Adding some character.

Another model I have been working on for my Vampires is the Lord model. I am using Archaon as my Vampire Lord, and he is awesomely huge. I also wanted him on top of a taller base to put him even higher 'above' the unit (to look cool, yes, but mostly so he would fit on a cav base). I still have to grab a Terrorgheist and steal one of the rider heads for this guy, but he is almost finished.

I switched out the thick Chaos sword, and wanted a thinner sword for a more 'finesse' look. A lot of the other Vamps I have looked at have thinner swords.

I also added Isabella Von Carstein to the mix, but chopped her off at the waist and mounted her to be a Hero in the army. She looked good on a less masculine horse, so I put her on a Dragon Prince mount. Here she is and with another shot with the beginnings of the front rank ranked up.

More in the works very soon. I was at the hobby store yesterday and picked up loads of basing supplies. I need to grab some Simple Green and primer tomorrow at the hardware store and I will be set to get serious with this plastic.

Expand your Warhammer knowledge. With Podcasts.

An excellent way to get better at Warhammer is to expand your rules knowledge. Another way is to increase your experience with different metas and different styles of players. One of the best ways to do this without traveling across the country (or world) is with Podcasts. There are many excellent podcasts and a few "just ok" ones out there for Warhammer, but I really recommend giving them a try if you want to get a very broad look at the Warhammer "World" out there.

While I have a few links on my blog roll, here is a more complete list of some great, and some at least somewhat good, podcasts:

Bad Dice. The best Warhammer podcast. Period. Ben also has a daily show, which is insane. The regular show co-hosts Mark and Gareth are awesome. Some great tactics and rules discussions.

Garagehammer. Best overall American cast, imo. Good mix of casual and tournament. I like the long episodes. Spans tournaments, hobby progression, as well as campaigns and large scale battle reports.

Pointhammered. Better than Garagehammer as far as tournament performance experience and specific hobby chat, if that is what you're looking for. Can be very crude, but it's alright with me.

Skull Bros Awesome. My favorite new podcast. Rising Star. Also very crude, haha.

Ohiohammer. Andrew is another work horse for podcasting. Lots of different episode types.

The Black Sun. Another very tournament focused cast from the UK, but also very crude.

Wisco Dice. Another Midwest podcast. Solid hobby balance with frequent tournament reports.

Painting Tabled. Hobby focused cast, with some tournament reporting when they go.

Canhammer. Another international cast. Chris is a good tournament player and the cast reflects that.

6 Dice Monkeys. Newer cast, haven't listened much other than their good VC review.

Bull City Wargaming. South East US cast. Need to listen more.

Chumphammer. Literally just downloaded for the first time. Will listen more.

And more I have been turned on to via Twitter:

Dwellers Below. Australian Warhammer. They probably play Warhammer upside down (I haven't listened yet).

Tale of 4 Geeks. Another new podcast in my list.

Westcoast Hammertime. Was told to check them out. So I will.

Noobhammer. Another new cast. Will check it out.

Bats, bats, and Fel Bats

My Vampire Count army is going to have 3 units of minimum size Fel Bats. The only problem is that I think the Fel Bat models are terrible. After some musing and questioning on Twitter, I decided to convert some using Gargoyles and Ghouls. The result was better than expected. With some additional advice I really made sure to make the bases interesting. This is the result.

Vampires... GO

I was burned out on blogging for a while. I figure I may as well try again. I'll do my best to keep it casual so that I actually keep up on it long term. In the time I was gone I went to Screw City GT and got top 10. It was a fun event. I also went to Freshcoast 40k's Foodhammer charity event last weekend and won the Fantasy event. It is a pretty cool trophy.

I've also started a Vampire project. More coming soon as I delve into another new army. The plan is to play them on the tournament scene next year, starting with the 2013 Great Lakes Warhammer League.

I wanted to build a cavalry combat army, which was the exact opposite of what I am used to with my Skaven. The 4 main characters of the army are a Vampire Lord, 2 Vampires, and a Wight King. All the characters are conversion, but most of the infantry will be as-is. I have a couple more conversion ideas, and will add and update as models are assembled.

