Neglect!

Looks like I missed a week there. My bad. Not that I've been forgetting, I've just both been busy with other things and had not much to report.

No games since last time, but I've painted 10 Horrors and will be basing them next week after I've moved house. If D&D is at our new place this weekend I might get the chance to do them then instead, but we'll see. Without further ado, the Horrors:

In other news, I received reinforcements today in the form of the recently released models. Lots of chariots, Plaguebearers and other models. There's also a Soulgrinder in there and I got a surprise model that I'll post about after he's painted. So pretty.

I also got some more Bloodletters, bringing my total up to 80. Two hordes, muahahahah! I've written up some particularly evil looking lists, not all of them using the BLs, and I can't wait to use them. After this weekend I'll be living in something of a Warhammer hub, so the chance will be coming sooner rather than later.

As promised last time, the Herald and OOP Horrors:

As a closing note, I've added up all of the base points in models that I own. Without upgrades or gifts... over 10,000 points. Versatility FTW.


"I'm a beguiler. We beguile things."
      -Excerpts from last week's D&D character creation session

New Daemons

I managed to get my hands on the new White Dwarf Monday, thanks to my office moving exactly half a lunch break’s walk away from the local GW. Let’s go over the updates to the old models first.

Flamers will now no longer be taken by anyone in fantasy, except maybe as a joke. The multiple shots penalty now applies, which means a huge drop in the number of hits that they get in. Since they move every turn – because that’s how they work – they’re now hitting on 5+ instead of 4+ with no other modifiers, with cover/long range changing it to a 6.

After they do whatever damage they manage, you then roll a D6 and on a 6 they do D3 more wounds with no armour save. Sounds good? If it’s a 1, then the enemy gains +1 to their regen save for the rest of the game. Instead of being able to chip away at the ranks of a huge block of enemies, I would now avoid it on the possibility of improving my enemy.

Their strength has also been nerfed from 5 to 4, and the points raised by 5 per model. They’re now also special rather than rare. More on the reasoning behind all of these changes by GW later.

Screamers have been changed completely from an annoyance unit to flying combat. They’ve retained their slashing attack, but it’s been nerfed. They can only hit one unit rather than several and do D3 hits which hit on a 4+. So on average that’s 2 shots which then goes down to 1 hit, making it exactly the same as before. The nerf comes from the hit now being S4 rather than S5. Their buffs are pretty good, now having S/T4, an extra wound and 3 attacks. Wounds against large targets now multiply out to D3.

They’re now 10 points more expensive, which is justified. The upper unit size cap has been removed, so I've had evil plans of 50 Screamers advancing as a wave over the enemy. Joy.

As with everything from GW, this release is all about money. They have released some fancy and expensive new models as the Slaanesh Chariots and have introduced the Soulgrinder to fantasy. Since Flamers were taking up the rare points that these need, they were nerfed into oblivion and then moved to special to free the points up. To make things even more profitable, the Soulgrinder is unchanged from the 40k release except for a new base, so GW gains the income of a new model without the cost of a new mould. They’re releasing new Screamer and Flamer models at the same time, which was initially a bit confusing considering that nobody wants Flamers any more, but I’ve heard they got better in 40k.

Anyway, on to how the Soulgrinder is the new must-have unit. He’s T7 with a grapeshot cannon as standard, and can move 8” and shoot. When he gets into combat a single model in base contact takes an initiative test or is hit automatically by the 4 S6 attacks. For a bit extra he can swap all of his attacks for a S10, D6 wounds attack. He can be upgraded to have a stone thrower, flame cannon or bolt thrower -with the bolt more expensive for some reason- in addition to his grapeshot gun, firing one of them per turn.

Word around the internet is that he’s about worth his points, which is a relief considering the track record of fun but overpriced monsters. Looking at you, Beastmen.

The other new models are the Slaanesh Chariots which come in 3 flavours. The basic chariot is now S4 instead of 5, but can be taken as a special, rather than just a Herald mount. The Hellflayer takes it a step further and uses an Exalted Alluress who gains an extra attack on the charge for every unsaved wound caused by the impact hits. There’s just one chariot box which can be used to make either of these.

