1000 Ork/Dark Eldar: Long Live Team Krump & Hump

     Tabletop Game & Hobby, my FLGS, held a 40k team tournament last weekend. Each player brought a 1000 pt list with no allies and 1 fortification between the team's players.

Big Mek KFF
1 Dakkajet with extra shoota
2*20 Boyz with BigChoppa/BP Nob
19 Boyz with PowerKlaw/BP Nob
3 Battlewagons with Big Shoota, Deffrolla, Red Paint

     My battleplan was to drive the battlewagons up a flank as fast as possible Turn 1. Turn 2 would be tankshocking with deffrollas and throwing fistfuls of shoota boy dice. My Dark Eldar partner and I would deploy to appear as a battle line, but he would quickly zoom over to my side in order to run a refused flank. I brought the durable troops, while he brought the anti-tank and harassing units.

     My Dakkajet "Da Shootiest" was my MVP as it put the hurt on 2 flying Daemon Princes and gave me some much needed quick dakka.

     Deffrollas didn't accomplish much since I didn't roll to hot with them, but they provided a much needed threat. I want the wagons to keep being a threat even after the boys are out of them. Thus, the rollas keep the wagons scary. Red Paint is also worth it. It helps with assaults and gives extra range to shooting.

Game 1: Blood Angels/Orks
     I deploy like a git, which allows a Dread with a melta to droppod down and melta one of my wagons. The updates to vehicle explosions is all vehicles explode at Str 4. This kills lots of boys...I run the other wagons forward to capture 2 objectives. We win this game.

Game 2: Necrons/Chaos Marines
     I deploy right on the edge of the left flank. Two 10 man flanks deploy right across from me. I fear being glanced to death, but I move up 19" in order to get a Turn 2 assault. One Wagon gets wrecked, which is preferable to exploding. Wagons serve their job if I can get 20 boys into a scrum without losing any Turn 2. We draw this game because I cannot finish off a single Plague Marine, so I can't contribute to a fight with a Necron Overlord.

Game 3: Chaos Marines/Chaos Daemons
     We face off against 4 flying monstrous creatures, and I cowardly place my wagons as far away as possible. I get a bunch of lucky shots off on the daemons and they fail Grounding tests. This misfortune opens up the door for shoota boys to lay down the hurt. This game becomes very one-sided as my partner and I have wiped all of the big daemons off the board after Turn 3. We win this game.

Final Record: 2-1-0

     Our team (Krump & Hump) ends up being Best Overall, so we win a shiny gold medal. Our perfect sportsmanship score and very high painting score allows us to barely squeak out a victory over a very close running.

     TL;DR: Orks are best.

1000 pt Battlewagon Rush Team Tournament

     I have a 40k team tournament coming up and my partner is Dark Eldar. We each have a 1000 points to build a single FOC list. I want to run Kan Wall, but I haven't had much luck with it in 6th. Thus, I am running an AV14 wall to rush forward.

The above is a WIP of 2 of my wagons with my KFF Big Mek Cyclork conversion. I had more fun painting the yellow one since it comes out so much more grungy. Plus, I spray primed it yellow, so it was easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Here is my list.

Big Mek KFF
1 Dakkajet with extra shoota
2*20 Boyz with BigChoppa/BP Nob
19 Boyz with PowerKlaw/BP Nob
2 Battlewagons with Big Shoota and Deffrolla
1 Battlewagon with Big Shoota/Deffrolla/Boarding Plank (To swing the PK)
990 points

I have ten points floating, which could be used for 2 more big shootas on the wagons or Cybork (5++) for the Big Mek. I could drop the Boarding Plank and run 2x Big Shootas on all wagons, but they will most likely be screaming forward full speed, so will only be there for weapon destroyed results. It kills me to not run Power Klaws on all of the Nobz, but I think the Deff Rollas are more important in the Team Setting. My Dark Eldar partner has plenty of Anti-Tank. The one Power Klaw is mainly there to absorb challenges, but I don't plan on getting out of the wagons unless a juicy CC presents itself.

Thoughts?

It is silly but the message on his fist, makes me giggle. Also, notice the red starter button for the KFF. I imagine a grot following him to pound the button as projectiles explode against the KFF.

Class Dismissed.

Ravenwing, Scouts, and HQs: Space Shark Style

     I am slowly adding my reinforcements from the new Dark Angels book to my Space Shark terminators. Here are 2 squads of Melta and Multimelta bikes with 5 Scouts with a Missile Launcher.

     Here is a Sargent with a MicroArt Steam Knight head.

     Here is my bike librarian and techmarine, with a gun ol' gun for funsies.

     I messed up my Scout sarge's eyes, so he got professional wrestler style face paint.

     After doing it about 80 times, I can freehand a pretty mean shark.....

Cheap and Easy Space Game Mat???

   
 Found a bunch of pictures from the Hubble telescope site. Science! Next, I went to a vinyl banner site, Banners on the Cheap, and picked out one that would look good on a 3 foot by 3 foot square.

