Chaos Spawn/ Ratted out

I worked on my chaos spawn this last weekend as well. I've already started painting them, but these pics are pre-painting.

I built 2, so I'll call them #1 and #2.

While I was working from the same basic model, I still wanted them to look a lot different from each other.

Also since these were Failed Rat Ogre experiments, they still needed to have some Rat Ogre parts showing on them. Here is what I came up with.

Failed Rat Ogre #1:


I did a lot of the standard Chaos spawn stuff with this spawn. The spawn head is normal, and many of the claws coming out are normal. I did add a Tyranid claw on the back that is a bit larger than normal.
Now the big changes: I added the dual split Rat Ogre arms instead of the standard spawn arm. This actually required a lot of modification to make it work, because of the beveled socket they have there.
Also, though hard to see, on the left side is a Rat Ogre head where the tentacles usually go. This required a bit of modification to as I had to remove an ear to make it fit right.

Then onto the greent stuff:


Mainly I was filling gaps, but I also was adding transition skin for most of the joints. The arm needed a lot of greenstuff since it didn't fit very well on the bottom portion.
For the Rat Ogre head, what I did was really different. Its kind of hard to tell, but I connected the tail to the head and created a sort of deformed, body for the head. So instead of a tail there is a loop in the body. It also has a small hand coming out as well.
Also, when I was done, I realized the 2 spawn still looked way too much alike. I decided it was because both had that hump in the middle of their tops. So I took the unused tentacles from this model and with some greenstuff added them to the top of the creature. as you can see.
Here is a shot from the backside:


Now onto Spawn #2:


This is the more traditional spawn. It has the standard arm and tentacles where they belong, but I put 2 Rat Ogre heads on this one. One on each side of the body. This makes for an interesting look.
I also added 2 small claws and 1 tyranid larger claw.

The only real mod needed was the plastic head in front. It had a large ball joint on the back that had to be chopped off. And it still didn't fit real well into the socket there.

Then the green stuff:


Here we had a lot of the same. Mainly filling in gaps and creating transition skin between the pieces and the main body.

And here is a shot from the back side.


Well, let me know what you think.

Until next time...

BR: Beasts vs Lizardmen, part 2

Here was the situation at the start of turn 2:


Turn 2a: With no charges, he moved things up more. Including moving his big SMP unit up on the hill to contest both objective markers.
He moved his skinks up closer to the house.
He rallied the fleeing skinks.

For magic he cast Dark hand at my hounds. I was actually glad to see this as I wanted them out of the way. But he rolls a miscast. Then he casts the steal soul on my Harbringer in the lower herd. I let it go and he takes a wound.
He then casts the 12" radius of death spell. I scroll that with my Harbringer who just took a wound. Then he casts forked lightning on my hounds. I almost let it go, but rolled my dice and stopped it.

For shooting, his lower skinks with javelins wound my spawn.
The salamanders spit at my 4 hounds in front of the temple guard and wipe them out. Ouch, 4 panic checks. Made them all except my chariot who was just outside the 12" generals range. Luckily they roll a 7 on the re-roll.

In combat the skinks fail to wound the spawn who kills 3 more. I win by 2, but now without the general, they flee and are run down by the spawn.

And here is the setup at the beginning of my turn 2.


Oh, what was he up to with the temple guard. I had been eyeing this charge since he moved it up there. Stubborn, Ld 9 with re-rolls could be rough, but if I could kill enough and stop any counter charges, I felt like I was ok.

So CHARGE!! Unit of 4 into the Temple guard. Unit of 3 Rat Ogres into their flank. And chariot into the front as well. At the very top I also declared the 5 hounds into the skinks with blowpipes.

He holds with the TG and stands and shoots with the skinks.
My spawn that had just broke the one unit, turns and hits this unit. He still shoots the hounds, and in an impressive display wipes them out. My Rat Ogres make their panic check.
The spawn by the house finds 1 skink he can make contact with and that is all he has to do. They also stand and shoot, but nothing.
Finally my last spawn. Here is the problem. If I roll, really low, it will block the Rat Ogres from charging. So I have only 1 safe move, I move him backwards towards my own table edge.

Then on the charge, the Rat Ogres are all fine, but the chariot fails its fear test. Luckily it gets a re-roll and makes it. I move my hounds to prevent the other Saurus block from moving that way.
I move my furies up to block his Krox from a rear charge on my Rat Ogres.
I move my chariot away from his Krox and move my unit of 4 up to face his unit of 3.

In magic I really didn't want the sallamanders to spit at Ratspawn, so I cast Beast cower on them, so now they can only shoot at the hounds.

In hand to hand, In each of the skink/spawn combats, I killed 1, it was a drawn combat.
In the big one, 7 impact hits. All wound, he saves only 1, needing a 5+. Then with 21 attacks, 10 hit and again, ALL WOUND. OUCH!!! Needing 6's to save, (I totally forgot about splitting out the flank attacks as he should have had no save with them.) He saves 4!! So a breath of life for him. I win by a huge number, but stubborn, fear causing Ld 8, makes it easily.

Here we are at the beginning of turn 3:


Note that the SMP is still in the middle of the TG. We just moved him as he wasn't very stable on the hill.

Turn 3a: My opponent was impressed he took that hard a charge on his TG and was still standing. His Kroxigor units charge my furies and my unit of 4 Rat Ogres respectively.
His saurus refuse to take the hound bait and move up. The salamanders cannot move but can still shoot.

In magic he casts Dark hand on Ratspawns unit, using the priest for LOS. He does 5 hits and gets 4 wounds, killing the Rat Ogre in the back.
He casts his 12" death nuke bomb but I use my other scroll on that.
He casts steal soul again and I dispel that. He casts forked lightning with his skink but fails.

In shooting his skinks and salamanders all shoot at the hounds. Manage to kill 3 after a salamander ate 2 handlers. They panicked (thankfully) and ran away. Through 2 units, but since they are only US 4, no one cares.

In hand to hand. skinks lose to the spawn at the top, but holds.
The skinks at the bottom wound my spawn, and actually win combat.
The krox kill 3 furies, I do no wounds, they pop. He overruns 5" stopping right in front of my herd.
In the SMP battle, he uses a resource to make himself +1 WS, so his Temple guard are WS 5. He does only 3 wounds to the front, killing 1 rat ogre and wounding a 2nd. And 2 wounds on the flank. He rolled no 3's to hit at all. But needing 4's to wound, he rolled a lot of 3s.
The chariot whiffs completely. My chariots really suck after they get past their impact hits I've noticed.
Between the 15 attacks from the minotaurs, I somehow manage to get 10 wounds again!! Where the hell did that come from?? Out of that, needing 6's to save, he saves 4 again!! Wow, this combat is just a friggen anomaly of high dice rolling.

Then finally, what I felt was the biggest combat. Krox on Rat Ogres. With 9 attacks he manages 4 wounds. So 1 dead Rat Ogre. 1 wounded. I get 9 Attacks back. Needing 3's to hit. I get 6 hits and all 6 wound. Sweet. So 2 dead. I win by 4, since I also have the Temple structure within 12". 2 wounds, size, Temple.
Needing a 3 not to break, he rolls it. UGGGhhhh!!!!
If he fails this, then I overrun an average of about 10" and am in perfect position to charge his Saurus block in the flank.

Here was the setup at the beginning of my turn 3:


Time to put it on the line. Turn 3b:
Ratspawn and body guard into Saurus infantry block.
Ratogres at the top into the rear of the skinks.
Herd at the bottom into the Kroxigor.

Everyone holds. Hounds rally.
Chariots move for supporting charges. The one in combat with the SMP is now out of combat. He swings around to face the flank of the Krox in case the herd cannot win that combat.