If you’re feeling particularly unhinged then you can combine 2 chariot sets into an Exalted Seeker Chariot, a nasty piece of work with an Exalted Alluress, 4 Daemonettes, 4 Steeds and 2D6+1 impact hits. It can be taken as a Herald mount as well, displacing a Daemonette. This one has 8 wounds instead of 4, but is still S/T4. It doesn’t come cheap, but I want to try it out anyway. On closer inspection of the rules, the Exalted SC doesn’t give extra attacks to the Alluress. Hopefully that’s just a typo, but it certainly dims the shininess of that choice.

As far as I know, these are the only chariots to have riders on the mounts pulling them, granting the ESC a grand total of 16 attacks on top of impact hits without the Herald. With a Herald it’s 18 attacks, 14 of which are ASF and 4 of which are poisoned.

While I could bitch and whine about the Flamer nerf and the blatant money grab by GW – and have a bit – I’m not going to any more. Overall this update is a good thing for 2 reasons. The first is that my lists were looking a bit samey and I’m glad to have more variety to play with. The second is that when they rewrite the Daemons book they’ll look at the changes that they made and be able to adjust them again - got to sell those new Flamer models, right?

In the past week I've finished the old Horror models and done my second Tzerald. I'll get some pictures up eventually, but for now I'm busy with another 10 Horrors.

Change

It’s never been so good to be evil. Rumours, leaks and teasers have been bouncing around the internet of new Daemon models being released next month with a rules update in White Dwarf; for the first time in over a decade I will buy a copy.

Considering the lack of decent pictures available I’ll keep you entertained with a couple of pictures of the OOP Horror models I’ve been working on this week. The musician:

Some of the new models are plastics of old metal models (new, not recast in finecast – thank god). Plastic Flamers, Screamers, Nurglings and Plaguebearers are included in here, and I think I saw something about Fiends, Beasts and some heroes and lords as well.

Flamers and Screamers are allegedly getting a rules update (nerfing one and buffing the other). I would hope that Plaguebearers would be getting updated too - no point in releasing the models if there’s no great reason to buy them.

Someone started a rumour of Bloodletters being nerfed to S3 with great weapons. Word is that it’s just someone making stuff up, but unless it were accompanied by a decent price drop then it would just be ridiculous. Plaguebearers are supposed to be the slow ones, damnit.

The big excitement is the new additions to the army. First of all: Soulgrinders. They’ve been around in 40k for a while and I’m a bit torn on them. On one hand we have a new big gribbly thing, which is awesome. I’ve liked the model since I first saw it too, and even considered buying one just to paint it. On the other hand it doesn’t fit too well aesthetically with the rest of the Daemons army (although Juggernauts seem to have gotten away with the mechanical look alright). I’ve heard that he’s going to be something like T7 with 5 wounds and the option to act as a stone thrower or grapeshot. Purely from the look of the model I’m expecting him to want to get into combat too, so hopefully they aren’t move or fire weapons. He’s going to need a massive base I think. Apparently the GDs were too hard to hit with a cannon.

If it comes with the option for giving it the mark of a God, then I may just have my excuse to buy a Plague Hulk from Forge World.

Oh yeah, here’s my Horror champion:

A bit of a blatant reminder of the bad old days where they could only produce practically 2D models, isn’t it? There’s a tail that I can attach but I’m not a huge fan of the look of it.

Now for the actually new new model, which is a Slaanesh chariot. It might be a 2 model kit (like the Empire got with the Luminark/Hurricanum) for a regular style chariot and what is being called a Hellflayer. It looks a bit like a Seeker-drawn combine harvester, which is just a beautiful concept for me. It harks back to the good old days in GTA: San Andreas when I drove farm equipment through crowded streets. Fun times. I’m expecting it to work like a chariot with extra impact hits or something, but having it damage enemies by moving through them like the current Screamer/Hexwraith rules would be pretty epic.

