A bit like the Queen's speech

... But with less corgi's.

Well it's been an interesting year for me - ups, downs, plenty of illness in the last 3 months of various sorts. My work has kept me busy, my mortgage payments were reduced by a third, two good friends of mine (I guess thats 4 friends?) have got married... Our lives continue apace.

Oh, and after 5 years I've become unexpectedly single, with complications of course.

Boy am I looking forward to next year! I'll be single (now) and free by April. I'm seeing it as a year of self made opportunities - plenty of gaming, plenty of time to catch up with people, plenty of new years resolutions - some of which I'm pretty sure I can keep!

So, before I share my whole life story, I think I'll finish here and wish all my readers

a Very Merry Christmas!

Eat well, enjoy the company of friends and Family, and have fun!

Merry Christmas, happy new year, and Dice Gods bless us, everyone!

Pilgrimage

I'm not a religious man. but even I have felt the need to make a pilgrimage. I'm sitting with a troll beer waiting for my Fat Bloke burger to turn up. I am at the home of this hobby of ours... Warhammer World in Nottingham. I'll post pics when I get back to my computer, though that may take a week.

I'm not going to find geek enlightenment here, and its unlikely I'll recognize anyone here, but I'm still loving the atmosphere!
shame about the music piping into Bugman's...

Amazing or Wank

I've had an idea for some time now, based on BMF speak. When my and my mate see something good or bad, we dispense with the thesaurus, and stick with 3 options.
No wows, no cools, no unnecessary adjectives.

3 options.

Either something is Amazing, Wank, or in seldom cases, Absolutely Incredible.

All of my occasional reviews from now on, as well as none GW related internet finds will be showing on my other blog... You've guessed it....

Amazing or Wank

ManFlu - it's real

I feel like crap. I've had this damned cold for 2 weeks now, and I keep getting knocked down again. Bah!

I've not been entirely negligent of my painting etc, but it's definetly slowed down a fair bit. I ended up completly building the High Elves from t'North, barring the purchase of the Island of Blood box - painting it will more likely take ages, but at least I'll have a relatively effective fantasy army...

Archmage, level 4

Noble/Prince on steed

BSB

20-30 Seaguard

20-30 Seaguard

10 Archers

5 Dragon princes

8ish Silver helms

20 total Sword masters (exact unit size/s to be determined)

5 Shadow warriors

Great Eagle

3 Reaper Bolt throwers

All this comes to around 2000 - 2750, depending on items and banners. I've put to together several versions around this basic idea, points and magic stuff will hopefully be decided through experience! I'm painting the first 5 dudes, and as soon as I'm happy, I'll throw up some pics/

I'm also slowly working my way through the Sons of Malice - I've finished the Devestator squad, chugging away on the assault squads, and I'm working on the first 3 terminators... There's more... everything on those guys, and I'm having to modify painting techniques a bit.

Proof

Just to show I have actually been doing something... Here's the Almost complete deve squad. It was going to be the fully finished, but I stupidly left by black and silver, and haven't actually completed one of the bases... Buggeritmilleniumhandandshrimp.



On another note, I probably won't be getting in a game tonight at the club - I'm coming down with a cold quite hard, so instead I'm going to concentrate on finishing this deve squad, hopefully finish the first assault squad, and finish building the Seaguard. In theory, this is well within my ability tonight - but as you may have noticed, theory and actuallity when it comes to my spare time don't often click!

Shame

Yes, yes I know I said I'd have the full unit painted and finished with pics for you wonderful, wonderful forgiving people...

Look, I played fantasy on Thursday night, my Goblin army verses Warriors of Chaos. I knew that Gobbo's aren't competative. I knew this was likely to be an uphill struggle, if not a solid defeat. I was bitch slapped off the table in 4 turns.

The bolt throwers did bugger all.
The fanatics were relatively fantastic.
The shaman twins blocked all of his magic that mattered, and I got off a genius Gork'll fix it. 6's to 1's on his Phat unit? Booyaa!
40 archers did absolutly nothing - literally!

All his units managed to get ward saves of one sort or another (damn those shrines!) and hell did he know how to roll them.

Warriors of Chaos, even when reduced down to one active phase (no shooting, 2 level 3's shut down his magic phase) - combat, he wiped me off the board. Not good, people.

So I looked at my large collection of Stuff...

Sons of Ulthuan to the rescue! With the purchase of the Island of Blood box, I'll have a complete 2400 point army*. I've built my first unit of Seaguard, and tinkering with a colour scheme. Something... Watery.

* What?! Yes, my collection of stuff includes several 'most of an army's, bought on a whim or as a bargain. Sad, isn't it?

Stay on target, stay on target...!

One Farmer Geddon point for the movie...

Do you know, I think I'm about there! I've got to do the bases, but due to the messiness of sand and sloshing, I'll be finishing these at home sometime this weekend I think. I'll slap up final photo's as and when.

So briefly, I added boltgun metal to the raised parts of the Rocket launchers*, painted the casings of the boltgun and chainsword black, and gave the chest skull and honour ribbons a quick wash of devlin mud. Bob's your Uncle, Fannie's your aunt.

I'm trying to get this army up and running as quickly as possible, so I'm cutting some corners, skipping some details. For example, I'm just painting the chest eagles foundation red and stopping there. I'll hopefully go back and 'finish' these at a later date.**

Interestingly enough I'm due to have a game of Fantasy tonight, my gobbo's vs... I really should keep a record of the people I play and their forum names, cos I've got a sneaky feeling it's the same guy I played a month or so ago, pretty much a mirror match!

