Thursday 28 February 2013

Daemon time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BOOBS!!!

So everyone has probably already seen the rumours, and if you haven't, then I'm not gonna help you. With the release of the new Daemons, I'm really getting the itch to go back and redo my Slaanesh-ified Daemon army which I made for the last edition of Daemons, but then got pissed off with because 8th made the book utterly boring and reliant on Bloodletter spamfest BS, and all of the fun stuff just awful...



I didn't particularly want to get rid of the old girls, but the troubles of travel meant it was almost impossible for me to justify getting them sent back (seriously it cost well over $300 to have them sent over in the first place) so I sold them when I left the UK. I don't actually regret that decision too much in the end, as I cut alot of corners to get that army finished and was never a hundred percent happy with some of the units. Also as Juan Diaz Nettes are like hens teeth, and I wanna do this army pure Slaanesh, it would have gotten annoying having two completely different looking units as Daemonettes. I do miss my Princess though...

So the army will get a complete restart, bar my Forgeworld Keeper of Secrets and two Soul Grinders which never made the trip around the world, as the rugged survivors and this time I'm gonna do it properly without any corners cut to get it on the table. This will be a long term project, and I will not be placing it on a table in anger until its done so don't expect much bar the odd model anytime soon (especially since I need to finish my Elves, and paint some White Scars at the same time...). I'm now gonna do a run down of the models I'm gonna be using for each unit today.


Keeper of Secrets:



From Forgeworld, the big gal herself. Its a pity she was so "broken" in the last book that I never really got to use her much. Will her time be now?


Daemon Princess:


From Yedharo Miniatures, Virgo. A beautiful model that I wanted for the last army. They also have some other really cool Zodiac themed miniatures. Sagitarius would make a great Ghorgon/Doombull. Shes currently on my table waiting for some time to get a paint job.

Herald of Slaanesh


Both from Ragingheroes. You'll see a theme here, I love all of their models, particularly the Manticore which is awesome!

Daemonettes


From Raging heroes again. Why use the Witch Elves and not the actual Daemonette proxies they make? Well I just don't like the mantis type arms they put on the "Daemonettes" also they are for the next part.

Furies of Slaanesh (yes thats a thing now!)



 So imagine these with the Wings from the Dark Eldar Scourges. IMAGINE!!!!

Seekers

Now unfortunately Raging Heroes hasn't been kind enough to make my life really easy, so I'm still unsure on this one. I'm tempted to try convert some of the above Witch Elves onto Wood Elf Elven Steeds, but making good legs is gonna be tricky...

Fiends



I'm gonna remake my Fiends from the previous army as that was such a raging success, and probably the best ever conversions I've made. So the above model, with Spawn claws

Seeker Chariots


I'm just gonna use the GW chariots with Witch Elves on the back. I might use Elven Steeds as per my Seekers though as I dislike the new Steeds GW make, but this could change down the track depending how I feel.

Lawmower of Slaanesh/Exalted Chariot

Same as above.

Soulgrinders of Slaanesh (also apparently now a thing)


These two bad boys are also from my past army, and are the Bouncers of Slaanesh. You don't touch the girls without paying first...


So that's the Slaanesh part of my army, and I'm not sure if I'll be Slaanesh-ifying anything from other gods this time, but I do have some great ideas for Khornate Girls, using... (looks around carefully) some Warmachine models for Bloodletters but we'll save that for later.

Anyway thats enough ramble for me

Laters all.

Sunday 24 February 2013

Of Star Dragons and Elves



So following the NZTC I've had some time to think about the list I took, and where I could improve it. Overall I enjoyed the army alot more than I ever enjoyed the Level 4 lists I ran. The Dragon gave me something to reach out and hit the enemy, and with that some modicum of game control which I never felt I had with the Level 4 list, which I always found was constantly on the back foot clawing for points where it could. While I know that the Dragon makes the game very much win big/lose big depending on the draw, I think with some decent terrain (which was the only failing of the NZTC imo), and actually getting my opponents to play the Cannon rules properly, it shouldn't be too bad. The big boy is here to stay!


