I played (40k... and I liked it!)

So I played against Jeff, aka Ultimate Rival, yesterday morning after I got out of work. It was pretty fun, and I started to remember part of the reason I enjoy playing 40k... I love painted models. I'm not a fan of half-painted, and even less so regarding plastic grey, so being able to face off against a fully painted army (to a really high quality, to boot!) was... amazing. Mind you, I say all this, and *my* models weren't painted much more than basecoated black... so... yeah, I need to step up my game.

Not gone, just forgotten...

...you have no idea, good sir... you have no idea...

I've had a bit of a rough... 3 months, apparently... since last I posted.

Lost in the Warp... how'd that happen?

Turns out half the Tau stuff I ordered almost a month ago now hasn't even been shipped by the place of purchase yet (I've bought from them before with no problems, and I suspect that they are having issues with GW supplying them... like nearly every other independent stockist...)

Herohammer 40k!

This is the list I brought to the most recent tournament I went to at Battlefront Gaming. It was mostly just to try it out and see how it would do, and for what it's worth it did not that bad, actually.

Anyway...

Stealth Cadre... Mark 1 (1850)

http://drazhar24.deviantart.com/art/Tau-Stealth-Team-174144996

So this is the basic concept I'm going with for my 1850 Tau list that is fast-moving-sneaky themed... I was going to go with a Cadre Fireblade (or maybe even Darkstrider) instead of an Ethereal for my HQ... but Ethereals are cheaper both in terms of points and money, and have a really cool area of effect ability to buff my nearby Firewarriors, thought they do yield and extra VP when killed...

That said, here's the list... and 12 out of 18 of the Stealth Suits are old metal XV-15's... because they're awesome.

I finally broke down and bought X-Wing...

I was weak... and I went on a bit of a spending spree at one of the cooler game stores in my area... which is also a coffee shop... Alpha Omega Coffee and Games. I love that place!

Fishies!

Random intro is random: for some reason I still don't feel like a Tau player. This may be because I haven't actually played the army with my own models yet... dunno. Just struck me as odd that I feel this way... even though I'll likely end up playing the Tau more than I ever played the particular Marine variants.

Tau-tally awesome!

So I finally bit the bullet and have started phase one of my future Tau Empire army.

The End of an Era

Not an accurate depiction of how much I get paid, but the first check still felt that way!

So... funny story... I haven't had a full-time job in all my 4+ years of playing tabletop games... until now. I've been working for a factory running an injection moulding machine (non-gaming related... unfortunately...) since April 1st, and boy was having a goodly sized paycheck a cool thing. The first gaming purchase I made with the new source of income was a secondhand Landraider Crusader, a Secondhand Dreadnought (with dual autocannons and everything!) and an Arjac Rockfist (who is freaking awesome, despite the obvious casting flaws and bubbles... I'm still on the fence if it's bad enough to complain to GW about it...)

Apocalypse Now (Yesterday!)

Yesterday marked the second Apocalypse 40k game at Battlefront Gaming. It was freaking amazing. There were two teams of three with ~3000 points each. I was with the Forces of Disorder and had the Titan Maniple you see in the first pic, my teammates had 3k of Imperial Guard/Chaos Space Marines, and ORKS! The orks did infinitely better than I ever imagined they would. Especially that squad of Grotz, who just would not die (vs a Dreadnought!) Unfortunately, I didn't get good pictures of that side of the battlefield, as I was slightly preoccupied with my end. My worthy adversaries included another Titan Princeps, commanding a single Warlord and a handful of Stormtalon reinforcements, (who was actually kind enough to allow me the use of a Reaver!) a Tau player who felt the need to NOT run the "cheese list" he came up with with tremendous amounts of Rail Weapons (including Area Denial Nodes, which could have gotten NASTY.) and a Space Marines player (he calls them Salamanders, but they aren't green yet... :P )

Now on to the breakdown of turns:

What a week!