* I don't like calling them Missile launchers due to the regularity that I 'Miss'. Call it an Orky mentallity if you must, except I don't think an ork can use words like Mentallity.

**Awww, who am I kidding? I'll be way too busy on all the other crap I've got to paint!

Mr WIPpy, one two miss a few...

Heh, I'm getting good at the dodgy post titles!

Onwards with the seemingly endless how-to... While not working, moping, procastinating etc, I am actually getting on with the rest of the army. I've almost finished the first assault squad. Pics will magically arrive when I've done it.

Ok, now for the missing steps. Below is the result of the black highlighting.

What do you mean you can't tell?! I've mixed up a couple of batches of really dark grey and quite dark grey based on mixing Codex grey and black. I've got a feeling it's too subtle, but I tried highlighting with codex grey and washing it back, and I just didn't like it.

So these are what happens where you block paint Number 1 (the really dark) and line highlight the edges with Number 2 (the just dark). Then a good slosh of Badass black over it.
To be honest I'm still not convinced, but it's good for now, and if I find a better method/colour level, it'll be easy enough to add to what's already down.

Next, I'm still not decided on the weapons colour - I'm tempted by boltgun metal:

Other idea's I've played with are mid grey (kind of goes against the black OR white scheme), dark red (I want it as a really small counter point, and I'm already painting the chest details red) or black white quartered (am I mad, that'd be hell!).

What do you think?

Next, just because I had time, I've finished of his shouting head (Sons of Malice actually battle in silence - I'll say he's just taked a glancing shot to the cod piece) and started the seals.

So, what do you think about the weapons (bolt pistols, chainswords, missile launchers)?

Farmer Geddon's Armageddon

Last Thursday I got the second game in with the BA flavoured Sons of Malice.*


Oh, what a different game this was...





I used exactly the same list as the previous week, and I was facing a perfectly modern Crimson Fists...

Librarian

3 Min tactical squads in Las/Plas razorbacks

5 TH/SS Terminators in Landraider Redeemer

2 Vindicators

1 Landspeeder Typhoon

1 Landspeeder MM/HF

No pictures I'm afraid - it was a bit of rush getting a pick up game at all, and I hadn't had a chance to paint much, and to be honest, I'd rather not chronicle being tabled that closely!

Table quarters deployment, 2 objectives.

He went first, deployed in a loosely defensive way, knowing I was going to try a mass deepstrike.

I deployed the Devo squad in ruins quite close to his quarter (Mistake 1**).

1st turn he shot up the Devo's killing a couple of grunts - nothing too bad.

I tried shooting on the vindicators, yes, I'd need 6's to do anything meaninful, but missing 3 out of the four shotd REALLY didn't help. Good start eh?!

2nd turn, he charges the LR forward and deposits the terminators in front ready to charge. All vehicles pop smoke. Charges, wipes out the whole squad.

I drop in Honour guard, Vanguard, 1 combat squaded 10 man, and the 5 man. one of the melta combat squads deviates into terrain, sprain their ankles and start running... flashforward: This squad keeps running due to running right past half his army, rallys on turn 4, only to be shot out of cover.

The honour guard immobilise the LRR - woop dee doo, then get wiped out by the terminators.
The vanguard charge the rear of a razorback and do jack, get wiped out by subsequent shooting.

The combat squad that actually landed on their feet shake one vindicator, then twiddle their thumbs. Finally charging the other vindicator blowing it up. Woot!

The flamer squad land, then wonder what the hell they're going to do, try charging the razorback holding his objective, fail to do anything, then they're wiped out by shooting.

The Librarian's 10 man squad deem to arrive, lining up for a Blood lance shot potentially hitting 3 vehicles***. 1 blows up, one gets stunned. His librarian then gets all emo, and Avengers half the squad away. Crap!

The following combat was really the only fun to be had, my Libby killed his Libby, the rest of his squad takes me down to just the Librarian. Next turn I cast Sang Sword, he swings, he kills a dude. Following combat phase (quickly now, my Librarian is the last model on the field), roll for Sang Sword again, and blam, his head explodes from demons tickling his eyeballs or somesuch.

The games ends his turn 5, nary a black and white dude on the pitch.

Umm, I'm at a bit of a loss here. The tools I had failed me (I know, a bad craftsmen), and in some cases I justs didn't have the tools I needed. I'd even bought new dice for the occasion, and showed that rolling ones and two's is actually an innate skill I posses. Seriously!

I'm going to go look back at seeing if I can make sure that both 'thpecial' squads have at least one powerfist. Also wondering if dropping and relying on Meltaguns to can-open is really a valid idea. It probably is, it just didn't work out too well for me this time.

* I don't think I have a thing for Bruce Willis?
** I think this is was the first mistake, and as bad as the second.
*** The only other major mistake, Landing them all together in a big KILLME squad.

Last Man Standing

Last thursday my magna marines AKA Sons of Malice AKA Blood Angels got their first outing on the battlefield, 1500 points, Kill points, quarters deployment. I didn't take any photo's I'm afraid, partly due to the exitement of the first outing, partly due to the very unpainted nature of my dudes...

My oponent was Imperial Guard, and as per every other time I've faced them this edition ( i.e 3?) I was shocked just how much you can fit into 1500!

