Citizen Nick Hobby Center

Sorcerer Base Done

2010-05-03T12:09:00.000-05:00

This weekend, I finished the base for my sorcerer and therefor, the entire miniature. Pictures for the complete model are on 2nd City Warzone.

Here are some detail pictures of the base.
Here you can see the glowing, cryptic, hexagram-thingee on the disc of Tzeentch.

Here's blasted Space Wolf Helmet.

A Hidden little imp and skull.

And my favorite, the owl, a symbol of secret, forbidden knowledge

Sorcerer Complete (More or less)

2010-04-20T12:10:00.000-05:00

Well, there you go.

I do believe that it's important to try new techniques and push the limits of your painting. I feel like I did that here, but at the same time, I not 100% satisfied with the results. I suspect that I'll take these lessons and improve them on my next piece.

I'll tell you one thing, these pictures really highlight some areas I still need to work on with this.

The hand is a touch sloppy. I might need to clean it up a bit.

I'm pretty happy with the freehand. I can see errors in this picture that I couldn't see with my eye, so I'll have to go back and correct them. I think the biggest thing is that the colors seem flat. I'm not looking forward to going back to highlight and shade the freehand, but I think it needs to be done.

I tried a combination of metallic and non-metallic painting here. I'm mostly happy.

Ok, after a couple touch-ups, I'll start working on the base.

Sorcerer Very Nearly Done!

2010-04-15T12:16:00.005-05:00

The eye on his "casting" hand is going to be red. I'm planning on doing some object source lighting to make it look like it's glowing. I'm pretty intimidated by it, so hopefully it's not a complete disaster.

I need to start working on the elaborate base after that.

More Sorcerer WIP Shots

2010-03-24T12:08:00.004-05:00

Here are more in-progress shots for my Chaos Sorcerer. The shots above and below were taken last week sometime, but I forgot to post them.

I dragged out my aspiring champions and a couple of Thousand Sons just to make sure I was keeping the colors consistent.

Here is what the sorcerer looked after this morning's painting session:

A lot of the blending is still pretty rough (particularly around the helmet, but I'm happy with how it's going so far.

Also, does anyone out there remember this paint company:

This used to be my favorite brands back when I started painting in the late 80s. I held on to this bottle long after it dried out. It's metal cap makes a great place to stick my magnetized mini and use as painting handle. I knew I held on to it for a reason.

Anyway, I don't see myself getting any more painting done before Adepticon, so that's it for now.

Speaking of Adepticon, keep an eye on 2nd City Warzone for what me and the other guys will be doing. Hope to see you there!

On the Table 3/12/10

2010-03-12T12:24:00.003-06:00

Feels good to finally be painting power armor again. I don't usually paint in sections like my friend Nick does, but this is a special model.

Also, I finally picked up some daylight bulbs, so hopefully, my pictures will be coming out a lot better from now on.

Daemonette Pictures

2010-03-04T11:31:00.002-06:00

Hello all. I've decided to revive this blog. I will still be posting finished work on 2nd City Warzone, but I wanted somewhere to post in-progress work. So Citizen Nick Hobby center is back!

Above are the finished Deamonettes, and below are some finished pictures. Enjoy.

Bloodletters Done!

2009-05-11T12:51:00.001-05:00

Picture are over at 2nd City Warzone.

New Project

2009-05-07T10:38:00.005-05:00

You may have noticed the group with whom I play regularly is heavy on bloggers. Nick has a blog, as does Eric. There are other members of our group that wanted to get in on some blogging action, but didn't want to commit to maintaining a blog full-time.

That's how 2nd City Warzone was born. We figured together, we can generate a lot more content.

At this point, none of us are that sure what form this blog is going to take. you'll just have to wait an see.

As to the future of Citizen Nick Hobby Center, I'm not really sure of that either. Again, I'm just working on this as I go.

Any please visit us over at 2nd City Warzone (and add it to your RSS feed).

Bah!

2009-04-24T13:25:00.002-05:00

Bear with me people. Still learning the new camera. These Bloodletters look better than this picture lets on. Now I just have to figure out what setting I had it on when I took that last set of pictures.

I'm Back!

2009-04-20T12:07:00.003-05:00

My new camera arrived last week, so photos will return to Citizen Nick Hobby Center!

Here is the unit I feel like I've been painting for an eternity, the Bloodletters. While my new camera is a bit nicer than my last one, the functions and settings are all different. It has macro, of course, but pretty much everything else is different. That is my long way of saying that I'm not 100% happy with these pictures. I'm sure I'll get used to it soon and crank out some nicer pictures.

I definitely have to add a little more highlighting o these guys and clean up some of the mistakes. There are quite a few areas that I slopped red paint somewhere it wasn't supposed to go (the red paint I slopped on the swords may stay).

I have to finish up the claws, some spines, the teeth, eyes, and more highlighting on the swords. I'm hoping to have this unit done after one more painting session.

Here's the banner/ icon. I was trying to make it look like an old faded tapestry (maybe painted with the blood of heretics?). The last layer came out a little brighter than I wanted, so I think I'll have paint some more highlights.

Some other business, I add a blog to my links. My buddy Felix's log, Pokeminiatures. The blog mainly features Warhammer Fantasy and Warmachine/Hordes. Check it out.

Also, I've watched this video about 15 times since it hit the tubes. Enjoy:

Request for Feedback and Other Important Business

2009-04-08T12:10:00.005-05:00

This year I've strip down this blog to just the basics. It's been a few months since I moved to the current format of switching off between progress pictures and in-game pictures.

So how do you like it so far?

Speaking of progress pictures, I have been plugging away at my Bloodletters. Unfortunately, I broke my camera during a pinata-bashing session at a baby shower this weekend. No, I didn't hit it with a bat. I just dropped it.

Here's a picture that someone else took of me about to rip the candy heart out of the beast that indirectly cause this tragedy:

Anyway, it will be a little bit before I show any more pictures, but that's where you come in. I need suggestions on a camera. I will mainly be using it to take pictures of the kids, but obviously, I need one that can take pictures of miniatures, too (although it seems like almost all cameras have macro now). Suggestions, anyone?

For the past several years, I've been posting pictures of Adepticon. However, for a wide variety of reasons, I wasn't able to attend this year. I will however post links to other blog that I think did a good job of coverage.

For example, John at plastic legions.

Finally, I have jumped on a bandwagon I would normally avoid and have summoned a Daemon Adoptable. It can be found on the right hand column. If you have no other feedback or suggestions, please at least click my Daemon.

I will be back soon with pictures of bloodletters. Stay tuned.

An Old Enemy

2009-03-26T14:14:00.006-05:00

I have some bloodletter pictures coming, but in the meantime, here are some pictures from this weeks game. I got to play against Art, my old nemesis and former roommate. Art and I have played in some games together in the last few years, but it's always been some odd two-on-one deal or a three-way free-for-all. This was the first time we were able to go mano-a-mano in something like three years.

This game had four objectives so Art deployed in the center near three of them. I was hoping to surround him, but not a single unit from my second wave showed up until turn three. That gave him plenty of time to waste my first wave.

My screamers made a line for his hellhound when they finally showed up, but it would be too little, too late. Art slaughtered me to the daemon.

Meanwhile, on the adjacent table, Nick was playing his old nemesis and former roommate, Anton. They were both practicing for the Adepticon Championships.

I was able to capture this heroic moment. Right after I took this picture, Nick had to take seven saves from from the Kroot attack. He made 6 of them! Impressive rolling. Too bad it wasn't enough to save the marine.

Monday Night City Fight

2009-03-12T16:59:00.005-05:00

Nick and I played a 1000pt cities of Death game this Monday so here are some pictures. Let me apologize for their weird tint. I think I had my white balance set wrong. Just pretend that this battle took place on a planet with an orange sun, or that it's atmosphere is so polluted, the sun looks especially yellow.

A small section of Nick's Ork horde. Word of caution: Orks kick ass in Cities of death.

In this photo, Nick points out which ork is about to shoot melta beams out of its eyes. WTF!?

Rhinos keeping those firing lanes clear. Good job, boys (Just kidding, I took this picture before the orks even deployed).

Great firing position, right? Wrong! I tried to get down from this 6" tall building for three turns! Never did get any closer to the objective.

This is what my sorcerer mini looked like after Nick knocked it on the floor. Luckily, it's mostly held together by magnets. I guess that makes up for me actually blowing up one of his Rhinos (that wasn't really my fault as much as I'd like to take credit for it).

The game was a total slaughter. I came to the game with a 1250 list and cut 250 points to do the 1000pt list. In retrospect, I should have left my defiler in there so that I could have blessed those Orks with some pie plates. Live and learn.

Behold! A test Mini! (And Special Offer)

2009-03-04T16:21:00.005-06:00

I want to say thank you to those of you that commented on my last post about test minis. I think I just needed to accept the fact that when starting a new color scheme, the noble test miniature is unavoidable.

So here are some more pictures of the mini. I'm pretty happy with it.

This is definitely pretty rough still. I need to neaten up some of the blending, especially around the horns. I'm happy I was able to work some subtle purple shading into this guy.

Special Offer!
I am finally taking the plunge into selling some old gaming stuff on e-bay. Find it here.

If there is something that you're interested, please make a bid. If you win, mention that you are a Citizen Nick Hobby Center reader and I'll give you free shipping!

A discussion about test miniatures

2009-02-27T13:57:00.005-06:00

I've been on a minimalist kick lately on this blog, but today, I'd like to provoke a little dialog. The subject is test miniature.

Instead of painting a whole squad at once, you paint just one to see how you like the color scheme. It's also a chance to figure out what colors you're going to use to get your desired effect.

Here's selection of some of mine:This is the miniature off of which the rest of my Thousand Sons are based. It's actually the second test mini I did. This is the first:

This is the third and final test mini for my Renegade Space Marine Chapter, the Sentinels of Truth. I had a real hard time getting the grey just right. This color scheme has yet to be, "put into production" since I decided to concentrate on demons for now.

Speaking of daemons, her are the test minis for my flamers and horrors. The Horrors have been finished with a slightly different look. The Flamers are in the queue.

One of the few test minis I was satisfied with the first time out. I still need to work on how that gold is going to look, but the flesh tones (blue body and pinkish claws) are pretty much what I was going for. Another unit in the queue.

This is a test miniature of a diffident sort. I just wanted somewhere to practice some highlighting and shading techniques. I figured a spawn was a good place for that. I don't intend to paint a whole squad like this, but I figure that if it doesn't come out perfect, no big deal,it's just a spawn.

The reason I'm bringing this all up is that with the unit I'm currently painting (the bloodletters), I wanted to forgo the usual test mini. I figured that they're mainly just red so how hard can they be?

Another reason I didn't want to paint a test mini was this it takes the limited painting time I have away from the unit as a whole. I really wanted to bang this unit out quick. Plus, I don't want to agonize over this unit too much. I'm more of a Tzeentch/ Slaanesh kinda guy, you know?

I painted the Bloodletters this week but didn't post pictures because I'm just not happy with them yet. I think I've come to the realization that it's harder to work without a goal in mind.

Here's what I mean. I started with a white under coat and started with a couple layers of Blood Red.

The first shading layer was Blood Red mixed with Red Gore(1:1). This layer didn't show that much, but I figured that as it was just the first layer.

I did this on all 8 miniatures in the unit. This took about three painting sessions (yeah, I paint slow).

The next layer was pure Red Gore. However, the shading wasn't really coming out the way I wanted. After I painted about half of the unit, I added Dark Angels Green to the Red Gore and painted one mini with it.

This one miniature looked OK, but I had too many questions. Is this final layer going to be dark enough? Should I add some Black? should I strat to build up some highlights? I wanted to work some purple in there; how would I do that?

I came to the realization that I'd have to paint a test mini. I hope I can nail it on the first try and not have to paint three of them.

What about the rest of you? Test miniatures: Good, bad? Waste of time? I'm open to suggestions if you have them.

It's that time of year again

2009-02-24T12:59:00.005-06:00

Time to help the gaming group get their Adepticon team tournament list ready. I haven't play the tournament since way back in 2006, but the people with whom I play do the team tournament every year. So every year for months leading up to Adepticon, I play a lot of team games.

Last night I allied with Chad's Imperial Guard. To celebrate the fact that I completed a second squad, my 1000 pts represented a "pure" Thousand Sons force: Two units of Sons, one unit of lesser summoned daemons, a spawn, and a chaos sorcerer HQ.

Nick and Eric both played Dark Angels (technically, Nick played Angels of Absolution).

Here are some picks plus a short recap:Here's the board set-up. The mission was from the team tournament primer. Dawn of War deployment with a modified Command and Control objective (We team had two objectives in their deployment zones).

Chad's Varrian 10th holding an objective with my Sorcerer. Note: it's not that my sorcerer isn't painted, he's using his powers to conceal himself.

Corrcal's squad disembarks...

... and Rohm Dutts squad takes a demolisher shell to the face.

Some of Nick's troops skulking around the backfield.

More skulking.

By far the most heroic moment of the game. Chad's HQ takes on three terminators at the peak of this ruin. Truly a contest for the ages.

In the end, the angels would be victorious; breaking Nick's non-winning streak, but continuing mine.

I try to learn something with every game I play in hopes that I can improve my playing skill. My biggest mistake in this game was that I worried way too much about Eric's Vindicator on the left flank. I sent Corrcal's quad (a.k.a. Squad #1), to shoot a bolt of change at it. If I had instead spent that turn motoring over to the right flank (which was getting hammered by Nick and Eric's double-wing combo), I probably would have had a better chance of turning the tide of the game.