Lord on Star Dragon - Dragon Armour, Warrior Bane, Charmed Shield, OTS, Talisman of Preservation.

Pretty much as good as you can run at 2400pts. The Star Dragon is such an improvement over the Moon Dragon, that I couldn't ever drop it down to get better equipment on the Lord. Lord seemed to survive alright over the weekend anyway despite the Dragon getting shot/pitted out from under him. Wish I could trade the Warrior bane for a decent weapon...WTB 2500pts for Elves?

BSB on Eagle - Dragon Armour, Great Weapon, Helm of Fortune, Guardian Phoenix

Again as good as you can get. Had no problems keeping him alive, unless I made silly mistakes, and with the Dragon around, he never got any Warmachine agro.

Mage - Level 2, Metal, Ring of Fury, Silver Wand

Had no issues with no scroll, even after this guy gapped it off the table on T1/2 a couple times vs Lvl 4s. Starting to wonder if I even need a Wizard! As for Metal, I know I played daemons 3 times, so its not the best feedback but I think I'll change over to High magic. generally lower casting values, and some very good utility spells. Also it wont be redundant in certain matchups. The Ring was amazing (when it didn't blow up...) and I'm never leaving home without it!

Archer core - 20 Archers w/Flaming, 3 X10 Archers

Perfect 600, always got me points back with the shooting, and provide 3 more chaff units to throw under the bus. Other than fiddling with unit sizes, I can't see a reason to take anything else in a HE army. You will definitely never see me with Spears on the table ever...

26 White Lions w/ Banner of Swiftness, Amulet of Light

Always good, cleaned up several units of Letters, but really not strong enough to take anything by themselves without being taken out of the game entirely afterwards. Note to self, avoid Kdaii and Sphinx in future! Never used the Amulet but I know in a general game it'll be useful. Banner of Swiftness caught out a couple of opponents and helped them somewhat keep up with the Dragon, but I can see the use of the Standard of Balance and might try that at some point soon.

6 Dragon Princes

I never really got that much out of them.. Partly my fault, partly my opponents armies fault, but I'm not sure they were really worth it. tended to leave them sweeping a flank, which they did well but not for that many points. Gonna replace them with 2 units of Chaffmasters for a bit and see how that goes

3 Eagles

They're Eagles, Theyre good. Nuff said. I'll keep running 3 for now, but 1 is pretty much the first thing to drop if I wanna squeeze some points for something else.



And so the new list I'll run whenever I can play some 2400 games (sadly VIC seems to be going through a phase of 2000pt tournies, which I don't like as it forces me back down the Lvl 4 route but what can ya do) will be:

Lord on StarDragon - as above

BSB - as above
Level 2 - same equipment but High Magic

15 Archers w/flaming banner
15 Archers w/ Banner (for Blood and Glory, and just because I fucked up and left some archers at home, so Maiden guard ftw...)
10 Archers w Muso
10 Archers w Muso

23 White Lions w/ Banner of Swiftness, Potion of Foolhardiness (extra attack can't hurt?)
7 Swordmasters w Champ w/ Talisman of Loec
7 Swordmasters

3 Eagles - considering dropping an Eagle for couple more Lions and the Amulet of Light back but will see if I need it.


Anyway, for once its not a drastic of army or playstyle which is new for me after tournaments, and probably my biggest failing in terms of results, so we'll run this for a bit and see how it rolls!



Peace out

James

Saturday 23 February 2013

NZTC (and a billion Bloodletters)


So last weekend, New Zealand held the the Inaugural New Zealand Team Championships. Big thanks to Pete Dunn for standing up to organise the whole thing and Locky and Ryan for TOing.


Blatantly stolen from my teammates. Glen appears to be constipated, this had no effect on his gaming fortunately.