CCS, astropath, naked chimera
2 X Vet squad, missile, 2 plasma
2 Infantry platoons, all with missile launchers, flamers, Chimera
Sludgehound (Banewolf, that I now dislike with a passion)
Vendetta
Valkery

8 Chimera chasis and 2 flyby's... This was nasty.

I took

Librarian, jump
Honour guard, 3 meltas, jump
2 X 10 man Jumpers with 2 meltas and PF serg
1 X 5 man jumpers with flamer and PW serg
5 Vanguard Vets with mixed weaponry
10 Devestators with 4 ML
2 Sang priests, one camped with the deve squad, 1 dropped with none librarian unit.

He deployed and went first, reserving flyers and banewolf. I deployed devestator squad in the open (uh oh) and sang priest. First turn he chipped a couple of ablative wounds off the deve's, I killed a chimera.
His second turn was a repeat, and in mine most of my squads come in, all combat squaded, all dropping within melta range of the rear of his Chimeras. Nothing scatters more than 2 inches (woohoo!). In fast forward... the turns get blurry...
I kill most of his chimeras, 1 is alive at the end. His flybys come in turn 2, my final squad (honour guard comes in turn 3, kills vendetta, his banewolf comes in turn 3 kills my honour guard. Ouch!

Deve's kill valk, and most of the contents on next turn. I kill myself alot due to being too close to exploding chimera's, and he kills my squads down to 2 or 3 members with pure lasgun blindingness. I think, hey, 2 marines can take on 7 or 8 guards? Surely? Bah! Major fail on all combat counts. Come to turn 5, I've got one dude, left. Just a dude. Singular. He's out in the open. He thinks its a great idea to go and bat a measly lonesome guard sergeant around the head. Fails.

We roll, turn 6 goes on! He rolls for attacks, bounce, I roll kill!

Now he's still got a bunch of guns, the nastiest of which belong to the vehicle now dubbed sludge wolf. Plus enough guns to get past marine armoour.

We roll, game ends! I win on kill points, 10 or 11 to 9. Yes its close!

...

What he should have done... His shooting was largely unfocussed, I don't think he concentrated fire enough to take out whole squads of only 5. His choice of reserves were reasonable - if he'd left the banewolf on, it would have been target number one, but if it had survived, it would have rampaged. Same with the flyboys, I think.

My mistakes... I think I failed to account for my ability to roll ones and twos for... Everything!
I should have probably kept the squads at 10 men - they wouldn't have been able to split fire, but I think they would have maintained more combat effectiveness. I also dropped the honour guard out in the middle of nowhere, basically panicing about the 3 twin linked lascannons on the vendetta. That resulted in the sludgewolf killing them in one hit. This may have been a mistake, or it may have been providence that took it out of danger range.

I've also got to study the wound allocation, deep strike, Descent of Angels and vehicle damage rules alot more closely. I think I would have more, and he would have had less... But there you go!

Nice chap, good mech army, with a bit to learn about target priority. He said himself that he was a serious fantasy player, and 40k was his 'fun'. Hopefully I'll get a whole assault squad painted for thursday, and get another battle in (with pics this time!).

Badass!

Ok, time for the next in my exclusive range of luxery painting how-to's...

As discussed, slap a second coat of skull white on the quarters; it should be fairly white at this point but by no means perfect. I'll tell you that these guys have been in action and their armour's covered in lots of small marks and scratches... I'll be thinking I'm lazy and want to get these guys on the table as soon as my honour will let me!

This lunchtime's paint session rewarded me with a layer of Badass black. For some reason the pot I've got is alot lighter and a bit browner than the first pot I bought. Great consistancy there GDubs. I think I've got the balance right - you need to slap on enough to go in every crease, crook and cranny, and then take off any puddles sitting on raised areas. I tried watering it down but then there's not enough definition. So if for some reason you're actually following this for tips - ummm... Give it a go any see what I mean?

I don't like using the flash, but it really shows you where the ink's sitting.

Black and White

As promised*, here's my slightly dodgy how to paint Sons of Malice with an even dodgyer method!

First of all, paint it black:

Yes, all of it. I've started getting cosy with Vallejo Game colour black. Smells really wierd, but it goes on beautifully!

Second, paint half of it skull white - it looks really nasty. Top left, bottom right white. The bottom white section carries over the belt - it just seems to balance it better with the back pack.

As a side note, the two guys on the right are over paints of a small SM army I picked up for a bargain. They form most of the Dev squad, and half of the assault marines.

Back on target... There will be a second coat of white coming tomorrow. But now, back to work!

* Now I've got four followers *waves* I've actually got to follow up on the blithely made promises!

Magna Marines - Ho!

Ok, so I've talked about my Sons of Malice, and about my willingness, ney, eagerness, to jump on the bandwagon of Space Wolves/ Blood Angels.

So, without further ado, I present the army lists, shared models (pending a magnestised weapon/backback/jumppack swap) are in italics:

Blood Angel flavoured Sons of Malice:

1000pts:

Librarian
Assault Squad, 2 meltas, PF sergeant
Assault Squad, 2 meltas, PF sergeant
Vanguard vet squad, lightning claw, 3 storm shields
Sanguinary priest, JP, meltabombs
Sanguinary priest, JP,

1500pts: add

5 Assault Squad, flamer, power weapon
Honour guard, 3 meltas, lighning claw
Full devastator Squad, 4 missile launchers
Swap 1 sang priest to walking with storm bolter,
Add lighning claws to the other sang priest.

