Chicago Games Day Coverage

This title is a little misleading since I didn't actually attend Games Day. I was hoping people would come back and fill me in on the details and give me pictures. The only one that actually did was John, and he's already posted them on his blog.

Also, I've been overwhelmed with the amount of Internet coverage on this thing, so it's probably makes more sense for me to point people to what I think is the best. The Fly Lords of Terra have a ton of great pictures. There's also this thread on Warseer. For more of a downer, there is a major bitch session going on at Adeptus Windy City.

Enjoy!!

Chicago Games Day Tomorrow

Tomorrow is Chicago's Games Workshop Games Day. For the first time since they started doing these in Chicago, I won't be attending.

I have mix feelings about this. While I like saying that I went to games day, I usually walk away trying to convince myself that it was worth the ticket price. Except for last year when I volunteered and walked away wondering if my time was worth it.

I think the problem with Games Day is that it seems to be tailored to young kids new to the hobby. The hobby for me has never been about screaming "Waaaaagh!!" When I started it was about being alone inhaling paint fumes in my mother's basement.

Anyway, I'm not here to go on about the relative merits of Games Day... but let me say this last thing...

I have to commend Games Workshop for having a combat patrol tournament for free at games day. I don't think I have the stamina to do a two day long grand tournament, nor do I want to pay the money for it. But a handful of 400pt 40k games? Sign me up... next year.

So, no I'm not going. I'll be in Missouri floating down some river in a canoe.

Have no fear! I have agents who will be attending on my behalf (and buying me forge world stuff). They promised to take pictures for me. Hopefully, I will have some kind of report for all of you on Monday.

The Adeptus Windy City Crew from Games Day Chicago 2006

Update: Games Day hasn't even really started yet and people are already posting pictures of it on Warseer!! Craziness!!

R.I.P. - BattleWagon Bits

I was just thinking the other day how I don't think I had sufficiently given props to Battlewagon Bits for giving me a free t-shirt at Adepticon. I was thinking this because I was wearing said t-shirt; something I've only done twice since Adepticon.

Then I heard the news that they're basically ceasing operation and I felt even worse. The guys working the booth at Adepticon were super cool. I bought some of the new (at the time) Dark Angels bits and they threw the t-shirt in for free. I was even more shocked when they actually had it in medium! A gamer t-shirt in medium is a surprisingly rare thing.

The on-line gaming retail giant The WarStore will be taking over the operation. They seem to have their act together, so I'm sure everything will run very smoothly.

Anyway, this may be a delayed thanks, but I did appreciate the freebie.

Battle of the Blogs III

Once again, this weekend My Thousand Sons clashed with John's Ultramarines from Plastic Legions. We decided to write up a joint battle report. He's also posted this report at his site. We each wrote our own turns a la White Dwarf. I tried to make it clear below who's saying what.

Also, John took some awesome pictures. All of the in-game shots here are his. For added visual interest, I've posted some close ups of my Thousand Sons unit #1, as requested.

My Army list

I have to admit, I hadn’t prepared for this game ahead of time. In fact, for some reason, I thought that we were playing at 600 pts. When John told me 700 pts, I threw a list together without much thought.

HQ

Chaos lieutenant Sorcerer - Derg Corra Amnon (156 pts)
Mark of Tzeentch
Power Weapon
CCW
Bolt of Change
Familiar
Wind of Chaos
Demonic flight

Troops

Thousand Sons Squad 1 (271 pts)
8 Rubric Marines + Free Aspiring Champion - Corracol Serrano
Power Weapon
Thrall
Familiar
Doombolt
Wind of Chaos

Thousand Sons Squad 2 (271 pts)
8 Rubric Marines + Free Aspiring Champion - Rohm Dutt
Power Weapon
Thrall
Familiar
Doombolt
Wind of Chaos

As you can see, all my spell casters have Wind of Chaos. When fighting marines, it’s a necessity. Also, I’ve named all my characters here for fun.

