The temple of Skulls

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Just a quick post. Last night I tried out what is easily the cheesiest list that I've fielded since 2nd. ed. 40k.

Why yes, they were Grey Knights, why do you ask?

Anyways, my sister & brother-in-law gave me the Chaos Temple of Skulls for Christmas, and being largely one piece (there only a half dozen parts aside from the base), I just put it on the table straight out of the box.

The picture above is of the end of the game, and indeed the only one I thought to take. We figured out that over the course of the game, 1776 points of GK & SW fought (and for the most part DIED) on the temple!!! The photo was taken @ game's end with a SW lord, a WG termie & 2 grey hunters left facing the last 2 Paladins of Grand Master Matt Fucking Ward's 'God Squad'. Its has been determined that the temple belongs to Khorne as much blood flowed and many skulls were taken upon it.

We also learned that when 2, OP & broken Deathstars collide in an epic HTH combat, you actually end up with a fair fight!

The Divinity

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Okay, so my Christmas break (blogging wise) was a bit longer than anticipated. I wanted to have SOMETHING to post other than 'look! I got even more toys for Christmas!' Anyways, while perusing Hoard o' bits for some bases last week, i stumbled across a Dwarven dirigible from Dreadfleet. It was kinda funky looking, so on a whim I got one along with my bases. Yesterday it arrived, and after adding a few bits, trimming the smoke stacks, a quick paint job (gotta love BFG for that fact alone), behold! I give you: The Divinity!

Its kinda cute for a BFG ship...

Now, in one of our Dark Heresy campaigns, I play an Adept-turned-madman, the 'living Imperial Saint' Boris Sevastopol. Currently his team is traveling thru the warp enroute to...somewhere (I don't recall where as its been quite sometime since I played him). However our GM has mentioned that a possible future outcome for him would be to place Boris at the helm of his own Imperial Crusade! Were this to come to pass, then odds are our Sister Secunda (among others) would go out of character & physically assault our GM! However the 'Divinity' is the ship I see as the vehicle for Saint Sevastopol's 'crusade'.

The Divinity was a tramp freighter known as the Sprite, and operated on a contract to contract basis, always teetering on the edge of financial oblivion. With neither a navigator nor astropath, it was limited to calculated warp jumps of no more than four light years, which further constrained her captain's (and owner's) dire situation. Desperate, a contract to smuggle Ghostfire pollen from Icanthos was accepted, and proved to be the Sprite's undoing.

Boarded & impounded, with her crew imprisoned and owner executed, the Sprite & her crew seemed destined to be crushed within the Imperial legal machine. Now just why the Inquisitor (known only to me as 'Omega') took interest in the Sprite is a mystery. Perhaps it was nothing more than a personal amusement, or rather he saw it as a creative way to eliminate a few loose ends (or is it loose screws?), perhaps it was an abuse of his power, or he was merely enjoying the perks of his position, regardless, Omega took ownership of the Sprite, her crew and rewrote their destiny.

With a few well placed donations, Omega was able to secure the official (and uncirculated) pronouncement of Sevastopol's elavation to 'Living Saint'. The Sprite's crew would be returned to their ship with Sevastopol as the highest moral (Hey! Stop laughing!) and religious authority aboard, indeed he was given absolute power (within the confines of the ship anyways) and a battalion's worth of penal troops (the Munitorum always has a surplus of these) which was to be led by Sevastopol's long time Inquisitorial teammate, the incredibly corrupt Arbitrator (or is that traitor?) Colonel Gentleman. Declared to be the 'tip of the spear' on a new crusade to liberate the space beyond the Koronus expanse! Saint Sevastopol's new ship the renamed Divinity would be this spear tip, to be followed on by the rest of the crusade fleet.

That was Omega's story anyways... Saint Sevastopol gathered his new minions, and made a glorious speech (he thought so anyway) telling them of the glories that awaited them. However no one aside from Sevastopol himself believed that a crusade was forthcoming, instead seeing the speech as the rambling diatribe of a lunatic, and their forthcoming journey as a death sentence (it is believed that the esteemed colonel Gentleman was too inebriated at the time to care). Asking if any of those present wished to not join him, Saint Sevestopol was pleased to note that not one man moved from his place! Truly his righteousness was proven! He then dismissed all present to prepare for immediate embarkation. Unbeknownst to Boris, the Inquisition did offer an alternative to joining this futile effort. That being a trip out of the nearest airlock. The human psyche being what it is, the chance to live a bit longer, and perhaps to save themselves via a savior pod later on (all of which were secretly welded into the hull & rendered unusable by Omega's order) is better than a miserable death now.

Leaving without any fanfare (Boris as per his usual, was too caught up in his own grandeur to even notice) the Divinity left for the Koronus expanse and was never heard from again...

Not a bad story for a ship that's not much bigger than the peg it sits on eh?

The Quad Sabre Platform

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Some years ago I ordered a Forgeworld Sabre defense platform with quad heavy stubbers (i.e.: 2 twin-linked stubbers). It was little more than an amusing (to me) waste of a heavy support slot (why would anyone take that over a Leman Russ?). Indeed I even mentioned it way back here under that same concept, wasting points. Six S:4, AP:6, twin-linked shots with a 36 " range, and a loader with a lasgun who functions as little more than ablative wound (the Sabre uses artillery rules). When fielding a heavy weapons platoon in my Vraks army (led by a command section with another single heavy stubber team), I'd place it deep in my deployment zone, and blaze happily away at anything it could remotely hurt within range. In general my opponents would ignore it unless they'd run out of other targets, or the game was going badly for them where I'd then get the 'I'm going to kill that stupid thing just cause you like it.' type of comments.

Wanting another, my friend Screech got me a second Quad Sabre last year for Christmas (I think) as he figured it was the least worrisome thing that he'd have to face on the table. Not a bad train of thought. However, it then became twice as effective...
At some point i realized that vs. just about any MEQ army (which is to say, most armies on the table), my Sabres function the same as long ranged & accurate bolter fire. Whether a bolter or a stubber, MEQ get a save anyways. However now pumping out 12, 36" ranged, twin-linked shots, they were starting to mow down marines via the 'death by a thousand paper cuts' method. Long Fangs really don't want to split their fire @ some Sabres, but have little choice when the stubbers are all pointed at them! The Sabre battery went from an amusing diversion to something fairly high on the target priority list. I know Murl's Nids often rank these as priority target #1! Something about their ability to mow down gaunts I guess...

Then the conversation (often with Screech) turned to:

I need another one for a full battery.

No you don't.

Sure, think of it, 18, twin-linked shots!!!

Umm, no.

No really, it'll be awes-

NO. YOU. DON'T.

-but, i...

NO!

