Search This Blog

Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Heralds of Ruin Kill Team Fully Painted

I sat down for a couple of hours and knocked out the last couple of models for my 250 point kill team.  I think the Apothecary needs a little more detail work, but I can knock that out later.  I really just needed to get everything to the 90%+ stage for table play.

I definitely need to do squad markings on the shoulder pads.



Monday, January 30, 2017

Wrath of Kings - Nasier

Two of my friends evidently bought into Wrath of Kings a bit ago, but never actually started playing.  I'm not sure how it came up in conversation, but I ended up going to their website and checking out the rules.  All of the rules, missions and unit cards are freely downloadable, which is a nice change of pace.

The Starter Set are normally $70 USD, which is a bit expensive for an impulse purchase/new game.  Enter eBay, stage right.  I was able to pick up a Starter for $29.  If the game is as fun as it looks, it'll be another $50 or so to flesh the army out to a full sized army.  I found the Nasier faction models to be the most appealing.


The Starter comes with a Longhorn and a Rathor (the bigger guy).  These are the Specialists of the army.  These are both Rank 1 models.  More on that in a bit.  These are kind of like Elites or Solos from other games.


The Starter also comes with 12x Ashmen Swordsmen in three sculpts (4x of each) and an Ashmen Hakar.  The Swordsmen are Rank 1 Infantry and the Hakar is a Rank 1 Leader.  I really dig the masks with the big horns.


Lastly, the box comes with 12x Pelegarth Bloodmasks and a Pelegarth Howl (the one with the horns).  Again, the Bloodmasks are Rank 1 Infantry and the Howl is a Rank 1 Leader.


All together, the Starter comes with 2x Rank 1 Leaders, 24x Rank 1 Infantry and 2x Rank 1 Specialists.  The game itself recommends three sizes, with the largest being marked as the standard size.  When building a list, 2x Rank 1's of a specific type can be swapped for a Rank 2 of the same type.  So, you could swap 2x Rank 1 Infantry for a single Rank 2 Infantry.  Same for Specialists and Leaders.

The game sizes are...

PATROL
  • 2x Rank 1 Leaders
  • 12x Rank 1 Infantry
  • 2x Rank 1 Specialists
SKIRMISH
  • 3x Rank 1 Leaders
  • 18x Rank 1 Infantry
  • 2x Rank 1 Specialists
  • Pick two of (3x Rank 1 Infantry OR 1x Rank 1 Specialist)
BATTLE
  • 5x Rank 1 Leaders
  • 24x Rank 1 Infantry
  • 4x Rank 1 Specialists
  • Pick four of (3x Rank 1 Infantry OR 1x Rank 1 Specialist)
As you can see, the Starter can do Patrol and only needs a single extra Rank 1 Leader to do Skirmish.  You'd need a couple of boxes to upgrade to Battle.  Picking up some Rank 2 models limits the actual number of models you'd need.  By maxing out Rank 1 Infantry, the most models you'd ever need tops out at 45.  Maxing out Rank 2 models gets you closer to 23 or so.

Hopefully the Starter set will show up soon.  I'm anxious to see the models.


Friday, January 27, 2017

Wow... new God in 40k...

I bought a copy of the Gathering Storm: Fall of Cadia, but haven't had a chance to fully read through it yet.  My understanding is that Cadia is somewhat destroyed and everyone escapes into a Webway portal at the very end with the help of some odd looking Eldar.

Well, we have some pictures of those Eldar...

This is Yvraine, Emissary of Ynnead.  I'm assuming that she's some sort of high priestess of the new death god.  She's obviously a psyker as the cat only hangs out with psykers.  It's a slick looking model.


This dude is The Visarch, Sword of Ynnead.  I'm guessing that he's the "Chosen" warrior type guy who protects Yvraine OR controls the mortal Eldar who are dedicated to fighting for Ynnead.  The model is a little static.  I feel like his one arm should be pointing or something.


This is The Yncarne, Avatar of Ynnead.  This dude looks VERY much like a Slaaneshi model, which makes sense as Slaanesh is an Eldar thing.  I don't know the full story, but I think Ynnead is intended to protect the Eldar's souls and possibly kill Slaanesh in the process.


