Skaven Rising...

o/

My Skaven haven't made an appearance on the blog since February of 2016, and outside of Mordheim (the game which spawned my little army) they've never seen battle on the table top. Well, this past Saturday that all changed when they made their Olde Hammer battlefield debut! That's right, none of that AoS crap! Instead we went old school with Warhammer Fantasy Battle's 8th edition. 

Bob was amused by the Skaven's request to 'say cheese!'.

As far as I can tell (by scrolling thru the archives of this blog), the last time I played a game of WHFB was in May of 2013 pitting my (now defunct) Stirlander army vs. Bob's Nordlanders. So...needless to say my grasp of the rules was a bit...rusty. This was only magnified by fielding an army I've never used before. Luckily Bob is pretty well up to speed after his recent bout vs. Neverness.

Waaaay too clean, no wonder my Stirlanders and now Skaven see them as enemies...

Recently, My Beloved Wolfy had expressed interest in giving WHFB a try to Bob who was all too happy to oblige in teaching her the game. However she didn't want to go in totally blind and asked if I would team up for her first game. Well of course I would!

My army is relatively small by Skaven standards containing a mere 80ish models and clocking in at 1,000 points. A lord, 3 heroes, 2 regiments of clanrats, 1 of slaves, and lastly 2 poison wind mortar weapon teams. 

The slaves have already been slaughtered by this point.

As for thoughts on their initial run, the mortars were great halving 2 of Bob's regiments and giving severe respiratory distress to the remaining survivors (I'm confident they all died shortly after the battle's end). As is typical of any war machine, one blew up taking 4 rats out of a nearby regiment, but the Skaven care little for casualties.

Wounds from a well placed poison wind  mortar round.
Neverness, this is how you are supposed to roll dice!

My Lord's regiment freight-trained thru a regiment and its detachment cowering to the rear before finally ending up well out of position at game's end. My other, characterless clanrat regiment was predictably mediocre and fled following their charge, being run down in exchange for only a few casualties. 

The slaves are kinda worthless as anything other than a distraction, though amusingly they inflicted more casualties as the fled than they did in combat! Our warped lightning spewing wizard did well, whereas the engineer equipped with the warpmusket was more or less useless. He'll serve as a wizard next go round instead as a free roaming riflerat.

Everyone's positions at game's end.

Whilst we did lose, it was a fun time and Wolfy found the game intriguing. Future purchases for the army aren't planned for at this point but...I do have about 60 or so rats that still need assembly. So that ought to keep me entertained till I can restock some paints from the FLGS (during regular store hours) and return to my Vanquisher.

When ya hit a wall, paint it!

o/

For whatever reason, my hobby mojo has been a bit lacking here of late and I haven't really been motivated to paint/build anything. So...I figured that maybe just picking up a random project from way out of left field, and painting on that instead might just be the jolt to the system that I need. Thus, I found myself working the walls that go with my long forgotten Stirland Watchtower. 

There's no initials more deserving of that tombstone than those of the game itself!

Ah yes, good ol' Warhammer Fantasy, may it rest in peace. I guess at this point I ought to go ahead and start working on the base for it, though that'll make storage a bit of a problem. Indeed, I think that that's why I never finished this project in the first place. 

I'm pretty sure this was the layout I had had for this.

When finished it certainly won't be as grandiose a structure as Neverness' Death Castle. Rather this is just a humble watch tower.

The overhead view.

The 'L' on the roof, visible only to overhead flying heroes mounted on dragons and other such creatures, mark this out as one of the watch towers which guard the approaches to the city of Liecheburg. This forlorn city is situated on Stirland's western frontier, bordering the haunted hills and beyond those, the accursed realm of Slyvania.

I love these old maps! You can still find them here.

Painting these was a fun little afternoon diversion. They're now done for the most part, only needing a few little bitz and bobs painted up prior to gluing onto the base. Once complete, maybe I can use the tower for games of Mordheim or something, as that's just about all the painted remnants of my Stirland army would be fit for these days.

Comparing Apples and Oranges...

