The Grapes of Wrath...um, I mean Rebellion!

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Just a quick post due again to a minimum of free time. Whilst I said I was going to repaint the HWK-290 next, actually (as you can see) my X-Wing and Y-Wing got painted instead. Purple is my favorite color and well as my GF's, so it was an obvious choice for us.

Locally the Rebellion has: the Stock red and yellow squadrons, Voril's Green Squadron, Kushial's Blue Squadron, and now our Purple Squadron. So ummm...yeah, Taste the rainbow you Imperial Bitches!!!

I had a bit of an 'oops-oh shit!' moment painting around the cockpit of the Y, so I covered over my mistake with Rakarth Flesh. That paint is just a hair off of the color the ships come painted as. While its not noticeable on the X-Wing touch ups, on the Y I ended up having to apply enough of it to where it didn't look right. Looked kinda flat actually. I hit it with a wash, which fixed the flat issue, but made it considerably darker, so ay my GF's suggestion, I gave the same treatment to the engine strut-things to balance the ship out. I suppose it came out alright, and if not...well, there's always a life for it as some Scum and Villainy!

Community post! (sorta...) Some X-Wing repaints

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Sorry for the lack of a blog post last Thursday per my normal schedule. My GF had a fairly substantial surgery on Tuesday, and helping her get around more or less ate up the rest of the week. Thus no hobby time = No blog post. She's managing pretty good though, and as such I was able to paint some on Saturday. Due to an extremely busy schedule the next two weeks coming, I'll be milking that little bit of painting time for all that its worth (just a forewarning).

So first up,  I finished up the Scarlet Harlot, and here she is:

Soon to be flying into an asteroid near you!

Any simple google search will show that I'm not alone in this endeavor though. Indeed Archon Voril offered to send me pix of his latest endeavor, his recently painted Green Wing:

I particularly like how the Y-Wing came out but as usual, I'm kinda biased in that ship's favor...

Also, whilst exchanging painting project pics on FB, Clayton sent me pics of his WIPs. Currently he has a quartet of TIEs of various types which are in progress. The HWK-290 looks like its done and The Goblin (Firespray) is in its final stages I think.

Hrmmm...I was pondering this color scheme, may have to try something else...

An excellent color scheme for what I otherwise consider an ugly ship.

I think next up on my X-Wing painting list will be the HWK-290...just don't like that brown. However I have a few things in the works. So there will be a few blog posts before I get to that.

Our X-Wing collection expands!

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Well, this weekend was the first of 3 in a row where we won't make it to the FLGS for Saturday night gaming. However all was not lost on the gaming front. Yesterday was my 39th birthday, and my wonderful and amazing girlfriend took me for an overnight stay in Asheville, NC. As always we lots of fantastic food, spent too much $$$ and had a great time! She also gave me two new X-Wing minis, my two favorites:

the TIE advanced and the Y-Wing!

I know most people lament the TIE advanced when Vader isn't at the controls but whatever, its my favorite class of TIE! Likewise, when I was a kid I had a toy Y-Wing and that poor thing was beat all too hell when I finally out grew it. We also picked up a new organizer case for our X-Wing toys! My GF saw the same one linked over and over on various X-Wing forums, so we opted for that one. It fits everything with plenty of room left for more, and it was all of $10.52 on homedepot.com (when shipped to our local store for pick up).

As a child, my biggest fear of adulthood was no more toys at Christmas and birthdays. Well kids, at the ripe old age of 39, I can assure you there's nothing to worry about on that front!

Also as you can see above, the YT-1300 has received more paint. This is the extent of the red. I've also painted the engine to look a bit like its lit, and now just have little touch ups. Speaking of the YT, the other night, out of nowhere a name popped to my head for the ship: The Scarlet Harlot. I like it, as does my GF so I think I'll stick with that.

 :-)

YT-1300 Conversion WIP

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As I mentioned in my last post, I received a Millennium Falcon as an early birthday present. After the iniatial oohs and ahhs!, and a rummage thru the cards, tokens, and included scenario, I got to converting it. Yes, the Millennium Falcon is cool but I'd rather it be a YT of my own. Apparently I'm not alone, just google YT-1300 conversion or repaint and you'll see endless examples. Actually that goes along perfectly with the YT-series' fluff, as they're so easily modifiable, that few if any look/function alike.

Needs more red...

The conversion itself was fairly straight forward and easy, so now comes the hard part: how to paint it? As you can see I started on that a bit last night, but am not sure where to go from here. I'll probably just wing it as per my norm I guess.