One tactic that Eric employed to my annoyance was going to ground whenever I rapid-fired my AP3 bolters at him. An odd move for a marine player, but one that kept his troops on the objective.

Rohm Dutt and the next step

2009-02-18T17:11:00.003-06:00

Rohm Dutt is done (and the title of this post would make an awesome band name). I'm pretty happy with the results.

However, I must now drift away from Tzeentch and the Thousand Sons. Let's see what's next on the painting block...

That's right. Time to shed some blood for the blood god (Blood Red paint, that is). It will be nice to not have to paint blue for a while.

I haven't done much on these so far: Just base coats and one layer of shade. I was hoping to show that with the picture below.

I'm afraid the shading is just a little too light at this point to really see. More shading next week.

More Battle Photos

2009-02-12T17:14:00.002-06:00

I've been getting in the habit of taking pictures of the games I play every other Monday. I really don't like writing battle reports, but I do like looking at pictures.

Anyway, here are some photos of last Monday's "Nerd Night."

I played against Eric and his Imperial Fists (formally the Highland Lions). It was an exciting Command and Control game that came down to a very close draw. I guess it was so exciting that I forgot to take any pictures except for the one above and this one...
...of my Tzeentch Herald facing of against a land speeder (which was downed the next turn).

Since our game was pretty short, I took some pictures of the game happening on the table next to me:

It was a battle between Nick's Angels of Absolution and Chad's Varrian 10th Imperial Guard.

Enjoy.

I hate this part....

2009-02-02T12:05:00.000-06:00

I spent a few minutes working on Rohm Dutt this weekend. Good luck finding what's differnt from the last picture I took.

Here one thing:

I like the way this little skull came out. It was shockingly easy.

Anyway, I'm at a point with this miniature were I'm just picking out tons of little details. It's very tedious and I really don't like this stage of the miniature. I had about a dozen different colors on my pallet and I worked on this model for less than an hour.

I believe I will have this guy done by the end of the week. Stay tuned

Thousand Sons, Rohm Dutt's Squad

2009-01-29T06:00:00.000-06:00

Finally, after working on this unit for what seems like an eternity, I have finally finished my second Thousand Sons unit.

This unit was my motivation to vow to only do one unit at a time for the rest of the year. I'm very happy that I decided that. I feel a lot better without this unfinished unit looming over me.

One big concern for me was that the second squad matched the first squad. It's funny, because I've been working for them on and off for so long, my painting style and skill level has changed a bit. However, I think the above photo shows that they match pretty well.

You'll see in the picture that the two from the first squad (on the right) have only one stripe on their tabards where the new squad has two. Also, in an effort to differentiate them, I added more silver elements to their backpack (which you can't see in these photos).

The sorcerer for this unit is still a work in progress. I've this sorcerer Rohm Dutt, thus the title of this post.

I think I can get this guy done in one more session. Then, I have to pick a daemon unit to finish.

Not a Battle Report

2009-01-28T11:53:00.005-06:00

I took some pictures of the game I played against Nick on Monday and wanted to share. So this is not a battle report, just pictures of a battle. Enjoy...

The setup.

This was a Command and control game, and I think I put too many units on his objective(upper right in the picture), and not enough on mine (not pictured, but to the lower left).

The most aesthetically pleasing close combat of the game. His tactical squad against the only fully painted unit in my army.

I'm proud of these screamers. They took a full tactical squad worth of rapid fire right in the "face" and only lost one member.

My favorite point in the game, when I smoked two dreadnaught on one turn (and by smoked I mean destroyed).

In the end, the game was a draw. A real blast of a game.

Here's a bonus shot:
For those of you that follow Nick's blog, you've seen the terrain he's recently finished. Still, I didn't appreciate the enormity of the rock spire until I saw it in person. I hope this picture shows that. In the foreground are Eric's new Crimson Fists.

Tune in tomorrow for a monumental update.

Moving Forward

2009-01-24T06:00:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in my last post, I was disappointed by how little I blogged in the last year. However, I think I see why. I tried to be a little too ambitious in what I'm doing here. I wanted to add a lot more content (campaign rules and terrain features being good examples).

As it turns out, the Fly Lords of Terra, I am not.

So this year, I want to take it 'back to basics'. When I started blogging (way back in 2006), I just wanted a place to share what I was working on painting-wise. Then I started reading stuff like BOLS and From the Warp and thought, "Oh yeah, that's what I want to be!"

Well, I think I realized that I don't really have the focus, energy, or patience for that. Plus, I have a lot of other things I do besides updating this blog (including a second child on the way in May!WOOT!).

That doesn't mean I won't post battle reports or articles on campaigning: it just means that I'm making no promises. I plan to post as many pictures of my current projects as I can, and if I decide to do more, it's all gravy.

So, that leads me right into my gaming resolutions for 2009 (hey, it's still January, I can still post these!)

First off, I plan to focus on Daemons this year. I want to finish 1,500 pts by the end of the year. I hope I'm not aiming too high, but it seems to me that Daemons paint up pretty fast. Much faster than my Thousand Sons or Space wolves.

Secondly, I plan to work on only one unit at a time. Being a "painting butterfly" is a huge problem for me. For example, in 2008 I started or worked on at least eleven projects but only finished two. Now, I plan to finish a project before I start a new one.

So let me show you what i have been working on...

First off, I just finished these horrors. For some reason, I just can't seem to get a picture of them that I'm happy with. This picture only shows four of them and hopefully, I'll be able to show you the rest as soon as I take a better picture.

Here is my current project:

These guys have been collecting dust in my drawer for a while (he-he, "dust"). I'm maybe one session away from finishing them. This photo shows the Thousand Sons chapter icons I just painting.

More of the Thousand Sons to come in the next couple weeks. Then, it's daemons, daemons, daemons!!!!

So it's almost the end of January....

2009-01-23T16:27:00.003-06:00

And I'm still talking about 2008. Let me just get this out of the way.

Here are more noteable events of 2008:

More Game Stores in and around Chicago!!
This year saw the opening of Gamer's Asylum in Evanston (where I purchased some Bloodletters and my collecter edition of 5th), Black Sun Games in Chicago (Where I picked up my Lord of Change and Assault on Black Reach), and The Games Dojo (Where I've never actaully been but figured I'd mention it).

I for a long time have looked for a games store to make my "home store". However, since I already have a regular place to play (not a game store), I'm probably not as excited about this as I could be. They're good stores and I plan to support them (Black Sun at least), but I don't see myself playing in them that often.

5th Edition of 40K
This is a huge deal. I've been over this, but I really like 5th edition. It's sad that a fair number of people I know actually quit 40K over 5th edition. Oh well; their loss.

First time running a 40K campaign
Again, I've been over this. I've learned something and I'm moving forward.

Blogging
Seems like more blogs then ever have popped up this year. I'm sad to say that I think I wrote less this year then in the two proceeding years (look here for 06). More on this in the next post.

Wheew! I'm glad that's out of the way....

Looking back...

2008-12-31T15:57:00.003-06:00

In an effort to consider my gaming-related resolutions for next year, I looked back at the goals I set for myself last year. Let's see how I did, shall we?

1. "What is Wargaming?" article - I never did write this, did I? I'd still like to, I just have to remember to actually do it.

2. More terrain! - This one wasn't about building terrain, it was about showing off other people's terrain. I did a couple posts on this, but it didn't last very long.

3. More games... Maybe... - Pftt! Not even close. In fact, I think it was this year that I came to terms with the fact that I have no time for another game system. I'd still like to break out some Star Wars minis with my son, but it's important to accept my limitations.

4. Running my First 40K Campaign - This is one thing I did do. Some things were good about it and some things were bad. If nothing else it was a learning experience. It gave me a lot of ideas for my next campaign.

So I only got one out of three. Pretty abysmal, I'd say. Next time, more looking back on 2008.

Prospero Burns!!

2008-12-18T10:21:00.006-06:00

The Black Library just announced its 2009 line-up of books. Coming in November, Propero Burns. I have been waiting for this since the Horus Heresy series started. Finally, the truth about what those murderous dogs, the Space Wolves, did to Prospero, the beautiful home world of the Thousand Sons.

What I'm especially happy about is who BL picked to write it: None other than Dan Abnett!

Now, I can't say that Dan Abnett is my favorite BL author, but he's definitely one of the best writers they have. At the very least, I know he's not going to butcher it. I also may not agree with his take on things, but at least I know it's going to be well written.

Updates and Such

2008-12-11T13:54:00.005-06:00

I haven't posted in a couple weeks, but I have been painting. I don't have pictures, but don't much feel like getting into the details of lost camera parts and such.

Anyway, I wanted to let everyone know that I am now part of the ++From the Warp++ Blogger Group. Yeah!!

Those of you that follow the group may notice that I haven't really participated in the round tables at all. This will change! I promise (As long as it's not about tactic/ strategy. Then the last thing you want is my advice. So far in 5th edition, I've lost almost every game).

In other news, I played my daemon army for the first time a couple weeks ago and got my first draw of 5th edition. Hopefully with a little practice, I can turn that into a win next time.

Apocalypse Last Week Part 2

2008-11-12T11:29:00.008-06:00

So many of the things I learned last time I played apocalypse were reinforced and I learned some new things.

First, I'll revisit some points from last time:

1. You need to build an Apocalypse Army One again, my army is not "apocalypse-ised". In fact, I played an army that I basically stopped playing two years ago. Fortunately, the Ork players knew this and went easy on us. While Brian brought his infamous stompa, we simply used it as a piece of scenery that represented an objective.

If I were playing my chaos, this may have been different. But then, I would have been using CSM allied with Daemons. Which would be much bigger and badder.

2. You need to use Datasheets. This is true for more reasons than I previously thought. We played this game on a 8' x 12' board, and with 9,000 points, we were still very cramped. However, if we would have sunk some points into super-heavies, would whould have had some breathing room.

3. Know your ally. No problems with this one this time around.

4. Play fast as possible. We timed our turns which I think helped things move along at a steady pace. We only made it to turn 4 after 7 hours. Still, not bad for the first game with this group.

5. Know what you're fighting for. Having Brian's Stompa on the board as an objective gave us something to shoot for (not shoot at). It was a vital objective (which we didn't know until the end of the game). Still, it was nice to have a unified Ork force against a unified (more or less) Imperial force.

6. Apocalypse is about planning as much as it is about playing. Hats off to Eric and Nick. The game went off very smoothly.

Some new things I'd like to add:

7. Don't get hung up on strategic assets. Eric handed out strategic assets randomly to both sides. He also limited what strategic assets were allowed in the game. I first, I thought this was a terrible idea (sorry). However, it turned out to be a lot of fun to work with assets I might not have tried otherwise. I received some kind of force field (I can't remember the name) and supreme headquarters. Both were extremely useful. I would actually suggest randomizing assets for your first time out. Or at the very least, try ones you might not usually try.

8. You can play faster than you think. This goes along with #4. We instituted a 30 minute per turn time limit. I was afraid that this would be tough for the Ork, but for the first few turns, both sides were finishing with time left on the clock. The later turns took longer, especially with assaults. We agreed that if the timer ran out while rolling for assault was in progress, we'd finish it. I suppose this system could be tweaked a little, and I say, set the bar high.

Without further ado, here are the rest of the pictures...

A perfect illustration of not having enough room. My Space Wolves got stuck in this corner after after destroying Brian's battle wagon. It became a wreck that blocked my way out.

Anton's three (3!) penitent engins take to the street.

The Orks make an orbital strike at our supreme head quarters. Luckily, our force shield (or whatever) held strong.

A lot of the fighting centered on the line of barricades. I kept yelling, "HOLD THE LINE!" at the top of my lungs. This apparently annoyed people.

Matt's version of Ragnar Blackmane (a much older, wiser version) holds an objective against a couple killer kans and a deff dread.

Apocalypse Last Week Part 1

2008-11-12T11:17:00.007-06:00

On Sunday, November 2nd, I took part in a 9,000 point Apocalypse battle organized by Eric and hosted by Nick. Despite what some people say about Apocalypse (I'm never going to let you live that down, John, ;) ),it was great fun.

The battle was between Orks (The Maplewaaaagh) and an Imperial coalition of Space Wolves and Witch Hunters (The Wolf Punks).

For now, I'm just going to post these pictures. Tune in tomorrow for more in-depth coverage. I'll also follow up on my previous post about Apocalypse.

The calm before the storm.

The entire table was bisected by barricades since both sides had the "Obstacles" Strategic asset.

Dawn breaks over the green tide.

Yep, that's a lotta orks!

Wolf Punks Anton and Matt mull over the battle plan.

Challenges to Campaigning

2008-10-29T14:05:00.001-05:00

Thank you to all the people that commented on my last post about campaigning. when I wrote that one it was much, much longer, so I decided to cut it into two posts. I probably put the cart before the horse on this one, since now I want to write about the challenges of running a campaign.

I've been a part of two 40k campaigns(one of which I "ran"). I've run a map-based Necromunda campaign. I've also watched some campaigns from afar (notably Brian's Ahon Project).

I've spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to make a good campaign that adds another dimension to people's games.

These are what I see as the challenges to a good campaign:

Time commitment - It seems to me that campaigns fall apart because most people have real lives that interrupt their gaming lives. This is natural. Still, a campaign system must be robust enough that it doesn't fall apart when people drop out.

Consistency of Attendance - There are some people who can play every week. Some, like me, can only two every-other week. Some people will play three weeks in a row and then disappear for a month and a half. No matter how much people play, it should disrupt the flow of the campaign.

Simplicity/ Complexity - There is a very tenuous balance between making rules simple enough that it doesn't bog down the actually playing of games but complex enough to make it worth doing in the first place.

