The Hobbit - Thorin and Bilbo

Thorin and Bilbo were both very fun to paint, the former had a limited palette with an emphasis on cool colours whereas the hobbit was painted warmly in contrasting colours. This makes the two characters distinct from one another and both paint schemes are totally unique from the other miniatures. With Thorin's Company and the Wizards painted I now had a horde of Goblins to paint which took what felt like an age. 

Thorin Oakenshield

Bilbo Baggins

Kill Team ressurgance?

Remember Kill Team? I do. Well, I remember it having two different incarnations: the original followed by the Battle Missions supplement. It's a pretty cool idea, a small team of specialists trying to outmanoeuvre their opponent, kind of the plot of a lot of films.

outmanoeuvre in the loosest sense

Is Kill Team any good now?

I hadn't had much to do with Kill Team really. I never owned the Battle Missions book so was never sure enough on the rules to give it a shot. Of course, the original rules were accessible so there was always that possibility. Usually, it's easier to set up a standard battle, at least in the case of the amount of terrain you need.

I used to hear a lot about how much Kill Team was loved. This was pre battle missions, I remember that book dropping and there being a great cry of how the mission was ruined. Forever.

But why...?

And that's the question I'd like to pitch. But Why?

Why did this ruin Kill Team?

Did this ruin Kill Team?

Well, it changed the mission. There's no doubt about that. This time no-one plays the patrols of enemy troops. There's no activation risk, no need to be quiet for risk of drawing down the horde of enemies. No special bonus upgrades to add flavour to your team. Instead, you pitch your own special team against an opponents. This way both people get to bring their own characters, their own personal hit squad. No nameless grunts this time. It's a different game. It's a different kettle of fish.

So why am I thinking about this? Well GW has been pretty excited about their new tournaments recently. Particularly their Kill Team ones. This tournament pack details the rules of Kill Team along with a mission (an objective based one). So I've given it a try. It's pretty fun. The half an hour limit is a good way of adding urgency to your turns and keeps the games short and sweet, you can pack a lot of them in. So with 200pts of 0-1 elites/fast attack/heavy support and 0-2 troops to play with there's a fair amount of choice. It's also very easy to set up and get going. You need few models, and not too much time to draw up multiple teams. What with the specialists rule giving squad members special rules to use there's also a lot of options contained there as well. It's fast, it's easy, it's varied. I've enjoyed it. How about you? Have you given it a shot?

Why has this popped up in tournaments if it's so much 'disliked'? Is it in fact more popular than I've been led to believe? I'd hope so. I bet with little thought you could adapt it to be similar to what it was. Could this lead to the rise of Kill Team?

The Hobbit - Balin and Dwalin

Balin and Dwalin are amongst my favourite of the dwarves so I decided to save them until near the end. Both were quite fun to paint; I decided to stick to quite a limited colour palette with them and Thorin to make the three stand out from the other, more richly coloured and varied dwarves of the company. Looking back the entire group could perhaps benefit from a little neatening up, something I think I will do when I base them. 

Balin

Dwalin

Techmarines: an alternative view

So I've been skimming back through my beloved Grey Knight book as a little break from my Space Wolf experimentation and a picture caught my eye...

Pretty darn cool I'd say

Now this got me thinking about the oft ignored techmarine. I'm not going to lie, it was this picture that did that entirely. The pencil sketches in 40k codices are some of the best artwork in my opinion.

So, why is it that the techmarine gets so little attention?

The Hobbit - Dori, Nori and Ori

These three were the only dwarves I was not looking forward to. I spend ages trying to get the right shade on Dori and I had to go out a buy some purple for Ori who for some reason I have taken a disliking to. Nori though I did enjoy painting. I think all three could have done with some small free-hand designs just to break up the solid colours a bit, unfortunately I am not very good with small details and didn't want to ruin a model by attempting something I know I can't do. 

Dori

Nori

Ori

Battle Rep: Wolfwing vs Webway 2000pts

So the Wolfwing take to the field again, this time against a pretty fun Deldar Webway based army fielded by Melons. It features a heavy hellion cohort (I'm a fan of Hellions, did I say?). It set up to be a pretty interesting match, we were both fielding very fast lists so it should kick off pretty quickly. Wolven savagery versus Eldar cunning. Which would win out?