I’ll be saying more once I get my hands on the White Dwarf this weekend. TBH I don’t care if they do what people who still think it’s 7^th ed. want and nerf Daemons back to hell. Doing so through a WD update gives them time to test out the changes before a new army book so anything that goes too far can be switched back (or anything that doesn’t go far enough can be taken further).

I’m not good enough at writing lists or playing at the moment to be able to limit the strength while remaining viable in a battle, so a nerfed army where I can bring whatever filth I want and have no complaints would probably be good for me.

Whatever the outcome, this is ideal for me: getting an update after long enough for me to have an opinion on the changes without taking so long that I get bored with what I have.

I was getting worried too; it’s been more than a week since I made a frivolous purchase.

A final word: non Daemon models rumoured to be release next month include recast finecast High Elves and Beastmen and an all new Great Bray Shaman model. I’m not seeing many people bothering with the finecast considering the cost and quality problems that we are all too familiar with being applied to old models, but the new stuff might be worth a look.

"Somebody once asked could I spare some change for gas,
I need to get myself away from this place.
I said yep, what a concept,
I could use a little fuel myself,
And we could all use a little change."

-All Star by Smash Mouth

Deployable

Right. That's done.


























I've left 2 standard bearers just holding poles for the moment; they'll be finished off when I paint some more rank and file to replace them.

Last weekend was mad fun. A 2000pt battle with 1200 of O&G on one side, 1200 of Beastmen on the other, and 800 each of Nurgle and Khorne to help each of them out, respectively.
Rolling dawn attack resulted in some epically bad deployment, with everything being deployed to either the centre or each side's left. We rolled a civil war (Garden of Nurgle, and General dies, you lose. We made this the non Daemon generals since they had the bigger armies.)

Highlights of the game:

• Bad chariot placement (too close) got it charged by Nurglings, tying it up and eventually killing it
• Herald of Nurgle and his unit charged a Ghorgon and got Miasma of Pestilence off, obliterating him without taking a wound
• A Bloodcrusher failed a march test 7.5" from the Mangler squigs. Next turn he got in and nobly sacrificed himself to save the Gors, taking like 11 wounds.
• HoN unit overran the Ghorgon into Flesh Hounds near a Shrine of Sigmar. Wards re-rolled but regen didn't. With Miasma still up, they didn't stand a chance. Overran again into Minotaurs. Miasma got up again and made them break from combat, getting caught.
• Bloodletters ran into some conga River trolls, killing them.
• NG bus and Gor bus got into combat in the middle of the board. Nets were used to great effect and they whittled each other down.
• HoN unit got into the back of the Gors and Miasma again worked to great effect. A devestating round of combat left them with just a couple of ranks left. Double ones miraculously kept the game going.
• Bloodletters charged the side of the NG. Savage Beast of Horros went off from the Greater Bray Shaman. Goblins netted themselves. Black Orc Boss declared a challenge to try to save himself from Bloodletter Killing Blows. Herald of Khorne graciously accepted.
• Horros and Firestorm Blade had the HoK at S10 with 6 attacks. Got 6 hits. 1 Killing Blow. Despite all that the Nurgle forces did (and the Beasts side being down to Bloodletters and Beast characters), it was a victory for the Beasts and Khorne.
• After that combat, the Plaguebearers stayed Steadfast by a single model. Had he died, they would have mostly exploded.

I made it sound like a very Daemon-centric game there. Thanks to the bulk of the O&G army being in one corner and some poor luck for the Beastmen with Miasma (it really shouldn't have gotten through that many times), it kind of was. Particularly with Daemons taking the rear and flank of the main units of each army at the end.

Frankly, I'm just surprised how I remained impartial through the entire game.

"Man, fuck Daemons."
   -Jolly 

39 Bloodletters, Full Command

No, I'm not done yet. Currently waiting on the glue to dry on the first layer of basing, and the standards are just black for now.