It is in the mail, now, so I will report back with pictures when it shows up. The website even has a gaming section for printing your own role-playing mats. From my research of other bloggers, players have even used dry-erase markers on them since they are made of vinyl. Handy dandy, Mandy!

If the mat is nice then this opens up the Pandora's Box of gaming tables. I could....
1) Print a Blood Bowl pitch
2) Print streets for an urban table of Infinity or 40k
3) Print an ocean mat for Dystopian Wars
4) Print costumes dungeons for role-playing

Oh, the potential. I hope that the image that I selected is not of too high a quality, so the details don't get washed out with the brightness. We shall see, readers, we shall see.

Class dismissed.

FFG X-Wing Ship Repaints: Revenge of the Painter

     Got 2 games of FFG's X-Wing Minatures today. Two buddies of mine opened up the Pandora's Box of painting X-Wing ships. I washed the X-Wings with GW Nuln Oil. I washed all of my Imperials with GW Blue wash to make them blue. I repainted the Firespray and used a sponge with Vallejo Grey-Black and GW Silver for battle damage. Finally, I painted engines on all of the ships.

The far left is a stock X-Wing, where the two on the right have been washed.

 

       I really cannot give this game enough praise. It is very fun and captures the feel of the Star Wars universe. Don't download the Android Star Wars dice app because it is rubbish for $4.99. I do like hearing Admiral Ackbar yell "It's a trap!" every time I go to roll dice with the Rebel sound pack though.....

     The games 2 strong points are the maneuvering and character combos. You have to really thing through your turns, especially with the activation order and bumping into other ships, which causes you to lose your action and make you unable to shoot what you bumped. The character combo is the list creation process. There are some really fun combos to be made by combining character abilities with weapon upgrades. It makes the game very fresh, but not in a sense that make sit unbalanced or broken.

 I wanted my TIEs to be blue!!

Bolt Action - Sikh (British) Army

     I am following my Flames of War decision of playing Indian Sikhs in Warlord's Bolt Action, a 28mm WW2 system. I find the Sikhs' look unique on the tabletop, and I admire their religion's goal of fighting oppression and injustice. Their mission explains their willingness to volunteer for military service in WW2 even though The Sikhs couldn't stand by and let innocents be killed. Amazing in my eyes.

     Sikhs can be found in almost every battlefield of WW2. A Sikh RAF pilot even took part in the Battle of Britain. This rich history will make it possible for me to field my army in Africa, Italy, or Asia.

     The picture above shows some Sikh in Monte Cassino at the Gustav Line, which they played a role in. My game group and I are forming our forces around this encounter. Thus, I will be running Sikh foot soldiers backed up by Canadian Army (Sherman tank).

     Warlord makes a batch of Sikh heads, which I am placing on my British infantrymen. Here is my first assembled figure that I will experiment with for a paint scheme.

     The Sikhs were famous for the courage on the battlefield.

     I am intrigued how this soldier has camo-netting over his dastar (turban).

Warriors of Chaos: New Book, First Thoughts

     Picked up the new Warriors of Chaos army book for WHFB. Here are my initial thoughts since this has been my main army since the start of 8th edition.

     The Marks of Chaos have all been redone. A hero/lord must have the same mark as the unit it joins. This ends the era of min/maxing marks for the most part, but I welcome the change.

Slaneesh - Auto-pass any Fear, Terror, or Panic test.
Tzeentch - Gain a 6+ ward save or improve the existing one by +1.
Khorne - Model has frenzy.
Nurgle - Enemy models have -1 to hit you in close combat.

     Right away, Nurgle seems to be the most interesting mark and good synergy with Chaos Warriors since hitting them on 5s, having 3+ armor, 6+ parry, then possibly Regeneration from the Nurgle lore seems nasty. The Nurgle lore can also further lower enemy toughness and WS, so I am seeing connections there.

     As much as it pains me to admit, Tzeentch magic is terrible now. If you hit a unit with magic with Warpflame property (all of the spells), and the enemy unit passes a toughness test, they can gain Regeneration (6+) or improve their existing regen by +1. If they fail, D3 enemy models take hits with no armor save.

      There aren't any indications that Warpflame is a flaming attack beyond fluff and the spell names. Thus, I expect your enemy to be recieving lost of regens, especially against armies like Ogres. Luckily, Tzeentch sorcerers can take Lore of Metal instead. Tzeentch approves of turning your enemies to gold, yes?

      A single great weapon Khorne Marauder now costs 11 points. Gone are the days of 50 lumberjacks chopping down the enemy. This was an expected change. I am now looking at possibly running small squads, maybe 20 man with flails, to back up a Chaos Warrior block.

      All of the monsters are really playable except the Slaughterbrute, which is ho-hum in its rules. Hellcannons surprisgingly got better. They now have a 5+ ward save and all of their attacks are magical (shooting, close combat, and stomps). Trolls lost their magical vomit, so I will no longer chunder rainbow puke on ethereal models. Throgg is beautiful in both his model and rules, but not his price ($58). He is worth it, though.

     More to come, but this is just a snapshot from my first night of reading. Overall, the army is very different, but more balanced and flavorful. There are a variety of options to choose from.