These models make me very optimistic about the Gathering Storm Part 2: Fracture of Biel-Tan story.  Biel-Tan is known for having lots of Wraith contructs, which also means they have lots of soul stones.  I'm assuming that these stones power Ynnead's birth.  After all, in the model, those are Eldar soul stones swirling in the blue stuff.


Thursday, January 26, 2017

Kill Teams "Mega Battle"

My Kill Teams group got together and did something a little different.  We played a game with three of our teams, the Imperial Fists, the Iron Warriors and a group of Imperial Guard, versus 600 points of Tau Empire.  The Tau Empire consisted entirely of a Commander, three Crisis Suits and a Riptide.  It was a fun battle.  The Tau side ultimately won, but was only had the Riptide with a handful of wounds remaining.  Everything else died.

The gaming board was pretty nice.  We played at Showcase Comics in Swarthmore, PA.  They have an amazing assortment of terrain that can be used for a variety of games.


We went with a sort of "gutted out NYC" vibe, complete with Central Park!


This Imperial Fists Centurion was one of the stars of the game.  His Heavy Bolter fire took out one of the Crisis Suits and damaged several others, including the Commander.  The Iron Warriors Siege Tyrant Master was one of the other stars.  Never underestimate Marines with massive weapon systems.


The lowly Guardsmen did a great job of slowly moving across the board and drawing fire.  Unfortunately, I don't think their Lasguns did much in the way of damage.


This is where we learned not to bunch up when a Riptide with a S8 AP2 Large Blast weapon is standing close by.  The casualties were epic.


After that blast, we learned to spread out a little more.  One of these Marines actually survived to charge the Riptide.  He tied it up in combat for a round, effectively taking away the Riptide's shooting phase.  I think he deserves an award for that.


That's all I have  I don't know how it happened, but I didn't get a single solid shot of the Tau enemies.  I'll try to do a better job in the future!


Wednesday, January 25, 2017

Iron Warriors Painting

After having played the first week of our Heralds of Ruin campaign, I found some motivation and did a little painting.  I had already painted one of the Siege Tyrant Terminators, but needed two for my 250 point kill team.  I evidently didn't write down my paint scheme, which is unusual for me, so I had to sort of guess on the leather strips.  I think it's a pretty good match.  I painted the one guy's head bronze just to be able to differentiate which is the Team Leader.  The only real difference between them from a game standpoint is that the one guy has an extra wound and an extra point of leadership.

I also knocked out the Heavy Bolter upgrade that I get to use in each game due to my base upgrade.


I still need to paint a Meltagun Dude as well as an Apothecary, and then my 250 point Kill Team will be fully painted.  The Meltagun Dude will be painted exactly the same as all the Bolter Dudes.  The Apothecary will probably just get a white helmet and maybe some white elements on the back pack and Narthecium.

More to come!


Tuesday, January 24, 2017

Damn You, Kickstarter!

I'm not likely NOT going to back this as I have several outstanding pledges right now, some of which are over 7 months past due in showing up.

...but this lookds pretty cool.



The World of Smog: Rise of Moloch is a miniatures based board game where 1-4 players band together and try to defeat the Nemesis player.  It's a many versus one type of game.  I'm sort of at a point where these games are hard to sell to my gaming groups.  Nobody ever wants to play as the bad guy.  We're all a little too competitive and being the bad guy really makes you feel like everyone is ganging up on you.

This seems to be your standard gaming fare for these sorts of games.  There is a map that everyone clusters around and you try to knock out bad guys while achieving set objectives.


The thing that really draws me to this game, though, is the aesthetic of the miniatures.  The world is set in a sort of steampunk Victorian England with werewolves, robots and other things.  It really is an interesting look.


If you think it's something you'd be interested in, check it out.


Monday, January 23, 2017

Heralds of Ruin - Week 1


Six of us started up a Heralds of Ruin Kill Teams campaign over the weekend.  Here's the link if you aren't familiar with Heralds of Ruin...