Amount of work for the organizer - If all the work for doing everything falls on one person, that person is going to get burned out really fast. I think the trick for an organizer is to make a system that runs itself.

Commitment to the story - The way I look at it, campaign is just a way to bring role playing into war gaming. It's more fun to say, "My chaos sorcerer, Rhum Dutt, is going to slay your warboss, Snagal Teef!" than, "I'm totally going to win tonight's game, dude." However, not everyone "gets into character" with their army. That's fine, but how do you make it fun for those of us that do?

I have solutions for some of these and some I do not. I'll go into those in greater detail in future posts.

Before I get to those, I ask you, what do you see as the challenges to running a good campaign?

The Assault on Fenris continues!

2008-10-24T00:00:00.000-05:00

Here are two more simple Assault on Black Reach/ Space Wolf conversions. The first was a simple case of clipping off the old head and then drilling out the neck with a large drill bit.

In the second, I glued a wolf tail on to the marine's belt before I glued the bolter on.

Simple!

Enjoy.

Space Crusade!

2008-10-23T10:46:00.002-05:00

Sorry if you've already seen this, but a friend just sent it to me and I think it's awesome!

Is this a totally crazy idea?

2008-10-22T13:06:00.001-05:00

There are a lot of challenges to running a good campaign (which I will go into in a future post). For some time, I have been brainstorming this and I think have some good ideas. However, I would like your input.

My over-all plan is very bare-bones right now, but there is one aspect I've been struggling with.

My idea is to make up an entire galactic sector. The sector would be the setting for all the games in the campaign. All planets would be under the control of different factions. There would be imperial planets and Ork planets, for example. A good example is this from Dark Heresy.

Before each game, the players would decide what planet they are playing on or for. Then, the results for that game would be applied to that planet. In this way, the factions could take control of various planets.

Recently in my Mighty Empires-based campaign, a lot of the players have been wanting to play new armies. This has happened for several reasons. Mostly it was because people wanted to start a new army or re-start an old army when the new codex came out. Sometimes, I think people just got bored with playing one army.

For the campaign I have in mind, people would be able to play whatever army they wanted on a given week.

So for example, let's say a player (we'll call him Bob) started the campaign playing space marines. Two months in, Bob is getting ready for a tournament where he wants to play his Eldar. He wants to play some practice games so he asks the GM if he can switch.

This leads to many questions. Should Bob get to keep the territory/ points he's earned? How does this affect the story background? If he can do it, why can't other people do it?

So I say, let's make a campaign that's so broad in scale that players can play any army they want. It still affects the story of the campaign, but gives all the players a lot more freedom.

To use the above example again, Bob would simply play a game with his Eldar army and apply the results to a planet where Eldar had a presence. If he wants to switch back to Marines, he'll apply the game results to plant that the Imperium is contesting. If he's smart, he won't apply the points to the same planet thus negating his own progress.

Assuming the mechanics of the game actually work, what do you think? Is this crazy? stupid? Keep in mind that this really isn't meant for super-competitive players. I'm just looking for a framework to make games more characterful.

Assault on Fenris?

2008-10-20T07:00:00.000-05:00

This is an insanely easy conversion. All I did was sand off that weird skull/ star thing on the Assault on Black Reach Dread and glue on the space wolves vehicle symbol.

Word to the wise, if you try to do this, don't bother trying to save the rivets that are on that panel. I tried to cram my hobby knife and my files between them, but ended up just cutting them right off. I wish I had just done that right from the start. It would have saved me a lot of aggravation. I'll go back later and green-stuff some rivets back on.

There are a couple more things I want to do to do with it to make it a little more Space Wolf, but even if I left it at this stage I don't think it would be too bad (Besides the fact that I haven't cleaned off the mold lines yet).

State of the (Daemonic) Union

2008-10-17T12:59:00.002-05:00

These pictures didn't come out as well as I hoped. I'm going to post them anyway because I'm trying to get back in the habit of posting. Cut me some slack, OK?!

Anyway, above you'll see my daemon army as it stands. I also have some partly-painted screamers, but they couldn't make the photo shoot.

My horror unit is the one that is closest to being done. Pretty much every model in the unit is at a different stage of completion, however. When I originally built them for my Thousand sons army, I was doing a lot of experimenting to get the pink to look right. I think I've finally figured it out, but now I'm faced with the difficult job of unifying the look of the unit. I'm not too worried. They are horrors after all. Cohesion isn't their strong suit.

Here is what list of the models I have and their respective stages:

Start Painting:
Horrors - 10
Flamers - 10 (Maybe two units of five?)
Daemonettes - 6 w/ standard bearer
screamers - 5 (these have to be stripped, more on that later)

Assembled:
Bloodletters - 8 w/ standard bearer

Unassembled:
Lord of Change
Keeper of Secrets
Herald of Tzeentch (the warhammer tzeentch sorcerer model)
Heralds of Khorne and Slaanesh (these will be made from left over parts form the Daemnoette and Bloodletter kits. I've already started some conversion work on both)

My daemon army is my main focus at the moment. However, I will soon report on the status of my Chaos Space Marine army. Stay tuned.

I just can't stay away!

2008-10-15T18:15:00.002-05:00

I know I said I was going to go on hiatus or whatever, but too much has been going on in the gamer world for me to stay away, so over the new few weeks, there are a some things I want to talk about.

Kids + Warhammer

Santa Cruz Warhammer has written a couple articles about introducing kids to warhammer. I have a lot to say on this subject. I happen to be starting to teach my son warhammer 40k. We just bought Assault on Black Reach, so we've been working on that together. Which brings me to the next thing...

Assault on Black Reach
Yes, it is as awesome as everyone says. Pick one up if you haven't already. I'm in the process right now of making all the marines look more Space Wolf-ish.

The New Space Marine Codex
It just makes me so mad! I hate loyalist!!

Campaigns Rules and Narrative Campaigns

These seem to be coming up a lot in the blog-o-sphere, and again, I have a lot to say about them. I've also had a lot of requests for my adaptation of the mighty empire rules to 40K. However, 5th edition made a few parts of the rules obsolete, so I'm in the process of updating them. Also, I've had a lot of ideas lately about some narrative campaigns and would like to share them with you.

Project Logs
I've become a big fan of the project logs on Warseer. lately I've been reading them and saying, "These are great, I should start one." Then I realize, duh, I already have one, this blog. Point is, I've a lot of newly painted stuff I'd like to share. It's time to get back to my roots, so to speak.

On Hiatus... Sorta...

2008-09-08T12:27:00.002-05:00

I just haven't been able to make the time to update this blog much lately. It's not that I haven't been painting: I have. I just haven't made the time to write about it.

Anyway, I've decided to put my meager blogging efforts into the background for the campaign I'm playing right now. If you want to follow that blog it's here: http://alphecaiiicampaign.blogspot.com/

If I feel inspired, I'll post here. Just don't expect too much until this campaign wraps up.

Bit of Follow-up

I visited Chicago's newest and only games store, Black Sun Games last week. It's everything you'd want in a game store: ample stock, friendly staff, good lighting, etc. Plus, there was a distinct lack of "gamer stink".

Check out the website and check out the store. I highly recomnd it.

New Game Store in Chicago!

2008-08-19T13:20:00.003-05:00

I know this blog is in dire straits when an event I've been anticipating for years happens and I take this long to report it.

Finally! A games store actually in Chicago! Not Evanston, not Oak park, but good-ole Chi-town. The store is called Black Sun Games and they open their doors this Friday, August 22nd. Check out the Website:

http://www.blacksungameschicago.com

It may be a bit before I can make a trip, but as soon as I do, I'll report back.

Happy Khorne's Day, 8/8/08

2008-08-08T08:08:00.000-05:00

I can't wait until Tzeentch day! One more year! Well, happy Khorne day anyway. Go spill some blood and take some skulls.

Wait, It's Khorne's day and they're starting the Olympics?! That's got to be a bad sign.

While I'm at it, I'll say that I'm not dead, I'm just really busy. More updates soon, promise.

Hello 5th Edition

2008-07-12T00:00:00.001-05:00

I'm nowhere near a game store this weekend, so I don't get mine until

Wednesday. Oh well.

LET THE GALAXY BURN!!! WHAAAAGGHH!! FOR THE GREATER GOOD!!! FOR THE EMPORER!! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!! WHATEVER IT IS THAT ELDAR YELL!! MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH (TYRANIDS)!!! ALL IS DUST!! LET THE GALAXY BURN!!! WHAAAAGGHH!! FOR THE GREATER GOOD!!! FOR THE EMPORER!! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!! WHATEVER IT IS THAT ELDAR YELL!! MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH (TYRANIDS)!!! ALL IS DUST!!

AAAARRRRRHHHH!!!! WATCH OUT FOR THAT GIANT HAMMER!!!

So Long 4th Edition

2008-07-10T12:24:00.003-05:00

... We hardly knew ya'.

No really, I was still forgetting rules when I played what was probably my last 4th edition game two weeks ago. What can I say, I'm not good at remembering rules.

Anyway, I usually try to look on the positive side of any change, but today I'm going to be a negative. Meaning, here's a list of four things from 4th Edition that I'm not going to miss.

1. Area Terrain Abuse: I hate it when someone puts their unit just around the corner of area terrain and claims that it blocks line of sight. How does 1.5" of sidewalk next to a building make you invisible? There is this one piece of terrain that my gaming group uses that's a rectangular area that surrounded by a fence. It's a chain link fence! I can see right through it!

2. Useless 3" Blasts: I never understood 3" blasts where you'd to roll for partials. How many models could you rally hit with that? Maybe three if you're really, really lucky. You still won't be able to hit that many, but at least models can't "roll" out of being hit.

3. Two Vehicle Damage Charts: Who thought that was a good idea to begin with? I have to remember two charts? Oh wait, there were three, weren't there? Even worse.

4. Line of Sight Abuse: "Oh! My unit can only see your sorcerer, I'll guess he'll have to be removed if you fail any saves!" For you loyal to the Emperor, replace "Sorcerer" with "Heavy Weapons Trooper." Bah!!

Slaaneshi CSM

2008-07-08T12:05:00.000-05:00

I've been trying to download these for days, but I had some computer problems.

Anyway, these are some early WIP Chaos Space Marines which will have and icon of Slaanesh.

You can sort of see the color scheme on the marine on the far left of this first picture. It's going to be grey, pink and gold. Sexy, right?

Actual Pictures of Miniatures!

2008-06-24T09:17:00.003-05:00

I know it's shocking, but I actually have some pictures of miniatures that I've been working on. I felt compelled to post more pics when my friend Chris linked to my site with the phrase "models painted well." I was horrified to realize that I had no pictures of miniatures (painted well or otherwise) on my front page (By the way, if you want cool stories of Alaska, check out his blog).

Therefore...

Behold! My first Daemonette:

I'm going to call this a work in progress since I'm not very happy with the way the gold turned out. I have to touch that up a bit. Plus, the base isn't finished, so there's that.

New Game Store Alert!!

2008-06-15T21:19:00.005-05:00

There have been rumor bouncing around locally-based web forums (Like Adeptus Windy City) that there is a new game store in Evanston. Ok, it's not Chicago, but it's pretty close. Plus, It's a independent game store not a GW store (No offence Jeff and crew of GWOP).

I made a trip to said store this week, and here I am to report back to you, my loyal readers (btw, if you're a loyal reader who doesn't live in the Chicagoland area, go read ++From the Warp++ or something).

Here's the facts: Gamer's Asylum, 611 Dempster, Evanston. www.gmasylum.com

It's a nice size store. They have two good sized gaming tables. They just opened, so they're not stocked to the gills like some games stores. Still, they had plenty of what I was looking for. Specifically, a handful of paints and a box of Bloodletters.

The store is run by a very friendly father and son team. The father had his ork army on display and I was very impressed by the presence of some Rogue Trader-era miniatures.

I like this store a lot. I'd be nicer if it was closer, but hey, it's got everything else you could hope for in an independent game store: friendly knowledgeable staff, diverse products, gaming tables.

I was thinking of giving them some unsolicited, vaguely anonymous, internet-based advice about what they should do with their store. I think I just keep an eye on how this develops and report back to youz guys when necessary.

Quick updates

2008-05-22T15:51:00.004-05:00

Just two quick updates before the holiday weekend. I wanted to share what I’ve been working on.

First off, I’ve almost completed the map for our upcoming campaign. I have to tell you, painting Mighty Empire maps is tedious! I still have to paint all those little flags, too. Ugh.

Anyway, it was fun adapting it to 40K. I built 3 hives cites and added as you can see. I also made some counters to represent airfields (to be featured in a future installment). More on this to come.

I also started to teach my son to paint.

Not bad for a first time by a seven year old. It’s 100 times better then how I started (which is to say: In my mother’s basement and using Testor’s high-gloss enamel straight out of the bottle onto lead figures. They were made of lead for crying out loud!)

That’s all for now. Everyone have a safe Memorial day weekend.

Adepticon pt III: And the rest...

2008-04-29T13:02:00.004-05:00

Now for the final instalment of our award winning Adepticon 2008 coverage. Remember, when you want to know about shit that happened three weeks ago, Citizen Nick Hobby center is your #1 news source.

Anyway, I wanted to post a few of the pictures that I took at Adepticon. For some reason this year, I had a real hard time getting decent pictures. I'm sure it had something to do with the high prices at the hotel canteen or possibly theme score judging. Whatever was the cause, I didn't walk away with as many pictures as in years past.

Here's a shot of the massive 1st edition space hulk game I played in. This, for me, was one of the most fun games I played at Adepticon. I had forgotten how much fun 1st edition was.

Some genestealers.

The Chicago Way demo. Awesome game with some awesome miniatures. Hats off to Dave for running this one.