John's List

Ultramarines (695 pts)

HQ

Captain Brother Septimius

Power Weapon
Plasma Pistol
Iron Halo

Troops

Alpha Squad-
Sgt Brother Tiberius
9 Marines
Plasma Gun
Missile Launcher

Rhino Transport

Beta Squad
Sgt Brother Octavian
9 Marines
Plasma Gun
Missile Launcher

Fast Attack

Assault Squad
Sgt Brother Cato
-Terminator honors
-Power Fist
-Combat Shield
5 marines
Plasma Gun
Flamer


Deployment
John - I wanted to get my Assault Squad into CC with Scott's 1st ASAP, my eagerness cost me big time. basically the plan was to get the Assault squad engaged, Alpha Squad gets objective while Beta provided range support... Nice plan, zero execution.

Scott - Take and Hold is absolutely my favorite scenario. Once a unit of Rubrics gets in the center of the board, there is almost no dislodging them.
Since both my Rubric units are basically the same, I deployed one on the left flank and one on the right. I positioned my HQ behind squad #2 on the left.

I knew that John’s Assault Squad was going to cause a lot of problems for me, so I made them target priority #1.

John won the first turn and so it began...

Turn 1

John - Movement-Rhino pulls up toward the lander clear its stormbolter clear shots on Scotts second squad. Alpha Squad with my Commander attached moves up near the transport using it as cover against the open squad. Beta Squad stays put and will fire a Krak missile a scott's second squad. Assault Marines deployed behind a hill fly over the hill into the open toward scotts 1st squad(this was very dumb, I will regret this later and need to learn how to use these guys properly)

Shooting-Rhino fires at squad two, causing 1 wound which scott saves.Beta Squad- fires Krak Missle at Scotts second squad. It misses.

Scott - I knew that I’d have to start getting a move on if I was going to get to the center of the board, so I made Slow and Purposeful (S&P) rolls for both units. I wanted to have squad 1 hang back since John’s assault marines where heading toward me on the right flank but I was afraid that I’d be plagued with bad S&P rolls so I figured just move them up. I also moved my Sorcerer Lord from behind unit #2 toward the right flank for support.

In the shooting phase, unit 1 opened up on the assault marines, causing 6 wounds. John saved all but one. I didn’t think that was good enough, so I sacrificed the thrall and shot Doombolt again, taking one more down. A Bolt of Change from my sorcerer claimed one more. This was enough to make the unit fall back. Ha! I wasn’t going to be charged next turn.

Squad #2 didn’t have any marines in range, so the Aspiring Champion fired Doombolt into the side of the Rhino. The shot was good enough to immobilize it. Hmm, this new Aspiring Champion is already showing promise…

Turn 2

John - Movement-Rhino- immobilized..chooses to fire rather than self repair. Alpha Squad- Holds and Fires into advancing Ksons. Beta Squad Holds and Fires at Scott. Second Squad Assault Squad - Holds stays in cover.

Shooting-Rhino- Fires stormbolter- misses. Alpha Squad- 8 shots, including Krak Missile and Plasma Gun land 4 wounds on scotts 1st squadhe makes all his saves. Beta Squad- fires a Krak and second squad- misses.

Scott - This turn’s moves were basically me moving all my units forward. Unit #2 got a crappy 2” for their S&P roll. That was still not enough for me to target John’s unit hanging back on his right flank.

Shooting wasn’t as impressive as the previous turn. I managed to cause only one casualty on the unit containing John’s leader. Unit #2 Stunned the rhino but kept it’s eyes on that unit far off in the wastes.

Turn 3

John - Movement-Rhino- immobilized..chooses to fire rather than self repair. Alpha Squad- Holds and Fires into advancing Ksons. Beta Squad Holds and Fires at Scott Second Squad. Assault Squads- flies towards scotts advancing squad.

Shooting-Rhino- misses. Assault Squad- fires pistols miss and flamer causes 1 wound.Alpha Squad- lands 5 wounds, plasma gun kills one wounded Chaos Marine, scott saves the restBeta Squad- another Krak missile misses, I did not land one the whole game.