Okay, so figuring it out from the point of view of starting from scratch, here's a comaprison of what I've purchased for Gruntz vs. the 40k Spess mahreen equivalent (because lets face it, 90% of players start with marines.

Also I'm not going with the Dark Vengeance boxed set as (1) not everybody starts with it and (2) there's no Gruntz equivalent which more or less renders this whole exercise in comparing the two pointless. Especially as the forces contained in that set don't really compare well with what I bought for Gruntz. The DV box is also intended to be split by 2 new players (which is amusing as only veteran players who have pre-existing armies for the minis contained in the set tend to actually do that).

"He's the Orange!'

 This is a good size comparison photo (which tend to be surprisingly hard to find in google searches...

Anyways, first up buying the game rules:

Gruntz rulebook PDF and unit builder app: $14.00 (+$10 for printing out and spiral binding @ kinko's)

40k Big Rulebook and SM codex ebook: $145.99

A difference of: $121.99! (ouch!)

Next up, minis (all of which were purchased from Khurasan miniatures with the lone exception of the commander's mech which came from The Ion Age):

Gruntz:

(1) APC

(1) Tank

(20) Infantry

(3) specialist squads (similar to IG heavy weapon teams)

(1) commander's mech

Gruntz minis total: $79.42 and just short of 250 points as built. 

That point total could go higher if I beefed em up a bit but I've kept em simple to start with and that's a decently sized starter army anyways.

40k:

(1) Rhino

(1) Predator

(20) Tactical Marines

(5) devastator marines

(1) dreadnought

(nope, no GW links as y'all already know what those look like)

Minis total: $267.25, and about 750 points (give or take) which is also a good starter size.

Minis come to a difference in price of: $187.83 (again, ouch!) Actually it would be worse as the Gruntz also includes shipping costs, whereas the 40k doesn't. The 40k costs also don't involve sales tax, and since GW's NA HQ is in Memphis, buying from them online would involve sales tax just like buying their toys at the FLGS would.

Total Gruntz Start up cost: $103.25
Total 40k Start up cost: $413.15

For a difference of: $309.90 (triple ouch!)

Increasing the armies from there won't get any cheaper for the 40k player (assuming ebay isn't involved) but is debatable for the Gruntz player as I could redo the unit stats, increasing their skills and their point costs free of charge (I would have to buy more stuff though).

Now, obviously Gruntz is not the (gamers) household name that 40k is, and I've yet to get in a game to see just how much I'll like it in the long run either, but still...most games of 40k these days feel like a pay-to-win scenario which just plain sucks! Personally, 7th ed as whole hasn't been any fun in general, as it feels like it has far more cons than pros to it. Apparently I'm not alone (locally Infinity has all but replaced 40k at the FLGS' game night), so its not hard to see why GW is hemorrhaging players and having difficulty finding new ones with new army start up costs like that. Don't even get me started on the AoS debacle! What's the latest on that? $100 for SIX Khorne Blood Crushers...curiously with most every release, the WHFB cost too much excuse for AoS's existance seems hollower and hollower.

Oops, back on topic...

Speaking of hemorrhaging players, the Gruntz purchases listed above came out of my now depleted Plastic 30k Fund that I had built up. Mk IV tac marines isn't what I was hoping for and given GW's opaque marketing scheme of: just have a lot of money ready to impulse buy our releases with no forewarning of what they are or when they'll come out... 

Meh, why did I put up with their crap for so long? Honestly it feels like I've achieved escape velocity and I don't see any reason to look back (unless I'm looking waaaaaaaaaaaay back towards GorkaMorka, Mordheim and the goodies from GW's long since past 'Golden Age').

GorkaMorka called...

...it wants it's Red Gobbo back.

I hope you didn't want to buy one on ebay. Holy crap! Look at those prices! For a stinkin' GROT!?!?!? I don't care if its a long out-of-production special character, that's just stupid! Now, whilst I don't think I'll be fielding a rebel grot force, I would like that model for my mob, and it just so happens that I have him already...