John from Plastic Legions calculating his scores in the Warhammer tournament. For his coverage of the event, check here.

You know, I was totally entranced by the pattern of this carpet. I have to figure out a way to work this pattern into a miniature somehow.

Well, that's it for this year, kids. A huge Thank You to all the wonderful people who organize this every year.

My plans for next year have already been put in motion. Watch this space.

There's a Disturbance in the Blog-o-sphere

2008-04-24T12:32:00.003-05:00

I now interrupt my half-assed Adepticon coverage with two new blog links.

First up is the blog of nine-time Golden Demon winner, Dave Pauwels:
Rabid Bat Studio

There are some great miniatures on this site. Everyone should go over there and pressure Dave to paint even more.

Secondly, here is a new blog by Nick Barran:
Redemptors of Golinar

Nick is in the the same gaming group as me, a former game store co-owner, and former GW employee. Nick has already posted some great articles and I'm sure there will be more to come.

I've made some changes to links. I've removed a couple of blogs that have ceased activity. I also removed the Warseer link because I figure most people know how to get there themselves. Plus, blogs are better than forums any day!

Stay positive, people!

Adepticon pt 2: Dramatis Persona

2008-04-14T13:02:00.002-05:00

Fair warning,I'm about to get really cheesy. Not cheesy in the Nidzilla or Mech Eldar sort of way, but more of a sappy rose colored glasses sort of way.

I said in my last post that stuff was not the most important part of Adepticon. What is? People, that's what (I warned you).

Seriously, it was very cool to hang out with so many awesome people. Most of the people I already knew, and it was great to see all the people I don't get to regularly see. It's funny, many of the people I got to hang out with I talk to via the Internet regularly, but the last time I saw them face-to-face was Adepticon last year!

The people who taught the seminars were also very cool. It's great when you can talk to people who have so much skill but are will to share they're knowledge with everyone.

Anyway, shout out to everyone who made this year so great.

Adepticon Pt 1: Swag

2008-04-14T12:09:00.004-05:00

I'm still recovering from my convention hang-over. Not a drinking hang-over, mind you; just too much fun and stimulus. I made it to work, of course, but I'm beat.

Still, I want to report on as much of my Adepticon experience as possible. Over the next week, I'll post short articles about various aspects of this, the king of all GW conventions.

I want to start off with what is definitely not the most important part of Adepticon, but certainly the easiest to write about. I'm talkin' about swag!

Every year, it seems like Adepticon gives you more and more for your money. Here is a list of free stuff I got with my general admission:
-Three Black library books:
-The Ambassador Chronicles, by Graham McNeil
-The Bloodquest Trilogy graphic novel
-Warhammer 40,000 Quiz Book
-A Dwarf Lord miniature from Avatars of War
-The Adepticon Miniature "Baegor the one-horned"
-A little bag of bits from the Warstore

About that last item, I have to say, I got more useful bits in that 2"x3" little baggy than I got in my entire BattleWagon Bits going out of business grab bag. How did they do that?

Some of the seminars had stuff included in the price. For example, the Chris Borer class came with three types of putty, four sculpting tools, a full-color booklet and a tiny piece of Plexiglas (for rolling out putty). The James Wapple glazing class came with a cool metal black orc mini with which we practiced the techniques of the class. However, since his and Cathy's basing class had so much material left over, he gave us two scenic bases and enough material to make about five more.

I've never really taken advantage of Adepticon's deal-finding potential and honestly, I was on a pretty tight budget this year (same as every year). However there were a few buys I simply could not pass up.

Black library was offering their books at deep discounts. I'm a big fan of their art books but usually the price prevents me from purchasing them. At Adepticon, Black Library was offering them at 50% off! I bought the last copy of Xenology they had and the Sabbat Worlds Crusade book. Nice find.

I found some awesome stuff at Saturday night's bit swap. I bought six old White Dwarf issues for 50 cents a pop. Most of them are numbered under 200. One is a copy of issue 84! Old school, yo! From the same vendor, I was able to pick up two more of the Mighty Empires tiles that came with White Dwarf last year.

I got two old style sprues, one CSM and On Ork, for $2 each.

I bought some resin-cast bits from Rich at the Chicago Terrain Factory and a handful of bits from some other folks.

Over all, a nice haul and I stayed under budget. Thanks Adepticon!

Almost there..

2008-04-10T12:40:00.003-05:00

Adepticon, I mean. I'll be there on Saturday and Sunday, so make sure to say hi if you see me. Here's that I look like in case I don't already know you:

(For the record, I don't own a dog. I don't even really like dogs. I just don't seem to have any decent pictures of myself on this computer.)

For those of you who are not attending Adepticon, let me know what you'd like me to report back on. I suspect I'll be taking a lot of pictures.

Chaos Space Marine Test Mini

2008-04-08T13:00:00.001-05:00

This is the first member of the CSM contingent of my army. As I've mentioned before, I want them to look like Space marines that have just recently turned to chaos. That's why I've use both loyalist and chaos parts.

The gold parts are just the first layer. I was more concerned about the color of grey for the armor. Honestly, I think I need to go a lot lighter. The base coat of this one was Charadon Granite, which is very dark. Over that, I painted a layer of a 1:1 mix of Charadon Granite and Skull white. I shaded that with another layer of Charadon Granite. It looks better, but I think I'll go a shade or two lighter. I have a bottle of Vallejo medium grey that I might try.

I also tried a little painted-on battle damage. You can see a couple chips out of the figure's right fore arm and elbow guard. I think if decide to do that, I need to do more of it so that the over-all effect of damage comes through. At this point, it just looks like I made a couple mistakes with the paint brush.

I would really appreciate people's input on this one. Keep in mind, it's a work in progress and I'll be adding a lot more detail later.

Oh Forge World!

2008-04-04T10:45:00.002-05:00

Why do you do things like this? Are you trying to get our attention? Forge World, you know you don't need to do things like this for us. We would love you if only made rhino doors for the rest of your life. We just want you to be happy Forge World. You don't have to buy our affection with big extravagant displays. You'll get burned out, Forge World. How about we go get some ice cream now?

Finally!

2008-04-03T13:12:00.003-05:00

My wife bought me a subscription to White Dwarf for my birthday last year. I've really enjoyed it, but this month, it annoyed me. I received issue 338 about February 6th. I was feverishly anticipating issue 339 because I knew that it was going have a bunch of Chaos Apocalypse datasheets in it.When I didn't get it by about the 25th of March, I called GW Mail order.

Say what you will about GW in general, their customer service it great. They sent out my issue and I got it this Tuesday.

Unfortunately, by that time, they had already posted the datasheets online.

Still, it's a decent issue. I really like when they write articles about the history of their various games. Since this issue marks the anniversary of WHFB, they had a lot of articles detailing it's history.

The oddest part about this whole fiasco is that I'm not the only person who hasn't gotten his issue 339. Everyone I know that lives in Chicago failed to receive their issue. I have friends who live in the suburbs that got their issues on time.

What happened to Chicago's issues? I suspect Privateer press is somehow behind this.

Tip of the week

2008-04-02T12:30:00.002-05:00

For the longest time, I just used old plates a painting palettes. Most of these were your basic grandma's china/ thrift store special. They got the job done even though sometimes the flowery designs got distracting.

After I had broken several of these plates, I decided it was time to invest in something nicer. I headed over to my local Blick art store and picked up a set of stacking porcelain bowls with a lid. The set is shown on the left in the picture below.

The set had five bowls at one time, but I broke one. I'm embarrassed to say that I paid in the area of $30 for this set of bowls. I thought that was awful high, but I really liked the set.

Fast forward to about two weeks ago. My wife and I were in Crate and Barrel trying to spend a gift card we had received as a wedding gift. I had never shopped at this store, but they carry a lot of plates, dishes, flatware, etc. I specifically noticed that they carried a lot of little porcelain dishes.

I really liked these little square ones pictured on the right. The best part is that they were only a buck a piece. I found them at Crate and Barrel's hipper "urban" incarnation CB2.

Granted, this made me feel like a yokel for having paid so much for a stack of pallets. Especially since these new ones were not only cheaper but actually easier to use.

I'd like to eventually get this, but right now it'd take up too much space on my tiny desk.

Thousand Sons progression photos

2008-03-26T15:18:00.007-05:00

I have to say that I love Google "products". I knew I needed an Internet hosting site, but wasn't sure which one to use. Since I'm already using Blogger, I decided to try Picasa. The most awesome thing was that when I logged in, it had already created albums for me from the pictures on my blog. That's so smart!

(The album isn't public at this point, so don't go looking)

Anyway, I was organizing pictures today and noticed that I had taken a few very similar ones of my Thousand Sons in progress. I wanted to see what they would look like together, so here goes.

Admittedly, that second to last photo is kinda crappy. I guess that's what I get for being lazy.

Thousand Sons Update Time!

2008-03-25T12:06:00.005-05:00

I'm embarrassed at how long it's been since I've posted pictures of my latest Thousand Sons Squad. I guess I'm also embarrassed by how long it's taken me to paint this squad. In my defence, I have painted and built quite a few other things.

Also, my picture taking skills seem to have gotten rusty. OK, I'll stop complaining here are the pictures...

Here's the whole squad. I have to put a layer of highlights on the gold and yellow, then pick out the details and I'm done.

Here's the front of my sorcerer. You may notice from the last time I posted a picture of this miniature, that some of the highlights on the tip of his cowl have warn off. This is because while I've been painting his mini, I've been using it in games. When I realized that routine game usage was wearing the paint off, I decided to stop using it in games until it was finished.

Here's the rear of the sorcerer. The robe came out a lot darker than I wanted, but oh well. It was the first time I used Foundation paints (Charadon Granite, specifically) and I didn't realize how dark it would come out.

This was a stab at taking a better picture of that Tzeentch Horror I featured recently. I think this picture may be worse. Also featured here is a work-in-progress Tzeentch flamer. Yes, I'm very, very excited about the demon codex.

So long Gary...

2008-03-13T12:40:00.001-05:00

I know it's been more than a week since Gary Gygax's passing, but I was on a Caribbean beach at the time, drinking Pina Colatas. I made up for it by crafting this Beholder out of felt at the MCA's family day this past Saturday (and yes I know I probably shouldn't have put tentacles on the bottom).

Anyway, I think I'd be remiss to not say something about such an important person (I mean NPR ran a story about it for crying out loud!).

I first played D&D way back in 1987. It was that red box edition that came with the dice set and a crayon for coloring in the numbers. I convinced my friend Art to play and fun time were had by all. My D&D interest pretty much died after I discovered 40K (Oddly enough, from an ad in the back of Dungeon Magazine).

I didn't play again until damn near 10 years later when I was invited to join my friend Chris's Forgotten Realms AD&D campaign. I played a monk who's true name has been lost to time. Since his chosen weapon was a Jo Staff (somehow different from bo staff?), he became known simply as "Joe".

I played consistently for about 9 months. I gained enough levels to be able to talk to animals (like druids). Unfortunately, animals never knew jack. Still, I felt a sense of accomplishment.

The party was a strange mix of chaotic/neutral/unlawful (sorry, I'm super rusty on my alignment types), so most games involved a lot of hack, slash and ask questions later. Chris was a great DM and threw a lot of puzzles at us to keep us on our toes.

The most memorable part of those games (besides the post-session craps games) was an NPC called "Larry the Drunk". Our party picked him up at some tavern brawl and he became our mascot/ pack animal. Unfortunately, he also became human bate. If we suspected a trap or an ambush, Larry went first and flushed out the perpetrator. Larry was our faithful companion for at least 8 sessions.

I can still remember how sad we all were when Larry met his end beneath the foot of a (frost?) giant. His body was crushed beyond any hope of resurrection. Chris beratted us for using Larry that way and made us all feel very ashamed of ourselves.

Aaahh, good times!

Anyway, I posted my felt finger puppet creation, so I'd also like to share my wife's and son's puppets.

On the left is Max's snowman with ice-axe (rules for which can be found in White Dwarf). Clare made a "fire hippie" with bonfire. There pictured here with the stage we made for them.

To tie them into my D&D theme, simply consider Max's a Ice Elemental and Clare's a fire elemental.

One for the Road

2008-02-28T09:57:00.004-06:00

I know I said that the blog was on hiatus, but I just can't stay away.

I came across this article yesterday (thanks to GoffRokka at AWC for pointing this out). While the zenithal lighting effect is something I want to incorporate more in my paining, I was much more interested in what the article says about painting with washes. James Whipple demonstrated a similar painting method in the Adepticon class I took with him last year.

So last night I had some time and a horror miniature that I had previously primed white, so I decided to give it a go.

Here's it after two hours of work:

One problem I had with this miniature is its crappy undercoat. A while back, I decided to try priming with gesso since I hated spraying them. I've had less experience with it, so it came out a little clumpy. I think I laid it on a little too think in some parts and a little too thin in others. That, and the fact that gesso doesn't seem stick to metal very well made for an extremely uneven undercoat.

I didn't go for any zenithal lighting on this miniature. It's a demon that's supposed to be made of pure warp magic, so I wanted the light to look almost internal.

Since this is just a basic troop, I didn't want to spend a ton of time on it. I made the washes a lot thicker than the article recommends. Plus, with something this light, it didn't take many washes. I can see what the author says about this process taking a ling time. It took me two hours to rush through basically two colors. I think I'll use this process to paint my HQ units, but I'll slow it down a lot.

I'm not happy with this picture, so I'll take more when I get back.

That's all for now, ya'll. I'm off on my honeymoon!!!

Blog Update

2008-02-19T11:41:00.002-06:00

Well, most of you may have noticed that I'm not posting much lately. Most likely, I won't be blogging much in the weeks to come, either.

