The Bandwagon? (or the new Dark Eldar)

Wellll... Gamesday UK is finally upon us and so are the long awaited pictures of new Dark Eldar models... Lets just assume that you have all see them and that we all generally agree how awesome they are.

GW needs these to be a slam dunk business wise for the bottom line. I expect that since the models are so good that the rules will be horribly nasty to match and really boost sales. That is just the old GW salesman in me speaking.

I have had two DE armies over the years (one being my really averagely painted wyche cult that I did really well with years ago). I have had a really soft spot in my heart for the little bondage freaks since I was given a kilo of free DE metal models when I first interviewed with GW (right after they came out... half the bag was unreleased models... imagine GW doing that now!).

I recently went back through my stuff and discovered I had the makings of a new wyche cult army. I assembled 40 and with the help Mr. Cousins painted all to a really nice standard. We left the hair and cloth strips across their chests unfinished as that is how I will eventually mark squads (and I don;t have the new book to know how to build each unit). Now... last night I see these...

The new wyches...

AND!!! THEY ARE PLASTIC!!!


Now I really like the new models BUT they do not match my wyches at all... I happen to love the old wyche models... WITH A PASSION! So that being said as I am fairly committed to the old models... I think that is where I will stay for now. Which is alittle sad BUT saves me a crapload of cash.

Something I will be getting into is a big old pile of these:


Move over Jabba I am carjacking your skiff... I really like the new raiders. I mean I really do. I very happy that I have some gift vouchers to burn come November. I am really curious to see what bases are used. I anticipate that the valkyrie base will be the go but you never know.

Now back to the picture at the beginning of this:


I want to know what the dudes with the long white hair and the glowing arms are... The ones that are on either side of the lord...

Ooooooo.... I really hope there are piles of new armylist entries to mess with. I really like how the tyranid book had what felt like thousands of extra units. I hope they went this route with DE. Only time and GW can tell...

B

A Perfect 100...

So as many of you know I played in heat one of the Warhammer GW run Conflict Tourney. Since 8th just came out it was open to all players not just beginners. I have 11 games under my belt after today. Anyway... Took daemons...

I walked in with 10 out of 10 for comp. GW said they were being soft of comp on purpose for beginners. Most people had 10 out of ten.

Game 1 Vamp Counts. 1 of my units of bloodletters are through a zombie unit to eat his skeleton horde while the other letters ate his general and grave guard block. Fiends ate his hounds. Flamers and blue scribes AND horrors helped out and pretty much wiped out the ghouls.... I tabled my opponent with little return. Zeke was a hell of a nice guy. I had a run with a great rolls.

Game 2... Vamp Counts again... a blur that looked alot like the game before but I flame/shot/ magiced his vargulf off the board before he came to me. Bloodletters are AMAZING! My letter champion killing blowed his vamp lord. Same result...

Game 3... Dwarves... He had three units of thunderers, 2 cannons, and two big units of warriors. He almost shot me off the board. We were playing the standard mission. I was able to barely get half a unit of bloodletters, a herald into combat. I flanked with blue scribes and rear charged with a fiend. I was able to challenge his rune priest and killing blowed him. The rest of the units did a crap load of combat res... He failed his test... Game over. His list was uber hard to beat but he did not have the banners to win. This is what I mean by missions leading comp in this edition.

In the end I did not drop a point. Full comp, painting, sports and battle.... I scored a perfect score... I have never scored a perfect before... I am dumb founded and really happy.

I have to defend this next weekend using the same list. My painting will never win... However... I am thinking if I re sculpt the rest of my army I can take my eyeballs and maybe get conversion points?

Have to think about it...

My Conflict 2010 List

So GW is running Conflict events in support of their WFB range this and next weekends in Melbourne. There are three general events that feed into one final on the 3rd of October. True Conflict is for beginners but the Melbourne crew has lifted this as most players are clueless in 8th (at least compared to 7th ed).. My heat this Sunday is full of veteran players who (I assume, like me) are looking for extra practice in 8th for future play.

As discusses earlier my Tomb Kings look pretty but are rubbish to play with. I have been busy the last couple of days repainting my wyche cult with the help of my buddy Chris soooo I needed an army in two and a half days. Thankfully I have a half painted DOC list that is entirely painted at this point. While I did not play DOC at Axemaster last weekend I did see some people playing them there so I can only assume they are still a feasible army. I wrote this with Chris's help while we painted and it is based on what models I have/ have painted. I am hoping it will work together as an army.

Anyway... This is what I have...

Heroes
Blue Scribes (81) 81

Barbarik… The Bezerker
Khorne Herald (100) Armour of Khorne (15) 115

Ballick The Bloody
Khorne Herald (100), Armour of Khorne (15) (General) 115

Core:
The Bloody Skulls
19 Bloodletters (228) Full Command (30) Icon of Endless War (25) 283

Brozen Death
19 Bloodletters (228) Full Command (30) Icon of Endless War (25) 283

Secrets That Kill
10 Horrors of Tzeentch (120) 120

Rare
The Firestarters
4 Flamers of Tzeentch (140) 140

Thing Number 1
Fiend (55) 55

Thing Number 1
Fiend (55) 55


Total: 1247

Axemaster Recap (quick)

Well. I took Tomb Kings to a local 2500 point tourney on the weekend. You know it is a bad sign when you walk in and the TO calls you a fool for playing with an obsolete, weak army. OUCH! To be fair though... Tomb Kings are horrible. I lost the first and third games by a marginal level. I drew my 2nd and 4th games. I won my 5th game (more on this in a minute) and was massacred in my last game.