Dis, iz (or rather wuz) Da Redd Barrun! A minor chieftain in my 2nd O&G army, and Da Warlord of my 3rd and final, purely goblin Warhammer army. Ironically, of all of my green skinned fantasy armies, the all goblin vesrion was the most effective (and I only had 6 fanatics!). As you can see, his slugga was removed and replaced with a shield taken from the old Dogs of War general Lorenzo Lupo (and now you know why that guy disappeared from existence, the gobbo's ate him!).

These photos were taken shortly after Da Barun was taken out of retirement in my Hall of Heroes and just before he went into the Simple green for a much needed bath. He joined the (now former) Captain I killed Draigo of Storm Wardens' fame, and an old, original rhino with waaay too many layers of paint on it. The latter two will go to my 30k Blackshields, whereas the barun will go to GorkaMorka (though the color of his coat remains to be determined...

The Age of Sig-meh

o/

Copyright of GW. I can assure you, I want no claim to this wretched image!

Well everyone else is going on and on about GW's latest debacle, so why not throw in my 2 cents as well. As you have probably already guessed, I'm not impressed. Not in the slightest. I downloaded my 4-page rule PDF, as well as the warscroll PDFs for my Empire and Skaven, even the one for the terrain, and...uh yeah. Nothing I read made me think 'Wow! I want to try this out! Now let me dig out my WHFB minis to see what kind of army I can build!'

Dormant as my WHFB collection is, I think it'll stay right where it is (along with 8th ed rulebook), and wait till someone wants to play a good ol' game of actual Warhammer! Hell, I might even build and paint a few Skaven out of spite for AoS.

I really feel for people like Necron Bob. He's a hardcore WHFB tournament player, and had traveled the country to various tournaments, and has many friends in that community. I asked him what his thoughts on AoS were and he replied with this:

"I've been talking to folks from all over the county. At first there was tempered optimism, followed by nervous skepticism. Now that those sad battle scrolls released there's a lot of bitterness and rage. It's totally not my game. I've made a lot of great friends and have loved travelling about the country. That's all going to fragment now. Very sad. Some are going to Warmachine. Some to Kings of War. There's talk of a community organized 8.5. Fewer are holding out hope that GW is going to come through with point values and/or a mass battle system. I don't think they will. For the life of me, I can't see how they thought this was a good idea..."


Yeah, I think AoS is going to tank. Horribly. I'm sad to say it, but I think GW deserves it too. Not only that, but if this is their long term plan for 40k...well, then they'd best start liquidating their corporate assets now, just saying.

Thus far, the only good thing I've seen come from this release is Inso's Adeptus Custodes conversion built from his free AoS mini (with the purchase of a White Dwarf magazine) which can be seen here.

You're not going to sell all of your bitz are you?

No, I...uh...well...

My friends who have rummaged thru this box over the years will probably be horrified by how empty it is now.

Looking down at my near empty bitz box (the 'BIG BOX' as I generally refer to it), and the 6, full, gallon sized bag at my feet...well, it sure looked like I was heading in that direction. I guess I kinda just got into the ebay mindset and wasn't stopping till Wolfy posed that question to me.

Next stop: ebay.

 My Orks, Space Marines and Eldar (what survives of the three armies), along with Wolfy's Tau are all already built, with no plans of any future purchases at the moment (and I'm two updated codexes behind already). The Grymn and Quar are all largely 1-2 piece metal minis, with little to no need of conversion. X-Wing conversions to date number just one ship, and that didn't require anymore than rearranging its own parts. Ya know, I always said I'd be done with gaming when I sold off all of my bitz, and after seeing how well Mike's bitz bags sold for a few weeks back, I thought:

Why hang onto all of this junk that I'm not using anymore?

But I dunno, faced with the reality of what I was doing, I quietly stopped and instead I collected my smaller bitz boxes and dumped them into the now almost empty big box, closed the lid and put it back in the game room. I know I'm not done with gaming just yet, but my connection to my 20 year love of all forms of Warhammer took another big, BIG hit today. It makes me sad, but more for what 40k & WHFB was, rather than what GW's turned them into now.

