And we have liftoff!

As everyone is well are, 8th Edition has launched! I stopped by the FLGS for the launch day event and enjoyed a couple small games and some cake.
My thoughts are scattered a bit, so I'm going to try to ramble about the day and the new edition in little sections.

Power Levels

I think everyone and their brother got hold of the leaked images of the various indexes and rulebook and started drafting lists early. I thought about doing that, but the process of totaling up points in 8th is just awful. I get why they jammed everything in the back, and I believe people will come to memorize the values quickly, but the flipping back and forth is atrocious.

I have to say, I'm in LOVE with Power Levels. A few days before the launch, I peeked at the PL values of every unit I have in my Raven Guard collection and jotted them down on paper. I brought that with me on launch day and it made my two games super easy to organize. Agree on the power level, pick some units that fit in the various detachment structures, and get to playing. Even list building for a tourney will take a few minutes instead of a day's worth of calculations and hemming and hawing to squeeze every last drop of efficiency out of your points.

The FLGS has the first monthly of the new edition scheduled as a Power Level 80 event. At first, I was taken aback by that, as the whole point of competitive points levels is to balance the game, right? My negative side figured people would max out every squad with top end gear, and that points levels would be very lopsided once the armies hit the table. But the other players at the launch and I spent some time talking about Power Levels and perceived potential for abuse. Someone mentioned that the designers had pointed out that Power Levels account for both the maximum unit power and the minimum unit power and assign a Level somewhere in the middle. It's to everyone's benefit to arm up your squads as best you can with the bits and models you have. Since everyone will be striving to get the most out of their Power Levels, it ends up a wash.

The Games

I got two games in over the course of the day. One was a quick 35 PL game, the other a 50PL.

The 35PL was on a 4x4 board (we had so many people playing we ran out of large boards, which hasn't happened in a long, long time). I pulled out a Chaplain, Vanguard with Jump Packs, 10-man Assault Squad with Jump Packs, Scouts with melee weapons, and a Rhino. I faced off against Necrons with some Warrior units, Immortals, a Lord, and the Nightbringer.

I wasn't intending to win, just test drive the new rules. I shoved everything forward and got my ass shot off early. Necrons are rough for power armor now, with the -1AP guns. Reanimation is also a beast since it happens every turn for every dead model. Necrons also hit hard in melee. The Immortals were smacking me around on 3s to hit, which was shocking. Very disconcerting, and I think Necrons will be very good in the new edition. My Rhino was the last model to go down after I tried out charging with it into some Warriors who had a really hard time touching it until the Lord and C'Tan got into the mix. Vehicles are hard as nails now. I can understand why they're so expensive to field.

The second game was against a Khorne Berserker army. A couple huge Zerk squads, Kharn, and a Land Raider. We played The Relic, which was just painful against Khorne. Again, I wanted to see what my stuff could do, so I threw all 15 Assault Marines into the middle and charged a big squad of Zerks. It didn't go well. My 10-man squad barely scratched the unit, and then my opponent used Command Points to interrupt the order before my 5-man unit could swing. It hurt, and then the buggers got to fight AGAIN. Holy shit, Khorne Berserkers are kings of melee now. I did manage to eventually kill the Land Raider by charging it with the Vanguard and some Scouts and beating it to death with a power fist and a relic blade. The relic blade did about three times the damage of the power fist. We laughed and laughed about it, and laughed more when the Land Raider exploded after losing its last wound and annihilating the Vanguard and the Scouts with mortal wounds.

One standout point from the game was my Land Speeder. It now moves 16" a turn and can fire everything, but every weapon available to a Land Speeder is Heavy, and moving means it fires at -1 to hit with all its weapons. That was a very disappointing revelation. Speeders are far more durable now, since bolter shots just bounce off it for the most part, but they no longer shoot very well. I'm not as excited about the three I'm currently building as I once was. My guess is that double heavy flamers are going to be the armament of choice for Land Speeders, as you can move your 16" and auto hit with two heavy flamers. Then weather the return fire until you're dead, since the Speeder has no damage tracks.

The Rules

There are a whopping eight pages of core rules in the new rulebook, and then a handful of other important things like detachment layouts and missions. The shop gave out some Battle Primer sheets, rulers, and other promotional stuff and I almost returned my BRB. If it weren't for the detachment and mission stuff, I may have actually done so. The entire game rules are contained on just the primer sheet, and that's awesome.

Despite that, there were a couple rules misreadings on my part (as well as others'). Someone was adamant that they were able to fire overwatch at every unit that declared a charge against their unit because "you have to declare all the charges at once." You don't, you run through each step in the charge phase for each unit, not each step for all units.

I failed to read the parentheses in the Cover rules and thought you would get a cover bonus to Invulnerable saves, which you do not.

The way statlines work is nice, since you always know exactly what you'll be hitting on in both melee and shooting. No more comparative values or initiative really shakes up close combat. As I said, having Necrons punch my Marines at the same values I was punching them was bonkers. Marine versus Marine melee used to be a slap fight, now there are a ton of hits and plenty of wounds. One of the things that made fighting Khorne Berserkers so tough was the -1 AP from their chain axes. Saving on a 4+ is a foreign concept to me.

It was a little odd getting used to vehicle shooting as well, since firing arcs are now gone. Your vehicles essentially have 360 degree vision and lines of fire now. The Land Raider in our game was able to put four lascannon shots on damn near anything it could draw a line to. Perhaps some clarification is forthcoming from GW regarding that?

I'm very happy so far with 8th Edition. There are some things that are going to need some getting used to, but with the game much simpler the adjustments should be faster to make. I just have to decide if I want to abandon my trio of Land Speeders in favor of some Terminators now, as I have to see how multiwound models will work. No one had to roll for random damage in my games, except against vehicles.

I Have Time!

Yes, dear readers, I once again have free time for 40K! It's a minor miracle!

The growing season is winding down, and the farm's first year is almost behind me. It was an interesting year, but you don't really care much about that. The great news is that I now have a little bit of free time to myself to work on 40K. Granted, it's not an immense amount of time. Just a half hour or so each weekday while my son is at school, but that's a lot when compared to the last year or so. I'm specifically setting that half hour block aside each morning after the farm animals are fed, but before I work on other farm projects. Expect to see more frequent "small bite" blog posts from me. I'm hoping to take at least one picture every other day, excluding weekends. This may all fall to pieces, but it's good to have dreams.

So with all that being said, what are my immediate plans? Well, I've had a six-man Raven Guard Assault Squad in the works for what feels like ages (and probably is). Two flamers and a sergeant with a lightning claw in the squad, backed up by a trio of pistol/chainsword Marines. I know six is an unusual number for a squad, but I was working on burning up the remainder of my old Assault Marine bits. I had six torsos and legs, so I built six Marines.
Here's a shot of them as they sit right now:

 

 

 

Black-armored Marines don't photograph well. I think I may need to print up a colored gradient sheet to put behind them from now on.

I've named the unit "Assault Squad Cyrax." Sergeant Aron Cyrax is a veteran of numerous campaigns against the Greenskin filth. Yes, the name is from Mortal Kombat 3. Everyone loves robot ninja assassins! Maybe I'll have a Sektor and Smoke unit?

Once these guys are done, I'll be turning my sights to the annual Standish Standoff in November, the FLGS's annual autumn event. It's 1750 points this year, max of two Factions per army. I'll be taking my Raven Guard, and have been drafting up various lists. I've got a couple ideas kicking around revolving around a Talon Strike Force built on the back of a Battle Demi Company. The struggle I'm having is that the Battle Demi and Pinion Demi (Raven Guard version of the generic Demi Company) require a bunch of Tactical Marines. I'd need to paint fifteen, plus another HQ. I'd be paring almost every unit down to bare bones in order to fit in the rest of my RG models, because my Leviathan Siege Dreadnought is NOT sitting on the sidelines. I want to play with units I like. The formation benefits are great, but there are just so many rules!

I'm seriously thinking about going back to basics and running my Raven Guard as a CAD. ObSec on the Troops and that's it to worry about. Let the army run on the merits of its component units, not on janky and sometimes downright confusing bonuses (played against Tau formations recently?). It might help me out as a player to run my units "pure" before I try to run them "special." Is anyone else sick of the millions of special rules coming about from Formations and overarching Detachments?

Also of note is that I split the Death Masque box with another player at the FLGS...I took the Harlequin half. Yes, that's right, I own fancy schmancy Space Elves. Perhaps the fanciest and schmanciest of the bunch! I wanted something other than black power armor to paint every now and then. I put aside my anti-elf bias that dates back to my D&D days long enough to see how interesting and challenging these models will be. I will likely be assembling them as six-model troupes and then painting them in pairs or trios in between all the Raven Guard models. I've not picked a color palette yet, but I'm hoping to avoid blue and black due to the history of my Marine armies (Ultramarines and Raven Guard). I quite like the look of the Shattered Mirage (teal and white with red/white checking). I also have to think about how to base models like that. I believe many of the models have integral wraithbone base bits in order to make them stand up on a base at all.