First, I picked up a new Wight King on foot, and wanted to mount him on a Black Knight horse. I had to chop him up and position his cape to go over the horse.

After some greenstuff on the torso he was good to go.

Bus!

A Challenger Appears

I've registered to be a Henchman for Wyrd Games. Being a Henchman includes the responsibilities of running demos for new players and events such as leagues and tournaments. Our FLGS Pandemonium in Garden City has a very strong retail presence for the game (they stock EVERYTHING), and a fledgling gaming group, so they have relaunched Malifaux Mondays.

As a Henchman I will be running open demos on Mondays from 6:00pm to 10:00pm with 4 different starter crews on hand for people to use, as well as my Terraclips board. In honor of getting accepted last night, I speed painted up this full Seamus starter box in 4 hours while watching the Olympics last night!

Here is a link to the event:
Malifaux Mondays on the Wyrd Forums

50 points of Warmachine

I got a game in for the first time with a "full" Warmachine army after playing the Beastmen this weekend. I have been wanting to play at this point level for a while and had only ever even played one game at 35 before, so the size was a little daunting as a new Warmachine / Hordes player. I was able to get another game in against Adam, who seems to be my most regular Warmachine player with my epic Madrak list. I should play with some other casters, but I really have been focusing on eMadrak as I learn the game. We played a scenario where you had to control the two zones once each to score 2 points and win.

I brought:

eMadrak
-Dire Troll Mauler
-Troll Axer
-Runebearer
Full Fennblades
-unit attachment
Full Pyg Burrowers
Full Long Riders
Fell Caller Hero
Trollkin Champion Hero

The idea of the list is tough cavalry and reach to go along with Madrak's "thresher" feat. Not too hard to grasp. I basically charged right up front and try to smash face (The "Axe to Face" Troll Strategy!). And it worked for me too, even though I got shot up as I advanced and lost my Fennblades, Adam focused hard on my left and I got in his grill on the right.

I was able to get +2 attack on the Pyg's and Blood Frenzy on the Long Riders and get into range to start chopping. Things ended when a Long Rider charged through two infantry with impact hits to get to Adam's caster and roll 6/6/4 for damage (with -4 dmg from armor), and then my Axer putting +2 move and Pathfinder on himself to get in range, make the final attack, and also roll box cars for damage to kill the caster for the Assassination.


It was a lot of fun playing at that level, and really makes me want to finish painting up my Trollbloods and start playing in more events. I'm pretty busy with the Skaven, but I see a lot of more Warmachine on the horizon for this Fall/Winter.

Universal Battle game.

This weekend I also played a big 3k game on Universal Battle with Grant Fetter. It was another Screw City practice game, as I try to get as many games in as possible with the Bell before lists are due (and make lots of little changes here and there to test things). Grant's list was a very cool, non traditional Ogre list with 2 Giants and 2 big gribblies with a Thundertusk and a Hunter riding a Stonehorn. Also lots and lots of Ogres.

After a first turn of solid shooting and magic, Grant could see how things were going and need to get stuck in fast. He charged into my Hellpit and I did 12 or so wounds in return to crush the Ogres on the left but they held Steadfast. In the middle my magic and shooting chopped down the Ironguts to a non-threat fast, but they still marched forward. A Skitterleaping brass orb scatted back and only killed 1 Mournfang, but also killed the lobbing Warlock.

The Beast Butcher got away and never did get finished, as Grant used his Thundertusk with great success to give my HPA always strikes last and charged it with a Giant, who killed the HPA. In the end though the Doomwheel was able to steal some points and kill the Giant in return with lightning bolts. In the middle the Ironguts waffled a bit before getting into the bell, but eventually stuck in. The Mournfang started charging all of my outlying units and wiping them all off the board.

In the end the Bell still stood and I finished off the BSB, General, and Gut Star with the Bell unit. They have been performing so well, but I still have not played them against a serious artillery threat which will spell the end of their great run, I expect. The game ended with me only winning by 160 or so points, which will probably be a draw depending on the Screw City GT rules, but Alex has been known to only require a win by 100 points.