I decided to play using a Legiones Astartes list focused on pre-heresy Iron Warriors.  The full list is as follows...
  • Pre-Heresy Iron Warriors
  • Dark Eldar 
  • Imperial Fists
  • Tau Empire
  • Imperial Guard
  • ??? - I didn't see the last game and can't remember what was played.
My first week's game was against the Dark Eldar Kill Team.  For the first game, we're only allowed to bring 200 points.  I'm terrible with their unit names, but the army consisted of a Succubus as Team Leader, 5x Wyches and 4x of the winged dudes.  Two of the winged dudes had some sort of high powered, 18" range melta/lance gun.  As you can see, there was plenty of line of sight blocking terrain.  This helped me out.


I decided to start the game out by hiding in little out of sight pockets in the gutted out buildings.  This hiding served me well.


If the Wyches wanted to engage, they would have to run at me, out in the open.  I took a few pot shots, but the Iron Warriors are better at tearing down walls, not shooting devious, fast moving Eldar.  They made a mistake and got too close...


...which let my Tyrant Siege Master assault.  The three Wyches were part of the combat, but ran away when they lost...  right into the open where Bolter fire finished them off.  Feels no Pain doesn't do much when your head is being crushed by a Power Fist.  Also, fancy 2+ cover saves don't help when your foe can literally reach out and punch you.


The only real snag I ran into is that one lone Marine outflanked onto the "wrong" side of the table.  He walked on and thought to himself...  "does that guy have bat wings?  shit."  Did not end well.


Overall, it was a great game.  I think we both had fun despite my more or less overwhelming victory.  My opponent chose to willingly rout after losing the Succubus.  The only model I lost was my Apothecary, who ended up making a full recovery.  Two of my opponent's models suffered permanent injuries that will carry onto the rest of the campaign, but they weren't relevant.  One was -1S to a model with a 2+ Poisoned weapon.  I don't remember the other.

I got 2 Renown Points for winning.  I also got a ton of Requisition Points.  Requisition Points are what allow you to improve your secret base and to requisition new gear and troops.

I got...

  • "Took Part" - 10 points for playing
  • "Winner" - 5 points for winning
  • "Assassin" - 3 points for taking out the opposing Team Leader
  • "First Blood" - 2 points for taking out the first model
  • "Considerate Commander" - 2 points for having 3/4 of my force still alive
  • "Mission Bonuses" - an extra 2 points for taking out the opposing Team Leader AND an extra 1 point for taking out one of the specials
That's a total of 25 Requisition Points.  I decided to spend points on the following...
  • 5 points to upgrade my base from a Base Camp to a Forward Base.  This allows me to bring 250 points to games from now on.
  • 5 points to upgrade my base to include a Defensive Turret.  This allows me to place a Gun Emplacement with a Twin-Linked Heavy Bolter that auto-fires at BS2 in my deployment zone at the start of every future game.  Seemed like a good deal for 5 points.
  • 10 points to grant my 4x Legion Tactical Marine group the +1 Ballistic Skill Battle Honour.  That's a lot of points, but BS5 Bolters are actually pretty good in this gaming format.
More to come!  I have some painting to do.  I want to have my Kill Team fully painted by the time Saturday rolls around.




Friday, January 20, 2017

Star Wars Imperial Assault - New Minis Incoming

FFG is getting really good at making miniatures.  They're also starting to branch out into some of the lesser known characters from the Star Wars universe.  Three new expansions were just announced.


First up is one of the coolest, for me.  0-0-0 (Triple Zero) and BT-1 are sort of like evil versions of C-3PO and R2-D2.  They hang out with Darth Vader and Doctor Aphra in the Darth Vader comics that Marvel has been putting out.  They're interesting characters that I'm hoping will also transition over to Star Wars Destiny.


Next up is a Star Wars classic.  Utinni!  Nothing much else to say.  Jawas are fun and ridiculously easy to paint.  This is the least exciting of the three new products.


Last up are Hera Syndulla and Chopper, the team leader and sidekick droid from the Star Wars Rebels show.  It's really exciting to see some of the other Star Wars properties being rolled into these games.  It's also interesting that Hera looks a little more cartoony than some of the other sculpts in the line.  I wonder how she'll look next to the Luke, for example.


We'll probably get more articles as time goes on.  It's hard to see what most of the abilities do.  Honestly, I'm not sure it matter much.  I mainly just like the models  They make for fun 'tokens' in the Destiny game.  I'll probably pick up Triple Zero and BT-1.  I might pick up the others.  It kind of depends what else is going on in the gaming world when they get released.


