...in which I discuss painting Bretonnian Heraldry

Now that I have fended off the Lesser Daemons of Nurgle, it is time to delve back into the world of painting.

I will confess, when I chose to play Bretonnians in WFB, I let my professional world collide with my hobby. You see, I am finishing my degree in history, and to keep it short and to the point, my specialty is Medieval Europe. I also do a lot of research into geneaology, and with that comes heraldry. So, not only do I now all the symbology, I know how to research particular family crests.

My own families coat of arms:

This lends itself well to such an army, as a way to personalize my army, and to have some real pride and sense of connection to the army.

Painting the heraldry is easier than you think. Take a look at my Knight of the Realm Gallant.

All heraldry will have 2 primary colors, with a thrid color to use in a minor capacity. My family's heraldy is relatively simple, being only 2 colors and 2 gold bars on a blue field with a gold bend(diagonal). I'll go into more detail below about how to do custom graphics for the heraldry in a bit, lets stick with the design first.

Just like painting anything, you should work from light to dark. I have a heck of a time working with white and yellow, they just seem to disagree with me. I started by priming the sheild gray, then completely pinting the shield Vomit Brown. Then I built up painting the entire shield yellow, to ensure that would be a bright and vibrant color. Next, I masked off the bars and bend. Tamiya does make some model masking tape, but I just used regular blue masking tape I picked up from Home Depot's painting section. I just cut the tape into small strips of the desired size with my hobby knife. Once that was masked off, I could paint the blue part of the shield, and it was done. Rinse, repeat 4 times on the horses coat.

Now not all coat of arms are as easy. 

This is the coat of arms of the royal family of England. Queen Elizabeth & Prince Charles family. Even in miniature, this coat of arms would be possible to do.

 The easiest way would be to put it thru photoshop, and print it on water slide decal paper. Testors makes 2 kinds, clear & white, and they are readily available at your local Hobby Lobby, Michael's or craft store. BE CAREFUL. You must also pick up a can on decal bond spray, to lock the image in place! Otherwise, the ink will disintegrate when you put the decal in water.

I prefer to use the clear paper, then I can overly they symbols on whatever color field without having to cut too close to the image. For something as complex as the Windsor coat of arms, I would actually go with white, and print the whole image. 

I hope this makes heraldry a little less intimidating to paint, regardless of whatever army you play.  If you are interested in looking into your own family heraldry, you can visit House of Names. Their search engine is pretty good, but of course individual familes crests and arms will vary depending on about a billion factors, so it is not 100%, but it's a step in the right direction.

... in which I am visited by Nurgle

In my usual tradition, the damons of Nurgle brought me the plague on New Years. Every year this happens, without fail. Granted, it's just a head/chest cold, not the actual plague, but it is enough to lay me up, and ground me to the couch for a few days.

On the positive side, this gives me plenty of time to contemplate what my next group of tasks will be in the hobby world.

I still need to finish up my 2nd Bretonnian Lord on Hippogryph conversion, and I still have the bulk of my Bretonnian Army to paint.

I was also able to pick up some Necron units as well, so I have those to work on as well.

I have 52 troops for a Death Korps of Kreig Army to build.

I also have terrain to build... I picked up Witchfate Tor over the holidays, and I still want to build a lake piece of terrain.

Plus, I usually have about a dozen or so non-wargame miniatures in various states of completion.

I guess all of this spare time is really just bringing into focus how much hobby work I am behind on. SO, I put it to you, the blog community, how many projects do you tend to juggle at a time? When is enough enough, and when do you kick it into high gear to catch up?

On another note, SeerKarandras and I have been kicking around the idea of doing a podcast. What are your thoughts/reactions?

Well, off to have another round of Robotussin. Happy New Year everybody!

Two Battle Reports for the price of one!

Despite it being a busy post-holiday week, I did manage to find time to squeak out to the hobby store to get in a game. Surprisingly, I was able to get in two, as I brought both my Armies with me, and people were out playing WFB as well.

