More meat for the grinder..

o/

I've not spent too much time on minis this week...or at least on anything exciting. Gluing dozens more washers to dozens more bases for my Skaven army is neither noteworthy, nor photogenic.  That said, I did run out of washers last night and so started assembling some of my slave regiment.

These pathetic fools never should have allowed themselves to be taken alive...

My original intent was to bolster the unit's numbers with my poor Stirlanders, but now I think I'll just mix my clanrats with hand weapons and shields into this unit instead. On reading the Skaven army book (now that I have one), it seems the slave units are made more of rats than anything else. In doing that, I'll have about 60ish slaves, which, with hand weapons and shields (the majority will anyways, and I'll go with that despite the variety of weaponry seen here). That horde will clock in at a mere 150 points!

lol, at that rate this army will never amass enough troops to be fieldable...

ALWAYS ANGRY!!! ALL THE TIME!!!

o/

Just a quick post this morning. Whilst I did get a game in this weekend, I didin't take any photos of it, Neverness snapped a few, but they're lost in the warp presumably. No matter since Mac (not 'Matt') and his Ultramarines thoroughly pasted my GF's Fem Fa'Tau and their erstwhile allies, the ANGRY MARINES!!! lol.

The yellow came out as more of a desert tan, than the bright, screaming 'I WANNA BE AN IMPERIAL FIST' yellow that the Angry Marines normally wear. Its much easier to paint and looks better too I think.

The battlefield debut of my little Angry little allied contingent was...mediocre at best. Landing in a (stolen from the Storm Wardens) drop pod, two died to a plasma cannon shortly thereafter. The drop pod never managed to kill anything (unsurprising with a mere storm bolter). The Wolf Guard Battle Leader (aka: the Fist Fucker) left the Blood Claws (regular angry marines) to single handedly take down a small dev squad, but bit off more than he could chew when he tried the same with an entire assault squad.

The rest of the Angry Mahreenz charged a 5-man squad of Umarine scout snipers, and after 3 rounds, managed to kill all of them whilst losing about half their number in the process. They then went on, pistols blazing and hitting nothing (much like my Orks) to charge a second dev squad, which they tied up for the remainder of the game.

As I said, mediocre, but amusing nonetheless which is all I really was hoping for. Orks aside, my armies tend to lack dedicated assault elements, so hopefully these lunatics will fill that niche. I'm thinking of giving them my old landraider crusader which I haven't really done anything with in years...

Edit: Neverness came thru with a few pics, here are two for a few scenes from the battle:

Closing the distance via drop pod and teleport homer for the termies, this pic shows the beginning of the end for the Fem Fa'Tau...

The Angry Marines Arrive! The Dev squad in the foreground would fall to the Fist Fucker (excluding one plasma cannon gunner who committed Sepuku beforehand).

The Vermintide continues...

o/

Whilst I feel like I've been on a spending spree here of late, my out of pocket expense hasn't been too bad. Virtually all of my purchases were either financed by the sale of something else via ebay (where these minis were also bought) or else from a small, and unexpected bonus I got at work. Thus the influx of Skaven has had minimal if any effect on my already (and always) depleted checking account. That said, purchases will prettymuch grind to halt as I have a bucket load to paint, and a short attention span. Also I just got a half priced but still new Skaven army book, also from ebay that came w/o an offsetting sale. Thus the above rationalization is already moot I guess. :-/

Anyways...

First up, my BSB:

I think there is a banner of Clan Superiority, seems an appropriate chioce considering this banner was taken from the Empire!

Yes he's just a Stormvermin with a clanrat flag, but as stated before, the Stormvermin standard bitz were pricey, whereas this army is being done on the cheap. Speaking of that standard, it looks like its been dropped and trampled on the ground, drug through the mud, and then taken to the under empire via a hole in the ground. Fitting for a Skaven standard. Beneath all that grime though, you can still make out the blue and yellow of Bob's Nordland army...

That fancy shield has 'unit champion' written all over it. Not sure which unit though...

Then there are a few more Clanrats that I painted last weekend, now with washers on their bases. Lost count of how many washers I glued to skaven bases this week...