Even so:

Going through a bit of a mad scramble to get them all based tonight because they'll be fighting tomorrow, I just need to stick a few rocks on and then build up the snow before I stick them on. It's so much easier before the model is on the base.

I'm looking at alternate methods of putting washers in the bases since the superglue is doing an appalling job. Contact glue is my next step, so we'll see how that goes.

Exactly what is happening tomorrow is a bit up in the air right now. If we have the numbers then I'm considering an army swap tournament. Here's the pitch:
Everyone writes a list for their army to whatever points. Armies are then distributed randomly with nobody getting their own army (and ideally no direct swaps). Opponents are then determined randomly with nobody facing their own list (so nobody will try to write a deliberately bad list).
At the end of the day, you add up the amount that you won your game by and the amount that your list won its game by, and the highest total is the winner.
The idea is to get a bit of absurd teamwork going on, where the person whose list you used wants you to win, but you want them to lose because they're facing your list.

I'll probably do a rundown of the day by early next week. One thing I know I won't be doing again is painting my entire bread and butter unit at once. Empty bases aren't very intimidating.

"They gave him a medal,
They caught him shaving his hairpiece,
They locked him in confinement, wild like a banshee with a blade"
    -Chunky Chunky Air Guitar, by The Whitlams

No ordinary rabbit

My bad, I wrote this on Wednesday and forgot to post. In addition to the below: the semi-official ruling is that characteristic test templates force 2 tests on mounted characters, each at their own values. Maybe my methods of dealing with dragons don't need to be as convoluted as the one I used last weekend.

The Game (damn, I just lost the game)

I played a very mean list last weekend, and I feel a bit dirty because of it. It won’t be used again in a friendly game anytime soon.

The game was against High Elves including a Prince on a Star Dragon, 2 Lvl 2 mages (Light and Beasts), 50 Spears, 2 units of 16 Swordmasters, 20 Archers, some Dragon Princes with the BSB and a couple of Eagles.

I, on the other hand, had the stock 39 Bloodletters, 4 units of 4 Flamers (2 with champions), 3 single Fiends, 5 Furies, 21 Daemonettes, 10 Horrors, 2 Tzeralds (Shadow and Life), a Kherald, a Slerald and the Masque. Oh yeah, and Cyrus as a L4 with a couple of gifts that he never got to use.

His mages got Wildform, Kadon, Shem’s and Banishment, while Cyrus got Stream of Corruption, Pit of Slime, Shrivelling Pox and Plague Wind.

Turn 1

He got first turn and moved his dragon to hide from Cyrus and everything else. The Spears, DPs (ok, an army having one unit called Dragon Princes and also being able to take a Prince on a Dragon. That’s unhelpful for battle report writing.) and Swordmasters moved forward, while the second Sword unit garrisoned a farm and the Archers stayed put behind a fence. The Eagles, of course, got in my way.

Magic went terribly for him, rolling a miscast with 4D6 on Banishment. This killed one and a half Flamers (I rolled 3 saves from 6 wounds, then rerolled all of them; nice.), while the resulting Dimensional Cascade killed all but one Swordmaster in the unit and took away the Light Mage. Shooting wounded a Flamer from another unit.

My Daemonettes charged an Eagle with the Siren Standard, preventing the flee. One Flamer unit garrisoned a building while the Bloodletters got into the other one. Everyone else generally moved up, with the Furies redirecting the DPs.

Magic was pretty shocking. I rolled double ones and failed to get the Pox onto his Prince. Still alive though, so I can’t complain. Shooting was nearly as bad, with a wound on an Eagle and a couple of Archers and Spears dead. Combat saw the Eagle annihilated.

Turn 2

Poor judgement by me had the Flamers charged by the Spears, with a potential overrun into the Masque. With little other choice, DPs charged the Furies. The Prince flew out of the charge arc of Cyrus while maintaining a view to him and the Daemonettes. Swords left their building and the lone Sword got out of my Fiend’s charge arc.

