Another Chance

So now that I've completed my first two days of work, I have a better idea of what things are going to be like.

Updates

Yes, this is one of those "post just to post" posts. I haven't been able to get a whole lot of painting/building/hobbying done lately due to real life stuff (two kids, wife, job stuff, etc), but I'm going to lay out the projects I'm working on and their progress so far. This also lets me know where I stand (and it's a quick-reference I can check on my phone lol, as my blog is enabled for web browsing now).

Blood Angels:
I started work on a 2,000 point list via my club's 40k Escalation League, and I believe I posted the contents a few months ago. There's 4 Las/Plas Razorbacks, 4 Predators, and a Stormraven in it. Sure, the list is not original, unique, or inspiring, but it surely is competitive and has won me many games (including scoring a SUPER CLOSE draw against the guy who won my store's Feast of Blades tournament). At the moment I have three Razorbacks and 15 Assault Marines primed bright red, and I've started painting black on the details of one of the Marines as a test model. Unfortunately, I still need roughly 8 Plasmaguns so I can convert the turret of the Razorbacks, and I need to do a LOT of work on my regular Predators as the sponsons have broken off tons of times over the years. Also, when I primed my Razorbacks red, there was a bit of shrinking and wrinkling of the paint in certain areas, apparently due to a chemical reaction between this new Army Painter primer and some old GW red primer. Isn't that awesome? Now I have to sand off that garbage and re-prime the spots. I'll post WIP pics later.

Tyranids:
I was in the process of painting up my bugs for Tacticon and GenghisCon, and since then my bugs have been horribly mistreated. I've played a TON of games with them, and unfortunately I don't have foam to store them in so they bounce around in cardboard trays and a tackle-box. Someday I'll purchase a shit-ton of foam from Battlefoam to store them in, and it'll be sweet. Until then I think I'm just going to have to be super-careful with them. Anyways, as I said a few posts back I've been really interested in using alternate units including Lictors, so I think I might work on building (and painting) a 2,000 point Tyranid list that doesn't really include the normal copy-paste stuff. I think I'll have a LOT more fun with it, and hey, if I win some games with them then that's even better. :)

Dark Elves:
They are still in-progress, don't worry! I have 40 Corsairs, 24 Crossbowmen, 10 Black Guard, a Hydra, a Supreme Sorceress, a Dreadlord, a Master, and a sorceress built. All I have left to do is roughly 30 more Corsairs, 12 more Crossbowmen (though I'm going to have 6 of them made as unit fillers because I actually don't have 6 more), 10 more Black Guard, another Hydra, and a Cauldron of Blood. I'm easily over half-way there, and my wife is making things WAY easier by cleaning everything ahead of time by de-spruing the models and bits and shaving off the plastic and metal flash. Fairly soon, I'll have 3k of Dark Elves fully built and ready for some kick-ass battles.

Cygnar:
Unfortunately my FLGS hasn't got in ANY of my preliminary Cygnar stuff (tokens, faction deck, etc), so I'm kind of stalled-out on them. Once the job situation gets figured out, I'll be able to start picking up little things here and there from other stores, but for now I'm waiting to use my store credit on the stuff I ordered, if it ever comes in. :(

So, stay tuned, I'll have pics of my WIP models up soon. Life is kickin me in the ass right now, and time is a very valuable asset at the moment.

3,000 points - Dark Elves

I've been putting together my Dark Elf models, and making sure I have a WYSIWYG 3,000 point army (I just randomly have the urge to play a larger force than 2,250). So far, here's the list I've been thinking about running (and I plan on play-testing it this weekend if I can get everything built):

2,996 points - Dark Elves - Lore of Shadow

LORDS
Dreadlord (General, Crimson Death, Armor of Darkness, Pendant of Kaeleth, The Other Trickster's Shard)

HEROES
Sorceress (Level 2, Talisman of Preservation)
Sorceress (Level 2, Null Talisman (3), Ironcurse Icon)
Death Hag (BSB, Cauldron of Blood)

CORE
Assassin (Touch of Death, Dark Venom)
14x Repeater Crossbowmen (Musician)
14x Repeater Crossbowmen (Musician)
14x Repeater Crossbowmen (Musician)
20x Corsairs (Extra Hand Weapons, Command)
30x Corsairs (Extra Hand Weapons, Command, Sea Serpent Standard)

SPECIAL
20x Blackguard (Command, Banner of Murder)
5x Cold One Knights (Command)
5x Cold One Knights (Command)

RARE
War Hydra
War Hydra

Blog-In-Progress

Well, that con was AWESOME!

I didn't do so well (37th out of 70), but I had a lot of fun and I was lucky enough to get a game in with the guy who won the tournament (Andy Shellenbarger, an Ork player believe it or not) as one of my five games. Overall, I'd say that if my con experiences keep continuing in this fashion, I might just have to spread my wings and hit up other major cons like Adepticon or even Wargames Con.

In the mean time, my LGS's Fantasy Escalation League has started playing games at 1,000 points, and my list was quite successful!

