End of September

Wow this month has gone quickly! I thought I still had tomorrow to go so queue quick end post!

I won my game tonight and will post a battle report tomorrow.

The sorcerer

I am going to re-do the cloak as I want to blend it but I need to get around to painting in the daylight as I've found bulbs really distort the colour.  I also need to finish the base but can't find the flock!

I'm really quite chuffed with how he turned out but boy i find delicate models hard to paint.  They really show up my lack of painting skills with fine detail.  With all my other models so far I've barely had to use anything other than a standard brush but this guy was pretty much fine detail all the way!

I decided to add the skeleton familiar too as without him I thought the model was to emty.

Some extras.  Since seeing the new mournfang cavalry I couldn't help but think of them as potential Thunder Wolves so I bought some when they were on sale and am having a go.

Another thing this gave me was the opportunity to convert two chaos ogres so I did :)  Will get another one at some point for a nice supporting unit...

I think once they are snow based I can hide the fact that I didn't completely manage to successfully sort out the cavalry legs...

Sorry you will have to scroll down to see my other models this month but target met with a few extras as well :)

Chariots of... er... Dire?

I didn't manage to get a game in this week but I have one arranged for next week against an ogre army... Should be interesting. Methinks i'll forgo shields with my main warrior unit for extra hand weapons and hopefully chop up enough ogres before they hit back hard and negate my armour anyways...

I've finished my chariots

And assembled my marauder unit. I really don't like the heads from the boxed set with these. They are to cartoony for me so I've used the heads from the horseman set as they look a lot meaner and a lot less comic.
I've used as many spare armour parts as I could and modeled a few bits of green to make each model different. Just switching hands with the weapons as well makes a big difference to a unit.
I wanted to make the champion bigger than the rest in some way so I gave him a warriors cloak. I like to think he isn't far off going on his quest to find his chaos armour and joining the ranks of the warriors. Him as well as using some helmets and shields from the warriors tie the unit in with the warriors.

I have mounted a sorcerer to stick him in with either my knights or marauder horse as this will get him close enough to use the shorter ranged death magic.
He's from the chaos manticore boxed set and works well on a horse. The cloak gives him a lot of motion.

What's better than cheap hammering? Getting paid to make your models! Well ok i'm not being paid but I have nearly made my money back this month on the models i've bought.
I bought the manticore model for £25 and sold the manticore and lord parts on ebay for near £30.
I also sold Astoraths wings and backpack for £15. The whole model cost me £10.50!
All i need now is to sell the marauder heads I haven't used for a couple of million and i'll be rich :D

I have done some other extras which i'll show next time around along with my finished sorcerer.  On that tantalizing note I shall say ttfn...

Gaming news

2 Battles this week and victory in both!

Anuerin has written a report against the elves here so i won't repeat it...

The cheesy elf set up to sit back and shoot and had the cheek to complain that elves aren't good at anything so he had to do this!  Hang on a second though...  Hit first in combat (check) with re-rolls (check) can shoot and hit on 3s in a rank of spears and shoot as a charge reaction and still use all ranks (check)  uses extra dice in magic phase because "i'm an elf" (check) bolt thrower doesn't allow armour saves (check) Boo bloody hoo!


I was disappointed when he announced he had changed his magic law and lack of silver helms as I had armed my sorcerer with an item allowing him to steal spells so was ready to give him a taste of his own medicine and Okams razor him into the floor!  Ah well...

Wayne played his Vampire counts and I faced:
Big unit og grave guard
Big unit of Ghouls
Big unit of skellies
A Vargulf
5 Blood knights
2 Corpse carts
10 dire wolves
A vampire Lord (ulp)
Each unit had a vampire and or necromancer in it

I took
25 warriors
10 knights with my death sorcerer mounted up
16 marauders with an exalted hero for extra punch
10 chosen with my fire sorcerer
2 10*warhounds
5 marauder horse
Warshrine
Chariot

Unfortunately battery was to low on phone for pics but here a quick report.  And even though I can produce really nice graphics here are 5 second paint maps :D

Turn 1

We basically marched towards each other as neither had any missile fire.  Magic was limited for me due to the amount of magic users in his army and his vampire being able to add 5 to his dispel dice!
Basically my warriors faced up against his skellies, marauders v ghouls, knights v grave guard and everything else flit about the flanks with Waynes skirmish units.
His Direwolves charged my marauder horse and 3 died to their axes before 4 more bit the dust in combat to no losses.  Being in range of the general though the wolves held in the combat
Annoyingly (and predictably) Wayne raised a unit of zombies right before my knights.

Turn 2

The knights charged the fresh unit of zombies and the marauders went into the ghouls. My hounds also stupidly charged the vargulf and failed to wounds due to being terrified and were promptly broken and fled but not charged down.
I did manage to get off a crucial magic roll to toughen up my marauders allowing them to wound the ghouls easier but they were hitting WS 7 ghouls as the vampire lord kindly lent them his WS stats for the round!
Having the hero in there really helped though as he killed off the necromancer and the overkill points helped the marauders win the combat causing 4 more to crumple.
The knights predictably killed the zombies and my horsemen killed off the Direwolves
In Waynes turn the skellies failed a charge on the warriors.

