, consisting (so far at least) of a hero, vehicle(s) and a squad or three.  They have also rationalized and consolidated the various rules (which were spread over a half dozen books) in a new rulebook...but then the meddling comes in.  First they got rid of the simple & clear LOS rules for ones that are a bit muddier and arguable; as in over the table top arguable.... 

Next, and most stupid, they started introducing firing arcs for vehicles, which I consider a good idea in a number of cases, but then they make the exception for turreted vehicles.  Well, okay, that works too.  Then they decided that the Axis walkers that turn at the waist (making the entire upper torso a turret) are "fixed gun" vehicles too.  Hello <knock, knock> anyone home?  The justification for walkers was their extreme (compared to tracked AFVs) agility in urban and close environments, but now Battlefront decides not only to kill that but make them fixed forward tank destroyers that are easier to see & easier to kill than a real tank destroyer...dumbasses.

However, I did pick up Osprey's little skirmish game, Ronin.  It looks like a lot of fun and thanks to some stuff I snagged for free at NOVA and a couple of other places, I can build up a Buntai or two for some quick and easy fun.

First things first, a common error among 40k players comes from their ignorance of the English language.  So, many of them see "heresy" and think that it means religion.  Although religious heresy is the subject of the primary definition of the word "heresy", it is not the only one.  So, when Space Marines, including Black Templar, speak of "heresy", it does not automatically mean that they consider the Emperor to be deity.  So both the priest of the Imperial Creed (who mean the religious type) and Space Marines can speak of "heresy" and not have the same import.  Why?  The other (and possibly original) definition of heresy:

a :  dissent or deviation from a dominant theory, opinion, or practice
b :  an opinion, doctrine, or practice contrary to the truth or to generally accepted beliefs or standards

So, you can have a "scientific heresy", "political heresy", "social heresy", or even "40k list building heresy".  It does not require acceptance of the Emperor as deity.

On the subject of the recent retcon, a number of people flinched and said they could "see that" BT might venerate those who had "touched the Emperor" (sanctioned psykers).  I thought about agreeing, it kinda, sorta sounded reasonable, but something kept stopping me from doing so, even though I remember arguing that since the Emperor had sanctioned Navigators and Astropaths, the Black Templar would accept them, so it wasn't that big a deal, right?  I found the answer in some of my recreational reading.  It goes a bit, you have been warned.

Nothing much, more opening of boxes, sorting out the empty and populated sprue, clipping off parts of sprue that still have a couple of bits on them for the "unclipped bits" boxes, etc.  I've gone through almost all the big boxes and got them stacked (big as in length & width, don't care about height) on the shelf.  I've got a couple more that are just vehicles or WIP that I'm going to box and pad a bit with stray foam to put on top of the rest.

Found a DZC blog off the Hawk Wargames forums that has some nice posts with the nickel version of the differences between the four factions. 

In minor sad news, it seems my FLGS has been seduced by the TwitMyFace cult and is shutting down its forums in favor of TwitMyFace operations.  Gee, look Mom, it's quicker and easier and nicer and funner and loads up your computer with spyware and brings offensive items from foafs onto your computer and all automatically unless you fight like heck to deny access.  Yes, I just had to spend time cleaning some computer hard drive space, not mine, but...

The most common refrain from the GW apologists for the massive changes apparently coming to the Black Templar is the title along with "... because all Marines lost that since 4th Edition."  Let me blunt, they are stupid, morons, idiots & arseholes with the addition of various Anglo-Saxon derogatory four letter words added for additional emphasis..

True, 40k Radio may be not have the final print copy they claim and GW might have removed its collective head from its rear, but these are the issues being justified by that false to fact excuse.

Once again, for the third time, Wordpress starts playing their stupid games with my account.  Gee, I can sign up for a "global" username...but then specific sites that require a Wordpress login don't seem to recognize the "global" Wordpress login as a valid one for their use.....so, I make a specific site registration on Wordpress.  This actually got me along for several years now (since my last fiasco with Wordpress and login issues) with the occasional minor hiccup to fix when a local account gets "lost".

So, with whatever is happening with OpenID and several flavors of blog sites that seem to reject OpenID periodically, I decided to try Wordpress yet again as a global login.  Some people had recommended it too me recently, claiming that their issues were fixed.  Well, it took them about six weeks after I registered a global account and now Wordpress not only seems to have "forgotten" my local login password for one site (my computer hasn't, but of course, it is my fault even though I store all these chicken excrement passwords required for random sites and forums), it has "forgotten" my global login.  Guess what, it cannot even seem to remember my email to email me a "lost password" link....even though I gave it the email address to use and it accepted it as valid (well, it didn't complain it didn't know it).  So, I'm stuck out again until Wordpress cleans up their caches and clears the dead accounts.

Fething arseholes.

At least by GW.  Okay, it has a pilot in an enclosed cockpit that has to be painted before getting past the first step in assembly, that is okay.  Glue together the seat, legs and cockpit back.  Glue together the torso and head.  Glue the control panel down.

Now, paint everything, including arms & shoulder pads taking care not to paint areas to be glued, especially on control panel.  Add Black Templar icon on left shoulder.  Given, painting all that with any detail was a PITA, but it looks pretty good and will look better when finished.  It really wasn't hard at all.

Last thing to do, slide the cockpit cover over and glue it down.....wait, it won't go on....WTH, I checked it several times....oh wait...THERE ARE TWO FRICKING FLANGES BLOCKED BY THE CONTROL PANEL!  Where is my knife....okay problem solved.

