Tactic of the Week

Todays tactic is what is called Diverting.

The purpose is to draw an enemy into a charge that will cause him to have to turn his flank to a 2nd unit.
I feel there is a good chance you will see this tactic disapearing in 7th ed. The no-redirect rule allows you to basically divert anyone with a flee and flank and is probably a better option. But here it is anyway.


As you can see in this picture, the Lizardman Cold One Saurus are sitting on the hill. A unit of giant rats are trying to get close enough to charge. But since the cold ones have a 14" charge compared to the rats 12, this is almost impossible to do barring a stupidity roll. And even if I do get the charge off, I'm looking at 3 ranks and US (so +4) compared to his banner and possibly a hill. Add on his 15+ str 4 or 5 attacks and I'm in trouble. My only solution is to flank him.

So I set up the throw away slave unit in front of the cavalry unit, angled, but blocking any charge to the giant rats.


The Lizardmen take the bait. They charge down the hill and into the slaves. If the slaves flee, they will almost certainly be run down and possibly out of range of the giant rats to charge.
By staying you are offering several possibilities, while still protecting the giant rats.


The Saurus cav easily dispatch the slaves and run them down as they lose. But even after running 11" (avg for 3d6), it is very difficult to get out of the charge arc of the giant rats. The worry is that if they can roll really, really high, they can still outrun your charge arc. A full 17 or 18" pursuit could take them out of danger an.


And in the final picture the giant rats have swarmed into the flank of the Saurus cav. Now with 3 ranks, US and flank, the Giant rats have +5 compared to only the banner and 3 attacks for the lizardmen. So it is an auto win for the giant rats.

Good luck

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, the last one for the month. This should be tough for anyone, even Shaun.
Slightly altered to remove a specific name.

Point value: 10 pts. hahahaha

"I saw someone standing in my neighbors backyard."

Good luck.

Heroes last night

Another great show last night.

Some real surprises:

1. The nice girl next door to Suresh turns out to be a spy for Sylar. Wow!! This one really caught be by surprise, but answers, soooo many questions I had.

2. Niki had betrayed DL and framed him. This one was a bit confusing as to why she would frame her husband, but maybe that was her way of getting her and Micah away from DL. The fight between the 2 at the end was truely awesome. She has the strength of 5-6 men and threw DL across the room like he was nothing. But when he came out of the wall to grab her, that was just awesome. She still threw him down like a rag doll. Then when she was interupted by Micah, DL stuck his fist in her chest. WOW!! Left her on the floor for dead and took Micah and the 2 million. Is she dead?? I can't believe thats it for Niki. But she is definetely moving into the bad guy category.

3. Hiro gets side tracked again to help out the gambler they ripped off previously. As he is helping his friend notices a gun under the table. They get out just in time before Niki comes in and kills them all and rips them apart. Blood oozes through the door. Hiro is upset he didn't help these people and questions the path he is on. But as usual his friend helps him continue on.

4. Isaac and Peter realize there is a piece to the comic strip that is missing and realize Simone must have it. That piece could tell them where the Cheerleader is. I'm thinking its the one of the train wreck where Claire saved the guy in the fire.
But Peter told Suresh about the visit. Save the cheeleader, save the world. Suresh told the next door neighbor spy, who passed it onto Claire's father the bad guy. This can't be good.

5. Claire met her "biological parents" but I think they were fake. Her mother later told her how impossible it was to find them right after she was born because of a genetic disorder she had?? Huh??

6. Dr. Suresh has left, but I'm sure he'll be back and nothing about Matt or Nathan this week.

I can't wait till next week. 1 hour is definetely not enough each week.

Alamo GT this weekend

I wanted to remind everyone that the Alamo GT is upon us already. It will be this weekend and I'll be there. I'll be leaving Dallas around 10AM and should be in San Antonio by 4.

Taking the Skaven force I did at the Lone Wolf. Its a good army that only got beat by the Best General and mainly because I forgot a rule during the game. Though David played an excellent game, some poor dice rolling definetly cost me. But both sides had our fair share.

Davids a great opponent and I'm hoping to pull a littl revenge on him at the Alamo.

But lots of Beer, lots of Warhammer, lots of Dice Rolling, and lots of friends.

I'm really looking forward to it, but I probably won't get really pumped until Thursday.

I'll of course give a full Tournament report, pictures of awesome armies, and much more.

Ben

How about them Cowboys!!

I was so relieved watching the Cowboys play last night. Ecspecially after the switch to Romo as the QB. It got a bit scary after he fell apart last weekend. But this weekend, they looked great.

Glad to see them guys finally playing like they have a purpose.

Go COWBOYS!!

Ben

Heroes tonight

Just want to remind everyone to check out Heroes tonight on NBC. Looks like another great episode.

So what is the message Peter needs to pass to Hiro?

What happens when Nikki actually talks to her alter ego and to DB?

Will Micah finally reveal his powers to his parents?

Will Matt learn to control his mind reading, or pass out anytime there are more than 2-3 people in a stressful situation?

Will they figure out who the Cheerleader is?

Save the Cheerleader, Save the world!!

Ben

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, here you go with a great, great movie. I remember when this came out, I stood in line at the premiere. Bought my ticket at midnight for the 3am showing. It was awesome.

Quote value: 5 points (Like it matters at this point)

"I love purple"

Good luck

Bone Yard Oct Contest

I think the contest is over, I don't think anyone can catch Shaun. But for fun, here is a tough one.

Quote Value: 5 points

"...1935 takes the prize."

Good luck

BR: Summary and Lessons

That was some battle verse the Stunty Dwarfs. Greg put up an excellent fight and proved to me Dwarfs are very much a force to be reckoned with now.

The Anvil is just nasty, nasty, nasty. It is an almost guaranteed 12" charge from any Dwarf unit on the board. And makes Miners a very good buy.

I had my deployment laid out in my head before we started and I stubbornly would not change it when I should have. I had 3 clanrat units on the right side of the field to face off with 1 slayer unit. Very stupid.

Then my giant rats and plague monks were facing off with Dwarf units one on one.

I should have just tied up the slayers in turn 2 or 3 and pushed the other units right on past and into the fight. I needed to get to the anvil to tie it up, but I couldn't get anything past his shield of long beards until turn 6.

Lucky for me he didn't get off either master rune he attempted, but he also didn't roll any bad results on the misfire chart either.

Stubborn warmachines are sick. They just stand there until you actually kill them.

If your opponent is making his armor saves, there is very little you can do about it. I have faced a few dwarven units and it seems like I just bounce off of every one of them. Even a 3+ save just gets sick after a while. Luckily Dwarfs cannot catch anything they pursue.

Lessons learned:
1. If there is an anvil, get to it and tie it up to stop him from using it. Unstoppable movement spells are very sick.
2. Slayers can be nasty now, but just hit them with something to tie them up. Don't let one unit hold up an entire flank.
3. When units are overlapping fleeing in the same direction. Start at the furtherest from the table and work towards the edge.
4. Charging uncrewed warmachines is the bomb!!
5. Dwarf armor still needs to be respected.
6. Dwarf leadership is disgusting.
7. Ratling guns are still useful, you just have to protect them more.
8. With the extra wounds from the miscast chart, I'm guaranteed to hand my opponent at least 1 warlock per game.
9. Miscast 5 is what you want when facing dwarfs. ;-)
10. With 5 wide, you lose ranks, so much faster than before. And for skaven that means losing leadership faster than before.
11. I need to boost up my Giant rats and plague monk units. So where do I get the extra points from?
12. Adding in a BSB would be great, but now I have to drop a character as well.
13. Nevery charge your general into combat after he has already been wounded.