After seeing what happened to the Light Mage, the Beasts Mage decided that failing to cast Kadon was a suitable alternative to miscasting, and promptly did so. A couple of shots did next to nothing and the DPs shredded the Furies. Crucially, the Spears only got one model in contact with the Flamers and despite fighting in 4 ranks, only killed one.

Despite movement being what you could refer to as the reliable phase, I failed 5 Leadership tests for marching or reforming. Daemonettes turned their back to the Swordmasters (with a Fiend redirecting) and moved toward the Prince. Bloodletters abandoned their building and everyone else moved toward their targets with the exception of the Horrors and Tzeralds, who reformed and got away from the Prince.

Magic went almost exactly according to plan, getting Mindrazor on the Daemonettes with the unfortunate side-effect of a Cascade killing the caster, while the Masque danced at the Prince. Shooting took out the second Eagle and a few Archers. Combat killed the Flamers, with the Spears reforming.

Turn 3

Part 2 of Operation Kill the Damn Dragon came into effect when the Slerald used her Siren Song on the Prince. He charged while the DPs went after some Flamers, with the effect of the DPs partially blocking the Prince’s charge, contacting 3 models instead of 4.

Magic saw Wildform miscast on the Dragon and a successful Kadon. Shooting was minimal once again. Mindrazor worked to great effect, taking 6 wounds off the Dragon. If Wildform weren’t on and the Prince could maximise it would have been quite dead, but as is the 7 extra attacks plus Thunderstomp won him the combat.

Bloodletters moved an inch away from the Spears. The uncovered unit of Flamers moved behind the Archers.

Cyrus hit the Spears with Plague Wind, somehow only getting 16 of the 50 despite T3. They fled, leaving 5 Nurgling bases in their wake. Archers were shot down to 4 left, but passed their test (a fail would have been awesome, taking their Monster Mage with them off the board). The Dragon finally died to a couple of sixes from me and 3s from him. I won combat there, but he held on Ld 5.

Turn 4

Swords finally got the charge on the Daemonettes’ rear after clearing the Fiend, sealing their fate. DPs moved to charge the Horrors next round, while the Mage-dragon flew away from the archers. Spears reformed.

In magic I dispelled Kadon, which let him Wildform the Swords. Combat saw my Daemonettes die to a combo of combat res and stabbing.

Flamers left their house and the Tzerald got away from the Horrors. Nurglings got out of the way of the Bloodletters, who moved nice and close to the Spears again.

Magic didn’t achieve much, although I hit the DPs with Awakening of the Wood. This did nothing. Shooting finished off the Archers and whittled down the Swords a bit.

Turn 5

DPs charged the Horrors and wiped them out, choosing to reform rather than overrun. Prince joined the Swords. Mage re-Kadonned.

Bloodletters charged the Spears and the Flamers moved over to the Swords. Cyrus charge-blocked the DPs away from the Tzerald.

Magic was very effective, getting Stream of corruption onto the DPs and taking out 4, Followed by Pox on the BSB, finishing him off. This unfortunately removed enough models to open the Tzerald up for charging again. The combo of the Masque’s dance and Flamers made the Swords and Prince flee dangerously close to the edge of the board.

Spears directed most of their attacks at the Kherald, not getting rerolls and therefore only getting 2 wounds in, which I saved with the armour alone. The horde and Kherald did enough wounds to break Steadfast, making the Spears flee off the table. I then reformed to face 3 Swordmasters and the Prince.

Turn 6

Despite a difference of opinion on the 25% rule, the tiny unit reformed an inch from the table edge. Princes charged the Tzerald. I dispelled Kadon again, then used the spellbreaker to prevent Wildform on the tiny Swordmaster unit. Again, he transformed. DPs slaughtered the Tzerald and overran into the flank of the Bloodletters.

For my final turn, the Flamers moved to shoot at the (now a Hydra) Mage and the last Swordmaster of the Cascaded unit, who had been buzzing around the table all game. Cyrus moved right next to the Prince and his buddies.