I ran the following....

GenghisCon starts TOMORROW

With everyone in panic mode for the con (or at least that's the vibe I'm feeling at my LGS), I'm really excited to see all of the events and games that will be going on this weekend! Genghis is supposedly larger than Tacticon, and this year I've got my Digital Camera (10MP, 5x Zoom) and my new Samsung Epic 4G Galaxy S phone (5x Zoom, 720p video capable) to help me document the whole thing! No more crappy cell phone pics (with "crappy" being a descriptor of the phone)!

Also, for those that actually read my blog, Fort Collins War Party has the 40k missions up for this weekend's Rogue Trader Tournament, so make sure you visit their site and familiarize yourself with the scenarios!

In other news, I've been working on my 1,000 point Dark Elves roster for my club's Fantasy Escalation League, and I think I've got something truly nasty.

• Sorceress (General, Level 2, Seal of Ghrond, Power Stone, Lore of Shadow)
• 10x Blackguard with command
• 21x Corsairs with command (extra hand weapons, ranked 7-wide)
• 12x Repeater Crossbowmen (ranked 6-wide)
• 12x Repeater Crossbowmen (ranked 6-wide)
• War Hydra

I definitely don't have any dirty tricks to pull off, but I do have some solid units here. Not sure where to stick the sorceress either but that is the whole point of the League, to learn as I go.

And finally, my part one order for my Blood Angels came in, so I went ahead and ordered part two which consists of:

• 12x boxes of Death Company (for 30 walking assault marines, 20 more jump marines, and 10 vanguard)
• 2x boxes of Sanguinary Guard (can be used for assault squad sergeants, and I'll have enough of them to run that hot new Apoc datasheet)
• 3 "Sanguinary Priests" from GW's site
• A pack of Meltaguns
• The Sanguinor

I'm pumped with all of the GW stuff I've got to work on, but I've also got the Feast of Blades tournament to run/attend on the 5th of March.

This spring is going to be CRAZY!

General Update

GenghisCon 2011 is less than two weeks away, so I have ramped up the amount of models I'm painting daily to ensure my 1850 pt Tyranid list gets finished before the tournament. I won't be changing my list all that much from the Tacticon version, but the good news is that my playtest games have gone fairly well.

Also, I have made part one of the final purchase of stuff for my Blood Angels, and here's what's on it's way:

• 2 Stormravens
• 2 Furioso Dreadnought kits
• 2 Razorbacks
• 3 Baal Predators
• Lemartes
• Astorath the Grim

I already have two Furiosos and two Baal Predators, but what this order will allow me to do is field six predators (three regular and three Baal) and be able to switch between Furiosos, Furioso Librarians, and Death Company Dreads. How I'm going to make the Dreadnought parts interchangeable is another story...

And now on to Fantasy. My club has been successfully running 500 point games of Fantasy for our Escalation League over the last few weeks. While several people (including myself) have yet to paint their minis, we have at least had regular attendance. The week after the con, we are upping the points level to 1,000, and we are also introducing Magic without the 6th-level spells (for now). I learned a lot playing against a Lizardmen player who was running Temple Guard and Sauruses, and I plan to have more of a tooled-up force to be able to combat builds like that.

In other news, I made FIVE MORE YouTube videos a few weeks ago so make sure you check them out at www.youtube.com/sonsofsanguinius.

Thanks for stopping by and stay tuned for update pictures of my Tyranids!

The Dark Elves are coming!

So I've begun construction on the army (and am working on it as I'm typing this), though initially I am building up to a 500 point level as my club is going to start an Escalation League after the new year.

Here's the list I'll be using:

497 Points
Core
22x Corsairs with Extra Hand Weapon (Musician, Standard Bearer, Sea Serpent Standard)
12x Repeater Crossbowmen

Hero
Master (Extra Hand Weapon, Heavy Armor, Sea Dragon Cloak, Pearl of Infinite Bleakness)

So, I'll attach the Master to the Corsairs, and use the Repeater Crossbowmen to mitigate any flanking nonsense or soften up a big block of troops before they make it to my Corsairs. By having the Pearl and the Frenzy banner, my Corsairs will have one extra attack AND will be immune to psychology. I think this makes up for the fact that I'm only bringing 35 models to a 500 point game, but hey, it could be worse. The Corsairs wills strike at Initiative 5 and since I'm ranking them up 7-wide, they'll have 25 WS4 S3 attacks plus 4 WS6 S4 attacks from the Master (at Initiative 7), all re-rolling failed rolls to hit in the first round of combat (thanks Eternal Hatred).

On a side note, I didn't include a Reaver in the Corsair unit because I knew I was going to attach the Master, and honestly I can't justify spending 10 points for one attack when there's a character already in the unit.

So, we'll see how it goes, and I'll be sure to post updates soon.

It's an Army!