I teamed with an exceptional (and rather attractive) group of gentlemen to form Team OMEN (RAWR!!!):

- Sam Whitt using a filthy Cold One Knight bus
- Glen Burfield running a pretty left field MSU VC list with double Terrorgheist, and three flying - Vamps
- Joel van de Ven Long with a pretty solid Empire gunline cockblock list
- Myself running a Star Dragon High Elf army

So overall, we took one solid allrounder in the Empire and three Smash and Grab lists that could get big points in the right circumstances but we all knew could also fail hard if we screwed up the matche ups. Risk big, Win big?

Anyway rather than run through the teams results (mainly cause I barely remember my own scores, let alone everyone else's, and you'll be able to find their tales on their own blogs) I'll just go through my own list and games.

I've been running a Lvl4 based High Elf build for the last 6-7 months, but I've never felt like I had a way to push for the win, always fighting on the back foot to claim points. I also havent been enjoying the playstyle as I much prefer to have mobility and speed, so I choose to go for the Star Dragon to give me some power and reach. However due to Xmas, and moving to Melbourne, unfortunately I didn't get a chance to play a single game with the list going in, which wasn't great but how hard can pushing a Dragon be? Anyway my list was:

Lord on Star Dragon – Warrior Bane, Charmed Shield, Talisman of Protection, Tricksters Shard

BSB on Eagle – Helm of Fortune, Guardian Pheonix
Lvl 2 Mage (Metal) – Extra Spell, Ring of Fury

20 Archers – Flaming Banner
10 Archers
10 Archers
10 Archers

26 White Lions – +1M Banner, magic attacks
6 Dragon Princes

3 Eagles

So pretty much aiming to shoot and hold stuff with the archers while throwing the Dragon/BSB/White Lions at one target before moving on. Simple

Sorry there are no photos as I got drunk and forgot...

Round One: Team Nerdymen - Paul Dalton's Daemons


So first up we drew the only other team to bother with a team shirt, and they did look pretty good, even if they were all filthy JAFAs...

I was drawn against Paul's Daemon list with only 60 Letters, but a Mindrazor/Siren Song Daemonette horde as well... Overall pretty happy with this match up, as I've figured out how to handle it in the past.
Ignore one horde, block the second, smash the third, just made slightly harder by the Siren Song.

So this game pretty much came down to me not getting screwed by the Siren Song... Paul got Mindrazor through T1, but my Dragon failed the 20” Siren charge by skillfully rolling a 9!.

As it was the Dragon distracted the Nettes, until he fell down a Pit, but the Lord survived and ran away saving me all those points, the Archers whittled down one unit of Letters, until Paul overcommited against an Eagle blocker, letting the White Lions take them off, and Paul was far too cautious imo with the second unit meaning they wer out of position to countercharge. BSB killed the Fiends stopping them clearing my backline and special mention should be made to the 10 archers that heroically took 4 Fleshhounds down in combat over 6 rounds and saved me a massive pain in the backfield. They earned a beer!

Last turn I got the Lions into the second unit of Letters but unfortunately I had to save my Lord from Magic Missiles rather than stop the buffs on the Letters and it meant a couple survived at the end, however I had only lost 2 units of archers and the Eagles, so job well done for a 13-7 win!

The rest of the team fought hard, but we ended up with a 35-45 loss in round one.


Round Two: Kapiti Crushers – Sam Campbell, Daemons


Sam was running a 90 Letter spam list. Tough but doable. However my eyes lit up when I got a building a third of the way in from my left flank. Buildings are ace for running around and blocking things off, particularly huge wide hordes of Letters.

So I managed tocunningly bait Sam into putting two units on the short side of the building with my White Lions, essentially taking at least one out of the game entirely and the other for a good three-four turns. The Lions then ran as fast as posible around the building toward the centre of the table, and the rest of my army.

