Next project... hmmm

 (image by Raax)

After selling my catachans to some lucky club in Florida, I am trying to decide what project to take on next. Over the past couple months, I have worked up an Imperial Fists lists that could use either  the Horus Heresy book or the Space Marine book. Very expensive models but a cool effect and there's plenty of other Heresy players in town.

However, the upcoming Tau release is like a splinter in my brain... I love playing xenos and Tau could be a fresh new game to play for me after playing almost exclusively Necrons over the past year. I also think in terms of my collection, a Tau army could be different than my other armies, both in terms of gameplay (long range shooting, barebones skirmish, finesse synergy) and in the overall aesthetic. I think it would be fun to incorporate a modern camo scheme to them, maybe do the 'snow based' army I have wanted to try for so long.

In the short term, I am planning on selling the Abaddon/Black Legion elements of my chaos army and focusing on the Khorne stuff. I had a few encounters with maulerfiends this weekend that gave me some hope for a crush-rush, and I WANT to play the new chaos book, but the Abaddon/rainbow chosen army just doesn't hit very hard. So going to consolidate.

I played a game with the khorne guys as blood angels last night which should appear as a video battle report on BOLS sometime soon, I'll post a link as soon as it does.

Tournament: Railhead Rumble March 2-3, 2013

 

Last weekend I played in a 7-game 1850 GT in Watauga near Fort Worth. I went 5-2 with both losses against goddamn noisemarines! Boo. Hate those guys.

  

First game was against a guy named John, playing a drop pod space wolves list. I nested up on the right half of my deployment zone and spread out my models to try and buy myself some room to breathe. Luckily I rolled well on my initiative tests when his rune priest dropped in and went after my destroyer lord and wraiths, only losing one and a warrior. After my first return volley, I tied up the biggest surviving squad on the right with the wraiths, the squad on the left with the destroyer lord, and charged one in the middle with the stalker. I don't remember him penetrating the quantum shielding with shooting, but maybe he did; in any case, the stalker somehow died in combat against guys armed only with krak grenades. The destroyer lord challenged and killed a few characters at a time, while I tried to diminish as many squads as possible with gauss and tesla. I ended up with only three models left, two night scythes and the destroyer lord, but it was just enough to win the table quarters mission by having more army points in three quarters. That together with the fact that I killed plenty of wolf guard and didn't have any character models to give up other than the destroyer lord, gave me the win for the round for winning two of three missions.

Game two I drew up against Daniel, who was playing with two command barge lords, a bunch of min squads of warriors in ghost arks, three annihilation barges, three squads of single tomb blades, with storm crypteks attached to each warrior squad. A bloody game that went back and forth with luck on both sides, but the destroyer lord resurrected twice and that more or less kept the win in my hands.

Game three was against Jared, playing a slaanesh-heavy army witha big bike squad and lord, two maulerfiends, a couple chaos marine squads in rhinos, a cultist squad behind an aegis line, a heldrake, and a vindicator.

Game four was against a kid I called Mooseport, because he had a big moose on his shirt. He was playing a bunch of purifier spam with a couple psiflemen for backup. He wiped out almost all my infantry, but not before I picked off squad after squad with tesla and gauss. I ended up winning playing the objectives in the end, though it would have been easier if the destroyer lord hadn't bailed after the first time he got knocked down.

Game five was against Chris from Austin, playing another slaanesh/noisemarine army with a lord and sorceror on bikes, a bike squad, three or four noisemarines squads, a heldrake, and a couple autocannon havoc squads.Turn one he shot up and ran my destroyer lord and attached tesla immortal squad off the board, and froze up my wraiths on turn two long enough to wipe them out. I was able to stabilize the patient long enough to come back, but couldn't grab the win in the end.

Game six was against a list very similar to Daniel's, with plenty of ghost arks and annihilation barges, plus a couple night scythes, but only one command barge. Before the game while we were chatting, he was saying he was going to keep his royal court together to keep from giving away character points, but then in the game he decided to split them out into the warrior squads and deathmarks. I chose his lord as my hunted unit, and set out to hunt him down and kill as many crypteks as I could. I chased him from my end of the board to his for three turns before he surged forward and tried to break out. He came after my destroyer lord and wraiths with his despairmarks but couldn't deal enough wounds and they died pretty easy. We did damage back and forth, until I shot down the command barge and the lord in one turn, but then he got up and jumped in a nearby ghost ark and ran away to the far corner of the board. I cornered the ghost ark on the last turn of the game, and he jumped the lord out to try his chances in a mindshackle duel. I passed the roll; he didn't, and that was game.