Lists:

Deldar
HQ:
Baron Sathonyx - 105
Haemonculus w/Webway - 85
Haemonculus w/Webway - 85
Haemonculus w/Webway - 85

Troops:
10x Wracks w/2x Liquifier Guns - 120
10x Hellions - 160
10x Hellions - 160
15x Hellions - 240

Elites:
4x Trueborn w/2x Splinter Cannon - 68
3x Trueborn w/2x Splinter Cannon - 56
3x Trueborn w/2x Dark Lance - 86

Heavy Support:
Ravager w/Flicker Field - 115
Ravager w/Flicker Field - 115
Talos w/Stinger Pod, Extra Close Combat Weapon, Chainflails - 130

Dedicated Transports:
6x Venoms w/Dual Splinter Cannons - (6x65) 390

2000 Points

Wolfwing
HQ
Canis Wolfborn - 1 FenWolf
Wolf Lord - Thunderwolf mount, Thunder hammer, Storm Shield, Runic armour, Saga of the bear, 1 Fenwolf

Troops
15 FenWolves
15 FenWolves
15 FenWolves
15 FenWolves

Fast Attack
4 Thunderwolf Cavalry - 4 Storm Shields, 1 Thunderhammer
4 Thunderwolf Cavalry - 4 Storm Shields, 1 Thunderhammer
4 Thunderwolf Cavalry - 4 Storm Shields, 1 Thunderhammer, 1 melta bomb

First, the vital statistics:

Mission: The Relic
Deployment: Hammer and Anvil
Warlord trait(s): both warlords rolled immovable object making them scoring.
                           The Warlords were Baron Sathonyx and the Wolf Lord

So, this wasn't that bad for me, I got the best warlord trait I could as it meant I actually had something to seize the objective with. Hammer and Anvil wasn't great as it gave Melons a lot of space to retreat into with the Relic and he had the speed to get there quickly. Thankfully, Wolfwing is fast too so I should be able to catch him eventually. The real point of contention would be those Venoms, they were going to be a real pain to catch and they could throw out enough torrent to deal with any of my units. This would be tough as I would have to be very proactive due to the heavy firepower facing me.

The Hobbit - Bifur, Bofur and Bombur

Bombur was the first dwarf I painted so varies slightly from his kin by having a far cleaner look about him. Bofur and Bifur I painted at the same time as they had similar colour schemes. When I saw the designs for Bofur and Bombur I readily accepted them, Bifur however concerned me when I saw part of an axe lodged in his head. It wasn't too distracting during the movie though it did seem a little odd and perhaps unnecessary in my opinion. Anyway the models, like the others in the starter set, are all well detailed and movie accurate being an absolute pleasure to paint.

Bofur

Bifur

Bombur

The Blackwing Part 5 - Captain Absolom

The Mountain, Brother-Captain Absolom was a Hellcarian guardsman whose military prowess and talent for violence made him the Inquisition's chief enforcer. Born with gigantism; once made a space marine and encased in custom power armour Absolom towers head and shoulders above a space marine. His loyalty to the Inquisition overturns any other directive given to him and more then once the Mountain has ignored orders from chapter leadership to further the goals of an inquisitor. Much to the frustration of his superiors inquisitorial influence is slowly worming its way through the Blackwing under Absolom, making the Dark Angels unsure as to the loyalty of their successors.

Project:Wolfwing - first reflections

Sorry about the delay in this post, I ended up having a more exciting (busy) week than I was expecting and I had to skip my general blog writing time to do work. Apology done, I'll move on.


Project:Wolfwing is go and proving as challenging as I had expected. It's pretty fun trying to get this concept working even if I end up trying my hardest just to scrape a draw I'm beginning to get a grasp on how this list functions as a whole. It's the most difficult list I've used (even compared to my pure Grey Knight Daemonhunters list, and that had 18 models at 1000pts). It's the coolness of the list that makes me strive to make it work however...

Just look at that

Battle rep: Wolfwing vs The Hitty Squad (Deldar)

 The second battle rep between two (slightly) themed armies! We are trying to get a battle in per week so there MAY be a battle rep each week if we have the time/can be bothered. Anyway, onwards to the battle rep!