On a brighter note, here's my latest Grymn WIP Twin-Heavy stubber team:

Too much sand?

Skaven War litter WIP

o/

In perusing the Skaven codex (and before I had that, 4chan) I came to like the idea of a war litter to carry my Skaven Lord into battle. On a google search, I found one right on GW's website that was to my liking and used that as a basis for my own war litter. Thus I picked up the Stormvermin bitz and most of an Orc chariot via ebay, and Neverness generously donated a pair of wheels to my cause (prices for those on ebay are ridiculous), and here it is thus far:

As you can see, I started base coating it last night. Looks like they're making it out of scrap wood scavenged from all over...

My Lord riding inside, though I have more characters than I can reasonably fit into a list, so I'll have options on who will be riding this to war.

I had to add 'wings' to the 40mm base for the storm vermin, which ought to add to the usual ranking up issues the game invariably creates...

Having perused the army book for a bit now I made up a list of my current forces, and they clocked in at 1250 points which is what I was aiming for. I could raise it higher, but like my Stirlanders, I would just be adding characters to the list which isn't too appealing. About the only thing I really want right now is Stormvermin, and maybe some jezzails...but that's it. In adding those I can fold the clanrats with hand weapons into the slaves which will free up some points to maybe only raise the army total up to 1500 or so.

However for now, there will be no more purchases for the army (movement trays, magnetic sheeting and washers aside), rather I just need to continue on with the assembly of my horde.

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...

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 guess Stirland has a rodent problem...

Actually Stirland has a lot of problems, this one will just be added to the list, lol.

I've made a few changes to my WHFB Stirland army, namely in the removal of a few units. Originally I had only wanted about a 1k point list, but once I started Greatswords, I 'needed' more to make them effective. Which meant a bigger army, cause they have a high point cost (for a foot slogging human). Plus I wanted a cannon, which meant an even bigger army to fit both units in with the army percentages (such a stupid system of army building). Soon my 1k army damn near hit 2k before I hit the breaks on it.

WHFB has taken a back seat here locally, as most games other than 40k do periodically. Looking at my little horde of Stirlanders, I really just wanted that 1k list, or rather about 1250 points just to have a little bit of variety. Thus, some units are hitting the auction block. I sold the Greatswords to Bob, and my FAILcast captain, spearmen, and archers (the latter have failed to kill ANYTHING in all of their games) will go to ebay sometime this week.

Now, before Neverness starts lamenting that I'm selling my Empire army before he finishes his Orc regiment (not holding my breath for the rest of the army...), remember that rodent problem I mentioned? Well...

Because I don't already have enough to paint...

Like my Stirland army, Mordheim is indeed a gateway drug as I've wanted a Skaven army for quite sometime, despite my public denials to the contrary. Last week was a good week on ebay (selling wise), and so I picked up 2 island of blood skaven starter regiments before transferring the rest of the funds to my checking account. Half have spears, the others hand weapons and shields. Hopefully this week I'll add the same amount to bump them up to blocks of 40-50 after adding in the Mordheim minis. They will be the core of my army. After that, I'll need an army book to see just what I have and where to go from there to reach the 1k mark, where again, I intend to stop.

Characters I already have in spades thanks to my Mordheim warband. The exception to that being a BSB which I picked up for dirt cheap on ebay, along with a pack master for all of my 'not-so-giant rats'. Right now, my warlord and BSB are Stormvermin. I love those minis but don't have the $100 needed to buy 2 boxes worth for a block of 40 (the Skaven standard it seems). Likewise, the BSB's flag is kinda sad, but till I get an actual Stormvermin standard bearer (those bits were kinda pricey) he'll have to do. Not too inspiring of a BSB, but the Skaven lead thru fear and intimidation so it is no matter. He has decent armor AND a shield, so it is easy to see that he is actually a rat of some worth!

These will have to wait a bit to see some paint/assembly, as we're moving my GF into my/our house this week. Hopefully the dust will settle enough next week for me to paint up a few or something.

Kill 'em with fire!!!

o/

The following is just something I came up with whilst bored last week. Its the background for a WHFB 'Bright Wizard' that I don't yet have a model for, though I do plan to get one at some point...

