MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Sorry I didn't get a post in yesterday and probably not tomorrow either. Its Christmas time, go enjoy yourselves.

I'll be getting back to the BR as soon as I'm back.

Off to the in-laws today for some ham, football and presents.

So until the 26th, Have a very Merry Christmas or other holiday that you may or may not celebrate.

And here's hoping Santa brings you all those miniatures you wanted.

BR: Dwarfs Vs Chaos Beasts Part I

This is going to be the army lists and setup leading into the main part of the battle report.

I took my standard list, but because he was dwarfs I switched up a few things.

Ratspawn the Reincarnated:
Vermin Lord Ratspawn w/Doom Glaive, Moulder, Daemonic armor
(Doombull with Hvy armor, shield, Hellfire sword, undivided)
Master Moulder w/Chimera Hide armor, Gr.weapon, shield, Moulder
(Wargor undivided, hvy armor, Gr.Weapon, shield, dark heart)
Harbringer Setrad, Moulder, Lvl 2, staff, shadow magic
(Bray shaman undivided, power stone, staff of Darkoth)
Harbringer Sutenrad, Moulder, staff, lvl 2, death magic
(Bray shaman undivided, power stonex2, braystaff)

Core:
Ratspawns Bodyguard:
4 Rat Ogres w/Gr.weapons, Ratspawns personal banner
Blood Rat w/Gr.weapon
(5 Minotaur undivided w/Gr.weapons, bloodkine, standard)

4 Rat Ogres w/Gr.weapons
4 Rat Ogres w/Gr.weapons
3 Rat Ogres w/Gr.weapons
3 Rat Ogres w/Gr.weapons
(Minotaurs undivided w/Gr.weapons)

5 Mutated Giant Rats
5 Mutated Giant Rats
5 Mutated Giant Rats
(Chaos Hounds)

2x Mutant Rat Carts
Storm Vermin w/Great weapon and Clanrat w/spear
Mutant Rat w/Horns
(2 Tuskigor Chariots undivided)

6 Mutant Skaven w/Extra HW's, standard, musc.
1 Mutant Clawleader w/Extra HW
6 Packmasters w/whips

6 Mutant Skaven w/Extra HW's, musician, Standard
1 Mutant Clawleader w/Extra HW
6 Packmasters w/whips
(Beastherd: 7 Gors w/ex HW, 6 ungors spears, Foerender, standard,musc.)

Special & Rare:
5 Cloud Runners
(Chaos Furies)

Failed Rat Ogre Mutant w/Mark of the Horned One
Failed Rat Ogre Mutant w/Mark of the Horned One
(Chaos spawn with mark of slaanesh)

I was able to take 2300 points because I was the home player.
My opponent had 2250 point Dwarf army:
Dwarf Lord w/ Great weapon, Gromril armor, shieldbearers, Rune of stone, resistance and Rune of spite.
(So this guy had a 1+ re-rollable armor save and 4+ ward save. Tough)

Thane w/Gromril armor, shield, oath stone, rune of swiftness & rune of stone.
Thane BSB w/Master rune of Gromril, Rune of Preservation, Rune of resistance.
Runesmith w/gromril armor,shield, Rune of spellbreaking x2.

10 Thunderers w/LA, shield, musician
25 Warriors w/ HA, Sh, full command
25 Warriors w/HA, Sh, full command
25 Longbeards w/HA, Sh, full command, rune of battle.
20 Ironbreakers w/Gromril armor, sh, full command, Rune of Stoicism

Bolt Thrower, Engineer, Rune penetrating & reloading.
Bolt Thrower, Engineer, Rune of reloading
Organ gun

We rolled for the number of terrain pieces and got 6. We got:
Hill, 2x Woods, Area of boulders, house, river

He got to place the first piece and the hill went into what would soon be his deployment zone. In our league we have up to 3 resources we can use in the game. My opponent had: Lay of the Land (always picks deployment zones) and Counter Magic (1 free dispel scroll, works even against IF spells).
My 2 were: Chrystal ball (Get to pick one unit and find out what magic it contains), and Hidden Temple (One free re-roll of dice, even re-roll a miscast).

We then rolled and found out we had hidden deployment. So we drew out on maps where everyone was going and then set them up. I've had 2 League games and had hidden deployment in both.

Deployment looked like this:


On the dwarf side, from the bottom to the top.
Warriors with the runesmith
Bolt thrower with penetrating on the hill. The organ gun next to it.
Iron breakers in front of that with Dwarf Lord
Then Longbeards w/BSB Thane
Next to them were the thunderers.
Then other bolt thrower
and finally warriors with thane w/oath stone.

He was faced off against my troops as follows:


In case you don't know my army by now, from bottom to top:
Giant Rats (chaos hounds) x2 units
behind them is a unit of 3 Rat Ogres and 4 Rat Ogres
Then chaos spawn, 2 chariots then other spawn
Behind them is one herd with Setrad and wargor
Then more giant rats/hounds
Behind them is Ratspawn and his body guard
Then the other herd with the death magic bray shaman
Then my cloud runners/furies
Then 4 Rat Ogres and finally 3 Rat Ogres.

After we deployed I rolled for spells:
For Death I rolled a 5-6 and changed 5 to 1. So I had Dark hand, 1d6 str 4 MM and Drain life. All enemy units in 12" take 1d6 str 3, no armor save hits.

For shadow I then rolled a 1-3. Ugghhh!! The only 2 spells I really had no use for. So I had steed of shadows, and the crap spell, all units (friends too) take a d6 str 4 hits. Worst spell in the game.

We rolled and found out it was a pitched battle, with 1 hidden objective. Objective is worth 200 vp to achieve it, and -100 vp if you fail.
Then we drew for objectives. Note to self, you need to do this before deployment.
I drew break through. I had to move 3 of my units off the opposite table edge. Should be easy enough, but my 3 hound units were right in the midst of stuff and wouldn't be able to make it through.

I didn't know it at the time, but my opponent drew delay. Don't get into combat until turn 4. Huh!! against my army, you have got to be kidding. He said he knew he was giving up 100 vp as soon as he drew it.

I haven't heard too many objections with the objectives, but I see several that my opponents just don't stand a chance in getting.

We then rolled to see who went first. I won the roll and decided to go first.

Rest of Battle report, coming soon.

Enjoy!!

Game today

First just want to say I've figured out how to post from home, so hopefully I'll be able to post during the holidays.

Second, I got in a League game yesterday with my beast Doombull army, Ratspawn the Reincarnated.

It was a great game against a great opponent. Andy was playing a new army for him, Dwarfs.

More to come on this in the coming days.
Hope everyone is having a great holidays.

Chariots in Progress

I am currently working on a new army as most of you know. The painting is coming along pretty well. Anyway, here are a couple of pics of my chariots in progress:


In this pic you can see I used the basic Beast chariot and added side boards for the Kangoroo rat pulling it. For the crew I used an older version Storm Vermin for the Beastigor and the Rat rider w/spear for the ungor with spear. Some balsa wood works for the running boards.
Work still need to be done besides painting.
1. Plan to add chains from the running boards to the big rat.
2.Remove the storm vermin base so he is standing on the chariot.
3. Probably add a banner on one of the poles on the back.