We will start with 40K, as that was the first game I got in of the night.
My Necron Force at 1850:
2 Units of 12 Warriors
Monolith
Tomb Stalker
Tomb Spider
The Nightbringer
6 Pariahs
Lord (Destroyer Body, Res Orb, Phylactery, Gaze of Flame) with a unit of 5 Immortals

 My opponents force (as well as I know it...)
Chaos Marines
1 Unit of Bikes with a Chaos Sorcerer
4 Terminators
2 Rhinos
1 Vindicator

 Turn 1 did NOT go well for me at all. I had lost first turn, so the Chaos Marines sped in on their bikes and started laying into the Warriors and the Las Cannoning the Nightbringer. The Nightbringer took a wound and the warriors suffered a few casualties. Thankfully, my Lord w/Res Orb was right there, so I did get my WBB. My Pariahs took some heat from the Terminators and Rhino, but no wounds. The Vindicator fired on the Monolith, with no effect. On my turn 1, My warriors, Lord, and Immortals opened fire on the bike squad, peeling off only one. My Monolith fired on the Vindicator, glancing it. The Nightbringer fired on the rhino, destroying a twin linked bolter. The Tomb Stalker and Tomb Spider fired on the bike squad, then assaulted.
Here's where it got painful. The Chaos Sorcerer had the best initiative, and got to strike first. He landed only 1 wound on the tomb stalker, but that was all he needed, as he was equipped with a Force weapon. He used his psychic power and inflicted the rest of the wound on the Tomb Stalker, taking it down. The Tomb Spider wasn't able to do anything, and was forced to take 5 fearless tests after I failed the leadership roll... So much for those two units....

 The bike squad continued its sweep into my warriors, annihilating one whole squad. The las cannons kept pounding the Nightbringer, and the Pariahs had their hands full on the other side of the Monolith.

 When the bike squad got closer to the bulk of my force, his champion summoned a greater Daemon... At least THIS time I had the Nightbringer. As you can see from the pic, the Daemon and the Sorcerer broke off to attack the Nightbringer, while the rest of the squad slams into the second unit of Warriors.

 The Nightbringer was able to cut right thru the Daemon and the Sorcerer. (Yay C'Tan!) And the bike squad started taking casualties from all the fire it took. I pulled the Warriors thru the Monolith to get them out of hand to hand with the bikes.

 More Daemons were summoned, and the bikes swooped around to assault the Lord and Immortals. By this time I am really nervous, as my Phase out number is looming. On my turn, I pulled the Lord & Immortals thru the Monolith to get them out of Hand to Hand. At least this way they could open fire the bikes. 2 out of my 3 warriors fell, and if I lost one one more, I would phase out. 5 of my Pariahs fell to a good artillery hit, and the lone one began to move in with the rest of my force.

 My Warriors were able to get back up, staving off the phase out for another turn. Unfortunately, I forgot to move the Nightbringer, and he was just outside of assault range on the bikes. So, he stood there, chesse in the wind, and fell beneath the repeated Las Cannon fire........

The group of Lesser Daemons kept on the Warriors, and dropped the last 3, which was enough to make me phase out.


Sorry if this one read kinda funny, lots was going on all at the same time, and I really felt on the ropes after my Tomb Stalker got gutted back on turn 1. The bike unit with the Mark of Nurgle was a total pain. Looking at my own army, I felt that if I would have deployed slightly different, I would have fared way better. I should have swapped the unit of Pariahs and the Tomb Stalker. The Tomb Stalker would have fared better against the Terminators and Rhino, as it would have been able to shrug off most of the hits, and its multiple wounds most likely would have let it get in close enough to do some damage. The Pariahs would have been the Ace in the hole against the Sorcerer, being a Psychic abomination, soulless, and all equipped with Warscythes. Those bikes would have fell faster underneath the warscythes... Oh well, you learn from your mistakes. All in all, a fantastic game against Tony's Chaos Marines.


FOR BRETTONIA!!!!

My next game pitted my Brettonians against a swarm of Skaven. Now, this was not Mr. O's skaven, so it wasn't grudge match round 2, but I feel I fought a bit harder this time. This was a 1500 point game.

My Force:

Lord-Mounted on Hippogriff, w/Armor of Agilulf (Grants WS 10), Lance of Artois (+2 S & Killing Blow) and a Luck Stone (Re-Roll one failed Armor save).