These lesser races shall be herded to their doom!

Oh, and the Slave regiment has arrived!

Vermintide rising...

o/

I didn't get in any gaming this past weekend. However, as I was dog sitting for my grandparents I was able to get in a good bit of hobby time (all hail the huge fenced in yard for the dogs to run around in!). I painted a few more Skaven, though they need to be based, matte and 'ard coated around the eyes and slobbery parts..., etc., so will save those for Thursday.

Instead I'll show you the 40ish rats I assembled:

Virtually all are Island of Blood minis, which aside from already attached shields, are no different than the regular clanrat minis.

First up the Clanrat spear regiment. I have enough to field either 2 smallish regiments, of about 25, or else one monster regiment of about 50. Not sure which would be better...

Next I have the clanrats with hand weapons. I have another 10 or so from my Mordheim warband to add to this bunch as well.

I have enough of the little rats like the one on his base, to make a rat swarm as well.

Then I have a packmaster to lord over the 'not-so-giant' rats, also from my Mordheim warband. As mediocre as the rats are in that game, I'm not expecting much from this guy.

As you can see, reinforcements are arriving all the time! Sale of a portion of the Stirland army financed this bunch, whereas a small bonus paid for my slave regiment. The Slaves consist of a smorgasbord of races, numbering 25 models. Only one human (a hapless Bretonian squire) is in that bunch, as I figure I can bolster the unit as needed with Stirlanders who foolishly allowed themselves to be taken alive!

I figure that ought to give me between 750-1000 points or so. Really need a army book at this point. I'd like to add Stormvermin, but having more than enough to paint right now, they can wait. Also, weapons teams aside (and maybe some jezzails if I can find some that are reasonably priced and not finecast) I don't plan on getting any of the giant warmachines (despite 1d4chan screaming DOOMWHEEL all the time). All of the WHFB stories I've read talk of the skaven appearing on the surface from small tunnels that are easily collapsed, or hidden. So just where the massive warmachines exit the under empire is something of a mystery to me.

Anyways, I'll finish up the paint jobs from this weekend for my next post. Aside from that I'm going to Lowes tonight to buy another bucket load of washers for their bases. I ran out of them while assembling the above rats the other night.

"I am the law."

o/

Not much hobby time here of late, though last night I did finally paint for the first time in about 3 weeks, which was enjoyable. I'll save that for my next post though. Whereas for today I have the Emperor's favorite SWAT team:

I've slowly acquired these from RTVoril over the past few months. My old Arbites were some of the first minis sold on ebay. Unlike a lot of my ebay sales, there was quite a bit of seller's remorse (even if there was no use for them at the time, as most had bolters). As such these will be sticking around for quite awhile, if not permanently as they're so hard to come by. That said (ironically) I do have an extra Judge on ebay to offset (hopefully) the cost of 2 more with Grenade launchers that I recently purchased.

I intend to use the Judge as a Commissar Lord, and the rest as IG vets. Squad leaders will be painted slightly different from the grunts. I'm thinking of steering away from the blue/black colors of old, and go for more of a 'military police' look. Will see. Not sure what sort of transports I'll use either as my one Chimera has been around the block too many times and shows it...

But...but I thought the Eldar were a dying race?

 ...snicker...

o/

I had intended to bring my Storm Wardens and a few ANGRY MAHREENZ! to the FLGS this past Saturday, but RTVoril asked  if I would bring my Exodites so we could have a 2v2, Eldar vs. Marines game. Sounded good to me, as marines (in one form or another) are always available to shoot. In building a list, my Exodites clock in at about 1300 points, however I filled out the army with some allied Corsairs from the FW list (i.e.: the remnants of my Saim-Hann contingent). Whilst some may complain about FW armies being unbalanced, compared to the new Eldar codex, the Corsairs have been reduced to 2nd rate soldiers. :-/

Our opponents were an unholy alliance of Screech's Thousand Sons (of  Bitches) and (the 'new guy') Matt's Ultramarines. I presume that those two sides were about to square off when the Eldar Warhost consisting of Craftworld Alaitoc, Exodites, and the 'Victim's Eternal' (a splinter-pirate Faction of the Saim-Hann) arrived to eliminate the 'Mon'keigh'. Whether you're a Loyalist' or a 'Traitor' is irrelevant in the face of complete annihilation...

