Reinforcements have arrived!

Hurrah! I can now field a 10-man squad of Winter Guard! 11, if you count the beardy dude with the rocket launcher:

These guys just arrived from my regular source on eBay. I've also added a Berserker and a Man-O-War Kovnik to the force. Under the Butcher, the Berserker should do pretty well, as long as I keep Full Throttle up when it counts. But later, say, when I field Sorscha or perhaps at 35pts, I figure I'd better take a little of the focus burden off the casters and let the MoW Kovnik help out. Between his Jack Marshall and Drive, that's boosted attack and damage without spending any Focus - that's pretty big medicine with a Berserker. Not to mention the Kovnik is quite a brute up close himself...

Anyway, here are my current plans for the growth of my Butcher's army:

1) Man-O-War units: Right now, I'm loving the idea of having a wall of Shocktroopers with Bombardiers behind them, a slowly advancing, unstoppable wall of steel and shrapnel. So far, I've been using Assaut Terminators as Shocktroopers, but from what I'm hearing about 6th ed close combat weapons, I may well end up using Shocktroopers as Assault Terminators with Thunder Hammers and Storm Shields. The models just look awesome!

Forward, for the Motherland! Do well, and you may be allowed to proxy as Imperial Guard Valhallan Veterans with shotguns...

2) Winter Guard: Looking around on the intertoobs, it seems the Winter Guard Deathstar is one of those units that does well under anyone, notably my Khador casters of choice, Sorscha and the Butcher. So, that's a must. However, I'm also interested in trying out assassination by Icy Gaze and Mortars. Maybe later on...

3) Iron Fangs: To hell with them, at least until plastic models come out. I've nothing against the Iron Fangs, but models with big long pikes in metal? Yuck. IF plastic models turn up, then hell, yes. Otherwise, they're off limits.

Not done yet, but man, he looks mean...

4) Warjacks: Well, I'm still waiting to get my hands on a Battle Box, so there'll be a Destroyer and  Juggernaut there. All I'll ever need, really, of that type of Jack. The thing is, what about the Devastator, Spriggan or Demolisher? Those 3, I've opted not to touch them. Yet. Looking at the similarity in the chassis, I get the feeling that those 3 jacks are destined for a future in plastic. I can wait. That leaves 3 more jacks to consider: Behemoth, Kodiak, and Berserker. Behemoth, I won't touch because, frankly, I don't like the model. A metal model that big has no business prancing about on one leg. Kodiak, maybe. Berserker, maybe. I'll need a few more scraps to decide.

I know there's loads more to Khador I haven't looked at too closely yet, but for now I'd like to focus on building a solid 35 pt list and making it look pretty. After that, Menoth, then... well, who knows what 6th ed 40k will bring, eh? Til next time...

Army List: Blood Angels Double Deathstar, 1750pts

... or at least Double Deathstar until such time as I figure out a better name. Each time I've fielded this list, it's been an absolute blast. Here it is, in as much glory as I can manage with my camera and limited photography skills:

WYSIWYG with 5 pts spare. Searchlights for everyone!

Read on for the story of what does what...

Batrep: Blood Angels vs Vanilla Marines, 1750pts

In between games of Warmachine, I got in a game against Wong using my Double Deathstar list. Here's what I was up against:

Marneus Calgar
Tigurius
10 Terminators with 2 Cyclone missile launchers and some chainfists
5 Assault Terminators, two with Lightning Claws, the rest with hammers and shields
5 Scouts with sniper rifles, camo cloaks, a missile launcher, combi-plasma and teleport homer
5 Scouts with sniper rifles, camo cloaks, a missile launcher, combi-plasma and teleport homer
5 Scouts with sniper rifles, camo cloaks
Land Raider with  multimelta and extra armour

15 Terminators, 15 Scouts and a Land Raider, led by the most illustrious commanders of the Ultramarines. Egads...

Thoughts on Warmachine vs 40k so far...

Four games in and I see no reason at all to think Warmachine is in any way a bad investment. In fact, I'm more driven than ever to build a couple of solid 35 pt lists, now that the GW price hikes are driving more players in the direction of alternative game systems (read: Warmachine).

As the proud owner of (almost) fully painted armies of Grey Knights, Chaos Space Marines, Necrons and a shit-tonne of Blood Angels, I'm not terribly keen on abandoning 40k entirely. I practically grew up with 40k, drawn to it since the 1st edition of Space Hulk and White Dwarf issue 144, and in my eyes, no game out there can ever have a universe to match that of Warhammer 40k. That having been said, I've kind of reached the point where I've got an army for every occasion and, apart from some new Canoptek Wraiths and some paints, I see no reason to spend a penny more in GW's direction.

