This is what 40K terrain should look like.

This is what a video battle report should look like.

Slightly hard to follow as it goes pretty fast. But damn good. Immersive. This is the essence of what 40K is to me - the not-so-competitive player - I want that story, the emotional investment in your little dudes and what happens. If you don't care - then what's the point? Winning? Congratulations, all that time spent for a very fleeting feeling of smug superiority. I'd rather have a narrative, but maybe that's just the original Drakar & Demoner RPGer in me speaking (very old GURPS-style, iirc, Swedish-language RPG I played a lot back in 1988ish).

So how, la?

Tripod. Or steadicam. Some basic editing. Some sound effects. And a bunch of planning ahead of time. It's really the planning that shines in this video.

Best Battlefleet Gothic battle report video I've seen.

Good voiceovers, awesome immersive table top setup (could have lost the papers, pens and dice but meh), well painted models. Slightly lacking in easily overviewed tactics, but if you know BFG you can probably tell what's up. I've never played it (would love to) and so had some difficulty following, but cool nonetheless, and it's not like good BFG video battle reports are all over youtube, really.

Give the guy some love and subscribe imo. http://www.youtube.com/user/Fixer40000

Best battle report I've seen.

This comes up if you google "40K cool" images.

Creative as all hell. Tons of work went into it. After effects. Planning. Semi-professional camerawork with a tripod. No wonder that the latter stages of the battle haven't been completed, as this is a crapton of work.

That said - a few hopefully constructive criticisms. I'm not a fan of green playing surfaces. They end up contrasting a lot with bases and buildings and whatnot. Straight black usually works better, even given that many model's bases are black sides and some sort of "terrain-coloured" top of the base - or even worse, "special," with some sort of converted terrain piece addition like crystals or a piece of a ruin that makes the individual unit look great alone but doesn't blend at all with the actual table top gaming terrain environment. Black, grey, olive drab gaming surface and same with the model bases. Anything else just ends up looking very contrasting - but I suppose it's just a game after all and many people care more about how their models look alone or in the privacy of your own collection, or just not "boring."

#2 - individual units moving one by one looks a bit weird.

#3 - individual units in a crowd firing one by one looks a bit weird. A tactical squad all firing at once would have been very cool.

Both the above I'm inclined not to care too much about since this is a battle report, not an immersive simulation. The video is damn good, just a few things *I* would do different. Or try to. Mad respect to the people who did this. I'd try something similar, but on a smaller scale with fewer units. I have plenty of experience editing CGI gaming videos, but never messed with actual effects like these.

#4 - the buildings alternately look nice and just weirdly paper-y. Meh.

Starting to think that how people deal with this hobby is more and more a reflection of whether they want a game or a narrative, immersive story.

In other news dealing with the US health insurance/dental insurance system is a p.i.t.a. and complex as all hell.

P.S. I'm gonna try to get a "Flowchart Friday" fun series up and running. Sort of like http://forthebubbles.wordpress.com/tag/flowchart-friday/ First up will be some sort of take on "I want to play 40K..."