Until next time, good luck.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Sorry this is late. Been sooooo busy today. This has got to be in most peoples top 20 or so movies. I loved it.

Quote Value: 4 points

"He Lives now, only in my memories."

Good luck

Tactic of the week

Todays tactic is pretty simple really, right up until you screw it up and it costs you the game. I did this in my last battle. As it turned out if I had failed the second test it would have cost me the game as I had 280 points in the unit. Since the Dwarf player was up by 50 or so, this 280 would have made it just over the limit for a minor victory.

So here is the initial setup:


In this situation I have 2 units close to the table edge. Both are fleeing.

My initial impulse was to attempt to rally the one closer to the edge first. So if it failed and the 2nd one failed, the 2nd one would not get leaped off the field, but have another chance to rally.

What happened was, the 1st one rallied, and the 2nd unit did not.



Unit #2 continued to run through the newly rallied unit. Like this:


Causing a new panic test. This was a horrible disaster. The newly rallied unit was missing a rank, and had my warlock in it. So right after having made a Ld 6 rally test for them, I was forced to make a Ld 7 panic test for them. Not a good plan at all. If I failed this they would have been off the table.

So the questions you have to ask yourself.
1. If I roll for unit #2 first, it leapfrogs over one and if 1 fails, it then leapfrogs over #2 and you lose it quicker.
2. If your general is in one of the units, this may make a difference, raising your chances to rally the #2 unit.
3. But is it worth the risk to rally your general first and then possibly take another panic test right away.

Anytime you pick up the dice to roll for a psych test, you are risking something bad happening to your army. Even if you have a Leadership of 10.

My recomendation is roll to rally unit #2 first. Then roll to rally #1. If they fail, they get to the board edge a bit faster. But if either makes it, lets keep it on the table, don't force yourself to roll more psych tests. Let your opponent do that.

Good luck

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, we are getting down to the nitty gritty. This was another awesome movie.

Quote value: 4 points!!

"Forget you ever knew me, and never come back here again."

Good luck

Battle Report: Dwarfs vs Skaven Part III

When I left off it was the top of turn 5. The glorious skaven forces had neutralized most of the stubborn dwarf shooting, but had yet to kill anything of any significance. On the other hand, The evil stunties had yet to kill anything of great signifacance to the Great and Good Skaven except some scouts, their swarms and a ratling gun.

Here is where we left off:


So the Skaven slaves #1 charge into the flank of the crossbowmen.
The giant rats charge into the flank of the clansmen.
And the Plague Censor bearers charge into the 2nd clansmen.

Slaves #2 rally, but slaves #3 with still a LD of 8, fail again and run off the board. The Plague monks needing a 7, rally.

The depleted clanrats #1 back up and allow the warlord and his clanrat unit to push forward to face the slayers. It was time to kill them off.
Clanrats #3 move to threaten the flank of the longbeards.
In magic I get a glorious 13 and kill 5 of the Longbeards, wiping out a rank. And shooting the ratling gun gets double 1's and jams.

But now I'm in a great setup. If my giant rats break the clansmen, then I overrun and hit the flank of the unit the PCBs are in combat with. This should totally collapse the dwarven line and give me the game.

We each do a wound and I win by 3 and he needs a 6 not to break. He makes it. Uggghhh!!! This runes my plans.
On to the PCB battle. I kill 1 each with the fog. So only 6 attacks I hit 5 times. Needing 3's to wound, I get only 3. Needing 5's to save he rolls 3 6's. He kills one back and thats it. We break and run. We get away, but the PCBs will never rally and lose the standard they had captured from the miners. This was huge.
Luckily the Plague monks make their panic test.

NOTE: The monks should not have had to make one since the PCBs were down to US 4 at this point.

On the hill no wounds are done in the cannon crew combat, so I win with unit strength. But, the dwarf makes his Ld 9 break test.
Finally the slaves kill the lone dwarf they are in combat with, break them and run them down.

Here is the beginning of the bottom of turn 5:


The slayers charge into my warlords unit. The clansmen charge the plague monks and we slide to maximize combat.
The longbeards try and charge my clanrats. They look out of ranges, so I stand and shoot. I misfire but fail to wound myself with my warlocks pistol. It is a failed charge.
In shooting the anvil gets the longbeards to charge again and this time easily in range the clanrats flee. But it gets the longbeards flank out of my charge arc.

In combat, the night runners kill a cannon dwarf the others hold.
The clansmen and plague monks fight, I kill a couple with my Priest flail. I win combat but he holds.
Then the giant rats do one wound and he makes his save. Then in 4 attacks needing 3's and 4's. He does 3 wounds. Now with US and a standard he has 5 CR. I have 2 ranks and flank so I lose by 2. Needing a 5 not to break, I flee. This also panics the globadiers and they flee as well.

In the combat with the slayers, they use extra hand weapons and do no wounds to my clanrats but do a 2nd wound to my general. I manage to kill off 2 slayers. Still win combat and expand to get more clanrats fighting.

Here is the setup at the beginning of turn 6:



So much changed in this last turn and almost none of it good for the Glorious Skaven.
The slaves charge the last crossbowmen, and he flees. Unable to redirect into the flank of the long beards, the slaves continue forward. I want to hit the anvil and tie it up to prevent its use on turn 6 but fall about an inch short.

The clanrats charge the goblin hewer as do the slaves.
The PCB's fail to rally and off the board.
The globadiers fail to rally and off.
The giant rats fail to rally and continue to flee.
The clanrats #4 with their warlock do rally.
(This led to a tactical situation I screwed up. It will be the tactics of the week, coming tomorrow.)

In magic the warlock gets off the warp lightning only to have eat up the last spell breaker rune.
In shooting the ratling gun shoots into combat and kills a couple more slayers.
By the time the clanrats finish attacking there is only 3 slayers left. The warlord gets 4 attacks and hits 4 times. Needing 2's to wound, he only kills 2. Leaving 1 slayer left for turn 6b. Ugghhhh!!
In combat the plague monks and clansmen fight to a dead draw and both units have musicians as he makes 2 armor saves.

The night runners kill the 2nd crewman, leaving only 1 cannon crewman left.
The clanrats fighting the slayer hero do 1 wound to him. Then 2 slaves get to attack. Needing 5's to hit and 5's to wound, I hit once and kill him off. I destroy the machine and overrun with the clanrats.
I only go 5". I think I've hit one of the crew of the anvil. Measurement and close eye balling, I thought I had it. My opponent didn't. It was very, very close.

I let it go, it wasn't that big a deal.

Here we were at the bottom of turn 6:


With no charges the dwarfs move the clansmen up to charge the clanrats and the longbeards turn to face the slaves#4 in front of the anvil.

He then tries a master move. Needing a 4, he rolls a 3. If he rolls a 1 for the misfire I win. He rolls another 3. Oh well, you can't just hope for your opponent to have bad luck.

What he should have done was just done the low level and gone after the clanrats and warlock. If he can break them thats 400 vp waiting for him. Instead he gets nothing because he was hoping to also get 44 vp for a slave unit?? Got too greedy and got nothing.

In combat I kill off the last of the cannon crew.
The Monks and clansmen fight to a draw again.

Finally, on the slayer. I get two attacks. Needing 4's and 5's. I hit 1 time and roll a 4 to wound. He gets 2 attacks on my warlord and hits both times and wounds both times!!! I fail my armor saves and down goes the warlord. Ugghhh!!!!
Not to mention that the slayer lives robbing me of an extra 110 vp. While I lose 202 vp for losing the Warlord. So if my warlord only fails to wound once the previous turn instead of twice I make 312 vp right there.