Thursday, January 19, 2017

Star Wars Destiny - Spirit of Rebellion

I am loving this game.  It has everything I liked about magic (mainly opening boosters) and nothing I don't like...  control, getting mana screwed, magic players (joking), etc.

Fantasy Flight Games just released an article showing off a few new cards.  I'm bored, so I'm going to stream of consciousness some thoughts about them...

First up is the Death Trooper.  He's a red villain with a cost of only 10.  That seems high for a non unique, but it allows you to field three of them together.  With four facings showing ranged damage, this guy is a very reliable performer.  I could easily see a deck with three of these guys and a ton of ranged weaponry performing well.  I doubt it'll be top tier, but it would do very well as a casual deck.


Next up is another red villan, Director Krennic.  He has pretty solid die facings and has a pretty interesting ability.  If you control the battlefield, you can roll in a Death Trooper (above) die when you activate him.  With a quick tempo deck, that effectively gives him an extra character die.  I think he'll see some action as a regular, but not as a unique.


Palpatine is an odd character.  At 21/28 points, he's the most expensive character in the game.  With 15 health, he's also the healthiest character.  His die looks fantastic and his ability is amazing.  After you resolve one of his character dice, the opponent eats two damage.  Elite Palpatine will dump out four damage per round just by going about his business.  I think he'll be either killed super quick or will win super quick.  The rough thing is that at only 15 health, he's also the last healthy character LIST.  Most lists will have 20-24 health.


Force Lightning is a new blue ability for villains.  That means it can be played using a Sith Holocron, potentially getting around that expensive cost.  The card has a ton of ranged, admittedly with a resource cost on two of the facings, but that's still some serious damage.  The special is nice because blanks tend to be pretty common.  I can see this being added into nasty force villain users.


Jyn is the only hero character we've seen so far.  She's also pretty expensive, but just screams to be in a mill/discard deck.  One out of three chance for mill?  Yes please.  One out of three chance for ranged damage?  That works, too.  I'm waiting on the other cards to see what sort of teams she could be on.  20 points is REALLY high for an elite version of this character.  I'm kind of thinking eJyn/Rey would be good.  Time will tell.


This is kind of a boring card, but very useful.  Any range focused hero deck should use this card.  It's a quick and easy dice removal card.  It can't remove damage, but it can remove just about anything else.


This is potentially amazing.  It's pricey...  but comes down to two resources if you're using Jyn.  Playing it with Jyn could net you either four damage or discard plus whatever your upgrade dice show.  If you're playing Jyn with guns, this could give you enough ranged damage to take out an average character.


Last up is a blue hero support that let's you manipulate an opponent's die whenever you roll a shield.  This seems like a no brainer for a shield based Qui-Gon deck.  It's not glamorous, but it has great activation economy.  You use one action to play it and then it's a 'free' activation for the rest of the game.  This might be good in a LOT of decks.


I can't wait to see more cards.  I totally love this game.


Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Vanguard of War - Archon Studio

So, there is this new Kickstarter out for a game called Vanguard of War.  It's by a studio called Archon...  which is really just a rebranded Prodos.  Prodos is the studio that absolutely botched the Aliens versus Predaters Kickstarter.  That game released to retail more than two years before some backers got their pledges.  They're also the same people responsible for LOAD, which was a perfectly executed Kickstarter.  I'm conflicted.  The minis look very cool, but I'm not sure I can trust the company to deliver on time.



The game looks to be some sort of defense versus multiple waves of enemies sort of thing.  The players play as defenders of some sort of space church that is being overrun by daemons.  I'm not sold.  The game looks a little boring.

Those minis though...



I tagged it for watching on Kickstarter, but I doubt I'll pull the trigger.  The base pledge is $110 plus shipping.  That's a lot for a game that probably won't see much play.  Hopefully, they'll put up some play through videos that will tell me whether or not it'll be any fun.  The minis may or may not be worth it depending on how many there are.  I think the stretch goals will have to sell this one for a lot of people.  Here's what you get for $110 right now...  I'm sure there will be more added as the campaign progresses.