So I've made the plunge! I have finally purchased my Warhammer Fantasy army of choice, the Dark Elves! Here's what I purchased:

• Dark Elves Army Book
• GW's customizable Movement Trays
• Dark Elf Battalion
• 20 Corsairs
• 16 Repeater Crossbow Warriors
• 12 Spear & Shield Warriors
• 5 Cold One Knights
• 10 Corsairs
• 16 Repeater Crossbow Warriors
• 5 Cold One Knights
• Dreadlord
• Sorceress on a Cold One
• Hydra
• Lokhir

Also, next Friday I plan on purchasing the following:

• 40 Corsairs
• 20 Blackguard (with command)
• Cauldron of Blood
• Assassin
• Dreadlord on Cold One
• Hydra

Also, I'm putting together a Fantasy "escalation" style league at my local game store. I'm hoping I'll get between 4 to 6 participants so we can end up with a couple of people who will have fully painted Fantasy armies in a couple months time!

More to come, including pictures of the Fantasy emo Elves in progress...

A little bit of everything...

Wow, just looking back at the blog posts I've made over the last few months, I've really dropped the ball on updating this thing. I started covering Fantasy 8th Edition and the games I was going to be playing while learning the new system, and I was going to have hobby store reviews after the Collectormania incident. Also, since then, I have played in two tournaments and another event at a convention AND I hosted and played in a local tournament.

I guess I have a bit to put into this blog, and I'll start by giving my opinions on the Dark Elves AND coverage of the convention I went to.

Part 1 - Dark Elves in 8th Edition Fantasy

 So far, I've thoroughly enjoyed running the Dark Elves. Though I was proxying with D&D miniatures at the time (hadn't picked any actual models up yet), I was able to learn a lot about how the army operates and learned their strengths and weaknesses pretty quickly, both in combat and in unit efficiency. I discovered I really liked Corsairs, and a close second would be Wyches. I'm not a fan of Reaper Bolt Throwers, regular Dark Elves, Cold One Riders, and Har Ganeth Executioners. In my opinion, the book really supports an "in-your-face" assault-oriented play style (with hints at competent defensive play as well), and Corsairs, Wyches, Hydras, Blackguard, and Cauldrons really epitomize this motif.

Here's a list I've been running at the 2,250 point level:

LORDS
Dreadlord (Whip of Agony, Armor of Darkness, Pendant of Khaeleth, The Other Trickster's Shard)

HEROES 
Death Hag (Cauldron of Blood, Battle Standard Bearer)
Sorceress (Level 2, Power Stone, Seal of Ghrond)

CORE 
30x Corsairs (Command)
25x Corsairs (Command, Sea Serpent Standard)
16x Repeater Crossbowmen
16x Repeater Crossbowmen

SPECIAL 
20x Blackguard (Musician, Standard Bearer)
War Hydra
War Hydra

Now, I found that while I have only 8 "units" on the table, each one hit like a sack of bricks! The Cauldron of Blood really is the catalyst that holds the army together, as its ability to grant either a 5+ Ward Save, +1 Attack, or Killing Blow is invaluable (when used at the right time). Honestly, having an army that hits first (Initiative 5) with re-rolls to hit in the first round of combat (Eternal Hatred) is awesome. Then, giving that army special abilities like Frenzy (from the Sea Serpent Standard) and Killing Blow (from the Cauldron) backed up by a Sorceress who is reducing characteristics by using the Lore of Shadow, is awesome.

I will be picking up my Dark Elves in February, and it will be the first army where I will force myself to paint a unit before I can use it. I'll go one unit at a time until I can field small forces (and continue playtesting and learning) and then before I know it I'll have my 2,250 point list ready to go to tournaments!

Part 2 - Tacticon 2010 Coverage 

Apologies, as unfortunately my sweet Digital Camera was being repaired during the event, so most pictures were taken using my phone (which admittedly does have a 3MP, 10x zoom Camera).

Click HERE to read Day 1

Click HERE to read Day 2

Click HERE to read Day 3

Enjoy!

And my Fantasy army of choice will be...

When I first decided I was going to play Fantasy (at the end of 7th), I thought Tomb Kings were going to be a really cool army. I looked at their army book and the models and ended up not liking them at all (I mean seriously, what the heck is up with the "Chiquita Banana" Tomb Giant?). Later, the Beastmen got a new army book and yet again my interest in Fantasy was sparked. They got a whole new line of stunning miniatures but again, after looking at the army book I was disappointed with the number of units (Ungors, Gors, Bestigors, Centigors, Minotaurs, and the Pumbagors and that's it).

And now, with the release of 8th Edition, my interest has yet again peaked with Dark Elves (after seeing several pictures of the army on one hobbyist's site). Some of the factors that helped me decide which army to play were:

• The actual sculpts of the models
• The number of units and options available to that army
• Was this army going to be the "Tau" of Fantasy

Now sure, it's plainly obvious that Dark Elves are a nasty, and even top-tier army, but I didn't know that when I made my original decision. They fulfilled all of the requirements I had, plain and simple. They look sweet, there are enough different builds to be nearly in the double digits, and they're at least competent.

I plan on picking some up soon, and I will keep a progress report going on them as this will be the first army I plan on buying then painting unit by unit!