Here is the 2nd chariot:


It is a scratch built chariot from popsicle craft sticks. The crossbar is from the beastman chariot. The 2 rats pulling it are the Nurglitch giant rats from the Lustria special character.
The crew are made up of a Storm Vermin for the Beastigor and a clanrat with spear for the ungor.
Work still need to be done:
1. Remove the bases and put the Storm Vermin and clanrat on the chairot.
2. Not sure if I want to run a chain around the necks of the rats. Still debating it.
3. And of course paint them.

I hope you enjoyed, I'll post pictures again when they are finished.

WHFB 7th ed FAQ out

For those who haven't seen it yet, go to the same link as I posted for the O&G in the previous post. The main rulebook FAQ is up and I love it.

Some of the highlights.
1. Page 46 Errata allows you to expand even if it won't bring in more models, so you can expand to pick up your rank bonus. Great for beast herds.

2. Spirit of the Forge is now a great spell.

3. Great clarifications for charging, tactical wheeling, enemy in the way, and charging skirmishers.

4. Great clarification on skirmishers fleeing.

5. Great clarification on when frenzied troops declare charges. Khorn knights and chariots took it in the shorts though.

6. I do not agree with the "no panic" test if you take 25% casualties in the close combat phase, but its there.

7. Interesting clarification on spears and Lances charging and being counter-charged.

8. Confusing Q&A on recapturing a standard. Whats the point? I'm pursuing this one further in the FAQ group.

9. Clarifies double 1's in dispelling the spell has the same rules for re-rolling as a miscast.

10. Clarifies that stored magic dice go to the main pool.

11. Howler wind has officially been castrated.

12. Super ruling to get rid of declaring charges that are out of range.

13. But most important of all are the new Apendix rules. Sliding, Charging mutliple units and drawing in troops within 1".

Great FAQ. Glad to see this one come out.

Good luck.

New O&G FAQ

I always think it is a good thing to read every official FAQ as it comes out.

So here is the new one for the O&G army:

http://us.games-workshop.com/errata/errata.htm

Check it out. The only question that really opened my eyes that I was not aware of was that Waaagh spell allows you to direct fanatics.

They also cleared up that nets do not stack.

But they avoided every difficult question sticking with the very simple easy ones to answer.

Gav and company have lost all resemblance of anything round in their crotch area.

Have fun.

The New Steam Tank

I wanted to spend at least one post looking at the new Steam Tank or STank as I like to call it.
With the release of the new Empire book comes everyones most hated model the Steam Tank. I'm working on 2nd hand knowledge for most of this. So some of this may be incorrect, but I'm pretty sure on most of it.

For 300 points and 1 rare slot (thats right, you can see 2 of these in a 2K army)
you get a warmachine that moves, shoots a cannon and can fire its Steam gun.

The rules have been greatly simplified, ie. only 1 version of it, but in an attempt to try and protect it, they went overboard as usual. But more on that later. First the stats.

This monster is Strength 6, Toughness 6, 10 wounds, has a 1+ armor save and is US 10.
It moves and acts like a nasty chariot that is large and causes terror.

Cannon is standard Empire Cannon with 26" (?) range. If fired while engaged with a unit does wounds to the unit to the front.
Steam gun uses the flame template and is strength 2 with no armor save.

Thats all the opponent really needs to know. But there are a few more rules for the owner to know.
He still needs to generate steam points. He can generate between 1 and 5 and then rolls a d6. If the number he tries to generate + the dice roll is more than the number of wounds, he suffers a wound and generates no steam at all.

It takes steam to do anything.
1 point to move 3".
1 point to fire the steam gun
2 points to fire the cannon.

Since its a risk to generate 5 points, you will rarely see people do this. So you will see them generate 4 points.
Turn 1, move 6" and shoot the cannon.
Turn 2, same.
Turn 3, if not in combat, and no lost points, move 3", shoot steam gun, fire cannon.

Not sure on the misfire chart. But I'm sure its along the lines of losing wounds. I'll have to check that and get back to you.

Couple good things is that in combat, it cannot simply move out as before, but is stuck in combat. And any attacks auto-hit it. So a bunch of even skaven slaves could do a few wounds to it if need be.

Now to the part I dislike. In a weird attempt to protect it, they stated anything without a strength value attached does nothing to the Stank. Huh?!? So any kind of spell or magic item that doesn't use strength has no affect at all.
So the Brass Orb, which could almost destroy a Stank before, does absolutely nothing now.
The Screaming bell, which couldn't do much, but dented the Stank, does nothing at all.

But there are still plenty of things that can hurt it. Cannons will continue to eat stanks for lunch.
Skaven can still use their jezzails and the warp lightning cannon.

But anything that is High strength or allows no armor save will eat this thing for lunch.
What you have to watch out for is its US 10 and ability to do impact hits in combat. It causes terror, so almost everything fears it.

Good luck and happy hunting.

Have a great weekend

I'm off to San Antonio as my son graduates Air Force Boot camp tomorrow morning. Then back to town Friday night as my older son Andrew graduates from UTA on Saturday morning.

So I'll be a bit busy for posting until Monday.
I hope everyone has a great weekend.

Until then, Let the dice smile on you.

BR Summary Beasts vs Empire

The battle was foremost, a lot of fun to play. My opponent was a great sport and worthy opponent, who is trying out a new army. I think he found the difficulties in playing a soft army against a smash you in the mouth type army like mine.

This was also the older Empire book and so he did not have access to the newer book at the time of the game. Something I'm sure he will rectify soon enough.

I mentioned during the game how I don't like dice to influence the game too much. I'd be happy with just average rolls all the time. Dice had a big impact on this game.

Here were some of the major changes in the game.

1. His lead belchers getting 14 hits and 7 wounds on one unit of Rat Ogres. But then broke from combat and failed to rally and off the board.

2. His cannon had a dead on shot at my Doombull on turn 2 with no Look out sir. He guessed well, but the +8" put it right behind Ratspawn and missed him completely.

3. 10 shots at a spawn = 8 hits and 3 wounds killing it in one round of shooting.

4. My other spawn moving 17" to hit his knights and tie them up FOREVER!! This was huge in the game, and IMO, cost him the game.

5. He forgot twice to move his general over to hack on the spawn.

6. Charging with the free company into the flank of the hounds. This then gave me his flank. I think he thought I would flee with them. When I didn't I think it threw his whole game off and he didn't know what to do. At this point he should have pulled his spearmen back out of my 12" charge range.

7. When the freecompany took the charge, were run down and the spearmen panicked. That was huge as 360 points and his whole flank was gone.

8. I played my BSB horribly bad keeping him on the flank. He should have been in the middle supporting the combats. I didn't like him, I'm thinking last BSB run for me.

9. Spearmen holding for one round so they could take control of the battle in the middle and then the knights coming in the flank.

10. Furies were my MVPs though. Took down pistoliers, a mortar, unit of handgunners, the 2nd wizard and then captured a 300 vp objective. I think they made their 75 vp worth back. And only lost 1 in all of that. They did fail to reach the spearblock and help out my Rat Ogres, but in the end, that might have been better.

11. The hit, overrun, hit again new 7th edition rule is unbeleavable when you are talking about chariots. I'm sure Billy didn't feel too bad about 1 chariot and the Rat Ogres on his knights in turn 6. But when Ratspawn and the 2nd chariot broke and ran down the spearmen and hit right into the knights as well, then it was very lopsided. You gotta love that rule.