I'm hoping to capitalize on my half-hour-a-day blocks and paint up a whole bunch of my existing Space Marine kits. I'd really like to have half my stash painted by the New Year. In fact, I think I'll do a full inventory soon, post the list here on the blog, and do a little self-imposed challenge to get half the stuff done by January. Sprinkling Harlequins in there should help break up the monotony.

Here's to having a plan and at least a little time to implement it!

Cursed Machine Spirits!

Hello, everyone.

I had a very nice, long post to share with you all last week, but it didn't work out. I wrote up all sorts of info on the progress I've made on my Raven Guard Vanguard squad (finished, played a couple games with them), as well as my Sternguard squad (paint in progress), and Leviathan Dread (mostly assembled). I put in place markers for pictures, and then went to take said pictures. That's when I discovered the machine spirits of the camera were acting up.

I burned some incense and used motor oil in supplication, to no avail. It seems the replacement batteries I'd bought less than five months ago are Ork tech, and only work on a roll of a 6. In short, the pair of batteries refuse to hold a charge whatsoever. Now I have to same some pennies and buy new ones. Until then, I have no way of taking legible photos of my models. I could try taking some with my phone, but I have a feeling it won't be pretty.

In the meantime, I'm continuing to work on my Raven Guard in preparation for the April monthly at the FLGS. 1500 points, in what is described as a "random partners" format, but you don't play on the same table as your partner. Instead, you and your partner get to decide who plays who from the opposing team. I'd probably call it a "linked fates" tourney, since you have a partner, but don't actually partner with them in the games. You just hope they/you do well enough in their games to carry the day. Sounds neat to me.

I'm figuring I'll have my full Shadow Force available to play with, and then I'll ally in some of my remaining Ultramarines models. Jump Librarian and some Assault Marines, Scouts, and maybe some Dreadnoughts?

In May we have the annual Fratris Salutem, which is a 1500 point narrative campaign day. By then, I hope to have all my Ultras out of my list, replaced by Raven Guard. Ideally, I'd like to run my Shadow Force, plus a Raven Guard CAD with a Techmarine and Servitors, two Scout Squads, and my Leviathan Dread. Back all that up with a Grey Knights Librarian leading a GK Terminator Squad. Of course, that depends on me painting the Leviathan, Techmarine, three to five Servitors, a 5-man Scout Squad, and all the Grey Knight models by mid-May. That's a tall order!

I'd better start painting faster.

Standish Standoff 2015 After-Action, plus Additional Words on Things

Yesterday I attended the fifth annual Standish Standoff at the old FLGS, Crossroad Games. 1850 "semi-competitive" tourney, three rounds, with scores for battle, painting, and sportsmanship as well as a submission-based painting competition.

I put "semi-competitive" in quotes because while it's touted as such by the shop and the organizers every year, some folks abide by the spirit and some...don't.

I brought my Ultramarines on what I declared as their "swan song" as a primary force. Yes, I'm holding on to my Ultramarine models until I can subsume them with Raven Guard, but they'll never be the primary force for my army again. I'll expand on the reasons later in this post.
My list was a Demi Company made of a Captain and Command Squad in a Razorback, three ten-man Tacticals in Rhinos, a 10-man Assault Squad with jump packs, and a 10-man Devastator Squad with missiles. Joining that formation was a Strike Force Command formation of a 9-man Honour Guard unit with a banner, relic-bladed Champion. Half had swords, and half had axes. They were led by a Chaplain, and all rode in a drop pod. Nothing overwhelming, and nothing abusive. I didn't opt to min/max with 5-man squads in a metric assload of free transports, because I'm not a huge fan of 5-man squads, nor do I own any additional transport models.

My first game was against Orks, which I haven't seen on a table in a very long time. The list was several units of Tankbustas, Boyz, and Lootaz in Trukks, a unit of Grots, and several units of Bikerz. The core of the army was a massive unit of 14 Bikerz, joined by a Painboy and Warboss on bikes, all led by another special Warboss on a bike who gave them all Skilled Rider and Scout.
We duked it out for only two and a half turns until time was called, with the win going to the Orks. I was rusty and play terribly slow with such a high points level, so I think I lost sportsmanship points as a result.

Game Two was against Tyranids. I don't remember the exact makeup of the force. I just remember that he had no duplicate units, and had GENESTEALERS. That made my day, seeing Genestealers actually played and enjoyed. We got a full four turns before game end, tied, with the Nids player taking some additional points on secondary objectives.

My last game of the day was against a Krieg army heavy in infantry and artillery units, backed up by a Baneblade. I steamrolled a tired and seemingly uninterested opponent. It had been a loooong day. My Honour Guard killed 80% or more of the infantry in his army single-handedly, though I think he took a bit of a fascination in seeing how many men it would take to drown them in blood and body parts.

I did poorly in battle points, and had less than perfect sportsmanship points. That was a first for me, and stung the whole way home and a little of this morning until I realized it was likely because I was so damn slow in my play. Who knows? Less than half the field had perfect sports scores, which is a HUGE departure from all but the very first Standoff.

I was awarded Second Best Army, which was a collation of Painting, Sportsmanship, Pub Quiz, and Favorite Opponent votes. There was some low grumbling from various players regarding their paint scores in relation to others' scores, and I'll freely admit I had a couple grumbles of my own, but those grumbles have been there for each of the five years the event has run. Anything from "How did an army without 100% of its models fully painted get THAT score?!" to "That guy just uses airbrush and washes!" have been voiced over the years. I've had to judge painting personally on two or more occasions, and it is HARD to be consistent across a 40 point scale. So no shade thrown at the judges by me, just some bruised ego on my part.

I achieved the one goal I had for myself on the day though, that being winning the Best Painted Squad category in the painting competition with my Ultramarine Command Squad. Mission accomplished!

There is one huge, glaring lesson that I take from the Standoff though, and that is that the Space Marine Demi Company formation is the most boring thing that has ever bored a player. I've actually been running a list of that type for several years off an on, and I thought that with new rules that support the build it would be more fun. Wrong. So wrong. The Demi Company (and even moreso the Gladius built with a double Demi), is a big bag of yawns thrown in a river of suck. Does it win games? Yes, it does. Does it appeal to me any longer? Not on your life.

I sat down in each of my three games and explained to my opponents what the Demi did, and what all my Ultramarines Doctrines did, and I watched their eyes glaze over. As I lay in bed last night trying to sleep, I realized that an ObSec Marine with a bolter is the worst thing ever. It has no special skills, no interesting stats/attacks, etc. Its role on the field is to exist, take up space, and not die while either sitting inside a Rhino or moving around 6" at a time and taking cover or pot shots with a mediocre weapon. I don't want to aim to win my games simply by existing, I want to win them by outmaneuvering, attacking, falling back, and generally playing more cerebrally. Ultramarines in a Demi Company play and win by Mathhammer, and I hate Mathhammer.

So, I'll be bidding a fond farewell to my Ultramarines from here on out. I picked up my copy of Kauyon, and will be painting Raven Guard from this point on, no exceptions. Ok, maybe a couple exceptions for the Grey Knight Terminators I still have kicking around here someplace, as well as some Tempestus Scions I'd like to pick up to spice things up as allies to the Sons of Corax.

I had built a squad of five Raven Guard Tactical Marines to add to my existing Scout Squad. Here's a couple WIP shots of two of the squad members (excuse the poor pics, I've still not set up my painting desk and photo area since the move to the farm):

 

 

 

 

Originally, I wanted my RG to be city fighters. Guys who are posed dynamically like they're kicking in doors and clearing rooms. Lots of gear and pouches. I chopped the arms and leg joints on every squad member, reposing them ever so slightly here and there. The sergeant in the first two pics has his legs at new angles and elevations, and the other Marine is about to pull the mag from his bolter. another non-pictured model is high-stepping over some rubble. The models without standard studded pads got scratchbuilt ones made from old third edition pads with the rims filed down and microbeads drilled in as studs. Those five Marines took a week or more of time and energy just to chop and build, and they don't really look all that great to me. The sergeant is too thin in the waist area, and the bolter Marine's hand isn't quite right in its grip or spacing. The high-stepping Marine I mentioned looks unbalanced in his run, like some sort of Khorne Berserker model.

 

When you combine what I feel is a failed first effort at building chop-shopped Marines with the new focus given by the Kauyon book and my sudden loathing for ObSec Tactical Marines, I'm hitting rewind on the Raven Guard machine. The squad will go into a box, and instead I'm building a Land Speeder. There are six different formations in Kauyon that involve Land Speeders. I've had one sitting in a box since the kit was recut in Fifth Edition, so it'll be my starting point. I will either build the Raptor Wing (Speeders and Stormtalons), Shadow Force (Speeder, Captain, Vanguard, Sternguard), Speartip Strike (Speeders and Bikes/Attack Bikes/Scout Bikes), or Stormbringer Squadron (Speeders and Scouts with Speeder Storms). They all have neat rules, and I can't decide quite yet.

 

I'm newly excited about my Raven Guard thanks to the new things Kauyon lets me do with them, and thanks to the realization that I've hit my limit with Tactical Marines, ObSec, and Doctrine rerolls. here comes a new way to play, and it dresses in black!