Magic had further dancing at the Prince, followed by a Stream of Corruption. They fled off the table. Flamers killed off the last Swordmaster and did a second wound on the Hydra-Mage who would have died to a dispel if we weren’t at the end of turn 6. Three DPs did next to nothing against the Bloodletters, and a Killing Blow knocked them down to 3.

There we go. An epic game and I rolled a 4 on resolution, so his army is destroyed (until the end of the season. Which is almost now. We still have to resolve injuries and the victory and defeat tables, which we will get to next time. The end of season event will be coming up shortly, which should be mad fun.

So 4 units of Flamers, Siren Song, Masque, Siren Standard and Despair Banner. In the interest of fairness, I won’t be using that particular combination again. Except when I really really feel like I need to. The sight of elves failing leadership tests is particularly entertaining though.

Sorry about the lack of pictures, I’ll post one up of my Bloodletters when they’re done. Here's the right now though:

"Run Away!!"

     -King Arthur in Monty Python and the Holy Grail

(Re)Basing Nurglings and airbrushing

I'm getting bad at doing this weekly, can't imagine how things will be during the move...
Not that I've been just sitting around, 6 more Nurgling bases are done and I redid the snow on the first few as well.

May as well do a basing tutorial thing now...

Start off with the base, sprayed white with primer.

 I then grab a suitably dirty brown colour and paint the area where the Nurglings will be sitting. Filthy Brown from the Vallejo game colour set was my base, then Dead Flesh was slopped randomly over the brown to give a bit of contrast.

 After that some teak wood stain and varnish mix (the same stuff I use for dipping) is generously applied with toothpicks. I've already made one old brush into a solid lump, no reason to do it to another.

 Aaand now I stopped taking photos. Generally speaking, I put the Nurglings onto the varnish while it was still wet (that stuff sets rock hard and holds like glue) then left them overnight. I found a few little bits of crushed rock to glue down and add some variety to the snow, then mixed up some bicarb with some PVA glue, sticking it over the rest of the base.
Bicarb gives a much better finish than the GW snow flock for about 10% of the price. It makes some very nice lumpy snow too. A coat of PVA over the top holds it together well, then some matt varnish after it's dry takes away the shine.
There were a couple of gaps between the slime and the snow that I filled in with more wood stain. That stuff is amazing. A once over with a permanent marker around the edges makes the base look much nicer in the end too.

I got out the airbrush last weekend with mixed results. Overwatering the paint was my first mistake and I managed to clog the nozzle after that. A quick clean later things sped up. I added more paint to the mix, which mostly fixed the water problem, but I'll just have to learn from that next time.

 I just did the basecoat on the Bletters with air, and I've now done some shading and detail manually. Here they are as of now, all 29 of them (really need to find that last one sometime).

 Fighting High Elves this weekend with Cyrus, facing a dragon. Balesword much? Maybe, maybe not. I rolled 550 extra points on my mines, which nudges me just above the "grand army" minimum. Fun fun. Unfortunately 24 Flamers cost 900pts with champions, so I can't get too ridiculous. Shame too, I just want be able to say that I've done it.
Never got to fight Empire, which is a bit unfortunate. I was hoping he'd bring a Hurricanum so I could annoy him by singing "Rock you like a Hurricanum" whenever he moved or used it.
Eeevil plans have been forming in my mind this week, but I can't seem to think of anything that I want to do with my Keeper. Probably ask the guys if I can swap him/her/it for Kairos, or more reasonably, my new Lord of Change. I can only think of a couple of evil plans with him, but that's better than the relative lack of interest in the Keeper.

On a final note, I've been coming up with custom rules and tournament ideas again. My birthday's in a couple weeks, so maybe I'll be able to convince people to give them a go around then.

Hopefully my next update will be within the next week, although I doubt my Bletters will be done by then. Probably do a battle report.



 "The night is calling
I have to go
The wolf is hungry
He runs the show
He's licking his lips
He's ready to win
On the hunt tonight
For love at first sting
Here I am, rock you like a hurricanum!"
 -Rock you like a hurricane, by Scorpions and bastardised by me.