Sam then made a big mistake and moved one unit os Screamers up too far in front of the middle letter block. Tactical combat archers ran in and held them for two rounds, letting me clean up the chaff and while the letters were stuck, before smashing the Letters with the Princes and Dragon. BSB flew headlong into the Herald/Horror bunker at the back and killed Sam's magic. This left me with two units of Letters that finally arrived on T5, however I screwed up with a blocking Eagle and let one unit get into my back field with poor angling killing about 30 archers. On the last turn, after discussion with my team mates and the realisation we were proably on the round cap anyway, I went for it (never would've gone in if round was closer) with the Dragon/BSB into the front of the Khorne BSB's Letter block. I killed the BSB but lost both the Lord and my BSB to Killing blow, Luckily the Dragon fled and got away, saving me from some severe embarrassment as I ended up with a 12-8 win but that wouldve flipped if he got the Dragon...

Round three – the Von Dunn Family, Tom Dunn's (you guessed it!) Daemons!


So another 90 Letter spam fest, but this time run by the Master himself. This'll be tricky... and it was made harder by the complete and utter lack of any decent abuseable terrain on the table. Still I was feeling pretty confident after two wins vs similar armies, and also (probably more so) by the substantial amount of beer I'd consumed at this point.

Anyway Tom pushed it all forward at me as a good player should, chaff on both flanks, and the Letters up the middle. I went for my usual kill, distract, ignore tactic, which worked-ish. Unfortunately, the key moment I think, was me forgetting that BS faq ruling about overruns vs Daemon Crumbles, which cost me the BSB, who flew off to hit a Plaguebeast and planned overrun into a Fiend behind and instead got 2 Crushers to the face. FAIL!!!

This meant when I killed the first unit of Letters with a Dragon/Lions combo charge, the Dragon had to take one for the team against the second unit of Letters following up, failed to do anything useful to the Champion and broke on a 5-6 Ld test, with no rerolls... then the Lions got ground out by the same unit. I managed to claw back some points by killing Tom's chaff but it was a 16- loss in the end. In hindsight I think I wasted my Eagles too early, which meant I couldnt keep out the second unit off Letters

The rest of the team got run over a bit too, and we only closely avoided the lower cap of 20pts. Ah well, Submarine time?


Round Four - Shaken not Stirred – Tim Joss, Chaos Dwarfs


So round 4 in one day was up and players looked shattered all over the place. I think the beer was getting me through though! I got shoved up against the Chaos Dwarfs, an army I know very little about, except Deathshriekers hurt like buggery, and Kdaii smash the shit out of stuff, if you can't get a flaming ward save into it. I got too carried away with the second part of that equation...

Tim castled as I expected, but I could use a building to hide the Dragon from one Shrieker so I thought I might be okay. I pushed up hard at Tim, who I think was a little bit brain fried as he didn't really react very well I don't think. Dragon took a couple wounds but things looked good for me.

Then I had a brain fart... Turn 2 I charged the Lions into the Centaurs, with a overrun lined up for the Kdaii. Aimed the Dragon at the Kdaii but failed to get the 9 I needed. I also for reasons I cannot fathom, chucked the BSB into the Ironguard to hold them up (Dear James, thats what unridden eagles are for!) Anyway, the Lions killed the Centaurs to hit the Kdaii all by themselves, the BSB held for a turn, before dieing, and the Dragon got pasted by two Deathshriekers as his charge pushed him just far enough out for LoS... After that the kdaii cleaned up the Lions and I got magiced/shot to death by Jossys army for a 19-1 loss.

Heres what should have happened: The Dragon and BSB hit the Iron Guard, the Lions kill the Centaurs and overrun into the IG too (the size of the Lions meant I could overrun into either them or Kdaii by unit placement) and take them all, or most of them at least, off in T2, then the Lions hold the Kdaii until I could Dragon smash it. Note to self, never focus on doing something so much you go for long odds to do it instead of the safe play.


After a night of annoyed self incrimination, I awoke feeling utterly tired from a long day (without any ill effects of alcohol, thank you to all those that asked!) and ready for redemption.