Infernicus the Lamp Lighter

Copyright of GW

The providence of Stirland has always been something of a backwater. Beyond the walls of the capital city of Wurtbad, efforts to maintain even the illusion of civilization have always been a difficult prospect. This has long been one many problems plaguing the far flung town of Leichberg, especially given its close proximity to the accursed Haunted Hills. Aside from building strong walls and hiring men to guard it, one method of constructing that illusion of civility is to keep the lights of the town burning bright thru the darkness of night.

This important task falls to the lowly lamp lighter. However the lamp lighter's toil is one fraught with danger. Alone on the darkened streets of Leichberg, with no one about other than those bent on thievery and mischief, the lamp lighter is often easy prey. Indeed he's seen as an enemy of the criminals of Leichberg, for he robs them of their protective shadow. Worse still, he is night-blinded by the very candle in which he illuminates the town's street lanterns. Leaving him unaware of an assailant until it is too late.

Thus lamp lighters are few, if at all. Suggestions have been made to employ the town's garrison to provide escort. Yet it is the garrison's so-called 'guards' who are most often accused of the aforementioned thievery and mischief. Avoiding the town's fortified walls and barracks by necessity, the lamp lighter walks instead the desolate streets of Leichberg till the first hint of dawn. Tragically it is left to only this solitary, and often short lived soul to stave off the terrors of night.

However the Lord of Leichberg found an ingenious solution to the lamp lighter's problem whilst solving another at the same time. Infernicus, the city garrison's old, decrepit (and some would say: 'not-so') bright wizard had become quite the thorn in his master's side. Primarily thru his insistence that 'one of his age was beyond need for further study of his order's spell craft.' Only to later be found lost in his scrolls, frantically trying to recall any spell of inflammatory use when called to assist in the town's defense! It seemed that other than in times of war, there's little need for a bright wizard's magics in such a place as Leichberg.

Killing two birds with one stone, Infernicus, at the order of his Lordship is now employed as the town's lamp lighter. His need to light fires on a nightly basis, even if only small flame upon a lantern's wick allows him to maintain mastery of at least one spell. Now he'll be theoretically prepared when next comes the call to arms! Furthermore, few are willing to rob a muttering old wizard as he wanders the streets at night. A few words cast in a moment of fright and his would-be attackers will see themselves quickly set aflame!

Wandering the streets each night, Infernicus now weaves an always varying path of flickering light throughout the town. His vigil maintains Leichberg's nightly visage of civility, whilst he memorizes his spell keeping, and sometimes assists the constabulary via the spontaneous combustion of the odd thief or two.

Keeping a wary eye on the greenskins...

o/

Fire!!!

After breaking the back of Rob's Ogre invasion, all is (currently) quiet on the WHFB front. My Army of Leichberg has returned to its normal duties of guarding the shelf, and I've busied myself with Battletech and my Quar invasion of Bolt Action. However Neverness has been feverishly working on his Orcs, and the Army of Leichberg must remain vigilant of this new and growing threat (well, not exactly new, as he's had the army longer than I've had mine).

The barrel and bits came compliments of Rob and it all works rather well I think!

Thus, I took a break from my Quar and battlemechs last weekend to apply a little paint to my Dwarf mercenaries.  Well, as you can see, only one of the mercenaries...but the cannon and its base are done as well! Having the gun separate from its base was an annoying feature and that's now been remedied. Sadly, these dwarfs have been away from the Runesmiths for so long that the gun's runes no longer glow with power, but rather have been reduced to mere decoration.

Nonetheless, its still a great (cannon) addition to my army! Necron Bob requested I use it to kill ogres in payment for sending it my way. To date however, only one ogre has fallen to a cannon ball to the face. Still, I'm sure he would have no issue with the cannon balls flying thru the ranks of the greenskins...

My current distractions and what not...

o/

First up, I have some very important news! Well...okay so its not that important since its being announced here and not on an actual news site, but anyways: My game room is once again open for operation, Huzzah!