2000pts: add

Vanguard vet squad, lightning claw, 3 storm shields
Terminater assault squad, 4 THSS, 1TLC

Space Wolf flavoured Sons of Malice:

1000pts: (not really feasable?)

Logan Grimnar
5 wolf guard, 1 in terminator armour with cyclone & chainfist
5 wolf guard, 1 in terminator armour with cyclone & PF
5 wolf guard, 1 in terminator armour with cyclone & PF
Lone wolf in terminator armour, chainfist stormshield
Lone wolf in terminator armour, chainfist stormshield
Devastator Squad, 4 missile launchers

1500pts: add

Rune Priest in terminator armour
5 wolf guard, 1 in terminator armour with cyclone & chainfist, joins another squad to make 10 man.
Thunderwolf cav, SS, PF
Thunderwolf cav, SS, PF

2000pts: add

Thunderwolf cav, SS, PF
Lone wolf in terminator armour, chainfist stormshield
Devastator Squad, 4 missile launchers
5 wolf guard, 1 in terminator armour with cyclone & PF

I would like it italisise the honour guard and vanguard, but I've had to use the 10 raptors I've got hanging around, and they don't really look right jumping around without jumppacks!

In total, the number of models is managable, the extras on both army flavours will give me some flexability either way (more assault terminators, more devestators, more melta).
And, as you've guessed, everything is magnetised, so both flavours fit into one standard GW case. All I've got to do is figure out something suitably... Morally ambiguous for the thunderwolf stand-ins. As I paint and model I'll put up pics. Black and white are supposed to be hard to paint... And damn they are! But from a distance, the couple of test dudes I've done look reasonable.

The Knowledge

Partly for my benefit, partly for yours, here is a hugely useful resource for modelling and painting. Thanks Ron @FTW!

Spoils of War Rectification part 3

Finally I'd like to show some random pictures, share some random thoughts, and make some random excuses.... Sorry for the quality of the photos; by this time I was pretty tired and had the shakes!

During the lunch of the Sunday, if you wanted to have a go at the painting prize (I gracefully declined, as my Tau in its current speed painted state will not win anything), you had to leave your army out for everyone to see and vote.

This is the full might of the guard army I played in Game 1; a fantastic demonstration of force. He later told me that he'd painted another of the guard armies present... Man, he must love painting grunts!

From Spoils of war 2010

I liked this army for it's simplicity and quality of paint job. Everything fitted together, the army as a whole looked quality.

From Spoils of war 2010

One of the two Necron players who entered the painting; it was great to see something other than boltgun metal! Well painted and great use of colours.

From Spoils of war 2010

I almost cried when I saw all the Dark Angels vets painted up in Thousand Sons colours... But then I had to admit that this army is painted to a very high standard, and the robes really fit well.

From Spoils of war 2010

All you need is dedication! Death Korps of Krieg, well painted with lots of mud really adding to this season's 'Siege Look'. Again, everything cam together to make an excellent looking army.

From Spoils of war 2010

The only Eldar to enter; it was nice to see some bright colours well applied. Individually the details were lacking, but standing back, with the high quality of basing, this army was lovely.

From Spoils of war 2010

This is the army belonging to one of the club council members; you know when people say the pictures don't do something justice? This guy took a theme and ran with it throughout the army and it looks fantastic.

From Spoils of war 2010

I don't think I've ever seen a traitor guard army IRL before this, but damn, this one is brilliant; judicious use of spikey bits, great graffiti on the vehicles, and the converted baneblade really show alot of effort and skill.

From Spoils of war 2010

I believe these nids belong to the store owner in Bristol Vanguard's new venue. This is a case of a well thought out colour scheme, applied across alot of bugs really can look good.

From Spoils of war 2010

And finally the actual winner of the painting contest. 1 careful lady owner, huge amounts of detail, real precision painting on all the suits and vehicles. I just wish I'd managed to get better photos!

From Spoils of war 2010

And here are a few amusing snaps...

Through the combined wishing of the Praetorian platoon, the Bainblade started to fly...

From Spoils of war 2010

"Mum? Sorry, can't talk right now, kind of busy..."

From Spoils of war 2010

These were by the same guy who crushed me on game 3, he worked out that each of these fella's cost him well over £10 each... They do look really cool though!

From Spoils of war 2010

Man, sometimes you've just got to brace yourself and charge!

From Spoils of war 2010

And thats all my coverage for Spoils of War 3 (2010). I enjoyed myself immensly!

The extra twists to the missions and army structure added some extra flavour; all of my opponents were great to play against (even the ones who left me wheeping into my army case); and it's definetly something I'll try to attend next year.

Something I noticed that will affect the way I look at the event in the future, that dispite it being a fun and friendly tournament, quite a few people brought full on, hold no punches lists. Fluffy? Maybe, but definetly near the competative edge.

I'm hoping to attend their 'real' tournament next April, so we'll see what changes are brought by a true competative scene.

Spoils of War Rectification part 2e

Ok, home stretch, more 40k played in 2 days than the last 20 months!

Game 5 - 2000pts

Everyone on the team did well last turn, so I chose the same table as last time, it offered good cover and line of site. I sit down, wondering who was going to step up... And its Nids! Standard deplyment, 3 objectives.

Ok, I'm thinking, I reckon I should have enough tools to kill lots of small nids, and make a dent in the bigguns... I was quite impressed just how much bugflesh you can fit into 2000!

Something like...