16 Archers

Damsel of the Lany, Lvl 2, Lore of Life

6 Grail Knights w/ Wailing Banner (Unit Causes Terror)

9 Knights of the Realm wBanner of Chalons (Units may NOT use Stand and Fire when this unit charges it.)

9 Knights Errant w/ Banner of War (+1 Combat Resolution)

Paladin Battle Standard Bearer w/Sword of Strife (+2 Attacks) and Seed of Regrowth. (6+ Regeneration).

My Opponent:
3 Units of 20 Clan rats
5 Rat Ogres & Packmaster
3 Warlocks
3Warpfire Cannons

 As normal with my Bretonnians, they spent the first turn in Prayer, to get the blessing of the Lady. The Skaven advanced. Warp Lightning and Warp Fire started to rain in on the Knights, dropping a few of the Knights Errant.
Turn 2, saw the Lord advance, the Grail Knights fail a long-shot charge against the Rat Ogres, and the Knights of the Realm and Knights Errant advance.

 Unfortunately for my Knights, the Skaven then charged. Nothing takes the wind out of a Bretonnian Army's sails like denying them their charge. The Knights of the Realm held their own, however, the inexperienced Knights Errant took enough losses to break. They fled off of the board after failing to reform.
The Lord was uncontested on the Flank of the Skaven, and he launched a devestating charge on the Rat Ogre unit. After the unit suffering 5 wounds to my 0, they broke, and were cut down by the Lord.

 The Grail Knights hit the flank of the Unit of Clan Rats that was engaged with the Knights of the Realm. Being caught between the two units of Knights, the frenzied rats were cut down.
The Archers lobbed volley after volley at the warp fire cannons, as they were damaging the knights severely. One cannon went down.
The left most unit of clan rats then charged the rear of the Grail Knights, with the Lord following shortly behind, charging their rear. The Lord challenged the Skaven Warlord, and they went toe-to-toe.

The Knights of the Realm broke free and charged the second warp fire thrower, crushing it with their charge. The Lord fell in his challenge, but the Hippogriff kept fighting in his place.

When the smoke cleared on the battle field (No turn 6...) Only the unit of clan rats that run off the Knights Errant were unhurt, and the bulk of the clan rat unit was destroyed by the Knights.

We figured out the Kill points, he had 4 of his 10 units left. So, 6 Kill points for me.
I had only lost 2 units, but my lord as well, so a total of 3 Kill points for him.

 Overall, a fantastic game against Matt's Skaven. Though a decisive Bretonnian victory, I have to give Matt mad props for this battle. It was only his 3rd game of WFB, and he did exactly what he needed to do to nerf a Bretonnian Army, take away their charge. Leaving his flank open to the Lord was his undoing... I think he thought his unit of Rat Ogres would have fared better against him, but the Lord is a beast.

I look forward to seeing how this Skaven army progresses, as he builds up his army to higher point value games, it will get a lot nastier with the swarm increasing in size.

Well, that wraps it up. My last blog post of the year. Probably my last battle report for a while too, as the new semester starts up and life will be thrown into chaos. Don't fret tho, the blog will continue, as I plan on focusing more on painting and modeling for a while. I have quite the backlog of mini's to paint, terrain to build, and armies to ponder.

See you all next year!

...in which I discuss the Ultramarines Movie

MERRY CHRISTMAS!


Now that I got that out of the way, lets delve into Ultramarines: The Movie!

ultramarinesthemovie.com

I will say this, the movie is pretty. And, gory! And, pretty gory!
The movie follows a squad of Ultramarines doing a recon mission that runs into some Chaos Marines. Thankfully, SeerK watched the movie with me, and was able to answer many of my n00b 40K universe questions.

The movie was penned by Dan Abnett, and though I know he has written many 40K books, I know his work from the Malus Darkblade WFB Books, and the recent work he's done with Marvel Comics for the "War of Kings" event. (BTW, I'm starting Horus Rising tomorrow morning) Anyway, the movie I found to be a little confusing. It's definately not  primer for the 40K universe, this movie was made for people steeped in the mythos of the 40K universe. As far as the script goes, it was pretty tight, much better than most of the schlock coming out of Hollywood lately.

The voice cast was also surprising. Terrance Stamp, John Hurt, Shawn Pertwee... Some pretty big names for Games Workshops first movie.