So as Christmas approached, Screech was in a quandry. Not knowing what to get me aside from a third Sabre, which he wanted nothing to do with. Asking if I wanted ANYTHING else, I asked for 'something for my Aurora scouts'. I won't ask someone to give me gift that they're absolutely loathe to have me field. So instead he gave me a Landspeeder Storm, something of a 'must have' for an all scout army! While he is curious to see what it can do, a BS:3, opened topped speeder full of scouts didn't seem to be all that worrisome to him (note his initial thoughts on the 2nd sabre...) as landspeeders are kinda rare around here for whatever reason.

Then last week I was perusing ebay looking for nothing in particular, when I spotted a quad sabre (sans the loyalist IG gunner). Just for the hell of it, i placed a bid. Becoming the high bidder (at my max bid) I bumped my bid up another $2 (which was still about $10 below retail), figured I'd lose the auction & promptly forgot about it. That is until I got the 'Congratulations, you won!' email from ebay!

So now I have both a landspeeder storm for the Auroras, AND a full sabre battery for the renegades, mwuhahaha!!!

Also I would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas! My Mom will be flying in Wednesday, so I'll be too busy to post till after the Holiday.

Songs of Our Ancestors

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One of my Christmas presents to me this year was the skirmish style rule book for the Quar, called Songs of Our Ancestors or 'SOA' as its often referred to on the Zombiesmith forums & website (I also bought another dozen Quar minis). SOA is a nice little book, the rules seem simple enough, though I'll probably have to read through them several times for them to soak in as I generally suck at understanding rules without actually playing the game. Seems like its designed to be a 'beer & pretzels' game of about a dozen minis per side.

The book is full color through out (not bad for a miniscule mini game company), and easy enough to read. It doesn't have the jam packed with info feel of say, the Heavy Gear Blitz rulebooks, where acronyms for essential tidbits of information are seemingly impossible to find when you most need them.

In addition to the basic game rules, SOA has rules listings & stats for the three original factions: the Royalists (the old guard fighting for their kings & countries), the Crusaders (who are trying to take over the world with quite a bit of success) and the Partisans (who's actions have probably done more to grind the Crusade to a bloody halt than the Royalists would like to admit). A fourth faction has the Kryst, have since been introduced but it isn't in this book. I believe the Krysters (NOT Krystians...) are somewhere between royalists & Partisans, and are desert dwellers...I think. Something like that.

In addition there are also several scenarios listed as well including recommended forces for 'historical' engagements. Kinda reminds me of a Forgeworld book in this regard, except that SOA didn't cost $85, nor do the recommended forces cost literally thousands of dollars each! Indeed, Between SOA & a dozen Royalists and another dozen Crusaders, I think I have roughly $100 invested (if that). I've yet to read any of the scenarios (or close to half of the book yet), however skimming thru I found that one of them has the 'intoxicated table' at right. I've not seen one of those before! Yes, SOA is definitely a beer & pretzels game!

My new Standard Bearer.

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So when deciding what to paint yesterday, I was spoiled for choices. Indeed, of just my new stuff I had: my new bastion, the GK Paladins, Chaos Terminators, more Mordheim guys, more Quar.....ummm, no. No in the end I decided upon something that I really can't use right now, nor will I in the next few months (if ever). Instead I decided to paint the lone standard bearer for my theoretical Empire army.


Now my intention from the start of my Stirland Mordheim warband (and continuing onto the army), was for (as usual) a dirty & grubby look. Kinda like the look of the armies in the movie Braveheart, rather than the clean & pretty fops like you would see in any of the myriad of Three Musketeers movies. As you can see, the standard bearer above reflects this.

'Wash the flag?! Isn't that what rain is for?'

I thought the Wolf Rampant decal off of one of the Space Wolves decal sheets, and the number '7' worked pretty good for the flag as well. Its doubtful that any aside from the army's leaders would actually know what a '7' actually means though, but I didn't feel like adding just the usual scribbles to represent writing.

Continuing with this theme, I also finished up Hans Gruber. He came out pretty good I think, and he'll take his place at the helm of the Stirland Deserters. In the Empire army, he'll probably end up as a 'Gold Sword' champion or something. Yeah I know that he doesn't have a sword, but in game terms that's irrelevant.

My Thursday morning updates

Mornin'

Just a quick post today, as not much worked on this week (beyond the mini below) is all that photogenic. Black primer has a habit of doing that. First off, Murl gave me some GK Termie 'test models' that he had played around with. I'll use them along with (now) Grand Master Matt Fucking Ward as his accompanying Paladin 'God Squad'. I've had a few requests that I play something 'competitive' or to field a 'deathstar'. Well, careful what you wish for...

I also started assembly on some CSM termies. I received a gift card (also from Murl) to the FLGS and so picked a squad of them up. They're a boxed set that I've avoided due to its stupid cost, but the gift & coupon combination eliminated that problem for me.

Lastly here is a WIP photo of my Mordheim Captain Hans Gruber. He just needs some drydrushing, touch ups & basing. I got the book that he's standing on (as well as another militia box, and some other assorted bits) cheap on ebay. Neverness has been complaining that he wanted to play me in WHFB but I had sold my O&G army before he could do so (the fact that I had the army for years is apparently irrelevant). So Having a theoretical opponent (rumor has it Murl has an all Goblin army somewhere), I was pondering a smallish, say 1k or so Empire army. Currently, I have to my guesstimate, about 600 points, so adding in a wizard, some artillery & another regiment box ought to do it I think. Nothing firm on that yet though, as I haven't seen ANY progress on Neverness' Empire army in quite some time...

A drop pod for my Dreadnought

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This weekend Murl gave me a 3rd (or possibly 4th) hand drop pod that he got for next to nothing himself. It was almost fully assembled & unpainted which probably is why its been so under utilized and instead just passed around. The drop pod kit is (like so many) a kit that needs to be painted as its assembled. When he got a hold of it, the doors were all glued shut, though he popped them open. The interior contained the stormbolter & central console but none of the passenger restraints.

Rather than infantry, I intend to use this for my Aurora Chaplain Dreadnought. So I popped out the console bit, and in doing so, one of the side spars popped off as well. The opening of which was easily the size required for a dread to exit. However the now missing spar didn't align with the glued in place stormbolter, so I removed a second spar with some difficulty, to remedy that.

The spar that came off first will be replaced after painting as without it, access to the interior will be easier. Being that this model has already been around the block a time or two before paint was ever even a consideration, Its paint job will be decent, though nothing on par with Neverness' drop pods.

Anyways, the removal of the center console made a mess of the floor, and the removal of the nub over which is sat was even uglier as you can see. So I cut a circle out of a failcost blister pack (a BFG flight stand was just the right size), and sanded it a bit to scuff it up so paint will stick to it. Note the blood on the blister pack: remember kids, exacto blades are sharp! It still isn't pretty, however once primed black & dry brushed over with boltgun metal, it ought to be more than adequate.

