A couple of 40k memes

Random... I made these a while back for a thread in our local forum.

Attention, All You Catachan Ladies Out There!

Domestic life got you down?

Ever get tired of devining the homestead day after day after day?

Do your hands hurt at the mere thought of cleaning and filleting troublesome Devils for the rest of your life?

Have you ever considered a job in the armed service of our Lord?

Well, don’t wait any longer!

Report to your local recruiter today and sign up for one of our thrilling career pathways for women in the Catachan jungle fighters!

Think about all the incredible opportunities you’d get as a proud Grenade Launcher Trooper!

Or maybe you’d prefer the adventure of serving as a Grenade Launcher Trooper!

And if that’s just not your cup of tea, consider instead the excitement of a career as a Grenade Launcher Trooper!

Here’s your chance to see the luscious jungles of our wonderful homeland on the Emperor’s dime.

And you never have to worry about overbearing commissars breathing down your neck (you know how we do)!

Do your part and sign up now!

Austin GW Store Opening Day 10/26/13

I went to the opening event ("First to the Fight") at the new Austin Games Workshop store (their facebook page) in the Brodie Oaks shopping center. It's a relatively small store but, as far as I could tell, is laser focused on showing off the goods with product shelves, display case, small demo table for the three main games (40k, WFB, and LOTR), painting bar, and two tiled tables with the GW plastic terrain. I think they had all their staff there to talk to folks, give plenty of demos, and run the First to the Fight events. Obviously loads of people that play 40k love to bitch about the font of their folly, as it were, but presentation is one of the main reasons I play this game, and the store is all about presentation. Fully painted armies look great on their tables. The walls are lined with their beautiful merch. Nicely painted demo armies displayed in glass cases. That's the kind of shit that turned me on when I started playing this game back in '95, and though I do indulge quite a bit in the competitive aspects of the game, I still enjoy closely-fought games the most, win or lose.

For the opening day, they had a painting contest, a conversion contest, and a little 40k skirmish contest. Not knowing what to expect, I brought my Saim Hann Eldar. Basically you could play up to three games using a simple scenario: pitched battle, purge the alien, at 500 points. They added up your points at the end and picked a couple winners.

Their was some confusion on the points you could score, but it was just for fun so I really didn't chase the wins too hard. I pulled a small force out of my collection: a farseer on jetbike with singing spear, 3 guardian jetbikes, 9 dire avengers, 5 rangers, a scatter laser/shuricannon vyper, and a double-scatter laser war walker. I was honestly just trying to throw in a bunch of little things so I could use a variety of models, but it ended up being really shooty and I apparently won the little challenge. Scored a sweet certificate even.

First game was against Trent and his nurgle CSM: a nurgle bike lord, 2 squads of about 15 cultists, and a heldrake (!). It came out about how I expected - I shot up the cultists and lord really good, and then the heldrake came on and wiped out about two of my units each turn. Lost that one. Then I played Tyson and his necrons: an overlord, 2 squads of warriors, and an annihilation barge. The annihilation barge was winnowing me down until it came within range of the Farseer's spear and charge. After that I pretty much just shredded what was left and took a win. Third game I played against a guy with a nicely painted ultramarines force: a librarian, one squad of sniper scouts, one squad of assault scouts, some tac marines in a rhino, and a whirlwind. Again, my shooting carried the day and I just worked my way through everything with S6 guns.

All in all, I think it is a nice addition to the Austin 40k community and will hopefully bring some new folks to the local tables.

Video Battle Report: Chaos Space Marines (Khorne) vs. Space Marines (Iron Hands) 1850

Here's another video battle report. Still experimenting with my editing software, liked a few things but I apparently set it on a background unintentionally. Good game against Dan, more skulls for my Khorniacs! Let me know if you have any suggestions regarding the commentary or format. I can't improve the actual video quality much, but... more zoom-ins on the models? more detail on the game play? British accent? I usually report on every full game turn because I often forget if I try to do every player turn. I actually played another game that same night against Kings' Mantis Warriors using the new Forgeworld Mantis chapter tactics and special character, which will come out on BOLS in the near future. Stay tuned.