12. He had crap for objectives, while mine were easier. Mine were: kill his general and capture 2 of 3 objective markers. I accomplished both of mine.
His were: Breakthrough, move 3 units off the board and invade, have 2 units in my deployment zone to end the game. So he had to get 5 units into my deployment zone at a minimum. He only got the 1 and it was below US 5 at the end so didn't even count.

13. There is no denying Ratspawn the Reincarnated. He and his army are just too Awesome!!

Battle Report Beastmen Vs Empire part II

Couple of corrections from yesterday's report.
1. The Elector count was carrying the sword of Battle and the Silver Horn.
2. The wizard had the doomfire ring.
3. The unit of Swordsmen with 1 detachment of handgunners were spearmen as well.
(I have his list today.)

When I left off yesterday his free company had just broken some hounds, but I made all my panic tests and was now in great shape.


Turn 3a: I had several charges.
The first was my furies into his mortar.
The hounds into the detachment of halbadiers.
The chariot into the knights fighting the spawn.
Ratspawn and bodyguard into the flank of the free company.
Rat Ogres to the left of Ratspawn charge the cannon on the hill.
The beastherd on the far left and lone Rat Ogre into the leadbelchers.

Slightly surprised he held with everyone. But the cannon fail their fear test and run for the hills. I hit the cannon and destroy it.
The hounds in the center rallied, but the ones on the far left, failed their Ld 9 rally and headed for the table edge. They ran right through the beastherd, who made a scarry Ld 7 panic test and finished between the knights and the lone Rat Ogre.
Everyone makes their charges, but when the Rat Ogre charges the leadbelchers, he has to go around the hounds and so only 4 from the beastherd get into combat, so no ranks.
Magic does nothing.

In combat, the furies kill 1, lose 1, win combat by 1, he autobreaks and I chase him down. The furies end up right behind the hand gunners and right by the lone wizard who is very nervous right now.

The hounds kill 2 halbadiers while losing none in return and the halbadiers break and run and are run down.

On the far left the Rat Ogre does 2 wounds to the Lead belchers. Then with 9 more attacks ranging from strength 3 to 5 I do none. He swings back with 9 attacks and does only 2 wounds himself, one on the shaman. Unit strength and banner let me win by 2, he breaks and gets away even though the Rat Ogre chased 3d6". I rolled an 8" pursuit to his 11" flee.

The chariot hits the knights. I roll a 1 for impact hits, so 2 hits. Then 3 str 5 attacks and a str 4 attack and I do a total of 1 wound. He does a wound to the spawn and wins combat by 3. The chariot breaks and runs.

In the big combat Ratspawn and body guards kill off around 8 free company with their 15 attacks needing 3's to hit and 2's to wound. It was a bloody mess. As they auto-break and run, (well, they got 2 shots at rolling snake eyes at least) they are immediately cut down. Looks like the spearmen with BSB are next on the snack table. This is too much for them and they run for the hills as well, leaving the small unit of hand gunners to hold the right flank.

Turn 3b:


This is what it looked like after that mess of attacks.

He charges the knights on the left flank into the fleeing hounds who run 14" and get away. They will fail to rally and run off the board.
The big block of spearmen charge my Rat Ogres on the hill.
Then another big blow, the Lead Belchers decide no amount of money or food is worth this mess and head off the board.

The flagelants move up.
The wizard tries to hide behind the hand gunners away from the furies.
The hand gunners on the hill let loose into Ratspawns bodyguard causing 5 wounds on 10 shots, knocking his unit down to him, a wounded standard bearer and his champion.
The smaller unit of hand gunners shoots at the chariot on the hill and wounds it.

In combat, again the knights fail to wound the spawn who also does nothing to them.
The spearmen and fire wizard who charged does 0 wounds to my Rat Ogres!! Then with 12 attacks back I do 2 wounds to the wizard and another 6 spearmen die.
So I have 8 to his 6. (3 ranks, US, banner, Temple structure) But he holds.

Turn 4a:


At the end of turn 4, I'm feeling pretty good, but some good things still need to happen.
Charges:
Furies into the rear of the hand gunners.
2 Rat Ogres that took out cannon into the flank of the hand gunners.

My fleeing chariot rallies.
Ratspawn turns around to face the middle.
The chariot and herd move to go after the knights on the far left.
The herd and rat ogres move to surround the flagellants on the right.

Magic: I finally do something and kill a knight out of the small unit with wind of death. Whoohoo.

In combat I do the Rat Ogres on the small hand gunners. Kill several, they break and are run down.
I play the furies next. I kill 3 and he whiffs, breaks and is cut down.
In my pursuit, I miss the wizard, but with a big 7" pursuit on 3d6", (he fled 2") I miss the rear of the spearmen by 1". Ouch.

In that combat he does 2 wounds, so only get 9 attacks back and do 5 wounds. So my 5 to his 7 and he wins by 2. I manage to hold.

Then in the spawn combat, his knights get hot and do 2 wounds to the spawn and kill it off. FINALLY!!

Turn 4b:


The Empire player knows he needs to do something to salvage part of this game.

Charges: Knights into the flank of the Rat Ogres, fighting the spearmen.

His other knights move well down the left flank and into my deployment zone.

His charge is devastating, killing all but 1 Rat Ogre, who drags down a couple spearmen before he breaks and runs.
Because his spearmen block his pursuit with his knights, he pursues with both but things get bottle necked on the hill with the spearmen ending up in front of the knights on the hill.

Turn 5a:


Things are looking great for Ratspawn.

But I'm not ready to lay the final killing blow just yet.
The furies do charge the wizard and kill him.

I move everyone up and surround his troops. With the spearmen in front of the knights he cannot charge.
I turn my hounds around (finally) to face the rear flank of the flagelants.

In magic I get off the beasts cower spell on his big knights, so he cannot move them even if he wanted to. So they are stuck.

No hand to hand besides the furies and wizard.

Turn 5b:


He moves his spearmen up about 3" and that is all he can do.
No wizards for any magic and cannot dispel the spell on the knights.
No shooting, no hand to hand.

Turn 6a: No picture here, but it is the same basically as the previous with the only difference being the spearmen are moved up 3" to claim the hill.

Charges: Time for the hammer to fall.
Ratspawn and chariot into the spearmen.
2 Rat Ogres defacating on the temple structure into the flank of the knights.
Chariot into the flank of the knights.
Rat Ogres and chaos hounds into the flagellants.

Herd moves into the boulders.
Furies fly back to land on the objective in my terrotory, hounds hold the other one.

I get off beast cowers again on the knights, so the horses cannot fight this round of combat.
And I get off wind of death on the other 4 knights and kill 2. He makes his panic test.

I do Ratspawns combat first. With their 12 attacks and chariot hits, we kill off all but 3 of the spearmen who auto-break and are cut down. Both Ratspawn and chariot overrun into the front of the knights.

Then we do the knights combat.
Ratspawn challenges and the Elector count accepts.
The 2 chariot impact hits, kill several.

In the challenge, I get 4 hits and 3 wounds on the Elector count. He laughs at this as he has a 1+ armor save. Modified to 3+, he fails 1 of the 3. Then he finds out about the Hellfire sword. He takes 2 more wounds from the hellfire with no armor saves and goes up in a puff of smoke.

When the smoke cleared there were only 3 knights left. Outnumbered badly by fear causers and having lost by a ton, he rolls the snake eyes and stays with insane courage when no one else in their right mind would.