Assault-Critical error... my distance to charge is short by 1 inch!!! My guys are now sitting ducks, lesson learned here.

Scott - Wow, my sorcerers must have cast some kind of hex on John’s Plasma and krak missiles. I truly am blessed of Tzeentch.

Anyway, More slow moving. I position my Sorcerer HQ right in front of John’s unit w/ his HQ and let rip with Wind of Chaos. Four marines were consumed by the dread fire of Tzeentch!
Unit one eliminated the last remnants of John’s assault unit and I breathed a sigh of relief.
My HQ then charged the recently decimated unit of Ultramarines and cut down three more!

Turn 4

John - Movement-Rhino- immobilized... chooses to fire rather than self repair. HQ/ Squad 1- in close combat. Beta Squad- holds and fires.

Shooting-Rhino- fires misses. Beta Squad- entire squads blasts Scotts second squad with rapid fire bolters, plasma gun and krak missile I roll a 13 attacks, Scott's Ksons scoff- my plasma comes up 1 with a gets hot, I fail the save and die, my Krak misses again and all the bolter shots on come out to 1 wound on one soldier after saves.AssaultHQ/ Alpha Squad Close Combat- land 1 wound on his sorcerer lord.

Scott - Movement in this turn is pretty minmal as my HQ Sorcerer is locked in comabt with John's Alpha Squad.

My Squad 2 manages to take John's Beta squad down to three marines.

The Assault phase is tense as our two HQs face off. We pull a Superman/ Doomsday and kill each other simultaneously. I was hoping that my general would do a demonic dance of victory over the corpse of Captain Brother Septimius, but at least I took him out.

Turn 5 (Note - both my and John's notes seem to be fuzzy from here on out.)

John - Movement Rhino- immobilized/ Crew Stunned. Alpha Squad- Shoots then Assaults. Beta Squad- advances and fires.

Shooting/ Assault-Alpha -I can't make out my notes here but either my Sgt's pistol or the assault lands some wounds. I kill one Chaos Marine here. Beta Squad- Bolters fire, I cause a wound here to the other squad.

Scott - I was shocked when alpha squad charged me. I mean, I know I suck at close combat, but that was a brave effort from those marines.

Anyway, we pretty much called the game at this point. Or as John, said, "The Thunderhawk comes down and rescues the last three marines standing."

Fair enough.

Final Recap

John - Wow, some my worst dice to date. I could barely do a thing and failed alot of saves.The highlight of game for me was the commanders taking each other out in a brutal close combat.I personally cant wait for the new Chaos Codex. While AP3 bolters sounds like hell, facing troops with only 1 wound will be nice change in dynamic.

Great game Scott...your revenge was served warm and cold and with a shovel!.

Quote of the day, from Scott after my 6th miss with a Krak missile- "Stop calling it a missile, call it a rocket as missile has the word MISS in it!" So true my friend. Next time- the Ultramarines counter attack.

Scott - I can't complain much about this game. It went smashingly well for me. I think my list could have been a little better. I probably didn't need to buy both my squads Wind of Chaos since neither of them got close enough to use it. I could have spent that money to give my HQ a better edge in close combat. I'm working on a Disc of Tzeentch right now which could have probably swung that last assault in my favor.

Also, John's Army looks great. I only had about 30% of my points painted and my leader looked pretty silly flying around without arms. I really need to try to get more painting done.

PS - Here's one more close up shot. More on the way, I promise.

Thousand Sons Squad 2

And so it begins again! I was going to start this post with some pictures of the demons I've worked on lately, but then I realized that I've taken almost no pictures of them. I think that's because I've gotten so frustrated with them that I can't bear to look at them more than I have to. I'll probably use some of the models in some capacity, but for now, I'm concentrating on my core.

Anyway, I'm pretty excited about this second squad of Thousand Sons. Since I don't have to test out my paint scheme, this unit should go a lot faster than my last one.

I learned one thing with my last unit that I've done differently in this unit. I based the models before I primed them. Last time, I waited until the very end to glue rocks and such on the base and then had a very hard time trying to paint around the legs and tabards.