Video Battle Report: Tau vs. Chaos Daemons 1850

I tried my hand at a video battle report! I've already got some ideas on how to improve and make it more interesting next time. Stay tuned.

Tournament: Wonkos 10/12/13

Heyooo, another tournament report! This time I took my Khorne crazies, aka The Guillotine, out to the Wonkos monthly 2k'er. Here was the list:

Chaos Lord - juggernaut of khorne, axe of blinding fury, 4+ invulnerable, meltabomb
Kharn the Betrayer
10 Cultists
10 Cultists
7 Chaos Space Marines - mark of khorne, meltagun
7 Chaos Space Marine Bikers - mark of khorne, 2 plasma guns
Heldrake - baleflamer
Land Raider - dozer blade
Maulerfiend - lasher tendrils
Maulerfiend - magma cutters
Bloodthirster - 2 greater rewards
10 Bloodletters
Soulgrinder - phlegm, mark of khorne (it's free!)

The game plan is not too sophisticated; just charge right at em and take as many heads as possible!

GAME 1 - Space Marines
Mission: Table Quarters & Special Relic
Deployment: Hammer and Anvil

Whoops, forgot a first turn picture for this one. My opponent was rolling with three Sternguard drop pods, a couple tac squads including Pedro Kantor in drop pods, a devastator squad with some missile launchers, and a thunderfire cannon. He brought the three sternguard in right on top of my big swarm and together with the devastators and thunderfre, took out the land raider and the bikers and juggernaut lord. Hellfire rounds are no joke and inflict a lot of saving throws on just about anybody. My counterattack was equally devastating however, and wiped out much of the sternguard in return. Kantor and the fourth drop pod came down and didn't do much before they were wiped out as well. It was a bloody battle all around, with little left on the table at the end, and after the points were calculated, we ended up with a draw, neither of us holding the relic.

Game 2 - Tau
Mission: Purge the Alien
Deployment: Dawn of War

My second opponent John had a fairly mixed Tau force, including a handy commander, ethereal and fire warriors in a devilfish, two broadsides with missiles and missile drones, an ion cannon hammerhead, a big squad of sniper kroot, two large squads of fire warriors on foot, two squads of crisis suits, a full unit of stealth suits, and a ion cannon riptide. I went straight at him, flanking hard on my right to try and take out the riptide as fast as possible.

His stealth suits deployed in a small house on my left side, and my cultists came out of reserve to cage them up and fire point-blank into the windows. The suits took out one of the cultist squads before the second one finished them off. I made a big dent in his left side before most of my guys got whittled down. Kharn personally executed the riptide. Late game is was basically up to my soulgrinder and land raider to try and inflict a few more casualties. Another brutal game, it ended very close with John up by just one point.

GAME 3 - Space Marines
Mission: 5 Relics (1 in each table quarter)
Deployment: Vanguard Strike

My third opponent had thirty terminators (20 shooty, 10 assault), two 10-man scout squads, a 5-man scout squad in a land speeder storm, and Vulkan leading the whole mess. The land speeder scouts made an early play to try and kill the land raider but failed and were taken out pretty quickly. He kept two of the terminator squads in reserve (deep strike), and my bloodthirster led the charge against the squad on the board, but was shot down and charged. He didn't take many out before getting banished back to the warp.

While the juggerlord and the heldrake took out the scouts and Vulkan on his left side corner, Kharn, the chaos marines, and my bikers tried to take on the terminators. My cultists sneakily grabbed objectives to my right and left and fled to the board edges. His other two terminator squads came in and wrecked shop hard on Kharn, the marines, and the bikers, but it was too late: my cultists had taken the objectives and secured me the win.