All of the spars are needed whilst in flight, however once on the ground & the doors open, one spar needs to release as well (via explosive bolts I would imagine) to allow egress of the dread from the drop pod. So I cut down a strip of metal & glued it into the recess in which the top of the spar fits. I then drilled into the spar and added a magnet. This bulged out the spar a touch and the groove into which it goes had to be widened accordingly. Once the magnet was set I used Warfrog's Baking soda & superglue method to fill in the gaps, and scraped the residual glue from the face of the magnet. As you can see in the left photo, I can hold the whole pod by just the magentized spar, so it'll hold just fine once it all painted up.

On a differnet note, gaming front, last week as a good week. Wednesday night the Aurora 10th met Murl's Deathguard head on and fought them to a draw. I fielded 2 scout crewed (BS:3) predators, which both survived untouched (though required multiple fixes by my techmarine) and gave a good accounting for themselves. Later on Saturday, my Exodites took to the field of battle @ the FLGS. After much reluctance, Screech was convinced of building a 'mere' 1300 point list. In doing so Arhiman & the Thousand Sons took to the field and were promptly swept aside with just 11 Exodite casualties suffered! So much for my 'this army was built just to look good, rather than be effective' theory...

Stirland Deserters

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Well I finally got a hold of my Empire free company (or as i call it, the Mordheim Warband in a box) and a few characters. I've shelved my original idea for using a Marienburg list as the militia guys don't look nearly as foppish as I would think they should to fit that theme (I had considered a Sollund theme as well, but they use the same colors as many Marienburg scheme's that I've seen so I just shelved it). True no matter where you go in the Empire there seem to be miserable looking peasants Marienburg included, I thought I'd just go with my usual favorite of Stirland using the Reikland list. With my premise being that they're army deserters, or perhaps a border garrison gone rogue.

In the heraldry of the empire book it shows Stirland's armies in their often mismatched & dirty uniforms, and often using their own personal weapons. Quite often these are axes as they're more versatile than swords. So first i have three warriors (in lieu of Swordsmen) with axes light armor & shields (need to get those, as the militia box doesn't come with any).

Next up, I needed some archers! Stirland is renowned for its archers apparently (taken again from the heraldry book), so that fits well with the BS:4 for the archers in the Reikland list. You get LOTS of archer bits in the free company box, however no arrow/bolt quivers what-so-ever. I know they aren't technically archers in an empire army, but it struck me as just odd. I was going to call them the 'one-shot-wonders' but technically I already have one of those, just by a different name.

I'm of course referring to this guy. He was intended to be a hero rather than a lone Henchman, however I didn't have the Mordheim book with me at the time, so I didn't realize till later that heroes can't get blunderbusses (which is a one shot weapon). Also, I guess its the wild blond hair or something, but for whatever reason he brought Nick Nolte to my mind. Now it only takes a quick google search to find one of his infamous mug shots, and they're...well, ugly. He's neither a skilled swordman (he's armed with a club as well), nor an expert marksman given his choice of firearm and the effects of a blunderbuss are likewise ugly, so.....Nick Nolte it is!

So who's in charge here anyways?

This is easily my favorite Empire character mini. Nothing exemplifies a knight on the downward spiral, as one who cannot go without a bottle of booze! Of course he needed a good German sounding name, and something that would also fit into the mold of the evil mastermind who frequently sends his minions off to their inevitable doom. So I gave him the name of a favorite old movie character: Hans Gruber. Unfortunately for Hans, he has a great weapon which means he strikes last & has only his heavy armor to protect him. Considering how Screech's identically equipped champion fared against the Skaven for his first few games, I'd say ol' Hans will be hitting the ground as often as he will that bottle!

I had hoped to use a bunch of Halberd wielding henchmen as well, but that was a misguided concept. I guess I was spoiled by dirt cheap (not-so) giant rats & barely equipped vermin kin in my Skaven warband. One warrior with light armor, helmet & halberd is 65gc! So, I decided to just use the middle guy as a sergeant (champion) instead. Needing a name for him (and coming up blank) I went with Karl, who was Gruber's 2nd, in Die Hard.

So, there are my Stirlanders for Mordheim, I'll post them on here as I paint them in the future.

My first trip to a GW store.

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As I said in my prior post, the mega tank went quicker than I thought & I had to go & buy something else to paint while in Florida. As it turns out, a brand new GW store opened up approximately a half mile from my old apartment (not that I'd be able to walk there were I still in my old apartment as it would require crossing an obscene number of lanes of traffic that are continually populated by Florida's insane drivers).

Anyways, in all of my years of gaming, there's never been a brick & mortar GW store within a 5 hour drive of me, so this was my first trip to one. I was hoping for the novelty of the hyper-aggressive 'red shirt' to pounce as I walked in so I could inquire about Squats (I hear that they have a standard response for that). However other than a 'Hello & welcome to games workshop' by a guy in a BLACK shirt, he was rather friendly instead of the stereotype. Which, was oddly disappointing.

Anyways, the selection was good (barring absolutely NO specialist games stuff, WTF?), 3 RoB tables to play on (sparse terrain by my standards, though they were desert tables), a nicely painted RoB demo table, the WHFB demo armies looked pretty good, the 40k demo armies (as well as those in the mini cases) were kinda basic in their paint schemes though. Another case had some really nice stuff in it along with various player names, I presumed them to be on display for a contest, or something.

So despite having been in the mood to buy something of the specialist sort, I had to settle for an Inquisitor Coteaz & an imperial bastion which will be split with Neverness (so I can make a low bastion, whereas his will be a veritable tower).

Coteaz was also painted easily enough, but took just enough of my remaining free time to fill out the rest of the week. I skipped his standard gold armor instead going for minty green. The storm troopers & hangers-on that he runs around with are in predominantly bolt gun metal, shadow gray & scaly green. So he ought to blend well with them while still standing out (assuming he ever gets out of his Chimera which which to date is only 50% of the time). As for the bastion, I haven't opened that box yet, as I've been working on my new Mordheim Warband. I'm using the Reikland list with a Stirland theme. But I'll save that for later in the week I suppose...

Grot Mega Tank part 2....or is it 3?

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After just two weeks I'm back, though considering what my family has gone through in that period of time, it feels much, much longer... When I left I had grabbed my grot mega tank along with the paint box to act as a distraction. Therapy in little bottles (of paint, not booze) if you will. That distraction was much needed, indeed so much so as I finished it well sooner than I had expected, leaving me to go & buy something else to paint, but I'll leave that for my next post.