Here was the final situation at the end of the game:


The dwarf player thought it was a definite loss for him but I knew better. When we added it up at the end it was much closer:

Dwarf Vp: 919 + 200 bonus = 1119 vp; bonus from 1 standard, general
Skaven vp: 852 + 200 bonus = 1052 vp; bonus from 2 table quarters

So a Draw to a great and epic battle.

It could have gone differently on so many levels. A lot of dice rolls determined the outcome of this game.

A review and breakdown will be coming soon.

I hope you enjoyed it.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Well, Shaun wanted some tougher ones. See if you can figure this one out.

Point Value: 3 points

"be a thinker, not a stinker."

Good luck.

Battle Report: Dwarfs vs Skaven part II

So after I chose to go first, the horde rushed forward. Jezzails run into the tower.

In magic, he dispelled the Storm Daemon, then used spell eater on my Warp Lightning, but failed to destroy the spell. Then my warlock with the scrolls rolls a miscast. Rolls an 8 and suffers a wound from the strength 4 hit.

Setup at the beginning of the Dwarfs turn 1:


He moves around a bit, but not much.
His shooting starts with a great shot from his cannon through my Warlock with a wound on him. I make my look out sir but suffer heavy casualties. His organ gun shoots at the same clanrats but is short. The Axe thrower shoots at the Clanrats #4 with the other warlock, but rolls a 1 and misses. Woohoo!! My slave shield is useless with all his shooting units on the hill.
His Crossbowmen pelt away at the Clanrats #4 forcing a panic test but they pass.
Finally the Anvil does the d6 str 4 hits on my Jezzails in the tower. He rolls the 2+ needed and kills 2. They run out of the tower.

I felt this was a bad target. Jezzails are nasty against cavalry, but what was a good target for Jezzails in this army?? I felt it was much better to go for a ratling gun or better yet my Plague Censor bearers.

Here is the setup at the beginning of Skaven turn 2:


I run the horde up more. Not sure why I'm holding back. I think this was a mistake. I was hesitating, I think because of the damn Anvil. Never hesitate!!! I think I was waiting for flankers to come around and try and take out some of the shooting.

My tunnel runners popped up but a misfire and a 6 had the Dwarf player putting them in my far back corner. They did nothing the rest of the game.
My Jezzails did rally luckily.

In magic, he dispels the SD again, uses a rune to stop the Warp lightning from my Warlock with the SD. Then I roll a 12 with the Warlock #2. He fails to stop it, so 2d6 into the slayers. A 3 and a 1. So I kill 2 slayers and my warlock. Ugghhh!!. That hurt.
No shooting again, no hand to hand.

Here we are at the beginning of the Dwarf turn 2:


Again very little movement for the Dwarfs.
The Cannon takes a pop shot at the General. And even with only a 2" bounce, it grazes my general who fails his Look out Sir and takes a wound. This will prove costly later.
The Organ gun turns and with 8 hits destroys the gutter runner scouts coming up the flank.
The Axe thrower and crossbows deplete the Clanrats #4, but they make their panic test.
The Anvil tries to do a Master Wrath and Ruin. Fails, but rolls a 4 for the misfire and it does nothing.

So onto the Skaven turn 3:


The night runners #2 out of the woods and into the organ gun. The rat swarms charge up the hill at the Goblin hewer. Other units move around to setup flanking postiions.
Slaves #3 tried to charge the crossbowmen but fell a well short. Bad charge.

Magic was dispelled.
Shooting: Ratling gun #1 was just in range of the slayers and dropped 3. Ratling gun #2 took out 4 crossbowmen, but they made their panic test. Jezzails moved up to get in range to shoot.

In combat the swarms killed a slayer crewman but took a wound on the stand and shoot. 2 more wounds in combat and lost by 1 and crumbled to 4 wounds on 1 stand.
The Night runners killed 2 crewmen for the organ gun but the last crewman held.

Start of turn 3 for the Dwarfs:


With a very important roll, the miners come up and move up right behind my giant rats #2 at the top of the picture. Ouch. This hurt.
The crossbowmen charge, one into the flank of the swarms, the 2nd into the flank of the night runners in combat.
For shooting, the cannon takes a pot shot at my general again, but overshoots and kills a couple clanrats.
The Anvil then does low level Oath and Honor. The Miners charge the rear of the Giant rats. They stand and take it, but it doesn't matter, they are beaten, and flee into the clansmen and are Cut down. The miners restrain.
The swarms do nothing and are chopped to pieces, the crossbowmen overrun into the Longbeards.
And the 2nd Crossbowmen kill only 1 night runner. The Night runners kill a crossbowmen and the last crewman of the organ gun. But they still lose by 1. Fail their break and are Cut down by the slayers. Slaves #3 panic and run. The crossbowmen stop when they hit the slayers.

This is the end of turn 3. Things still very much up in the air, with the Dwarfs slightly up.
I forgot to take a picture here, sorry.

Skaven turn 4:
The Plague Censor bearers up in the scree hit the miners in the flank.
The plague monks hit the clansmen #2 in the front.
Clanrats #3 charge the crossbowmen who had stopped by the slayers. The crossbowmen flee.
Using my new tactic I just read about last week. The night runners are out of range of the cannon, but in range of the organ gun who's crew I had just killed. So I charge the Organ gun. Destroy it and overrun into the cannon crew. Sweet.
Slaves #3 fail to rally on Ld 8.

I meant to move the giant rats up to protect the flank of the plague monks, but for some reason had a brain fart and backed them up instead. Huh??? More mistakes.

Magic did nothing.
Shooting from Ratling #1 killed another 3 slayers. Ratling gun #2 took out all but 1 of the crossbowmen that had wiped out the swarms.
And the Jezzails did a long shot on the Goblin Hewer and killed the 2nd crewman. Only the hero was left to man it.

The PCB's killed 8 miners and ran them down, stopping just short of the table edge.
The Plague monks win combat by 3. But needing a 6 to stay, they do. Uggghhh!!??
The night runners and cannon crew will have to wait till next round to fight.

Here is the battle field at the beginning of the Dwarfs turn 4.


The clansmen charge the monks in the flank.
The slayers charge the slaves #2 who flee.
In shooting, the Goblin hewer down to only the hero shoots at Clanrats #3 and kills a few. Forget what the Anvil did here.
Crossbowmen rallied, but he rallied with his flank to my slaves. He should have turned them more to face my slaves. We thought it was close but we pulled out the arc and I was easily in the flank for the upcoming charge.

In combat the clansmen didn't kill only 1 monk. While I kill 2-3 clansmen, but I still lose by a bunch and break. I get away leaving only my banner behind. The Globadiers make their panic test.
The night runners lose two to the cannon crew, while the dwarven armor makes his 6+ save and wins combat by 1. Luckily the night runners make their Ld 5 break test.

This is the setup at the beginning of the Skaven turn 5:


As you can see, things look really interesting. The Clansmen are ripe for the picking. Stay tuned for part III coming soon.

HEROES, WOW!!

That about sums it up. This is the one show a week I so look forward to. It reminds me of Lost with so much going on. But Lost got lost, wondering around and was just so weird. Lost doesn't make a lot of sense now.

But Heroes seems to be moving forward with a real plot that looks awesome.
Not to go into too much detail this week but here were some highlights.