Tuesday, January 17, 2017

Broken Token is Amazing

I ended up ordering two of the Compact Game kits from Broken Token.  The package came in on a Friday.  Unfortunately, I was only shipped one of the two that I ordered.  I sent an email to their customer service address at 5:30PM EST (GMT-5).  They're in California, so that's 2:30PM PST (GMT-8).  They responded within 30 minutes, apologizing and promising a correction.  Within an hour, I had a tracking number.  Within two hours, the USPS had acknowledged receipt of the package.  Within 48 hours, the package is marked as sitting in the local post office, awaiting delivery.  That's amazing customer service.

The item itself is pretty cool.  It took me about 10 minutes to fully assemble.  I definitely recommend using tape to hold the token container together.  They recommend glue, but tape is just easier.  I used masking tape, which more or less blends in with the balsa wood.

The box lid doesn't sit all the way down, so they include this crazy rubber band thing.  It keeps the lid in place and is pretty easy to work with.


The instructions still sit on the top with no problem.



The token container sits in the middle and slides out for use during games.  I was pretty impressed overall.  I'll definitely buy from them again in the future.  It's a shame that they don't make dividers for most of the board games I play, but I'll be paying attention to them in the future.


Broken Token gets a solid A+ rating from me!


Monday, January 16, 2017

Arcadia Quest Fountain

I love that 3D printer technology is a thing.  This is so amazing  Some dude named Carlos Montero designed and printed this out.  It's for Arcadia Quest and covers up the fountain artwork on one of the game's tiles.  He made the files available for anyone who wants to download and print them out.  I've posted a link below the pictures if you want to try it out yourself.  I REALLY need a 3D printer.



As I type this, Thingiverse is down, but here's the link if you want to download it...

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2032263


Friday, January 13, 2017

Star Wars Destiny Tournament

I played in a Star Wars Destiny Tournament on Wednesday.  There were 28 people at the tournament.  I placed in the high 20s.  Yup.  Didn't work out even a little bit.  A little kid soundly crushed me in the rankings.  Like...  badly.

This was my deck.  Do not use this deck.  It is unreliable.  Fun, but very unreliable.

Character: (30/30)
2x Padme Amidala (Awakenings)
2x Rebel Trooper (Awakenings)

Battlefield:
1x Command Center (Awakenings)

Event: (8)
1x Block (Awakenings)
1x Dodge (Awakenings)
2x Electroshock (Awakenings)
2x Field Medic (Awakenings)
2x Hyperspace Jump (Awakenings)

Support: (6)
2x Infamous (Awakenings)
2x Millennium Falcon (Awakenings)
2x Outpost (Awakenings)

Upgrade: (16)
2x Cunning (Awakenings)
2x Datapad (Awakenings)
2x Diplomatic Immunity (Awakenings)
2x Infiltrate (Awakenings)
2x Scout (Awakenings)
2x Second Chance (Awakenings)
2x Survival Gear (Awakenings)
2x Thermal Detonator (Awakenings)

Wednesday, January 11, 2017

MASMORRA IS HERE!!!

I came from work to see a big brown box with a Masmorra sticker on the side.  Yay!!!  It's always exciting when a game you backed on Kickstarter ACTUALLY shows up.  Masmorra was originally expected to show up in November of 2016.  The actual campaign ended on March 8th, 2016.  That means I bought it and had to wait 308 days for my "pre-order" to show up.  These things truly take forever.

This is what all was in the box...


I picked up one of everything, plus an extra pack of the little treasure chests.  I think they'll be useful in other games, such as Descent: Journeys in the Dark.  I don't have much time today to go through the purchase, but I did get to take a quick look.

The cardboard box holds most of the Kickstarter exclusives.  It's really nice that all of these new models come with cards to use in Arcadia Quest.  The one box that has a terrible reflection on it above is the Arcadia Crossover Kit.  It lets me use all of the retail Arcadia Quest heroes in Masmorra.  It's nice when companies do this across games.


The dice are actually pretty cool.  One of them has a small tear on the image, but such is life.  It's not very noticeable and if I really need to, it's one of the dice I can buy a duplicate of later.


These dice are Kickstarter exclusive.  It's pretty nice to be able to have extra monsters to fight.  I like when the Kickstarter exclusives add additional playable content.  Makes it feel worthwhile to order things, you know...  308 days ahead of time.