Here it is, set up for last night's Bolt Action demo game. My thoughts on which I'll get to next week so stay tuned...

The last two of my grandparents' ginormous dollhouses that were designated for my cousins left the premises last Sunday, and to my knowledge they left the state of Tennessee yesterday. They ought to be in Pennsylvania/New York by now. There are of course three smaller ones still under the tables, to which we need to be mindful of, as much for the sake of our knees (as Screech found out last night) as for the houses themselves.

As for distractions, we've been feeling a bit of a 40k burnout here lately. Its a seasonal thing, nothing to be alarmed about, but still annoying. Attendance at the FLGS has been down (though the college kids going home for the summer has a part in that as well). The easy switch was to WHFB.

On that front, my Army of Stirland had a good run of 2:1 out of three games. However at 1850 points (pretty much my max army size) I have one build, with little variation beyond a character swap or two. So it gets old fast. We've pondered a campaign some, in the form of an Empire civil war among the three local Empire armies. However 1/3 of that is MIA for the summer (see the college kids bit above) and another 1/3 is lacking the Empire rule book and (more importantly) the funds to remedy that. So will just ponder it some more for a while.  Given my reluctance to invest more in that game right now, I'm thinking 1000-1250 point games would work best if we do try a campaign.

Looking elsewhere, Rob keeps mentioning the Malifaux beta rules are out, to which I keep reminding him I have no interest in that game. He doesn't bother with mentioning Warmahordes as that cause is lost from the start (that said, I'm still rather fond of Lt. Moen, if only for my 'fluff' for him). The FLGS had a bunch of the Warlord games on display, kinda out of nowhere really. While Rob likes Pike and Shotte, to me that looks like my Stirland army all over again. So being the history buffs that Rob, Screech and I are, we're pondering the Bolt Action game instead, but I'll get into that next week.

One other idea, is to resurrect Heavy Gear again. I have 250-300 points in the form of one squad (all previously painted minis barring the one I was going to proxy for Battletech have long since been sold off). Rob has 3 squads of Northern Guard which he said he'd give me! As nice as that is, before he buys a new faction, I think he ought to hang on to two squads, and we'll give it a few games to see if we want to really give it another go. If we do, then he can give his two remaining squads to Screech and dragoon him into the game. Besides, we never quite got the rules all the way down before, and Screech is much better at translating the rules from a rulebook to the table top than I am.

Prior to discussing Heavy Gear, I painted up these two Stripped-Down Hunters last Sunday for no other reason than they were 'something different'. Also I wouldn't have much time to paint as we were moving dollhouses around, and Gears paint up rather quickly. Stripped-Down Hunters are more or less ad-hoc recon gears, where the rocket pod and some arm, leg and shoulder armor is removed and replaced with ballistic cloth. The weight reduction increases their speed, though as expected as the expense of firepower and protection. They're common in the Western Frontier Protectorate (my favorite faction) which tends to be on the lower end of the economic spectrum.

So, will ponder Bolt Action some more for next week, while still playing 40k this coming weekend. Burnt out as we are, I still did miss it after a month or so of WHFB.

The first engagement of my GF's Tau army...

o/

I've not fielded Tau in quite a while, and certainly not since the new codex release. Combine with that my girlfriend's want to play with her new army, and it was painfully obvious that I needed a crash course in the new Tau's operating procedures! As such I took them for a spin (with her permission of course) this past Saturday night while she was at work. My opponent was to be the ever wily Neverness and his archaic Ultrasmurfs. 

As per my norm, what follows will be a photo dump of the game with my usual running commentary in the captions. He also took quite a few photos of our game, so give his blog a look for a battle report from the opposing viewpoint. Indeed, this game is probably the best covered of all of my games thus far!

Setup was 1500 points, Crusade scenario with 4 objectives, and the weird triangular deployment zones. Tau went first and night fight didn't kick in till turn 5.

The amassed tau. Again this was sort of a 'community project' in its assembly (with more stealth suits than one can shake a stick at), and once more many thanks to RTVoril, Kushial & Screech!