In the other combat, the Rat Ogres kill 6 flagelants on the charge and the hounds in a historic effort drag down 3 of their own on 5 attacks. WOW!! The flagellants whiff but are unbreakable.

Turn 6b:


Well at this point its all over but the crying. Ignore the knights on his board edge, those are part of the dead pile.

In combat, Ratspawn challenges again and his champion accepts. Again only 1 wound makes it through the armor, but the hell fire sword lights him up for 6!!! more wounds!!! Damn I love this thing. So I get the kill and get full overkill bonus.

Not really needed as the Rat Ogres hack down the other 2 remaining knights.

The hounds drag down 2 more flagellants, who manage to kill 2 hounds and do a wound to the Rat Ogres before they chop down 6 more leaving only 3 left alive.

Here is the battlefield at the end of the game:


The flagellants would never flee so they would have died miserably afterwards. Leaving only the 2 lone knights far away to run and hopefully report back to the Empire lines of Ratspawn.

He Cannot be Stopped. He is a god Reincarnated on the Old World. He shall Inherit!!

Hope you enjoyed it. Final thoughts later.

Battle Report Beastmen Vs Empire

10 Days ago I played my first League game. It was a 2300 point battle that pitted my Skaven Beastmen vs his Empire horde list.

Here was my army list:
Ratspawn the Reincarnated

Characters: Points:
Vermin Lord Ratspawn 264
(Doom Bull undivided, Heavy armor, Shield, Hellfire sword)

Master Moulder Sutenrot 139
(Wargor, undivided, BSB, Banner of Wrath, Hvy Armor)

Harbringer Setrad, 141
(Bray shaman lvl 2, undivided, d. scroll, braystaff)
Took Beast. Got the no mounts can attack or move and the bolt thrower spells.

Harbringer Sedition, 141
(Bray shaman lvl 2, undivided, d.scroll, braystaff)
Took death, got the 2 MM spells.

Core:
Ratspawns Bodyguard: 270
(5 Minotaur undivided w/Gr. weapons, Bloodkine, standard)

4 Rat Ogres (Minotaur und. w/Gr.weapons) 184
4 Rat Ogres (Minotaur und. w/Gr.weapons) 184
3 Rat Ogres (Minotaur und. w/Gr.weapons) 138
3 Rat Ogres (Minotaur und. w/Gr.weapons) 138
5 Mutated Giant Rats (chaos hounds) 30
5 Mutated Giant Rats (chaos hounds) 30
5 Mutated Giant Rats (chaos hounds) 30
Mutant Rat Cart w/Storm Vermin and clanrat (tuskgor chariot, und) 85
Mutant Rat Cart w/Storm Vermin and clanrat (tuskgor chariot, und) 85
7 Mutant Skaven extra hws & 6 Packmasters w/whips, clawleader, musc. 108
7 Mutant Skaven extra hws & 6 Packmasters w/whips, clawleader, musc. 108
(Beastherd: 7 Gors w/extra hws, 6 ungors w/spears, Foe render, standard, musician)
Special:
5 Cloud Runners (Furies) 75

Rare:
Failed Rat Ogre Mutant (chaos spawn, slaanesh) 75
Failed Rat Ogre Mutant (chaos spawn, slaanesh) 75

Total Points: 2300
Power dice: 6 + 1 bound item
Dispel dice: 4 + 2 d.scrolls.

His Empire list looked more like:
Elector Count
BSB on foot with no magic at all.
2 Lvl 2 wizards, 1 with bound item, 3 scrolls total.
(1 fire, 2 MMs, 1 heavens, second sign, comet.)
Big unit of 9 regular knights full command (not IC)
Smaller unit of 5 knights, full command
20 Flagelants
Big block infantry spearmen with 2 detachments, halbadiers and hand gunners.
Block of Swordsmen with detachment of handgunners.
small block of free comany.
5 Pistoliers
1 Mortar
1 Cannon
Unit of 3 Leadbelchers (he wasn't really suppose to have those, but I let it slide)

This was a league game so he also had a Temple Structure which gives him +1 to all his combat resolution within 12".

Terrain consisted of 3 hills, a small woods, an area of boulders and a river with a ford.
He got to pick his deployment zone and chose the side with the hill. I got to decide who went first.

Turn 1a: I took the first turn and moved up. Magic was useless, no shooting.

Turn 1b: He moved his pistoliers up on the right flank. And his small cav and Ogres on the left. His big knight unit moved up a hair, but not much. Magic didn't do much, except start a comet coming down right in the middle of my troops. In shooting he wounded a Rat Ogre on a hill with his handgunners. And a cannon took out one of Ratspawns body guards.

Here is the pic at the beginning of turn 2a:


From right to left I have:
Beastherd with BSB and Beast Shaman behind the river.
Rat Ogres, hounds in front of them, furies in front of them.
Spawn
4 Rat Ogres, then chariot
2 unit of hounds (giant rats) the oarnge dice is the comet marker.
Ratspawns unit behind them.
Rat Ogres on a hill with a chariot behind the hill.
Spawn on the far side of the hill.
Another herd in the boulders with the Death shaman.
And hard to see but more rat ogres on the other side of the boulder.

his army has right to left:
Pistoliers
Flagelants behind the woods
Big unit of knights with Elector Count
Mortar in the back.
Unit of Spearmen with detachments on each side
His Temple Scructure
Unit of Free company
Big unit of swordsmen, with handgunner detachment on hill next to them. BSB in swordsman block.
Cannon on the hill
Leadbelchers then knights.

You can also see 2 cheese markers. These are 2 of the 3 objectives I needed to capture, the 3rd is behind the woods.

Turn 2a: The comet does not go down.
I charged the beastherd and furies into the pistoliers. The pistoliers only fled 8" and the furies were able to fly 20" and catch them on the back side of the flagelants.
The spawn on the right flank moves 17" and hits the big unit of knights.
Everyone else moves up.
Magic is useless except I dispel the comet.
In hand to hand the spawn does nothing and the knights w/horses cannot wound the spawn. So they just sit there.

Here is the situation at the beginning of turn 2b:


His block of free company charge my hounds in the flank.
His small unit of knights charge my Rat Ogres on the far left flank. But they are 15" out and so only move 7.
His magic kills a fury.
In shooting his cannon does 2 wounds to a Ratspawn bodyguard
The mortar wounds a Rat Ogre in the Right middle flank.
Handgunners kill the left flank spawn.
Handgunners kill 2 hounds on the central hill and they flee.
Finally, his leadbelchers blast the Rat Ogres on the far flank killing 2. The last one makes his panic check.
In combat, no one does any wounds in the knight/spawn combat.
No wounds done in the free company/hounds combat. But hounds break and run. Free company chases but fails to catch them or get away from the upcoming flank charge.
The hounds flee through a smaller unit of rat ogres, but they make their panic test.

The Skaven Beasts forces are beginning to smile as the battle plan unfolds. We took the brunt of their shooting and magic and are still standing.

Here was the situation after turn 2:


Coming soon the exciting outcome of this hard fought battle.

Off Today

Sorry no posts today. I've been super busy and my son has a Christmas play tonight. I have a Battle report for my Beast army all ready to write, with pics etc.. I just have to have time to sit down and do it.

