A Month at a Glance - January

Well, that went in quick, and completely opposite to form, I have actually been updating this...

So, painting wise I managed to knock out 2 Razor Boars, a maximum unit of Bone Grinders, and at the last minute, Rorsh & Brine, so a rather healthy 16 points.  The good news is I can now play with a fully painted 25pt list.  It might not be optimal, but, at least it looks not bad.

This is muh boomstick.  And dynamite.  And big-ass Pig.

Gaming wise - played about 10 games, all against Brushchewer, more wins than losses.  I've also just bought my ticket to NorthCon2015, so, I have a clear date on the calendar for having to be fully painted and au fait with all the rules.  Oh boy...


Off to Vapnartak in York in a couple of hours with Falkirk District Wargames Club, so, might be able to pick up some reinforcements whilst I'm there.

Plans for February are probably the addition of some Razorback Crews and Maximus.  If I get through that, I'll keep on keeping on with the Slaughterhousers and the Road Hog, before turning my thoughts to a second 'Lock.

Orange is the new Black...

...pit of despair I sink into when painting it...

But still, it is worth the effort, and to kick of the month (or year) I have knocked out two wee Razorboars, thus keeping my force still all Battlegroup.

Flaming Pigs, not just Roman around...

 

We doan need no steenkin' units...

So, next on the painting agenda, and in a bid to break out of the whole Battlegroup only force, I have a unit of Bonegrinders on the go.  Probably not the best beginning unit for Thornfall, although they will also give me some pre-painted points if I start a Blindwater list  ;)  I've tried them out a couple of times, and whilst they haven't been stellar, they are not a bad filler unit, the Arcane Bolt comes in handy, and they can do in a pinch to Quagmire something else.

As well as the Grinders, I've been working away on Rorsh & Brine, partly due to them being pretty much fully basecoated, partly because they are part of Carver's Tier list.  I'm not entirely sold on his Tier, saving 2 pts on Brigands isn't great when you are spending 9 on a Solo (with attendant Heavy) and losing all the units having Advance Deploy is a big blow, although, it is somewhat mitigated in my case by having a lot of beast that instead gain Advance Move.  Time will tell on how best to run it.

(One) Armed and Dangerous...

So, originally I was aiming at having 5pts painted this month between the max. Grinders and a Razorboar.   I'm at 4 already with the 2 Razorboars, and the Grinders will take me to 6 or 7.  Getting Rorsh & Brine would take me up to 15 or 16, which isn't a bad chunk to add to what I already have.  I'm toying with the idea of trying to get least one of each Farrow option painted up before doing more duplicate choices, so, not counting Alten Ashley or Gudrun, or any of the other non-pig solos.  If I can finish off the Grinders and R&B, that would leave - Roadhog, Maximus, Brigands, Slaughterhousers and Razorback Crew.  I'm thinking along the lines of finishing off each area (Warbeasts/Solos/Units) before tackling a new 'Lock although Arkadius and Midas would bring in some new Beasts as part of their Tier lists.

In non-painting news, I've also managed to get a few games in, somewhere around 4-5, and doing not bad.  I've broken the play it painted rule, just to try out new things, but, at the end of the day, I really don't have too many choices to spoil me for choice, and I'll be painting up at least one of everything anyway.

Brushchewer also picked up Maximus and the Sentinel UA for me, so, I am pretty much up to date with Thornfall releases (roll on the MeatThresher) and am just an Aspis away from a full Retribution collection.

Looking forwards, if I clear what is on the paintstation this month, I have a few pieces lined up in the wings, so I reckon it might be time to bust out a new big (flaming) gun with the Roadhog, and possibly some Slaughterhousers too.

On the defeat of Circle, Molik Karn and the power of a couple of inches.

So this has been an eventful few days, where to begin?

I have been busy with both gaming and hobby work this year (which sounds so much more impressive when you put it like that) and kicked off the hobby side with building and painting my Cyclops Brute. It was a simple model to build and the first plastic PP model I've put together and painted. I decided to paint it in a few bits just to catch the places I otherwise would have struggled with. The decision was made then that I was that I was going to rebase as well as repaint all of my Skorne onto resin bases. John had a few of the ones I was looking at using (Tiny worlds Swamp bases) so I didn't have to worry about the first few things not having a base. I figured that I would paint them up like rolling sand dunes with a bit of tuft here and there.

The colour scheme hasn't changed since my early days with Skorne but the technique and paints used has. Instead of working up the red in six layers, which I found wasn't nearly as effective or necessary on the small areas, I have changed to working sensibly with three. My colours are a lot more solid as I'm trying to avoid dry brushing everything (which was the case in the early stuff as I was too lazy to pick out all the detail in the metal). I've also started to add small bits of cold blue grey/white to act as a contrast to the very warm bronze and red of the colour scheme.

I think the base looks good with the tuft and the various elements picked out. The silver highlights to the bronze don't show through that well in the picture but you can see them on the "horns" of the helmet.

  I do have to find a better way of taking photos for this blog.

