Battle Report: Well Kind Of

It's been a while since my last post, and I honestly haven't done too much. I've been procrastinating over what the hell to use as a Necromunda army, and have come up blank every time. I don't really want to buy Games Workshops seriously old, seriously outdated, seriously ugly and seriously expensive Necromunda models. But I may not have a choice due to the lacking amount of alternatives.

On a battle report note. I did have some fun with a mate named Dan. He is a Warhammer veteran of some 15 years and quite an accomplished painter to boot. We played a rather large 2500 point battle mission, with his Orks against my Chaos Space Marines.

The Boyz swarming in

Funnily enough, I managed to hold off his absurdly large army and we finished on a draw. I was very happy with this and it was a great game! Our rematch is going to be a 2 regiment setup, with 3000 points per side. The interesting thing with this is the chance to take up to 4 HQ's and even 6 HS! We have also allowed Apocalypse armory to make an appearance in the form of a flyer each. Hardcore fun here we come!

A Big Tank Thingy

The pictures you're seeing on here are Dan's impressive Ork models. As I stated earlier, he has been an avid Warhammer fanatic for over 15 years and has nearly every army ever made, the lucky bastard!

Beginner's Luck!

I had the chance to play a young fellow at our local game day. The difference with this, versus other encounters, was the fact that it was his first ever game. He had a 1500 point Tyranid army, that was pitted against my rather lacklustre 1500 list that I slapped together on the day.

I started off with winning the roll and we were stuck into a hold the objective mission. All started off well for me, as he was essentially a sitting duck for a hail of bullets, rocket and laser beams on the first turn. Then he slowly moved forwards for another pummelling of projectiles. Eventually the tables turned when he was close enough to physically attack, then things started looking grim for me.

I have had very little to do with Tyranids in the past, so I was as much of a noob as the young fellow was. His little aliens were ripping Chaos Marines to shreds before my eyes, their shrieks of pain was music to my evil ears. Luckily I was smart enough to keep some distance, and managed to draw on held objectives by the end of the game.

So there you go, outdone by a new player. Am I upset about this? Not at all, I had a great game and learnt a valuable lesson... Don't play against Tyranids! :P

It's In the List!

I love writing lists. This is quite unusual, because things like lists generally didn't interest me before I started playing Warhammer! As far as list building goes, Army Builder is the bees knees! While it is quite expensive, it really saves on paper, frustration and writers cramp. There are other cramps of the hand, but those are not appropriate on a Warhammer related blog! :)

Army Builder is just the core program and needs to be loaded with the rules that are used for all the different game systems. I currently have 40k, and Necromunda. Though you can find many different game systems that have been lovingly built by ardent fans. The only real downside with Army Builder, is a rather dismal support for older versions of the game. You seem to be expected to renew your copy every 12 months and AB files will eventually stop working for your piddly old version.

As for gaming, I tried out Necromunda on the weekend. Set in the 40K universe, Necromunda is a small unit tactical game of post apocalyptic gang warfare. The game mechanics seem to be quite easy to grasp, with a chopped down type of 40k ruleset.

I was trying to avoid the GW Necromunda models, but after scouring the interwebz for alternatives, I have finally chosen to use GW ones. My reasoning behind this is the specialised weapons that are needed for the game (bolt pistols, snipers, chain swords, etc). Plus the GW models generally work out at the same price, or even less than the competitors offerings. Which in the grand scheme of things is a +1 to GW... I hate to say it, but it's true :)

Anyone For A Boardgame?

I really enjoy playing boardgames. I'm not to the level of the BoardGameGeek fanatics, but I think I'm slowly getting there! Currently the games we have in our collection is Pandemic, Puerto Rico, Space Hulk and Forbidden Island.

Pandemic: (displayed) is a fantastic co-op game, where you have to try and stop a worldwide viral outbreak. You, and your friends, are fighting a constantly expanding set of viruses across a game board of the World. This is a very hard game to win, in the 15 or so times we've played it, we've only won a couple of times.

Puerto Rico: I would kind of describe as Civilization lite. You are plantation growers in Puerto Rico, and must outdo your opponents in efficiency when growing crops. Each round everyone gets to select a role with varying benefits. This is the crafty part as you can select items that your opponent may want, in order to hinder their progress.

Space Hulk: Honestly, what more really needs to be said! This is one of the best GW Boardgames to ever come out. Unluckily like most other GW games, this was only released in a limited run on multiple occasions. The last run was only a year or so ago, so you may still track it down at a reasonable price.

Forbidden Island: Coming in at the cheap end of the scale at a measly $25AU, is this little gem. While it is relatively similar to Pandemic, it is simpler and easier to get into. You (and your cohorts) are sent down to a sinking island and have to collect artifacts, while keeping the island floating and yourselves alive. While Pandemic is a co-op game, it is restrictive in what you can do with each other. This game actually promotes the idea of helping each other with suggestions and ideas.

