Warhammer World here we come

Hopefully, right about now, me and the boy should be just getting on the coach at Southport and about to head our merry way to Nottingham to Warhammer World. A day of gaming and gawping at the terrain, exhibitions, displays, artwork and miniatures awaits.

This will be a unique experience for us, our first ever visit to the gamers Mecca. I did Golden Demon and Games Day way back in 1991 but I think this will be a special trip for me and the nipper. He's as prepared as he could be and will be running 1000pts of Tyranids, to be honest when I saw the 1000pts spare we have after I take my usual list I was intrigued to swap as they looked like an interesting mix, although only two Synapse Creatures eek!

Loads of pics will be taken and no doubt I will fill you in on events over the course of the next few weeks/months.

Sunday Showdown - Nids Vs White Scars 1000pts pt1

OK folks, there's a lesson to be learned here about delaying a post too long. My local friendly neighbourhood gaming club had a Sunday Warmachine tournament with 40k thrown in to try and cover the costs. I arrived earlier than I may have indicated so instead of taking on PeteB's eldar again I ended up facing the might of Robs White Scars. Now it was so long ago I'm not entirely sure how the game went down, but loads of pictures so I'll try and make sense of it all. My son took some of the pictures so they may be completely out of context so bare with me or just enjoy the pics, he continues to take some surprisingly evocitive shots.

I think it was Spearhead deployment and there were definitely objectives. I started with the Tervigon in this building with the Warriors and Hormagaunts wrapped around the front of the building.

The Hormagaunts were just in cover.

I don't think the Trygon was deployed at this stage, this is just my Son taking snaps ;)

A Hormagaunt on the run.

At some point the Tervigon bashed it's way through the ruined building, it spawned out quite early, if I recall, and the Termagants sat on the objective in the ruins.

The Tervigon is heading for Vehicles to hopefully trash something. Meanwhile the Trygon popped up and his bio-electric pulse aint half as good as a Primes Containment Spines he probably targeted the Marines given their closeness to the centre objective.

The adrenal Stealers came on from the right flank, charged toward a Land Speeder. They immobilized it, either this turn or the next, not sure.

On the far left side the Mycetic Spore splashed down near to the injured White Scar objective, a lot of Devourer fires scoured some of the marines from the building but the Techmariune remained unharmed.

Suddenly realising the Marines were still capable of securing the centre objective the monstrous from of the Tervigon smashed through the ruined building to take on the tactical squad.

With the Land Speeder immobilised and objectives being the aim of the game the Stealers left the downed skimmer and went looking for more prey via the cover from blasted landscape.

The Termagants hunkered down in as much cover as possible to guarantee control of their objective.

A cool shot of the Tyranid Prime, not sure what they did in the game but they form the core foundation for this 1000 pt army. they may not always get MVP but they're worth it.

The Termagants hold onto their objective, another cool pic from my son.

The Tervigon in combat.

The remaining Hormagaunts hide behind the ruin and the Warriors move up to provide synapse and get into firing range.

The Broodlord bellows a challenge to all comers and then lopes forwards with the rest of the brood to see what else he can slay.

Yep those Termagants are still holding that objective.

The Warriors clearly have taken a few wounds but step in to capture the objective and support the Tervigon, which by this stage has taken 5 wounds and is down to it's final one, eek!

 Guess that the Termagants are doing?

The Genestealers reach a Rhino [or Razorback that had it's guns destroyed]

My son found out you could get some weird effects by shooting pictures through the centre of the blast templates. Here you can see the Warriors charging into combat with the remaining White Scars.

The Spore Pod takes some wounds, by this stage the Devgaunts may have been destroyed.

The combined might of the Tyranids destroys the remaining Tactical squads

The Termagants take five.

The Stealers immobilise the Rhino.

After destroying the Tactical squad the tervigon heads for the Razorback and the Warriors consolidate into cover whilst securing the objective.

The scouts in the objective next to the wounded White Scar and Mycetic Spore continue to take pot shots at whatever xeno passes in front of their scopes,

As it ended up, with me securing two objectives and possibly contesting the 3rd. Once again the ability to deepstrike near objectives and root out units that are entrenched was the secret to my success.