 

Now I just have to figure out how to fund purchases of so many more Land Speeders...eBay bitz selloff?

Scrapwing?

I have pictures to share of my painting progress, but unfortunately/fortunately I wasn't able to pull them off the camera last night because I was busy negotiating to sell my house.

Instead, I'm going to ramble on about yet another project I'd love to do if I had the free time: Scrapwing.

What's Scrapwing? Well, it's this idea I have where I buy a unit of used Terminator models one at a time on eBay or Bartertown, strip them down to plastic/metal, and rebuild them into a Deathwing force. Deathwing from scrap models = Scrapwing.

I like to pride myself on my ability to rehab old models. There's a significant percentage of my Ultramarines that are made from pre-owned models or pre-owned bitz. Building an entire Scrapwing army would be neat, but it's not a project I'll actually tackle right now.

Why not? Well, here's where I ramble. The reasons are twofold:

1) Time. This is the big one. I'll be moving soon, if all goes well. Once that happens, I'll be up to my ass in farm work. I forsee a lot of my painting being done in the winter.

2) Money. Honestly, I'm not hurting for hobby funds, and if I were buying secondhand models and repainting them, things would be even cheaper. But the part that doesn't make monetary sense is the comparative costs.
You see, GW has been putting out some very good box set bundles and campaign sets. Dark Vengeance is a great starting point, and I'd likely pick up one set of the five Terminators in that set to start the project (if I were actually to do take it up). Right now, you can get a full set of the five DV Terminators for about $10-15. That makes each Terminator cost about $2-3. A multi-part model from any of the Space Marine ranges is $5 or $6 (for Chapter-specific models). So the DV models come in at less than half of a retail Terminator. Not bad, but you don't want to build a whole army from the same five models!
You can land used squads of various Terminators for anything from $10 to $100. These are typically someone's old Black Reach models, or poorly painted/assembled normal Terminators. Prices vary wildly based on the seller. You even have sellers hawking squads of old, metal Terminators in various states of paint and assembly for foolish prices. The more times the words "vintage" or "OOP" are used in the title, the more outrageous the price.

And then there's the seller I found who's been selling five-man, multipart Terminator squads for $25 shipped. It's the torpedo that sinks the Scrapwing boat. Tons of half-price, multipart Terminator kits are available for less than the cost of USED models. These are all being sourced from the Shield of Baal: Deathstorm box set.

Why, other than to be quirky, would you spend MORE money on used models to create a Scrapwing army when you can spend LESS money on brand new models? It's sort of a funny state of the game right now, with GW's awesome bundle deals in the form of campaign sets.

Are Terminators a Thing of the Past?

I have several project progress pictures to share...tomorrow. I was a little too busy to take them last night. Clearing snow and doing home improvements eats up time!
Today I wanted to talk about Terminators. Terminators, and characters in Terminator Armor, have long been one of my favorite models in the Space Marine ranges. Big, brutal guys who are immune to all but the heaviest weapons in the lore, but who crumple on the table to massed lasgun fire.

I've always wanted to run a very Terminator-heavy army. At various points in my hobby history I've thought about painting Deathwing, or running an army using their rules and my Ultramarine models. I've never done so, because Deathwing are always very points-intensive and lack really good support options. When the previous Grey Knights codex was released, I (along with everyone else) considered a GKT/Paladin army, but could never justify spending all that money. The current GK codex is very points-friendly, and I have money to spend so it would be an option if I hadn't already messing around with Raven Guard.

The biggest obstacle to running a lot of Terminators is that my FLGS runs Maelstrom missions exclusively. Terminators are incredibly slow, being infantry units with very limited transport options. For Space Marines, you've got Land Raiders and Stormraven Gunships. Both are upwards of 200 points, and with upgrades and weapon options can creep up into the 300 point range.

That combination of expensive units and expensive transports means you're short on models and units to claim and contest objectives in Maelstrom missions, on top of that very limited mobility issue.

So, does this mean Terminator-heavy armies are dead in this edition of the game? I cannot think of a viable way to run pure Deathwing, pure GKT, or another all-Terminator force anymore.

When you add in the massive amounts of AP2 weaponry in the game now, TDA feels like its pretty damned pointless. You've got Eldar disc-shooter guns with de facto Rending, plasma, melta cannons, monstrous creatures, and a million other things that can simply bypass Terminator armor. A model that can take a krak missile to the head and keep ticking is felled by little bits of metal spit out by an Eldar gun.

Does anyone actually still run Terminators in their armies? How do you reconcile the inability to react quickly to Maelstrom missions or the wide variety of AP2 fire with the units' ability on the table?

Metals and Music

I found the time to do a little painting last night. I got the midtone coat finished on my Standard Bearer, but decided not to press on to the top coat as it was getting late. Instead, I brought out the dozer blade for my Forgeworld Vindicator. I've got all the blue done on that already, but needed to start on the metallics.

I was too lazy to take a rather boring shot of a blank dozer blade, but essentially I'm painting the bottom teeth of the blade and the surrounding plate, as well as the side plates silver metallic, while the blade face is my standard Ultramarine blue.
Back when I was working on my drop pod, I'd had a really tough time on the metallic sections of the model. My Reaper Master Series metallic paints just didn't cover very well. I was getting brush strokes, pigment separation, and not enough paint in various areas. I muddled through, but decided MSP silver metallics weren't going to work for large areas anymore. It had been suggested that I try out the GW/Citadel line of metallics, so I grabbed a pot of Leadbelcher and a pot of Ironbreaker a couple months ago.
I broke open the pot of Leadbelcher and started working on the dozer blade. I held my breath and started applying paint. SWEET MOSES! It was like a revelation. The paint went on in a single coat, and perfectly covered the primer. I didn't need more than a single pass on any of the primed areas. I did need a quick second touch on areas that I'd gotten blue paint into, but it wasn't the struggle I normally encounter with my MSP metallics.
I've always been a bit of a Reaper paint snob, but I have to say I'm sold on these Citadel metallics. I don't think I'll go back to Reaper metallics on anything larger than infantry weapons. My only concern with the Citadel paint is that pot design. I had to paint with the pot open on my desk, which made me think it would dry out over time since it's constantly exposed to open air. Has anyone noticed drying in the modern Citadel paints? 

I've been listening to some 40K music in an attempt to get myself re-motivated to paint. It's not that I don't want to paint, it's just that when I have free time at 8pm at night after a day of work and a few hours playing with my son, it's hard to park myself in the heat of my office (it's been an Indian summer here lately) and put brush to model. It's even tougher when I spend an hour or two a night working on home improvement stuff, like redoing windows in our living room.However, 40K related music seems to really help with getting the mental juices going. I've been spending a lot of time listening to the soundtrack to Space Marine. You can listen to the whole thing on YouTube if you don't want to buy it (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2v4kaE_XbR8). I recommend Titus' Theme, Battlements, Titan, and A Hero's Legacy, though there's no bad track in the whole thing. The tracks have a little ore meaning if you've played the hell out of the game like I have, as you can picture the scenes from which they are pulled. Also good is the Dawn of War 2 soundtrack (also available on YouTube), and the first track from the Ultramarines: The Movie soundtrack, "Steel and Doom." Yes, that one's also on YouTube. I can fire these up on my Kindle Fire and listen to them while I paint, or while I'm trapped in my cubicle at work.

Expensive Conversions

This morning I've been scanning around the interwebs looking for examples of reposed Space Marines posted by players on various sites. This was prompted by my experience playing Space Marine on my Xbox the other night. I have been playing a lot of Exterminatus co-op lately, and during a pause between waves I happened to have my Marine standing on a rock. I panned the camera out and thought, "Wow, that would be a great pose for a model!"
My Marine had his arms by his side, with a combat blade in a reverse grip in one hand, and his bolt pistol in another. He was looking sidelong at the camera, with his rear leg up a little on the rock, while the front leg was extended to the ground. I wish I knew how to take screenshots on my 360 so I could analyze the pose.

Anyhow, I decided that it would be interesting to try reposing some legs and arms to make what will eventually become my Raven Guard Vanguard or Assault Marines. You know, once I finish my Ultramarine Command Squad, and the Vindicator, and the Raven Guard Shadow Captain...

In my searches, I saw some absolutely great work, and some complete butchery of parts. As part of those trends, I saw some nice things done to expensive models, and then some expensive models that were completely ruined. An entire squad of Forgeworld Mk4 Marines sliced up at the joints, and then glued back together with the gaps poorly filled with Greenstuff, or knee plates cut through and not replaced. It's not a new idea. I've seen examples online of people who buy a $400 Warhound Titan and then take a Dremel to it to give it "battle damage" or saw through joints to pose things awkwardly or with massive gaps.

Those are those peoples' models and they're free to do what they want with them. But the question popped into my head "What's the most expensive model someone risked a conversion on?".

Personally, I'm not a big risk taker with my expensive models. I'm not going to chop apart my Korvydae model to repose his legs. I've also avoided buying the Finecast Lord Executioner model and removing his arms and pads for fear of ruining a $23 model. I've done some small reposing on arms, but that's about it. The only major attempt I ever made at a leg chop/repose was for my old Master of the Forge. I'd originally intended to repose and build him some bionic legs. I started like this, but abandoned the idea when I laid hands on a set of the metal Iron Hands upgrade legs.