Game 5 – Capital Crusaders – Tony Peever, Tks


So we draw some filthy Aussies (they were all great guys despite this...), and I get the Tks as Dragon Armour > Catapults. I was alright with the matchup as only the Casket really worried me...

I moved up aggresively at the flank with Hierophant, everything going well as I passed 6 Casket tests and Final Transmutationed the Death Priest like a boss. But then I left the BSB in 19” of the Necrosphinx when he really didn't need to be there and Tony took the long shot, got the BSB and overran into the White Lions and proceeded to grind them all off. The Dragon went on a happy little rampage killing Warphinx, Chariots, Casket, Catapults but without any help couldn't get the Heirophant in a big block of Skellies. Meanwhile the rest of my army decided that without a BSB they didn't really care much for the game and ran off the board, leaving me with a 11-9 loss that never shouldve happened...

My teammates made up some good points however and we headed into the last round in 5th place with a podium shot to play for.

Game 6 – NZHammered – James Brown, Ogres


Yay, Ogres!!! probably my worst matchup behind Skaven. Fortunately James is top bloke who I've chatted with a lot over the last 6 months so it would be good fun regardless. Also there was only one Ironblaster so the Dragon might live for a turn or two!

So with the pressure of the last round and me being shoved under the bus anyway, I decided to go for it. I faced off all my combat troops vs the MF, with the aim to get them, the small ogre block and then maybe one of his big blocks if all went well.

To my delight and James' horror, the Dragon dodged a Cannonball before it blew up, and 2 Lightning bolts for no wounds :-D. My Level 2 did however decide a comet was worth running from the table on T1... The MF fled from the Dragon through the rest of the army to be out of the way for the game, but the Lions had to pull a conga to hold the Maneaters for the Dragon. Meanwhile I blocked off the Gutstar as much as possible, and it never made a decent combat which I'm always proud to achieve. The Archers spent 6 turns shooting the small Ogre block and just got there on T6.

The Dragon hit the Maneaters and started the grind while the Lion Champ took the challenge, but in the second round the Lord did the 1 remaining wound before the Dragons attacks, and it fled but luckily got away and rallied to be charged again. The grind then continued til the end of the game, with the Stardragon on 2 wounds remaining after some horrible wound rolls by James. I got the Butcher, but the last Maneater had two wounds, and cost me 450 odd pts :-P the BSB and a couple units of archers survived too. In the end I was happy to scrape a 3-17 loss from a shocking match up.


The rest of Team OMEN unfortunately struggled too, and we went down hard dropping us back to 7th overall, which is a bit disappointing from where we could have been.


Overall I had 2 wins, one small loss, and 3 big losses, but with a bit of practice I'd be confident to turn 2 of those losses into wins. Star Dragon has big potential and I will defintiely keep running him when I use the Elves as I just felt better and happier using it than the Level 4 list...

For the team, we had two to many high risk lists and that cost us as we had to be very careful in getting the right matchups and some decent luck in games. Next year we'll be back and we'll do it properly with solid filthy lists across the board and claim that trophy for its rightful owners!


As for my list, overall I think it was pretty solid and only a few things need to change, one being my attention to detail in game...


Tuesday 19 February 2013

Hello Everybody!

Hey guys,

So I've finally decided to join this here crazy world of blogging, because everyone else is doing it and I'm a big old sheep ;-). But seriously in my travels across this small little world of ours I've met wargamers of many nations and creeds (playing Warhammer in 6 different countries will do that) and I feel like its the best and easiest way to get my ideas out to everyone, and it gives me a place to dump my, possibly inane, musings on my travels and the world of wargaming and to put up pretty photos of miniatures, and also maybe discuss the general failings of the sport teams that I love....

Anyway as a taster of what's to come, heres the start of my Retribution of Scyrah force for Warmahordes, which may have stagnated somewhat recently...

Ravyn loves to frolic in the snow!
Eyriss gets quite cold up there on her pedestal...



There shall be Elves and Space Marines and Battle reports to come...


Laters all,

James