Flames of Construction

After a very long break, since my false start with Flames of War I have finally gotten back to it. The main trigger for this was Sam asking for a tutorial game, something I couldnt facilitate as I had never played; but we bashed through a few basics together to try and get a feel for it. Long story short I found myself fully enthused for the game, but realised; I have a force but no appropriate terrain. Thus I began to make

It has real windows

a nice lawn and hedgerow

and it even lights up!

Boom one down, just 6 months of building and Ill have a village. Ok so that wont happen, but Im think farm house to begin with (it has a non descript look for versatility); so a few sheds and that will be structures for now. Im also knocking together wood land, hedgerows, roads and some boggy ground. So soon my welsh guards will have some rural Europe to fight over in my own home.

Blood for the Blood God!

 My friend Luke and I decided a goodbye game to the soon to be old chaos space marines codex game was in order, so to make it a suitable fair well we each took 4,000pts; Luke with his Grey Knight and me with my Word Bearers and of course daemonic allies (how fluffy).

The first turns were looking rough for me, something that seems to have become a trend against Luke lately. Luke had the first turn and his two dreadknights promptly shunted to my  right flank and caused some serious damage with their heavy incinerators, imobilising my Hell brute and vindicator, exploding a rhino and killing several marines.

My response was somewhat plasma based and one dreadknight was shredded, on my left flank two defilers achieved approximately nothing and getting desperate I fired my Havocs at the surviving Dreadknight as I was sure it had a great deal more menace to come, gratifyingly I wounded it twice.

As the game moved on Luke destroyed the two defilers and my vindicator, but not before his wave of rhinos and razorbacks were immobilized in a great line. He reduced my centre forces to ash and murdered my Khorne bezerkers with dishonorable shooting, somethig that was shortly to anger the blood god greatly.

On my first turn I had rolled for my daemonic assault and its seems that against my wishes the servants of Khorne were getting in fast, I didnt know it as the time but I was to be very greatful for that. Over on the far right of the field events that would twist the course of battle were shaping up. I had fired and destroyed Lukes razorback, then killed 5 of his six occupants (six what and un-khorne ish number ((not cornish, I imagine they have nothing against 6); the remainder was just within a 12" charge and I wanted my Bloodletters accross the field to an objective. So I decided what the hell, lets try. 2D6 rolled and bam 12", he fires overwatch, its an incinerator he gets 3 shots and does 3 wounds; bam 3 invulnerable saves. His last hope to maul the blood letters, he casts cleansing flame; but sorcery is not something the blood god approves of a double six was rolled and the pitiful purifier was devoured by Khorne himself.

Ultimately my true champion has to be my Coryphaus, Chaos lord and warlord of the host. He had rolled the legendary fighter trait, he had marched on through death as his army died in drove around him. Grey Knight heroes turned from him fearing the challenge that was sure to come (know no fear pah these were purifiers, allegedly fearless). In the end one of the two units the Coryphaus had waded through was reduced to just the Purifier champion and he could no longer refuse my challenge. He dead (at first he died, but now he dead). Another pivotal event.

The ending, 1 objective a piece; Luke had taken one in my deployment zone but it was cleansed by a Bloodthirster! That he then killed. I had taken one in his deployment zone with my Bloodletters, but he had it contested by some plucky terminators. He had first blood, I had breakthrough; it all came down to the Coryphaus and his trait 2-1 to the Word Bearers.

Return of Word!

 Like many Im feeling the Chaos hype, but for me the servants of the true gods and no new fancy. After reading Fear to Tread and Know no Fear on a recent holiday, I returned enthused will desire to reshape my Word Bearers host and their daemonic allies; then with the Dark Vengence box release my path was set.


This is the first of the Dark Vengence models off the painting table, a new junior war leader yet to be named. In fact I really need to develop the fluff and organisation of my host, at least past the point of a loose copy of the structure mentioned in Dark Apostle.

Of course no true Word Bearers army would be complete without daemons and with the new all rules for force organisation the possibilities and far greater. Thus the recent addition of bloodletters and the repaint (it was some tacky job over 8 years old) of my balrogthirster (I dont really like the blood thirster model, very out of step with todays sleek deadly daemons).


So coming soon, more Dark Vengence models and a summary of my war host.

les grenouilles

L’armee de la mer

 L’armee de terre

Played a game with Mark yesterday using a reasonable amount of french armour and despite popular opinions on the forums Im impressed. The Bombards dealt many a punishing salvo while running away (very french), the medium tanks did well, though I can envision keeping them at RB2 could be tricky in the future. The landship was cool too, the heat lance better than I thought and more mortars can only be a good thing. Havent used much of the naval units I have yet and soon I plan to aquire the sky fortress, so more from the grenouilles soon.

Tinkering

It seems since finishing uni Ive been struggling to get stuck in to a gaming project. I have a Dystopian wars weekend event to write which is coming on but Im really waiting for the buzz to arrive on that one, the kind of energy that makes you work feverishly till a project is done. So Ive been biding my time, painting a bit of this and that; so I decided to get the old inherited Imperial Guard out and give them a lick of paint. Its a super simple scheme, got to be for that many infantry and vehicles right? Anyway, 2 Infantry squads, 1 junior officer squad with commissar and a command squad with a few advisers done so far; more underway. 

Bellys gonna get ya

Hes a big fat mess but I like him. Im looking forward to giving Rasheth a try, it will be a very different style to my normal favourite Hexeris. Titan sentry done too, with the Bronzeback on the way and Lord Arbiter Hexeris started too. What will be next after that? Who knows, got a few new toys in the form of Tyrant Vorkesh and a Cyclops Shaman; so maybe cataphracts next or perhaps nip the cyclops off first.