Today was just not the day. So until tomorrow, have a good one.

Dealing with Fanatics

Dealing with Night Goblin fanatics is always a tough call no matter what army you are playing.

With the latest release of rules, they have streamlined them a bit, but still can cause many players headaches.
Here were the primary changes:
1. Allow an armor save now. So cavarly troops stand a little bit of a chance against them now.
2. No more random direction to start. Owner always gets to point them and push.
3. Easier to kill now with a unit landing on them.


So obviously to deal with fanatics, lots of scenery and smaller throw away units are the best way to deal with them.
For higher elite armies like Bretonians and high elves, it is tough to do.

Lets break this down into 2 categories, setting them off and killing them.

There are only a few good tactics for getting fanatics releasedm, but here are some of the biggest points.
1. Always try to get them released as soon as possible. The earlier the better. The idea being they are farther away from your main units and actually closer to his.
2. Try to set them off from troops in terrain. This prevents him from pushing them towards the troops that set them off so there is a good chance they will do no damage the turn they are released.
3. If you can't used terrain, try and place another O&G unit between you and the night goblin host unit. So if he wants to get to your unit, he has to plow through his own first.
4. Use smaller units to get them released. Example, for chaos would be warhounds.
This has the affect of killing a cheap unit but also they don't get free movement by popping out the back side.

Now onto killing them.
Care should be taken and considered when looking at a fanatic out spinning on the board. Remember once released they are as dangerous to the enemy as they are to you. A fanatic right in front of his unit, is probably best to be left alone. But definetely rid yourself of any that have made it behind your lines.
1. You can magic them. A small magic missile will easily dispatch them.
2. You can shoot them. Even a small unit with bows should be able to get rid of him.

Finally, just land on them. The rules get a bit fuzzy on when to take the panic test. One interpretation is you can land on them, destroy them and take 2d6 impact hits. (1 for initial and the 2nd d6 for the death throes)
Using this interpretation, taking only a single model, say the lone guy left from shooting, or a previous fanatic hit can move on him. Take 2d6 hits, die and take the fanatic with him.

Some players will claim that a panic test must be made after the initial hits and then if you choose to stop on him you take 1d5 more and kill him if you make your panic test.

However you play it, just be consistent and good luck taking out those little whirling dervishes.

Quick Review: The Librarian

I got a chance to watch a made for TV movie called the Librarian: Return to King Solomons Mines.

This is a sequal to The Librarian: Quest for the Spear, that aired in 2004. The star of the movies is Noah Wyle as Flynn Carsen.

Flynn works in a library that collects legendary artifacts from across the globe to be stored in the library. Everything from Excalibur to the Spear of Destiny, and hundreds of other artifacts.

Flynn's job is to go out and procure these artifacts and return them. It is very similar in plot lines and story telling to Indiana Jones.

Start film with him going after minor artifact, stealing it from the bad guys. Run away from bad guys. End up jumping in the river to get away. Come back home, 2 mins of him there, get mailed ancient artifact. Go chasing across the world, bad guys chasing him the whole way. Find keys he has to put together to locate the artifact. When he finally solves it, he is betrayed by someone close to him in the movie. Only to overcome this, save the day and either retrieve the artifact or destroy it.

In this particular case, he was going after the Book of Solomon. He was mailed the map to find the book. Because as it turns out he is a direct decendant of one of the 12 masons that built the Mine of Soloman. He finds the 2 pieces that make up the key to the map. He had the map stolen, but he finds it and retrieves it, and solves the mystery and locates the Mine in a matter of a day.

So instead of at this point returning with the map and the key, so that the mine is safe, he goes after the book. Of course he is followed and when he gets into the mine he is betrayed by his "uncle" that is really his fathers dead best friend. But as it turned out really shot his father. Huh??

Instead of just shooting them, they throw them in a trap room, that they just happened to know was there and figured out how to work it. This room would fill up with water and had spikes on a cieling that would come down and kill you also. Who the hell makes a room like this in a hidden treasure chamber? Solomon I guess. Luckily the guy they had just happen to have run across in the desert and saved his life, showed up and saved them. Lucky them.

They then beat up the 3-4 henchmen and made it up to where the evil uncle is using the book to try and go back and change history. Flynn gets there and fights him off, gets the book, where his evil uncle talks him into using it to bring back his dead father. But half way through, the girl heroine distracts him and he comes to his senses and throws the book into the lava.
Lots of ghosts flying around ala Raiders, they even do the beautiful one that turns to a screaming skull.

Overall you have to give this movie a thumbs up, but no originality at all. They even stole the theme of the story from the Qurtamane movies and the plot line was pulled directly out of a combination of Raiders and The Holy Grail Indiana movies.

But still I liked it. He is a much nerdier hero, who uses his book knowledge and 22 degrees to try and save the world. Where my slogan for him, "Feets don't fail me now!" is his battle cry.

Not nearly good enough for a movie theatre, but for a nice evening of a cheap, fun, campy low budget movie, it is a good time that I recommend.

Check both of them out if you get the chance.

Ogres Overrun the Alamo

There were some great looking Ogre Kindom armies at the Alamo.

Here is just a sampling. Enjoy.

















I hope you enjoyed them, I know I did.

More Whacky RAW Rules

This has got to stop soon. Gav with his RAW and refusing to answer some basic questions with a little logic instead of RAW, RAW, RAW, is making things into a rule lawyer night mare.

First we have Plague Censor Bearers killing themselves to win combat.

Second with have Beast Herds who always got a rank bonus before when they lined up, all of the sudden forgot how and now rarely get a rank bonus.

Then we have Wood Elf Nobles refusing challenges but keeping the unit stubborn because they are still "joined" to the unit.

Now we have Skaven getting a free pass on panic checks.

The rule for skaven slaves says All other Skaven non-slave units who are forced to make a panic test from slaves auto-pass it.

This is much different than saying they are immune to panic caused by slaves, or no test is taken. The test is taken, they just auto-pass it no matter what they roll.

In 6th ed, this had no affect because all panic tests were taken at the same time at the end of each phase. But now with the roll panic tests immediately, this could play a big roll.

So here is the situation:

XXXX..........YYYYYY
AAAA..CCCC. SSSSS

The enemy units of X and Y are facing clanrats (A) and Slaves (S).
C is an extra clanrat unit. If I have the slave combat go first, the slaves lose and break. The clanrats (C) auto-pass their panic test. Now the 2nd combat takes place, the Clanrats (A) lose and break. But the Clanrats (C) are now immune to the panic as they have already tested for panic this phase.

Cheese to the max boys.

Come on Gav step up to the plate and start fixing some of the problems.

Good luck!!

BR: VC vs Skaven

This is the last of my Alamo BR's since I did round 5 to get it out of the way early.

This game was round 4 Sunday morning. I actually felt pretty good, and I had known the night before I would be facing Dwayne Choat in this battle. Dwayne's army is made up primarily of ghouls. In fact he had 6 units of 13 ghouls!!
I had actually noticed this army Friday night and was a bit worried about it. VC are pretty tough cookie for Skaven to begin with, but poison and fear were a deadly combo.