Onto gaming. I've been playing a lot of games with Makeda2 and I've found that I have enjoyed her style of play immensely. Although I have been playing her for a while now, only recently have I got to try out the famous 'Molik Missile' I've heard so much about. Wow, that is a powerful play. Leaving out the assassination power of the combo, Molik is capable of taking out large amounts of infantry and then sod off back to the line of the army. Yo-yo'ing him like this doesn't take a huge amount of effort and with his high speed for a heavy, Makedas speed buff, rush and side step he can go an impressive distance.

John and I decided that we needed to experience playing against other armies to truly understand the game and master it. With that in mind when somebody asked for people to come to the FLGS and have a few games we jumped at the chance. The gentleman who came down had a large Circle force with him and played Morvahna1 with an infantry heavy force consisting of a unit of Reeves, a unit of Wolves with UA and a Pureblood Warpwolf. I have played against circle before but the list I went up against last time had more beasts and multi-wound infantry. I played Makeda2 with Molik, an ancestral swordsmen bubble ( an Ancestral guardian, a unit of Swordsmen and a Extoller Soulward.) the Cyclops brute I had finished painting and a unit of Beasthandlers.

His Reeves shot a lot of my Swordsmen, however this just powered up my Ancestral Guardian and Extoller Soulward with souls. Unsurprisingly, the game was won however with Molik. I waited till there was a few infantry spaced out in front of Morvahna and had Molik charge the one in the front, after hitting and turning it into a cloud of blood he then took his sidestep move and hit the next, he then took his last sidestep move and ended up in front of the worried Circle warlock and only needed to buy a few attacks before it was game over.

Now, a lot of this would not have been possible without reach, giving Molik that extra couple inches off his base that he can hit at is supremely useful.

Reach is wonderful I thought.

Thank goodness for reach I thought.

Well, reach would come back to bite me in the ass.

When we got home I felt like I was confident with Makeda and wanted to move on to another caster so as not to get crutched on her. I decided to try out a 25 point version of my Hexeris2 list. This was a primarily shooty list working with hexy2s Black spot to drop lots of ranged hurt on units. However, coming from one caster to another and expecting immediate success is always going to end up hurting you. My first few games with him ended in crushing defeats because I was being stupid with my positioning and not focusing.

This is where reach comes in. Twice in the games I've played with hexy2 I have ended up losing an assassination attempt that I thought was a sure fire thing because of Reach. Carver has reach and due to the idea of engagement I kept on giving Carver a +4 defence bonus. Carver with a +4 defence bonus is very VERY hard to hit leading to failed assassination attempts and annoyance.

So, in the next games I'm gonna focus on getting good placement and making sure that I have a reason to have everybody in the place they are for a reason. I will try and get at least one win in with Hexy2 and try to get as comfortable as I can with him.



Thanks for reading my rambles and hopefully they get a bit better (and more flowing) as I get used to writing all this down.

As happy as a pig in....

Wash obviously...  ;)

Halves.  Things I don't do things by...

I managed to basecoat most, if not all of the Bonegrinders and Slaughterhousers so I figured it was about the right time to hit them with a wash and get them glued into the bases, which were already started and almost done.  Then I figured I might as well just wash the Warhog, Roadhog and Rorsh & Brine sitting there too, on the very, very off-chance that I actually finished the Grinders and Razorboar I pledged for January.  Pledge 5pts, paint 39.  Sounds great on paper, maybe a bit less realistic in theory.

In other news, I also picked up my first loss of the year, errrr.... got my first game in.  Carver ultimately falling to an Engine of Destructioned Makeda2, on two boxes...  after leaving himself open dispatching a Cyclops Savage and Quagmiring a Gladiator in the process to make it easy pickings for the Warhog.   It was a small 14pt game, just fully painted forces see, and I am thinking I really need to get at least one Razorboar painted up, just for that Mobility enabled 16" run to block charge lanes and attack avenues. 

Before the game, we did come up with a couple of Warmahordes specific house rules, which will be vigorously enforced.

1.  The player with the most fully painted (painted/based/varnished) army gains a +1 bonus to the roll for table edge/starting.  This is cumulative with any Tier bonus.  Obviously this doesn't come into effect if both players have fully painted armies.  Basically a small bonus to encourage fully painted gaming.

2.  All spells/feats/animi in play must be marked and on the table.  If there is any dispute as to whether a spell was cast/feat popped if there is no marker on the table, then it follows tat the spell/feat is not in effect.  This could have more serious connotations, but is designed for clarity during play.

In Elf related news, I am currently trying to nail down a 50pt list to get started with, and work out a colour scheme.  I've run the whole gamut from yellow to grey to green, but ultimately think I'm going to end up doing a variation of blue...  Likewise with the bases, I was planning bon going for a bleached look for them, but, after doing a quick tester, I think I might end up with grey slate, as it ties in more with my Farrow.

I'll give it a bit more thought and post up the prospective retribution list once I have it set, and keep pluggging away at colour theory.