1. We got to see Nathan fly. Wow, now that was awesome. Nathan and Hiro meet when he lands, but Nathan showed his politicians side when he negotiated his bribe up to 4 million when he found out he had been taped with Nikki.

2. Nikki saw a tape of herself as her alter ego. I'm sure that was an eye opener.

3. Matt woke up at home. Syler made him forget what happened, but they didn't cut out his brain. Not sure why not? Then he gets back with his wife, he used his powers for good there. ;-) Then at the store later is overwhelmed with emotional thoughts and he passes out.

4. At the end a new character shows up, DL. This is Nikkis ex husband and Micah's father. His ability is that he can walk through walls. Very cool. Some people are getting him confused with the Cleaner Syler. But I think they are 2 different actors and characters. So I'm looking forward to seeing more about him later.

5. Of course the show started with Future Hiro talking with Peter. "Save the Cheerleader, save the world." He goes back to see Isaac who is coming off his high. He didn't have enough Heroine to finish his painting. But Peter finishes it for him. It is gruesome as it shows Claire with her brain cut out. Whenever Isaac is on the screen, I just get goosebumps. You know those kind you get when something weird is going on.

6. But it ends with Hiro calling Isaac. "Don't answer it. Some Japanese guy keeps calling." Peter answers it.

Its all coming together, the characters are being drawn to each other by some unknown force and they are powerless to stop it. Its their Destiny. "Save the Cheerleader, Save the World!!"

WOW!! The show is just great. What were your thoughts on it?

Blog problems

Couple things.

1. I've been having horrible response from blogspot. Not sure what is going on, but it just bogged down to nothing around lunch time and I couldn't post or comment at all.

So if you were trying to get in and couldn't my apologies.

2. Wanted to remind everyone Heroes is on tonight. "Save the Cheerleader, save the world." Oh yea. I am seriously pumped.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, here is an easy one. I think everyone can agree, this was an awesome movie.

Quote Value: 3 points

"I was in the war, Medical Corps."

Good luck.

Battle Report: Dwarfs vs Skaven part I

I got a battle in this last weekend. It was against an excellent player using a very well put together Dwarf list. It was the typical Dwarf Leadership and armor verse the massive Skaven horde.
I hope you enjoy the report.

Skaven List: Velsquee's Vermintide.
Characters:
Warlord Velsquee w/Great Weapon, Heavy Armor
Plague Priest Juhel w/Flail
Warlock Squelch: full kit w/Warp-stone charm & Storm Daemon
Warlock Squeek: full kit w/ 2xDispel Scrolls

Core:
25 Clanrats w/ LA, HW, Sh, Standard, musician
24 Clanrats w/ LA, HW, Sh, Standard, musician
24 Clanrats w/ LA, HW, Sh, Standard, musician
24 Clanrats w/ LA, HW, Sh, Standard, musician
Ratling gun team
Ratling gun team
20 Slaves w/ HW, musician
20 Slaves w/ HW, musician
20 Slaves w/ HW, musician
20 Slaves w/ HW, musician
18 Giant Rats & 3 pack masters w/ HW & whip
18 Giant Rats & 3 pack masters w/ HW & whip
2 Rat Swarms
7 Poison Wind Globadiers w/ HW & globes
6 Night Runners w/ HW, ex. Hand weapons
6 Night Runners w/ HW, ex. Hand weapons

Special:
19 Plague Monks w/ HW, Standard, musician
5 Jezzails w/ HW, pavise, jezzail
6 Tunnel runners w/HW, ex HW, poison hand weapons, tunneling
6 Gutter runners w/ HW, ex HW, poison hand weapons

Rare:
6 Plague Censor Bearers w/ Plague censor

Total Points: 2248

Dwarf List:
RuneLord on Anvil w/Runic Armor: Master rune of Gromril, Runic Talisman: 2x Rune of Spell breaking, Rune of spell eating. Gromril armour.
Dwarf guards.

Thane w/Gromril armour, BSB, runic weapon: Rune of swiftness, cleaving, strength, Snorri Spangelheim. Runic armor: Rune of stone.

19 Longbeards, full command, rune of battle. (BSB in here)
20 Troll slayers.
12 Miners gr. weapons, heavy armor, standard, musc.
20 Warriors Hvy armor, shield, standard, musc.
20 Warriors Hvy armor, shield, standard, musc.
10 Quarrellers w/Light armor, crossbows
10 Quarrellers w/Light armor, crossbows

Malakai's Goblin Hewer
Organ Gun
Cannon w/Rune of Forging

Total points: 2250

We rolled random (4-6 pieces of terrain) and got 6 pieces. Hill, 2x trees, 2x scree and 1 watch tower. (3 levels, flyers may land on top.)

He placed first piece and hill went down. He then picked sides and chose the hill.

Here is a picture before turn 1:


As you can see, I cut off part, but you can see most of it.
From bottom to top. I had:
Gutter runners in the trees
Night runners #1
Clanrats #1 with warlock and ratling gun, slaves #1 in front of them.
Clarnats #2 w/warlord and slaves #2 in front of them.
Clanrats #3 w/ratling gun and slaves #3 in front of them.
Night runners #2
Rat swarms
Clarnats #4 w/warlock and slaves #4 in front of them.
Jezzails behind the tower
Giant rats #1
Plague monks w/Plague priest
Plague Cesor bearers
Poison wind globadiers
Finally, Giant rats #2 on the far top of the pic.

The dwarfs were:
Slayers
On the hill, organ gun,
2 crossbow units
Cannon behind the crossbows
Goblin hewer
Rune Lord w/anvil
Long beards w/BSB in front of anvil
Clansmen #1
Clansmen #2

My tunnel marker went right between cannon and organ gun.

We rolled and I won right to pick. Usually I choose to go 2nd, but with so much shooting, I felt going first was imperative. Not only reducing his shooting 1 round, but also increasing chances of tunnel team coming up quicker.
I went first.

Stay tuned for part 2 coming soon.

Please post comments or questions about the army lists, deployment, etc.. This was a warm up game for the Alamo, so while we didn't swap lists we talked freely about them. And I didn't drop my dispel scrolls just to face a dwarf player.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Great movie, though I don't like the actor.

A few extra points since I'm not going to do one tomorrow. Should be easy though.

Quote Value: 4 points!!

"I feel the need. For Speed!!"

Good luck and be fast.

7th ed rule discussions

Today I wanted to talk a bit about the Insane Courage rule. This was the one rule that David Bowman pointed out that he didn't like about the game. So I thought I might delve into it a bit to see what he was talking about.

Now I've played for many years using this rule. We've called it the gentlemans rule. It didn't apply to fear breaking but any other we did.

So I did not see the harm in it. But lets take a closer look at the rule.

1. It states that no matter how badly you lose, you can always stay on a double 1.
2. And anyone is allowed this even if outnumbered by fear causers.

Who does this rule hurt?
1. He has to hurt anyone who never runs away. Why, because they do not benefit from it at all. All it can do is hurt them. So any undead armies, daemon units/armies, unbreakable units such as swarms, slayers, flagelants, spawn, etc..

2. What armies does it help the most?
A1 answer here has to be Lizardmen. The ability to roll 2 1's on 3d6 is a heck of a lot easier than rolling 2 1's on 2 d6. Difference is 7.4% compared to 2.7% or almost 3 times as often. So Lizardmen are really helped with this rule.
Now add in the BSB nearby and the odds go up a lot more.

Others that are helped are anyone else that runs any army with guys who can break from comat.

So the rule is not even/fair across the board. Some might even call this the Lizardman rule.