Magic: Setrad casts Beast Cower on the salamanders again, but it is dispelled.
Sutenrot casts Bears Anger on himself. 3-6's. Sweet.

In hand to hand, I do the SMP first, hoping to break them early on, so he can't use the general's leadership or BSB to his advantage.
He does 1 wound and kills a Rat Ogre to the front. My 3 rat Ogres on the flank get 9 attacks on the SMP and 2 get through. So he is down 1. (remember the drain life earlier.) Then with 6 attacks on the 2 TG, I get 2 hits and only 1 wound. Guess all that good luck came back on me. And he saves that 1 wound on a 6.
So I have 2 wounds, US and flank. He has 1 wound, banner & BSB. Whew, I almost lost that combat. He holds easily.

In the Herd combat, with 5 strength 5 attacks, needing 3's and 3s, the bear's anger Shaman does only 1 wound. Luckily the rest of the herd do 2 more wounds, and kill one.
He puts 3 attacks on my Harbringer and kills him. The other krox does 2 wounds on a couple Gor. So 3 wounds, to 3 wounds. But US, rank, and banner, he breaks and runs. I pursue and catch him.

Skinks in combat with the spawn at the bottom, actually kill the spawn. Ugghhh.

The Rat Ogres at the top of the battle, easily wipe out the skinks there in combat with the spawn.
And the 3 rat ogres with higher initiative, wipe out the lone Krox there.

Finally on the Saurus/Ratspawn combat. Ratspawn challenges. Scar Vet accepts.
With 5 attacks, I hit 4 times. Sweet. Then needing 3's to wound, I do not get a single wound. What is up with Ratspawn and wounding lately?? This is 2 times in a row he has sucked at this.
So I hated to do it, but I used my Hidden Temple League resource to get my 1 re-roll. (you must re-roll all dice rolled for that one roll) I re-rolled the 4 to wound dice and got 2 wounds. Average, thats all I ask.

Anyway, he only saves 1. And I then roll for the extra hellfire damage and get a 6. So the Scar Vet literally explodes into a hundred pieces and I pick up 7 wounds there. 2 + 5 overkill, ouch!!
I then get my other 13 attacks. My dice turned again, as needing 3's and 2s with no armor save, I only get 4 wounds. Should have been around 8. I did take out the champion, so he got no attacks back. He still has 16 saurus to my US 15. Banner, 3 ranks, so he only loses by 7. So needing a 2 not to break, he rolls a 3. He gets to re-roll from the BSB. And fails again. Ratspawn chases him down.

That was the game.


We played on another turn, but we were mainly BSing the rest of the time and I didn't bother with turn by turn pictures.

Turn 4a: He ran his skinks into the house. sallies and skinks shot at Ratspawn, killing 1 of his body guards.
His magic he soul drained a Rat Ogre in base with him.

In combat I kill off his 2 Temple guard, win by 2, but he makes his break test. I now have 4 Rat Ogres on his SMP.

Turn 4b: Chariot and spawn charge skinks. He stands and shoots and does a wound to the chariot. I wipe them out, overrun into the salamanders.
I do a wound to his SMP, he again holds.
Beastherd assaulted the house and kicked the skinks out. The last 2-3 ran off the board, I take the house.

We call it there. Here was the final picture:


Remember the SMP is still up on the hill facing the 2 Rat Ogres there.


Final thoughts on the battle coming tomorrow.

until next time...

BR: Beasts vs Lizardmen, part 1

Saturday a Lizardman force had found its way to Ratspawns breeding grounds in the upper Empire. The armies spread out to form their battle lines and it did not take long for the 2 forces to come together in battle.

This was another League game. I took my basic army I'm planning on running at the GT in only 10 days. Since I had +50 points, I went ahead and used a resource to give me +25 to make +75 and took an extra Spawn of Slaanesh.

The battlefield had 2 woods, 2 hills, a 1 story farmhouse and some stone walls for terrain.

My battle line looked like this:


Starting at the bottom and working up:
Failed Rat Ogre (Spawn of Slaanesh)
3 Rat Ogres (Minos, und, gr.weapons)
5 cloud runners (chaos furies)
7 Mutated clanrats with 6 packmasters (Beastherd, 7 gors, 6 ungors, full command)
Harbringer of mutation (Lvl 2 bray shaman, d.scroll, bray staff. Spells: Bears anger, beast cower). In with the beastherd.
Rat Cart (beast chariot)
Failed Rat Ogre
5 Giant Rats (Chaos hounds)
4 Rat Ogres behind them.
Temple Structure (this is a league resource. It gives me +1 combat res to any combats within 12" of it.)
6 Giant Rats
Ratspawn w/Doom Glaive (Doombull, undivided, Hvy armor, shield, Hellfire sword)
Ratspawn's Body guard. 5 Rat Ogres with champion, standard.
Failed Rat Ogre
Rat Cart
7 Mutated Clanrats with 6 handlers (beast herd, full command)
Master Moulder (wargor, und, gr.weapon)
Harbringer Setrad (bray shaman, lvl 2, und., Staff of Darkoth, d.scroll, spells: Bears anger, Beasts Cower)
4 Rat Ogres (behind the herd)
5 Giant rats
3 Rat Ogres.

Couple of points of note.
1. I tried out my new beasts movement trays. I made them 5" by 4". So I can rank up 5 wide, which is what I want, or 4 wide, which is minimum. If I have to go wider, I just pull them off to one side. It allows me to move them very fast and they worked great.
2. I ran Ratspawn and body guard 5 wide. Since his 2 main blocks were at least 125 mm wide, that means in a good charge, thats an extra 3 str 6 attacks coming in.
3. The markers you see on the board. There are actually 4 markers. The 2 with skulls and one more in the upper woods with a skull (blocked by tree) were my opponents objectives. He had to claim 2 of those 3. The other marker at the base of the hill was my objective. I had to move the bray shaman in the lower beast herd on top of that marker at the end of the game.

My opponents deployment:


I'm not 100% sure on his magic items. But from bottom to top:
10 skinks javelins and shields
3 Kroxigor
2 salamanders with handler, & skink priest lvl 2. spells: second sign, forked lightning.
10 skinks with blowpipes
20 Temple guard (painted silver. j/k)full command.
2nd Gen slaan. BSB, banner of fear. Not sure what else magic wise. Spells: Death magic. Dark head, Death Dealer, Steal soul, Drain life.
10 skinks with javelin, shields
20 Saurus with full command.
Scar Vet with 1+ armor, sword of might, in saurus block.
3 Kroxigor
10 skinks with blowpipes.

We set up and rolled to see who went first. I won, since he had no long range shooting, I let him go first.

Turn 1a:
The lizardmen surge forward, wanting to stake claim to the objectives early on.
For magic, he had only a couple of spells within range. He throws 5 dice for dark hand of death at my 5 giant rats next to the temple structure. He rolls really high, so I let it go and it kills 1 rat.
He then uses forked lightning but I dispel that.
Shooting is all out of range.

This is what it looked like at the beginning of my turn 1b:


I usually do not charge on turn 1, but I figured, what the hell.
The chariots both charge the skinks in front of them. The 6 giant rats in front of Ratspawn charge the skinks in front of them.
The skinks on the hill flee, both other skinks stand and shoot.
The fleeing skinks run through the salamanders who pass their panic test.
My other 2 chargers are out of range by 1/2", so he stands and shoots. No wounds on the chariot, 1 dead Giant rat.

I then roll for my spawn. 1 moves up by the fence. The one in the middle rolls 16" and hit the skinks who just stood and shot the hounds. So he takes the charge.
I would have let him take it all back, but he didn't seem to mind at all. I need to remember to do compulsory movement before stand and shoots.
Everything else moves up.