Here is a pic of his army:


His list looked like this:
Vamp Lord Van Carstein Lvl 3 w/D.scroll, Ring of night Aura of Dark Majesty.
Necromancer Lvl 2 w/D.Scroll, book of Arkhan
Vamp thrall, BSB, Flayed Hauberk, Talisman of protection

6x 13 ghouls
27 Skeletons with full comand
28 skeletons w/full command
6 fell bats
5 black knights
2 banshees

I knew my only hope was to try and spread his army out so he couldn't use his general's leadership to help out his ghouls. I needed to get them running from shooting and magic.

Then we turned over the scenario. Rain storm. this has the effect of pushing everything to one side of the board and helping him out a ton.

I went first and moved up. Miscast turn 1 and he gets to cast a spell. High level raises lots of skellies.

His turn 1 he moves up. Raised some zombies in front of my plague monks to force them out of position. He flew his fellbats onto the top of the castle to charge my jezzails on the hill.

My turn 2: My jezzails killed 3 knights!! The monks hit the zombies, crushed them and overran 3". I move my swarms in front of my jezzails to protect them.
Ratling gun shoots his bats on the tower doing 4 wounds, killing 2.

His turn 2, put his black knights in charge range of the monks, looking for the big overrun. His banshees are hiding behind the building. His bats charge
Bats charge the Poison wind globadiers who stand and shoot and do a wound. But the bats have the hill, I have numbers. He whiffs, I do 1 wound, another bat drops.

My turn 3: tunnel team pops up, deviates enough to avoid the ghouls, and charges the banshee. He wasn't worried till I let him know their poison was magical. They then promptly failed their fear test. This quickly became the pro-quo for the rest of the game.
Monks and PCBs hit knights, slaughter them both overrun and are stopped by the tunnel team.
Jezzails try to charge bats but fail their fear test. Bats whiff, PWG's do a wound and another pops. Move swarms to get charge next turn.

We are jockying around in the middle of the board, nothing big going on.
All this is on the far left flank.
Some raised zombies hit a slave unit, break them and hit another slave unit. I charge the raised zombies with giant rats, takes a couple rounds to kill them.

His turn 3: Ghouls into the tunnel team. To be honest I can't remember if they fled or if they failed their fear test. I should have had them hold, but whatever it was they fled. Right off the board. His ghouls hit my PCBs and we rank up.
Combat has 1 ghoul die from the fog and 2 PCBs. He then gets 4 poison hits and wipes them out. Overruns off the board.
His bats whiff while my PWGs do 2 wounds and the last bat pops as well.
Banshee screams at jezzails, killing a bunch, the others run off the board.
Banshee screams at a Ld 10 ratling gun and kills it.

My turn 4. Realizing things are going really bad I decide to make a bold move and run the monks to the flank of his skellie block. Charge the banshee with some Giant rats, swarms charge the other banshee.
Charge some ghouls with clanrats.
The rain is becoming a real hinderance.
The ghouls are making every panic test because of the 18" range of the general.
The ghoul poison attacks are just eating up my unarmored troops and is not looking pretty.

I take out the banshees but thats about it. Giant rats overrun into some ghouls.

His turn 4, his BSB unit turns to face my Monks and Priest. He moves his ghouls back on the table.
His general moves his unit up.
The ghouls lose to the giant rats but they hold.

My turn 5. Monks charge the BSB skellie unit. His champ challenges and my Priest has to go for him instead of the BSB. I win combat by a couple. Big deal.
My rat swarms charge into the ghouls fighting the giant rats. We lose combat this round because of the loss of ranks, and the giant rats flee, but the rat swarms hold up the ghouls.

His turn 5. His Generals unit charges some clanrats who flee. His BSB now challenges and faces my priest without a flail. He beats down the priest, wins combat, they break run and are run down.

My turn 6. I am down right now, but feel I could pull it to a draw if a couple things can happen. I know I lose if I do nothing. Generals unit charges his general's unit in the flank. My general for the 2nd game whiffs with every attack. We do win by 1, big deal.
My warlock blows himself up.

His turn 6. His general moves over by my general. Then in the magic phase, rolls a miscast. This could be it. If he can roll the double 1's, it might still be a draw.

Nope, I get to cast a spell. So warlock high level into his ghouls with 3 left hoping to wipe them out. I roll a 3 and a 1. I kill 2. The last one makes his panic, I kill myself with the other.

In combat his Vamp hacks down Velsquee.

A devastating loss to the Vamps and any hope of an award went out the window. Now sitting a 2-2, I had one battle left to redeem myself. Instead I get that aweful draw and end up 2-2-1, the worst GT record I have ever had. I've never had a losing record, but the way I've been playing lately I just can't put it together.

Hope you enjoyed it. Dwayne was an excellent sport and we had a great game. He even let me go back and take a magic & shooting phase when I had skipped right over them close to the end of the game. My head was definetly not into it.

New Empire List

Thanks to my fellow DAWG I've had a pretty good look into the new Empire list.
Thought I might pass on some of my own feelings towards it.

Looks like you will be seeing a lot of Arch Lectors running around. And add in the new War Alter for 100 points and he is really nasty.

Warrior priests seem to be better than before. Cheaper, now cause hatred to everything and not just low leadership troops.
My first thought was I liked their prayers, but looking back, they are so, so. 2 help the priest only, but one does make his unit unbreakable.
And now their prayer is bound 4 instead of bound 4-6.

Basic infantry are a few points cheaper. But Handgunners now lose their +d6" on their first shot.

But my biggest blow, my white wolf knights lost their Cavalry hammers. They downgraded them to great weapons only. Though they are a couple points cheaper.

But this just sucks, IMO. The lance and shield option is much better and take the 1+ armor save.

The outriders don't sound that impressive. A unit of 5 gets 15 shots, but move, long range and multi-shot means you need 6's to hit.

Hellblaster was definetely weakened so now you need to roll to hit. Though at 15 points less than before, I expect to still see these. Strength 5 all the time. Add the engineer in here and you are going to blast some serious troops at even 24". But no longer any good against skirmishers.

Instead add in the Rocket Battery. You better learn the rules for this bad boy as you will be seeing them in 90% of all Empire armies. Uses the Large template and is Str 5. So this is the new anti-skirmisher weapon.

You will also be seeing many more steam tanks. Rules have been greatly simplified. Thank the GW studios. Now it is just Toughness 6, 10 wounds and US 10 with a 1+ armor save. There is only 1 version now instead of the 5 different cheese options.

This thing is still a monster but if you can knock off 3-4 wounds early it is pretty useless. To move and fire the cannon takes 3 steam points. So this becomes a risk if you knock off even 2 wounds.
But attacks that allow no armor save, cannons, some swords, special weapons, etc... These things are very suceptable. And everyone auto-hits it in hand to hand.

As for magic items, the big hit is the Griffon banner. Only allowed on the BSB now that it costs 55 points. But expect to see the 30 point rod of power everywhere.

Seemed like a lot of stuff got cheaper overall for Empire. While they nerfed a few rules here and there. I expect to see a bit better army hit the field. But some of the old tricks are going to have to be thrown out.

Good luck

BR Summary Skaven Vs Orcs & Goblins

In round 3 of the Alamo GT I got a chance to square off against the new Orc & Goblin army list. Luckily I had gotten a chance to read the new army book on the drive down. There are some very nice combo's but overall I still see the O&G list as too unreliable to be a winning GT army unless you are just extremely lucky throughout.

