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Gothic Sector Legion terrain is pure Warhammer 40k Dawn of War

With designs inspired by the classic Warhammer 40,000 RTS, Gothic Sector Legion is a treat for lore lovers but not so hot for competitions.

Gothic Sector Legion stronhold building

Our Verdict

Gothic Sector: Legion is a solid entry in the Battlefield in a Box terrain range, distinguished by its obvious creative debt to Dawn of War. Conveniently pre-painted and with some excellent designs, the range still has limited appeal: you’ve got to love Space Marines, and this isn't useful for tournament practise. One for the lore lovers to consider.

Reasons to buy
  • Channels Dawn of War perfectly
  • Minimal assembly required
  • Pre-painted
  • Generally very sturdy
Reasons to avoid
  • Thinner components are brittle
  • Not all of the range is a winner
  • You’re paying for convenience
  • Not suited for tournament style games

The Gothic Sector: Legion terrain range, designed by War Scenery and produced by Gale Force Nine, is a loving homage to the Space Marine buildings from classic Warhammer 40k RTS Dawn of War. While it absolutely looks the part, it does mean this terrain is a bit one-dimensional, tactically speaking.

Wargamer received samples of every kit from GF9’s Gothic Sector: Legion terrain range. Despite the undeniable similarity to the designs in a classic Warhammer 40k game, these aren’t licensed Warhammer 40k products. Let’s call it an ‘homage’. While that gives the range a strong aesthetic, it has resulted in some buildings that don’t have much purpose in games of 40k.

Gothic Sector Legion  map view

Like all of Gale Force Nine’s ‘Battlefield in a box’ products, each Gothic Sector kit comes prepainted, in a dark green color scheme that looks distinctly like the Dark Angels Space Marine chapter.

Some of the kits require minimal assembly using superglue and magnets, to allow components like antennae or support buttresses to be attached to models or removed for storage. Generally this wasn’t tough, but the radar dish magnets were tricky to get right.

Gothic Sector Legion  power generators

All the models are made from a hard resin. For the most part this is quite durable, but thin components can be brittle: so far I’ve chipped one small ornamental piece, and snapped the heads from two radar dishes. The material will withstand normal battlefield wear and tear just fine, but rough handling when you put this into or out of storage is going to chip it.

Gothic Sector Legion  orbital relay

The overall aesthetics are great, light industrial sci-fi that’s very familiar to anyone who played the original Dawn of War, but which 40k itself has moved away from over the years. Though everything looks different, modern 40k terrain rules will count almost all of this as ‘enclosed buildings’ – providing the benefit of cover to larger models, hiding smaller models from sight, and disrupting unit movement.

Let’s start with the blandest part of the range, the bunker, which… well, yes it has walls, and room for five Primaris Space Marines inside, so it meets the minimum requirements for a bunker, but hardly thrills. Placed alongside the rest of the range it looks a lot more convincing, but if you plan to buy a single piece, don’t get this one.

Gothic Sector Legion Machine Cult

The Machine Cult building looks great and is almost entirely inert in game terms, 12 inches wide and almost entirely flat. I think it looks great, but it won’t have a noticeable impact on a game except as the ultimate objective zone marker.

Gothic Sector Legion Barracks

Likewise, the Chapel Barracks has a big flat missile silo pad that attaches to a lumpy line-of-sight blocking building by magnets. It looks great, and it’s clear which Dawn of War building inspired it, but half of the building has no in-game effect.

Gothic Sector Legion  defense turrets

The defense turrets (which come in a pair), armored listening post, plasma generators, legion arsenal, and orbital relay, are all nice little bits of scatter terrain. They each fill about as much volume as a single Munitorum Armored Container, for about twice the price. On balance that feels like an appropriate premium to get them (mostly) pre-assembled and pre-painted.

Gothic Sector Legion  fortified relay

The centerpiece of the range is the Legion Stronghold. It actually comes in two hefty chunks, each about the size of a 2lb bag of sugar. It’s solid: there’s no removable roof and hidden interior in there. Gameplay wise, this is a very angular hill. But what a hill!

Gothic Sector Legion stronghold

This is obviously not the right Warhammer terrain for tournament grinders, because nothing in here could be used as a ruin. If you’re looking for terrain that just looks good, and you’re more strapped for time than you are for cash, Gothic Sector: Legion offers the same pre-painted, low-assembly convenience that makes the rest of the Battlefield in a Box range so popular.

If you’re playing Horus Heresy and want to use defensive emplacements, the turrets and armored listening post are very nice. Otherwise, if you like giving your Warhammer 40k factions matching terrain, or like pushing the boat out for narrative games and want to feature a Space Marine forward base, well, they don’t get much more Space Marine themed than this.

And we would be remiss not to mention the YouTuber Zorpazorp’s custom rules to bring Dawn of War into tabletop Warhammer 40k. If you’re one of the very few gamers committed enough to turn 40k into a tabletop RTS, we can’t think of better scenery than Gothic Sector: Legion.