Just over a year ago my grot mega tank arrived in the mail and it was received by me with much enthusiasm. However my enthusiasm for my Orks was waning. So the mega tank sat, and sat, and sat... I have a speed freaks army (for the most part) yet when faced with overwhelming numbers of Space Wolves (locally), and one Ward codex after the next...this so-called hand to hand based army has more or less gotten shelved as it in general is fighting for it's life just to get a draw.

So will 'Da Grot Spee' reignite my interest in Orks? Who knows, probably not. However I can assure yo that Da Long Wayz Dezert Groop's Eleet Grot Mountain Divishun will be fielding it with much glee!!

It really is a gorgeous kit! Just the right blend of whimsical & WTF?!? I thankfully have the experimental PDF rules, and will be using those with the omission of the regular grot tanks. Otherwise I need to buy the raid on Kastoral Novem, a Skwadrun of grot tanks in order to just to field this. Of course the mega tank isn't in that book, no I need to get the latest Apocalypse book for that. That would collectively be an additional expenditure comparable to a small Titan, just to field a 155 point-ish tank.

One change I made was to the boom canister. It's listed as having two, one to each side. However the kit has just one. Plus mounting it on either side would hide some of the nice little bits & bobs that it's covered in. Whereas under the aft turret there was a large space for additional exhaust pipes. So I mounted it there instead. Rather than being a depth charge like it so obviously resembles, I think of it as an anti-Space Wolf scout device. I also need to point out (if only for Neverness' sake) that da kommunikashunz mast is equipped with 'Bloo Toof Teknology'

My weekend dreadnought

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Real life has been kinda rough here of late (more on that below) however painting minis (and indeed gaming in general) makes for an ideal escape from reality for several hours. As such my mini gaming (40k & otherwise) has picked up considerably in the past few weeks as I seek distraction. Three games were played last week, with a few highlights of the third one to be seen here.

Also last week, I picked up an AoBR dreadnought off of ebay for less that half the cost or a regular dreadnought box. Sure it lacks the options of the boxed set, but $44.50 is a bit much in my book, especially as for what? another $20 tops? I can get a FW dreadnought that looks far prettier. No I thought I'd just go on the cheap this time around. Anyways, it arrived Saturday in the mail, and with no plans for the evening, I set to work on it, finishing it up yesterday.

It came out pretty good I think. I dressed it up a bit adding a regular dreadnought base, heavy flamer, searchlight, smoke launcher & several purity seals from my bitz box. It still needs iconography but I am out of materials to make some Aurora custom decals. I also need to figure out what will be written onto its leg & torso scrolls, but for the time being it's 'done'.

I wanted a full HQ roster for the Aurora army, but with only 2 slots available, the librarian & chaplain are found vying for the same slot. However using this as a chaplain dread (probably just make it venerable) cures that problem (of course this only matters when I'm not running them on a split force org. list). At some point I need to get a drop pod for this guy too. My old Dark Hands ven. dread. w/multi-melta attested to the waste of points that this mini can be w/o one.

And now on a personal note...

In general I've kept my personal life off of here, however this time it will directly effect this blog, so I'll give it more than just the token mention. I will be going on hiatus from blogging here shortly. My stepfather is about to lose his short & brutal war with cancer, and I'm expecting the 'the call' to come now any day. My Bags are packed, arrangements made, etc.

Bob's been a central figure in my life for a little over a quarter of a century, and he's going to leave this world far too soon. Its going to be pretty rough for us (well even more so than it is now). I'll be bringing my paints with me, so whenever it is that i return to the blog, I'll have something to show you. As I said above, painting minis is a wonderful way to escape reality for a bit, and while I can't hide forever, the occasional respite will be needed. The photo of Bob above was taken @ my sister's wedding just a few short months ago.

Take care.

Da Masta Cheef

How Quar are born.

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I thought these were pretty cool & thought I'd Share them here for those that haven't seen them. The two following videos were made by Josh Qualtieri who created the Quar (scroll to the bottom for a brief description) & goes by the moniker of 'Headzombie' on the Zombiesmith forum. They're the first two in a series (don't quote me on that as I'm not sure if any more are forthcoming). Anyways, its been pretty interesting to see his set up, as in all of my years of mini gaming I really had no idea as to just how minis were cast. Also this ought to provide some good insight for those interested in home casting (looks @ Warfrog...).






And for those who've not seen it, the Quar short film (which is how I discovered them when it was posted on Miniature Review).

My 200th post!!!!

Umm....yeah. After that kindova title, the following will be rather anti-climatic. No speechs, confetti, marching bands or even hooters' girls (and let me just say that that last bit is nothing short of tragic). Anyways...

This is just a quick little post (honestly, till this morning I hadn't realized it would be #200) to show off my finished Rat Ogre. Digging thru the bitz box, I saw that I have a definitive lack in anything that looks 'Empire-ish'. I've never fielded a human based WHFB army barring my initial Chaos army, and that was back when I first tried the game well over a decade ago. However I did contemplate a Bretonnian army at some point as I recall, and found a Man-at-Arms' shield and the Bretonnian decal sheet. I also found a claymore without it's hilt and together they finished off the ogre's base nicely I think.

So there you have it. Number 200 in all of it's anti-climatic glory!

A big rat and a slice o' cheese.

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Well, despite my thoughts of my henchmen horde as being a 'failing' list, in their battlefield debut they almost tabled a mech/vet. IG army. Indeed the only remaining model IG model was a demolisher (in which all of my units in its range were redeploying away from, as they couldn't hurt it). Coteaz should be considered the MVP I guess having taken down a chimera & Pask's Vanquisher single handedly. However I think the MVP award goes to the death cult assassin who stood his ground after his squad was annihilated. Flush with victory, the IG vets. then charged him and 2 rounds of HTH later, he cut down the fleeing IG survivors. Not bad for a 15 point scrub!

Matt Fucking Ward & the Eversor assassin on the other hand were both gunned down via massed shotgun fire after doing nothing more than looking scary. I dunno, the army has potential I guess, though as my opponent noted, my anti-tank options are rather limited.

Below is my finished Justicar for my Exorcist's Purgation squad. He was both finished in time for the game and the sole survivor of his squad. They did account for a Basilisk & a vet squad, so I guess they gave a decent accounting for themselves.


With the 'cheese' out of the way, I now move onto the big rat. lol, no more explanation is needed on that topic I suppose.



This isn't quite done as I've yet to decide on what to add to his base. 40mm bases are too large to simply flock without some sort of decoration. Otherwise they look more like wasted space than a proper base. I'll have to dig thru the bitz box to see if I have anything 'Empire-ish' looking to add. Aside from that, it was fairly quick & easy to paint with the Ogryn flesh wash once again doing most of the work for me. It certainly is a nice model though. Oh, and I've named him 'Scrum' which strikes me as an appropriate moniker for a rat Ogre.