So how's it looking now? Let's see...

More 15 pt adventures...

... in Warmachine, of course. 15 pts won't get you very far in 40k... As yet, nothing spectacular, just Jin and I having a couple of small Kill-the-Caster games to get a better feel for the game and the factions. Here's how it went...

News from the GW front...

Just two little things:

1) Price hikes! Boo! Saw this on Bell of Lost Souls and man, am I glad I've already got as many Stormravens as I'd ever care to have.

2) THIS:

Looks... so... tempting! But no. Not yet, at any rate. At least not until I've pieced together my first itty bitty Khador and Menoth armies.

There's more fun pics, too, but I can't say I'm particularly interested. Stormtalon? F*** that, I play Blood Angels! And Ork flyers? I don't do Orks and neither does anyone at my FLGS, so sod that.

Anyway, that's it from me. Next post will, fingers crossed, be an unboxing...

USD8 for a Wreck Marker?! I think not!

... so I dug around the beautiful intertoobs for a bit and found this. A quick printing and a little literal cut and paste later....

Ta-dah!

Here's a closer look:

Apologies to Privateer Press, I love Warmachine and everything, but no way am I shelling out that kind of money to mark dead jacks. Here's hoping these markers don't see too much use, eh?

Weekend Roundup

Quite a bit of gaming done this weekend on two fronts: 40k and Warmachine!

Read on...

Omnijack!

Behold! Omnijack!

Okay, so I haven't gotten round to finishing the paint job, but I've been doing a lot of reading on this site lately and figured I might as well make use of all those lovely spare arms that came with the warjack. It's great! A little Blu-tack happily holds the arms in place, and I can take my pick between Marauder, Destroyer, Decimator and Juggernaught, just with a quick arm swap. Just need a couple more jacks and, apart from, say, Berserkers, Spriggans and Devastators, that's all the jacks I'll ever need.

The Butcher's humble beginnings...

Just a quick pic of my fledgeling Khador army:

Just a little line highlighting on the Decimator, then the base and he's all good for battle. I like how he's looking with those big shiny rivets. I'm still thinking about what to do with all those big, open areas on those armour plates, though.

The Winter Guard are coming along nicely, though I'm thinking twice about my plan to field a large mass of them with Sorscha, simply because I might well be too lazy to paint 2 full squads of them. Maybe 1 fully upgraded squad and some big guns? We'll see...

The Butcher and Friends!

Yay! Mr Lonely no more! Here he is, now with suitably deranged axe-wielding girlfriend and monstrous beast of a dog:

On a side note, I LOVE Mephiston Red! Red is now so easy! Stay tuned, the Decimator's coming up next. Probably not tonight, though... Here are some more angles:

Meanwhile...

Soon...

Khador WIP

Here's where I am now with my Khador force:

Manhunter (Manhuntress?)

Moar axes!

The Butcher's big horrible axe for casters and warjacks, the manhuntress' little axes for little men, yes?

 War Dog

I've decided the Butcher's dog will be black; a great horrible rabid hellhound to match the Butcher's own termperament...

Decimator

Blu-tack holds the weapons in surprisingly well. Alas, even a Khador warjack is too puny to make a passable proxy Dreadnought! Note the slight difference in the red. The Furioso is Dragon Red + a Baal Red wash. The Decimator is Mephiston Red + a layer of Blood Red. Will definitely put up another pic when I've got the red shaded and highlighted.

In other news, I'm *still* waiting for that Battle Box...

Moar Khador!

A package arrived! Not the Battle Box, but some Khador stuff I'd ordered to put together my first 20 pt army (which isn't quite straight out of the Battle Box). And it didn't quite arrive, I received a note from the mailman saying that since I wasn't in, the package was waiting for me at the Central Post Office. I was so excited I rushed over, snapped it up and sat down to assemble and spray them right away. Here's the Butcher with his new friends...

L to R: Manhunter, the Butcher, War Dog. Behind is a Decimator

I currently intend to play the Butcher in this 20 pt list:

The Butcher
Decimator
Juggernaught
5-man Man-O-War Shocktroopers
Manhunter

Why Decimator? I've no idea. I get a juggernaught and a Destroyer in the Battle Box (if it ever arrives) so I figured for my first few games I'd experiment a bit. Anyway, that's it for now. There's work that needs doing. Will update as I slap more paint on...

WIP: Bits and bobs

Just a quick update today on various hobby stuff. In other news, the Battle Box that I purchased from these guys.has yet to arrive, despite having been marked as dispatched on 31 March. I asked about it, having checked the USPS website with the tracking number provided, and was informed that "USPS sometimes does not scan in the tracking info". Most disappointing. It's just as well I've other projects to keep me occupied...