Exalted Vermin Lord

I have had the Exalted Vermin Lord on my bench for a while now, on a 60x100 base for the official Storm of Magic monster. But I've been thinking of playing a game or two with a regular Vermin Lord in my regular games lately, especially with Midlands coverage in the UK, where they have a Best Vermin Lord award! Ben Johnson, formerly of the Bad Dice Podcast, altered his Exalted Vermin Lord to fit a 50x50 regular monster base and to be used as a regular VL in tournaments... so I thought I would do the same with mine!

Hordes of Beastmen vs Bell

Spending some quality gaming time this Saturday, I got a game against Beastmen for the first time in a while, and finally got around to playing Michael O. from Fresh Coast 40K. I was playing around with my Bell list again, and he brought hordes and hordes of Gor, along with a load of magic support and a few gribblies.

Assassin comparison.

Small hobby update today. I put together a new assassin today and was able to compare first hand the difference between the old metal and new Finecast Deathmaster Snikch models. I'm hoping to paint these guys up soon to mess around with in Fantasy, but taking a look at the models themselves, the Finecast version IS a bit of a disappointment compared to the old metal. It is so fragile in the thin areas it feels like it will snap with a stiff breeze. It also had a lot more work needing to be done to clean it up and I felt again like I would break it, and also had to remove some detail on the cape in order to get rid of some thick flash.

On the positive side, what detail is on the model IS more crisp and does look better. I do prefer Finecast over metal to have lighter models. I know some people love the weight of a metal model, but I am the opposite. I prefer plastic and finecast for the weight. Also, it is super easy to do conversions, which I may end up doing to the second assassin for when I ever use 2 of them.

More up tomorrow. Off to the hobby store to pick up the new White Dwarf with new Daemon rules inside, and to play a game of Fantasy and a game of Warmachine.

Necron Debut

Had my first game with Necrons this week, and I had a blast. I played with the 1000 points I have assembled against Tau. My list was an Overlord with warscythe and res orb, Destroyer Lord with warscythe and 2+, 10 Warriors with Ark, 10 Warriors, 3 Wraiths, and an Annihilation Barge. We rolled up a scenario with 5 objectives, which meant we had a little more room to move around with only 1000 points on the board, but we still ended up playing for 3 or so objectives.

Against Vampires

Another game with the Bell, another victory that I don't really take stock in. I played against a special character heavy Vampire list with Heinrich Khemler and Krell, leading hordes of Skeletons and some flying support. This battle report will be short and sweet...

I won the first turn and advanced and got the Bell swinging, hoping for a solid second ring. My opponent maneuvered his units, blocking up and trying to get around terrain in the board, but left Khemler's unit with JUST enough room for the full Screaming Bell horde to charge in to the master necromancer. Second turn, the bell unit charged in and popped the 30 or so Skeletons through deaths and then combat resolution, and took the General with them. No buffs, and no Bell ringing to help, the Storm Vermin (half of them, really) did the work themselves.

I 13th'd the Grave Guard on the first turn, which was more or less why Heinrich's unit moved forward. They were hiding in the back with a rank or so left over to try and raise up later. This was the key reason the unit moved up and was able to be charged.

Still, I would have liked a more prolonged game with the Bell, and to test it out vs other match ups (especially war machines) before I ultimately decide to take it to Screw City GT.

Bell practice

Today's game was one I played with Andrea as we both tried out a few ideas for Screw City GT. I had wanted to get a few games in with the Screaming Bell in a Storm Vermin horde for a while, and have been thinking about bringing it to the tournament. My rare choices have also been up in the air for the list, so I tried out 2 WLC's with 1 Abom and 1 Doomwheel. We set up and played a battle line, as we do for most practice games...

Billy the Bloodthirster

I had a game at GW this week, playing as Daemons against High Elves. I had been playing a lot of Skaven so wanted a break from them, and knew Drew had High Elves so wouldn't want to double up the same army, so Billy and the Daemons came out to play.

Ghost Ark

Home sick today, I spent some time working on the crazy complicated Ghost Ark model from my Necron Battleforce. This thing has tons of parts and I will probably have to have multiple assemblies to get it painted decently. No regular battle report today, because of being sick, but I still have two reports waiting to be written and another Screw City GT practice game scheduled for tomorrow.