My Skaven will be taking to the field tonight actually, though this big beastie won't be amongst them. They only have 70 gc or so in their stash, so he's a bit out of their price for the moment.

My GK 'Failing Circus'

I have no Stormravens, so the 'flying circus' name is out...

o/

Despite my lack of want to play 40k, i will be around to play @ the FLGS this Saturday & am going to give the Retinue Horde a try. I started paint on my Purgation squad Justicar last night, and hope to at least have him finished before then. Matt Fucking Ward will also be in attendance. I know that I posted a prospective list some time ago, but its been worked over a multitude of times. Not so much looking for anything that's optimized (not an option here) rather this is just an attempt to hold (somewhat) true to my old retinue themes while giving some vague semblance of combat effectiveness.

Did I succeed? Who the hell knows, but at this point I'm tired of tweaking it for now. In the end, the various retinues are named close to the way they were before (only now being named after included acolytes who used to be inquisitors), and I'm sorely tempted to write the names of each named mini on their respective bases. Doing so in total opposition to Neverness's suggestion from 2 posts ago to not give every model a name! (ahhh, glorious spite!) Below is my list. It holds true (sorta) to my old retinue themes, and has the token allotment of primed SM vehicles trying to not look like they're codex hopping...

Honestly! This is just a test run! The Auroras will get them back, eventually...

So totaling up @ 1500 points even, this is what I've got:

HQ:

Inquisitor Coteaz

O.M. Inquisitor Longshot w/Hellrifle & 2 servo skulls

Elite:

Eversor assassin

Matt-Fucking-Ward (Paladin) with master crafted halberd

Venerable psyfleman dread

Troops:

The Imperial Forestry Service:
6 acolytes w/5 autoguns (shush! I paid the point ea. for bolters, if i want them @ str. 3 then that's what I'll use them as) and (1) stormbolter)

Forestry Service Rhino w/Extra armor & plow

Skubb's Storm troopers:
(5) acolytes w/Hot shot lasguns & carapace
(1) acolyte w/boltgun & carapace
(1) acolyte w/hot shot lasgun & power armor
(1) acolyte w/carapace & flamer

Chimera w/extra armor & searchlight

Proust's Fire support:
(1) acolyte w/power armor, plasma-bolter
(2) acolytes w/bolters
(3) Heavy Bolter Gun Servitors

Ben Franklin's Chinese wave assault*:
(1) acolyte w/Carapace, Power sword
(1) Death Cult assassin
(1) acolyte with 'melta bomb' (Sgt. Pepper for those who remember him)
(7) Acolytes

Rhino w/extra armor & plow

Heavy Support:

(5) man Purgation Squad w/(4) Psycannons

Razorback w/Psybolt

Landraider Crusader w/Psybolt

*These were trimmed down to 10 models to fit into a rhino as 15 screaming idiots with next to no armor [some even without clothing] and pistols running across the table will die before ever doing anything useful!

So there they are, the bulk of my former allied retinues and their handful of Exorcist (GK) allies (kinda ironic to use that word in this particular context). Coteaz isn't present as I don't have the mini yet. I'll be proxying him with a friend's old Njal Stormcaller model, because he too is holding a bird.

Sorry for the lousy photo, I just took a quick photo before heading out the door this morning.

Some colors just don't come in a paint pot.

Its a bit early to be the peak weekend for the Autumn colors, yet this past weekend was postcard perfect in terms of weather and foliage. Not a cloud in the sky either day, cool but not cold mornings, and a nice breeze to keep it comfortable instead of getting too hot. So, over the course of two afternoons I hiked roughly 10 miles and never even considered picking up a paint brush. I did get my rat ogre in this week, so in the event I can keep myself out of the woods long enough to not inflict a state of exhaustion on myself (this weekend was so worth it though), then perhaps I'll have some painting progress to show you later in the week.

So what happens when the side projects are no longer on the side?

o/

Well I ended up going with the test rat pack for Morheim the other night. I wanted to see if blowpipes are actually useful, rather than just over-priced, ineffective & very situational weapons. It would seem to me that no, they aren't useful, and they are in fact the waste that i thought they were. True the dice weren't with me, but I doubt that the blow pipes would have made a difference even if they were. In the aftermath of the game (where my dice rolling continued to fail) 4 of the rats in my test pack (including three characters, one of whom was my assassin adept) died.

The test pack was thus disbanded after it's first and only game.

Despite this debacle I've been rather enjoying Mordheim, indeed so much so that I've ordered some minis from the FLGS to form a human mercenary warband. (the captain* @ right is just one of the minis ordered). I made up a preliminary list but will have to finalize it after I open up and see just what all is in the Empire Free Company (or warband in a box) at a later date. I'm thinking of using the Marienburg list, though painted in the colors of Sollund, with a theme of it being a desperate attempt to raise funds to reinstate Sollund as a province (or something like that, I'll figure it out later).

Also, this morning I got a shipping confirmation email for another 5 Quar that I ordered a little ways back. Those Quar will bring my total up to 11 Royalists, which will equal what I'll get when I buy the Crusader starter deal (again @ some later date). However the Quar, BFG, Mordheim, Heavy Gear, etc., all got me to thinking about 40k (or rather my lack thereof). I've played 40k I think twice in the last 6-8 weeks or so. That's it, and here's the kicker, I don't miss playing it.

At all.

I'm just not having fun playing the game. I'm sure the MC/pysker spam nid list that I got handed every week for several months had a hand in that, but no more than the never ending onslaught of the Space Wolves and their apparently now required 'deathstars'. I still recall when that codex came out, it felt like I was fighting the entire chapter as there are so many SW armies here locally (and more have been added since that time!).

In years past I had 'blackballed ' a player or two as their idea of fun was to murder you to the point of you weren't having any fun playing the game (looks @ Warfrog), yet lately it seems that everyone wants to play 40k like that! WTF? Do I really need a sign on the door to my own game room that reads 'No Powergamers'?

So ebay would be the only option right? Well, I've been thinking on that concept for some time as well, and the problem is, is that I'm down to my favorite armies at this point (barring the GK which are a test of sorts). They're the ones that I don't want to sell. Yet, why keep them? Most of 'teh nterwebz' scream 'PLAY WARMAHORDES!' whenever someone says that they're tired of 40k. However i don't like that game.

Nice minis, but I don't like the play style, or the fact that every character is a special character. Additionally, a friend of mine recently played a demo and commented that the game felt like it was designed for you to be a total dick. Yup, that's what I recall from my past WM gaming experiences in WM Mk I. I took a really long & hard look @ Mk II, and nope, still the same game @ its core. Killer combos from 'teh interwebz' is what its all about (even more so than 40k, cause WM is supposed to be for competitive players). Brian @ the Gentleman's Ones called it 'mental masturbation' in his first impressions of the game, and I couldn't have phrased it better myself.