In the squad above, I've started to apply the Midnight Blue to the areas of the armor that are going to be blue. The pictures don't show much since Midnight blue is so dark, almost black.

Ok, so not much to see at this point.

Here is the first stage of the Aspiring Champion/Sorcerer.

A random Thousand Sons Marine.


Finally, a Son with only the black undercoat.

Campaign Report

As I've mentioned previously, I've been involved in a campaign for a month or two now. So far, my army, "The Eye of Prophesy", is undefeated.

Below is a re-cap of my first four games. Note that we are doing an escalation from game to game. You may notice that some of the armies I describe aren't legal under standard 40k force organization. We started at 300 points, so there are rules dictating what we can take.

Game One - vs. Aaron's Imperial Guard (The Tarsus 88th)

This took place on one of the city-fight nodes on the campaign map. Since we had just stated the campaign, we weren't really ready for COD rules. We used lots of buildings but no stratagems. The game was a take and hold.

Aaron had three Imperial Guard Veteran Squads and I had one full squad of Thousand Sons and a unit of screamers.

Early in game, Aaron made the mistake of leaving one of his squads out in the open. I made them fall off the board just from shooting. The screamers showed up pretty quickly but didn't do much. Aaron shot them down pretty quickly. Fortunately, this caused one of plasma gunners to overheat and die. In fact, I think three of the plasma guns he had in his force died do to overheats.

Once I got in the center of the board, there was no dislodging me. I just blazed away with my bolters and brought his other two squads below scoring.

Game two - vs. Aaron (again)

This time Aaron attacked me at a node that grants me a free thrall when I fight a battle on it. He was able to afford more scary guns (Missile launchers) this time around and I had an extra screamer.

He was a lot smarter about placing his units this time and I was a lot smarter about my screamer's fall back move.

This one was Recon, if I recall. This one was a lot closer, but the end result was the same.


Game three - vs. Anton's sisters of Battle (Order of the Amethyst Shroud)

As a Space Wolves player, I played against Sisters of Battle a lot, so I was keen to test my new army against them. Anton took two small sisters squads and a stormtrooper squad in a chimera. He also had a heavy hitter in the form of a Callidus assassin.

Now, I've played sisters before, but never an assassin. I had no clue about the flamer template weapon that works on leadership. WTF!?!

Needless to say, I had my Thousand Sons packed pretty tightly when she showed up. I lost both my thralls and about three marines.

Luckily, I was sort of prepared. I had given my Aspiring Champion a familiar. He had Doombolt and Gift of Chaos. When my turn rolled around, I quickly turned the assassin into a chaos spawn.

Later in the game, I managed to charge the spawn into the side of the chimera and immobilize it. Nice tasty victory points for me.

Game Four - vs Anton's Sisters (again)

At the end of game three, Anton astutely pointed out that I had broken the rules by including my invulnerable save demons. Oops! My bad.

For game four, I decided to not take any demons. This time around, I had a full unit of Thousand sons and a smaller one with just the Aspiring champion and three rubrics.

It was take and hold again. I really like this mission because if I get a full unit of rubrics in the center of the board, it will take a lot to dislodge them.

This time, Anton had a unit of seraphim and two units of sisters, both with heavy bolters. Despite the may times I've played against sisters, I had never fought against seraphim. I have to say, they were a surprising unit. Combined with some of the faith points mo-jo (as some say, faith points bullshit), they put some hurt on one of my units.

Again, the assassin showed up and did some serious damage, and then I promptly turned her into a spawn.

I turned the sister superior of the seraphim into a spawn, too, but as I only have one spawn model, she just disappeared.

This one was close, but I pulled it out in the end.


Here are a few pictures taken on campaign nights:


This is a map-based campaign, and this is the map.


Jason, Nick and Eric contemplate their moves.



Nick's Orks take to the field.



Anton's Witch Hunters and Mike's Eldar battle over "The Tower of Knowledge" (not pictured).