Warhammer 40,000 Crusade Battle Report: Astra Militarum vs Dark Angels (Watchers of the Fall)

 

The Tallarn XVI, concerned their Necron 'landlords' might be a bit upset about them losing a whole bunch of Necron territory, decided to go on the offensive, while staying on the Necron home planet. Unfortunately for the Tallarn, they ended up running into a bunch of angry looking Dark Angels ?Successors? coming the other way...

This mission was all about seizing some objectives, and the Dark Angel bikes were quick and effective at doing so, with the Guard on the defensive.

They also had a Vindicator for close support, which ended up covering one of the objectives and heavily damaging the Tallarn Chimera.

The Hellhound swept up to counter attack, causing a chunk of damage but not really finishing anything off.

Near the Hellhound, the Deathwatch arrived to counter its advance.

While the Infantry squad piled out of the Chimera to take the objective.

The counter-attack from the assault squad was swift and merciless...

Bikes poured onto the Guard squad holding the central objective...

The Terminators neutralised the Hellhound...

And it wasn't long before the Guard positions were over-whelmed, with the Manticore getting charged and taken out by the bike squad. In the end, while I'd scored a few points holding objectives (my best result so far) it was a 100-30 loss, with every Guard unit lost. I took three Battle Scars, paying for one to be removed immediately to prevent it wrecking a unit, but leaving the others on for the next game...

Infinity Battle Report: Are Jayth Cutthroats Any Good? (No)

 

A while back, now, I arranged a game of Infinity and decided to dip back into Shasvastii to look at the "Jayth Cutthroat" profile. These are lightly armoured, one wound models who are excellent in close combat, have some good mid and short ranged shooting profiles, are incredibly hard to hit and have a visor to help them shoot enemy models that are hard to hit.

I took a Haris, with one armed with a Red Fury, another Chain Rifles, and the last a specialist with a shotgun. I deployed them defensively on the left flank with the intention of advancing once things that threatened them had been dealt with.

My opponent and I had a whole bunch of back and forth, trading pieces. My Speculo and my Noctifer both got a bit of piece trading done to clear out threats to the Jayth, and the Taigha cleared others.

However, by the time it came for the Jayth to push up the table, I didn't really have enough orders left to complete the mission. They are very vulnerable to template weapons that don't need to roll to hit, which means deploying them cagily, which in turn means that they're not really pulling their weight in a list.

I'm not sticking with Shasvastii at the moment, but it was good to pull out some profiles that people say are probably bad and have some experience as to why. 

Assembly Line

 

Just a couple of hobby things this week. First up, the Frameworks Kobolds got a white undercoat before the weather broke. It's a job ticked off and that makes me happy.

Meanwhile, working through the Combined Army models I had still in packaging, I've worked through assembling the Caskuda. This is a TAG (dreadnought sized model) that can drop into the middle of the table during the game. It's of dubious use and quality, but got discontinued at the start of the third edition, so it's return late in fourth edition caused quite a bit of nostalgia among players who've been playing longer than I have.

I just assembled it because it's box was the largest one in my "to do" pile, and I wanted to work through stuff.

Overcoming insurmountable hurdles

 

As a "nice easy" start to my holiday hobby, I decided to assemble the Wizkids Frameworks Kobolds set. I got them out of their box ages back and it was starting to annoy me. Oh my goodness these were a faff to assemble!

The feet were separate to the legs, with the torso, tail, head and arms all separate. Some had two part heads, and some needed things gluing into their hands, or a two handed weapon lined up across the two arms.

So rather than the Kobolds being a quick assembly job on the first day of the holiday, it took me all week to finally get them done, as they were so fiddly I kept on needing to take breaks.

All in all, I'm not impressed with these Frameworks kits. They're pricey for what they are, the detail is pretty soft, and they're far, far too difficult to assemble for a kit that's supposed to be the next step up for people after pre-assembled miniatures. Better options exist in plastic, resin and 3D printing, depending on your preference.