 For my last game, I played against another Space Wolf drop pod list, this one with a couple of dreadnoughts joining the gray hunter and wolf guard squads. I placed one of the two objectives in the far corner to try and divert some of his forces and possibly make a move on it later with my scythes and reserve warriors. My destroyer lord was definitely MVP - after losing all his wraith bodyguards to shooting, he jumped into the wolf priest's grey hunter squad. Down went the wolf priest in a challenge to mindshackles and his own force weapon. After he charged a second nearby grey hunter squad into the fray, the destroyer lord survived the first round of punches and I held my breath before he struck out with a couple precision hits and took out both power axes in the fight. Both space wolf squads broke and ran, buying a moment for the destroyer lord to jump back and help out my immortals and warriors. He then scythed down both dreadnoughts in subsequent turns. Shooting from my other squads meanwhile had fended off the rest of his troop units, and the night scythes and reserve warriors came on and took the far objective as planned. A good game against a well painted enemy, great way to close out the weekend.

Last Few Weeks Whathaveyou

 A few pictures from the last few weeks of 40k for me. Even if I can't seem to find the time or desire to write a full post on a single subject, I feel compelled to at least briefly keep tabs on what I've been doing. The above game was my necrons, including a then-newly-painted Triarch Stalker, against Bigred Larry's pre-Heresy Deathguard. If I remember right, Larry came away the victor by one point. Bigred turned it into a battle report for BOLS that made it to the site not too long ago. This was a really fun game, as I brought some new and old things and was playing with a pretty mixed demo-type army (always my favorite). The Pre-Heresy Deathguard had some interesting little tricks, though I was able to keep his super double plasma pistol guy from making his money back.

On the second weekend in January I drove up to Killeen for a one day, 3-game tournament at Battlefield Games. Big store, plenty of merchandise, nice staff and players. I was playing with a resorb foot lord in a big blob of warriors, two more 10-man warrior squads, a triarch stalker, a 10-man tesla immortal squad, 2 5-man immortal squads with stormteks in Night Scythes, 6 wraiths with 3 whip coils, 1 gloom prism spyder, and 2 annihilation barges. I came up against another Necron player in the first game playing 2 destroyer lords, 3 squads of 20 warriors, 2 or 3 squads of 5 immortals, 6 separate tomb spyders, and 3 scarab swarms. I made a big error in letting the scarabs make a first turn charge into my big warrior unit and accidentally sacrificed the lord, which basically meant the rest of my army was tied up in fending off scarabs and spyders for the remainder of the game. I think if we'd had time for a 7th turn, I might have snuck away with earned more points, but as it was, my very friendly but very boring army-having opponent won pretty big. At least his silver tide was fully painted!

The second mission was pretty whacked (no units could cross the space between vanguard strike deployment zones for at least 3 turns, and I drew double manticore guard as my opponent!) but I managed to pull out a win nonetheless. The main mission was based on getting the most points in models into the center. In just 2 turns, I was able to pile in and fight off his guard in order to pull out a massacre. Still, having the crap blasted out of you for 4 turns while you basically just fidget, not cool! For the third game I played a killpoints match against the new Dark Angels and completely wiped out my opponent's  mixed ravenwing/deathwing army after he basically came at me piecemeal as I was castled up. I fought off a big squad of ravenwing with my wraiths, shot up the small second unit with my firing line, and picked off a couple deathwing squads with the stalker and immortals. Late in the game, the stalker let me pour fire into his belial megaunit until the squad's apothecary just couldn't keep up with the damage I was dealing and he gave up the game. I ended up winning best appearance, and I think second overall (glad I brought the display board!). I will definitely head up there again for another 40k tourney later this year.

I was in Lubbock for a few days work and so I set up a game with a regular (Mitchell) at Stormcrow Games. This was a big store with plenty of space and tables. The folks were very friendly here too. I was playing another pretty mixed army with no flyers (couldn't fit em in my carry-on), a douchecanoe, a squad of spyders and scarabs, a stalker, an annihilation barge, and a bunch of infantry. For what I would consider balanced games, the stalker is so, so money and really should be taken out immediately. He enables you to lay down some serious rain when you need it most. He got bad reserve rolls for his dakkajet to come in, and he only managed to chew through my skirmish units before I mowed down almost his entire force. I held my flank with my canoelord, who, after getting his ride shot out from under him, stopped an entire battlewagon along with the choppa boys and weirdboy inside to prevent them from scoring an objective. A nice win, hopefully I will be welcome back in the future (if only for revenges sake)!

While I was at Stormcrow, I picked up a lonely metal farseer on their rack. This was the version with the singing spear making the devil horns - I already had the one with the staff and shuriken pistol, and I've been wanting to play with a legit second farseer lately, so I had to get him. Only now him is a her, since I adapted the head and sword arm to a female Shining Spear body and added a few more accoutremonts to finish the ladyseer out. I have an 1850 build I want to try with the two farseers and a 4-warlock seer council, 10 dire avengers in a scatter laser/shuriken cannon wave serpent, 4 squads of 3 jetbikes, a vyper squadron with scatter lasers and shuriken cannons, 2 fire prisms, and a falcon with 6 fire dragons including a pike exarch (super bonus melta killzone lol). Not a super competitive build but zappy and fast enough to take a bite while I use invisibility and fortune to keep my own damage dealers alive.