Trygon Prime
2 Mawlocks
1 Tervigon
20 Gargoyles
10 Genestealers with broodlord
3 Hive Guard
Several Raveners
6 Warriors
1 Venomthrope
A bunch of Termagants to start.
2 Zoanthropes

Impressed... Shocked.... Worried!

I'm only going to show the 1 of 2 pictures I remembered to take of the game:



This is at the end, where he claims 1 objective, and contests the one on the left.

He didn't kill that much, and I killed bugger all. It was largely inifective shooting at everything that had a cover save! Tervigon gives Gargoyles FNP from catalyst (really annoying) combined with 5+ cover from venomthrope (very annoying), they in turn give most of the small bugs cover saves, while the big bugs passed all their 3+/5+(venomthrope).

If I'd remembered to move the crisis squad on the right hand side, then I may have been able to contest there?

Gaaaah!

Nice guy, obviously knew exactly what to do to make the army stay alive in all the right places.

And finished.

Spoils of War Rectification part 2d

Ok, I've had a weeks break from writing batreps, and its almost 3 weeks since the event, but I think I remember enough to set out the outlines.

Game 4, Sunday morning.

This round we got to choose our tables and opponents. Our eyes met across the crowded room, and I knew that I wanted to play Space marines. Plain, vanilla space marines.

Roll up Jose (sorry to the other guys who's names I can't remember!), 1500 points of Crimson fists. I set up and went first on this killpoints mission...



Ummm... Target number 1 the landradier methinks?! In my first turn I take out the landraider and rhino. Potshots all round after that, failling to do much of any significance.
His turn 1, struggles to move the termies forward as fast as possible, fluffs the run roll. Moves the vinidicator forward towards the my mobile wing, shot scatters off (phew!) He takes out out a piranha, even with the disruption pods.
My next turn. Target number 1 eliminated, target number 2 (*twitch* thunderhammer stormshield termies) eliminated, only remaining member the chaplain... In other news, I blow his rhino on the left, and skoot the remaining piranha for a side melta shot, detroying it.
This is the beginning of his turn 2:




Does well to land the pod very close, and out jumps your friendly neighborhood Dread, who fails to hit anything. Walking dread takes out the final piranha, and he proceeds to land a pie plate on my forward kroot squad from the deathwind launcher on the pod... Ouch!



I think he calls quits on turn 4 after I remove his near tac squad, and immobilise and disarm his drop dread. I win 7-1!

He didn't have a great dice game, but even so, this flavour of Tau just eats up that kind of army!

Nice guy, hard matchup for him.

The thought process of choosing an army... GrimDark

I love the idea of doing a Night Lord army, the colours, the fluff, the gameplay... I've delved further into my 'supplies' and dug out 9 CSM raptors to either mix in as ASM or make the Vanguard squad.

I'm facing a bit of anguish though.

I know that the future is Grimdark, I know that in the 40k universe everyones a bit depressed, as are the colours. I know that I can produce (at least at current skill levels) a reasonable dirty/brooding selection of army colours.

But is another dark army the way I want to go?

Eldar: Dark reds, greys and bone

Dark Angels: Bone, rich dark green, black with reds

Tau: Dark grey and purple.

With a Sons of Malice colour scheme, I can mix and match models across Codices a bit better, chaos bits will blend in better, and it will stand out, hopefully in an impressive way rather than a sore thumb.

Any idea's readers?

The thought process of choosing an army.,,

As you may have noticed, I attended a campaign/tournament weekend a few weeks ago - enjoyed it immensly, even though I got a measly 2-0-3 (in the British system).

I realised that I have to work hard to get anywhere with all of my armies!

• Dark Angels /Deathwing: outdated codex, 1/5 points disadvantage against all of the 'modern' codices. Still the coolest chapter. And I'm stubborn enough to stick with the 'proper' rules.


• Eldar: Still strongish, but you have to think. Now I don't have anything against thinking per se, but sometimes you want to sit back and kick ass - you know?


• Tau: I can see why they're good, and with some work/practice/a few more suits I can see it becoming my best army. But again, takes alot of skill to know how, where, and when to do everything. I'm not there yet.


• Orks and IG - neither are in a playable state and to be honest I can't afford the hardware* to make either feasable any time soon.

So, whats 'good' right now? What can I paint that will be effective, be slightly unusual, and come out of my embarrasingly large selection of boxes and bits?

Marines.

I have a bajillion of them (ok a few thousand points). I have 20+ jumpers, dozens of tacticals, bikes, and unbranded** terminators, all sitting in boxes, all wanting purpose. Now I was intending them to be Dark Angels, but having obtained a few battleforces worth of robed guys (best deal EVAR - £70+ worth of models for what, £40?), I can use the excess none robe grunts.

Then I came across the Generi-Marines. I wish I could remember which blog has them, but the excellent idea is to have a space marine army that can be turned into any SM codex (found it - For the Throne).

Choo choo!

Whats that, is that the Band Wagon I hear approaching?

Why yes, I have marines, I love the new wolves and bloody angel codices, and I lament the current state of the Dark Angels (they deserve capitalisation) but refuse to use them as any of the lesser chaptors***.

So, what chaptor/legion can I use? While the idea of grey marines is excellent, I've had to paint way too much of it on the Tau to face doing it on another army.

• Sons of malice/malaal. I love the fluff/lack thereof. I love the highly tenuous links to Malaal, the black sheep of the Chaos family. Black and white isn't too hard to paint. I can use everything as if they're still loyal/just gone bad.