My list - a completely footslogging melee based list . . . with Drazhar!:

Deldar list 'The Hitty Squad':
HQ:
Drazhar - 230
Succubus w/Venom Blade, Shardnet and Impaler - 75

Troops:
10x Wytches w/Shardnet and Impaler - 120
10x Wytches w/Shardnet and Impaler - 120
10x Wytches w/Shardnet and Impaler - 120

Elites:
10x Incubi w/Klaivex w/Demiklaives, Murderous Assault - 265
9x Incubi w/Klaivex w/Demiklaives, Murderous Assault - 243
9x Incubi w/Klaivex w/Demiklaives, Murderous Assault - 243

Fast Attack:
3x Beastmasters w/ 5x Khymera, 4x Razorwings - 156
3x Beastmasters w/ 5x Khymera, 4x Razorwings - 156
5x Beastmasters w/ 10x Khymera, 6x Razorwings - 270

1998 points

The Euphemism's Wolfwing list was:

HQ
Canis Wolfborn - 1 FenWolf
Wolf Lord - Thunderwolf mount, Thunder hammer, Storm Shield, Runic armour, Saga of the bear, 1 Fenwolf

Troops

15 FenWolves
15 FenWolves
15 FenWolves
15 FenWolves

Fast Attack

4 Thunderwolf Cavalry - 4 Storm Shields, 1 Thunderhammer
4 Thunderwolf Cavalry - 4 Storm Shields, 1 Thunderhammer
4 Thunderwolf Cavalry - 4 Storm Shields, 1 Thunderhammer, 1 melta bomb

Mission: 5 - Emperors Will (One objective each)
Deployment: 1 - Dawn of war
Drazhar warlord. Rolled on strategic table and got a 6 (Princeps of Deceit).
Wolf Lord warlord. Rolled on personal table and got 3 (Master of Manoeuvre).
Deployment rolls:
Wolfwing - 5
Deldar - 2
Wolfwing are first up!

Deployment:

We decided to do random objectives and came up with this:
Wolfies objective - Roll of a 6 so thats a Grav Wave Generator (slightly useful if he could actually capture objectives)
Deldar objective - Roll of a 3 which means a Skyfire Nexus (completely useless)
Night fight is on a roll of a 6.
Deldar try to seize . . . and get a 1. Nice job boys.


Wolves Turn 1:

Mostly forward movement trying to stay out of Deldar assault range and shuffling up to get in the best positions.

Deldar Turn 1:

Shooting from Beastmasters sees 4 wolves from the blue squad die and 5 from the orange squad die. The orange wolves fail their leadership and run off the board with a 14" on 3d6 (we thought it was only 2d6 but we spotted this mistake after we took the picture. Oops!) ! Deldar claim first blood and give the beastmasters a pain token.
Green Beastmasters charge the blue wolves and wipe out the squad giving another pain token. Blue Incubi with Drazhar and the Succubus try to assault the pink wolves and just fail even with fleet.
First turn sees Deldar winning 4vp to 0 (objective and first blood).

Wolves Turn 2:

The pink wolves move back towards the Wolfies objective. Green Fen wolves and the red Thunderwolves move around the buildings to counter the threat from the large squad of beasts. The white and yellow thunderwolves shuffle up to get in better grenade range.
Grenades from the white thunderwolf unit and from the wolf lord into the green beastmaster squad see 1 razorwing flock and a khymera dead with one wound on another razorwing flock. Red thunderwolves attempt to throw a grenade at bright green beast unit and due to it being a very windy day, it lands on a Fen wolf but fails to wound.
White and yellow thunderwolf units charge the green beast unit. Bright green fen wolves and red thunderwolves both charge the large bright green beast squad. All unit successfully charge into combat.
Overwatch did nothing at all to the thunderwolves. Hammer of Wrath from the thunderwolves kills a Khymera. The beasts kill 5 fen wolves and put a wound onto a thunderwolf. The wolves kill 8 khymera and 2 razorwing flocks in return and the beast fail their leadership (needed snake eyes) and run 13" and almost off the board!
Middle combat. 5 Hammer of Wrath attacks of which 4 wound but thanks to 4+ invuns on my khymera, only one dies. My beastmasters call 2 challenges to tie up his two HQ's and both are accepted.
The beasts manage to take down a thunderwolf from the white squad with rending but get vaporised into a red mist in return. The wolf lord and canis units consolidate 3 and 5 inches respectively.