But which type of players does it help more.
1. You cannot really use this as a stratagy. You can't say, "I'm going to run these slaves up against the skeletons and count on that 2 1's to keep me there." That would be rediculous. You could, but it would only work once in 36 tries.

2. As a fear user, you cannot count on him auto-breaking any more. 35 of 36 times he will, but just when you need it, he won't break.

3. So who does it help the most. It helps the lucky dice roller who doesn't really know what he's doing but lucky dice will keep you in the game.

So I think I'm jumping on board with David on this rule. It will occasionally screw up your best laid plans, but it will rarely help you out.

Good luck

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, this was a great little movie. As soon as I saw it I knew the actor was going to be a superstar. That should help out.

Quote value: 2 points

"He wants me because I'm sweet and pure, so f%$# off."

Good luck and be fast.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok another movie quote of the day. I love this movie, but haven't seen it in years.

Quote value: 2 points (all will be for the rest of the month.)

"Pearl Harbor did not work out very well, so we got you with tape decks."

Good luck

Found another 7th ed rule change

There are so many subtle changes in there, wow. This one could be used to some benefit if you know about it.

In 6th edition, if you charged a Warmachine and the crew fled, then you could still move up to the machine and destroy it. But then could not overrun. You were stuck there.

That is not the case in 7th edition. If you charge a warmachine, and there are no crew there. Either because you had previously killed them all, or if they fled your charge, then you may auto destroy the machine and still overrun.

This could be big. You can basically use abandoned Warmachines as launching pads to get yourself another 2-3d6" of charging range into another unit.

Assume he has a unit and a warmachine beside it. You have previously killed off the crew.

You can now charge the front of the unit with one unit. Have a 2nd unit charge the flank of the warmachine. Destroy it, then overrun into the flank of the previously engaged unit, and attack again.

Good luck

Featured Army: Slaanesh Daemonic Legion

Brian is a great player. I've had the pleasure of meeting him in 2 Gt's. Once with his Dark Elves and again with his Slaanesh Daemonettes. He has been an up and coming GT participant for the last couple of years and everyone knew it was only a matter of time before he took that Best Overall.

His General skills are excellent, his sportsmanship is super and his army as you will see here is exceptional.
At the Lone wolf he finally put it all together. 4 wins, top painting marks and the best sportsmanship at the GT, pulling 4 of 5 best opponent votes. That is just unheard of.

So on with the pics. Here is the full Army:


Here are his daemonettes:


And 2 pics of his chariots:


And chariot #2:


And now his pleasure seekers, which are a great spider conversion:


Here are his Mounted Daemonettes:


And top it all off with his great Naga Daemon Prince:


Overall an outstanding army that my pics due no justice to. I love this army. It is fast, hits hard and can give anyone a run for their money.

Congrats Brian.

I hope you guys enjoyed it.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

This one should be pretty easy. Slight modification, not much.

Quote value: 1 point

"Maybe, I can find whole new ways to motivate them."

Good luck.

Stay tuned for Featured army segment coming a bit later today for Brian Ching's Slaanesh Daemonic Army.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, here is an easy one. Silly little movie that I loved. Guess its the Geek in me.

Quote value: 1 point

character 1: "Can you hammer an 8 inch nail through a board with your penis?"
character 2: "Not yet."
character 1: "Well a girl has to have her standards."

Good luck

HEROES

Wow, what another great show. Some serious tests for our heroes, and all of them are falling flat on their faces.

Isaac as it turns out, cannot paint the future without his heroine. Man your heart has to go out to him. It showed him last night, his eyes turn white. It is really cool.

We get to see Nikis alter ego in action last night. First Micah lets his mom know he knows about her stripping on the internet. But doesn't want her to go be a whore as its too dangerous. But all her debt will be repaid if she sets up a congressman, who just happens to be the guy who can fly Nathan. When she can't follow through, Nikki's alter ego takes over and does what she can't. First kicks the tough guy's ass who threatens her and Micah, and then goes and finishes up the deal and now Nathan is caught on tape.

Of course as their paths cross there will be more interaction. Nathan goes to Las Vegas and falls into a trap set by Niki and the Vegas casino owners. He has now been caught on tape. And as he and Niki sleep, Sylar shows up and I think they capture Nathan.

Matt found himself strapped to a table after being drugged the week before. And it seems the bad guy can either cause a hero to lose his ability, or at least block Matt from reading minds. Whatever it is, it didn't look good for Matt. I hope he lives through this as I think Greg Grunberg is a great actor and would be a great asset for this show. In Lost, they kill him off in episode 1 or 2.

Dr. Suresh, gets all excited as he thinks he finds a hero. But when he confronts Nathan he is treated as a crazy man. This seriously tests his faith and he is ready to give up completely until Peter shows up. Peter doesn't realize yet his power isn't flying. I think he just absorbs others powers. So when he is near his brother he can fly. But away from him he cannot. And he is having a hard time convincing Suresh now that he is for real and not a nut job himself.
And when they go to talk to Isaac, he is on a heroine high and painting like mad, so he doesn't let them in.

Claire had a most interesting show. She wakes up on the autopsy table and has to put her chest back together and runs home. Her stepdad/badguy realizes she's been out all night. When she goes to school she surprises the QB who tried to rape her the night before and killed her. He is a little shocked as well. Everyone tries to say they don't remember a thing. Then Claire finds out he has raped other girls in the past and will probably continue to do it. So she gets him to let her drive his car and rams it into a wall. WOW!!! Good girl taking up revenge. This was a bit extreme.

And finally Hiro. One of everone's favorite. His friend has a gambling obsession and convinces Hiro to use his powers to help them win at poker. After a while, they are thrown out of the casino. Hiro says he won't use his powers for economic gain anymore, when they are met in the ally by one of the gamblers they ripped off. Hiro is knocked out with one punch.

But the show ends with Peter and Suresh travelling on a subway and time is frozen. Only Peter can move around. Then Hiro, or should I say a future Hiro shows up. Small goatee, Katana strapped to his back and speaks perfect English. Not nearly the chubby little wimp we love so much. Hiro looks, totally awesome. He has a message for Peter.

That is how it ends. WOW!!
Every week I love this show more and more. I only wish the story would move a bit faster and 1 hour a week is not nearly enough. My wife, who wasn't sure she would like the show to start, is now a huge fan as well.

So until next week.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, this one goes way back. But still an awesome movie.

Quote value: 2 points

"I'll have to think up a lot of new adjectives when I come back."

Good luck.

Tactic of the Week

As usual its Monday morning. Time for Tactic of the Week. Today we are going to go back and look at one of the easiest tactics to use, the basic "Flee and Flank."

Here is a picture to start:


I have run into a very large Orc unit. Supported with 3 ranks, and a character in front, this unit will be very tough to beat in a straight up battle.

So I move my slaves up to a position to where the Orcs have 2 options. charge the slaves, or try and back up. Orcs and Goblins are not a very controllable race and trying to do sneaky maneuvers with them often will get you in trouble.

When the Orcs charge, the slaves flee. In the last edition, this tactic had the flaw that the Orcs could now redirect into the clanrats. This is gone in 7th edition. Now the Orcs must follow the path of the fleeing slaves. And only if an enemy happens to be in the way, may he "redirect" into them.

Here is the situation after the flee. I rolled a 7, so my skaven slaves fled 8" and got away.


As you can see even only wheeling 1" and moving up 3", will leave the flank of the Orcs wide open. You need to be careful and watch your opponents move. I've seen many opponents try to move their guys straight, or not nearly enough for their 4" move, to try and keep the clanrats in their front arc.