Tomb King magic is pretty decent but incantations don't gain levels of the casters soooo everyone was dispelling alot of what I was throwing at them. Which since TK cannot even march with incantations made for a hard time. The Casket helped because them people would hold dice to stop that letting me get off a charge here or there. Still I could be really speedy but when I hit it was just not enough. Skeletons just don't cut it anymore. The unit of 50 was a good tarpit for a a couple of turns but a lack of dominant magic really hurt my ability to capitalize on that.

I got best comp at the tourney even with the casket and three liche priests. I think that says lot about my army.

I was really please though that I was about to draw and almost draw so many games. I basically fought hard for the draw in every game. I was a aggressive as I could be but there was so much hard stuff out there that I just could not compete.

Now, as promised, the game I won was the banner mission. I really like that certain missions in fantasy now require you to think hard about them when building your army. I played High Elves in this game and my opponent had 6 banners. He then stuck his general (worth two) mage dude out in front in a large unit of lothern seaguard. I hammered that unit with my catapult, ushabti, and my giant. I was eventually able to wipe out the guard but the general got away. Thankfully he rallied in a nice bit of line of sight with the catapult and we played catch with a large magical flaming boulder. I win. Meanwhile my banners (BSB, General and Tombguard...) all huddled together away from archer spam and played the defensive game until he came to get me but by then I won the game. New tactics and army design is a good thing. It breathes life into the game and forces people to think outside the box.

In any event my tomb kings are going back in the box until the new book. (anytime now kids!)

B

P.S. My old friend Chis Cousins is back from living overseas and he is helping me to complete a half finished project I am VERY excited about. Hope to have lots of good photos tomorrow!

I'll give you a hint. An army of some of the best HTH fighters in the game. One of my old lots loves...

My End of the Deal (A HUGE Blood Angel Army)

So a few weeks back. I traded a large army of sisters of battle and steel legion models (all unpainted) for a full painted Blood Angel Army... I got the box in the mail on Thursday and I have to say... I am pretty happy.

This is what I received:


Captain

Chaplain with jump pack
Chaplain in power armour
Librarian in power armour

Librarian in terminator armour
Apothecary/sanguinary priest with jump pack

Death company with jump packs (plenty of power fists and power weapons)
Death company with rhino (plenty of power fists and power weapons)

4x 10 man tactical squads, each with flamer, sergeant and rhino
2x 10 man assault squads with rhinos (no jump packs)
1x 10 man assault squad with jump packs

7x extra veteran sergeants with alternative close combat weapons eg power fists, one with lightning claws, another jump pack.

2x twin linked lascannon attachments to convert rhinos to razorbacks


7x man Terminator squad
10x man scout squad
7x Heavy/special weapons marines

4x bikers, sarge with power fist, one with melta gun
Attack bike with multimelta

2x vindicators
2x whirlwinds

Land raider crusader
Predator annihilator
Predator Destructor
Baal predator with two turrets - flamestorm and twin linked assault cannons

Dreadnought with assault cannon and ccw
Dreadnought with twin linked lascannon and missilelauncher
Death company dreadnought





Not everything is painted to the same standard although it is generally close. The tac squads and some of the assault marines are highlighted but not shaded. I am hoping that this is something that I can fix with minimal repainting. The squad markings are all transfers which is a personal thing of mine. Not a good thing. While these transfers are perfect some are old and are lifting off. I am thinking about painting over the transfers by hand and using them as a guide. We'll see...

Anyone have any good ideas?

B

Overall Shot of my "Alien" Tyranids

Had a few requests for an overall shot of the army that won Eastcon a month back...

You can find the list in previous posts by clicking on the Tyranid tab on the right side of the page.



Here is another shot of my big hole digger (taken at the same time)...




I got a huge box in the mail from Sydney last night. The contents of which are my side of the large trade deal I had going on a few weeks ago... Opened it last night... IT IS LIKE CHRISTMAS!!! Picts in the next 36 hours with the beginnings of my write up of how I am going at Axemaster with my Tomb Kings... (which I also just finished last night... WHEW!)

The resurrection of an old hobby...

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away I was a fairly successful radio DJ in New Orleans (for 6ish years in the late nineties). My radio handle was Skabrad and when I retired my handle online became skabradisdead... Since that was when I started using online forum... That became my online name...

I played ska... Reggae... Rocksteady and some punk. I LOVED IT! But I never made a career of it.

My wife has been spinning trance for a few years now. Much more seriously lately than before. Soooo she has inspired me... My buddy Drew (whose ogres have been seen here) and I are getting together to spin the old ska and other fun and my wife is coming along to keep us in line...