I'm really beginning to get a feel for these 1000pts. I miss the Trygon Prime, the Trygon seems to have disappeared quite quickly and the inability to attack on deep strike means I rely on the shooting and that Bio Electric Pulse just doesn't cut it. I may even consider a Mawloc given the way he's being played at the moment, 2-3 deep strike attacks from below could be really handy and give me a few extra points to play with. But another win agianst Rob and his White Scars, WOOT! He'll have his revenge yet no doubt.

Test mini - iridescent FX [?]

I've already mentioned my Son's wish to make his aspect warriors just that little bit different and here's where I try and come up with a paint solution for his Emperor Scorpion coloured Striking Scorpions. What I wanted was to have a black figure but with an iridescent sheen of colours showing through, much like an oil slick or starlings feathers. So I started with a Red Oxide Primer base, [I also tried a straight Matt Black one as well later on] then I did a quick drybrush of turquoise in on direction, diagonally down from the top.

Then I did another drybrush, this time with a cheap purple acrylic diagonally up from below, thus giving a different highlight depending on which direction the light catches the model or that's the theory. 

Then I washed the model heavily with Badab Black, which does allow the two highlights and the some elements of the Red Oxide to show through but unfortunately it did mute the colours an awful lot. I'm thinking a coat of gloss varnish will be used as well, and I might want to use a toothbrush dipped in white paint to just add a series of random white highlight dots like the Emperor Scorpion texture.

Here's the model highlighted on top of a Matt Black undercoat, this seems a bit richer because although it's Matt Black there is a certain reflective quality in the paint, unlike the Badab Black wash which is just flat and dulls the other colours. 

Still elements to refine, but we'll get there eventually.

My Son's Eldar Farseer

I've managed to keep my hand out of this, up to a point. I think he needs me to start him going and then he'll paint for half an hour or so and then get bored. I have put some base coats on some of his figures, I base coated the Fire Prism and I've done the Yellow and Blue on the Wraithlord but he's keen to do the rest, although he isn't fussed too much about the Fire Prism so has asked me to add the washes.

However the Farseer is all his own work and I'm really impressed with this, there's something about the bits where his paint has spread too far that I think actually enhances the miniature. He's not too keen on the white face, he says it looks like a clown but I really like it and the way the red bleeds further down than it should makes it look very alien. 

The only real issue I have is that certain areas, particularly edges are already starting to show wear and the metal is visible through the paint. I've discussed adding another set of highlights to enhance the miniature and cover up these bits and hopefully make them stay protected but I'm not sure he's that fussed.

I think it's his best miniature so far, I hope he takes time to make it better. I've insisted on basing them, he helps putting the sand on the glue but by keeping the red planet basing consistent all our armies will fit together regardless of who painted the actual model. It's hard graft but there's a huge amount of satisfaction when you get through 50 figures based in one go!

Tuesday night's all right for fighting!

Tuesday night is gaming night at my local friendly gaming club but tonight was special for the guys as at the weekend they competed in the WPS Challenge Tournament. Having just competed in a local gaming club tournament and I believe coming 2nd to last there may not have been a lot of hope of success at the WPS. However the Lost Boys Gaming Club came 3rd overall and 1st in the 40k tournament. Well done to everyone apparently they said I can be classed as a 'Winner' too by 'association' ;) Next time I'll have to tag along and see what the 'big guys' get up to

Meanwhile I rocked up with my 1000pt list for  Warhammer World [7 days to go!] and Roy decided to take me on, a real challenge to trim down his Vendetta list. We had two objectives and set up was Dawn of War. In the end Roy's list was something like:

• 2 Vendettas - Plasma Vets
• 3 Guard squads, at least 10 in each squad
• 1 Five man squad of Flamer vets
• 2 Hydra Flak tanks
• 1 Manticore Missile Launcher