• Night Lords. Ok, so I've just read Lord of the Night, but I liked them before, honest? They were the first chapter to use large scale jump packs, they work through creating fear and terror throughout the populace, they have friggin lightning flickering on their armour! They also (at least in some of the fluff) are averse to Choas. Given that the majority of the stuff I have is 'non-evil' I could call it Heresy age (Mark VII armour), mix in a few chaosy bits for the fear factor. Ah, the painting. I've done half a test mini, and the hard part will be adding some lightning that doesn't look like it was done at 4am by a caffeine addict. And making it look 'midnight blue'. And adding brass/brinze that matches. Ummm... It's nice that I'll have 2 green armies (gobbo's and DA), 1 red army(Eldar), 1 blue army (NL)? Vague batman correlations FTW!

• Pre-heresy Emperor's Children. Love the idea, have enough fluffy bits to make a couple of squads, but no more. By fluffy bits I mean beaky helmets and aquilla breast plates. I'm not usually a fluff monster, but I'd like to get it right. Maybe a killteam at a later date then.

• Homebru. All of the colours are taken, and I'd feel the need to create a small backround piece, names, fluff etc etc.


• Codex. I tried painting blood angels, and found that I just can't get a bright, true red. Either it goes orange or too grimdark - and that base is already covered by my eldar. I like the imagery of the space wolves, but it wouldn't look very wolfy without all the bits.






• Rainbow Warriors. Naa - just kidding. But come on, how many Rainbow marine armies have you seen?






• Deathwatch. Oooh... Now this is an interesting. Black, with just the shoulder pads in the chapter colours. Cool fluff, cool imagery (I like me some imagery). Vague possibility of a codex sometime in the next 5 years. Unfortunatly not known for hanging around in groups of more than 10. And not an army I can think would bend into the BA codex very eaily. Plus I was looking at the kit that GW makes (granted - it makes them look 'proper') and that would cost £30 per squad... No thanks. Again, something I'd love to do for a kill team.

Hmmm, I had talked myself into Night Lords, but to be honest writing all this down has added a few possibilities that I hadn't considered. Bah! Decisions decisions.... None Chaosy Night Lords it is then. No, Sons of Malaal! No, Night.... Oh crap. Two Face coin flip?

Dominus Nox!

* 6 inch thick armour, unfeasably large guns, tracks... Etc etc etc.

** Without any Deathwing symbology. Yes, I have a bunch of them sitting waiting to be stripped and repainted. Ah, Ebay, my friend.

*** It's a 3rd ed rule called Stubborn, at least half of DA players have it.

Spoils of War Rectification part 2c

A brief break followed game two where Team Epsilon (go the good guys!) consolled each other and apparently did quite well! Apart from me that is. Boo.

Game 3, I got to choose the table - I thought the ice world look was cool, some cover, plenty of shooty space. I sat down and a nice canadian chap joined me. From team Aquilla (Imperial Guard).

I chose normal deployment, he chose kill points. Cool I thought, we both suffer killpoint hemorraging right?

At 2000 points, he had 7 Chimeras, 2 LR battletanks, 9 Sentinels, a vendetta, and a boss squad with psycher and orbital barrage calling guy.

I'm not going to go into detail with this one. Because it hurts.

1) I made the mistake (not learned from game 1 against guard) that the trick is to take the fight to them. They were all outside of the transports, no cover, and I had the firewarriors and kroot to do a half decent amount of damage. I didn't do this of course.

2) I couldn't do diddly.
I miss.
I fail to wound.
I can't make a coversave or disruption pod save. I tried to buy new dice, but nobody would sell me any!


This is the second to last turn.

I shot some stuff, charged in with the kroot in an attempt to maybe do something. Lost 7 to 1 I think.

He was a great oponent, had a great attitude, the army had some great oldskool guard and he had obviously lavished some care.

We both agreed after the second turn that the dice gods were firmly on his side.

It was just one of those games, y'know?

Lesson learned - Guard are juicy and fragile, go beat them.

Spoils of War Rectification part 2b

Ok, after lunch* we had game two, 1500 points.


In the previous round team Epsilon (go the good guys!) didn't do that well, I headed towards a decent looking table with plenty of good lanes of fire while providing plenty of cover for jump-shoot-jump antics. It was an intact cityscape**.


His army was fairly hard, but I figured I could give it a good run:


Khorne Prince with wings
3x8 Khorne Bezerkers plus rhino's (havoc launchers)
2x2 Obliterators
And I think a 3 man terminator squad, but I'm not sure.


He chose table quarter deployment, I chose 3 objectives (the badly painted white and silver dudes in this game). I deployed standard bubblewrap, he hid everything where he could.

I think I went first, popped one rhino (the bezerkers hid) and imobilised another. And this is where the realisation dawned that I'd probably lose this game. The buildings count as vehicles, armour 12, with access points, shooting points and on half of them, roof hatches. I now hate buildings.
He'd placed to oblits on a building in his back corner, and when I tried to shoot them, I couldn't. Because they're in a building/vehicle. I could, and did blow up the building, but it took alot of shots which should have been shooting closer scary stuff. See the ruin in the first picture.


End of my turn 1 I think.


He jumped his scary prince a building closer, took some pot shots, killed a few kroot. Drove the rhino through the gap (see next picture). Hid the disembarked Bezerkers in a building.

Do I bother to shoot the buildings and try to get out the bezerkers, or shoot at the stuff I can see? That was a decision I had to make, and he took advantage of.