I have also just purchased two old Games Workshop board games. They are Judge Dredd and Rogue Trooper. Both were released in the 80's and never got released again. I have read that people on BoardGameGeek had been putting up counters and board scans on the site, but GW used their almighty Ban Fist (a compact version of the Power Fist) to quell this evil deed of keeping a forgotten game alive.

Bring Out Yer Lead!

It seems that metal GW models are going the way of the Dodo bird. While this is a good thing for tabletop gamers who have a shit of a time with metal getting chipped, it's an even greater time for the bargain conscious gamer.

I'll be picking up a squad of old Havocs from the local Reseller for half price. Yep, HALF PRICE! I could've gotten Abbadon, but my Son chose to not tell me of these savings in time, and I missed the veritable boat. While most people generally scorn Havocs, I can see some genuine uses for these little blokes. Make up a 10 man squad (they are the same price as normal CSM's) with a Lascannon, Autocannon and Missile Launcher. Then add yet another of the former 3 options, and you have 4 heavy weapons at your disposal each turn with a 48" range. Also with 10 men, they can take a lot of damage before you start losing the important members.

Another advantage of owning a Havoc Squad is inter-changeability between them and normal CSM squads. You can add CSM's to Havocs, and vice versa. Ever wanted to have a Lascannon in your stationary CSM squad? You had to either buy a Havoc guy with Lascannon or try and hunt one down on Ebay. Quite a challenge indeed.

One thing I am not too happy about is the Obliterator's not on the Finecast rollout. While I have stated in a previous post that I will avoid GW models. If I could replace the Obliterator's with resin I would be a very happy chappy. If you've never had the hair pulling and anger inducing joy of dealing with Obliterator's, then you are missing out on a treat! You need the never ending patience of a Swami Guru to put them together, then in your first game it's guaranteed weapons will fall off and get lost, and of course they will get chipped over, and over again, and before you know it your hard work looks as bad as the little Matchbox cars you had as a kid.

For the Dark Gods!

I have felt a tad confident since the mildly successful photographing and posting of Reaper's Mouslings yesterday, and have decided to add some photo's of the Chaos Space Marines I have been painting.

Black Legion is easy to paint, are recognizable and can be done quickly. I am still a novice painter, and had jumped in the deep end with my Khorne Berzerkers a year ago. Red is not an easy colour to apply, and I found that out the hard way. Black Legion is probably the most well known Chaos Legion, and is also one of the fastest to paint. Prime black, do the edging gold and silver, paint some filler and you're done. It's really that simple.

As you can see, it's not the best of jobs, but I'm really quite happy with the results. My hand has been getting steadier, and I have been trying different colours on parts of the models to offer a individual feel for each model. I have yet to do the bases, they will come after I have painted the 40-50 CSM models I have to paint.

Also, if you're possibly wondering why I have coloured bars on the bases. These models were the first ones I bought. They were second hand, all pre-built (and pre-broken), and either badly painted or primered. I had absolutely no idea what I was doing game wise, so my Son helped me colour code them into squads, and unit types. The guy up top is in the bone squad, and I probably had him as a normal guy.

Dock Rockin'

I'm back! Unluckily, for the one person that possibly looks at my blog, I didn't sink the house boat and drown. We had a great time. I drank a bit, read a bit, played a little bit on the Laptop and generally lounged around like a Sloth. The Wife and I are now suffering from "Sea Legs", which means we are still swaying around like we have been on a really bloody fast merry-go round. It is also known as "Dock Rock", which we found quite amusing because it sounds like "Jock Rot"

The boat was.. Well.. Cozy, to say the least. The toilet/bathroom was around half the size of a toilet and the double bed was a bit of a drama due to my exceedingly large frame (damn you giving up smoking!). Also being a "land lubber" I had to come to terms with such things as currents, and other people on the river. Just like on the roads, there are rules, except no bastard actually adheres to said rules. Jet Skier's, we worked out, are the Hoon's of the waterways. They zip around like angry Wasps getting in your way and have zero regard for anybody, including themselves. Luckily the House Boat was essentially a floating pontoon. We puttered up the river, full speed ahead, at such a leisurely pace that Jesus Christ walked past, and was kind enough to wave on the way through.

I really shouldn't complain, it was still great fun, and we are already planning ahead for the next outing in a couple of months time. Our next outing is going to be a lap of luxury. Next time it's going to be a 2 storey behemoth with 3 bedrooms, full lounge, full bathroom and 2 toilets (Yes!). We'll be dragging along a few family members for this, seeing the cost will be around $1500 for 3 nights. It would've sounded better if it was OVER $9000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But at those prices, we wouldn't even get onto the jetty before we were broke.

Onto some modelling now! I have taken some oh so average pictures of some Mouslings, from Reaper Miniatures. The had their Reapercon convention a couple of weeks ago and a couple of video gaming ones have been added to their line up. The point is, I had painted some of the original Mouslings for my Wife's Birthday last year and here's some piccy's of them. Please excuse the crude looking work, they do actually look a lot better in person, but hey.















Please excuse the odd layout of the pictures. Blogger is being a pain in the arse, and I thought it's probably safer to just post it as is, rather than get even more pissed off :)