Waits for the WM players to stop screaming their just as unbiased opinions about the games that I like to play...

So, at this point in time I find myself enjoying all of my (not-so) side projects, and instead shelving my massive 40k collection, while still not wanting to sell it. Indeed, its becoming a struggle to get myself to even paint my few GK minis just to see if that idea will work, if only to save all of my otherwise worthless inquisitorial retinues from the auction block. Hell, I feel dirty every time I open the GK codex (and I do so only sparingly). I mean, who (over the age of 13) actually read Draigo's fluff and thought 'wow, that was really good'?

Sure they're marketing this stuff towards kids these days, but kids have short attention spans and shallow pockets from which to spend. Whereas older players like me have long term addictions to feed. I dunno. I'm just not quite sure on just where to go from here with 40k...

* Photo is a copyright of Games Workshop & used without their permission or consent (though if I'm buying one then I think they ought to be grateful enough to allow me to post it w/o a disclaimer).

Skaven outbreak!

o/

This is coming a little late after yet another long weekend spent with the family. Unlike the last however I was able to get some painting in. Quite a bit actually, though Skaven are rather easy to paint (speaking of easily painted minis, I also finished off a Blood Bowl lineman & brought two more close to completion).

Above you see my second & last Stormvermin & five verminkin for the Clockwork Forage. With these my warband is now fully painted with quit a few spare models in which to swap out in the case of casualties, new hires, etc.. My favorite of the bunch is he one with the meat cleaver. However that's not a Skaven weapon option so I'll just treat it like a dagger.

I would like to use him as a hero model, but Skaven heroes can't start off with shields. So I'll lump him in with the other dagger wielding slaves and just wait for a roll of 'the lad's got talent' to make him into a hero.

We're set to play Mordheim tonight actually, though I'm going to try out a different Skaven warband. This will make for only a half painted warband, but will let me try out a few other weapon options. While less experienced than the Clockwork Forage, my Reiklander opponent's dice consistently hate him, so my odds of victory are still pretty good!

Edit: I just bought a cheap rat ogre off of ebay, so i think I'll wait on using the new warband till that arrives!

The Bleeding line

o/

Its been a short week, so notta whole lot has happened hobby wise. Indeed about all that I've accomplished was the creation of some background fluff for my Quar and the creation of their Catrawd's company standard. With SoA players so widely scattered (the closest that I've found on their forum lives approx. 5 hours away), tourney play seems to be nonexistent, and instead games are of the beer & pretzels sort. Themed armies also seem to be a common, which I'm sure makes its appeal to me obvious to all.

First up, the standard:

The design is based off of a standard that was created by the Headzombie (the Quar's creator) and Pete (Pete who? you ask...well, damned if I know the answer to that). The two triangles are Quar numbers ('5' on top with '7' below) and the three lines in the bottom right corner is the Quar number '9'. This will one day become a battle standard and probably trimmed down to a square (removing the numbers) for a vehicle decal or two.

As for the fluff, first I'll offer a few translations for those completely unfamiliar with the Quar (and somewhat miraculously still reading at this point):

Catrawd: regiment (though the word 'regiment' itself appears in the Quar fluff as well, so perhaps not?)
Tok: The nation that spawned the Crusade against which all of the Royalist factions have been fighting (and generally losing) against.
Aklyinder: The Tokish general who deposed Tok's royalty, reorganized the military (structurally as well as in tactically) into the Crusader form it has now.
Quar: Kinda overweight looking, bipedal aardvarks with guns who have been at war with themselves for centuries.
Chyweethal: The Royalist MBT (essentially anyways). Its a turretless design like the WWII Stug. The resemblance ends there however as it looks more like an oval shaped British Mk 1 with a pedrail rather than tracked method of locomotion. It certainly is a bizarre vehicle.
Backside Plates: A name of my own creation to describe the 57th's spaced armor.

I think that about covers all of the otherwise untranslatable bits for you. So onto my bit o' fluff (which I'm pleased to say has been fairly well received on the Zombiesmith Forum).

57th Consolidated Catrawd - ‘The Bleeding Line’

The 57th is believed to have originally been a Tokish guard catrawd that mutineed and then switched sides after Aklinder’s reorganization of the unit into a light infantry catrawd. However due to the mutiny, the 57th never gained the trust of royalist generals. Unfortunately all of the supposedly mutinous Quar of the later renamed 57th Consolidated Catrawd have long since passed. Whether or not the mutiny actually happened, or the 57th simply got (and kept) the 'short straw' during a long forgotten retreat is something that no living Quar knows.

What is known is that the 57th is now the dumping ground of survivors from shattered, depleted and all but destroyed royalist units. Worse yet, the 57th is permanently tasked with the thankless job of going forward to ‘hold the line’ and then make an orderly fighting retreat, after more prestigious or simply intact catrawds have already pulled back out of danger. Needless to say, losses to the ranks of the 57th (be they killed/injured/or captured) tend to be exceedingly high. However as the Crusader armies continue to slowly grind their way forward, the 57th Consolidated finds itself with no shortage of ‘remnants’ with which to fill its continually depleted ranks.

Any Chyweethals that are unfortunate enough to get posted to the 57th are hastily equipped with 'backside plates' on the tank's forward facing along with the addition of a roof mounted, rear facing periscope for the driver. After such modifications, the Chyweethals make a mad dash to the front. Their chances of survival during their slow retreat are marginally improved with their newly up-armored 'backsides' facing the enemy. More importantly, they're be able to provide fire support for the rest of the 57th rearguard with their main guns, whilst moving in reverse! Interestingly, given the moniker of 'backside plates', it's never occurred to any other Quar regiments to add such armor protection to their advancing tanks...

Purgation Squad assembled, sorta

o/

Just a quick update. I went outta town to visit my Mom & stepfather this past weekend, so there is little in the way of hobby to talk about. I did however finally get my Exorcist purgation squad mostly assembled in the days prior to leaving. The backpacks are still separate as is the justicar's helm (it won't be primed black like everything else will be).

I doubt I'll start painting on these this weekend though. My dad & stepmother will be down visiting & I'll be staying @ my grandparent's house with them. While granted its normal for me to paint minis there (not much to do around here @ night), I'm not bringing a model who's base has 'Matt Fucking Ward' painted on it to grandma's for a painting reference. Likewise I won't have any internet access there (Ma says that they're too old for computers) to allow me to pull up his photos on here.

Of course I have tons of other minis to paint, so I'll find something to work on...

For King and Catrawd!!!

o/

I had to look that last word up. Apparently its roughly equivilent to a regiment though its also been referred to as a battalion (perhaps a gutted regiment?). Anyways, these six are the entirety of my meager Quar collection. They're of the Royalist faction who are made up of the few remaining independent kingdoms that are fighting against the Crusader cause (to unify the planet under a single flag). Of course as quarrelsome as Quar are (see what I did there?) royalist rebellions, revolts, insurgencies, etc., mean that there is almost as much fighting in the 'conquered' Kingdoms as there are on the front lines.

