View Full Version : Adeptus Titanicus & all the rest
Forhekset
08-27-2009, 02:13 AM
I've become more and more interested in titans as I've read Abnett and McNeill's books, and I've been investigating the super old game system Adeptus Titanticus (realising it's a precursor to Epic, so that's why I'm posting here), but it's so difficult to gather all the 20 year old documents together to get the complete picture.
I have the original rules pulled down from GW SGs section, and also AT II rules, but with a small glance over them I think I prefer the original since it uses plasma reactor scores or whatever to dictate orders. Seems more like Battlefleet Gothic to me, which I like, as opposed to just getting a move and an attack regardless.
At any rate I have almost all races documents for ATII adding their titans, but I'm missing key parts from all over, like the cards from AT that give examples of known titan loadouts, and if there's anything besides just Imperial titans for AT I can't find them. I guess I could just add reactor points to the ATII units, as that seems to be the only difference in the unit cards.
There's just tons of allusions to parts of these documents I don't have from other documents, like unit cards, campaign rules and all sorts of missing pieces from mostly magazine articles it seems, all of which are like 20 years old. But also core releases like Codex Titanicus and Titan Legions (some of which are early Epic rules, no?). I also found what seems to be a fan-version called Codex Titanicus Online with absurdly over complicated rules.
I'm interested in Knights as well, which seemed to have come out with Titan Legions, but the game is probably completely different by that point.
The whole thing is just a mess - what I want to know is, is there a definitive resource for all of these ancient systems? I can't for the life of me connect all the dots with bits and pieces strewn all over the internet. I'm hoping someone knows for sure how all this is supposed to make sense.
Gotthammer
08-27-2009, 09:58 AM
The books are Adeptus Titanicus (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/4091) (1988), which covered Warlord vs Warlord combat in the Heresy (very early heresy fluff). There was the expansion Codex Titanicus (http://usuarios.lycos.es/inquisitorweb/CodexTitanicus.pdf) (1989 - yes it is official, yes it is that complex), which contained rules for Reavers, Warhounds, Gargants, Phantoms for AT. It also had rules for combining Adeptus Titanicus with Space Marine v1 (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/4001) (1989 - Marine v Marine during the heresy), which was known as 'the Epic Battle System.'
These used unit cards that had points and weapon layouts for titans (though you could build your own very easily with AT or very complicatedly with CT), and for infantry and light vehicles units (had points and morale details).
Then there was Epic v2 (1991 - the Space Marine v2 boxed game), which had expansions such as 'Armies of the Imperium', 'Renegades' and 'Warlords'. This had no stand alone Titan System, and the Titan vs Titan combat was much simpler, not being the focus of the game. Titans had data cards that had target squares, and when fired at you had to roll special dice that could alter what square was hit, and thus what damage was taken.
Titan Legions (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/6516) was released later though (1994), and was a stand alone system, but compatible with Space Marine v2.
After Epic: Space Marine went away it was replaced by Epic 40,000 (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/5316) (1997), which basically killed the Epic system and removed 6mm as a core game :(
Then in 2000/2001 Adeptus Titanicus II was published in White Dwarf (I forget exactly when), which is available to download as a PDF.
Epic: Armageddon apeared around this time as a Specialist Game.
Basically you can play Adeptus Titanicus and Space Marine v1 together, but you need Codex Titanicus and both the core systems' books (and Space Marine's cards).
You can play Space Marine v2 and Titan Legions together without too much trouble.
Epic 40,000 by itself (where it belongs).
Adeptus Titanicus II is also standalone, and in my opinion inferior to Adeptus Titanicus v1.
Epic Armageddon is again different from the rest.
As for finding the cards and whatnot I suggest EBay and be prepared to shell out a lot of money for a complete set.
Forhekset
08-29-2009, 01:19 AM
Thankls for the all the info, it was very helpful. I was saddened that all this wasn't meticuously catalogued by older gamers as well as RPG books and such are, and hence not easily available.
I was pretty sure my Codex Titanicus Online was fanmade cause it was so ridiculously detailed, and it doesn't provide a complete rules package I don't think. I just didn't think GW would do something that intense.
I like AT1 alot more as well, for reasons I said above, but my problem was finding units for the game instead of just Warhound, Reaver, Warlord, Emperor, Imperator and Warmonger. Oh and I wanted the unit cards for preconfigured titans so I could actually see for myself the names and hence the fluff related to different loadouts, as I've only ever heard them second hand from people.
At least I think that document is AT1, it gives the appearance of being mixed up or updated somehow since the document looks fresh but also has old blurry pictures. There's even a mention of ATIII which I'd never heard of, and I think may just be a typo.
It's all really confusing at any rate.
So essentially, seeing as how out of all of this AT1 is my favorite and intended game system in the end, should I just try to add reactor points to other races titan sheets which seem to be for AT2/Epic? Or do you actually know of any additional units beyond the ones I mentioned?
I'm just going for PDF files at the moment, as I hope that game systems long abandoned and so very old won't bother anyone if I attempt to aquire for free? Well at least one iteration of the rules is free on the website.
But if I could still buy all the boxes and books off the shelf (ha!) I definitely would do so, for all those little plastic titans and stuff, they seemed to cram alot into them :D
I wish I could show you all the files I have and you could make sense of them for me hehe
Gotthammer
08-29-2009, 09:37 AM
Codex Titanicus isn't a complete ruleset - it has expansions for the Original Adeptus Titanics, and rules for merging it with the game Space Marine. If it's a PDF that says "Codex Titanicus Online" on every page and opens with a story about a new princeps taking over a warlord during the battle of Tallarn, it's legit.
The Codex Titanicus Online team seem to have copied the text and some of the pictures (at lo res) to reduce the file size from what plain scans would be. They also did some editing here and there (changing Horus' command bunker to his command ship for example). It comes out looking fan made, but the contents is accurate.
The PDF from GW (that only has a few Imperials, requires reactor rolls etc) is th eone from 2000ish - that's here: http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m1340007_Adeptus_Titanicus.pdf
It is technically ATII, though there was a slightly earlier version for use with Epic 40,000, so maybe that's where the confusion is.
Space Marine v2 and Titan Legions have the biggest number of units for all races (excluding Tau and Necron as they weren't around then), but they rely on the unit card system, so getting all the info you need could be a hassle.
Adeptus Titanicus I only contains Warlords, but Codex Titanicus adds Reavers, Warhounds, Phantoms and Gargants. There are more rules in CT, but some of those can easily be ignored as they are replacements (such as new, more comlex, damage tables).
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