Turn 3

My warriors went into the skellies hewing them down with ease taking no damage in return due to +1 armour from the warshrine. The knights into ANOTHER unit of zombies...  The maruaders continued to whittle down the ghouls but were losing number fast themselves and the vampire lord had a blood thirsty look in his eyes...
In waynes turn the blood knights went into my chariot and smashed it apart and the vargulf came closer to my lines from the flank after chasing down the hounds.  The grave guard attempted a charge at the horsemen who fled taken the unit out of the game for all purposes.

Turn 4

Things got interesting this round...  In my turn the ghouls got whittled down to one while I had 3 marauders standing and the hero.  I charged my hounds into the side of the grave guard to stop them going into my knights who were having to wade through yet another unit of summoned zombies!  The hounds fled but took the grave guard way out wide.
My warriors continued to knock down skellies but they had 4 left at the end of the turn still grinning in their faces.
His vampire finally went into the flank of the maruaders... My chosen got charged by the blood knights, vargulf and corpse cart.
Magic phase before combat.  In an attempt to replenish the ghoul unit wayes casts his raising spell on two dice.  Wayne (i roll 6's for fun) Poppleton true to his name rolls two sixes on them.  I laugh evilly as he rolls on the miscast table.  "Oh not to bad" says he "at least he doesn't die from it". "Erm," i reply, "Well... actually, expecting you to have shed loads of magic and hopefully a miscast I took an infernal puppet allowing me to subtract 2 from that roll meaning you now have to roll a d6, under a 4 and your general is dust.  roll of a 2 later and my gods laugh as a new play thing enters their realm!
And to add insult to injury the spell resurrects only one ghoul who dies in the resultant S10 blast anyways leaving only my hero standing next to a mound of his comrades and a pair of smoking pointy boots!

The vargulf can't survive the death of his leader and in the chosen combat they chop up the knights and cart due to being not only armed with 2 weapons but also being granted an extra attack by the gods!  Waynes face was a picture as I rolled buckets of dice at WS6 initiative 5!  Mwhahahaha.

After that disastrous round we called it a day as the only viable unit Wayne had left were his grave guard way out on the flank and I had my two big blocks left virtually unscathed

Seems I can win a straight out march forward and kill battle then.. Though I was lucky a few times especially as 2 hounds survived the grave guard to run away making them chase them right out on the flank.  My marauders were hero's against the ghouls as they really should have died.  I know the Vampire dying helped but i think i still would have won as the left flank was mine anyways and yeah more units would have been raised against me but nothing that would really hurt.

All in all a good week of battles!

Conversion clinic...

First off in gaming news I lost miserably to Kierons Bretonnians last week.  Full battle report is here 

To sum it up Kieron completely outplayed me and combined with poor magic and Kieron making an amazing amount of 5+ saves meant I got trodden into the ground.  Was as ever though a good game with Kieron letting me off mistakes as i'm still learning

Learning points from this were:

Chariots are to slow for a supporting unit.  If I'd had a quicker unit they could have covered my knights rear meaning they would have won their combat by not getting hit by the men at arms.
Don't be afraid to take a flank charge from a weaker unit if it means advancing onto the main army.  Turning to face my warriors against the Knights Errant meant they were taken out of the game and didn't make their points back
Don't chase flying units, its pointless.  Shoot the feckers (buy something that shoots)  It was like whacky races with my War Shrine and the pegasii
Sacrifice some virgins before battle to make sure my gods give me some luck!  (Though where i'll find some in Rotherham is a bit of a problem.. ;-) )

Onto modelling where i'm having a much nicer time.  First off here is my death sorcerer.  I am chuffed to bits with this model.  It was a great model to start with.  I love working with finecast, its so nice as long as you're careful

I snipped off all the blood angels iconography, re-positioned his arms having to break them into two, made his power axe not powered and remove his other hand from it.  I need to find a left hand that fits as he is a tad smaller than warriors and other space marines annoyingly.  Anyone know of one holding a skull or open handed?
I also want to add a bit more decoration to his axe

I've used the cloak from the chaos manticore sorcerer.  I tried making my own but wasn't happy with the results.  I added the icon and skulls as it looked to plain otherwise and as the model is so detailed i felt it needed something else.  I am going to print some transfers to add more detail to it once painted

I've finished the undivided chariot, just need to do the riders and finish the base

Khornate chariot on the way as well

And my marauders are being built.  Decided to go hand weapon and shield in the end.  Then I could go beardy and give them the mark of Tzeench too and get two 5+ saves.  It worked for Kieron!

Let me know any thoughts and ideas please!  'Til then...

Its been a while...