I think that's the bulk of it

Once again no pics, I'm afraid. I'll try and take some next time, well it'll be Warhammer World so I expect a good few 'rolls of film' to be taken. Roy generously gave me a lot of advice during the game. I know I've talked in the past about being 'part' of the club and my experiences in being part of my kendo club. At kendo I was of senior grade to the rest of the members. As such it was my responsibility to help them improve, to adjust my practice to accommodate their ability and over advice and opportunity so they would get better. This is very similar at Lost Boys, presumably because they want a good game, not a walk in the park. the better I get the more challenging I am and therefore push them to improve. It also means if I join them in a tournament and they've asked me to come along a few times already, they know I can bring my 'game' to the table and do well, alongside having fun.

The game itself was great, Roy suggested if I let him go first because of Dawn of War he wouldn't be able to shoot me first turn. I could see his deployment and then choose to focus my deployment on just once section of the board, wipe that out and then steam roll the rest. Thankfully there was a large building in the middle of the board that could hide my Tervigon and Warrior/Prime unit first turn.

In my first turn the Warriors took cover in the shadow of the building and the Tervigon went round the side and Cluster Spined a squad of troops on the opposite side of the building. Having moved already I didn't get to spawn some Termagants, did that come back to haunt me AGAIN? Hormagaunts raced up the field.

Roys 2nd turn and the Warriors took a few hits from the Manticore and Las Cannon. Some wounds were taken and a Deathspitter was insta-killed. The tervigon may have taken a wound too.

My turn 2, Genestealers and Spore Pod came on. Genestealers on the right flank, next to the Manticore, 10 man squad, a Flak tank and a Vendetta. The Spore pod landed perfectly, behind the Vendetta and next to the Flak Tank. the Genestealers went on to multi-assault the Manticore and 10 man Squad which were whittled down a bit through Devgaunt fire once they exited the pod. The Manticore was blown to pieces and the squad was slaughtered. they later spent two turns thrashing the Flak tank, taking off weapons, shaking it and all sorts until one penetrating hit finally thrashed it.

The Warrior squad slowly got whittled down and I eventually had to remove the Prime and send him scuttling back to my objective because late in the game Roy made a backfield play for my objectives and thee Termagant brood I had in cover next to it were barbecued by the Vet flamers.

The Tervigon continued to take fire, amusingly he was shot by Plasma vets who both overheated and killed themselves leaving one unit leader with a las pistol left. However, their deaths were not in vain as they took the final wound of the Tervigon and it keeled over. The Trygon turned up in turn 3 I think. He survived his first turn as most of the fire was targeted at my scoring Hormagaunts. They'd conga lined through cover and captured Roy's objective. Next turn though the Trygon tore the second Hydra apart and then went on to eat most of the guard squad in the ruined building next to it.

By now it was a mad rush to try and get back to my own objective and still secure Roy's with my 4 remaining gaunts. Eventually they were reduce to two and as the Prime was killed I needed to get the Barbed Strangler warrior back to my objective and shoot the unit of Vets camping in the cover next to it. Because the Warrior moved the Gaunts failed their leadership as they were not in Synapse and legged it - BUGGER! The warrior failed to destroy the Vet squad, seriously? Just one died.

It went into turn 6 and 7, my genestealers had run the width of the board and needed to position themselves to either assault the Vets or the Vendetta contesting the objective. The Warrior tried to remove the Vets from the equation but the Barbed Strangler deviated onto itself and the Stealers, killing one, wounding the Broodlord and I believe killing the Warrior itself! By this time we called it a draw the only other thing of not was one Termagant that had been locked in combat with the sole remaining las-pistol toting unit leader from the unlucky plasma vets. We rolled to see who would die but they were forever to remain locked in melee.

A much better game on my part, helped mostly by Roy's generosity and tactical advice. He says I'm improving and having talked over some options I may well prepare a list with Hive Guard and Mawloc to to try and take out some of his Vendettas and artillery. He was very impressed with the Mawloc rules, describing it as a 'must take' so we'll see for next time.

Hope this hasn't been too tedious, I appreciate a battle report without pics isn't too great but it's useful for me at least as a record