As some of you may know, I'm getting married in less than two weeks and my mind has totally check out. It's a great thing, actually. I can't wait. I'm especially excited about the honeymoon. I've never taken a beach vacation before, so I'm really looking forward to this. I just want to get out of this crappy Chicago weather.

Also, I realized yesterday that my camera is broken. As some of you remember from the early days, a painting blog without pictures is pretty lame. Hopefully, I can get it fixed, because I really don't want to shell out the dough for a new one.

Anyway loyal readers, I don't want to leave you all hanging, so consider this notice that this blog will be on hiatus until at least mid-March. I appreciate your patience and understanding.

Terrain Monday, Again!

2008-02-11T17:03:00.000-06:00

Oops, did I say every Monday. I meant every other. Anyway, he's more of Art's stuff...

For you Chicagoans out there, this piece is inspired by the asphalt factory at Pulaski and the Stevenson (I-55).

Yeah, it's basically two coffee cans, some tuna cans, and a couple of yogurt cups.

Terrain Monday!

2008-01-28T13:14:00.000-06:00

Hello all and welcome to a new feature here at Citizen Nick Hobby Center:

Terrain Monday!

Every Monday I feature one piece of gaming scenery for your inspirational viewing pleasure. Most of these probably won't be mine as I don't have a large collection. I will be featuring finished pieces as well as works in progress (WIP).

First piece comes from the collection of Art Olsen. Art has one of the best terrain collections I've ever seen, so expect to see a lot from him in the coming months.

Today's piece is a ruined chapel:

As Art bought this second hand, so he is unsure of the manufacture. At first, I thought it was some form of Armorcast, but I'm not 100% sure. The buttresses are from GW's Basilica.

The chapel is attached to a base of fiberboard with some felt glued on the bottom. The felt keeps the piece from sliding around during games.

Above you can see some vile Tau desecrating the chapel during a recent game.

You've probably seen this picture before. I like it, so I'm posting it again.

That's all for this week, folks. If you want some of your gaming terrain/ scenery, whatever profiled, use the contact button on my profile to send me some pics.

Return of Rogue Traders

2008-01-25T10:13:00.000-06:00

Not really. Thanks to Brian for pointing this story out to me:

Rogue trader to cost SocGen $7bn

Now they just need their own codex...

Gaming Comics

2008-01-18T12:14:00.000-06:00

I really like comics. As evidence by this blog, I also like gaming. Therefore, I really, really like it when gaming and comics are combined.

This is basically my convoluted way of saying I've added a list to the right over there of links to my favorite gaming related webcomics. Check them out. I will point out that Secret Lives of Mobs is on hiatus at the moment. Still, if you've never seen it before, the old ones will be new to you.

Also, Misfire has recently returned to the scene after disappearing for sometime. Unfortunately, they have yet to get into the routine of posting frequently. Hopefully they will soon because what they've posted so far is pretty funny.

Some other stuff...

Rich over at Chicago Terrain Factory has added an interesting feature to his blog. It's a list of RSS feeds from 40 different hobby blogs (including the one you're reading Right now). Click on over there and look to the right sidebar. it's pretty cool.

Dude, Where's my Demon Engine? I wanted to follow up my last post about the Codex: Demon rumors. I was pretty excited at the early rumors of this codex because they seemed to hint that there would be two different demon engines: an "unbound" defiler and some kind of mutant amalgamation of various tanks from other armies.

As the rumors have gotten more specific of late, it seems that there is only one demon engine in the codex and it's just another version of the defiler. Still cool, I'm sure, but the more demon engines the better, I say.

Damn you, Hackers! Adeptus Windy City, my hometown forum, got hacked this week. Bastards! The data center where the forum is hosted seems to have it's head up it's ass, so about a month's worth of posts are gone! Very sucky, but the administrator has gotten things running pretty smoothly again, so hats off to him.

Codex: Demons Rumor Round Up

2008-01-09T18:02:00.000-06:00

A member of Warseer who claims to have play tested the new demon codex has posted a lot about the list on this thread. Unfortunately, he's not a native English speaker, so some of what he's saying is hard to read. Still, he's offered a lot of information, which I have combined with the previous rumors and summarized.

Here is a list of the units in the codex and their rumored characteristics:
HQ
Greater Daemons
Blood Thirster - Can Fly and also rumored to have a shooting attack, which seems odd. May be as strong as S8! Maybe because of furious charge?
Great Unclean one - T6, but I2 and slow and purposeful.
Keeper of Secrets - Fleet, Hit and run, and some sort of Lash of submission- like ability.
Lord of Change - Rumored to be the most powerful. Carries some kind of force weapon. Can target three units with three shooting attacks.

Herald - Can have up to two for one HQ slot. Each Chaos God has it's own Herald with tons of options. These were featured in January WD.

Elite
Flamers - I've heard nothing on these.
Flesh hounds - Have option to have special character.
Fiends of Slaanesh - I've heard nothing on these, either.
Beast of nurgle - Similar to Chaos Spawn with poisoned attacks and feel no pain.

Troops

Daemonettes - Have Fleet and Rending. The plastic kits have caused much debate.
Bloodletters - Have Power Weapons and Furious Charge. Loincloth no longer confers 3+ armor save. The other plastic kit seen around the net.
Plaguebeares - Feel No Pain, Poisoned Weapons, Slow and Purposeful.
Nurglings - Got me!
Pink Horrors - S3 AP3 Shooting attack with option for Bolt of Change. Also has option for special character called "The Changeling"
Furies - i don't know, but I'd bet they fly.

Fast Attack
Bloodcrushers - Bloodletters on Juggernauts of Khorne. May only move 6" - I'm not sure why.
Seekers of Slaanesh - f.k.a. Mounted Demonettes
Screamers - Treated as Jet bikes. May also have some kind of killer optional upgrade.

Heavy Support - There seems to be a lot of confusion and contradiction in this area. More on that later...
Soulgrinder - Modified Defiler. Possibly source of "unbound Defiler" rumor.
Daemon Prince - A very customizable choice. Treated with disdain by true demons due to formally human nature.

Special Characters
3 Greater Daemons:One for Nurgle, one For Tzeentch and one Undivided)
4 Special Heralds:One for each God. Slaanesh Herald called, "The Masque".

General rules: All Daemons have invulnerable save, can be placed in deep strike and have immunities versus Instant death. All codex entries - even demon engines- are daemons.

I have to go, but I wanted to post this before anyone else (I hope I can beat the Bell of Lost souls). I haven't thoroughly spell-checked this, so forgive me if I've misspelled any names of any Chaos deities.

Also, if you want to see the thread that started this, it's here.

Looking Forward for 2008

2008-01-08T12:36:00.000-06:00

Well, now that I have the reminiscing of the last year out of the way, it's time to see what's in store for next year!

1. "What is Wargaming?" article - When people ask me about wargaming, I usually refer them to my own site. Then I realized that I don't do a particularly good job of describing what all these little painted figures are for. One friend looked at my site and said, "It looks like D&D mixed with model railroading." I can't say that I can argue with that, but I figure I can do a better job of explainign it. Then, when I've finished the article, you can send the link to your friends and family who have no idea how you spend your free time.

2. More terrain! - No, I'm not going to build any more terrain. At least not until I have someplace to put it. Still, I like looking at pictures of terrain. I think a lot of people do, so I'm going to be starting a new segment at the end of this month called, "Terrain Mondays". If you have a terrain feature that you're particularly fond of, please forward me a picture and I'll present it here.

3. More games... Maybe... - I started this wargaming business with a skaven Warhammer army. I tried to start a goblin army a few years back, but it never really went anywhere. I'd like to get back into Warhammer Fantasy Battle, but I'm making no promises. John over a Plastic Legions has been harassing me for ages and maybe I'll give in... Maybe.

It doesn't help that all the new vampire counts miniatures are freakin' awesome! I suspect I can get away with a smaller army than a goblin horde and therefore paint it faster. I'm not making any promises.

If not, my son has taken an interest in Star Wars Miniatures. I'm not sure what I can feature here, but maybe I'll make some terrain or something. If nothing else, I'll actually be playing something besides 40K.

4. Running my First 40K Campaign - I'm pretty excited about this. I'm basing it loosely on mighty Empires. I'm hoping it will be fun for everyone involved. Watch this space for updates.

Other Stuff

I'd like to give a shout-out to Chicago Terrain Factory for hitting the one year mark. Congratulations, Rich! -and I agree, blogs are better than forums!

On that point, tomorrow is this blog's two year anniversary (One year under the old name and one under the new). Just sayin'.

I forgot to mention two important events on my year in review post: the opening of Games Workshop Oak Park (a.k.a GWOP)and the opening of Galaxy America. From the looks of it, GWOP is doing great. Unfortunately, Galaxy American in rumored to be in some sort of dire straits. Word on the street is that they had issues with their landlord and are presently looking for new space. Best of Luck to them. I hope to see them back soon.

2007 in Review

2008-01-04T10:45:00.000-06:00

It's this time of year that I like to look back at the passed year and reflect on it. Some people like to do these year in review things during December, but those people are lame. I mean, you need some distance, you know what I'm saying?

Anyway, here are gaming related events that were important to me in 2007:

In list form!!

1. The return of the Harlequins - So, I don't even own an Eldar army. I may never own a Eldar army. Still, I was so excited to see the Harlequins return. The original Rogue-trader area Harlequin box was one of the first sets I ever owned. The new minis are some of the best that Games Workshop has ever put out. I probably seeing them through nostalgia-colored glasses, but I'm really happy to see their return.

2. My first 40K campaign- Even since I started playing 40K, I wanted to be part of a campaign. This year, I finally got the chance. Because of the campaign, I think I played more games of 40K this year than I have in the last 2 combined, seriously. It was a map-based campaign, which was another thing I've wanted to try. 40K is so much better when you have some story behind it to motivate you.

3. Finally getting my Thousand Sons on the table - My army in no where near finished, even now. But I was happy to finally make the switch from Space Wolves to Thousand Sons this year. Oh course, playing a new army is a learning experience. I had a lot of victories at the beginning; from which, I learned very little. It wouldn't really matter because...

4. The New Chaos Codex - It's just my luck that right when I finally start playing my new army, the army gets completely re-vamped. I think most of the changes were for the better. My only complaint was that I spent so much time building those stupid demons, only to have them made mostly useless.

Still, I not one of the many, many people who posted on forums all over the Internet that they were going to quit playing 40K because of the new Chaos Codex. Hmm, funny, I see those same people still posting on those same forums.

Anyway, new Codex means new miniatures and this batch of chaos ones are some of my favorites ever. Did I mention how much I like SPAWN!!!

5. Apocalypse - I must admit that I don't actually own a copy of Apocalypse yet. Still, I like the theories behind it. I like that 40K is moving away form the tournament/ power gamer mentality which it's been mired in for way too long.

6. The year of the bitch and moan - I don't know if I just never noticed it before now, but MAN, are people on the Internet bitchy! I used to love chatting on forums about gaming, but it seems that most of my favorite forums have been taken over by people who like talking about how much they hate 40K more than they like to talk about how much they like 40K. Maybe people have always been like this, but it seems to me that in the last year, it's gotten so much worse.

7. Blog-splosion! - I know that's not a word, but I've used it before and I'll use it again, so there! This year, so many great blogs have hit the scene. Bell of Lost Souls continues to blow my mind. My buddy, Old Coast (a.k.a. John) has been posting some great stuff over at Plastic Legions. Of course, there's also Rich over at Chicago Terrain Factory who continues to amaze. Check out my side bar for more great blogs.

Next time: Looking forward to 2008!

Six Things I Learned about Playing Apocalypse

2007-12-04T12:17:00.000-06:00

Last Friday I played my first Apocalypse game. I was definitely fun, but more than anything it was a learning experience. I thought I'd share some of my observations.

First off, let me explain how I came to participate in this battle. A friend of mine suggested to his gamer friends that we all take a day off of work to have a huge mega-battle. I was skeptical at first, but eventually gave into peer-pressure.

We had seven people total. We ran two boards: one 6'x4' and one 8'x6'. I partnered up with another Chaos player named Dan against Brian's 4,000pts of Orks. The other table was an alliance of Necrons, Tau, and Eldar with an Imperial Callidus Assassin for good measure. This unlikely union faced off against a team of Tau and Imperial guard.

Unfortunately, we got stuck on the small table. Here's a picture of our forces after set-up:

I'd like to point out several a couple things. First off, Brian's excellent scratch-built stompa. Also, remember, all those trucks and what-not were full of Orks.

Bottom line, it was a slaughter. It really was a green tide.

OK, so here are 6 things I learned in this first game:

1. You need to build an Apocalypse Army. Dan and I basically threw together a force from what miniatures we had available whereas Brian had a huge, well-defined force. The Orks were an Apocalypse Army: Chaos was two 40K armies. This goes hand-in hand with my next point...

2. You need to use Datasheets. Brain was using three: Speed Freaks, Mek Stompa, and Skullhama Battle Fortress. We had none. I've been working on a tide of spawn, but it's not ready. Neither of us had anything to really threaten those killer units.

3. Know your ally. This is not to disparage Dan, who I met five minutes before we started playing. He was a real cool to play with and a nice guy (and his army, unlike mine, was completely painted). I just wish we could have coordinated before hand so that we had a sense of what we were doing. A ten minute discussion before the game probably won't cut it.

4. Play fast as possible. Seriously, games like this take a long time. I think generally, I play pretty fast. I make decisions fast and I move from phase to phase as quick as possible. This means I probably make a lot of mistakes, but I'd rather see more things actually happen during the course of a game than think about what could possibly happen over the course of a game.