 

Even with the planned Raven Guard reposing, I'm thinking a lot about using salvaged/stripped parts to minimize the bitz cost. This might be a mistake, as a good model deserves new/fresh parts. Marine legs are one of the more expensive infantry bits you can buy, so I'm a little reluctant to invest in a ton of new legs for chopping up (though I actually already have plenty in my bitz boxes).
I've bought some expensive parts for kitbashes, but never for a full on chop-and-slice conversion.

What's the most expensive model you've ever sliced to pieces? Were you hesitant about it, or were you confident enough in your abilities to fix any mistakes?

 

First Games of Seventh Edition

This past Saturday was the FLGS's first Seventh Edition monthly tournament and my first opportunity to play Seventh Edition.
I slammed together a list the night before, as I had no real idea what I wanted to play. I thought about testing Salamanders Chapter tactics with a lot of flamers and melta (though melta is irrelevant to the CT unless you run Vulkan, which I didn't plan to do). I also wanted to try the Hammerfall Strike Force formation from the Strike Force Ultra dataslate.

In the end, I went with the Hammerfall Strike Force formation, and added a Combined Arms Detachment of a Librarian, Command Squad in Deathwind Pod (4 plasma guns, and an apothecary), 10-man tactical in Rhino, and 7 Scouts with snipers and a missile launcher. I wanted to play some damned Terminators for a change, and wanted to try out the new psychic powers. Everything was run as Ultramarines.

I did discover one question when building the list: Can a Formation be your Primary Detachment? The rulebook defines a Formation as a "special type of Detachment" that only consist of the units defined as part of the formation. The only definition of Primary Detachment is the detachment from which you select your Warlord. With that being said, can you select your Warlord from a Formation so long as he fits the criteria for being the Warlord, thereby making the Formation your Primary Detachment? I played my Terminator Captain as my Warlord based on those readings, and I'm fairly certain that was legal. What say you?

My first game was against Thor from Creative Twilight. We seem to play each other every month now, though with only six players in the field there was a 20% chance of that happening. The players decided before the day started to try out the Tactical Objectives system and track a winner using raw victory points. The first mission of the day was #5, where you had three cards and kept them secret.
Thor ran a Korne-centered force with one or two Nurgle-marked units for effect. He beat me pretty handily (10-3), as I had no clue what the hell I was doing, and made some pretty dumb deployment decision. Dropping the pod full of plasma in front of Kharn and a Berserker squad was pretty dumb, since they're Fearless and rolled Deny the Witch tests on a 2+. My Telepathy casting Librarian couldn't do much to them.
We did learn some valuable lessons about slight changes to USRs in 7th Edition tough. You have to check the wording of your tried and true USRs now, as things like Rage and Hatred no longer confer to a whole squad! Those are now model-by-model, unless another rule like a Warlord Trait or unit ability (Chaplains) says otherwise.

Second game was against an Eldar force that was built to dismantle Gargantuans and Superheavies. it was perfectly adept at dismantling my cobbled together army. I think the final score was 14-1. Proof that strong units are still strong in 7th.

My last game of the day was against White Scars, but not in bikes. Tactical Squads, Scouts, Terminators, Land Raider, Sternguard, and a Storm Raven. This one was much closer, ending 7-6 in my opponent's favor. I actually had a nice, early lead but a strong couple of turns near the end flipped the situation, which was interesting to see.

All in all, a very good learning day. Here are some of the lessons I learned:

• It's much harder to one-shot vehicles without AP1 weapons. Expect far more wrecks than explosions.
• Psychic powers are tough to cast, and Deny bonuses make that exponentially harder. Trying to throw three dice at an ML1 power when your opponent denies on a 4+ or even a 5+ makes things so much harder, and throwing yet more dice makes the risk of Perils huge.
• Objective placement in Maelstrom of War missions might as well be flatly dictated as equidistant across the board by the rules. In all three games, the objectives ended up in a pretty standard spread across the board. In the two Dawn of War games I played (two and three), the objectives were in damned near identical places.
• Tactical Objectives are fun and interesting, but they require you to build a list based on them. if you can't move to other objectives, you're boned. However, if you're lucky enough to draw the same objective numbers in multiple turns, you can pile up a solid lead on points that your opponent has to overcome.
• It's important to remember your Warlord traits and Chapter tactics every game! I rolled Strategic traits in every game, and got a different one each time. One was -1 to enemy reserve rolls, but Thor forgot to roll his reserves until Turn Four. Game Two was to force a Pinning test on three enemy units at the beginning of his first turn, which I forgot to use (might have helped keep some fire off my guys early). Game Three was Stealth (Ruins) and Move Through Cover (Ruins), which I remembered, but there was only one ruin on the board, and it had solid walls. I forgot my Chapter Tactics completely in Game One and half of Game Two.
• Terrain is shitty and boring in 7th Edition. Seriously. EVERYTHING is a 5+ save now except ruins, and area terrain is so ambiguously defined that it's confusing. Of course, that makes Stealth and Shrouded that much more valuable.
• I need to stop experimenting with crazy lists. While it's neat to try new things every month with the different Chapter Tactics, I'm stunting my ability to refine and better my game with one Tactic. Simple things like remembering to even use CTs become easier with practice, and I've spent too many games jumping from CT to CT that I've made myself rusty on applying my Ultramarine CT. I need to write an "ideal" list, and work towards refining it instead of toying around. Not so I can win all the time (read as: "ever"), but so I can play the game competently. it's a HUGE detractor to the game being played if I build an Ultramarine list and forget to apply all the Ultramarine bonuses!

So, going forward I'm planning to stop with the CT experimentation and build towards an "ideal" Ultramarines list. I need to hash out what I feel will be interesting to play, but also viable as a challenge to my opponents. Slammed together lists make for clumsy games on my part. I figure I can keep the spirit of my "play what you like" approach while still sharpening the edges on my unit selections.

After all of that, I can happily report that my Company Champion is now complete. The paint on his base was drying last night, but I hope to get pictures up tomorrow or Wednesday. Next up is the Apothecary...

The Templar Experiment

I was able to make it to the monthly tournament at the FLGS on Saturday.
I brought a Black Templars list, built using my Ultramarines. As I may have mentioned before, I'm working on playing at least 3 games with each Chapter Tactic, just so I know what they all do and to test some theories.

The list I brought was:

Captain - artificer armor, plasma pistol, power sword
Command Squad - power axe, power sword, apothecary, two plasmaguns
Razorback - Dozer, TL Assault Cannons

Crusader Squad (10) - sword brother with power sword, heavy bolter, flamer, one Marine with pistol and chainsword, Rhino
Crusader Squad (10) - sword brother with power axe, missile launcher, meltagun, one Marine with pistol and chainsword, Rhino
Crusader Squad (5) - sword brother with power axe, meltagun, one Marine with power fist, Razorback with Lascannon/TL Plasmagun

Assault Squad (10) - veteran sergeant with power fist, two flamers

It's very simple, and suboptimal. I simply don't have the pistol/chainsword models to do Templars correctly. I wanted to see how a full-on Rhino blitz worked out, and wanted to see how useful the reroll and Rending benefits to challenges worked out.

My first game ruined the day for me. I faced a Tau/Space Marine list that consisted of Farsight, some other Commander in a suit, two 10-strong Kroot Squads, Tigurius, a 5-man Scout Squad, and six Devastator Centurions with grav cannons and amps.
We were playing Bomb Sweep.
The mission didn't really matter, because I didn't really participate in this game. Tigurius, Farsight, the Tau Commander, and the Centurions were all joined in one big unit. It was simply a matter of using Tigurius to Gate the unit 24" away, not scatter at all due to Farsight, point at one of my units, and have me remove it from the board. The Centurions were all twin-linked every turn die to some piece of wargear on one of the Tau models, rrolled failed AP and wound rolls, and had Ignores Cover from another piece of Tau wargear. I tried locking them in melee, but...they have Hit and Run from yet another Tau wargear item or rule.
This list illustrates everything that is wrong with 6th Edition.

My second game I had originally drawn Thor over at Creative Twilight, but since I was tied at 0 points with another player and Thor and I had played one another last month, I asked to swap for the bye round and instead played the swing player.
He was using loaned models for the day, running Black Templars as well. Chapter Master with artificer armor and thunder hammer, one Tactical Squad in a pod, a multimelta Dread in a pod, a Vindicator, two Landspeeder Typhoons, a Hunter, five bolter Scouts, and a 5-man Devastator Squad with 4 missiles. We played Target Priority, but forgot to nominate a unit for the double kill points. Oops!
The board we played on was VERY open, with all the line of sigh blockers in corners and no really obscured sight lines. My transports weren't going to last long.
I mucked around trying to keep units alive and kill off the large squad that landed in my backfield as well as the Dread and the scouts. We pointed out Assault Marines at one another and decided to have a punch fight, which was entertaining.
I also completely forgot to have my Captain and Command Squad get out of their Razorback when it was wrecked...which was sort of huge. But we didn't realize that until after the game was over. I laughed about it, because I didn't really care.
We learned that in a Templar versus Templar fight, NO ONE ever leaves combat until they're dead. Seriously. The Assault Marine versus Assault Marine fight was a six-turn battle of attrition. I'd lose by two, and make morale. Or lose by one and fail, but be caught in the Sweep due to the Crusader rule and fight on.