Anyway...

For the 40k lovers out there... Here is a blast from the past...

The largest Space Wolf you have ever seen...

Rough Pictures of the Rest of my Tomb Kings

Well I haven't been able to get into the local shop for well lit, nice photos of the rest of the Tomb Kings but I thought that for now I would post some shots of what I have been doing. Please keep in mind that the lighting is CRAP!

Starting with my Tomb King and BSB: The king is a converted Blood Bowl Mummy as I thought the regular GW Kings and princes looked to "wimpy". The BSB is fairly straight forward except that I used a smaller banner top since he would not rank properly otherwise.



My Liche Priests: Once again I really didn't like the GW standard models so I converted an empire wizard and the head off of a blood bowl skele. I then used the top of the mounted liche priests staff to TK him up... The mounted one uses the legs off of the earlier mentioned mounted Liche Priest and the torso off of a flagellant. I rounded him out with bitz and bobz off the wizard sprue (empire). I really like how he came out. I will get better shots soon as his cloak is really cool looking in proper light.



The other Liche Priest on the Casket:
OK so I cheated.... I ran out of time and I am using my converted corpse cart (when I run this army as Vampire counts)... Once again, Empire wizard with BB skele head... Good times...



Eventually I will convert a "walking" casket ala The Arc picture from Indiana Jones...

Catapult:
I was going to run this as the straight model but GW did not include the arm in my kit... I do have 18 unassembled chariots though... Solved...




Big Boney:



Love that model... Might have to do another one soon...

B

Green Bones?

So I have been feverishly painting my Icon Bearer and Screaming Skull Catapult for this weekends Fantasy Tourney (Axemaster). I thought I would tray a new bone recipe since my other recipe while awesome takes years to paint.

I started with a black spray and painted Deneb Stone for a base.
After letting that dry I added a Devlin wash. Let that completely dry.
I went with bleached bone after that followed by bleached and skull white 50/50 with small pure white highlights. Works the treat.

Well... I was up late painting under my crappy lamp only to wake up the next morning with a greenish catapult. I had used rotting flesh without noticing. Under my lamp it looked very bleached but in sunlight... Green.

Moving to a space with much better lighting I highlighted the rotting flesh with the 50/50 bleached and skull white and highlighted up from there.

In the end I really like how it came out… Piccies soon.

US Studio Chaos Dwarf Army

So it's Friday so I thought I would add a little fun and post pictures of an army I had for years. It was the US studio Chaos Dwarf army but they got rid of it when CD's were discontinued. I had been doing alot of work for the studio at the time so I ended up with it. Here are the pictures... I added paint to many of the models (read as most) adding details and fun bitz (and fixing chips and breaks).

Here are the shots:

Starting with the Hobogoblins...








The Bull Centaurs:


The Dwarves themselves...




War machines and HQ's






I have an almost entire new army half painted waiting for a new list. I really do hope that Forgeworld does a new list. Then my evil beards will strike again!

Have a great weekend gang!

My Axemaster Army List

So I have been told that I will be the only Tomb King player at Axemaster this year (a good local fantasy tourney). I think that says alot about the perceived power of the army book. Hey I am probably going to get my head kicked in BUT it should be fun. Axemaster is run by the Hampton Club who always put on a good show. Anyway... Here is my list...


Lords:

Tomb King
Dragonbane Gem, Fencer's Sword, Glittering Scales, Shield
He hangs with the Tomb Guard and with items requires a 6 for most troops to hit in HTH. If he gets flamed as Tomb Kings are prone to do he has a 2+ ward save. He will be running at anyone with a flaming banner. :)

Heroes:

Liche Priest, Hieretic Jar, Skeleton Horse,
Runs around boosting ushabti and chariots where they need it.

Liche Priest, Casket of Souls
The minus 1 for enemy casters is huge. Also helps me to get other incantations off since it is hideous with TLOS in 8th and people will save dispel dice to block the Casket.

Liche Priest
Lives need the bowmen and the catapult

Icon Bearer, Sword of Striking, Light Armour
Hangs in the horde of skeles..

Core:

3 Tomb King Chariots, Standard,

40 Skeletons with Light Armour and Shields, Full Command
With Banner of Undying Legion
(these guys never die... It is awesome!)

20 Bowmen and Full Command

Special:

4 Ushabti

25 Tomb Guard, Full Command

Rare:

Screaming Skull Catapult
Never used on before. But hey stone throwers are great in 8th and this one can first twice with incantations.

Bone Giant



I know everyone thinks that Tomb Kings are rubbish but I am giving them a go. I will take any tactical advice anyone wants to throw my way...

NOTHING TO SEE HERE!

Sorry guys... Had trouble sending photos to someone I am making a rather large deal with... So I am posting the pictures of my unpainted steel legion and sisters...

Starting with the steel legion... here is the discussed fanatic legionaire I mentioned... I also found some old cadian stuff with an old yarrik I am throwing in for fun

CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE!







And the sisters... The painted ones are not included in the count and are free extras... I also found an extra hvy bolter and a backpack that is added...