Also very sorry to hear of Lukes Burglary, Ill keep my eyes peeled for any sign of you Orboros models.

Busy times and lots of distractions

So as the title suggests Ive had less hobby time than I like, bloody degree! Though I enjoy that too so I guess its my fault. Anyway gaming, so the campaign mentioned earlier is still going ok; had a few losses but the Empire are holding together. We have had some down turn on fantasy enthusiasm recently though, so turns have been slower. Which has led me to dust off the Skorne and get excited about that again. So finally I have finished my Venator reiver unit, 6 of these were done an age ago but the officer attachment  and 4 remaining grunts have been waiting since christmas.

Im now on with my second basilisk Krea and my first Drake and the big fat fatty Dominar Raksheth, so it seems Hordes enthusiasm is live and kicking.

A Spear of Light in to the Darkness

As everyone (Mark and Chris) seems to be posting about the campaign that we are playing I decided I ought to share the Empire perspective, that and Im avoiding some work.

We are playing using most of the Blood in the Badlands rules, with a few changes to suit our story and location in the Darklands. We have played the first campaign turn so far and made the moves for the second turn, now waiting for the battles to take place. So far its been a great start of my Averland Empire armies, thanks to a lucky roll on the random events chart I have a third army, were my opponants only have two; this has allowed me to land grab and thus become the biggest empire.

In turn 1 I played Marks vampire led undead army and despite his relentless cheating I managed a win, largely thanks to mentalist Flaggellants and my Hero of Legend Hierophant Khaefesh Usterveld (aka an Arch Lector). My Flaggellants secured my left flank by giving a large unit of Ghouls and characters a jolly good seeing too, supported by the efforts of Usterveld as he smashed a mortis engine to iddy biddy bits. They then turned to support the right flank just as my greatswords were faltering, though credit is well deserved by the Empire elite as they held up a grave guard unit led by Abdabdegwengo (sorry Mark couldnt remember your vamp lords name, so I thought I name him after George from Phonejacker) a vampire lord for a very long time. I also had my steam tank in play and yes they are very slow and over priced these days, but very very pretty; it helped too by taking out Marks zombies. 300pt tank to take on 90pts of Zombies? Sure why not.

So next for me is a big fight with Sam's Skaven in the north. Im a bit worried as his mine has given him a scary amount of extra points, however my mines have given me some fancy magic items; including the Helm of the Ratslayer. Lets see that helm live up to its name!

Time for a steam time and why not? Basically I just wanted one so I picked one up at doubles and lo and behold I find the Empire loving is becoming an obsession. So she is painted, has a removable top to view the low effort but nice enough interior and the commander can be removed to the tank can be closed.

In other empire news, being involved in two campaigns and the opportunity for an anniversary gift has lead to some new purchases. Which Ill keep hush hush for now as my campaign enemies make up most of this blogs audience.

Oh and for those who were not there and who read the previous post that made a small mention of 40k doubles, I had a great weekend, some wins and some losses; but all in all a solid weekend. Mark will talk about it more I think on his blog the Rune of Stone, but highlights include a feet dance and volley ball amongst much much more.

The sons of Corax

It took an age but I finally got the last of my Raven Guard model and now they are painted. The army paint job is nothing flash, busy in my 3rd year of uni I havent time for flash; but they are more than serviceable.

Ive only had one game with them so far, it was against Mart who was using my Word bearers; so my army was going to win either way ha ha. Anyway it was a great game, I wish Id had a camera as some of the maneuvers were very very Raven Guard 'I will be everywhere' and I bloody well was an all. So first steps a good one and I hope to continue to really love playing with these.

this last pic is my doubles force for the coming weekend, small, hard to kill and packing a punch........ which will hopefully complement me being, loud, drunk and probably a little distracted.

While I wait...

As seems to have been the case forever I am still waiting for models I tried to buy a month ago, though since I cancelled the order with Maelstrom after 3 weeks and some poor customer service Im now finally due my delivery today or possibly tomorrow. So with new stuff about to arrive and little focused project development I made myself busy anyway. Ive had a rather eclectic drive on terrain including, a battering ram possibly for blood in the badlands games, a chunk of land mass with pretty cliffs for dystopian wars (I have plans and materials for a second section) and four arcane fulcrums for storm of magic.

Theres lots to do to the fulcrums yet but as using sponge in terrain takes forever to dry and harden (saturated with pva) it may take a while.

Its been an age!

Its been an age since I last posted on this blog, why? Well many reasons, Ive been busy with uni, my xmas present (xbox :)) and projects have been up and down. Back were I left off with planetary empires; it went well the hive looks great and I have no pictures because as always I took a camera, planned to use a camera and then forgot.

So to were I am now, well Im obsessed with Dystopian wars. Here are a few images of my Prussian Empire forces as they build towards the first Dystopian world war to be held this summer! What a site to see, promise Ill cover that event better (or Mark will).

Ive also been busy with many other projects; for warhammer fantasy Ive been progressing my Empire with suprisingly long term enthusiasm so a blog may come on that soon. Then for 40k Raven Guard have become the new force, based on the blood angels book for rules. Im quite taken with them but have been stuck for the last two models as Maelstrom are the worst company in the world and failed to dispatch them for over two weeks. So after they failed to apologize for their sloppy service Ive had to cancel my order and shop with a more reliable company, anyway before I rant Ill say that once I have the new models up and painted perhaps there will be a blog there too.