In magic, I cast beast cower on the salamanders. with 3 dice I roll 3 1's. :(
I roll an 8, so str x hit and magic ends. He fails to wound me.
No shooting.
In combat, I kill 3 skinks with the spawn. So I win by 2, but with the general within range, he easily passes his break test.

Here was the setup at the beginning for turn 2a:


In the next turn, my opponent makes a bold move. Is it a trap, or folly?

Until next time...

Dresden & Heroes

I have to admit it. This week Dresden files was even better than Heroes. I know I have a hard time believing it, but its true.

Dresden files was really great with the whole Vampire needs a detective to track down who was trying to assassinate her, and then later frame her.

Not a ton of magic, but the story didn't need it. He used magic to get out of some handcuffs. He also used a hockey stick as a wand and fought off the vampire he was working for when she got some drug that makes them go crazy.

Overall really excellent.

Heroes was still good, but not great. It stuck with one story the whole show with flashbacks into HRG's past. He's been working with this group for 15 years. You did learn a couple things.
1. That Hiro's father is a major player in this organization and was the one who told Mr. Bennet (aka HRG) he would take care of Claire.

2. That the invisible man (aka Dr. Who) was HRGs partner for several years until HRG shot him.

3. That HRG really has a disgust for people with abilities. He doesn't even see them as human. Other than Claire, who he loves very much and wants to protect.

4. That Claire can take a ton of damage. shot and killed, regenerates. Burned with a small low level nuke explosion and heals, no biggie. Tough girl. Just because it heals doesn't mean it doesn't hurt when its going on. I'm a bit surprised she was even able to walk after being burnt so badly.

5. In the end, HRG is willing to be shot and have his memory erased to let Claire have a chance to escape with the Haitian.

I guess it was a bit dissapointing in that I had figured out 90% of what he did. It didn't show a whole lot of new stuff, just a few faces I wasn't expecting.

Now the previews... Thats another story. Simone comes back? Another healer, Sylar is being tested by Suresh, Nathan and Nikki are fighting, Hiro gets his sword...
The next few chapters look awesome.

Until next time...

Heroes are done

I got my 3 hero models finished Saturday before my game. I was pretty pleased with the way they came out.

I'll start off with my least favorite, Bray Shamen: Harbringer Sutenrot.


** Remember click on the picture to enlarge it. **

And here is a shot from behind:


The model isn't bad, but I think I've done better.

Now we move on to my Wargor: Master Moulder Grubslob


And here is a shot from behind:


I like this model a lot. First the miniatur looks great. It allows for some real creative choices. I added a banner onto his personal standard to make him a little bit more unique. The banner was all done freehand with a brush. I think it came out pretty nice. I may have a few last minute touchups to do on him.

And finally without further ado. I bring you my last bray shaman. This is the creator of Ratspawn, my namesake and biographer of his adventures.
Master Harbringer of Mutations: Setrad


And a shot from behind:


I really liked the way Setrad came out. I love the way the colors flowed, and the detail in the book came out nice. It helps that the miniature is one of the best Skaven models GW has ever put out.

And a final pic of all 3.


I hope you enjoyed them. They were a ton of fun to paint. And I am so looking forward to seeing them on the table.

Until next time...

ITS MONDAY

Welcome back everyone, I hope you guys all had a great weekend. I sure did.

Painting schedule is right on track.
Things I got accomplished this weekend for the GT:
Finished painting my 3 heroes. Pictures on the way.

Built my 2 spawn. Got them based and primed, ready for painting.
Pictures on the way.

Got in a another League game with my GT army. Battle report with pictures on the way.

Got the wood out for my display board, got it sanded and am working on it.

Watched a couple of cool movies this weekend. Zoom, which is fun, quirky and a little too silly for my taste. (The usual Chevy Chase dry humor that I've never really liked.) And Tim Allen who was great. He had one scene that had me laughing out loud for almost a full minute. My son liked it so much, he took it upstairs and watched it again. Something he almost never does.
If you have kids, and like Chevy Chase and or Tim Allen, I recommend it.

Also watched The Illusionist. When this movie ended both me and my wife said wow. Not the most action packed of movies, but if you like mysteries and intrigue, this movie is great. It makes a great date movie or sit at home with your significant other. You will both enjoy it. We did.

Also of course watched the Dresden files last night. Review coming.

And more importantly, Heroes returns tonight!!

Until next time...

Defended Obstacles: Tactic of the week

Thought I might spend a post talking about Defended Obstacles. They changed quite a bit from last edition. Last edition people needed 6's to hit you if you were behind a defended obstacle. So it was good no matter who charged you.

Not so this edition. This edition there are several units that ignore your obstacle or are even helped by the obstacle. Knowing when to defend it and when not to, can help you.

First lets look at the primary rule on defended obstacles.

"Models charging an enemy behind a defended obstacle do not get any of the bonuses normally associated with a charge and instead fight as if they were already engaged in the combat from a previous turn."

So any chargers lose their right to swing first. This is great if you are a unit of spear elves, or skaven gutter runners with initive 5. But a unit of dwarfs with initiative 2, this does nothing for them unless a unit with great weapons is bearing down on them.

But the more important side of things is the loss of bonuses associated with a charge. This includes things like strength bonuses from lances and spears on cavalry and chariot impact hits. In fact a chariot charging an obstacle takes hits on itself as if it moved through difficult terrain. (I may need to check that, thats coming from my faulty memory. I'm sure you readers will correct me if I'm wrong.)

*** So lets look at units a wall helps most against if he charges you:
Low initiative troops. If his troops are low initiative or have great weapons you get to swing first.

Chariots. Obviously chariots will avoid charging any unit behind a wall. But definetely draw out those frenzied chariots into that charge. Or setup pursuits or overruns into them.

Knights with lances/spears. If a unit of Empire knights run up to you, they are a bunch of strength 3 guys swinging at you.

A Bretonian Lance. With no charge bonuses, this means they do not get the extra attacks from the guys in the back ranks. So only 3 models are attacking you and no lances either. Even their Questing knights are now swinging last. So this helps against any Bret knight lance formation.

***Units that pretty much ignore a defended obstacle. The following units will simply not care that there is an obstacle there and all it is doing is keeping you hemmed in.
Flyers: flyers all ignore walls, etc..

Chaos knights: No charge bonuses, high initiatives, they are going to kill you and the wall definetely will not stop them.

Units that do no wounds and count on static combat res to win combat. So a big block of strength 3 troops with a banner, bsb, warbanner runs up an hits you and does no wounds, they don't care. They have +7 combat res to your 3 or 4.

Any unit not listed in section 1, if you have great weapons.

**** Units that actually helped by you being behind a wall.
Spear/Pike units. Since we are treating it as if the unit did not charge. Then spears and pikes get their full compliment of attacks when they hit you.
Let's say a unit of spear elves with initive 5 hits you. They will probably still swing first but get all 3 ranks attacking you instead of just 2. Pikes with all 4.

*** Other questionable items:
Things like Flails and maces are not really covered. Are flails still considered to have their +2 strength bonus. Its not a charge bonus, its a 1st round of combat thing. The spear rank is a charge thing.

I would say, yes, those items still get their strength bonus the 1st round of combat.

And finally, if a unit charges a unit behind a defended obstacle and wipes it out, does it get to overrun? Is that a charge bonus?? I would think so.

I hope this has been helpful to you.

Until next time...

Rat Beast chariots: A closer look

I had several requests for some better pics of the chariots. So I took 3 of each chariot last night here they are.

Lets start with chariot 1.
This pic gives a nice shot of the driver and warpstone in the chariot. As well as the 2 rats pulling the cart.


**click on images to enlarge**
This next picture is from the backside of the chariot 1. It gives a clear shot of the main passanger area in the chariot.


And finally the last pic of chariot 1 is from up top.