Overall, I totally dug the movie. I didn't know much about the Space Marines before, and this has inspired me to get to reading.

So, if you get a chance, pick up the movie! Support the compny so that they can make more movies about 40K. Who knows, perhaps the next one will be about Necrons....

... in which I discuss an underused unit, the Pariah.

Why do Necron Players not use the Pariah? Why don't people fear the Pariah as much as the Immortal?

I didn't manage to get a game in last night, but I was able to watch SeerKarandras take down the other Necron player at the shop. Now, he normally runs the Destroyer list, but last time we talked we threw around a few ideas and both came to the same conclusion. We need to utilize the Pariah. 

The Pariah itself is a pretty solid unit. It is not a Necron, so it does NOT get WBB. WS/BS 4, S/T 5,1 Wound, 1 attack, Leadership 10, 3+ save. The only stat I'm not happy with is initiative 3. They are equipped with a warscythe w/built in gauss blaster. Warscythe: No saves of ANY sort allowed, 2d6+Str for Armor Penetraion. Gauss Blaster: 24" Str 5 Ap 4 Assault 2. Special Abilities: Soulless: Enemy units within 12" are now leadership 7, unless normally lower. Psychic Abomination: Any Psyker within 6" must take a leadership test or fall back along with any squad they are leading. If they fail the Ld test, they only hit the Pariah on a 6. Fearless. All for 36 points a model.

Both LittleD and I came up with dramtically different lists, but still had the same concept core to them. Against SeerK's Eldar, he fielded 2 Monoliths, 2 Lords, 2 squads of Warriors, 2 Squads of Flayed Ones, and a squad of  Pariahs. The Pariahs definately had an effect on the Eldar. Sure, they don't have WBB, but they are just as tough as any other Necron unit. He had the Pariahs in the middle of the field, close enough to the Eldar that the Soulless ability (You have leadership 7, good day sir!) kicked in. They never got close enough to Eldrad to mess with him as a Psyker, but the Leadership reduction was enough. He closed the distance with his lords (both with Gaze of Flame. [-1 leadership that stacks w/any other penalties]) and Flayed Ones. Now, the Eldar had leadership 6, because of the combo of the two, and the Flayed Ones force a leadership test for terrifying visage. (If you fail, you only hit flayed ones on a 6.) This made it really ugly for the squad of aspect warriors that they assaulted. Obviously, they lost the assault, and broke... Unfortunately, they beat the Initiative test, so they ran... But the Flayed ones were able to give chase and keep harassing the squad. Very Effective strategy.

SeerK ended up crushing the Necrons, Dark Reapers launching crack missles into the Pariahs put an end to them pretty quick.

My idea for Pariahs initially had a great basis, but sadly wouldn't work. I wanted a Lord w/Warscythe and a veil of darkness to move them around. I figured, teleport in, use the gauss blaster, then assault with the Warscythes the next turn. Give any vehicles and or terminators a REALLY bad day. Sadly, Pariahs are not NECRONS.... meaning, no Veil of Darkness for them... Sad Panda. It wasn't a total loss though, as the Warscythe strategy w/Gaze of Flame and a Nightbringer nearby... I think that would cause some chaos. We shall see. I'm throwing together a list that would utilize this, and collecting the pieces... Perhaps by my next game I'll be able to test it.

Battle Report 12.15.10

LOL, I don't get it. Page views are WAAAAYYYYY up, but yet not many people leave comments or follow the blog. Either way, I am grateful for the traffic.

On to the battle report!

Ouch.

Chaos Daemons are a bunch of nasties.

Now, it's common knowledge that I am a 40k n00b, and that I don't know a lot about the opposing armies. My game this day taught me a lot though. Daemons are a nasty bunch to deal with, and for once, I feel that my loss was not an error of my mistaken tactics, but more that I faced a superior army with a general that knows how to use them. I had to use some proxy pieces in this battle, as I wanted to run my revamped army list, but I had not had enough time & money to buy the units I needed.