Third game was against the same third round opponent from last month, with his Blood Ravens. He'd made some good progress on painting models. He'd brought a Chapter Master, two Tactical Squads with las/plas Razorbacks, two Dreads with las/missile, a Mortis Contemptor with Kheres Cannons and a missile launcher, and a Stormtalon with missiles and assault cannon.
We played King of the Hill.
The board we played on was pretty diverse with some WHFB buildings scattered about, tree stands, and a massive LOS-blocking tree near the mid-left. It also had a river running through it diagonally, which happened to be the no-man's land between the Vanguard Strike deployment zones. My plan was basically to ram a couple units forward in their transports, block the bridge with hulls or wreckage, and hold on tight. It didn't work out. I faced too much S6+ fire from multiple angles to hold up. Tabled, to a man, but it was an entertaining game.

So all in all, a very mediocre day. I brought a suboptimal list to try some things out, and it wasn't as fun a day as I thought it was.
What I did learn was: the challenge mechanic for Black Templars might work better when you're not blindly trying to get it to work purely for the sake of shits and giggles. I was issuing a challenge any time I could, like having my power fist Assault Sergeant challenge a Templar Assault Sergeant carrying a power sword. Stupid idea, but it led to an entertaining moment later in the game. Honestly,  if I hadn't been knocked off my horse by that first game, I'd probably have played smarter and harder.
Crusader is a very useful USR. I found lots of chances to roll two Run dice (take the highest), and the +d3 to your Initiative during a Sweeping Advance all but guaranteed you were sweeping or at least staying in combat with models you can't sweep. Adamantium Will didn't help at all in the first game (the only one in which I faced a psyker), but it would probably be much better in a larger sample size.
You can't force Templars to run like regular Space Marines. Arming everyone with bolters just doesn't cut it. My guess is that you'd want at least a 50/50 split between bolters and chainswords.
Also, Rhinos are shit for Templars. Total shit. For standard Marines, they work just fine because you have other rules to make up for the inability to charge out of a Rhino. Rerolls, bonuses, etc. Templars simply cannot walk across a board, no matter if you have five men or twenty. But they also cannot roll up, jump out, fire, and survive the replying fire. You need something with the Assault Vehicle rule. I really wanted to add a Land Raider Crusader to this list, but felt that at 1250 points, it was simply too much invested in a single model.
Drop pods might be a better choice for Templars, but you'd have to mix your unit with some bolters in there to make full use of the delivery method. Eight to ten pistol shots isn't worth much, and you're only packing one special weapon per squad. The lack of mobility post-landing is somewhat mitigated by Crusader.

Anyhow, despite the lackluster day I was energized to get some more painting done last night. I got the fin assembly of my drop pod edge highlighted, and now I have to go back and do the cleanup on the messy areas. That was a lot of work! Over an hour to get all five fins done.

I also packed up all of my Tyranid models and put them away. My enthusiasm for the army is at zero. When I first started planning for them, I was excited by the prospect of painting something that wasn't power armor, and I really did enjoy painting my Hive Tyrant and Genestealers. But then I got bored, because there's no real variation in the Nid models. Posing is minimal without extensive recuts and sculpting. So, I've put it all away until I either get reenergized about it, need room and sell it, or find someone who wants to buy it all in one go.

Yes, It's a Long Break

Yes, yes. I know there has been a very long break between posts here. I'm in one of those super busy points in non-war gaming life (aka "real life"), so free time isn't as plentiful as it used to be, and what little I've had has been spent on other things.

I finally finished the play kitchen for my son, and it's a huge hit. In the end, I compromised on the wiring of the oven and stove top just to get it done. However, I made sure to leave a removable access panel in the back so I can update it eventually. I had put XMas lights under the holes drilled in the stove top for light-up burners, but I plan to buy a bunch of loose LEDs and wire those in instead. The fridge light works great though, and it's his favorite part of the whole thing. The little "whooooah" every time he opens the door and the light comes on is awesome.

Now that I'm not spending nearly every spare moment in the basement working on that, I can get back to painting 40K stuff. I have picked away at my drop pod from time to time, and now have the fins up to the final coat, and ready for line highlights. After that is metallics, which should go fast. It's surprising how hard it is to paint something like the fin assembly of a drop pod. I found myself constantly forgetting to paint inside the little vent areas on each fin and had to go back several times to make sure. I won't get into too much detail here, as I don't have the picture to support the talk. I'll have to snap some tonight between periods of the Bruins game.

I have also collected up the parts for my Company Champion and begun cleaning them of mold lines. I', hoping to pull off a neat arm chop job in order to pose him in a shield-guard stance. I did notice a minor irritant when working with the new Sternguard kit. Seems GW switched the location of the alignment pitons (pegs, plugs, whatever, I wanted to use "pitons" in a sentence!) from the front torso half to the back. If you try to put a new torso front on an old torso back, you have to slice off all of the alignment pitons. Minor issue.
I'll get pics of this guy's components up as well.

This Saturday is the FLGS's monthly tourney. 1250 points, and I'm hoping and praying I can make it. If so, I plan to slap together a Black Templars list using my Ultramarines models. Not for cheese purposes, but to get a feel for how each Chapter Tactic plays out on the table. My feeling is that a Templar list has to rely a lot on its Sword Brothers. I figure I can use my Ultramarine Honour Guard models as Sword Brothers leading bolter-armed guys as Crusader Squads. Sadly, I have no non-sniper Scouts to use as Neophytes. I can toss all my sergeant models in those squads as the "extra" power weapon/fist allowed in each squad. Stuff them all in Rhinos and you have a bare bones Templar test list.

The crew at the FLGS recently gathered up for a Forgeworld order. I put in for a Deathstorm Drop Pod (missiles) and a Mortis Missile launcher arm for my Dreads. I've always wanted a couple Deathstorms, and the math on converting them turned out to be more expensive than just buying one. I figure the Mortis missile arm is also a cheap anti-air option. Slap a couple missile arms on a Dread and you have a model that can frag infantry, fire missiles at ground armor, and stand still to hit aircraft. Better than the Icarus lascannon and ADL I've been using. that Hunter/Stalker kit is growing on me though, as are the rules for the Hunter.

A Vow

I'm back at the blog after a while away, and I'm back with a bit of a vow.

You see, I looked at all the "2013 Wrapup" posts on all of the blogs I follow (and some I don't follow), and looked back at my own year. I'm not going to wrap up here, as most of the year is a misty, foggy blur. The one thing I did notice is that I spent a lot of time talking about painting and projects, and an ever-increasing amount of time posting pictures of that stuff. Talking about painting without accompanying pictures is pointless!

So, my vow for the blog going forward is that I will not post about painting projects and progress without at least one picture. I can't make any claims for quality of the photos, but there will be at least one for every project I discuss.

I had a nice 9 days off from work over the holidays. Thank goodness for paid vacation days! I didn't get (or want) any 40K stuff for XMas, but my wife did find me a really nice old roll-top desk to replace my scrapheap of a painting desk. Seriously, my desk was the remains of a big box store particleboard beast that I'd had since 2005 or so.
This new roll-top is great. It has all the little cubbies in the top, and drawers on each side. The roll-top is the greatest feature. I can now leave the door to the office open without fear of the cat smacking all my projects around. That same cat I posted about in early 2013 that broke half my models continued to knock projects off of the desk, scatter parts, etc. No more of that, stupid cat! Of course, as revenge she learned how to open the drawers on my bitz bin and grab parts out of them. I found a dozen shoulder pads scattered on the floor, as well as a metal Techmarine servo arm backpack. The bin lives in the closet for now, until I can figure out a solution.

I found plenty of time to paint over the break, but in keeping with my vow, I won't talk about it until I can take some pictures. I finally scrapped my desktop computer and switched to my laptop (which is the wife's old laptop, I inherit her old electronics). I had retained the use of the desktop purely for Photoshop 7, but I loaded GIMP onto the laptop instead. This should speed up the picture taking a little, as before I'd take the shots, pull them onto the desktop, edit, and upload to Photobucket. because the desktop was in the office, I had to take a break from whatever else I was doing to edit and upload. now I can just take the shots, and sit on my ass in the living room while watching hockey or a DVR'd show (currently working on episodes of Falling Skies Season 3) while editing and loading.

That is actually my plan for this evening. Load some old photos from the camera that I'd accumulated during October and November. You should see them in the next day or two.

In Which My Attention Wanes

It's been two weeks since I have posted anything besides Sergeant Series articles. I've been busy with life in general and not overly motivated to work on 40K stuff. I'm in the middle of a months-long project of refinishing a toy box my wife had as a child, in order to give it to my son for Christmas. I started stripping the paint back in JULY, and just last night reprimed it in preparation for new paint. Yes, every project I tackle seems to take forever, it's not just 40K!