Barring that cheesy cheating move, this tactic works great, over and over again.

Finally, the clanrats charge into the flank:


Now my 25 clanrats are up against his 24 Orcs. So I have +6 CR (standard, numbers, flank & 3 ranks) to his only +1 (standard). In addition, I have my characters and champions in the fighting rank while his Orc boss is stuck in the front rank at least for the first round of combat.
Barring some lopsided dice rolls, this should be an easy win for the skaven and likely break for the Orcs.

I have won entire games where all I did was flee and flank.
It works great on ranked units as they often rely on their ranks to give them the CR they need.
It also works great on cavalry as now they only get 1-2 models into combat instead of the 5-6 they need to overcome ranks.
It works great on chariots, Ogre units and even monsters.
About the only thing it doesn't work well on is skirmished units.

And it is the bane of the Bretonian army. These guys love to charge, and hate to flee. If they ever run away for any reason, choose to flee, break, panic, whatever, they lose their blessing and get so much easier to kill. Add in their small fronts, so easier to not be in the way of their charge, and huge flanks, and this tactic was written to take them down.

Good luck

Warhammer thoughts

I haven't gotten to paint in some time or play since my last battle report. Kind of bummed out about it.

I am going to the Alamo GT in 3 more weeks. I'm totally psyched about that. I'm taking my Skaven down there. I have yet to play a game with them in 7th edition, but will hopefully get in a game next weekend.

I'm also getting my Warhammer league kicked off soon. I'm pretty certain I'll be playing my Beastmen army again. This will give me the motivation to paint them, so I can take them to GT's next year. I'm going to try and do a bit of painting tomorrow.

Interview with David Bowman

I got the chance at the Lone Wolf to sit down with David Bowman, the tall man of Texas Warhammer. If you don't know who he is, you need to meet him. I consider him a friend and a huge asset to the Warhammer community. And as far as I know, the only Warhammer player who has been honored with having his head stuck on a flag pole.

So without further ado:

BoneYard: So just to start, how old are you?
David Bowman: Hahaha, early thirthies.

BY: How many armies do you own?
DB: GT ready armies?
BY: Yes.
DB: 4, I have my Bretonians, Skaven, Chaos Dwarfs and Vampire Counts. Actually I have 2 vampire armies so 5 total.

BY: Which army do you prefer to play?
DB: Right now, my Skaven. They are a lot of fun.

BY: What army are you working on for your next project?
DB: Actually, I had an idea for a scratch built army. But while I'm still in school, I'll just work on enhanceing my Skaven and then redo my Bretonians.

BY: How many GT top prizes have you won?
DB: I have won 5 Best Overall, 3 Best General, haha, I'm always winning overall. One Best Sportsman, won at a GW GT that I played 6 total strangers, not one where I played my friends. And one Best Painted in 2004 with my Chaos Dwarfs.

BY: What are you impression of the 7th edition rules?
DB: I like most of them. The only one I don't like is the double 1's, where you don't break on a double 1. I don't understand why a golin unit that loses by 28, is the same as a Dwarf unit that loses by 7.
I do like the pursue into a new unit and get to do 2 combats in 1 turn. Doing the combats in order. That is going to seperate out the tacticians from everyone else.

BY: What does it take to win a Grand Tournament, ecspecially the Lone Wolf?
DB: Painting, well besides the obvious playing. Its better to be balanced and above average in everything, than it is to be excellent in 1 thing.
But the one that is above the rest, other than winning, you have to do that, 2nd is painting. Sportsmanship is nice, you know. But if you go to a GT and know everyone, its different than going to a GT and playing 6 strangers.
In regards to the Lone Wolf, generally what happens is someone will go undefeated, but they won't get all the objectives. And those objectives generally determine who will win overall and best general. That and painting.
The one thing about winning best overall is the stars have to align.
I remember one year at the Hillbilly, I won because Mark Havener, on the table next to me did not rally his Slaan Mage Priest in the bottom of turn 6, 3d6 for Leadership 9. That pushed me over.

BY: When you go to a GT what record do you set as a goal?
DB: I always shoot for at least 4 wins and a draw.

BY: What part of the Warhammer hobby is most important to you?
DB: Playing the game. Interacting with other people and playing warhammer.
How many times have you been to a tournament and someone says, "so how many layers are on your army?" Or "why did you choose to paint in red and green as opposed to red and blue?"
No, they ask why you take this unit as compared to that unit in a tactical sense. That's Warhammer. Everything else is secondary to that.

BY: Do you feel you were always as good a painter as you are now?
DB: Actually I don't think I'm as good a painter as I use to be. In the past I was more for presentation, with a little splash, like the red for my Chaos Dwarfs. Using ideas and communication as a theme to overcome not excellent painting.

BY: What painting technique do you like the best?
DB: Going forward, I'm going to do it the old fashion way. Which is base color, highlight and shade. The hard way, one model at a time.

BY: Finally, what was you favorite Warhammer battle of all time that you can remember?
DB: One of the most tactically challenging games was against Alcantera and his Skaven in one GT. Seems playing with or against Skaven is always so much more challenging because there are so many units and so much going on.
In one Rogue Trader game verse Tom Mancino and his Skaven. I was playing my Vampire Counts. There was so much going on the table, but I saw an opening right up the center. Everything was setup, but there was this little hole, and I saw it, and I went for it. I broke his general, but then let up. He rallied and killed my vampire with his weeping blade.
Moral, never let your opponents back in the game. Go for the kill.

***********************************

I hope you guys enjoyed it, David was very gracious to do the interview, so thanks David. I tried not to make you sound like an idiot.

If you guys enjoyed this, let me know and I can try and do some more soon.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, we are back. I liked this movie but it doesn't make my top 20. Probably not even my top 50 now days. But its a good movie anyway. Just not my cup of tea.

Quote value: 1 point

"You may have probably noticed something a little strange with Dad."

I have changed it a bit, but the meaning is the same. Good luck.

Where am I

For the next couple of days, I'll be in Atlanta. So unfortunately, I will probably not be able to post anything. Feel free to post comments on previous Blog entries and I'll answer those as I return.

Have a great couple of days. And I'll be back before you know it.

Tactic of the Week

I thought I might go back and cover some of the more basic tactics, for those who never read my books. So I apologize if you feel this is old hat, but it is probably a good review.

Todays is called the bucket.

Here is the initial setup:


My opponent has a very nasty Plague monk unit with full ranks, banner, hero, could be the warbanner. Either way, I don't want to face this unit alone with my small unit of cavalry.
So I run a throw away hound unit in front and move up another knight unit for support. The key is I must get a flank on the unit.


In this picture, he has charged. He probably thought I would flee with the hounds and he could continue his charge into my knights, break them and be behind my lines.

But I surprise him by holding with the hounds.



He has now easily destroyed the hounds and pursued into my white wolf knight unit. If he was not frenzy, and chose not to pursue, it wouldn't matter as I'd be able to charge him in either both the flank and front, or just the flank.


And as can be seen on the last pic, my 2nd knight unit hits him hard in the flank.

Now instead of him having +5 to my +1 going into combat, I have +2 (banner & flank) and he has only +1, banner. Our US is the same, and no ranks.
So instead of being behind by 4 CR to start, I'm actually up by 1. This should lead to a fairly easy victory for the knights.

Good luck.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, this one is a bit trickier.

Quote value: 2 points

"We are all going to die and I'm never going to get my license!"

Good luck.

And as promised a bonus if you watched Heroes last night on NBC.

Bonus value: 1 point.