 Turn 1 left the Necrons setting up to an empty board. Now, I had lost initiative, and seeing as his army was teleporting in, I thought it would have been pointless to try and seize initiative.
I put my army in a good spread, warriors out front with the Monolith right behind, and the Lords and their units flanking the monolith.
A unit of Pink Horrors dropped in across the table, right in a blast crater. Two units of Plague Bearers dropped next, across the board from my Monolith.
The Pink Horrors then opened up on my squad of Warriors, 45 shots tearing into them. Many went down, but after my WBB roll, only 2 actually fell.

 My retaliation fire dropped a few PH's, and my Warriors moved in a little to help get their full assault fire next turn. My Lord grabbed his unit of Immortals and Veil of Darkness'ed over to the flank of the PH.
Turn 2 saw 2 Daemon Princes drop onto the table, using the standard bearers in the PH and PB units to come in spot on. Juggernauts of Khorne popped in, and a unit of flamers right to my flank. The Juggernauts assaulted my Necron Lord/Immortal unit, dropping 7 of my 8 Immortals. The Daemon Prince with the axe assaulted my warrior unit, while the flamers opened up on the Tomb Spider. The PH's kept their fire up, landing another 45 shots into my Warriors.

 I had planned on pulling my Immortal/Lord combo thru the Monolith, but discovered too late that they must be within 18"... My bad. 4 Immortals got back up, and the Lord VoD'd out to the rear of the PH's. Instead, I pulled my Monolith around and started Particle Whipping the Daemon Prince. The Unit of Pariahs sliced right thru the flamers (Yay Warscythes!)  Now, he had a named Character in with his Unit of Juggernauts that had broken off and moved towards the main force of my army. My Tomb Spider assaulted him, more keeping him tied up than actually harming him.

My reserves are where it began to get disappointing. My Flayed ones failed their reserve roll (Again!), but my Tomb Stalker made it, so it was able to Deep Strike right up by the PH's and Juggernauts. I had the TS fire on the PH's taking a few more of them out, seeing as I can't assault when I deep strike, unlike the Daemons. My Warriors were falling left and right underneath the assault from the Daemon Prince, and their assault back did nothing more than make more fall. The instant death dealt to them by the Prince just wasn't helpful.

 After the Pariahs and 2nd Lord finished off the flamers, they consolidated in around the Named Character. He was about to have a really bad turn 3 with 6 Warscythes coming for him.

Sadly, however, turn 3 never came for me. The Daemon prince wiped out the last of my Warrior squad, and the PH's dropped my second unit of Warriors, dropping me to phase out.

 A pretty resounding defeat by the Daemons for the Necrons. Like I said, however, I think I was outclassed here, and didn't make any tactical mistakes. He totally ignored my Tomb Stalker, Monolith, and Pariahs. He went straight for the phase out, cutting down my warriors with extreme prejudice. With instant death and/or power weapons, my WBB was never even a factor. This is why I don't care if they get rid of that rule. There are so many ways around it, it has never done more than have a smidgen of warriors get back up over the course of me running this army. It's been useful, but not game deciding like everyone makes it out to be. There are just too many 2x strength, powered, and other types of weapons that denies the WBB roll.

What I took away from this battle:
-Protect the Necrons! Phase out sucks, so I should barricade some Warriors aside so that Phase out isn't an issue.
-Warscythes rule!
-Should have brought the Nightbringer. If anyone sould have stepped to a Daemon Prince, it would be a C'Tan.
-The Monolith my be nigh on impossible for the opposing army to destroy, and I should use that to my advantage. Instead of holding it back, I should have put it right out and particle whipped the snot out of his troops, even though it was damaging the prince every turn, it was only dealing one would a turn, when it could have been wiping squads out.

Well, time to revamp the list for a trip out to Evolution tonight. I hope to report a victory this time!

Constructing a Necron Tomb Stalker Part 3, Finishing Touches

Well, I intended for this entry to be longer, but I feel that the pictures speak for themselves.

I went over the flat areas of the base, and flocked it with a dirty earth color powder. After gluing the Tomb Stalker on, it was ready to go out and play.

I still want to make one addition to the model, but I wanted to get these posted now, and with winter break and Christmas upon us, I just don't know when I'll be able to get to that last detail.





Enjoy, and please comment! I really do enjoy reading them! Especially all you international readers out there, please speak up! I look forward to hearing from you all.