Close ups of the last four painted Quar.

Squads appear to be 5-10 Quar with rhyflers, a Yawdryl (Sgt.) and a LMG gunner. However just buying a few random minis, I instead have an Caerten (Lt.), 4 Rhyflers (grunts) & the LMG. It doesn't look like there are any royalist Yawdrly's available as individual models, but being a small shop with surprisingly good communication it ought to not be too hard to get one along with a few extra Rhyflers to flesh out a squad. At that point, I'll have about all I need for one side of a skirmish sized game. Well, barring the rules and an opposing side that is...

A very, very Lone Wolf...

o/

Below you see my former Iron Warriors' Warsmith Kursk. The Iron priest was a hold over from an old SW army and not wanting it to go unused, I had converted it for use with my Iron Warriors. Conveniently the Iron Priest is one of the few metal GW loyalist marines that has no Imperial Aquilas on it anywhere, which meant that all I needed was a servo-pack and arm swap before sending him on his way to chaos.
My Iron warriors were themselves sold off years ago (prior to my selling of anything on ebay even), however being one of my favorite models Warsmith Kursk was separated out. Aside from an occasional cameo in a random CSM list here & there over the years, he's spent his time as a permanent member of my 'Hall of Heroes' (i.e.: my retired minis display stand).

The problem with my Hall of Heroes is that it sits up on top of a bookcase, and more than once a model has taken a swan dive off of it when said bookcase was bumped into. Indeed sometime back that was the fate of my old Iron Hands Iron Father 'Samuel L. Jackson' who was indeed a bad mother-fucker (prior to hitting the hardwood floor @ terminal velocity).

Kursk, has narrowly avoided this fate several times and I reasoned that the servo-pack was not helping his odds as it left the model rather unbalanced. So after snapping the photos above for posterity, I decided to return him to the Emperor's light.

Returned to Space Wolf colors (primed black with a drybrush of codex gray followed by SW gray, delvan mud, and finally a bleached bone drybrushing) and sporting a simple plastic pack, I think he came out rather well. Given that I don't actually have a SW army (and often complain about the over abundance of them locally) he is now simply a Lone Wolf.

Lone Wolves from what I gather, are the last survivors of wiped out packs who want nothing more than to join their lost brethren. However I'm sure that that isn't the only reason for going on a suicide run. Perhaps he was exiled by the other Iron Priests or renounced his position in the chapter's armory himself for some failure of duty. I was thinking of maybe something along the lines of in an act of misguided brevity he skipped a verse in a drop pods' ritual activation catechisms, angering it's machine spirit and causing the retro thrusters to not activate, thus pancaking a dreadnought during an orbital drop.

Something like that.

Anyways, as I said I haven't fielded Wolves in several years, but going from what I know of them, I would figure that potential Iron Priests are separated from their packs while serving as a Blood Claw, and so I put (what I assume is) a Blood Claw marking on his shoulder pad, and his original pack marking on his right leg. His bionic arm with frost blade (can Lone Wolves even get those?) is from an IG sentinel, and a combi-weapon rounds out his weapons. Of course he has the required wolf tail hanging on his pack and I added a brass etched cog from the GW basing kit as well, as I wanted to mechanicum-up his pack a bit.

Anyways, he'll now sit on the shelf and hopefully an army won't materialize around him in the future (much like one did after my Exodite test model came into being).

Saved by the split force org!

o/

So, some ways back I shelved my Aurora chapter army and started debating whether or not to send them the way of ebay (like so many others before them). Problem was that I really like my painted Aurora minis, just not the army itself. So I started to ask myself why?

Well, I had intended to just build a Scout company army. Nice theme, though not very competitive, but a fun & different SM list than what is always down @ the game shop. However with a low point total I would just add in allied Witch Hunters, tac. squads, etc.. Then the Tyranids arrived in force and Tac Squads became Sternguard, a Librarian showed up, and an arms race began with the Aurora generally staying on the losing end as the fun & themed list was unceremoniously discarded in an attempt to become a competitive list that just happened to have a lot of scouts in it.

Scouts? Competitive?

...brief pause for laughter...

So after much thought & consideration I just said 'fuck it, I want my themed 10th Co. army'. Plus I don't have to paint 100 scouts, I mean it doesn't have to be the WHOLE 10th company...

(1) The 10th company or any company for that matter is rarely @ full strength.

(2) Easily a third or so are on individual squad level deployments/training exercises.

(3) Easily another third are just a bunch of snot nosed brats who are doing push ups, not running fast enough while being yelled/shot at (for combat simulation of course), getting continually grilled on imperial indoctrination/weeded out for flaws/screaming as they're implanted with organs (that their bodies may or may not accept) via somewhat sadistic chirurgens who don't believe in any form of anesthetics, and are in general just not fit for combat...yet.

That leaves me with roughly 30 or so scouts to play with. Toss in a Company commander & his small support staff and that'll fit into roughly 1000 points I figure.

...another (not so) brief pause for...

Nobody plays @ only 1000 points! (or) Only new players that don't own enough models play at 1k! (or) I can't take anything that's good! (or) I can't take a Deathstar, and you can't win a game with out one! (or) don't you have anything else with you? (or) I have some extra models if you need to borrow/proxy some stuff...(or [and one of my personal favorites]) Its impossible to field an effective Space Wolf army at anything less than 1500 points! (that's bad news for anyone starting with Wolves I guess, and doesn't take into account the 1k Logan-wings either, regardless don't argue as he will not be swayed).

So after all of that pissing & moaning which is something I often hear when suggesting any game below 1850 points (and damn those evil GW people for making us buy more mod--umm, wait...). I gotta ask, is 4ok really a game about strategy & tactics? Or is 40k about Deathstars? (which ironically always gets blown up in the Star Wars Movies...) I mean, if you can not only take one, but rather all of your army's bells & whistles, then where's the challenge?

Its the Internet! Its the net lists! Its...the....way umm, the way that...everyone...umm...plays these days...yeah.

...until there's an odd man out @ the FLGS. A guy shows up late while other people are deploying, or two friends want to come to my house to play, but no one wants to sit there & just watch, or there are too many people @ the shop for the tables available. So what d'ya do? Most often there it ends up with a team game. Either 2 v. 2, or 2 v. 1, or a 3 player carnage scenario (which still is best @ a 1250pts or less often rendering that option moot to the opinions mentioned above).