5. Know what you're fighting for. This is complicated and I plan to write more about this in the future. Plus, the basic point applies to regular 40K games as well. I think game-playing is so much more enjoyable when you are playing to a story or background. Maybe I'm just a RPGer at heart, but I don't find pointless destruction entertaining. This is not to say that I don't find the strategic challenge of 40K fun. I do; I just like more.

6. Apocalypse is about planning as much as it is about playing. I have to say I got away with very little pre-game work. Still, the guys who organized this put a lot of work into getting people, tables, models and terrain together. Plus Aaron was nice enough to open his home to us. He even provided coffee and a deli tray:

My hat goes off to the all the people who planned this day-off event.

I hope to play more Apocalypse in the future as time allows.

Here a few more pictures from the game:
ORKS!! And...

More Orks!

Here's a picture of the backside of the only fully-painted unit I fielded. OK, I need to go paint now...

Give Thanks for Updates!!

2007-11-20T15:42:00.000-06:00

OK, these pictures aren't the best, but I couldn't live with myself if I didn't update my blog before going away for Thanksgiving.

Here is the second unit of Thousands Sons. The sorcerer needs a little more gold, but all the rubric marines have their base gold (which is a 1:1 mix of Vermin Brown and Shining Gold)

Here are my unmarked Chaos Space marines. They're going to represent Space marines that have recently rebelled, so I've mixed a lot of loyalist parts in.

LET THE SPAWNING BEGIN!!!
This was one of my birthday presents. Thanks again guys.

Here are the first four chaos spawn I've made. I tell you, making spawn is fun! I could just make spawn for the rest of my gaming career, seriously.

Game Store Update and Sale!

As mentioned in my last post, there is a new store in town. I got to visit a couple of weeks ago and it's looking good so far. I heard they've added a couple of tables, so that's even better.

I thought about it later. This is probably the first game store with gaming in Chicago in nearly 10 years. The last one I can remember was Third Eye games, and close down a long time ago.

Anyway, Galaxy America is having a Thanksgiving sale. Here are the details.

In the spirit of the turkey, we are having a sale this Wed., Fri., Sat. and Sun. (closed Thursday) 10% off on everything in the store (several baneblades in stock), 5% off special orders, and a few specials including a SM Battle Company marked from $450 down to $400. Also, LOTR is 15% off. Our 2 full-sized gaming tables are up and running and terrain options are constantly expanding. You can find us at:

4318 W. Irving Park Rd.
Chicago, IL 60641

Wed-Sat: 2-8pm
Sun: 2-6pm

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!

Hazzah!! A New Store!

2007-11-09T16:03:00.000-06:00

There is now a game store in the Chicago city limits. Yes, I'm as shocked as you are. It's called Galaxy America and it's on Irving Park Road. Check out this forum post.

Also, I called the place today, they were super friendly on the phone. I'm planning to check them out on Saturday, so I'll report back.

As far as the regular painting blog stuff, I've done so much lately, but have no pictures to prove it. Recently, I've built a full squad of Chaos Space Marines, a Thousand Sons Predator, and four Chaos Spawn. Basically, my loyal readers, I owe you a lot of pictures.

In other news, I finally got a chance to play the new codex. I have to say, that I like a lot of the way the new list plays. It was nice to be able to include a unit of relatively cheap CSMs along side my Thousand Sons. Also, those AP3 bolters are nice against Sisters of Battle. Wounding on 3, with no save? Nice.

I'm not going to say much about spawn yet, because I think I got pretty lucky my first game. I rolled well enough to get a first turn charge. The two spawn broke a unit of Imperial guard, effectively taking them out of the game. My opponent, Anton, committed three death-cult assassins to taking them out. The spawn took out two before falling to the third. Not a bad performance, but like I said, I think I got lucky.

Force weapons are nice, too. My sorcerer was able to take out his Cannoness with one wound and a psychic test. Too bad his Inquisitor killed my HQ in the same turn. Also, when that one remaining Death cult assassin charged one of my units of sons, she didn't last very long.

I lost the game, but it was the closest game I've played against this particular opponent. I really need to get my sons some Rhinos, too. They really need to be kept away from close combat. They also need a commanding firing position to blast away at the enemy.

I'll keep posting about this as I get more games under my belt.

Thoughts on Army building

2007-10-26T13:11:00.000-05:00

I've actually built and painted quite a bit since my last blog post, but I haven't seem to have found the time to take any pictures. However, I hate the thought of a week going by without a post, so I decided to write about something else on my mind.

I've been thinking a lot about the way in which people go about planning their armies. There are countless ways to go about this, I've found two general philosophies pretty common. One is to build a force in small, playable chunks. The other is to write a goal list (for example a 2,000pt tournament list) and build your army to that goal.

I've been trying to build with the second philosophy in mind. Long ago, I wrote a 1,850 (or so) list that was something like this:

HQ - Tzeentch Sorcerer on Disc
Troops - Thousand Sons Squad w/ Sorcerer
Troops - Thousand Sons Squad w/ Sorcerer
Troops - Thousand Sons Squad w/ Sorcerer
Troops - Horror/ Flamer Demons
Troops - Horror/ Flamer Demons
Heavy - Defiler
Heavy - Defiler
Heavy - Lascannon Predator
Fast - Screamers

Every model I was working on would be part of this list. I found ti difficult, however, to write smaller lists with models from the larger list. This became quickly evident when I started playing the escalation league. We started at 300 points, which basically bought me one squad of Thousand sons. this was compounded by the fact that there were a lot of restrictions on what you could buy at various stages of escalation (see the rules here).

Another thing that threw a monkey wrench in the works was the fact that a new codex came out while I was still int he midst of building my army. This meant that my "goal list" was no longer valid.

Plus, with the new codex, there is a lot more freedom with which units I can add to my army.

I decided to adopt a new policy in regards to my army building. Instead of thinking of my army as points, I would just think of it as a series of modeling projects. I then created a new goal list based on the modeling ideas I have banging around in my head. It looks something like this:

HQ - Tzeentch sorcerer on disc
HQ - Renegade Lord in Terminator Army & Lightning Claws(Unmarked/ Undivided)
HQ - Tzeentch Demon Prince
Elite - Chosen of Tzeentch (w/ Meltaguns)
Elite - Chosen of Tzeentch (W/ Flamers)
Elite - Renegade Termiantors
Elite - Chosen of Slaanesh (Power Weapons, Power Claws)
Elite - Possessed of Slaneesh
Elite - Dreadnought (Slaanesh themed)
Troops - Thousand Sons Squad w/ Sorcerer
Troops - Thousand Sons Squad w/ Sorcerer
Troops - Thousand Sons Squad w/ Sorcerer
Troops - Renegade marines (Unmarked/ Undivided)
Troops - Renegade marines (Unmarked/ Undivided)
Troops - Renegade marines of Slaanesh
Troops - Noise marines
Troops - Summoned Demons (Horrors)
Heavy - Defiler (Close combat)
Heavy - Defiler (Reaper/ Havoc)
Heavy - Lascannon Predator
Heavy - Vindicator
Fast - Raptors of Slaanesh
Fast - SPAWN!!! (About a dozen, I figure)

Whew! that should keep me busy for about 10 years. Granted, I could never field all these units in one game (unless it's Apocalypse of course). Still, it's a nice way to keep all the things I want to do organized.

Plus it gives me flexibility. I can field a renegade force with Thousand sons allies, or I can field a renegade force with Slaanesh elements. Or maybe just a dark allegiance of Tzeentch and Slaanesh. We'll see if I work some Khorne or Nurgle in at some point as well.

Is this modeling-based approach to army building practical? I'm not so sure. I know that this is the way that my mind works, so it will make the building of this force, a lot more enjoyable.

Why can't Tzeentch get Apocalypse love?

2007-10-18T14:41:00.000-05:00

I haven't bought Apocalypse,yet, but I've been paying attention to the news and rumors about it. So far, all the Datasheets I've read are pretty cool (I would buy several Tide of Spawn boxes if I could afford them).

The one thing that kinda burns me is that there are no Tzeentch specific Datasheets.

On the Apocalypse book itself, there is the Brass Scorpion (Khorne) and the Plague Reaper (Nurgle). Fine, they promised that more Datasheets would follow and the website, so no big deal.

Games Workshop just released more Datasheets (at this point only on the UK site). What do you know, another Khorne sheet (Maelstrom of Gore) and another Nurgle sheet (Zombie Plague).

Don't get me wrong, those sheets are awesome, but why no Tzeentch?

Edit - Since I posted this yesterday, GW has removed the datasheets from their website. Hopefully they'll be back soon.

C:CSM Review?

2007-10-10T13:12:00.000-05:00

I was planning on writing a lengthy review on the Codex: Chaos Space Marines. I've wanted to write a review for a codex for a long time and figured that this was my chance. The problem being of course that the thing has been out for almost a month now. I started writing the review and realized I wasn't saying anything that hadn't already been said ad naseum on dozens of forums.

Anyway, I won't bore you with a long-winded re-cap of the pros and cons of the new codex.

I will say, however, that I love this new list. It's so much more flexible! while it was nice to get bonuses for doing a purely Thousand Sons force, just adding one random non-Tzeentch unit would make the whole thing fall apart. Now, I can add anything I want!

Needless to say, this alters my plans for this army dramatically. I plan to add some vanilla renegades, havocs, some Emperor's Children Noise Marines, and some Slaneesh-marked possessed. Who knows, down the line, I may even add some Nurgle themed troops.

This doesn't mean that I'm abandoning the Thousand Sons. It does mean however, that to do all the things I want to do with this army, I'm committed to chaos for a long, long, time.

Update

2007-10-06T10:37:00.000-05:00

This will be quick, but I'm now finished with all the layers of blue.

More later...

Third Edition Chaos Retirement Party!

2007-09-28T14:11:00.000-05:00

A couple weeks ago, I took a trip over to my friend Art's house to play a game of 40K. We actually met before hand to Games Workshop Oak Park so I could pick up a copy of the new Chaos Codex.

In some ways, I considered the game that followed a retirement party of sorts for the 3rd edition Chaos Codex (and good riddance!). I purposefully wrote a list that used as much 3rd edition stuff as possible. My list looked something like this:

HQ - Sorcerer Lord (Mark of Tzeentch, Disc, CCW, PW, Demonic Aura, Personal Icon, Familiar, Bolt of Change, Twisting Path)

Troops - two 9-man squads of Thousand Sons (Free Aspiring Champion and Icon, Champion armed with PW, familiar, Doom Bolt, Bolt of Change, and two Thralls)

-Two 9-man units of Demons (5 flamers and 4 horrors)

Heavy - Defiler with consecrating warp fire and mutated hull

Fast - 5-man unit of screamers

I unfortunately don't have Art's list nor did I take very good notes. what follows is pictures and a brief synopses of the game.

Here's a picture of the board set up:

We played secure and control with 5 loot counters. Since we were using such a 8x4 table for a 1200 point game, most of the loot counters ended up in our respective deployment zones. There was plenty of room to keep them 12" apart without having to go into the middle of the board.

I deployed most of my force(the defiler, and both units of sons) in the large ruins closest to my right flank. I deployed my HQ on my far left. I was hoping to use him to go tank hunting w/ Bolt of Change.

Pretty quickly, I realized two mistakes. Since I had tried to cram three units into one building, I had created a great target for Art's Basilisk, Leman Russ, and Hellhound. Also, as strong as my lord was, he was basically all alone on the left flank.

In the first turn, my HQ destroyed a lone Sentinel, but then was wiped out by a direct hit from the Russ. TheBasilisk then destroyed half of one of my son squads.

The rest of the game was very back and forth. My screamers performed very well for what will probably be their last outing. I used them to charge one of his large squads from behind. The guard broke and fled, but since the screamers were behind and flamers/horrors were in the front, they were wiped out.

I also have to commend Art's supreme commander. He was brave enough to charge a unit of flamers and caused enough wounds to force an instability test, sending the rest of the unit back to the warp.

In the end, Art held three objectives and contested one, while I only contested one. Good game over all.

Here are some more pictures:

Above is the only picture of my own forces I managed to take. my two units spent most of the game sheltered in this building against Basilisk shots.

Art's Command squad in their post-battle prayer meeting.

Quick Update

2007-09-20T22:01:00.000-05:00

I've been super busy this week, but I couldn't let a week go by without an update. So above is the only miniature related work I got done this week. It's my HQ for my Thousand Sons Army. I attached his right arm with a magnet for easy storage/ transportation. I'm especially happy with the way the halberd came out (hereafter referred to as "the can opener").

Tip of the WeeK

2007-09-14T11:00:00.000-05:00

I've been making a point of trying to post every Friday (or Thursday if I was away from a computer on that day). Unfortunately, I sort of blew my load earlier since I posted that big update on Tuesday.

So today, for consistency sake, is a painting tip for you.

The Painting Notebook!

A lot of people like to keep a notebook in their painting area to keep track of their painting projects. It's a good place to make lists of tasks that you can cross out as they're completed. It's also a good place to take notes on painting "recipes" so that you can re-create them later.

I only mention this because is used to be really good about writing in my notebook every time I mixed a new color or decided on what colors I was going o paint a particular area.

Then I got lazy and can't for the life of me remember how I did certain things previously. This is problem since I'm on my second unit of Thousand Sons and I can't remember how I did certain parts of the first unit. Luckily I have this blog. Now I just have to go back and search it for my old gold recipe. Still, if I had just kept up on that damned notebook...

Anyway, that's my tip of the week! There may be more next week.

In the meantime remember, if you're working on a very long term project where you can potentially forget something important later down the road, take notes!