Next up is of chariot 2. This gives you a nice front shot of the Kangoroo Rat and his rider:


The next pic is a rear shot of chariot 2:


And the final shot of chariot 2 is from the right side.

Feel free to click on the pictures to enlarge them. Not sure how well this pics will stand up to that kind of scrutiney. But I hope you enjoy them.

Until next time...

Dresden Files & Heroes

Man, what a 1-2 punch on Sunday and Monday nights.

Dresden files has really gotten away from the conservative, don't show any magic in the first episode. I posted I wanted to see more magic, and those writers must have read my post. They brought it with both barrels blasting in this episode.

Everything from Location spells, to rituals to a Hellion blasting fire out of his hand.
I was a bit skeptical at this show when it started but it has easily become my 2nd favorite show on TV now. Right behind, well you know.

Then Monday night rolls around. Not much to like about Monday until 8 PM, when the groove tube brings you one of the best shows to hit the airwaves in a long, long time. Possibly ever. I'm not sure I've ever watched a TV show I liked more than Heroes.

And Last Monday did not dissapoint. Wow, is all I could say when it was over.
Bring on the new hero who can auto connect to the internet or any computer anywhere. Sweet. Combine her with Nuke man and Matt, the cop who reads minds and you have a nice combo. They are going after HRG (Horned Rim Glasses) Mr. Bennet for answers. Without the Haitian there to protect them, they should get them.

Sylar again shows you what evil looks like and now sounds like. The lady mechanic with super hearing stood no chance as Dr. Suresh took Sylar to see her. But could this super hearing be more than Sylar can handle. Will this be his undoing.

And lets not forget Peter. Man oh man is he coming into his own. If anyone can defeat Sylar, this is your guy. Can turn invisible, has Telekenises, regenerates, flies, has a sonic boom, can read minds. This guy is a walking, or should I say flying, superman.

I hated the final scene, but knew it was coming. How will Isaac handle what he has done? Will Peter exact justice?
What answers will Matt and company exact from HRG?

Next weeks episode looks to be a doozy.

Until next time...

Chariots finished

I got my chariots all finished up on Sunday. So I'm only 2 days behind at this point. I also managed to get my last 2 movement trays built.
I have also started working on my 3 hero characters. I should have them finished by this weekend.

Once I am done with them I can start on the 2 spawn. After that all I have left to do is the movement board, then base, prime, paint and flock the movement trays.

If I get all that done with a couple days to spare, I might even try to add some static grass as well to the whole army.

Anyway, on to the chariots. Not much to say here. I've done a bit on how I built them before.
Chariot 1 has 2 the Plague Lord's Giant rats pulling it. The crossbar is off of a Beastman chariot. The chariot itself is scratch built. The riders are just a Clanrat with spear, and the Beastigor is a Storm Vermin.
And after I finished, there was a big blank spot in the chariot. So I ended up putting their hunk of warpstone.

Chariot 2 is a beast chariot body. In the chariot is another Storm Vermin as the Beastigor. It is pulled by an older Kangaroo Rat with rider. This old miniature was produced by Grenadier, IIRC. I originally had side slots on it like an old horse cart might have, but I didn't like the way they looked and ended up taking them off.
I also considered putting chains on it, but eventually decided against that as well.

First up is a picture of chariot 2 primed. You can see the side boards are still on at this point.


The next is a pic of chariot 1 after I have done the movement base to match the rest of the army. You can also see the large area in front of the storm vermin that looks vacant.


The next pic is after I started inking the miniatures.


To give it a different look than the rest of the model, the chariot body is done in a black wash and then dry brushed with brown.
I also dry brushed the rats with tan and then went back over them with the ink. tan/flesh on the skin. Metal on all the metal parts.


And finally in the last pick you have both chariots finished. You can see the warpstone in chariot 1.
While not as good as the furies or Giant Rats, I'm still very pleased with the way they came out.



I hope you enjoy them.

Until next time...

BR: Summary and Lessons

Wow, what a great battle. Mario and I have played 3 times now and each and every game is a strugle to get any victory points at all. And every year he gets closer and closer to beating me. This year, if not for the big point objective, its a draw in his favor.

There were several clutch spots in the game that really hurt my opponent.
1. Insane courage from that one hound. If he breaks there and overruns, I cannot turn the Rat Ogres and chariot to deal with the Hammerers, I have to worry about the warriors.

2. Killing every last one of the Rat Ogres in the 2nd round of combat in turn 6. If he lets one live, I break, he gets his objective and its a draw.

3. The pursuit that only went 2" in turn 6. If he goes 4" I can't charge him and he wins the game as I don't get my objective, only half points for the hammerers and no points for the general. That 2" pursuit cost him almost 1100 vp. Ouch!

Things I learned.
1. When moving up on shooters, don't screw around, get up there and take them out.

2. When you have the chance to take out the cannon, do it. Don't go chasing off after gyrocopters.

3. Avoid Dwarf Lords if you can. Those guys are just mean as hell.

4. I killed everything but the warriors, 1 unit thunderers, long beards, bsb and runesmith. And I was still down on points. Ouch. And I still had Ratspawns body guard, 2 units of Rat ogres, 2 chariots, both heroes, half a herd and my furies.

5. Keep Ratspawn in the middle. I don't care what the objective is. I need that Ld 9 for both herds.

6. Don't count on dwarfs only overrunning 6-7". And they are nasty on the charge.

7. Keep in mind you can flee now from an overrun. Better to flee, rally and charge him, than let him have the charge.

8. Keep trying to setup those flank and rear charges.

Things I think he could have done to help him win.
1. The Long Beards were trapped in and couldn't get out from behind the Thunderers. I'm sure his plan was when I charged them, and broke, the Long beards would hold me up. I intentionally didn't charge them because of that.

2. I felt his whole right flank (my left) was too unprotected. He needed a block over there and the Long beards would have filled in nicely. Put him on the outer flank and I have to deal with them. Probably holding me up for another turn or 2, while the cannons, thunderers, crossbows and bolt throwers, continue to blast away.

3. Damn I hate cannons. He was dead on, only once missing. Rolled a couple of misfires, but forging let him re-roll those. And he wounded everytime and did 2.5 wounds on average. It was nasty. At least the bolt throwers were really pretty useless. But the volley gun was great. Getting 10 hits 2 times.

4. Keeping his on on the objective. I was keeping count, but he didn't seem to be worry about it. He felt he could never get it, but only because I made a ton of panic checks, that kept him from getting it. Then when he had a chance, he used a re-roll to wipe a unit out instead of just breaking it. Though he did spread the shooting around, which is counter intuitive, trying to break more units.

Well thats all for now. Like I said a simple roll of 5+ on the final puruit would have given him the 500+ point win and I'm trying to figure out what went wrong.

Until next time...

BR: Dwarfs vs Chaos Beasts part 3

So heading into turn 4. I have done nothing, while he has whittled down over 1/3 of my forces. My general is almost dead suffering 3 of 4 wounds from a cannon shot. And one herd is chasing after a gyrocopter on the back side of my field.

Turn 4a: Charge. His Hammerers and general charge the hounds.
His warriors with runesmith and BSB charge my other hounds.
Now when I originally put them there, I was planning on fleeing. What got into me to hold, I'm not sure. But hold I did. With both.
His Gyro rallies and moves up by my chariot.

Cannon shot, at my general. After first roll he is 3" away. Rolls for bounce and he rolls a 2. Ratspawn is saved for one more turn.
2nd Cannon does grapeshot into R5. Hits 1, partial on 2nd. Hit. Rolls, strength 10. Kills 1, I have 2 wounds on the 2nd. Down to 2 Rat Ogres there.

Organ gun fires into unit R-3 with 2 Rat Ogres in it and rolls 10 hits. Totally wiped out. This forced a couple of tense panic checks. R-2 rolls a 11, but re-rolls an 8. B-2 rolls and gets a 7. Whew.