However, I did sit down and prime my first Drop Pod last weekend, and picked away at Genestealers and the early painting stages of the pod this weekend.

The pod feels like it's going to be a major pain to paint, even though I built it in subassemblies using the From the Warp tutorial. It's a pretty simple model, but the sheer surface area of the interior and exterior is staggering. I need to make sure I have backup bottles of my preferred metallics on hand.

The Genestealers have been much more interesting to work on. I've moved beyond the greens and browns, and am chugging along on the talons and blades now. These models go faster, as they don't have that whole armored carapace brown process to go through. Just some little plates on their heads. After the talons are done, it's purple under-flesh and bases. I'm not sure which Nid model I'll work on next. Maybe a Lictor or Warrior. I'd like to do more Genestealers, but I think I'll jump around a bit. I have no immediate plans to run anything out of the upcoming Nid codex, but I'd prefer not to hop in wholesale on a completely new unit. Maybe the Lictor would be the best bet, as those rarely get a wealth of options.

My attention on 40K projects has been flitting around quite a bit the last week or so. I keep having this urge to pick up an Ork project. I'd like to do a looted trukk conversion or something like that. Maybe even a Deff Dread or a unit of Kans. The new kits for those look great, plus seeing the Kans in the Space Marine video game multiplayer co-op levels makes them look crazy fun (though they aren't as fun on the table).
This is a problem, as I have so many thing already started. Drop pod, Genestealers, a Company Champion in bits in a bog on my desk, a Biker Chaplain in bitz in a bag, etc. This wouldn't be starting an entire Ork army. Just a looted vehicle or something ramshackle.
The other obstacles are that I don't really know much about rough conversions like this. If I were to do this project, I'd likely take the existing tank, drill a couple pilot holes, and use wire cutters to snip away sections. I think that would make things suitably rough for my vision, but am not sure it would paint up well. Painting Ork vehicles also looks like a big undertaking. I'd have to learn paint chipping and weathering techniques. It's a good project to learn on, so I'm not sure. Maybe after Xmas when life settles down some.

Post-Standoff Post

The third annual Standish Standoff has come and gone, and I have some mixed feelings about it. This is going to be a long post, so be prepared.

The first thing I did when I arrived was get my army set up on my old display board. I was up the night before working on my Devastator Sergeant, and never did finish the new display box/board. If you remember, I brought a half-company of Ultramarines. Three Tac Squads in Rhinos, one Assault Squad, a Devastator Squad, Cato Sicarius and his Command Squad in a Land Raider Crusader, and an Aegis Defense Line with an Icarus Lascannon. After that, I dropped off my two entries into the painting competition: my 5-man Sternguard squad in the Squad category and my Hive Tyrant in the 60mm category.

My first game was against Daemons, an almost entirely scratch built force run by a guy I've played a couple times before. We were tied 1-1 in lifetime games. We played a kill point mission with objectives as secondary and destruction of all HQs as tertiary. It was a solid, fun game that I took primary on, we split secondary and tertiary. Technically a win for me, so now I'm up 2 games to 1. I discovered that I liked the 96" range of the Icarus, but it wasn't overly useful against the one flying monster in the Daemon list.

Second game was against a Nid list with monsters and Gaunts. Flyrant with double twinned devourers, HQ Tervigon, Troop Tervigon, 20 Devilgaunts, 20 Hormagaunts, Raveners (repurposed Warriors counts-as Raveners), Ymgarl Genestealers, the Doom in a Pod, and a Trygon Prime. Primary objective was objectives (3 on the board, each counting as a Relic from the BRB missions), secondary was kill points, and tertiary was...something I forget. There were simply too many monsters to kill off. The highlight of the game for me was using Sicarius to challenge the incoming Trygon, and lopping off its head with a Coup De Gras attack. I lost the primary, took the secondary, and I can't remember who got tertiary. The ADL was a hindrance for me in this game, blocking in my units and generally being a pain in the ass. I should have jammed it up in a far corner and forgotten about it. There's no rule that the Icarus has to be behind the line, or anywhere NEAR the line, so I could have dumped the ADL and just used the Icarus in my zone.

My final game was against the new Eldar Serpent list. Farseer on a bike accompanied by a bunch of Warlocks on bikes with all the buff powers (+Armor, +Cover, Guide, Fortune, blah blah), three minimum sized Dire Avengers in Wave Serpents with scatter lasers, minimum Fire Dragons in a Serpent with scatter lasers, a Fire prism, and the obligatory Wraithknight with sun cannon and scatter lasers. It was the first time I had played against the new Eldar. Before this game, I'd told the folks who complained loudest about Serpent Spam that it wasn't that bad.
It is that bad.
My opponent was a nice guy, but the army is absolutely zero fun to play against. Every weapon on every unit that isn't buttoned up inside a transport is twin linked or made twin linked with Guide. If it doesn't put out 12 shots of some type a turn, it's an AP3 or better blast weapon. All at long range. After the first turn and Night Fight expired, I felt like I might as well just ask which units should be removed from the board each turn. It would have saved time. My fluffy army that took a comp hit to perfectly represent a Codex formation put up no resistance whatsoever to an army that managed a perfect comp score while still building the most soul-sucking list possible.

I find that this happens to me in every large event/tourney I go to. I have two good games, and then the day is given a black eye when I face a list like this in the final round. I've had it happen with Grey Knights, Necrons, and now Eldar.

At the end of the day was the awards ceremony (duh, lol). I somehow managed second place with my Sternguard, and was very surprised. There were squads I felt were better than mine.
My Hive Tyrant also took second, and again I was surprised.

I made the drive home feeling...dissatisfied? I can't tell if it's because that last game sent me home feeling abused and taken advantage of, or if it was an inadvertent deflation of ego from the Hive Tyrant not taking top spot in its category. One minor thing I noticed is that some of the efforts I put in for others' sakes go unnoticed. Last month at Shocktober, I wrote a way-too-long story into for my army and attached it to my army list. I think it contributed to my Dorka's Choice award, but my actual opponents, bar one, showed no interest in it. Yes, it was long, and I can understand not wanting to sit down with it before a game. So for the Standoff, I took a different approach. I grabbed some quotes from the Codex Astartes that described each unit in the army and its role, and a Marneus Calgar quote that made the transition to the army itself. I stapled that sheet to the FRONT of each copy my army list that I gave to my opponents. Only one had any interest in it. One flipped it without a passing glance, and one tore it off entirely. Only the first player kept the copy of the list I gave out. The others left it on the table when they left.
Is that the wrong place for an army into? The wrong time? I'm not sure. When I get things like that, I either read them during deployment/setup, or if they're long I read them after the game. If my opponents give me a list to keep, I keep it.

I think my malaise comes from the general question of "Why do I bother with this?" I have always been a proponent of the "social contract" of wargaming. The game involves two people, each of whom is playing a game. For fun. when I build armies for events, I want them to be fun and interesting to play against. A half-company might be boring to some, so I attempt to use fiction or quotes to help explain WHY the army even exists on the table. I'm putting forth great effort in painting, building a list, and including fiction or fluff for both myself and my opponent. When I play the game and get what I interpret as "that's cute, shut up and roll dice," it hurts my tender feelings. The whole lead-in to the event feels like wasted effort if I face a list designed purely to kick teeth, or the effort I expend is dismissed due to indifference. You cannot pick your opponents in a 40-man randomly paired event, but I guess I was hoping for a larger percentage of the field to contain like-minded individuals.

Where do I go from here? Do I continue to expend heart and energy on efforts that may or may not be noticed or appreciated by my opponents, or do I just stop and roll the damned dice? Do I shed the willingness to play within the universe of the game, and just play the hardest list I can? Do I break my brushes and pen in frustration and throw them in the ocean?

40K is a creative outlet for me. I like the quiet times of painting and writing and imagining, but you can only throw so much out into the void before futility sets in. I do all of this stuff because it calms me down and fills a creative need, but I also do it because I want other people to share my vision and stories. I don't want to be lauded for my efforts, but I would like them at least noticed by my opponents, their intended audience.

Sergeant Series: The Devastator Sergeant

My Standish Standoff list contains a full unit of Devastators. Every Devastator unit has to include the obligatory sergeant, and I kept mine bare bones. Bolter, bolt pistol, and signum.
While cleaning parts and deciding on a pose for my Devastator sergeant, last night, I got to thinking about all the possible armaments and load-outs this one guy can have.

On the surface, a Dev sergeant is identical to a sergeant in a Tactical squad. You start with the typical Marine stat line, a bolter, bolt pistol, frags/kraks, and power armor. However, the Devastator sergeant gets a signum, which allows one model in his unit to fire at BS5, so long as the sergeant is alive and does not fire in the Shooting phase himself. It's a very handy tool.

The Dev sergeant is able to purchase any upgrade you can typically purchase for a Tac sergeant. Ranged weapons like pistols and combi-bolters, as well as melee weapons like power weapons and fists. You can also take the Veteran upgrade, as well as meltabombs.