We lined up to play and I got choice of sides. His side had a nice building for my Jezzails to hide in, so I took that side. Oh whoa is me, for what I didn't realize is that there was no, zero, natta as far as air circulation went. It was hot. Plain and simple. I was miserable through the entire battle and after the loss the previous round I just wanted to get it over with.

So unfortunately I have no pics and very little recognition of this game.
I do remember my opponent, Clay Beiter, was an excellent sport and I gave him my favorite player vote.

Here were some highlights.
1. Spiders run up on the hill on turn 2.
On my turn 2, I charge spider riders with slaves. He holds, I do a wound. Spiders do 2 back, I win by 3, he breaks and runs, going through a huge goblin unit that fails its panic test and both run right into the waiting arms of my tunnel runners.

2. A pack of 10 squig hoppers was super scary. Lucky for me when he had them charge a unit he rolled a little on the low side so only 2-3 actually could make it. The rest ranked up behind and so he got very few attacks, I won combat and chased them off the board.

3. Giant getting pick up and eat when in base to base with your general, is just well, squishy.

4. A unit of Jezzails in a building with line of sight to a big unit of boar boyz, just means dead boar boyz.

5. I love the new rule that allow you to stop on a fanatic and kill them. So slaves and night runners play a huge service in this regards.

6. Poison weapon wielding tunnel runners into the flank of a Orc chariot, meant 1 breaking chariot that was fleeing directly through one of his units and into a pond. Impact hits on his guys, oh he didn't know that, or care for it. And damage to his chariot going through the difficult terrain. Ouch. Same tunnel runners that cut down all those goblins in item 1 above.

7. Getting too many characters around a Orc character is super nasty. Can you say 6-7 str 7 attacks. Ouch.

8. First chance for me to use the hit, kill, overrun into a combat, attack again. Got to do it with my PCB's. They took out the giant, then overran into his Generals unit. When this unit broke and ran that was game.

Win for the Skaven with the objective. So 44 points after 2 days and a 2-1 record.

Other things of comment from the O&G book.
Waaagghhh!! is not near as scary as it sounds in the book. When my opponent finally used it, it didn't really do anything. The only thing it really helps is his general's unit and big blocks of Orcs.
And it cannot prevent the '1' result, it just makes it worse.

There is a really nasty enchanted item combo. 2 characters need to take them. One is a bound 5(?) item that last 1 turn and gives you -1 Ld. As soon as you get that off, then he uses his pipes of doom. This is a one shot item that forces all enemy cavalry units to make a panic test. Combined with the -1 Ld makes this a very nasty item.

I love a lot of their new magic items. Some of their weapons are awesome. The banner that can give them +3 dispel dice. Sweet. Black orcs are now very usable characters. Overall, it looks like a fun army but not overpowered.

Good luck

Skaven Vs Wood Elves BR Wrapup

I've been trying to examine this battle and how I might come up with some new angle that would have helped me in my battle. A few things came to mind.

1. Whenever a "good" opponent offers you his flank, there is a reason why. Step back and think about it for a minute.

2. If I had run a unit into the building, he could not have assaulted it, as he was too large. Max is US 30.

3. Wild Riders are nasty. Devote 2 units to killing them. Don't expect a single unit on its own to be able to handle them.

4. Huge blocks that cause fear and are stubborn are just nasty and need to avoided at all costs. Same would apply to really large undead blocks.

Well, thats it for now. Round 3 coming soon.

Fall Finale: Heroes

The fall final show for Heroes was last night and it did not dissapoint. There were so many cool things that happened it is tough to describe them all.

Just wanted to point out the highlights for me. Feel free to point out the points that you liked best.

1. The audio feedback when the cop tried to mind read Peter and Peter then picks up his ability and they are reading each others minds. I loved the feedback squelch like two microphones feeding off each other. Awesome.

2. DL putting his hand through the door. That was just great.

3. The bullet shot going through DL's head. Wow!!

4. Peter's dream at the end. Looks like he will get near the nuke man and maybe cannot control it.

5. Isaac getting his power to work without Heroine. And then drawing Hiro with a sword facing a dinosaur.

6. Hiro's friend saying: "Who's calling?" Hiro: "Destiny". His friend: "I wish Destiny would lose our number."

7. Claire learning everyone who knows about her power is having their memories erased.

8. And while I didn't like it. Eden trying to get Sylar to kill himself and it backfired, and then her killing herself to prevent Sylar from getting her ability.

What were your favorite parts?

Ratspawn Beast Army Update

My goal was to have my Doombull and Minotaurs all finished by the end of November. I accomplished that goal. I am using my Vermin Lord model as my doombull and 19 Rat Ogres (yea 19!!) for my Minotaurs.

I did in fact finish the primary painting on Nov 30th. I still need to go back and give them one more shade coat and finish the flocking and final spray coat. But all of that can be done in an hour or 2 for all 20 models. I'm not too worried about that.

My next project are the two beast herds. They are already primed and are on the paint table to begin the painting. My objective is to have all 26 painted by the end of December.

that leaves the following after that:
2 Chariots, 5 Furies, 15 Chaos hounds, 3 characters, building 2 spawn from stratch, and painting them.
So I think I can do the hounds and chariots in January.
Leaving the furies, characters and spawn for Feb.
And finally a display board the first week in March before the Bayou.

So if I keep on the above schedule, Ratspawn the Reincarnated will be ready to go come Bayou time.

As a side note, I also played the above army again Saturday against an Empire player. It was another Outstanding victory for Ratspawn as he had only 5 models left on the table at the end of turn 6. Full battle report with pictures coming for that one.

Good luck.

Battle Report Skaven vs Wood Elves

This was game 2 of the Alamo. My opponent Aaron Chapman. Aaron runs a very had hitting army of Wood Elves. He runs no wizards but instead takes very nasty magic item combos. He loves historical armies. He took a Roman Legion army to the Lone Wolf and has the Greek Phalanx here.

Here is his awesome Greek army on display:


His army consisted of the following:
Highborn w/ Rhymer's Harp and annoyance of netlings
Noble BSB w/Royal Standard of Ariel
68 Eternal guard, standard, musc, warbanner

Noble with blight of terrors
29 Eternal guard w/standard & musc

6 Wild riders
6 wild riders
10 glade guard archers

That was it, for a total of 122 models facing off against my horde of 290 models.

Here was is initial setup:


And here was the majority of my setup across from him:



Turn 1a: He went first and moved up.

Turns 1b: On the left flank I moved my giant rats facing off his wild riders and ran my swarms up for support. Everything else moved up as well. I do 3 wounds with magic to his big block to watch him make 3 5+ ward saves. This was going to be tough. I had scouted my gutter runners in the woods and moved them up to the edge.

Turn 2a: He charges his wild riders into my giant rats. I'm thinking they are out, so I hold. He is 17.5" out. Ouch. He hits, breaks them, but restrains pursuit.
He charges my swarms with his small block (of 30). I'm thinking he has to wheel to hit them. I noticed a minor side slide, no biggie, and he barely touches 1 corner of a swarm. He then wants me to move both completely over to maximize, so he doesn't have to wheel? It was still early so I let it go.
Of course he does 5 wounds, and swarm crumbles. He overruns 10" and hits my ratling gun. I can flee but if I do, he will continue on into my PCB's and I'd rather have the charge with them. So I hold with the ratling. He makes his terror check.

His big block charges some slaves, breaks them and overrun 11" and is right in front of my warlocks unit.
Archers shoot at my gutter runners but fail to wound any.