These models are just plain awesome. I have a few Skaven to paint for Screw City GT before I can put any serious work into starting them though.

I assembled the Ghost Ark without the crew and passengers, and without the guns to paint it a bit easier, but also leave it more or less playable. There is a driver and 10 crew to individually paint.

More Necrons... the planning

I was able to pick up some more Necron reinforcements yesterday, both new and used. The Necron Destroyer Lord for $16 was nice. I also picked a box of Wraiths, which are now one of my favorite models ever. The only problem is that while they are somewhat sturdy they are still top heavy, which I expected looking at the models.

I am hoping the resin bases I am planning on using for the army holds them down a bit. They are sturdy, until you blow on them basically... so the extra weight might to the trick. My original army intent was to not double up on units that weren't Core... but these guys really have me rethinking that. The models are my favorite, and their rules are pretty good. I still think I might stick to one unit of 6 with a Destroyer Lord attached.

Until next time. I have battle reports with Daemons vs High Elves, and Skaven vs Daemons in the works.

Buckeye Battles Final

For the final game of Buckeye Battles, I was matched up against High Elves with loads and loads of magic. The idea with the "Coven of Light" HE list is loads of Lore of Light casters, and a caster who gets to pick his spells so that you can have 2 Pha's Protection spells and 2 Banishment spells... and Banishment would be at strength 7. Let's look at what Ken brought to the table.

Buckeye Battles Game 4

I woke up Sunday morning and joked with Andrew Sherman of the Ohiohammer podcast that we were close on points, which meant we would probably face off. He checked the score and was sure he would escape me, but we ended up matched up after all when pairings were announced! Andrew was originally set up to play Chaos Dwarfs I think, but switched to Empire because of his love for the army and the new book being out. Here is what he brought:

Buckeye Battles Game 3

The final game of day 1 and the strict Buckeye Battles banding system had me faced off against another Ogre player, this time from New York. Tim brought an interesting list that seemed to have many of the standard Ogre toys, but also had some Gnoblars, a Scraplauncher, and was using Heavens. He also took advantage of the comp rules and put Magic Resistance on his Slaughtermaster, so I knew I wouldn't be trying to Crack's Call that unit too much. Lets look at the list:

Buckeye Battles Game 2

After the draw vs the Dark Elves, I was matched up against Sean and his solid Ogre list. The list I am running has me pretty confident against Ogres and much less afraid against the Ironblasters than I would be if I was running a Bell and/or Furnace. The ability to take out chaff and put lots of wounds on Ogres and Chariots with Gutter Runners is a big advantage. Lets look at what he had:

Buckeye Battles Game 1

Last weekend I attended another Midwest Grand Tournament, my first Buckeye Battles in Delaware, Ohio. I brought the Skaven and a nearly identical list as Blood in the Sun to make preparation and practice easier, and to stay completely familiar with the list between events. The event had special comp where Magic Resistance could be used against any spell, even spells that normally do not allow saves (Dwellers, Pit, 13th). Also, hills blocked line of sight to all but large targets.

Also importantly was the "comp" which was not truly comp, but a banding system. This meant the hard armies would only play the hard armies while the soft drew the soft for the first full day. My first opponent of the event was Jason Matley, who beat me for the GLWL League Championship with his Dark Elves. He brought them again, and this time they were fully painted, and I was looking for some revenge.

Assembling first Necrons

I took a game break for today's post, to start assembling the Necron Battleforce I picked up after my 40K 6E demo last week. The older plastic Warriors have a load of annoying mold lines, but the models are pretty cool. Mold lines do take up a lot of time, but I was able to catch up on some 40K podcasts I haven't listened to in 6 months.

Playing Online Warhammer

Not Warhammer Online, but Online Warhammer. Universal Battles is a website with build in models, dice rollers, chat system, and everything you need to play an actual game of Warhammer over the computer other than the rules and army list in front of you. I set up to play a small 500 point game with Ogres vs Lizardmen to show Matt (@Mansell84) how to use the site and get used to play Warhammer with the computer.

