Trench Crusade - my two penneth

As there's been so much talk about it both from outraged historical gamers, and enthusiastic fantasy gamers, I recently took some time to look at Trench Crusade.

After watching some videos, browsing the official website and skimming the "lore" and rules, I have to say I don't know what the fuss is about from the historical side of the hobby.  I really don't. 

It's clearly an alternative history game.  It has nothing to do with any real history and doesn't pretend to.  Even a cursory glance at any of the material would swiftly confirm that. Therefore I'm at a bit of a loss as to why it has caused such an outpouring of bile and derision.  Is it because it's been so successful?  Is there a feeling of injustice in that historical companies just don't make that sort of money after all their painstaking research?  Unfortunately that seems to be the way of the world, look at all the fantastic artists, musicians etc. that never received the rewards their work deserved.  Anyhow, I'm quite sure there's not any attempt to undermine "serious" historical wargaming.  It's about as historical as BBC SAS Rogue Heroes.  Now that was offensive 😆 

I could understand the reaction more if it was in the vein of A War Transformed or Konflikt 47, which use the history as a basis before the (weird) shit bolt ons.  But Trench Crusade doesn’t really do that.  It’s so fantastical there’s no real history being perverted.

A lot of the art is superb, there's also a bit I personally find too much, but then I stopped watching gore soaked horror films in the 1980s.  Perhaps that aspect of the game would offend which I understand, but it's always been billed as the darkest of "grim dark", so there’s some clues there.

My initial take was that the creators have crossed Warmachine with the Hellraiser movies, added some World War/Diesel Punk style (knowing it would tick a lot of people's boxes) and have made a lot of money.  Fair play, they've done their marketing research perfectly.  Actually that's a very cynical view, I think they've just created a world they like. 

It is a mash up of lots of long established tropes (as are Warhammer and the afore mentioned Warmachine and Infinity to name a few), and I see little that's truly original.  But then after so many years of games what's there left to do that would be truly original?  To me some factions look like they've been added just to tick a box and make sure every trope to appeal to every type of player is covered.

The overall aesthetic reminds me very much of a range of 54mm figures called Mauser Earth, which were around a few years ago.  I loved the look of these miniatures and if Mauser Earth had been in a smaller  scale I'd have been in, but that's another story.  It disappeared long ago anyway.  

Mauser Earth miniature C.2015?.

Would I collect?  That’s a question.  I can see much of the appeal.  I personally like the religious elements, it's dark, as well Hell, and some of the figures are just plain excellent.  The imminent release of the plastic Prussians is tempting my resolve verily.  However, I have boxes of Warmachine figures, cards, tokens etc. and a shelf of books that don't get used.  I have resisted boutique games since I had the first version of Carnevale (and swiftly sold it on).  I do like a lot of the ideas and aesthetics and some of the figures would be lovely to paint.  The terrain would be a big task and without specific themed terrain I wonder if you'd lose the full experience.  I'll keep an eye on it and see how it develops.