Edit: After writing this post, I added red around the outer edge of the saucer as well as all of the front 'forks' (as Archon Voril calls them), whilst leaving the sides as they are.

Looks almost like a racing stripe that was painted in the wrong direction!

I'm still lacking a proper name for my ship. Being an Ork player, I tend to gravitate towards the goofier names (regardless of faction) but nothing I've come up with as of yet really has appealed to me. Any suggestions?

Our first taste of Epic X-Wing!

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Well, the WHFB game fell thru so my GF, our friend Chikar (who had never played x-wing before) and I were quickly roped into an Epic rules, 300 point game of X-Wing. My apologies to Imperial Recruitment but we fought along side Billy and his CR90 (in its battlefield debut). Also, my apologies for the photos, they're kinda rough. We had cell phones all around, but notta real camera in sight and it shows in the photos. As such these are in in the best order that I can recall, as many, many photos were deleted after inspection of their quality.

Turn one was mainly maneuvering into position, and turn 2, Chikar started off by 1-shotting an Interceptor with his E-Wing! As you can see here, over confident, that same E-Wing is about to bite off more than it can chew...

They're going for the Bait--uh, I mean Billy. Of course Billy set the corvette's auto pilot to forward 2 (for the WHOLE game...), and apparently went to see what was in the fridge rather than do something useful like ram the block of TIEs meandering around in front of the CR90. Against the Phantoms, the Corvette's shooting was entirely ineffectual.

With my outer rim smuggler and Tala squadron pilot, I quickly found out that the 'cheese squadron' (so-named by the other Imperial player) was all but impossible to hit! As the Phantoms had oh, I dunno...we'll say at least 6 dice to defend! WTF? All I managed to do was whittle off the shields from one of them before giving up on them. Though, they were largely ignoring my 2 ships in favor of gutting the CR90.

Thus starts the Falcon's multi-turn run of hauling ass to engage the 'regular' TIE fighters.

Whilst moving first, the Rebel ships on the other flank are easily out maneuvered. Luckily the hawk had a turret.

The CR90 is on its last legs, and the YT is on the edge of range of the regular ties, whilst still firing behind at the phantoms with its turret (and still, to no avail).

The CR90 goes BOOM! and the Headhunters follow suit. The Hawk quickly pops whilst the YT makes a run for the table edge. Sadly, hopelessly out gunned, it never makes it...

It was fun (untouchable Phantom squadron aside) and while it was his first time at the helm of the CR90, I was thoroughly unimpressed with it. I think a GR75 would have worked much better for us. That said it could be inexperience with the ship, or well...its just Billy (if you knew him you'd understand).

Trying to split 50 points each or so to myself, my GF and Chikar was a mistake. Apparently had I taken Han solo and buffed the Falcon all to hell, I could have easily taken down the Phantoms according to my opponent. In a normal sized game you're only likely to face 1 phantom which is a good thing, otherwise X-Wing could quickly devolve into a 40k-like game of: 'I have more broken models than you, I win!' which has been my complaint here of late. The guy using them admitted it was a 'dick list' but then again he was expecting to face experienced players (though unlike his team mate he didn't switch lists when he found out...). Oh well, its all still just a learning experience at this point, and I was ignored till the CR90 was all but dead. Still, if anything it convinced me to shove the CR90 waaaay down on my list of X-Wing priorities.

Speaking of new toys, Rob gave me an early birthday present in the form of the Millennium Falcon! So awesome! I can't wait to convert it into a different YT-1300. I've been checking out various paint jobs and conversions online,so am pretty sure that I know what I want to do (conversion wise anyways, paint, not so much), but I'll leave that for a later post.

The point at which it all falls apart.

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Well, the flood gates are about to open. A combination of economic necessity, my general state of apathy towards 7th edition, along with my total contempt of the way GW is doing business has led me to this point. I'm not saying I'm 'done with 40k' but I am going to be making a massive reduction in my overall collection. Hell, right now, I don't even want the 7th ed rulebook. Why waste our money? My GF offered to buy me the Stormclaw box for my birthday but I declined the offer. Honestly, there wasn't anything in the box that I wanted. No, not even the rules.