The scenario was the new 'auto tie' (Emprah's Will...I think), short table edge deployment zones, both objectives granted sky fire, conveniently no one had any flyers. The marines won the deployment roll and opted to go first, first turn was night fight, and we failed to steal the initiative. As per my pseudo-battle report norm, what follows is my typical photo dump with a vague commentary of the highlights.

The Eldar deployment. 

The Mon'Keigh deployment. Aside from two small SM dev squads in the backfield, everything was either deep striking or in a transport.

While not the best angle, these are some of Matt's superbly painted Ultramarines. At the tender age of 18, he claims to not be an art student, however we've all suggested he consider the idea...

Under the cover of darkness (no really, it is dark...) the marines advance. Turn one didn't amount to much other than the Eldar claiming first blood via a rhino, and then killing 7 of the 10 Tactical marines that were inside, for the loss of a Dragon Knight or two.

Turn two, the Ironclad's drop pod arrived after the chapter serf in the strike cruiser above forgot to launch it in turn one, and two Landspeeders drop into the backfield. The Ironclad incinerated most of my dire avengers, while the speeder's 2 multi-meltas only stunned and immobilized the wave serpent. However in point blank range of a horde of shuriken catapults, the speeders were short lived.

Turn three the Librarian and his Termie escorts arrived via Deep Strike. Despite a relic that gave him a 4+ Deny the Witch, he rolled a 1 when a Warlock cast 'Horrify' on the squad reducing their LD to 7! The point was moot however as EVERYTHING in range  opened up on them, and wiped the squad out!

'Supa Fly!' My Autarch on his Griffon (jet bike) arrived via deep strike, and proceeded to piss all over the CSM's psychic power cards. Speaking of Chaos, somewhere during the game, my Farseer cast DOOM! on the CSM lord's unit of Possessed. However he denied the witch AND killed the Farseer with the Witch-Eater boon. Bastard!

Once again the Harlequins prove to be useless, fleeing at the first few casualties...why are these so damned expensive and NOT able to get a venom (which in the original fluff was a Harlequin transport)??? The soul blaze marker followed them around but never did anything.

RTVorils' Impressively painted Avatar. He held the guardian horde battle line in place whilst dispatching the Ironclad, Drop Pod, and a few others...

The Harlequins rally on a snake eyes roll, no doubt due to the mockery of the Alaitoc warriors around them. in the end it was a moot point as they never really accomplished anything...

Supa Fly! Charged and dispatched one Dev squad which was in that ruin with his laser lance (i.e.: those big fucking claws), though he took a wound on the way in. 

The Tac Marines (at some point)  multi-charged the Rangers and a squad of Exodite guardians, resulting in an almost game long tar pit of tied combats. My corsair prince with his power sword charged in, but with a strength of three only added to the collective failure...

The scouts finally arrived and outflanked right behind a fire prism, bolters blazing! When the smoke cleared however they were astonished to find that in true scout fashion, they damaged nothing!

The Ironclad and Landraider dispatched, the Eldar line starts to trundle forward. At this point, Screech was crying for his IG Basilisks which were at home.

To quote a rebel pilot out of Return of the Jedi: "There's too many of them!"

The scouts are about to pay for their failure...though they did manage to hang on for 2 rounds of intense fire...

The Eldar right flank advances past the 'still-suffering-little-to-no-casualties-tarpit'  although I think the Rangers had fled from the fight by this point.

The grey squad of the Thousand Sons (of Bitches) had steadily withered under fire from the Dragon Knights who were slowly suffering the same fate especially with the hellbrute helping. However Supa Fly swooped in and quickly finished them off!

That task complete, he went on by the Hellbrute to save his minions from the tar pit with the tactical squad.

Edit: Found the 2 missing photos, drop box 'dropped them' practically off of my monitor! Anyways:

However having foolishly fled said tar pit (and without a chance to regroup) the remaining tactical marines find themselves in a most unenviable crossfire and are annihilated!