Enchanted, Pt. II

2007-09-11T13:24:00.000-05:00

Well, I'm finished with the Enchanted Blue stage of Squad #2. sorry, but these pictures came out terrible. I think I had my exposure set wrong.

Anyway, time to break out the Ice Blue!

Now for Something Slightly Different...

2007-09-07T12:43:00.001-05:00

Well, it's not a Thousand Son, but it is Chaos. With the way this new codex is organized, there is really no reason for me to stick with a pure Thousand Sons army. I've decided to add contingent of Renegade Space Marines.

This is the first test miniature that I made from some spare parts I got in a bits trade. I want my force to represent a force of marines that has recently turned to chaos, so I plan to use a mix of Chaos and loyalist bits. You may notice on this miniature that one shoulder pad and the chest plate come from the loyalist sprue.

I have a ton of left-over bits from both my space wolves and my thousand sons. I'm hoping that this expansion will be a cheap one since I'll be using stuff I already have.

New Ash Waste Setting for Necromunda

2007-09-06T12:38:00.000-05:00

I recently popped over to the Specialist Games Website and noticed that they recently posted rules for setting Necromunda games in the Ash Wastes. The supplement can be found here, but fair waring, it's a 128 page PDF and may take a while to load.

Basically, this supplement adds vehicles to the game. I haven't given it a good read yet, but from the looks of it, the authors transplanted the GorkaMorka vehicle rules over to Necromunda. This could be very cool.

... And why you're visiting the Specialist games website, why not read the setting I wrote, Alevan Town (second place winner of the Necromunda settlement competition).

I'm Enchanted

2007-08-30T13:19:00.001-05:00

I'm on Enchanted Blue, that is... What I mean to say is the layer at which I'm at is Enchanted Blue... on my second squad of thousand sons. But only these five guys.

Whatever. I'm kinda out of it.

Here's another picture at a slightly different angle:

Blogsplosion

2007-08-24T12:24:00.000-05:00

I have a couple new blogs that I've added to my links that I'd like to point out.

First off, my friend Aaron has started a blog to showcase his many painting and sculpting projects. Aaron's a great sculptor, so I'm sure we're going to see a lot of great conversion projects from him.

On the other end of the gaming spectrum, Bill Kim, the winner of the 2007 Chicago Warhammer 40K Grand Tournament, has started a blog talking about strategy. Since I'm kinda dumb when it comes to basic strategy, I'm looking forward to reading this.

While on the subject of blogs, I've been a big fan of Bell of Lost Souls since around Adepticon this year. Then, I meet these guys at Adepticon and they were super cool. I've been secretly hoping that they'd link me from their site and recently, they added me to their blog roll!

I felt terrible when I realized that I hadn't added them to mine. Oops, bad form on my part. That has been corrected.

Thousand Sons HQ Update

Not much has been happening on the Thousand Sons front. I've been painting slowly, but nothing that would be that interesting to anyone. I'm still in the early stages of the models.

I have however done some work on my Sorcerer HQ.

Look, I glued an arm on:

The other arm is complete, but I'm waiting on an order of magnets that I need to attach it.

The picture above is generally what it will look like when I glue the head on and put him on his base. This picture makes me realize that this base is way too tall and I'll have to trim it down a bit. Also, I need to take a picture of it someplace other than my cluttered desk. The camera has a hard time focusing on the mini with all that junk behind it.

Can I get a codex?

2007-08-17T11:15:00.000-05:00

I've been reading a lot of forum posts lately about the new Chaos Codex being released in September. The thing that shocks me is how many people already claim to own copies of the codex. One person on Warseer even went so far as to start a post titled, "Better late than never: My review of the Chaos Space Marine Codex."

Better late than never? The thing hasn't even been released yet!

Back when I had an independent retailer I could go to, it wasn't uncommon to get things like this early. The store would get the preview copy and instead of letting it sit on display, the owner would sell it. I can only assume that something similar is happening to all these people who claim to own a copy.

Then again, maybe they just bootlegged it.

Anyway, I just want to make an appeal to the Internet and its fine denizens:

Can I get a chaos codex? Please?

No, I don't want a bootleg PDF version. I want an honest-to-goodness, hold in my hand and flip the real pages, Chaos Space Marine Codex.

Can someone do that for me? Does some one out there have mad Games Workshop hook-ups that they can pass along?

I've been blogging about chaos for a while now. Doesn't that deserve something?

Why the Hell Did I Buy This?

2007-08-13T12:30:00.000-05:00

This pile of bits is from the "Mega Bits Grab Bag" that I ordered from the Battle Wagon Bits when they were closing operation.

I can't say that it was completely worth it. I got a few cool things that I proabaly won't have ordered if I didn't get them here. There's some Elf archer bits, a Tomb Kings standard top, three goblin shamans from Battle for Skull Pass, a complete markerlight drone, and some dark angels bits. Come game night, I'll probably be trading most of this stuff away.

Chicago GT Report

2007-08-09T12:15:00.000-05:00

Te results from the Chicago Grand Tournaments have been posted. My friend Anton was nice enough to write this extensive report of his games. I would have published this earlier, but I somehow overlooked it. Sorry.

Anton plays a fierce Tau force and he placed in the top 25%. Here's his report on the action:

I didn't take any pictures, but I can give you a brief battle-report of my games:

Game 1: Iron Warriors
mission: Annihilate

12 Terminators, 3 Predators, a Defiler, and some other random ickyness. Only 2 6 man marine squads for troops. I stuck him on sportsmanship for that, but only one notch, and I told him about it.
Overall, I was worried about this being my first game, and having never beaten iron warriors, I thought I was headed for the bottom of the barrel. However, I did a good job of limiting his fire-lanes, I refused flank the hell out of him, so only 1 or 2 tanks had shots in a turn, and while I didn't manage to destroy many of the preds (only immobilized one), I did make short work of the 12 man termi squad and they ran off the board after being taken below half. He didn't spread out well, and I used my mobility to my advantage.

Result: Minor Victory that should have been major because I forgot i got points for my scoring units left.

Game 2: Crusade Marines (various chapters, actually written up that way and well painted, not just thrown together)
Mission: Objective markers

Really friendly. I sat down and his wife was there, and I thought I was playing her for a second. Probably the most easy going and chatty of my opponents. Very basic set up. Lots of 6 man las-plas, 2 dreads, 2 speeders. Very nicely painted. Hadn't played 4th edition much, and I mopped him up. By turn 4 he was off the board except for one dread, and a squad of marines. Did a very good job of using a squad to claim 2 objectives. Tricky. In the end, he didn't have enough scoring units left to claim a victory. I used fish of fury which upset him a bit. I demoralized him completely after that, and after sinking 48 pulse rifle shots into his terminators, he was all but done. The rest was pretty much mopping up. He played a good game though, and his wife and him were very interested in the game and discussed tactics and armies with me the entire game. She was just starting a sisters army and since I am doing the same we were talking penitent engines, repentia, and seraphim all game. It was actually her suggestion that got me to take the engine against scott last monday (so you can blame her for the cheating!)

Result: Victorious slaughter

Game 3: Tau
Mission: board center

I was kind of excited to be playing another Tau player. Much different build than my list. 4 static firewarrior squads, 12 each (but no marker drones), sniper drones, a hammerhead, 2 squads of three crisis suits w/ pods and plasma, a pair of broadsides. He placed the broadsides to one side with a good field of vision. I knew I'd have to sink a hell of a lot of firepower into them to drop them, so I ignored them completely. Limiting their shots as best I could and focusing on everything else. I think that basically won me the game. I infiltrated the Kroot into the woods in the center, but they got picked apart fairly early. I had much more firepower to bring to bear on everything else. We both rolled HORRIBLY this game. More ones and twos than I've ever seen... But it was horrible on both ends... I was able to use my dropped skimmers as cover to advance my suits in the backline. It was kind of an accident, but I couldn't have asked for a better strategy. He dropped one of mine, and I dropped one of his fish, and I used them to block line of sight from his broadsides and other suits and advanced on one side and used my firepower (which wasn't superior at all in this game), and picked apart the firewarriors in cover. The suits were tricky. I only managed to kill one squad, after catching them out in the open and frying them with railgun shots. I deepstruck my drones and almost managed to kill his ethereal with them. Had I done that, I think I would have gotten a major or maybe a slaughter. Only caused one wound on the little bugger though. He tankshocked my broadside off the board... That sucked... but it was kind of funny. I have never seen anyone else use tankshock in a tournament setting, but it's not a bad strategy/technique. Certainly worked for him. I was the only player who beat him, and I think he ended up being the highest scoring tau player, so this was a proud moment for my army.

Result: Minor Victory (I had a lot of stuff in the center at the end of the game, he had nothing).

Game 4: Ultramarines eq.
Mission: Table quarters

At first, I couldn't figure out where the hell all his points were at... he had 3 squads of 6 w/ las-plas, and 2 devastator squads, one attack bike squad, one w/ missile launchers, and one with heavy bolters. I scared him into setting up his HB devastators behind cover. He had two beefed up librarians w/ retinue, and uber powers... It was a bit ridiculous. I made the mistake of not realizing that one was still scoring, and that cost me a major victory... I thought the missile launcher devs would be much more brutal, but I ended up almost ignoring them, and it paid off.

He hid the attack bikes behind cover, and I knew I'd have to do something about it. I deepstruck my commander and managed to kill one, but not the other. I thought i was fucked and he'd get a last turn grab (I took first turn because i had too much in LOS of his lascannons), but I managed to vaporize it with a hammerhead railgun shot on turn 4 when I flanked him. I also vaporized one of the librarians with a railgun when he got too close to my broadside. The broadside took a ridiculous amount of fire, and he had a vendetta against it, which probably cost him the game in a way. He all but ignored my hammerheads for the more lightly armored devilfish and the broadside. They took maybe 2 or 3 shots all game, and were free to flank the less manned side of his board. I picked apart the closest las-plas squads, and got myself into a great shooting position. He sent the terminators into each quarter, and they got chewed up on both sides. He was a weird superstitious guy and had all his dice set to sixes and in nice rows. He also over-measured a lot, but all in all, neither the superstition nor the long moves helped. I only managed to get a minor victory because I thought his other terminator squad was below scoring and didn't sink enough fire into them on the last 2 turns.

Result: Minor Victory

Game 5: Undivided Marines
Mission: Recon

I went into this game a bit cocky, I'll admit. Recon? I thought I had it in the bag. My mobility had won me at least 2 of my games so far, and I didn't think this was going to be a problem. Boy was I wrong. The guy was the Las Vegas GT winner, and it showed. He played an excellent game, lined up like 10 lascannon shots so that I couldn't hide (it was one of those shitty lava boards), and managed to drop my 2 hammerheads by turn 3. At that point, the game was effectively over. He caught my refused flank, and matched it with a ton of marines. I took first turn and tried to pull a switch and move to the other flank, that was almost empty except for a squad of havocs. Had I been able to pull it off, I think I would have had the game, but he just had way too much firepower to bring to bear on me. Stunned my 1st hammerhead on his first turn, immobilized on the 2nd, and destroyed it on the 3rd. My shooting was abysmal the first turn. I dropped one marine I think. I should have deepstruck all my suits... But I figured he'd have to come to me... He did, but by that point, I had almost nothing left on the board.

My only complaint was his ridiculous lords... on bikes (T5), 4 wounds, 2+ save, 4+ invul. Immune to insta-kill, and feel no pain on every wound... This was the only game I felt completely outplayed though, and he timed everything well. He didn't make a single mistake, and played a great game against me. He got a slaughter out of me, for my only loss of the tournament. He played super fair, and got a deserved victory out of me. I should have deep struck my suits, and not tried to refuse flank him... He was by far the best player I played all weekend, and caught everything I was doing and countered it well. I was going to dock him for the lords, but he played such a stand up and honest game that I gave him the 10 for sportsmanship anyways. At one point he was arguing with me about something that was going to help me (Attacking skimmers that haven't moved, I still think he should have been able to hit them automatically, but he insisted he needed 6's), and it was nice to play someone who wasn't trying to get something over on you (I know we've all had our share of those games). By turn three I was fighting for a minor loss... but didn't manage to hold on.

Result: Slaughtered

I had a great time at the GT this year. The games were spaced well apart, giving you a break and not making you feel rushed. My main complaint was some of the uber-powered characters, and really unbalanced lists I played. You couldn't score them anywhere but sportsmanship, and I felt bad docking someone on that if they played a fair game. Also, they need to do away with the shitty lava boards... terrible.

I did much better than expected. I wanted to be in the top 25%, and I think I made that easily. I'm not 100% sure though, because of my slaughter the last game. We'll see when the results are posted.

Thanks for the report, Anton.

Nick Baran had this to say about his Grand Tournament experience:

I was 2 people's favorite opponent. That's the only reward I get out of those stats. I got an average painting score with the army they have directly linked on the GW site to their "What we are looking for" painting examples. I feel slightly hurt.

Also, the tournament winner, Bill Kim, has started his own Blog. Check it out.

Slow and Purposeful

2007-08-08T12:27:00.000-05:00

The title of this post doesn't only apply to the Thousand Sons, it also describes my painting habits. I paint at least one day every week, I just paint slowly. Oh well, the tortoise beats the hare, right.

Anyway, ever since I've started this blog, I've wanted to have some good progress shots. I have to say that this is a lot more challenging than I expected. First off, learning to take pictures of miniatures is an art in itself. Besides that, I can't figure how people get consistent poses from shot to shot to show progress.

Below is my attempt.