Rest of shooting doesn't do a whole lot.
In combat, With the BSB, Runesmith and 3 dwarfs, they only manage 3 wounds. So 1 hound left. Ouch. I roll my break test. Snake Eyes!! I manage the Insane courage and at an awesome time.

In the 2nd combat, with his Lord and Hammerers, he again only manages 3 wounds and leaves 1 hound. Ugghhh!!! I wanted him to kill them all. I need insane courage again, but fail. The lone hound breaks. I measure and I'm exactly 6" from Ratspawn to the hound. I thought I was a bit further back. I make my panic test. The lone hound flees.
The Hammerers, pursue and roll a 9. So 8" purusuit is just enough to hit Ratspawns unit. Ugghhh!!! I really needed to get the charge here.

Here was the setup at the end of turn 4a:


With the hounds fleeing, his magic number is at 2 out of 8.

Turn 4b: I know Ratspawn is in trouble, but there is little I can do to save him. His Hammerer unit is barely out of charge arc of R2. If he rolls only 7" last turn, I can charge with both. Now, neither. Oh well.
CHARGE!!! R5 into cannon crew.
R4 into Crossbows.
Herd into Bolt thrower.
Furies into Cannon 1.
Rolled unruley and Beastherd 1 moved as fast as it could to the gyro.
The spawn surges towards the thunderers.
Ratspawns body guard moves to the right away from the overrun path of the hammerers.
R2 and C2, do not have to worry about the Warriors, so I turn and head towards the Hammerers.

The Cannon 2 crew fails its fear test and runs off the board. R5 hits the Crossbows instead.
The crossbows stand and shoot at R4 and do nothing.
In combat I kill off 6 of the Crossbows. They break, run and are caught in the direction of the bolt thrower. R4 pursues and hits the bolt thrower crew in combat with the beastherd.
We kill 2 of the crew who whiff back. Outnumbered by fearcausers, they flee towards the table edge, the herd pursues and hits the thunderers.
The warriors wipe out the last hound they are facing.

The furies kill off 2 cannon crew, they break and are off the table. Furies try to restrain but fail and off after them.

Finally the big battle. To keep his general from just slicing and dicing my Rat Ogres, on top of killing Ratspawn, I challenge. And hope for some serious whiffage.
I don't get it it.
General does around 11 wounds to me, so gets his kill and 5 overkill.
The Hammerers, who couldn't kill 4 hounds, commence to knock out 5 wounds on my Rat Ogres, killing 2. The last one flees, runs 5" and is caught.

Rat Ogres 2, make their panic check. Chariot 2 makes its panic check.
But Ratspawns body guard roll a 10 and then an 11 and head for the board edge.

With these 2 units breaking, this brings his magic number up to 4.
Here is the setup at the end of turn 4:


Remember these diagrams are crude and not always to exact scale.

The General with Hammerers, charge the chariot. It is very close to the 6". He will have to wheel an inch or 2 to get around the difficult terrain, but I think he can make it. This would mean disaster as he would easily break it and pursue into my herd and well away from my Rat Ogres and chariot.
So the chariot flees. It splits the gap between the gyro and herd, but actually hits both.
So impact hits on both units. My herd suffers 2 wounds out of 8, and they panic and flee.
The gyro suffers its last wound and crashes to the ground.

The Hammerers and general are now in great shape for me.

The Warriors are out of charge range and so move up.
The bolt thrower has no target and moves as do the Longbeards.
The Volley gun does 4 hits on Rat Ogre unit 4 killing 1 and knocking the other down to its final wound.
The thunderers blow the spawn back to hell from which it came.
(according to the dwarfs).

In combat the Herd kills off 4, while the thunderers kill none. I win by 6. So needing a 3 not to break. He rolls it!! Ugghhh!!

With the chariot and herd running, this brought his magic number up to 6. He only needs 2 more units to go.

So this is the setup at the end of turn 5a:


I knew this was the critical turn here.
Charges: Lone Rat Ogre 4 into flank of Thunderers 2.
Rat Ogres 2, into rear of hammerers
Chariot 2 into flank of hammerers.

Rallies:
Chariot 1 rallies.
Beastherd 1 rallies.

Then the big one.
Rat Spawns body guard rolls an 11. Ugghhhh!!! I use a League Resource I have and re-roll it. I make the 8 and they reform. Whew!!
Furies fly on and land behind the thunderers.

In combat, the herd kills 4 more thunderers, who whiff back. The last 2 are outnumbered by fear causers and break off the table.
I need the herd for turn 6, but not the lone Rat Ogre. I let him pursue off also.
The herd restrains.

Then the big one. Impact hits. I need a 6. I get a 1!?! So only 2 impact hits. Here my opponent found out his armor did not get the +1 for flank or rear. So his 4+ did not become 3+. Between the chariot and Rat Ogres in the rear, he looses 9 Hammerers, leaving only 5 + the general.
But immune to fear and terror, and stubborn 10, he easily stays.

Here was the setup at the end of turn 5:


Turn 6a: The Dwarfs are a bit frustrated from having no charges and not being able to turn around in combat. But they fight on.
The warriors turn to face to the Rat Ogre 5 unit. The Long beards turn to face the furies.
The volley gun gets off 10 shots on the herd. OUCH!! When the dust cleared only the Wargor was standing. With the panic test he rolls a 10. But without the herd, his undivided mark is useful now and he gets to re-roll it. He rolls a 6 and sticks around.
Bolt thrower misses.

Not sure about thethunderers. To be honest, I think my opponent may have forgotten to shoot them. Either that, or they did really bad.

Combat: The general turns and with a whiff of his blade, he only kills 1. He uses his league resource to reroll and kills off 2 of the Rat Ogres. My chariot then whiffs horribly doing 0 wounds. And finally, his hammers with 5 attacks do three wounds and kill off the rest of the Rat Ogres.
Losing by a ton, the chariot flees 10".

The general's unit just needs an average roll of pursuit to get out of harms way. Rolls a 2!!! Whoohoo!!! This gives me one last chance.

With the chariot fleeing, his magic number is up to 7 out of 8. He really needed to not wipe out the whole herd or the whole Rat Ogre unit.

Here is the setup after turn 6a:


Turn 6b: I looked down at the field. He still had all 3 blocks, all 3 characters and 2 of his warmachines left. He was short on his objective by 1. So I had to be careful not to give him the last unit fleeing. But by the same token, I had not picked up my objective either. His general did not have a wound on him. Was still immune to fear and was stubborn 10.

I had one hope, run in with my body guard and kill off the hammerers, completely to a man. Then hope the general doesn't open a can of whoopass on me.
So into the breach they go.

My wargor and Rat Ogres 5 into the volley gun.

I could have gone after the runesmith and bsb, but I figured, even if I managed to kill them both, I'd lose combat break and run and give him his objective.

The furies started to charge the thunderers, but there was a slim crack between the thunderers and longbeards and I could see the bolt thrower. So the 5 furies charged them instead.

Everyone holds.

My chariot rallies, and the rest of my stuff moves to make sure its out of panic range.

I do the Organ gun combat first and kill all 3 crewmen. The Rat Ogres cannot pursue, but the wargor can. He overruns 10" and just misses the bolt thrower crew.

In the bolt thower combat, I kill 1. He kills 1 fury. I still outnumber him 4 to 3. So needs insane courage and fails.

Finally, the last big combat:
He uses his league resource and makes his unit have hatred. ugghhh!! But I still get to swing first. I cannot waste any shots at the general. Everything on the Hammerers. 13 attacks, 4+ to hit. 7 hits!!! Whoohoo!!!
Then 6 wounds!!!! No save. Yes, my dice finally did not screw me in the end.