In 2 v. 2's you often end up with an apocalypse game that's shoe horned into a normal 40k game and isn't too much fun in my opinion. I just avoid those. Or you can whip out the sharpies & start gutting an army like a fish to bring it down to 1k to make things more manageable. However in a 2 v 1, you can swamp the '1' with 6 heavies and the like.

To solve this overloading of slots in the force org., somebody somewhere came up with the 'split force org.' set up in which two people each build an army as follows:

1-HQ
up to 1-Elite
1-3 troops
up to 1-heavy
up to 1-Fast attack
and one optional elite/heavy/fast attack may be used if the other player isn't which makes for a fairly balance force org. Not sure if its universal or not, but locally we allow for units that don't take force org slots to be used as well (i.e.: Command squads, advisers, SW getting 2 HQs in the slot of 1, etc.).

Now, in a 2 v. 1. game that isn't always a balanced game, as the '1' can take all of the bells & whistles, whereas the '2' have armies that are built out of strict limitations. Unless...one army is built as a balanced force (why hello Aurora Scouts...), and the other is..well...just cheese for lack of a better term. Say taking (5) Grey hunters with a power weapon & flamer covers the (1) required troop choice, and probably rolls in @ around 175ish points. That would leave them 825ish points for the HQ & accompanying Deathstar unit. Yeah, for an army list that's pretty risky putting all of your eggs in that one basket, However when that is paired with an army that was specifically built for the split force org., its really not so bad.

...well in theory I guess...

So coming in full rambling circle now, I've decided to build the Aurora 10th co. as 1k split force org. army. So I can have my fluffy theme, and if I get paired up with some cheese-ball partner that's fine (for me anyways) as it doesn't compromise my principles and it has the added benefit of being easily portable and is more convenient than having to rewrite and/or gut an existing list to accommodate the odd man out @ the shop.

So there you have it, my Auroras (and their BS:3 predator) are saved!

Another Quar

Mornin'

I finished painting another Quar Crusader this weekend and have a third pretty far along. Here's the second:
With me not having any of the rules for these rotund little guys, I've instead been perusing the Zombiesmith forums for background fluff and found quite a bit of it here. I'm not sure but I believe that that's all fan fiction (and unlike a lot of fan fiction, its really quite good!). The first linked story is from a different game line, but the rest of it is all Quar related.

Other than that, I've been spending a lot of time outdoors lately. We've gotten an instant dose of Autumn weather and my gaming has dropped off considerably. Aside from a round of DH the other night, I think its been 2-ish weeks or more since I've played any other games. I'm kinda hoping the lack of playing will reignite my interest (in much the opposite way that my near constant playing earlier this year killed it).

THIS MEANS QUAR!!!!

o/

okay, this is kindova early post for me, but I'm rather enamored with my latest painted mini and I didn't feel like waiting till Thursday or Friday to post it (schedules suck anyways). So here it is, my first painted Quar!
To be honest, I don't know a whole lot of anything about the Quar or the games in which they're played. First there's This Quar's War which is company sized engagements & then Songs of Our Ancestors which I think would be a more appealing skirmish style (there's a nice little review of it here). I first found the Quar on Miniature Review when they posted the CGI Quar Short film, and have been kinda hooked on the minis ever since. I browse their forums regularly (though like most forums I rarely post), and debated for quite sometime about just what I would get. Then, right around my birthday, I ordered a handful on a whim.

Zombiesmith is a small shop, so it took several weeks for my minis to arrive. When it did the other day I found I was shorted one Royalist Rhyfler (what's pictured above), but the 'Head Zombie' responded within a day with apologies & the missing Quar is currently enroute to me. I don't know if I'll ever play the game (I showed a few friends the short film got the incredulous 'really?' response) But I'd like to get the skirmish version rulebook @ some point, along with a few more minis (just in case).

I mean just for the hell of it, who wouldn't want a little collection of seemingly overweight, bipedal, gun toting aardvarks (or anteaters?) who look like they're eternally fighting WWI? We all have minis on our shelves that we bought for no other reason than 'they look cool', right? I'll post the others as I paint them so stay tuned.

Also, in a continuation of my Monday rant. The esteemed Colonel Gravis has also just posted a rant on his blog that's in a similar vain to my own (though he is a bit more eloquent than I). Should you want to read it then you'll find it here.

Happy Monday...

Nothing starts the day better than the combination of google telling me that the 'auto save' isn't working followed by a browser crash that wipes out my almost finished Monday morning post.

Anyways...

Murl commented he other day that he was thinking of ordering the Heavy Gear Paxton army starter, and so I thought I'd paint another gear. Makes sense really. We only had a general idea of the rules when we stopped playing (damned real life interference) and now several months later we've probably forgotten what little we did understand.

This is a Mauler Bear for my WFPA Highlander squad (Dragoon squad to the rest of the Northerners). I've seen comments on the DP9 forums that point-for-point, the Mauler bear is probably one of, if not the worst gears in the game! The WFPA does use a lot of obsolete equipment though, so I suppose that's fitting.

The twin medium rocket pods are good anti-everything weapons, however they're woefully short ranged and inaccurate. Aside from machine guns, all it had was a light grenade launcher (and both of those are really only good at killing infantry). However the simple upgrade to a heavy grenade launcher seriously improves its threat level as its a fairly long ranged (though still inaccurate) anti-everything gun. Looks like all that I really need is a northern GP squad to flesh out the ranks and my little WFPA force will be complete (I'll put that on my 'to buy' list).


Going back to VOR, here's the last of my Infinity Line Kazak minis. Of the three that I have, I like this one the most. He has kindova 'Hollywood mercenary' look to him. I'm now out of infinity minis to paint so will have to p/u another blister of them as well (and yet again my 'to buy' list grows longer).

I've rather enjoyed these last couple minis. After so many years of playing 40k, its a nice change of pace to not just be painting yet another Space marine or Guardsman. I dunno. I'm wondering just what the future of 40k holds for me. My love of fluffy beer & pretzel lists seem to be getting continually crushed under the current mindset of 'THIS IS GOING TO DESTROY YOU!!!!' I mean, is it really necessary to have every list be either MC spam, Alpha strike, or fielding a Death Star unit (if not several)? Here, this unit will hit & wipe you out without you ever needing to roll a die.

Because that's so much fun right?

Everybody apparently loves that feeling because they all feel the need to field a comparable unit that does the same to their opponent, so everybody can enjoy the feeling of getting your teeth kicked in with no chance of fighting back in every game.

Yaaay, I so want to experience this every game...

Murl commented the other day that due to the 'net list' & tournament mentality that the game seems to be going in that direction whether we like it or not. True perhaps. Dunno, maybe I've outgrown the game or something. I don't really have any urge to sell my minis (various mini purges have left me with the bare bones of what I really like) but I also don't have too much urge to buy 40k stuff or even paint it (as I'm sure readers of this blog have noticed here of late).

...shrugs...