Last night the cheerleader made an effigy of the opposing teams mascot to burn at the barnfire that night. What was the mascot?

Good luck. You can get either part or both.

Heroes last night

I hope everyone got a chance to check it out again last night. I think the show is great, and next weeks looks even better. But here is a quick recap of last nights show.

The Japanese man convinces a friend that they have to go to New York to stop the nuclear bomb. He froze time for a few seconds so he could save a girl from an on coming truck. Wow, that was great. I'd love that power.

The flyer is still struggling with his power and wasn't able to fly this week, but picked up the girl the artist dumped. She didn't waste any time.

The artist had his heroin flushed, so he is trying to use his power without his fix. I think it still works, just not as well.

This weeks episode looked a little deeper into the cop with his ability to read minds. Now that was cool. He is now working with the FBI to try and track down Syler, the bad guy. Looked like we got a glimpse at his abilities last night as well.
It was hard to tell, but I'm thinking telekenises. He can move things with his mind including himself, so he can basically fly, or jump, really, really high.
But he also took 6-7 shots from the cops gun, stood up and got away!!??

Lots of questions, was he wearing a vest? Did he slow down the bullets enough to keep him safe? Can he heal himself somehow? You still didn't get a good look at him.

Then at home, the cop has the bitchy wife who wants him to leave, so he does. At the bar, he is reading peoples minds until he comes across one he cannot seem to hear any thoughts. Then he passes out. Next weeks Scenes show the man from the bar, a black man, who is new on the scene has captured him.

And finally, the cheerleader. Ouch, decides she is just going to ignore her power and live a normal life. But at a party later the QB decides to try and force her into sex, she fights him off, trips and impales herself on a wood stump and dies.

When she regenerates after she has the tree branch removed from her brain, she is in the middle of an autopsy with her chest spread out wide. OUch!!

So 2 things become clear. One, she cannot regenerate as long as a foriegn body is in the way. So bullets, etc.. that don't go straight through her, will do real damage that will stay. And 2. She has a very unlucky streak. Last week, she had another unfortunate accident where she broke her neck. This is 2 death encounters in just a few days. How unlucky is this girl now.

Next week, they are all supposed to start getting together, I'm really looking forward to that one. I hope you guys are as well.

Heroes Tonight

I wanted to remind everyone to watch Heroes tonight.

Possibly a bonus question tomorrow about the show. ;-)

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, this is a fairly new movie, that I watched this weekend. It could have been better, but I really, enjoyed it.

Quote Value: 1 point

"When the F&#k did we get ice cream?"

Good luck!

Product Review

Over the weekend I received a new blister product to review from Mike Cannon of Wizard Workshop.
http://www.wizards-workshop.com/oscommerce/catalog/index.php
The blister is called "Rat Swarms" produced by Mega Miniatures. http://www.megaminis.com/

Here is a pic of the blister unopened:


As you can see it is a bright red color making it easy to spot and is packed full of miniatures. You can also see the very low price of $9.99.

So the next step is to open it up:


Here is the pic after I dumped the items onto my table. My first thought was a lot of metal and a lot of loose flash. My next step was to count what you get. I throw away the loose flash and count. 1 big sized rat and 9 smaller rats. For about $10, you get 10 metal miniatures and 1 of them is ogre sized. This was starting to look like an excellent deal.

My next step was to look at the sculpting work. How did the miniatures look?

Here is a pic of the larger rat on a 40mm base standing between a 3rd ed Rat Ogre and one of the newer 5th edition ones:


I'm not totally impressed with the Large Rat. The sculpt isn't bad, but its not remarkable either. Reminds me of some old Grenadier Orge sized Rats I purchased several years ago. A bit more muscular would have been good as well as a loin cloth. Arms tucked into the side always looks bad, IMO. He looks more like a standing mouse than a rat. Small teeth, no claws.

He does have the height of a Rat Ogre and would work in a pinch, or if you were looking for some big rats cheap. Even though the others are painted and he is not, I consider him comparable to the older 3rd edition, model.
However, while there was a lot of loose flash to trim off, the mold lines were very difficult to find, and would require minimal work, which is something GW minis often are very guilty of.

Here is a pic of the Giant Rats:


Since I got 9, I wanted to see how they would look as a swarm. 3 is as many as you could put on, without it looking totally crowded. A couple of weapons, bones, or the mini-rats every skaven player has laying around would fill out this swarm base easily. So it looks like you could build 3 swarms out of it.


Or in comparison to an average sized Giant Rat that GW produces, these rats would fit right in. GW has several Giant rats smaller than the one I'm showing here, and a few larger.

As for the miniatures themselves, again, a lot of flash and hard to find mold lines. Unlike the big rat, these rats have some excellent detail, the proportions look good and overall an excellent Giant Rat miniature.

The only drawback I really saw to these guys, is that there is only one sculpt. Every single one of the nine are the exact same pose. A little variation would have been good.

Final thoughts:
I'm not a big fan of the huge Rat, he isn't a bad model and I might use him in a pinch if I was running a lot of Rat Ogres and wanted to add in something different.

However, the cost of the blister is justified from the 9 Giant Rats you receive. Whether you want to slap together 3 swarms or bulk out some Giant Rat units, these guys are awesome. Just spread them around so the same mold look doesn't bite you, but if you are looking to bulk your G.Rat selections to 2 units of 24 G.Rats from 2 units of 18. These 9 guys can go a long way to filling up those empty slots, and can mix in well with the GW rats.

For the price, this is an excellent deal. I give it an A-.

In this day of $4-$8 miniatures for a regular rank and file guy, any company that puts out good metal miniatures at a fair price is a company to be praised and supported.

I'd like to thank Mike, for trusting me to do a fair and honest review of the product.

2nd Tactic of the Week

For a treat today, I thought I'd post a 2nd Tactic of the Week, being Friday and all.

I call this the "Hop to Safety."

Here is the Situation, you are facing a cav unit with lances. Last thing you want is for them to charge you. So you need to setup the charge on them.

I have a unit of Clanrats (CR) and Slaves (SL) facing off against the cavalry unit (CAV).


The slave unit has moved up really close and is threatening the flank of the cav unit. The cav unit has almost no choice but to charge.
When the cav charges the slaves flee.



Normally the cavalry would easly chase the slaves down and run them down. Usually this is not that big a problem, but if you don't want to sacrifice them, you can save them. When the slaves flee they will hit the clanrats and get an extra 4-5" flee boost by landing on the clanrats. Just ensure you are not near the table edge. No panic on the clanrats as slaves don't cause panic to Clanrats.

With the long wheel, the cavalry is out of charge range of the clanrats and falls short.


And finally, the slaves rally and the clanrats charge into the cavalry unit keeping them from getting their charge bonuses and allowing you to win combat.

Good luck

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Todays contest will be a Brain Teaser. I hope you enjoy it. You may only post 1 answer. Any extra answers will not be counted.

Teaser value: 1 point

I was having trouble sleeping last night and I tossed and turned well into the night. Our local town hall has a clock which strikes on the hour and also strikes just once on the half hour. During one of my more awake moments I heard the clock strike once, but I could not tell what time it was. Half an hour later it struck once again, but I still could not tell what time it was. Finally, half an hour later it struck once again and I knew what the time was. What time was it?

Ok, first one to post the correct time gets it.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Todays contest will be back to Warhammer Trivia.

In todays contest the question is, who will be auto-affected by killing blow.
This means the person with a normal weapon, rolls a 6 to wound. What models will I have to simply remove without rolling any dice at all. They are just dead.
I will list 15 models. Give me a simple yes or no for all 15.