But now his generals attacks. 4 attacks, 2 hits, 2 misses. Rerolls, 1 more hit. So 3 hits total.
Rolls to wound. only 1!!!!! Whoohoo!!!

Wait, he uses a league resource to re-roll it.!!??? I didn't question it at the time, but I think he had used this resource back in turn 5 to re-roll the wounds in that combat. So watch that Mario. (Maybe I'm wrong, but don't think so.)

So 3 hits, he rolls to wound all 3 wound. Ugghhhh!!!
Each one now does a d6 wounds. He rolls, a 6, a 2 and a 1. So only kills 2 guys as the 6 is capped down to a 3.

So he did 6 wounds, but I did 5, have a banner, unit strength and the rear. I win and he is now subject to fear. He needs insane courage and fails it!!!

Finally, time to add up the points.

I had killed 1337 points of troops.
He had killed 1465 points of troos.

Bonus point time.
He had +100 for my general, no banners and -200 for missing the objective, by 1.

I got +100 for the Hammerers banner, +100 for the general, +400 for completing my objective.

Final score:
Dwarfs: 1365
Glorius Ratspawn: 1937

So a win for Ratspawn and the Rat Ogre horde.

I hope you enjoyed it.
Final thoughts and recap, coming soon.

Until next time...

BR: Dwarfs vs Chaos Beasts part 2

The first 3 turns were pretty much a blur, but I'll try to recant as much as I remember.

Turn 1a: The gyro coptor flies onto the hill, behind the 2nd level.
Shooting, A cannon shot kills off a couple hounds in H2. Rat Ogres take wounds left and right.

Turn 1b: Everything moves up. Furies fly over the Rocky ridge, ready to charge the cannon #1 next turn.
Chariot 2, goes to the right of the scree. Spawns move up. One into the gap between the hill and scree blocking traffic. The other up on the hill.

Turn 2a: More things have range now. Cannons shoot, killing more Rat Ogres (Minotaurs) and Rat spawn losses one of his body guards.
He flies his Gyro coptor right by the furies and fires, killing 2.
His Thunderers 2, kill off 4 of the 5 hounds in H3. The last one panics and runs. If he kills off the last one, I have to make about 3 panic tests. So I was happy with this result. But his magic number is at 1 out of 8.

Turn 2b: Furies have a choice. Charge the cannon, or the gyro. I should have stuck to my plan and charged the cannon. But like an idiot I charge the gyro. It was only 1" away and I knew he couldn't flee, or he was dead. If he stands, I can kill it outright, or catch it in the pursuit.
Everything else moves up.
Hounds were in the way of Spawn 1, and it gets stuck on the hill.
Beastherd 1, moves up over the hill.
I felt like they needed Ratspawns Leadership, I move him out of his body guard and joins R1.
In combat, I whiff with the furies. He does 1 wound, but I make the ward save.
He losses by 1 and needs insane courage. Nope. I pursue. He goes 17"!! I got 10. Damn.

Turn 3a: Gyro rallies, but cannot move.
Cannon shot from C1, directly at Ratspawn. Ugghhh. Direct hit. Well it was actually on the back side of him. But the line goes right to his gyrocopter, if he gets a 10" bounce. He rolls, 10". Wounds both. Ratspawn takes 3 wounds!! Gyro takes 2.
Organ gun takes aim at my spawn 2 and does 4 hits. Needing 4+ to wound, he gets 3 wounds and its dead.
More Rat Ogres die or take wounds.
Bolt thrower bounces off other spawn.
I make some critical panic checks.
As it turns out, my Beastherd 1, needed Ratspawns Ld 9 to pass.

Turn 3b: Beastherd 1 fails its unruley check. I measure it and the gyro behind it, is the closest unit and is barely in charge range. Declare the charge.
So the spawn 1 moves off to the right. Furies move over there as well.
I move the 2 hounds right in front of his warmachines. I wish I had angled them, but didn't.
Moved up Ratspawn and company about 8-9" behind the hounds.
Moved everything else up to in charge range as best possible.
The Gyro flees the charge. 14" takes it off the board. He rolls 13". Ugghh!!

Here was the basic setup at the end of my turn 3.


His army was intact except the fleeing Gyro had 2 wounds on it.

My army was beat to hell though.
S1: had 1 wound on it.
F: Furies were down to 6.
R1: 2 wounds on 1 Rat Ogre, Ratspawn had 1 wound left.
RS: The body guard was down to 4 Rat Ogres, but all were healthy.
H1: The hounds had 4 left.
B1: Was down to 7 plus the hero.
R2: Still had all 3 Rat Ogres, but 1 down to its last wound.
H2: Was down to 4 hounds.
R3: Was down to 2 Rat Ogres and one had 2 wounds on him.
B2: Was down to 8 + the hero.
R4: Was down to 2 Rat Ogres and 1 had 2 wounds on him.
R5: Was down to 3 Rat Ogres and 1 had 1 wound on him.

So all of my units except the chariots were a bit beat up. But was ready to charge. I just had to live through this round of firing.

The Exciting conclusion coming soon.

Until next time...

BR: Dwarfs vs Chaos Beasts part 1

Ratspawn looked out at the Dwarf troops camped across the valley. They looked small to him. But there was no doubting the armor they wore. It sparkled in the sunlight. And their many warmachines also gleamed in the early dawn.
The cloudrunners landed just a few paces behind Ratspawn.

The news wasn't good. There was no clear way around the dwarfs out of the mountain area, and the battlefield would definetely favor the Stunties.

The cloud runners sketched out the battlefield. Yes, this Dwarf general was not dumb. Any path towards the Dwarfs would lead to bottlenecks where their cannons would rip them up. But one side definetely set up a natural defensive position for the short ones. Ratspawn knew he could not let him take that side of the battlefield. Luckily the cloud runners gave him good knowledge of the Lay of the Land.

Ratspawn called for a fast march and they took to the battlefield. At least once we get through the bottlenecks the field was pretty open, where their speed could be used.

**********************
My opponent and I laid out the battlefield and setup. It was a mess of a table top. With 6 pieces of terrain and the majority setup in the middle, only small gaps between them. This totally disrupted my plans and formations.

Here is a rough pic of what the battlefield looked like after setup:



Terrain: Far right is a Rocky Ridge in the middle. It blocks line of sight and is impassable.
Up at the top the large black hole is a ravine. Does not block LOS and is impassable.
In the middle is a 2 layer hill. Bottom layer is normal hill. Top section, is difficult terrain. The red bars are impassable.
The brown area with grey circles is an area of scree. Does not block LoS, difficult.
The 2 bright green areas are woods.

Dwarfs: Going Right to left: C1: Cannon with Rune of Forging
G: Gyrocoptor
T1: 10 Thunderers
LB: 15 Long Beards, full command, Rune of courage
B1: Bolt thrower, Engineer
H: 14 Hammerers, Full command, Rune Battle
w/Lord Runes Smiting, cleaving, stone, 2xIron

W: 18 Warriors, full command
w/Thane BSB, rune of battle, courage, determination
w/Runesmith, shield, 3x Rune spellbreaking

V: Organ Gun
T2: 10 Thunderers
B2: Bolt Thrower, Engineer, Rune of Penetrating
XB: 10 Quarellers
C2: Cannon with Forging, Burning

Beast Troops of Goodness and Light: Right to left: C1: Beast Chariot
F: Furies (cloud runners)
RS: Rat Spawn and body guard. Ratspawn, DB, und,w/ Hvy Armor, shield, Hellfire sword
Body guard: 5 Minotaurs und (Rat Ogres), champ, standard, great weapons
H1: 5 Chaos hounds (Giant Rats)
R1: 3 Minotaurs, und, gr.weapons (Rat Ogres)
S1: 1 Spawn of Slaanesh
B1: Beastherd: 7 Gors, 6 ungors, full command
w/Wargor, chaos armor, great weapon
H2: 6 Chaos hounds
R2: 3 Minotaurs, und, gr.weapons
S2: Spawn of Slaanesh
C2: Beast Chariot
H3: 5 Chaos hounds
R3: 3 Minotaurs, und, gr.weapons
B2: Beastherd: 7 Gors, 6 ungors, full command
w/Wargor, Armor of Damnation, great weapon
R4: 4 Minotaurs, und, gr.weapons
R5: 4 Minotaurs, und, gr.weapons

We rolled and found out we had 1 objective that was worth 600 vp!! (+400 to get it, -200 if you fail) and table quarters do not count.
My objective, kill a wizard. Since he had none, I roll and get, Kill the general. Great. His guy was tough and I'd have a damn hard time, doing this one.