 Here's the pair:

More 6th experiences

I was thinking what a letdown it was that there were no new fortifications released with the Chaos book, and how awesome and narritave-y it would have been for each new book to include a codex-specific fort. So much opportunity wasted! Chaos could have really been a chance to introduce out-of-the-box style fortifications, like a temple that could help units deep strike if another unit was occupying it or something (ie summoning circle). In other words, the potential for more interactive terrain. I mean static deep-strike assistance is not really game breaking... but then again GW took away Chaos' deep-strikey icons for infantry. And it seems like a very conscious (and obnoxious) decision to disallow any CSM/demons synergy besides the allies rule. 

Otherwise, I like the chaos book so far, though it made my particular collection a little tough to work with, but thems the breaks. I've really enjoyed playing a lvl3 tzeentch terminator sorceror with some tzeentch terminators to back up Abaddon. After the obligatory tzeentch power (preferably gift or doombolt), I usually start rolling on the telepathy chart. Either hypnosis or invisibility is my goal, but psychic shriek and the one that takes away fearless are not shabby either. I'm still using my old cults as troops, with 3 squads of chosen and one of thousand sons, along with some autocannon havocs and obliterators. Against balanced marine lists so far I have done extremely well, but I still haven't played Grey Knights with Abby yet, and I anticipate they would be tougher. Against xenos... I think I have lost one or two times, can't recall right this second. Mostly I have been creating a rhino corral and slowly advancing in the desired direction. In my experiences, Abby's 12" preferred enemy rule greatly enhances the obliterators and havocs at range, and all the other guys close-in. The rhinos are really for an assault speed bump, deep strike buffer, and portable cover more than mobility, but in a game where they're likely to get shot up first turn, I'll keep most of them empty so my troops don't get stunned into inaction when their cars do. Thousand sons practically beg to walk'n'spray anyway, and the khorne guys love to get in and start taking skulls rather than take 2 turns to get into a scrum - though since they have bolters, they do all right jumping out from a rhino than other assault troops. I actually like Chosen quite a bit with their full equipment loadout. With everyone walking, they can put out more long range bolter shots anyway. But like I said, most of my luck has been against balanced marine lists, and overall I would consider this mostly a "fun" army given its limited numbers and flyer defense.

I also started incorporating the aforementioned telepathy superstars into my Saim Hann build by including a second farseer to fly around with the seer council. Invisible fortuned jetbikes are the shit. Plus they have embolden to help reroll failed leadership tests, so getting the powers off is pretty likely. Also I've noticed fire prisms got a nice boost from the new rules for blasts against vehicles. The jetbike/skimmer eldar are not too shabby overall but can have trouble putting out damage if they take some key losses early.

Necrons would probably be my most competitive army right now, just based on their decent survivability and trick plays. The douche canoes seek out trouble better than a teen actor, so I typically use them to destroy or entangle the more devastating portions of an enemy force, while everything else hacks away at infantry and other scoring units. Obviously I can't complain about Night Scythes at all, and they make the double-despair-mark squad a great free safety against any death star unit trying to ruin my day. 

My Berzerker/Blood Angels have done ok. Longer charge ranges can only help these guys, given that I use mostly jump or bike infantry. You have to be more careful with a blood claw dreadnought; terminators will now stop these guys cold. Dante's still a beast and axe-wielding (ex)sanguinary guardsmen are great too. I think the blood angels rules still suit my berzerkers much better and more characterfully than the new chaos rules do, though I do like khorne bikers and raptors in the 6th ed chaos book. I just can't find the points for them.

Guard does just ok; I play 

Chaos 6th Edition Army

Here's my Black Legion Chaos army in it's latest 6th edition incarnation. Not a power army by any means but I like the fluffy fluff and it's something I can play right away without buying anything new. I played one game with Abaddon against Space Wolves and the preferred enemy and hatred did let them hang in there well. Still, losing one or two squads can hurt. For my particular purposes, I think Slaanesh and Khorne Chosen are just as good as Noisemarines (don't have any sonic weapon models, but I have given my pink chosen squad bareheads, mouthpieces, and modified their backpack exhaust ports to be big speakers), and the number of attacks they can put out is very nice. Obviously the army doesn't have much anti-flyer at all and would struggle against a heavy flyer enemy.

Here's the 2k list:

Abaddon

Sorceror - mark of tzeentch, spell familiar, +1 level, terminator armor

4 Chosen Terminators - mark of tzeentch, champion with chainfist, 1 powerfist, 2 power axes, 1 reaper autocannon, and 3 combi-plasmas

8 Thousand Sons + Aspiring Sorceror - power axe
Rhino

8 Chosen - mark of khorne, 2 meltaguns, champion with powerfist
Rhino

7 Plaguemarines - 2 meltaguns, champion with powerfist
Rhino

6 Chosen - mark of slaanesh, 5 flamers, champion with power weapon
Rhino

3 Obliterators

Defiler - extra powerfist, power scourge