In my opinion, the first thing you have to decide on is Veteran status. Taking the upgrade gives you one extra Attack and one point of Leadership. So, two attacks base instead of one, and Ld9 instead of Ld8. I don't feel an additional attack in melee is useful for a model in a shooting-dedicated unit. The additional point of leadership, however, is useful.
Devastators are typically a backfield unit. They have a nice, long range band with all of their weapons, which means they're often sitting near your back table edge. This position means that failed Morale tests are dangerous. Lose two or three Marines in a turn and you're risking falling back off the board. Even if you don't fall off the board, the involuntary movement means you lose a turn of shooting as you regroup and regain your fire lanes (unless you are running Ultramarines Chapter Tactics and burn your Devastator Doctrine for the turn).

Meltabombs have always been an upgrade you take as a safety net or last-ditch option. They're cheap enough to throw in without thinking too hard. For Devs, they don't make quite as much sense. You can' throw meltabombs, so they're only applicable in melee against a monstrous creature or a vehicle. Most MCs that charge into a unit whose sergeant has meltabombs tends to challenge out that sergeant to remove the bombs entirely (either by killing the sergeant with AP2 wounds or forcing the denial of the challenge). Walkers are seriously threatened by meltabombs, but if anything but a drop podded Dreadnought ends up in close with your Devastators, I think you may have done something fundamentally wrong that meltabombs won't fix.

That brings us neatly into the melee weapon options. Every one of these falls under the same logic as meltabombs and the Veteran upgrade: Devs aren't a melee unit. If they find themselves in a fistfight, something has gone terribly wrong. Do you really want to spend the heavy points investment in something like a power fist that you may not/probably won't use?

By my thinking, the only viable options besides Veteran status are the ranged weapons, as they match the role of the unit. But which one to take?

I'd write the pistol options (grav and plasma) off immediately, due to their 12" range. Both pistol types are too expensive to take as insurance, single-shot weaponry. I'd skip the combi-flamer and combi-melta for the exact same reason, though they are less expensive as insurance.
A combi-grav is a neat little gem, but its max range is only half that of the weapons it most closely shares a target priority with (plasma cannons, fired at medium and heavy infantry). It does put out a solid three shots when stationary, and the signum is nearly useless for plasma cannon Devastators. I'd say a combi-grav is an "ok, not great" choice.
All that's left is the storm bolter. It's an Assault 2, 24" range weapon, and is as cheap an upgrade as you can get. That range band is at least useful for some of the heavy weapons it'll be alongside. When the unit packs multimeltas, you'll want to use the signum. Plasma cannons make the storm bolter shots into an afterthought, but more dice rolled for shooting is never a bad thing. Lascannons are like multimeltas, where you want the signum instead. Missile launchers split the difference, where they want the signum if you're firing krak/flakk, but the storm bolter shots if you're firing frag. Your closest relative for the storm bolter will be heavy bolters. If you calculate it all out, upping a single heavy bolter to BS5 over BS4 will net you about the same number of wounds on Toughness 4 models as using the storm bolter instead. The difference is only about .30 wounds in favor of the storm bolter.

After all of that rambling, my theory is that there are only two real choices to make when kitting a Devastator Sergeant: veteran or not, and storm bolter, combi-bolter, or regular bolter.
Vet status depends on what other Leadership mechanics are in your army and where. For my Standoff list, I'm running Cato Sicarius, who gives a blanket Ld10 to your army, so long as he's alive. That makes Vet status moot for the Dev sergeant. I feel that if Sicarius is dead early enough for the Devs' Leadership value to matter, I'm on the downslope anyways.
The other option is a banner in a Command Squad or Honor Guard. Honor Guard can't be made into fire support units, so their banner probably won't be anywhere near the Devs. Command Squads can take a whole lot of plasma guns and become some sort of mid-range firebase unit, parked near the Devs, but it's unlikely.
The bolter-or-not-bolter question really depends on how you arm the heavy weapons Marines, and if you're a fan of small points spent on small probability wargear (the statistical chance a storm bolter by itself will kill a MEQ model is small, but when stacked up alongside other factors, it can add up).

Well, there's some mental vomit of "40k tactics" talk for you. I'm sure I've missed something in this pages-long post, so feel free to discuss the math, the options, and the situations for which you'd arm a Devastator Sergeant.

Situation Report, beginning of November

It's the beginning of a new month, and sometimes I like to use the beginning of a month to sit down and map out my hobby progress and plans. it helps a tiny little bit in clarifying what I'm doing hobby-wise, and why I'm doing it.

First up is my army list for Standish Standoff 3. Way back at the beginning of summer, I'd planned on bringing a retooled "all fast" bike list. The composition requirements we use at the Standoff require that you fill all your FOC slots (1-1-3-1-1) before taking a second slot of any type, if you want to avoid penalties. I had a solid 1750 list a couple months ago after the new Marine Codex dropped, but it would be obliterated purely on composition points at the Standoff. I could apply for a theme waiver, but I don't think it would warrant enough of a waiver to be worth it. It runs with 2 HQs, two non-slot HQs, three or four Troops, three Fast Attack, no Elites, and no Heavy Support. My plan was to expand the list to match the slot-filling composition scoring. I wanted to add Vanguard Vets as Elites (hooray for moving them where they belong!), and a Stormraven in Heavy Support. None of those models happened, so that plan is out the window.

Instead, I'm planning to run a list I've ALWAYS wanted to run: Classic Half-Company. The list takes the standard Ultramarine Battle Company layout of 6 Tactical, 2 Assault, and 2 Devastator squads and halves it to fit into a non-Apocalypse points level. So, the list contains 3 Tactical, 1 Assault, and 1 Devastator squad. Add in Cato Sicarius and a Command Squad, and give them a Land Raider Crusader to ride in and you've got a Codex-perfect army list. It does take a 5 point hit for having a second Heavy slot without having any Elites, but that's a surmountable number. I'd tried some other iterations of the list that had perfect comp scores, like swapping the Command for some Sternguard, but it just didn't "feel" right. Cato doesn't run with Sternguard in any of the fiction I've ever read. He runs with a Command Squad.

So, I'm painting toward that list. Funnily enough, the only thing keeping me from running this in the past (besides old points costs) was not having enough bolter-armed Marines. I was three short, so I'm currently working on those three grunts. The first one is done all of his base painting, and awaiting a coat of sealer tonight before he gets freehand symbols on his shoulders.

I'm also planning on painting up a new sergeant for the Devastator squad. Allof the sergeants I have now are armed for tactical Squad duty with bolt pistol and some form of melee weapon. Devestator sergeants don't need any of those, so this one will have just his pistol and a bolter, as well as his signum backpack and a head with some bionic targeters.

I've made progress on the base for my Hive Tyrant, which also needs to be done by the 23rd for the Standoff. I'm collecting images for a step-by-step post on the base, so I won't share them early. It looks great though.

The brood of five Genestealers I've been staring at for months is still sitting at the wash stage. They're just not urgent enough of a project to work on right now. I'm also considering selling off all the Nid sprues I have collected, but I might wait until the new book drops next year in order to maximize on sales price (due to popularity).

As for Marines going forward, I'm juggling some plans. I'd like to get my two drop pods built and painted, but have also been hankering to get a Bike Chaplain done (I've already bought most of the parts I needed), as well as a Company Champion and a Company Standard Bearer to round out the options available to my Command Squads.

Thank the Emperor!

I haven't heard better news in a while:
http://natfka.blogspot.com/2013/08/space-marine-large-walker-debunked-and.html

No super walker for Marines. HUZZAH! I hated the idea from the beginning, and I am so very happy it was proven wrong.

Of course, we're also now seeing talk of a new Marine armor type, the Centurion. Basically, it's a Marine in power armor with a gun harness. I'm not sure how I feel about that. The sketches seen on some of the rumor sites are rough, and they have guns on the harness right next to the Marine's head. It reminds me a lot of Battle Beasts, which were one of my FAVORITE toys when I was a kid. (Trivia point: I sold all my Battle Beasts on eBay in 2007 for a couple hundred bucks that went to rent and some used 40K models).

 

 

These Centurions are supposed to be Heavy Support, which makes them almost direct competition for Devastators. That makes me sad, as I have a soft spot for the classic Battle Company formation (Tacs, Assault, Devs). 

There's also talk of a old-yet-new anti-air tank, the Hunter. It's an old Epic tank that's never seen 40K scale rules, as far as I know. It sounds interesting, being a Predator-level vehicle with Whirlwind style guns. I'm sure it'll have Skyfire, but will it have Interceptor?

 

The thing I'm most excited about are the new kits. There's word of new boxes for Vanguard, Sternguard, and Tactical Marines. All of them are supposed to have more ornate armor with studded sections, seals, parchments, etc. I'm hoping for some "advancing" poses for Tactical Marines. Maybe some non-screaming helmetless heads for HQs. There's also supposed to be plastic clam packs for Chaplains and Librarians. I'm less excited about these, as the plastic clam pack models are great, but tend to be mono-pose models with little customizability. We'll see!

 

In painting news, I worked more on my Hive Tyrant last night. I'd gotten his carapace all the way up to Faded Khaki, but when I compared it to the talons I've already finished, it didn't match! I realized that I'd gone overboard with the light color, and forgotten to leave some dark areas at the top of each plate. I had to go back in with shade colors and flow improver and darken the top of each plate. I'm realizing how detrimental it is to paint separate pieces of a model months and months apart.