His objective, Rout. He had to get half of my units fleeing at some point in the game. Since I had 16 units, he had to have 8 of them run.

We rolled off to see who went first and he won. He chose to go first. I didn't mind, since I also would have let him go first. If I could get his general to run, on turn 6 I didn't want him to have a chance to rally. And 70% of his shooting was out of range on turn 1.

**********************
I took the side I did because I felt if he took my table side, he could deploy everything to the right and I'd have only 2 paths into his area. A prospect I wasn't real fond of.

But from this side, I could fit through the gaps without too much interferance.
I wanted to put Ratspawns unit in the middle. But knew if I was going to kill his general I really needed Ratspawn to charge his general and I'd have 1 shot at it.

I really felt like my opponent made a mistake with the Long beards. I felt he should have put them on the left flank for a little protection there, for all his shooty stuff.

Until next time...

Battle Report Tease

All I can say is WOW!! Mario and I had a great game last night. The Dwarf Semi-Gun line with 3 powerful blocks and 6 warmachines vs the Rat Ogre Horde racing across the field. Felt like the Normandy invasion. So much blood, so much death.

Dice were tossed, resources used, both Counter resources were used. This was one exciting game. And it all came down to 2 to 3 dice rolls.

Winner is probably in the playoffs, loser still possibly in, but chances diminish. Draw doesn't help either of us.

Mario, again Fantastic game last night.

Sorry I didn't get pictures, I really wish I did. They would have told the story so much better.

Until next Time...

And Time Marches On...

Today marks three weeks till BB-day. (That would be Bayou Battles GT day for those uninformed masses out there.)

Only 3 more weeks to finish up and get ready to go.

A mere 21 days and counting.

With 21 days left to go, lets take a look at my schedule so far:
Feb 1-7: Paint furies (DONE)
Feb 3: Flock all Rat Ogres, Giant Rats & Beast herds. Clear coat everything. (DONE)
Feb 4: Complete, Base and prime chariots. (DONE)
Feb 8-11: Paint chariot 1. (DONE)
Feb 10: Base and prime characters (DONE)
Feb 11: Pay for Boyou GT (DONE)
Feb 12-15: Paint Chariot 2.
Feb 16-21: Paint 3 characters.
Feb 17-18: Build 2 spawn.
Feb 22-27: Paint 2 spawn.
Feb 24: Turn in Army list to Boyou GT.
Feb 24-25: Build display board.
Feb 25-Mar 3: Base, prime and paint movement trays.
Mar 3-8: Finish anything not done. Final touchups.
Mar 9: Pack and head to Houston.

I am almost done with my Chariot 2. I have 1 day left of painting on it to be finished. But because of my battle tonight, it will have to wait until tomorrow to finish. I might be able to start on my 3 characters tomorrow as well, meaning I'm only 1-2 days behind right now.

I just made a trade for 2 Chaos spawns, so I won't be able to build them over the weekend. Instead I'll wait until next weekend to do them after I'm done painting the characters. I'm going to build my last 2 movement trays and measure out what size display board I need to make.

so revised schedule looks like:
Feb 13-17: Paint Chariot 2.
Feb 17-18: Build last 2 movement trays for beastherds.
Feb 17-22: Paint 3 characters.
Feb 23-24: Build 2 spawn.
Feb 24: Turn in Army list to Boyou GT.
Feb 25-28: Paint 2 spawn.
Feb 25: Practice GT game. League game, I'm taking my GT army to.
Mar 1-5: Base, prime, paint, flock and coat movement trays.
Mar 3-4: Build display board.
Mar 6-8: Finish anything not done. Final touchups.
Mar 9: Pack and head to Houston.

With the 2 spawn in the mail on their way to me, I feel a lot more confident with this schedule and I think I will finish in plenty of time.
I still have 2 more League games to play between now and the 9th besides the one tonight. Playing one on the 25th. Try to get in the other on 3rd or 4th of March.

But things are looking good. After the chariot I'm down to just 5 models. Piece of cake. ;-)

Until next time...

There will be Battle Tonight

Setrad crawled out from under his furs. The chill air in the morning was very cold and he wanted nothing more than to crawl back under the warmth the furs provided. Setrad didn't like the Mountains. Ratspawn had led them up here, away from the troubles that the man-things brought with them. But more trouble had lay in wait.

Stunty beard-things had challenged Ratspawns right to travel these lands. Ratspawn had swept them away with a wave of his hands. The Dwarf-things had screamed and yelled, but in the end, they were good eating, and we did feast.

We had travelled deeper into the Mountains and set up camp only two days when we were attacked. Tracked by the evil of the council of 13. It was Kreeklaw's Skruten Raiders again. They had attacked us almost 9 months ago. Backed by Clan Skryre previously, Ratspawn and his Rat Ogres were victorious. But this time, Kreeklaw did not rely on the random machines of the Skryre clan. Instead he was relying on the force of the horde. Hundreds of skaven skittered around in front of us. It was difficult to come to grips with them.
Ratspawn had announced that Kreeklaw must die. Anything else was unacceptable.
The battle had been long and bloody. As night began to fall, we gathered our wounded and left the field. Loosses on both sides had been great. The battle was very even, but Kreeklaw had lived. Ratspawn, took the news hard. The messenger died quickly in the maw of the great Ratspawn.

To Ratspawn this was a defeat. We had failed to do the one thing he had wanted us to accomplish. All he kept saying was that we would have to fight again. Kreeklaw was working for the council, this much we knew. He would regather his forces and track us again. So Ratspawn ordered us out of the mountains.

As we turned to go, the dwarf-things showed up again. Blocking our retreat, their anvil struck loud and clear. The clash was again bloody and many fine Rat Ogres fell that day. Ratspawn even made a strategic withdrawl, but in the end, the Rat Ogres held firm. And neither side seem to have the upper hand at the end of the day.

When the dwarf-things withdrew back into their stronghold, we moved on down the mountain. It was not far now to make it back to the fields and grasslands, where we had called home. It has been a month now since we had left. But at the base of the mountain, more dwarf things. They were blocking our way, and there was no way around it. They did not want us to leave this mountain.

Ratspawn called a halt to our march and we rested for the night. He has drawn up his battle plans, but has yet to share them with me. I can see him standing amongst the Rat Ogres that follow him so blidly. Faith I use to have in him. As he stretches, he easily stands 13 big paws, high and towers over the Rat Ogres. I barely reach to his knees by comparison.

But I am not blind, I have seen doubt coursing through the army of late. While once we seemed almost invincible, lately, we have been anything but. I check my equipment and walk up the path to where he is. There will be battle tonight.

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

As mentioned, I am having another battle tonight. My 5th League game. Against another Dwarf player. This is 3 dwarf armies in 4 battles. Well at least I'll have them play tested well.

Should have a Battle Report next week. Uggh, I just realized I forgot my camera. So no pics. Sorry.

HEROES

Time for this week's Heroes recap. Sorry I didn't get to this earlier this week.