If you post more than 1 time I will only use the latest post.
If you miss any of the 15, I will simply say yes or no to your entire set of answers.
You must get all 15 correct.

Trivia value: 2 points.

1. US 1 Character in 1+ armor
2. US 1 Character with a ward save
3. US 1 Character with regeneration
4. Dwarf Lord on shield bearers with 1+ re-rerollable armor save.
5. US 1 Character on a dragon
6. The dragon
7. Pegasus knights
8. Terradons
9. Rat Swarms
10. Bat Swarms
11. Pleasure Seekers
12. Fell Bats
13. Wardancers
14. Ratling guns
15. Vampire Lord with the Van Carstein ring

Good luck

Featured army of the Week

Well, this week I wanted to feature Isaac Cutierrez awesome looking Christmas/Snowman army. Unfortunately, due to my own ineptitude, I accidentally destroyed the original, from which the other pictures are derived.

This means, I cannot feature his army. I was only able to salvage 2 pics, that I want to share with you.


He was running a Dogs of War Army, so I'm assuming the Snowmen are Ogres. And the snow looks awesome. Very tough to paint white and make it come out right.


And in this last pick you can see the Santa Clause Riding knights and elf duelists in front.

He really did a great job and these pics do not do this army justice. If he brings it to the Alamo this year, I'll make sure I get a lot more pics.

So my apologies about screwing this one up, but wanted to share what I had.

Bone Yard Oct Contest

Ok, back to movie quotes today. This one should be pretty easy for you.

Quote value: 1 point

"Beautifully synchronized, wouldn't you agree?"

Good luck, Ben

House Rules 7th ed

Overall, I love the new house rules, though my all cavalry Cult of Ulric army doesn't.

The basic rules for the house are fairly simple.
1. Only infantry units may enter a house.
2. Only 1 unit may be in a house at a time.
3. You may not march to enter a house, so use your normal movement to move up and enter a house.
4. If an enemy unit is in a house, you may assault the house with 1 infantry unit. If you have no infantry units, you may shoot at him, hahaha, or you may magic him out.
5. A unit in the house may use Missile weapons up to US 5, for each floor of the house.
6. In an assault, no charge bonuses apply, up to US 10 can fight from both sides, and only actual wounds apply. So no ranks, no banners, no warbanners, BSBs, marks, nothing. But musicians still break ties.
7. If you break the enemy in the house, they flee and get away, the unit assaulting the house occupies the house.
8. A unit in the house may not march or charge out of the house.

For a semi-combat archer unit, this is a great place to scout. Wood elf scouts and way watchers will love this place. Not being able to charge out of the house seems to be the only drawback.

A house will become a safe haven for infantry units trying to close in on cavalry units or get by them.
If you want to hide a unit from being wiped out, this is a great place.
Though it provides no magic protection, so spells can still wipe them out pretty easily.
A 2 story house is ideal for a unit of 10 archers to hide. They can shoot all 10 in a 360 arc. And if charged, all 10 get to stand and shoot and fight in combat and don't have to worry about ranks, standards, etc..

Not sure how a blunderbuss unit of Chaos dwarfs would work in here, probably not as they rely on ranks, and they would have none. but for most archer units, this is great.
Very short range weapons, such as thrown weapon units and pistoliers, may find opponents staying out of their range and moving away from the houses.

I can also see a unit of 3 Ogres or Minotaurs taking up residence in a house and holding it. Daring a unit to charge them. They get quite a bit of protection from the house from missile fire and can still claim or dispute table quarters from here.

Compared to last editions mess where 99% of all my games with a house ended up playing them as impassable, I think these are a nice set of rules that should be easy to use and add a new set of tactics and challenges with them.

The Bone Yard Oct Contest

Todays contest will be a Warhammer Rules question.

You are allowed only ONE answer. Your first one will be counted. Any others after that are simply clues for any other contestants. This will prevent anyone from just guessing every possible answer.

Contest:Warhammer rules

Rule value: 1 point.

Q: If you want to expand or reduce your ranks by between 1 and 5 models, how much movement must you sacrifice?

Good luck

Heroes Episode 2

I was not as impressed with this episode as the first. Seemed like it really dragged its heels on this one, only introducing 1 new character into the mix Matt Parkman, played by Greg Grunberg of Alias. He has the awesome ability to read other peoples thoughts. Of course this immediately gets him into trouble and arrested for a murder as he knows too much.

When they killed off the artist, Isaac Mendez, I was totally bumbed as he was my favorite. Imagine having to take heroine for your superpower to work. Ouch!! From my champion playing days, thats a pretty huge disadvantage. But then when the teleporter, Hiro Nakamura, found out he actually teleported 5 weeks into the future, he was able to take himself back that 5 weeks, just as the Nuclear bomb goes off.

So I'm guessing they have 5 weeks to stop the murder of Isaac and save New York from being Nuked.

And the bad guy seems to be the dad of the indestructable cheerleader, Claire Bennet. This should lead to some very interesting story lines.

But the Mom & son duo, Niki & Micah Sanders has got to be the weirdest ones. Her power of the mirror alternate persona. Not sure exactly what happens, but it seems she blacks out and the alter ego takes over. Sounds like a Hulk thing or maybe Dr.Jekyl & Mr. Hyde.

Anyway, still a ton of fun to watch. I hope you guys are tapping into this show as well. Its great so far.

DAWG Contest Oct

For October, I think I'm going to mix it up a bit. So one day it might be movie quotes and the next might be a Warhammer rules question and the next might be a brain teaser.

So Anyway, I hope you have a good time with it. This is round 1.

Type: Movie quote

Quote value: 1 point

"He could not quite get the idea that the nurse could not make it be yesterday."

Good luck.

Tactic of the Week

I have the following situation:



In one area of the battle I have only a unit of clanrats and night runners, facing off against a wolf rider unit, shown here without riders, and a very large nasty unit of Orcs. Their only drawback is Low leadership. My shooting and magic are useless, so I need to break them in some other way.
The solution charge the clanrats into the wolf riders and the night runners into the block of Boyz:


Then we commence combat. Since its my turn, I choose to fight the smaller combat first. The Boyz kill all but 2 of the night runners, and break them easily. They either voluntarily pursue, they are orcs, or a failed Leadership test forces them to pursue:



Above is the picture after the Orcs have pursued. The 2 fleet of foot rats get away, but more importantly the Orcs, have now pulled within the very important
6" range to the wolf combat.
I think you can figure it out at this point. The clanrats easily break the Wolf unit and pursue, but the goal was to get the Orc unit fleeing. They are forced into a panic check now and are running as well:


Good luck and have fun.

Quick review of Heroes

Just wanted to say that while I missed this great new show, I caught the show Friday night.

And it is great so far. 2 thumbs way up. It has bumped up on my watch list of TV shows.

For those who are unfamiliar with it, just do a quick search for NBC Heroes. In the show Ordinary people discover they have super powers. The depressed cheerleader who has rapid regeneration. The freaked out Mom whos mirror image has a life of its own. The Japanese man who can bend time and space to teleport.

But my favorite has to be the painter that can forsee the future in his drug indunced paintings.

I love how each of them reacts differently to having powers. The cheerleader is pissed that she is now a freak show. While the Japanese man is totally pumped up that he is different.

They are also doing a great job trying to deal with so many people without keeping the show moving. And they are all being drawn together. And the professor from India who is doing research on just this possibility.

Fate is definetely playing a hand in this show. So if you haven't checked it out, I recommend it. It airs Monday nights.