 No longer interested in selling great games, GW is instead only concerned with wringing every last dollar out of its fans, whilst trashing its core game of 40k. Firstly, you need to spend a bucket load of $$$ on 'supplements', remember folks, GW is a miniatures company, not a rules company. Thus spending $150 on a codex and 2 supplements to be able to get full functionality out of your models is just an option. Apparently supplements are now designed to contain an army's lynchpin rules that were left out of the codex books (rather than adding contents in after-the-fact like a 'supplement' ought to do).

Following that, you need to buy the latest giant stompy/flying whatever that debatably fits into the fluff (a marine inside a marine, really?), and/or models that only ought to be in Apocalypse (don't hear about that flavor of 40k much anymore, guess its obsolete). Then with these new toys (who's rules are far better than what you bought years ago) they will paste whatever is in front of them, unless the opponent has something equally unbalanced. But wait! Don't forget those supplemental 'formations' where you get some 'free rules' in return for spending a mortgage payment's worth of money on whatever they're trying to sell (like 5 battlewagons, because everyone needs 5 of them in a regular game, right?).

Umm, where's the strategy in that? 

Toss in unbound (not that I've ever seen anyone bother with it as multiple CADs essentially do the same thing, only better as permission is not required), the WHFB-esque psychic phase with the alteration of making dispelling all but impossible unless the opponent spams psykers, (I'll skip the obvious rant on all of the witchfire spells in the ork codex) along with the rest of the half-assed, shove it out the door 7th ed, which was only done in the futile hope of raising the bottom line quickly (and how did that go GW?).

Oh, not so good you say? Wonder why? Perhaps the fish stinks at the head?

Tom Kirby (Dogbert) in action...

Nothing, and I mean NOTHING that I've experienced with this stupid, premature edition has excited me, nor made me want to play 40k more.

Not. One. Damned. Thing. 

I've loved this game for 20ish years and this is what we get? GW screaming: BUY MOAR!!! All while not giving us what we want, or even asking. Instead just making shit up and expecting people to buy it with glee?

Just a few games in and my GF and I are all about X-Wing. True that is probably just 'ooh, new and shiny' syndrome, but ya now what? It takes strategy to really play it, not just buying the new uber model. Then again, the direction GW has taken with 40k gave us, and many others reason to go looking for something else in the first place. Hell, we've also talked about dusting off my quite neglected WHFB armies to play (I'm tentatively set to play WHFB this weekend actually, first time in at least a year). With the advent of 7th ed. 40k, Saturday night gaming at the FLGS has gone quickly from 40k and maybe another random game or two, to an even mix of: Infinity, Warmahordes, X-Wing, and 40k in relatively short order.

We all lay the blame at GW's feet. 

As an example: prior to the Ork codex release, our gaming group was planning an enormous Orks vs/Everybody Apoc game. Now? Nope, notta word about it. Of the 5 main Ork armies that were in our group, 2 have been traded away (both by the 2 guys who were the ones organizing the Apoc game), and mine is in downsizing mode.

Already the Spess Puppy players are bitching as they have tons of Grey Hunters with Bolters and Chainswords, and apparently that's not an option in their new, forthcoming codex. Come now guys, be good GW fanbois and just throw those models out and buy new ones, you know that that's what they want. Also be sure to buy Santa Claws, and a flying brick for every squad. So glad. So...so glad I sold my Space Wolves back in 4th ed. That stupid sled (admittedly, the termie riding in it looks AMAZING!!!) ought to be converted to have it jumping an 'ice shark' on its base.

I just...I just don't understand what their thinking is. I really don't and at this point, the really sad part is: I don't think I'd even care if I did.

RIMPAC 2014

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We went to a family reunion this past weekend and thus I lack any gaming photos. Additionally, my Grymn gun team from my last post has had a bit more work done to it, but nothing too photogenic just yet.

I pulled this off of the interwebz, so no idea who to give the photo credit to other than (presumably) the US Navy.

Instead I thought I'd post a few pics a buddy of mine (and currently former 40k gamer) sent me. He's a Lieutenant in the US Navy and the ship on which he serves, the USS Rodney M. Davis FFG 60 recently took part in this year's RIMPAC 2014 naval exercise. Whilst its not too visible, he said the Rodney was in the second row from the left, 4th ship back in line. He said it was crazy to be in the middle of so many ships in such close proximity and moving at speed!

 Here are the photos he sent me from within the fleet above:

I know that that's the USS Independence on the right. 

At least this one has a glimpse of the Rodney in the bottom corner.

The JDS Kirishima and the carrier: USS Ronald Reagan.

Photo Credit for all photos: US Navy photo by LT. Daniel Denton/Released.