The Family vs The Gremlins

Today is the first day of Buckeye Battles 2012, and I will be down in the Columbus area playing the Skaven in a 2400 point Fantasy tournament. But while I am away I still have a blog post! Today we have another quick Malifaux game against Gremlins, where I used the Ortegas to take on Ophelia again. For our Strategy we flipped shared Treasure Hunt, which meant there would be a token in the center of the board that we needed to pick up and bring back to our deployment zone. For schemes I chose Hold Out, because I wanted the Gremlins to come towards my fire superiority, as well as Bodyguard on Perdita.

Breaking back into Malifaux

I have been meaning to start playing more Malifaux, and wanting to have games and hobby work for the blog every day is an excellent excuse to get in some small/shorter skirmish games. Our local group at Pandemonium has been wanting to restart their Malifaux Mondays again, so I hit up the store this past week to play with my Guild.

Facing off against Kairos

Recently, I hit up the local GW with Andrea's new High Elves to try and get a pick up game. I really wanted to use the Dragon model that came in her army, so I built up a choppy Lord on a Star Dragon list at 2500. My opponent was none other than Kairos Fateweaver himself, it seemed as the Chaos Gods though it fitting after the previous weekend's tournament!

New 40K

I've fallen to the #new40K bug! I dropped my 40K armies about 6-12 months ago, and gave up on the game. There is something about a new edition that gets me going, so I wanted to give new 40K a shot. At my local Games Workshop Hobby Center in Rochester Hills, MI I got wrangled into a demo game, where I played Orks vs Space Marines. We rolled up one of the new scenarios, and we played Relic where the objective was to grab a token (the relic) and hold it at the end of the game.

More Dwarfs??

Today's game was the final game at the Gamers Sanctuary tournament, and I was matched up against Dwarfs and loads of artillery again, but the supporting list was different. My opponent Mike and I play often but normally with his Lizards, which he is very good with. This event was his first time ever playing Dwarfs, but he had done very well in his first two games destroying both opponents (also getting a little luck and sniping Teclis with a cannon first turn). Here was his list:

Game 2 at GS

Today's game was the second game at Gamers Sanctuary's July 2500 point tournament. I was running the Daemon list I posted in yesterday's game and I was lined up against Tom's Dwarfs with loads of warmachines and we were playing Battle for the Pass!

1 / 365 !

Here we go, the kick off game of the 365. I decided to start at my local regular tournament, which is held at the Gamers Sanctuary in Flint, MI. The format is 2500 with no comp, so basically anything goes. I've been successful at this event with all kinds of different lists, and today since Andrea was playing her new High Elves I decided to really filth it up with a special character heavy Daemon list. I'm not going to lie and say this is anything other than 'Ard Boyz -ish in quality, but I plan on helping Andrea learn Kairos and also seeing him at the Screw City GT coming up in September.

Here is the list. Be careful, as you may need a shower afterwards:

Rhellion 365!

Now is time for the big format change announcement. I have decided to undergo a tough hobby challenge over the next year to try and play a game or do some hobby work EVERY DAY. This is going to be called the #Rhellion365 and I plan on playing pick up games at GW, hobby games with the club, small local tournament games, and large regional GT's to try and fill out all 365. Not every game or project will be Warhammer Fantasy, but the vast majority will be.

I will be playing mainly with Skaven, which are my main tournament army and the only fully painted force I own. But, as you will see in the first few games, I will also be playing with Daemons and High Elves on the table, any army I can create on Universal Battle, and also throwing in some Malifaux, Warmachine, maybe some Warhammer 40K, and maybe even some Dungeons and Dragons.

So buckle up and enjoy the ride, and if you are interested in a game in person or online, send me an email at rhellion.wh@gmail.com. I will probably need some motivation to complete this massive task, so your page views and comments are truly appreciated. Thanks, and as always you can follow me every day on Twitter @Rhellion.

Blood in the Sun 2012

I've been back a little bit and had a rough couple weeks, but I need to get my BitS reports up! This year's Blood in the Sun 2012 tournament was fantastic. I may not have placed as high as last year, but I still did well and had a good time along the way.

This year I brought a different list than last year, and the style of play was very different. Instead of a large Furnace horde and pushing it forward looking for the best match ups, I brought swarms of Gutter Runners and played the defensive shooting and magic battle.