 

No new Marine progress, unfortunately. I've still got that Sternguard model hanging out on the desk waiting for his midtone coat.

 

I'm also waiting for the wife to buy another bottle of wine that has a cork and not a screw top. I have four Genestealers mounted to corks, and I need that fifth cork! She keeps buying screw-top wine without any consideration to my hobby needs, lol!

Only Three More Games?

If the rumors are to be believed, there will be a new Space Marine codex out around Labor Day. I think this means I'll only get three more games in with my Space Marines before they're overhauled. The FLGS' July tournament is on a day I cannot attend, so that only leaves our August monthly in which to play!
I don't get the chance to make it to the weekly 40K night at the shop due to life. This summer it's hockey (my team skates on Wednesday nights), but typically it's just lack of free time.

I think I might put my Marine plans in a deep freeze until September. I've been working on Sternguard models lately, with a third model 90% done, and two more in the works for a squad of five. After that I was planning on Scout Bikes or a Storm Raven. I'm icing those for now, as I won't have time to finish any full squad or vehicle model other than the Sternguard before Labor Day. The best plan is probably to work on basic Marine mainstays: Tactical Marines or Rhinos.

So, what will my "last hurrah" with my Marines be? I guess it depends on the August event format. Do I want to go back to the core roots of marines with Tacticals and various support, or run the bikes one last time before the new book invalidates the build without paying an extra $50 for the White Scars supplement? Only time will tell!

I think that I'll turn my focus to finishing the Hive Tyrant to a nice standard for our big event in November. I don't plan to play a Tyranid army then, but he'll be a nice submission into the painting competition. Nids are also supposedly right behind Marines for a codex, if you believe the Internet whisperings. That makes me hesitant to keep plugging away on models, as there's no clue what they'll change, and if any of the models I create between now and then will become invalid. Marines are easier to cope with changes, as they all have pretty standard armaments. Bugs have varied wildly from third edition on up.

Hilariously, I did just buy some bitz for my Nids, alongside some parts that will be used to create the painting trophies for the November event. I bought the body and legs for a Carnifex, as I already have several weapon sprues and heads/carapaces for that model. The parts were cheaper than retail by a good margin, and will help me clear up the pile of unused bits. I also nabbed a set of Vargheist wings to see how they stack up to the Forgeworld Shrike Wings kit. I bought that kit a couple months ago, and am honestly not super impressed with it. The wings don't match the current Nid aesthetic. I figure with some clever modifications, I can make the Vargheist wings look more Nid-like.

Speakling of Forgeworld, they just released two new HH kits. The Palatine Blades and Destroyers with jump packs. Wow. Nice models! I really like Mk4 armor kits, though I'm not a huge fan of the rad-shielded helmets. The Palatines have some great parts, but all the EC-specific icons would have to be sold or traded away.

Where's the Violence? Where's the Blood Spray?

 

 

I've been reading upcoming 40K release rumors on the blogosphere lately (don't worry, it's not interfering with my painting), and they have me greatly concerned.

It's widely apparent that a re-re-re-release of Apocalypse is slated for July. Great, but no one really plays Apocalypse locally, though I'm sure there are many fans worldwide.

I'd bet that most of you have seen the new Lord of battles model coming out for Chaos in this release. Big robot guy welded to a Baneblade chassis. Meh. Neat idea, but not something I'd want to put on the table.

I'm really more concerned with the rumors for the next Space Marine codex. They'll finally be recutting the Tac Squad sprues, which is great. I'm all for additional detail, so long as it doesn't force me to assemble all my models in one specific way like the arm/weapon sets on the Grey Knights and Blood Angels (and some small parts of the Space Wolves) kits.

Then there are the rumblings about Marines getting a new "super walker" kit. Something larger than a Contemptor Dread. This bothers me greatly.

I was/am drawn to 40K because of its background and atmosphere. The crumbling, rotting Gothic feeling is appropriate to the universe. I like that humanity is on its last leg, with its ultimate fate poised on a razor's edge. I like the constant threat of Chaos, baroque Chaos Marines, twisted cultists. I like the jagged violence of Orks, lithe, dying grace of Eldar (Dark or otherwise). I like that technology has ground to a halt, with even the most mundane of machinery kept running on prayer and rote. I do not like Tau or their aesthetics, because they break so completely from the Gothic image.

Then I hear about the super walker, and I despair. I love the simplicity of power armor, and I love the idea of Dreadnoughts. Eternally entombed warriors who slumber in forced comas until they're activated and interred in a millennia-old Dreadnought is so brutal, and yet inspiring. It retains the personal grit of warfare in 40K. While the Marine may be isolated from the outside world by his near-death state and physical containment in his ceramite sarcophagus, he still interacts with the battle on a tactile basis. He's there in the bloody trenches, fighting equal opponents.

But if you slap a Space Marine into a giant walker body, you lose that magic. Marines are superhuman, able to take on scores of ordinary men alone. They stride the battlefield in ancient and revered armor, and any Marine lost is a great tragedy for human kind. But to install that walking god into a titanic walker is to lose that tactile, personal level of warfare. A Marine entombed in a Dreadnought has failings: he's shattered wreck of a being, but he fights on despite that through force of will and genius of mind. His armament is formidable, but not titanic.

The super walker violates all of that, either by placing an already godlike figure like a Marine into a pure pilot position, or by making the fractured Dreadnought pilot absolutely unstoppable in an even larger walker. You remove the fragility, leaving a Voltron or a Might Morphin Power Ranger. Impersonal.

 

I get that GW is trying to sell large kits, and wants everyone to have one, but they're compromising the integrity of the background story by doing so. The Gothic grim darkness is violated when you invent new super walkers for Space Marines who don't need them.

 

I guess what I'm lamenting is the personal level of warfare that 40K fiction portrays. Yes, ranged weapons are used, and untold millions are destroyed in volleys of massive cannons, but those weapons still possess an appropriate level of Gothic imagery. The orbital bombardment is enacted by a press gang of a thousand men who often die just loading the guns. The gun is prayed over, anointed with oils, and revered as a living being.

Even a Titan requires a crew of hundreds to function, and at great expense. But to shrink down a Titan so a marine can pilot it removes all of the risk, all of the insanity. It's like putting Superman inside a larger Superman. You don't want to see Superman be a driver, you want to see him be super!

 

I guess what I'm ranting here is that I want my 40K to stay Gothic, stay personal. I don't want it to evolve into a clash of giant robots. Giant robots don't have souls, and a pilot inside a behemoth is not a hero.

Cooling on Tyranids

I haven't done much in the last week that relates to 40K. I did prime my Hive Tyrant's main body assembly and give him a basecoat of green, but I stalled after that. I need to apply the shading wash before I can move on, and I just have no real motivation to do so.

I've simply cooled on Tyranids, and I'm mad at myself. I got all gung-ho about building the army, and painting the models to a high standard. The key thing I forgot is that painting to a high standard is not compatible with producing an "army."

I bought my Hive Tyrant kit and was very excited. I took my time assembling and painting (still not done, obviously), but I also sat down with the Nid codex and started building army lists. Every time I did so, I crumpled up the paper and thought "Why bother? The damned Tyrant won't be done for months anyways." I'd get a small jolt of motivation to finish from that act, but it would peter out soon enough.

To make matters worse, I started shopping. As a way to finance my Tyranid project, I started liquidating Space Marine models and all my peripheral books and items. I had all this money sitting in my Paypal and FLGS store credit accounts, and nothing to do with it. So I started buying models. Now I'm sitting on a small mountain of Hormagaunts, Warriors, and Genestealers. All bought at a good price, all sitting around doing nothing. I simply traded my overlarge pile of Marine kits and sprues for Tyranid kits and sprues. Dammit!

The Genestealers won't resell for hardly anything, as they're the least popular Troops model out there. The Hormagaunts might recover some of my money, as folks seem enamored with them lately as an alternative to the ultra-competitive build of Tervigons and Gaunts. Warriors are also en vogue, though the allure is limited. I'm going to take a loss on this stuff if I try to sell it. I just have to decide if I want to sell it. The whole point of the Marine sell off was to reduce my collection, and keeping this stuff around goes counter to that.

Oddly, I've been slightly more interested in my Marines the last few weeks. The narrowing of my focus into fast-mover units seems to have helped. I'm looking forward to buying and painting a Storm Raven to support my Marines, but haven't done so yet. I'm thinking of taking a shot at a small unit of 5 Vanguard Vets, because I'm enjoying painting white. I event thought about building a Shrike model (or using the super limited lightning claw Cato Sicarius model I have, or painting up a squad of Doom Eagles Assault Marines (We are the Doom Eagles, and we are dead already!).

So, I'm not really sure what I'll be doing with Tyranids. The temptation is there to just get rid of it all, knowing that I won't have a fieldable army for at least a year or more. By then, they'll have a new codex, but so will Marines. it all seems so very pointless and hopeless.

I probably should have just painted my Space Hulk set as a way to sate my Tyranid interests, and not gotten in over my head. Oops.