Turn 2b: Things are looking messy quick. I have a clanrat unit that can hit the flank of his huge unit. I charge but fail my Ld 10 fear test. (probably a good thing in retrospect)
Plague Censor bearers have to charge the smaller block.
The Monks can charge either the smaller block or have an outside shot at hitting the wild riders. I go ahead and hit the block. Not sure if this was the right move or not.
Gutter runners charge the archers, who stand and shoot but fail to wound any.

I move my warlock into my generals unit.
In combat my PCB's with monks kill a bunch but their Stubborn 9 they stay. I was able to expand the monks enough to keep the wild riders from having a flank charge.
My gutter runners kill 2, he kills 1, its a drawn combat.
Magic and shooting are whittling down the huge block.

Turn 3a: He charges my clanrats with his big block, they flee, he hits the slaves. Wipes them out, they run off the board, he restrains pursuit.
Moves the wilder riders behind the monks, but facing the middle of the board.
His other wild riders have been dancing around with several of my units.
The gutter runners kill 2-3 archers, win combat, break them and run them down.
In the combat with the smaller block, I kill off many elves, while my PCBs are getting hurt as are the monks.

Turn 3b: Huge mistake turn. General with warlock and clanrats charge into the huge block. Wish I had failed my fear test but did not. To make matters worse I shoot into combat with ratling gun. 8 hits. Randomize, 2 on him, no wounds, 6 on me, all wound. So I lose a rank as well. So we are even up going into combat.
Warlord 4 attacks: 4 misses. Warlock: 2 attacks, 2 misses. Clanrats manage to kill 1. He does 2 wounds to the warlock, wins combat by 1, I auto break from fear and run off the board. He pursued so he got turned and captured my standard. :(
Thats almost 500 points and I'm trying to salvage a draw at this point.

In the smaller combat, I'm still winning and hes still making his stubborn check.
But now I've killed enough his noble has had to slide into combat finally.

Turn 4a: He charges his big block at a clanrat unit that flees, runs through another clanrat unit, that makes its panic check.
I think he forgets to move the wild riders on my side of the board. The 2nd wild rider unit won't take my bait and continues to move back away from my 3 units coming at him.
In the combat, I challenge with my priest and kill the noble. Now he's not stubborn but I only win by a couple and he holds.

Turn 4b: My tunnelers pop up. I'm hoping to go after his wild riders dancing in the back, but I deviate 10" and too far away from them. But am right behind the smaller eternal guard fighting my monks and last PCB. I charge. We kill them to just a couple, though I lose the pCB. Monks and Gutter runners both pursue. I capture their standard, but screw up and put my tunnel team completely in front of my monks.

My clanrats that fled last turn rallied.

Turn 5a: He turns his wild riders around to face the tunnel team.
His big block charges clanrats who flee, run through just rallied clanrats who make panic check.

Turn 5b: If my tunnel team was just off set I could have charged both units at the wild riders. But with only the tunnel team to face them from the front, I decided against it. They also had the enemy banner. So I run them into the woods to hide them and prepare the Monks for a charge. This was a huge mistake. Saving the Monks should have been the primary objective, but I just couldn't see how to do it.

Clanrats that fled rallied. Lots of shooting and magic into his big block.

Turn 6a: Big block into clanrats who fled through just rallied clanrats, they pass their panic check.
Wild riders charge monks. 2 horses kill the plague priest needing 6's to wound.
He wins combat, I break, and am run down, but the tunnel team makes their panic check.

Turn 6b: with no charges, I rally my clanrats.
Magic into the big block. I roll a 6,6,4 and say 14. My opponent rolls a 14. I then say, oh, I meant 16. A bit of huh!! and then he lets me have it. I roll a 1 and 3. Wound myself and fail to wound any elves. So I give him 72 points right there.
I then shoot him to below half in his huge unit.

When we add it up, he is up by 250 points. Then we remember 1 more standard he captured and I lose by aorund 350 points. Ugghhh!!!

If the warlock doesn't wound himself in the bottom of 6, its a draw. If I don't charge his block, I probably win this game. If I have my tunnel team and monks set up to both charge, he probably has to dance away with them and thats 300+ points I don't give him in turn 6.

I played very poorly, and Aaron took advantage of every mistake I made.
He won 2nd best overall and went 4-1 in the GT. Great job Aaron.
I know we will be seeing a lot more of him as time goes on.

I hope you enjoyed it.

Rant of the Day

Let me start by saying Warhammer is my hobby. I love it. I will continue painting, building armies and playing for many years to come.

But Games Workshop makes me so mad I can't see straight some time.

This latest rendition of the rules has some very good points to it. I love some of the new stuff. The pursuit into fresh enemy and get to fight another round, the 5 wide for a rank, the maximize both sides on charging, nastier miscast chart, better leveling of spell lores, heck I even like insane courage.

What is killing me is a few of these insane little tidbits that seem to fall through the cracks. And instead of standing up with a quick racial FAQ, all we get is: "Read AS Written" or RAW as it has been come to call.
Well it is rubbing me RAW in so many places.

Shall we start with the characters still benefiting a unit after refusing a challenge. Eternal guard stay stubborn if the only noble refuses a challenge?? A unit is still immune to fear if the hero on daemonic steed refuses a challenge?? A Daemonic Legion can still re-roll its instability if the Icon Bearer refuses a challenge??

The only things you lose if you refuse a challenge is:
1. Cannot use your Leadership
2. No magic or Magic items can be used.
3. Cannot count or use your BSB if he refuses a challenge.

Any other thing is fair game.

Here is another pet peeve of mine. Herds only ranking up 4 wide. How rediculous is this? They realized in playtesting that herds needed to be ranked up and get rank bonuses to make them worth while. So what do they do. When the BoC book comes out they have a special rule to allow them to alway rank up at least 4 wide to get ranks.

So 7th ed comes out and ups it to 5 wide to get a rank. All they have to do is say, oh yea, beasts can now rank up 5 wide as a minumum. But instead, NOOOOO, they come back with, yea you know it, "RAW."

And finally, this latest rule of wounds done to yourself help you. So here is my absurd situation of the day.

6 Plague Censor Bearers (PCBs) charge a beast herd. The herd gets to match width and gets 6 models in base to base. They have 18 guys, so they get 2 ranks, have US and a banner. So +4 combat res to the PCB's +0.
In combat the PCB's roll horrible for fog of death and kill 0 (ZERO) Gors but roll 5 - 6's and kill off all but 1 PCB. Ugghhh, how horrible.
In combat the only ones who can fight are the 1 PCB and the 2 Gors facing him. Possibly an ungor or 2 with spears in the 2nd rank.
As it turns out the dice go cold and everyone whiffs.

Now its time to add up combat res. You have +4. I have +5. I WIN!!! You need a (7-1=6) 6 and roll a 7 for your break test. You flee and my lone PCB runs them down, capturing the standard and wiping out the 150 point unit. WhoooHoooo!!!

This is as about as rediculous as it can possibly get. I can just see the Gors now. "Aggghhh!!!, they are all killing themselves, run for your lives..."

Give me a break.

Gav or Allesio or GW studio, get off your butts and fix these atrosities to our rules. I know your working on an FAQ, but you've got to learn to post things a bit faster. RAW sucks and you know it.

Ok, I feel better now.