Deldar Turn 2:

General movement forward. The now diminished bright green beast squad rallied and turn back to the fight. The Succubus leaves the blue incubi squad and joins the dark green incubi squad. Wytches stayed put on the backfield objective.
Shooting from the rallied beast squad does 2 wounds to the red thunderwolf squad and therefore succeeds in killing one! The light blue beast squad shoots the white thunderwolf squad and causes a wound. Light green wytches shoot their pistols at the yellow thunderwolf squad causing 5 wounds and manage to kill the wolf lord's pet fen wolf. The remaining 4 wounds go onto the wolf lord and he fails one and then also fails to Look Out Sir! leaving him on 2 wounds. Light blue wytches run 4 inches forwards. The dark green incubi run 1 inch as they admire the scenery.
The light blue incubi attempt to chage the pink wolves again and once again, fail. The light green wytches charge the wolf lord and yellow thunderwolves, the light blue beasts charge the white thunderwolves and canis squad. The incubi also try to assault canis but fail. The light green beasts charge the red thunderwolves and get in on 3. All overwatched grenades fail.
The wytches cause no wounds and take 4 in return then fail leadership but get away. The blue beasts cause one wound and kill off the wounded thunderwolf. All 5 khymera die in return but the beasts stay in with leadership 4. The bright green beasts manage to kill 2 thunderwolves with a venom blade and rending and lose the single remaining khymera in return but the last thunderwolf stays in on a roll of 4.

Despite a lot of guys starting to die, Deldar are still winning 4 - 0!

Wolves + Deldar Turn 3:

Wolves turn 3:
Light green wolves shuffle forward slightly. Yellow thunderwolves slide through the gap between the incubi and the beasts who are in combat. The pink fen wolves retreat further into the table corner.
2 grenades fly into the light green incubi from the wolf lord and the yellow thunderwolves but do nothing. The wolf lord and yellow thunderwolves then successfully assault the incubi. The light green wolves on the right back up the lone red thunderwolf in combat with the beasts.
The light green klaivex makes an imperious gesture and therefore has preferred enemy against the wolf lord thanks to murderous assault and issues a challenge which is accepted. Hammer of Wrath promptly makes him go poof and joins the growing cloud of red mist that now covers alot of the battlefield. The other thunderwolves kill all but 4 incubi who fail leadership and consequently get run down. The light green beasts fluff all but one attack against the thunderwolf and fen wolves which then gets saved. The wolves then kill two razorwings and win combat. The remaing beasts fail leadership and get run down.

Deldar turn 3:
Deldar light blue wytches and light blue incubi run towards the objective. Light green wytches continue running another 5". Remaining beast squad rally. Drazhar joins dark green incubi squad. Some shooting happens but barely any wounds caused and all were saved. No assaults made.

Wolves Turn 4:

The remaining wolf squads leg it down to the Deldar deployment zone for as many linebreaker points as they can get. Pink fen wolves head down to cut the wytches off so the Deldar cant get any scoring units to their objective.

Deldar Turn 4:

The Incubi and yellow wytches take out the pink fen wolves and the blue wytches fall back slightly (not sure why - could have won me the game if i had played it better).

Wolves Turn 5:

Still more shuffling up into the far right corner just to make sure I can't get any lucky assaults or shots to kill anyone off.

Deldar Turn 5:

My top 3 squads leg it and try to make it up into the wolves deployment zone before the game ends. We roll for the end of the game and it carries on for another turn.

Wolves + Deldar Turn 6:

Wolves dont really have much they can do apart from bunker down and survive.
Deldar manage to get 2 sqads into his deployment area finally although not close enough to claim the objective. Bummer.

Game ends here at 6 all.
Deldar:
3 for objective
1 for first blood
2 for line breaker
Wolves:
All 6 points from linebreaker