When I started my second squad of Thousand Sons, I decided that this miniature was going to be my example. This first shot is with only the black undercoat:

This one is after the midnight blue is added. Midnight blue is very dark, so it doesn't show up very well:

Finally, the latest step, Regal Blue:

Next up, Enchanted Blue. Watch this space.

Back To Work!

2007-08-03T12:30:00.000-05:00

All right. Enough about Games Day and all that noise. On to more Thousand Sons goodness. Above is my first of what will probably be several rhinos.

I've also done some work on the base for my sorcerer lord riding a disc of Tzeentch. This has been a bit of a headache. When I first put it together, it looked like this:

I want it to look like my lord is riding a flat-topped floating rock over a ruined urban scene. I'm not crazy about Games Workshop's current Disc of Tzeentch. I was also partly inspired by this piece of Tzeentch-themed scenery.

The problem I had with it was that the post looked odd in front of the buttress. If the flying post (or do I call it a "flight stick"?) isn't supposed to be there, it will look super obvious if it was in front of one of the main elements of the scenic base.

Anyway, I was pretty annoyed so I tore the whole thing apart and re-positioned it. I even drilled a hole through the buttress so that the flight stick would be even less obvious.

This is how it came out (sorry for the blurry picture):

The hole didn't come out as straight as I had hoped, so I'm hoping some paint will hide the imperfections.

Chicago Games Day Coverage

2007-07-31T12:40:00.000-05:00

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

2007-07-27T14:28:00.000-05:00

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

2007-07-26T10:54:00.000-05:00

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

2007-07-24T12:34:00.000-05:00

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

2007-07-18T12:52:00.000-05:00

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

2007-07-13T13:14:00.000-05:00

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).

Multi-Topic Blitz!!

2007-06-25T11:44:00.000-05:00

I have quite a bit to catch up on, so...

Games Workshop Oak Park

I have to say, I really enjoyed my time at the Oak Park GW store. Jeff, the manager, has way exceeded my expectations. He seems like a genuinely nice guy and was eager to please. I was happy to see that once his red shirts (low-ranking store employees) realized that me and my friends were veteran players, they backed off the hard sell.

My only point of contention was when one of the red shirts shouted out, "Who's going to Games Day this year? It's the Super Bowl, World Series, and Stanley Cup of Gaming."

To which I replied, "Isn't that Adepticon."

He was nice enough to not argue with me.

Battle of the Blogs II: The Revenge

This weekend, my Thousand Sons and the Ultramarines of Plastic Legions clashed on the battlefield. John wrote an awesome battle report on his blog so head over there. It's got pictures and everything.

The last turn was a classic moment. Something like this:

Me: "Ok, I just have to roll these two bolter saves and the game is a draw.." Rolls... Snake Eyes! Whaa-wha-whaaaaa...

Congrats to John on the win... Wait, I mean, I will have my revenge servant of the false emperor!!

Chaos Rumours

These have been covered ad-nausea on both Warseer and Adeptus Windy City, so I won't re-hash them here.

Since most of the rumors have been pretty much confirmed, I'd rather like to address how the changes will affect my army.

First off, I see no point is having any demons now. I love my flamers as they are, but if I lose doombolt, I don't really see the point. Maybe I'll paint up those horrors and use them as generic demons.

This might be a blessing in disguise. I've been really agonizing on how to paint my demons. The screamers I've done so far look like bad enough that I've considered stripping them! I never strip miniatures. Up until this debacle, I didn't believe in stripping. Now that the new codex won't even have screamers, I'm not going to bother painting or stripping them.

I've started a second unit of Thousand Sons. I'm hoping to have them primed by next week. I figure this is one unit that's probably not changing much.

My two defilers are up in the air at this moment. If I have the option to sacrifice my two secondary weapons for close combat weapons, I'm going to do it. However that means I'll have to do some kind of converting to my defilers. I really, really hope they DON'T release a new defiler kit. As crappy as the present one is, I have one sitting in a box unbuilt. If a new and better one comes out, I'll be lamenting the fact that I'm sitting on an old cheesy one.

One thing that I'm happy to hear is the Dreadnoughts are going to be Elite choices now. I'm thinking that I'll fill up on those.

Games Day

I'm on the fence as to whether or not I will be attending Games Day. I'd like to enter Golden Demon, but I'd rather spend $40 on forge world stuff. In fact, I might just give $40 to someone who's going and have them buy me a set of Thousand Sons Rhino doors.

In that vein, if anyone wants to sponsor me...

Games Workshop Oak Park Grand Opening 6/21/07

2007-06-22T14:33:00.000-05:00

I had a great time last night. I'll write more about it later, but I wanted to throw up these photos really quick...

New Store

2007-06-20T14:00:00.000-05:00

Who's going to the Grand Opening of the Oak Park Games Workshop Store? Heck, yeah, I am! If you go, and I don't already know you, say hi. I'll be the guy handing out the Citizen Nick Hobby Center business cards.

Also, I'm several weeks into my campaign and IOU battle reports and pictures. I've already apologized at my other blog for being a blogging bum, so I'm not saying it again. Regardless, there will be both pictures, battle reports, and a review of the new store coming soon.

Battle of the Blogs Report

2007-05-29T06:55:00.000-05:00

As I mentioned in my last post, I played John over at Plastic Legions this weekend. Art was kind enough to provide the space to play.

In our first game, I used a new 300 point list from the one I played last time. The major changes being that fact that I bought a thrall and bought Gift of Chaos instead of Doombolt. So basically I had one full 9 man unit of Sons and a 4 demon strong screamer unit.

He had three Ultra Marine tactical squads. The thing that worried me the most was his plasma guns in two of the units.

Honestly, we didn't take any notes, so I don't have much to give in the way of details. Basically, he wiped out my screamers before they could take out anything. I failed all three gift of chaos rolls I attempted to make. Most of the game came down to working out the combat result of close-combat between my one Thousand Sons unit and two of his tactical units.

Fortunately, the dice favored me and I managed to wipe out one of his squads. It was more expensive than my unit of screamers, so I won by about 50 VPs. Not bad for a 300 pt game.

In the second game, John allied with Art's Demon hunter army. John had the same list as before and Art brought along two Chimeras of storm troopers, and DH dreadnought, and a unit of Grey Knight Terminators.

My list was a little odd as it was basically everything that I owned that could be put down on the table. Basically everything that was glued to a base. My list was something like:

HQ
Lord on Disc, Bolt of Change, personal icon, and Demonic Aura.

Troops
9 sons, AC with Gift of Chaos and a Thrall in a Rhino

5 Flamers/ 4 Horrors (unit 1)

5 Flamers/ 4 Horrors (Unit 2)

Fast Attack
5 Screamers

Heavy
Defiler w/ CWF and Mutated Hull

An odd Army list to be sure. It weighed in at about 1,100 Pts.

Again, no one was taking notes, but it went down something like this. We rolled up Recon on the scenario chart. My first turn was really lucky and I immobilized Art's lead Chimera with my Defiler.

Amazingly, on my second turn one unit of flamers/horrors and my screamers showed up. This was good in the fact that I had a lot of stuff coming in early, but bad in the fact that the only Icon on the board was my Lord's personal icon. Both units showed up on target. The terrain that my lord was hiding in got very crowded.

My lord was taking a lot of shots from Art's Dreadnought, so I dropped him back behind a ruined building. The problem being that the next turn my final unit of demons showed up and very nearly scattered off the board.

The first unit of Flamers did a lot of damage to the Ultra Marines, but the screamers where mostly ineffective. They quickly got wiped out, but thanks to the Grey Knight Dreadnought's demonic infestation, they were quickly back.

The Defiler did little after the first turn besides kill a couple of Ultra Marines with it's Reaper Autocannon.

The luckiest part of my game was the fact that Art's Grey Knight Terminators never showed up. He rolled 1s for their deep strike rolls turns 3, 4, and 5.

We called the game at turn 5 since I had taken out quite a bit of their stuff an had lost almost nothing. Plus, if the terminators did show up on turn 6, they couldn't do anything but shoot.

So in the end I racked up two victories for the Thousand Sons in one day. They certainly weren't pretty as I spent a lot of time just remembering the rules specific to my army.

Here are a couple of pictures I snapped at the end of the battle to make this a little more exciting.

No,there were no Space wolves in the battle. John and Art let my use my SW Rhino as a stand in. I know, Thousand Sons in a Space Wolves Rhino... Terrible.

I award Troop of the match to these guys... for never showing up. Seriously, if they had shown up in a timely manner, I'd have been screwed.

That's not camera blur, it's demonic instability.

Thanks to John for two good games and thanks to Art for providing his awesome terrain and board.

Big Thousand Sons Update

2007-05-24T23:48:00.000-05:00

I've actaully been sitting on these pictures for a little while. As you can see, my first squad of Thousand Sons is complete appart from basing. I plan to do that this weekend.

Below are some close shots of my thousand sons aspiring champion.

I'm not a big fan of decals so I freehand painted both the Thousand Sons badge and this symbol of Tzeentch.

In other news, this weekend I plan to take on Old Coast from Plastic Legions! That's right, it's a battle of the blogs! Which Blog will triumph!

Report to follow...

Slow Escalation Campaign Rules

2007-05-16T12:10:00.000-05:00

A lot of people have been asking me about these, so I figured I'd post them here. Below are the rules for the campaign I'll be taking part in next month. These come courtesy of Nick Barren, so if you like them, show your appreciating by visiting his website and buying some stuff.

Slow Escalation Campaign Rules
Below are the required limitations for playing a slow escalation campaign. These will help allow for more balanced games. Play all games on 4' x 4' boards (Note: We're also experimenting with some 3'x3' and 2'x4' boards on really small games).

Starting Forces:
- 300 Point scouting forces. Troops, Elites, and Fast Attack ONLY
- Vehicles with a combined armor score of 32 or less.
- No models with more than 2 wounds.
- No Invulnerable saves.
- No ordnance weapons.
- Forces may halve minimum squad sizes.
- No 2+ saves.

Escalation Modifications:
400 Points: Models with 3 wounds or less allowed. Vehicles with a combined armor score of 33 or less allowed.

550 Points: HQ Allowed. 2+ Saves Allowed. No more halved squads allowed. Vehicles with a combined armor score of 34 or less allowed.

750 Points: Heavy Support allowed. Vehicles with a combined armor score of 35 or less allowed. HQ Required.

1000 Points: Models with more than 3 wounds allowed. All vehicles armor values allowed. Ordnance weapons allowed. Invulnerable saves allowed.

Note: When a force exceeds an Escalation threshold, it now operates under those rules. The lesser forces they fight, however, do not.

Fleeing the Table
You may voluntarily cut your losses and flee the battle if it is going poorly. You may only do so after you’ve sustained 50% of your total models in casualties.

Accumulating Points
Earn D6 points for every 50 points of your earned Victory Points rounded down. Earn 2D6 points for winning the battle. Earn D6 points for a draw.

Maximum Disparity
To prevent a continually victorious army from becoming invincibly large a maximum disparity will be established based upon the points bracket the campaign is in. This will also force the escalation of even those armies that continuously lose.

-750 points - Maximum disparity 25 points
750-1000 points - Maximum disparity 50 points
1000+ points - Maximum disparity 100 points

Ask and You Shall Receive

2007-05-14T15:34:00.000-05:00

Per the request from Old Coast (see comments two post down).

Bonus post!

2007-05-11T12:33:00.000-05:00

Since yesterday's post was so text-heavy, I figured I'd make it up to you and post some pictures today. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures to share at the moment. My friend Art sent me these pictures yesterday, so I figured I'll share them with you all.

Here is a nice "aerial" shot of Art's cityfight board(or Cities of Death board if you wan to be new-school about it).

Art's Armored Company. I think the best part of this picture is the Imperial Eagle that is stenciled on the board.

more Cities of Death buildings and a couple of Vehicles from his Sisters of Battle Army.

---------------------------------------------------

Don't fear good citizens! I have been working on my Thousand Sons Army. In fact, I spray primed my unit of screamers last night. Thrilling, I know.

I will be posting pictures next week, I promise!

First Blood!

2007-05-10T12:20:00.000-05:00

Or should I say, "First Dust" since Thousand sons technically don't have blood.

Sorry, what I mean to say is that I played my first game with my thousand sons this week. I'm in an escalation campaign that will be starting in a couple weeks. We're going to be starting at 300 pts and earning more points as the weeks go on. Since I'm not sure how well the sons do at such low points cost, I wanted to get a practice game in.

For this low points cost, were allowed to halve the minimum squad requirement. This means I can take demon packs as small as two models. I ended up taking a full unit of Sons and a unit of four screamers. The Aspiring Champion had Doom Bolt, Demonic Strength, and Demonic Visage.

I played against my friend Eric who is starting a Space Marine Army. He had two Tactical squads, both with plasma guns and one assault squad with jump packs.

I won first turn, but figured since I'm going nowhere fast, I'll just let him go first and let him come to me. I gave him the first turn and he just moved his two tactical squads forward.

My first turn was great. I rolled a 5 for my Slow and Purposeful roll and moved into range of his closest tactical squad. I opened up with all bolters and the Doom Bolt. He failed four of his saves and fell back.

I was feeling pretty good at that point, but the rest of the game he saved against all my shooting and charged my by turn three. My screamers didn't show up until turn four and at that point they couldn't be much help.

Turn six ended with him still having one scoring unit but me having more wounds on the board. Since this was a practice game and we didn't have a scenario, we just called it a draw.

It was definitely a learning experience. I'm thinking that I need to write several lists depending who my opponent is. I think until I can afford two units, I'm going to buy myself a familiar for my Aspiring Champion and invest more points into another power. That way, he can be a lot more versatile on the field.

The campaign starts in two weeks, so I'll be sure to post results of my first battle soon after.