Well, it's been ~13 hours since that last post, and I officially declare myself to be done building titans for now. I didn't finish them all, in fact, I only got one more to the point where I'll be able to use it tomorrow (for a total of two), but that's ok. Chance smiled upon me today, and as it turns out, there will be another Titan Princeps joining the fray, and he was kind enough to agree to allow me to utilize one of his Reaver Titans he ran out of room for. I'll be 50 points under the 3k limit, but I'm totally fine with that.

It's the Final Countdown!

I wish I had 24 hours left!

So it's Friday, and the game is tomorrow. I'm not sure I'll be able to make all the remaining Titans in time, but by the Emperor I'm going to try!

Progress!

I'm currently taking a break so I figured I'd sit down and share what I've gotten done already. I finished the first Titan yesterday, and assembled the torsos of the other three. I'm about to start on the heads and then the... pelvis... area of the Titans, and if that goes really quickly, I'll finish off the weapon arms tonight that way I'll have two whole days to work on the legs and feet, which happens to be the part I'm dreading... the pose of the model is 100% dependent on the legs and they take FOREVER to assemble. And I'm doing all this before the big game on Saturday... I hope there's an Apocalypse game this Saturday... if not, well at least I'll have the structural stuff done and then I can detail as I see fit. In any case, here's a couple pics:

Combat Patrol 40k... the best kind of 40k

I'm starting to see the appeal...

So I played in a Combat Patrol Tournament today at Evolution Games in Lansing, MI...

Made of Win

One of my friends who plays in the local tournament scene sent me some pictures of one of the other armies in attendance during one such tournament. I really do still have a soft spot for Salamanders (and Space Wolves for that matter!), so I found these to be... most impressive. Now I want to take the time to share them with you, because they are so awesome!

The Eastern Sea

Release the KRAKEN!

So, I played an 1000 point game on a 4x4 board, vs Empire of the Blazing Sun. I don't remember much of it (the game was played yesterday night, but I've slept and worked since then, so my mind is fuzzy on the details...) so I'm not going to do a play-by-play, and I apologize, but I really don't have the current brain-capacity to remember order and the details.

Shock and Awe

I'm sure my opponent felt this way after the game.

So I finally got brave enough to venture outside in the snow and went down to Battlefront to get a game in of Dystopian Wars. I got there a little after 12:30-ish, and nobody else showed up until almost 7 (well there was one 40k guy, but I didn't bring any 40k stuff with me). In the meantime, I cut out some Medium (medium-area and small-area) and Large (mostly small area) Height Iceburgs. We ended up using some of them in the battle later on. I also took the time to cut out some Iceburgs the size of my Iceburg templates, which was handy. I look forward to painting them up.

Now on to the game, the very first thing I want to do is thank my opponent for continuing even though the first turn's worth of dice were in no way shape or form in his favor. I rolled more 5's and 6's this game than all of my other games combined, and that coincided with him rolling next to none himself. It also didn't help that I both won and held the initiative the whole game.

The Battleship Titanic

The painting bug has struck me again. I got my first Borodino Battleship (which I christened the Titanic) done tonight, along with the Iceburg markers that came with the Kostroma Carrier. The decking was a pain in the butt, but everything else was fairly quick to paint. Here's some pics of the finished product:

Taking down a Dreadnought

The Doom Boat! (FSA Dreadnought)

Ok, it's been a few weeks since my last post about Dystopian Wars, and my fleet has grown a bit since the last time. Since then, I've taken the time to purchase a Carrier (one, so I have more tiny fighters in the air keeping my opponent's tiny bombers away, and two for the access to the sweet, sweet Glacier Generator) and a blister of 6 more Escort/Frigate models.

Rules Conundrum: In light of the recent FAQ...

My thoughts on the "new" range rule: I'm pretty sure that's actually how it was always supposed to be played... The big rule book mentions being out of range in the wound allocation section, though that particular paragraph made little-to-no sense given the context it was placed, but now with this FAQ, it makes just a little more sense.