I blocked the Rhino scooting close with the piranhas (hate the model, love the function!) and blew it up. Couldn't get anything in to shoot the prince, and failed to appreciate the function of Wings.



End of my second turn I think.


Next turn he moves the prince into the convenient gap I left him behind the kroot and in front of the broadsides. Crap. He kills the piranhas, plus assorted shooting. To be honest on this board the obliterators didn't seem to do much. They were annoying, difficult to kill, and killed some stuff, but they're not great. He charges the Prince into the afformentioned broadsides and wipes them out in a roll. Never mind eh? Lesson learned. He also manages to charge one of the kroot squads with the closest squad, leaving one alive (he runs, and kills a bezerker shooting over his shoulder, neat!)


Turn 3 or 4?


The rest was a bit of a blur, I killed the deamon prince in one turn of shooting with whatever I had, moved the piranha drones for some blocking, didn't really manage much.

Basically at the call of time (turn 5 I think) he claimed two objectives with the bezerker squad at the back, stretched. I contest the closest one. I was so busy playing keep away that I forgot I had some speed to contest his objective, but it probably wouldn't have helped much.

He won, got a +1 on the special table condition, I got 0.

Nice guy, used the table well to his advantage. I was more annoyed with the table than him.

Lessons:
Don't play with buildings when you're a shooting army.
Remember your mobility
Things with wings can fly


* The catering and support people deserve more of a mention that a page note. The brownies were sooooooo good.

** Oh how I wish I paid more attention in class.

Spoils of War Rectification part 2a

Right - the painful part. I didn't do quite as well as I'd hoped using:

Shas'o MP PR

2X2 Fireknives

2 Deathrains

3 Stealthsuits

2x 6 Firewarriors

2 x10 Kroot + 4 hounds

2 x 6 Pathfinders w Devilfish

2 melta Piranhas

3 Broadsides

2 Hammerheads

Drones smattered in logical places

Broadly based on the Stelek bubblewrap hybrid theory, this was everything I could scrape together or kitbash to make up 2000.

Game 1: 1000 Vs Imperial Guard

Right, first game was my choice of player (I didn't see the army before hand... May have chosen differently?). He chose standard deployment and I chose D3+2 objective mission.

Deployment - green things are objectives.

His army was pretty much all infantry platoons with as many heavy bolters and lascannons as he could squeeze in. Two autocannon sentinels went into reserve. Que the start of theme for the weekend, I think I killed a sentinel and a 10 man squad. 5 turns, thats it. He knocked out the pathfinders early on. I hugged cover and took as many potshots as I could.

About turn 4. Lone remianing Deathrain with flamer trying his luck.

In the end, 6 firewarriors in an imobilised devilfish sat on the objective at the back right, an outflanking kroot squad claimed the objective left center, suits contested his left objective, and a weaponless piranha contested his center. This was at the end of turn 5, and a 3+ would have seen me knocked off the two contested objectives. He rolls... It's cocked! He rolls again... It's a 1.

Fa'MaGed'on 4 Points.

I was relieved; he was a good sport, but the frustration of knowing he'd have won with another turn was clear!

Lesson 1, unlearned: when you can see 100 near naked humans and you're mostly well protected, get up close and kick him.

Lesson 2, disruption pods are priceless.

Spoils of War Rectification part 1

Wow, what a weekend. 54 players, 6 teams, 26 tables, 5 games, 17 hours.

This was my first event of any sort, and in a way I'm happy that it was a slightly laid back campaign style tournament.

The format was slightly escalation with 5 games: 1000pt (no heavy support or special characters, max of 3 fast/ellite total), 2 x 1500pt, 2 x 2000pt (1 forgeworld 'extra' or an extra HS/E/FA slot).

Yes, so I may have lost out a little bit with these tweaks, but largely it didn't make a huge impact. So I could have done with a pie plate in game 1, and an extra set of suits in game 5, but in the end neither would have made a huge difference, I plain didn't own the extra models, and the other guy had exactly the same advantages/disadvantages.

Players were arranged into teams:

Team Primus – Space Marines of all loyal chapters.
Team Aquila – Imperial Guard, Witch Hunters and Daemon Hunters.
Team Chaotica – Chaos Space Marines, Daemons and Traitor Guard.
Team Epsilon – Tau and Eldar.
Team Reavers – Dark Eldar, Necrons and Tyranids.
Team Waaargh! – Orks.

I loved this idea - for the most part because it prevented mirror matches, and also it had a cool effect on table/opponent choice...

For each round, the winning team from the previous round (it was random in the first) chose their tables. Then the team with the next highest points, etc. When all the tables had one person on it, the subsequent players filled up the opponent lots. The first player to a table chose deployment type, the second player chose mission, both out of the main rulebook.
Then play continued normally.

I like this in principle. In actuallity, it screwed me on a couple of games - more to come later.

Finally teams were given small bonus cards based on random/wins from previous round. These were fairly small effects, a sniper shot, minefield, fearless troop, that sort of thing. In all 5 of my games, this did exactly nothing. I know that some of my teammates had great success with outflanking Wraithguard in a serpent, or redeplying an opponents unit to spin a tank 180 for rear shots. Next, a very brief run down of my games (with a few pics)...

Points to me

I've been painting. Lots. More than I have in several years I think, and I'm fed up at work, so I'm adding up my painting points.