This weeks was a very limited episode in the number of characters involved. But still excellent none the less.

Hiro and Ando are looking for Hope, when they find her. Unfortunately for Ando, she is a thief who locks Hiro up in a closet and Ando is led astray. I loved the way Ando kept throwing Hiro's sayings back at him. But Hiro's gut was right. This was something they should have stayed away from.
Hiro needs Ando, but at the same time, Ando gets them into more trouble.

Then the confusing one. Claire goes back to see her real mom after her step dad, HRG, figures out she was not at the Aquariame that day. She wants to meet her real dad, but her mom kind of steps between them and keeps this from happening. Telling the other they don't want to meet. Clair did get a look at him, so she knows what he looks like. I'm sure they will meet in the future.
Her mom is going to just grab the $100,000 of hush money and head back to Mexico to lay on the beach and drink. Notice how she offered Clair half of the $50K. She is a peach alright. Good riddence, and lets get Claire and Nathan together.

Dr. Suresh goes to meet a new mutant only to arrive after Sylar has already killed him and taken his power. The ability to melt items with a touch. Oh man, this guy is scary. What prison could possibly hold this guy now? And he offers to help Suresh find more mutants. Oh this just gets better and better.
But I think Suresh can sense something is wrong. He just can't put his finger on it. And unfortunately I don't think the DNA sample is going to help him either.

Finally the big story. Niki, or should I say Jessica, has struck a deal with Linderman. Who the heck is this guy? I hope they show him before the season is out.
She has become a professional hit man for him. And her target. Lindermans ex-employee. This guy picked up the 2 million from DL and then decided to keep it. He was also the one in the prison who let Nikki out of jail. Well he betrayed Linderman and stole the 2 million. He hired Matt, the cop, to be a body guard while he exchanges the money for diamonds to get out of the country.
Nikki is hired to take him out but first she has to take out Matt. Matt can read her thoughts and knows when she is about to strike. He gets behind her and makes her drop her gun. He handcuffs her to the stairwell and wants to know where Nikki is.

So did he really hear Nikki talking, or just read Nikki's mind inside of Jessica. Ugghhh, it makes my head hurt. Either way, he leaves Jessica alone to go protect his client. It didn't take long for Jessica to show up and just throw him out the window. Lucky he landed on a sign, or he was dead. When he got back in, the body was folded in half. Ouch. But they never found the diamonds.
Matt remembers his client repeating something in his mind that led Matt to the hidden diamonds. Just as he was about to turn them in, he could hear the detective saying Matt would never be a cop again.

So he pockets the diamonds and heads out. WOW!! Matt the cop turned bad guy?? Say it isn't so. This definetely crossed the line from Good to Neutral at least.

Well that was all the headlines.
Next week looks great as well.

if you haven't seen them, I think you can go to their website and download them
here.

Until next time...

A review of the building rules

One of the newest rules in the 7th ed book were new and useable building rules.

They are actually very simple, but people either are not reading them, or not using them, when they should.

Are their still questions with certain aspects of the rules? Sure, but all in all, they are pretty well done.

1. Only infantry models may enter a building. This is described as anything on 2 legs on a 20, 25 or 40 mm base. This does exclude skaven weapon teams, which is pretty silly. But true.

2. To enter the building you may not march, but only 1 model must reach the building for the unit to enter.

3. Max size of the unit must not be higher than US 30. US 30+ may assault the building, but not enter it. Cavalry models may not enter or assault the buildings.

4. Inside the building up to US 5 models may shoot out for each level of the building.

5. If you are inside the building you may not march or charge out of the building.

6. Any missile weapons that shoot at you are either -3 to hit you, -2 for Ogre sized models. Or only do d6 hits max. So a ratling gun, d6 hits max. Cannon, stone thrower, Spells with templates, etc.. all do d6 hits max.

7. 1 unit may assault a building if a unit is inside. If the unit flees, then it is moved outside the building and flees. The assaulting unit will fail its charge. It will either move 1/2 distance, or if half distance will touch the building, I'm assuming it can occuppy the building if it wishes, or stop 1" outside the building.

8. If engaged in an assault. Up to US 10 on each side may fight. So 10 infantry or 3 Ogres may fight. A single model may be targeted by up to US 5 in models. So 5 infantry may attack a single wizard.
NOTE: Don't put wizards in buildings.
Or only 1 Ogre could.
NOTE: Wizards in building are ok as long as only Ogres may assault it.

9. When counting up combat resolution, use wounds only. No banners, warbanners, bsbs, ranks, unit strength, bloodlines, virtues, nothing, zilch, nadda, zip. The only thing that counts are wounds done. And then if it is a draw, count musicians.
Ogre types with great weapons will love assaulting or being assaulted in a building. But nothing beats ethereal troops. Banshees should camp out in them. Barring a magic weapon, they can only lose by max of 1, if the opponent has a musician.
Spirit hosts should also do really well inside of buildings.

Note: Never assault a spirit host or banshee camping out in a building unless you have magic weapons or at least a musician. It is suicide.

10. If the unit inside the building loses, they take a break test as normal. If failed they are put outside the building and flee. The assaulting unit, may not pursue, but either stay where they are, or may enter the building. Since you did not pursue, you do not capture their standard, if they had one.

11. If the assaulting unit losses, or it is a draw, the assaulting unit moves 1" back and the assault is ended. You do not take a break test. And while it does not say it, I would assume you also do not take instability tests or crumble.

Thats about it. Buildings should be where small units of archers park themselves to shoot out of. A few units can assault it, but without some killing power you are not going to drive anyone out of a building.

Until next time...

Giving in

After much torment today, I have decided to just give in. I think I could probably do a decent job on some sculpted Spawn, if I had more time.

But considering the severe lack of time and this being my first shot at it, I think its best if I buy a couple and modify them to my whim.
I could spend 20+ hours trying to sculpt these guys, but that time is probably better spent on painting, a movement board and with the wife and kid.

Maybe I'll try my hand and sculpting after this is over when I have more time to mess with it.

So now off to round up two Chaos spawn.

Until next time...

Wild Dreams

In my youth I had many very wild, very vivid dreams. Some of them still stick with me today. But last night I had a very weird dream that I decided to share.

*****
I had to have a face transplant done. If I didn't I would die. The only donor was a young black female and the doctors working on me were from the TV shows of ER and Grey's Anatomy. Very strange.

But while they were operating on me, I was able to Astraly Project myself and travel.
I was at a hotel where a party was being held and ran into Paris Hilton. She cried on my shoulder and complained everyone thought she was a slut. I assured her, that it didn't really matter, because she was still Paris Hilton. She perked up and went off into the party.

I lost her in the crowd and eventually I left the party. Outside in the hotel lobby I ran into Brett Amundson. President of our local gaming group the DAWGS. And painter extrodanaire.
In the dream I asked Brett for help as I was about to embark on trying to build my 2 spawn out of a lot of green stuff, Rat Ogre and Tyranid parts. He told me in the dream to give it up and not even try.
**********

That was pretty much the end of the dream and it has me thinking perhaps I shouldn't attempt to try any sculpting work with only 3 weeks to go. That maybe just buying a couple of spawn and painting them is the proper course of action here. The newest spawn I think look awesome, and 2 of them, painted in the same paint scheme as the rest of the army would look pretty cool.

I think the face transplant is me changing my mind on this project or having doubts. Paris I think was a sign saying, no matter what I do, it doesn't really matter, because I'm Ben Burns and I'll do fine whether the spawn look like crap or not.
And Brett was there to say, no matter how good I do them, it wouldn't be as good as he could have done.

So what do you guys think, give it a try, or simply buy 2 spawn. Remember I do only have 3 weeks to go and still have quite a bit of painting to go.

Though I did get the 2nd chariot off to a good start yesterday.

Until next time...