Neverness' Ultramarines, of which I'm sure all of the models are of legal drinking age! (Note the 'crayon tank')

The Tau's deployment. I had the Pathfinders way too far back which greatly limited their ability to markerlight anything. The 4 drones at the bottom would harass the Ultrmarine left flank for a few turns before suffering the fate of all skeet (which they so clearly resemble). 

The Ultramarines left flank deployment.

Their center deployment...

...and this tactical squad was holding their right.

The Devilfish advances under the watchful guns of a broadside.

Not much forward movement for me on turn one. In the assault or rather 'jumping phase' my Tau commander would consistently roll a '2' all game due to his iridium armor. This greatly hampered his unit's movement.

Both Stealth suit units arrived on turn 2, with the 2 fusion blaster squad arriving and killing the dreaded crayon tank granting me first blood!

Truly, the 'Warhammer Ancients' had arrived (via teleporter)!

The Ultramarine left flank does an about face to deal with the stealth suits that arrived behind them!

I'm pretty sure this was the first time I've ever encountered the Legion of the Damned!

Oh Shit! The Landraider was full of Sternguard! Thus my Stealth suits summarily died, sad face.

Those damned legionnaires killed my Devilfish! However in point blank range of the pathfinders, they were markerlighted and blown off of the table! The U-Marine tac squad out of picture killed one of the Devilfish's Drones as well.

The greater good unloads into the ancient termies, however the Sgt. on point absorbed a ton of fire before dying! It was rather disheartening.

The remaining drone commences its 'annoyance operations' against the U-marine right flank. It wouldn't accomplish much beyond that though.

Hand to hand is unethical! You were supposed to die to all of the ungodly overwatch fire! (stupid termie armor) The Fire warriors held for a turn, but the results were predictable.

I've flanked the enemy (which in most cases spells certain doom for my armies).

Faced with overwhelming odds, the last tactical marine on the right hides in that ruined building.

Contesting the objective and killing a fire warrior resulted in a text book sweep & clear of the room in which he was hiding. The Objective hadn't read the textbook though, as it blew up killing 2 fire warriors.

The Stealth suits move at best possible speed to engage the enemy, while that drone finishes off a lone marine that was hiding in the center building ruins.

My Commander (on the left) slowly moves his unit forward to engage the sternguard.

The last Termie rounds the corner, and combined with the sternguard, kills the drone, bodyguard and wounds my commander, only to be cut down by the plasma rifle's overwatch fire!

My commander then tries to tempt the sternguard away from the Fire Warriors that are holding their volatile objective.

The Stealth suits continue to advance while ignoring the big, blue box, as they lacked any fusion blasters with which to deal with it.

The fire warriors hold despite the sternguard's attempt to annihilate them. Three other fire warriors hid within the building on the left, but were close enough to an objective to cede me victory!

 Final victory points came to 8-3. I had first blood, war lord, and 2 objectives, to Neverness' 1 objective. Victory to the Tau! It was a good game and good learning experience. The Pathfinders need to be in a forward position with better fields of fire, as do the Broadsides (well, not so forward, just better fields of fire). Also that landraider was an issue. All I had to deal with it really were the 2 fusion blasters, as the heavy rail rifles only rolled 4s for armor penetration (no doubt forgetting that they were no longer STR10!). However with so many stealth suits and 2 unassembled piranhas, I ought to be able to remedy that.The list will need some tweaking, but was a good first run and gives my a good starting point on giving my GF some instruction in their use.

On a side note, a new guy to the group (Ben) arrived looking for  a game of WHFB. Sadly there were no armies for him to fight, but the quick photo below gives a glimpse of his amazingly painted High Elves! The sea guard specifically were just...wow! He plays 40k too, but the tone of his voice on mentioning his 40k armies made it clear that WHFB was his preference. He also knew of Necron Bob and his High Elves (having also played at this year's Brawler Bash), so perhaps Bob can give us some insight as to whether or not Ben's Playing skill equals his painting skill (and if it does, the sons of Stirland could be in trouble...).

This photo gives little indication of just how well painted this army is!