Too Many Starter Sets.....

I often hear that we're living in the golden age of gaming, and I think this may well be true, I love the recent explosion in products and new companies doing well.  This does leave a problem though as we approach the christmas season (I know its early but I work in retail and alas I've already been dealing with it for the last two weeks)  There are four great looking starter sets competing for my money and time.

 

 The first of these and the one I am definately going to buy is the new 40K starter set from Games Workshop.  I've said this before but 2nd ed 40K was my first real wargame and after a long break I'm really enjoying playing it again.  This set has some superb figures (the chaos in particular), contains the new rulebook and comes in at a very reasonable price.

Battlefront games have finally woken up to the modern world and have started to produce miniatures in plastic (I wonder if the plastic soldier company was really starting to eat into their profits), and very sensibly they're going to throw a lot of them into a big box with the mini rulebook and call it a starter set.  I have fledgling forces for the Brits and the Germans and this would turn them both into small armies.  It looks to be good value for money and good quality miniatures, but I haven't actually persuaded any of my opponents to start collecting flames of war yet (although one guy has stated an intent to collect), so if I got them they might end up never really getting used.

This next one was a surprise, although prehaps it shouldn't have been.  It's the new sci-fi sports game from mantic called dreadball, its currently up on kickstarter and has already been funded.  It basically seems to be bloodbowl mixed with tron set in their warpath universe and written by jake thornton (the man behind the excellent dwarf kings hold series), which in my mind is probably a winning combination.  As yet there are no details on the gameplay and with a game like this that will be the deciding factor way above how pretty the models are (which for things like 40K selection can for me often be all that matters).

And finally sedition wars from studio McVey, a sort of space crusade-esque board game stuffed full of truly excellent minis.  This also had a VERY successful kickstarter that I regret not joining.

The problem here isn't money, (I reckon all 4 sets together will end up costing £250-£300, which isn't so far beyond my hobby budget from now till christmas to be unobtainable), but gaming time.  I have three regular opponents and normally manage to get a game of something against one of them every 2-3 weeks, so even one of these sets will keep me busy for a few months.  In theory I could buy all four and they would keep me busy for the next year, but in reality they'll just sit on a shelf doing nothing as I get distracted by something new and shinny that we haven't even heard of yet. 
It's a shame but I think I need to limit myself to dark vengence and one other, but which will it be?


Oh I forgot, there will a new Hobbit game out in december to tempt me too!