To the objective!!!

Then the long rush across the table begins, whilst Eldar foot sloggers can easily reach up to 12" per turn, its doubtful they would have reached the objective by turn 7. Luckily the point was moot. Thus, at the bottom of turn 6,the Marines ran up the white flag. Screech had just 2 rhinos and the Hellbrute, and Matt had only a pair of Devastators left.

The Eldar had First Blood, their Objective, and Slay the Warlord, where the Marines came away with nothing. They had killed our Warlord (Supa Fly!) till Matt realized that there was no way his lascannon devastator could have seen him. The angle he was at on the fourth floor obscured those giant wings! Since there were a few floors in the way, he graciously allowed Supa Fly's resurrection.

All in all it was a fun, if loooong game, as 3k games so often are.

Bring out the pigs...

o/

Hobby time was non-existent this past weekend aside from a little bit of Dark Heresy RPGing Friday night. The rest of my time was spent (with quite a bit of help) moving my GF in and various pieces of our redundant furniture out to their new homes.

As such, the house looks like a bomb went off inside! Anything that we didn't immediately know where to put went into the dining room. As a result that room is now impassable terrain, aside from a walk-thru lane to connect both ends of the house. Her kitties seem to be adjusting to their new home...however tonight we'll pick up my dog from my grandparents' house and on her return, I'm sure a whole new level of chaos shall ensue...

I do have one bit on the hobby front though. My GF has a coffee table that is essentially built around/out of an aquarium (sorry, no picture of it as its buried in the dining room). Wanting to keep it she suggested we could put terrain in it and display battle scene-type dioramas in it! Awesome idea!  The dioramas will change periodically, but one project we've already earmarked for it is a 1/72 scale, super-heavy anime-inspired tank which was originally drawn by Miyazaki Hayao. 

I'll be honest, the addition of the crew of pigs is what really sold me on this...somehow they make this monster kinda 'cute' (which sold my GF on the idea as well).

'I first spotted this tank on a google search for...something some ways back, but it was out of production. Drooling over the kit and instantly wanting it, I checked on it periodically to see if it was ever reissued, and lo and behold it was! So I used last week's ebay sales to finance virtually all of it, and with shipping from Japan it came to about $55. Which, to my surprise is less than a Space Marine Whirlwind!

Speaking of which, can somebody please explain to me the justification of $57 for a $37.25 rhino with one extra turret sprue and a different box??? Insanity.

anyways...

My order was ready to ship and so I paid for it Friday (that site has a bit of an odd process for ordering...) and so we should be good to go in a month or so when it gets here. At least I hope so...I see today it is listed as 'back ordered'. It was still 'in stock' when I paid for it, so I can only hope I got the last one. Kindova worrisome development though...

Edit: I got the shipment notification last night, so apparently I did get the last one, whew!

A little bit of non-miniature painting.

o/

Not much time this week as preparations for moving my GF in with me has eaten up the hobby time. Best I could manage was arming all of my Angry Marines as I needed to clear them and their constituent parts off of the entertainment center which has been given to one of my neighbors.

One project that I've been working on however is at the museum where I volunteer, the Gray Fossil Site. I'm principally a lab volunteer, however after painting a cast of a Triceratops for them a ways back, whenever a little painting project comes up they come to me. As such, Dr. Blaine Schubert (the PhD in charge) asked if I could paint a cast they made of a prehistoric elk jaw that is beng donated to the museum (and is currently on display). The fossil owner asked if they could cast it and if so he would donate the piece to the collections dept.

The museum did so, however when turning over the replica the donor asked if we could paint it to match the fossil first. Which brought me into the process (despite there being an employee of the museum who also plays 40k and paints minis). Its all good though as its fun to have my hobby go to a good cause (aside from just keeping me entertained...lol).

Yes I know, that tank brush is shot...

Here it is whilst drying from one of its washes. About all I have left to do is to clear coat it and then go over the teeth with 'ard coat shiny them up to match the tooth enamel. The staff seem pleased with it as is, but I don't want the paint to wear off from handling. I won't have time to get to it this weekend, but will do so next weekend.