The end of the month is here and I've met my target : )  I even got some warriors half done when down visiting the folks and will boost my unit next month

One game since I last posted against the dreaded girly elves.  I really do resent going second and having re-rolls against me!  When my high initiative is my main asset having it taking away sucks balls...  Battle report here
It was a fun game though and thanks to Anuerin for hosting it.

Here is what I've gotten done.  12 warriors, 2 chariots built and the warshrine painted
Heads will go on the models in chariots once they are based so they aren't looking into the sky!  Still waiting for the warrior for the Khorn one to come from ebay.

I am really quite chuffed with how the warshrine turned out.  At certain points I thought it would look to unwieldy and bare but once the skulls were on it really made it come together and the base helps too.

Here is where I got with the sorcerer.  I have called it a day with him as i'm not happy with the pose, I can't get the legs right!  I may finish him just to get used to sculpting some more as I want to get into that.  Some parts you can't tell i've done but others are poor...
Instead i'm going to buy the Astorath the grim model and convert him instead but can't find him on ebay cheap enough yet though I may plump for the new finecast model for ease of conversion.  To replace him in the target I did 12 warriors rather than 6.

So for next month...  Hmm...  After playing games now I am starting to think more about units to help me win rather than just looks.  I would like a big marauder unit and have read up on how best to kit them out.  at 4 points a model for a WS4 initiative 4 core model is excellent so just a big unit of these would soak up fire then hits and should still hit back well.  Equip with shields and light armour for 5+ then 6+ ward save for 6 points each and with the mark of Tzeench for a 5+ ward save will make them quite durable.
I also like the idea of two hand weapons or a great weapon.  Aaaargh! to many decisions!

What are peoples thoughts on this?
I like the idea of them armed individually to fit in with the chaotic nature of the army however this won't wash in tournaments so.  If I did 10 models with hand weapon and shield, 10 with flails and 10 with two weapons etc then whichever 10 is on the front rank the whole unit counts as armed like them?  This means its easy to see for opponents and I don't have to choose!

Target for September
16 marauders built (with conversions for more armour)
Paint chariots
Convert and paint new sorcerer model

That's all folks...

In gaming news I lost miserably to Mr Lucy's Elves...  Overgrown budgies stopped me moving and charging as I wanted and ridiculously long charge rolls meant my units were taken apart my at least two Elven units at a time.  Lessons learn from this one;

1 - I need some small units to disrupt my enemies movement and stop gaps in my lines to leave them none to disrupt me
2 - Death magic is fun
3 - I really really don't like High Elves!

Modelling wise I've had a good week getting 12 warriors done and my War Shrine finished (barring a few skulls as I ran out)
Progress is slow going with my death sorcerer as its more complicated than I thought and i'm having to green a lot.  My flesh hounds turned up this morning though so i can get my other chariot done :)

Once again all different but tied by black cloak linings and shields.  I need to do a transfer for the banner

I'm quite chuffed with this model.  I couldn't think what colour to do his "belt buckle" so did it in lots.  Very chaotic :)
He's black as according to the bumf in the book the majority of Norse are dark skinned despite GW painting all theirs as pasty white vikings.

So sorcerer, chariot and basing to go, 'till then...

Beaten by old bones...

Grrr, the first time my new Harry Model gets into combat against Craigs Tomb Kings and he disgraces himself by running away!  From skellies!  He caused 1 wound on the Heriophant and then 16 attacks from the unit caused another 2 to crumble!  3 wounds from 21 WS5 S4 attacks!
Still in most of the rest of the game I was rolling extremely well and Craig extremely badly (double 1 for his giants charge sticks out).
I'm not to bothered about losing at the mo until I have a better idea of what i'm doing.  A few lessons were learnt in this game;

1: Ranking up correctly is muy importante
2: Make sure I move my units in the right order so I don't get stuck behind myself
3: Fire magic is pretty pants if you don't get the right spells and don't get the bonus for multiple attacks on a unit
4: My knights need new armour as not one made a freaking save!
5: I need an army standard
6: I need to tailor magic items better to the army i'm facing
7: War hounds are not crap :D

Ta for the game and lessons Craig :)

I'm playing a 2400 pointer next week so I need to get my chosen unit built, a lord and another warrior unit raised to make up the points.

Onto the modelling side.  I'm pleased with my scratch build chariot using the spiky bits from the 40k chaos rhino

From a pile of bits to...

I'm going to have a converted Crom the conqueror model as the warrior in this one.  I figured you wouldn't get a fully blown warrior as a "driver" so used a marauder model instead.  Once painted he will be holding the chains as reins.
I'm going to have a second chariot pulled by two flesh hounds and done up as a Khorn follower simply because it will look cool!

War shrine is coming along nicely.  I need to do the altar and sorcerer then add a load of skulls into it to cover the floor.  Am also wondering whether to include weapons etc as just skulls may be to Khornate.

I still cannot find my knights weapons... Or my champions hands.  Maybe its Tzeentch's way of telling me to give them tentacles instead?