Notice, something easy to do up to that point is designed as a major PITA.  If you assemble it in order (control panel after everything else), then you cannot detail it well.  If you detail everything else in assembly order, then you are stuck trying to glue in the torso, arms and/or control panel either in pieces or as a unit (which you hopefully have lined up just right) all in the now enclosed cockpit area.

Solution?  Cut those two little bits off the cover and be done with it.  Although next time, I'm going to try the trick with super hot water and fabric dye to "sunscreen" the cockpit, that way I'll get some more Marine bitz to use later.

Speaking of the tournament victory condition of "Table Quarters".    Mike Brandt of NOVA posted up something about it on his Whiskey & 40k blog, which I tried twice to reply to, but it seems the apparent issues with Blogger & OpenID continue, so my posts show up as published immediately, but a refresh has them deleted.   (EDIT: I just posted again a couple of days ago, same issue, looks like I'm persona non grata on Whiskey & 40k.)

Pretty much MVB appears to be trying to salvage "Quarters" from 5th to 6th.  His three options offered are:
1.  Require all the models in a unit to be in one quarter or it doesn't count. 
2.  Create a "dead zone" in midfield that doesn't count for scoring any quarter.
3.  All units count for quarters except Designated Transports & Flyers.

All three cause game balance issues and alter the way the 6th edition victory conditions work.  As Marshal Laeroth pointed out to me in a comment on the draft copy of this post, the problem isn't Table Quarters, it is trying to make a 4th Edition scenario victory condition work using 6th Edition scoring unit rules.  Although from the discussion I've read on the subject, nobody is interested in making everything but ICs and DTs scoring units for the purposes of Quarters, totally randomizing which quarter gets scored on for units in more than one quarter, or making is so that the only way to score a quarter is to have the only scoring unit in it.  One crucial point that most people don't seem to want to bring up...it is easy to tie Quarters.  Way too easy.  Which means <drumroll>, it is essentially useless as a victory condition in virtually all games.

So...the question becomes, if it is this much trouble to balance and make it work, then why are we using 5th Edition tournament rules based on the victory conditions for a 4th Edition scenario for 6th Edition tournaments in the future?  It is one thing to rush job to 6th for NOVA 2012 and make it happen, it is another to be trying to plan how to force it to work for NOVA 2013.  Especially given the fact that it changes the balance of 6th Edition, establishing an exclusive meta for NOVA, no matter the decision on how to "balance" it.  The question may now become more pertinent given MVB is looking at changing to 1750/1850 instead of 1999+1 or going with an actual 2000 points (and double FOC).

First things first, Mike and his staff did a great job from what I saw.  His people were kind, courteous, dedicated and worked to fix issues in a timely manner.  They didn't always succeed and I'll list some of those issues in another post as well as where they dealt with the unexpected quickly.  The NOVA team should cover most of that in their post event hot wash.

Here, I mainly want to discuss my actual experience playing in the GT.  I went 1-5 with a close fight in the win, four losses by a sliver and once getting slaughtered.  IMO, TOs for tournaments need to make some changes, because like Mike's idea that "well everyone can just play their 5th lists mainly" when he made the switch to 6th, I think there is a lot of wishful thinking going on.  This is an overview, so I'm not going to break down each battle here.  My list is here.

EDIT:  This is a rant to blow off steam.  Remember that when you read it.

For now at least.  I'm not touching the stuff until I see the FAQ and see how much I enjoy the screwing we are all going to receive.  Yes, most of it will be fair or at least something that can be worked around, but this is turning into a damned money and time pit. 

You know, I might just be a "scrub" and not worthy of competing on the top tables.  It might be a pure talent issue, but it definitely is a time issue.  I cannot go out and play multiple games of 40k most days of the week.  Which means the more I have to change my list and play style, the less capable of having any shot at the top tables I'll be.  Which means being biased towards the "scrub" tables anyway. 

I'm not in this for the money (although it would be nice), I'm not in this for the glory (yes, that is nice too), I'm in this to test myself.  I'm not in this to tie one or more limbs behind my back (or have them tied there for me by having to learn how to play a list on the fly because I cannot finalize the thing until two weeks or less before the tournament and maybe get two games with to playtest).  All of which means that I don't give a flip if "even the guys in the 0-4 bracket have something to compete for".  For most of the last 9-10 months, I've maintained fairly close to a 3-1 win/draw vs loss rate.  Which means if I go 0-4, 1-3 or maybe even 2-2, I'll probably be polite, but hope you draw my name if you are in those brackets at NOVA for the first two rounds of the second set, because I'll probably walk to the table, shake your hand, congratulate you on your win, fill out the paperwork with you and then go do something else. 

The problem is, I have put in a lot of my time, including time taken away from other things that might have needed it, to prepare for NOVA.  As much as others?  No, which is why I can figure I'm not going to go 8-0 and 6-2 would probably be great.  However, it was the time I could budget and I gave all I could to it.  Of course, as long as NOVA gets to brag about being the first 6th Ed GT (which nobody will care about in a few years anyway) rather than the last stand of 5th, then we should all sit around and sing Kum-By-Yah and give it our all for the cause, right?

Oh, there will be a pretty face put on it all no matter what, but I think if Mike thought last year's explosion was bad, then this year is going to be worse.  Especially since I've already gotten hints of NOVA FAQ rulings which are not going to be in line with what I think GW will rule.  True, I think most of the NOVA FAQ rulings will be spot on, but I've seen a couple of snap calls and use of flawed logic to make rulings that will make some builds a lot stronger.  Oh wait, the NOVA terrain meta last year did the same thing didn't it?