4 Tanks = 40
2 Skimmers (monstous creatures) = 10
5 Large Infantry = 10
16 Infantry = 16
44 Infantry finishing touches and bases (0.5pt) = 22

98 Points! That almost makes up for last years painting fail.

And more importantly, I now have a fully painted (ok, so I want to add some highlights and a few details to really finish) up to scratch, 2000pt army. I've got about 500 points of extra unused stuff (some kroot riders, a devilsfish, another crisis suit that'll be painted in chicken colours [don't ask], and a dozen assorted infantry). But that can all wait as I'm properly burnt out on painting!

Spoils of War

As someone may have noticed I've been quiet for the last month or so*.

I've been feverishly preparing for Bristol Vanguard's Spoils of War 3/2010.

It's a 1000/1500/2000 pt campaign driven weekend, and looking at my armies, I balanced effectivness (I still want to win, even if its fluffy), how much I needed to paint (I may have chosen poorly), and how little I needed to buy to get the army up to scratch (Zero, zilch, win!).

So, my options were Dark Angels (any flavour), Eldar, or Tau.

Deathwing, I'm just not comfortable with in a multigame situation where I want to win.
Ravenwing - too much to paint, and see above
Greenwing - I hate painting rhino's & predators, and I thought there was just too much to paint.

Eldar - I'm not happy with the paint job on too much of the army, even though I own everything I need**. Also completly unpractised on using biker councils, and with the potential prolliferation of counter psykers out there, the army can fall apart.

Tau - quite alot to paint, potentially effective if I'm awake, and I own everything.

Tau it is then!


To follow: lists, painting and hopefully battle reps and reviews afterwards!


















* Yeah I know, I've never posted that often, and it's not like anyone reads this. *echo* *echo* *echo*
**Probably twice over!

Lost

I think I've found the answer to Lost.

I saw the last bumper sized show. I paid great attention assuming that there would be some answers, that there was some epic quasi sub uber plot.

Of course, like everyone else, I was dissapointed.

Then I found this, and realise the answer was there back in 2004, if you knew where to look!

Nincompoop!

I silently stared at this... Paragraph of utter drivel, mentally spluttering, pretty much speechless.

I couldn't think of anything to say except...

Sarah Palin, former governor of Alaska, you are a Nincompoop.

Thanks for all the fish, guys

It sounds like recent times have taken their toll on Spencer and co 40K radio is no more.

I've enjoyed every episode - the humour and comradery they squeezed down the interweb tubes with generally good 40k advice, news and tips kept me company through many a working hour. I'm sorry to see it end.

They were the first GW game podcast, and I think all the current podcasts have 40K Radio to thank for their pioneering work.

The linked post above does mention that 40k radio as a business is for sale, so it it's possible that this isn't the end, with new presenters and ideas to carry on the torch.

Thanks to Spencer, Phill, Scott, Chipley and Jarjar. I hope you carry on gaming and having fun.

This would make an excellent screensaver

I followed a link through to WikipediaVision, sat enthralled for a couple of minutes and thought it would make an excellent screensaver. I used to love watching my old pc hunting aliens on the old SETI program.

Whatever happened to SETI? Can you still get the screensaver?

Apparently yes!

Bandwagon Part Deux

Several months ago, I briefly discussed the Wolf train (wagon) and The Hunt. Nothing came of it, as I decided to get on with getting the Dark Angels up to scratch.

Now I've come over all Red! Before I loathe myself too much:

1) I've owned the 2nd Ed Angels of Darkness since I started playing 40k, and the Darks and Bloods have always kind of sat together

2) I already own enough Jump Pack marines to make a small (1K) BA army with mimum purchases. Just need some Vanguard Vets, a librarian and maybe 2 Sang priests, plus some remodelling.

3) I was looking at using these Assault marines with the Darktimes*

4) The speed I paint, by the time I feel like playing them the bandwagon will have moved onto Inquisition and Dark Eldar!

So I was thinking:

Librarian 125
Jump pack, Sword, Lance

Honour Guard 195
3 Meltagun

Sanguinary Priest 90
Jump Pack, Infernus Pistol

Sanguinary Priest 90
Jump Pack, Infernus Pistol

Blood Angels Assault Squad 235
10, Power Fist, 2 Melta Guns

Blood Angels Assault Squad 235
10, Power Fist, 2 Melta Guns

Vanguard Veteran Squad 200**
5, Stormshield, powerfist.

I've got a bunch of power fists knocking around, I've got this excellent conversion from flamer to meltagun method I'm planning to use - and if they all look the same I can call it Baal pattern!

So I've got some test tac marines to try different reds that I'll plaster over while painting other stuff.

*4th Edition BA pdf gold... en rain.

** Yes, yes I know, thats more than 1000pts, but you gotta have some choice!

I can change I can change...

Hands up who remembers that musical masterpiece?


I can change the 'This week I have been mostly painting'...



Yes, I've finally got to a 'reasonable' finishing point with the command squad. Time to take them home, add them to the deathwing case, and maybe take them gaming this thursday. Thats right peeps, a mere 12 months after my last game.

One hole to rule them all

Found this a couple of days ago....

Just Awesome. More pics and the clever lady can be found here.

Onnaroll...

I've finished an Assault sergeant with powerfist:

And as a change of colour, I finished my last Guardian Defender:

The one on the left is new, and the one on the right is from the original batch... At least 5 years ago?! Unfortunatly the paints I used back then (flesh wash particularly) aren't available now, so the catapult looks different. But don't worry, it still fits in with the other 20 or so.

Again 'finished' is pending a little bit of basing and in this case, eye lenses.