On Sunday, I'd arranged an Infinity game where I was running vanilla Combined Army. As I mentioned last week, they're my planned first force for N5 in October. Mid-week, I wrote a list using Bit and Kiss, who I hadn't assembled yet. And then, at 10pm on Saturday, the Kobolds finally finished, I remembered I hadn't done my Infinity assembly.

My goodness, was I pleased to see two part assemblies when I opened the blister.

All in all, it took me about 20 - 25 minutes to get them both cleaned assembled, including cutting the holes in the bases for their slotta tabs. That was an absolute delight after the Kobolds, and really reinvigorated my hobby keen immediately.

Of course, first thing Sunday morning, I had an idea, changed my list, and ended up not needing to take Bit and Kiss. Because of course. But it's two more models assembled, and my keen restored...

Breaks and holidays

 

I've not been posting on the blog much. I've played a few games, been playing Flesh and Blood, doing some tidying of the flat and LARPing. The blog is a hobby, too, and while I generally keep to a good regular update schedule, I don't want it to be a job. Sometimes a break is better than letting something stop being fun.

As of today, I've got two weeks of holiday from work, and I'm having a staycation. There is some tidying around the flat I do want to get done, but I want to have some rest, and get some painting done. High on the "to do" list is reducing the number of trays of miniatures that are out to "work on next". I'm not working on most of them next, so they need to go away to where they live.

There's a few half finished miniatures on the painting table that I should finish up. A Battletech Lance, a D&D adventurer and a handful of Halflings shouldn't take long.

Corvus Belli have just announced N5 - the next edition of Infinity - and it's going to be in October. I'm not going to have time to get my Nomads painted for then, but I reckon over the course of this holiday I should be able to blitz my Vanilla Combined Army and get my Nomad test paints done so I know what the Nomad paint scheme is going to be...

First up, though, are these Wizkids Kobolds I threw away the box for ages ago, and are still on their sprue. The Bretonnian Men at Arms are also getting a firm side eye as something in need of assembling, but they're a bit further down the list. Lets see how we go...

Purest Nostalgia

 

One of the first places I came across wargaming miniatures was "Toy Town" in Leamington Spa, a much missed large independent toy store that had a wide range of wargaming figures tucked away in one corner. I "wasn't old enough" for the miniatures, but I would spend entire shopping visits reading the unit backgrounds and stats of the miniatures, day dreaming about what it all meant in the days before I owned the rules.

So when I saw that Prince Ulther's Dragon Company was going up on "Made to Order", and they had specific mercenary rules for Warhammer: The Old World, I simply couldn't resist. A quick google search tells me that folk who understand the game think that they're uncompetitive, overequipped and not much actual use - but I suspect that's what most of the old named units were back then as well...

The blisters (which don't photo well) come with a little leaflet with their rules, and the command blister comes with a paper sheet with a cut out flag on. The idea of cutting that out absolutely terrifies me... There's a non zero chance I may scan and print it at a high resolution so I can make a mistake and not destroy it.

There's four command figures, which came as a set - Prince Ulther, a Champion, Standard Bearer and Musician. They come with solid plastic shields, while the originals had tabs that became the shield boss, so they'll need filing down if you want to use the shields they come with.

In Warhammer: The Old World, they also go on 25mm bases rather than 20mm bases, so if you're buying them for older editions you'll want to find your own bases, too.

The line troops come as a set of five, with three different sculpts. These nearly-monopose single piece metal troopers are one of my "missed nostalgias" - I only got into playing from 4th edition, so didn't end up with many of this era of troops. I have such a happy vibe from these miniatures turning up. They're not for everyone, but they've really brought me joy this week.

If this is your jam and you're flush with cash, these are still available from the Warhammer online store until 8am, Monday 12 August. I ordered these early on so got some of the sets they'd already cast up. You'll get yours within six months, so it won't be quite such immediate gratification. They are a teensy bit pricey, and if you're willing to hunt around you may be able to find originals cheaper, but I was willing to pay for the convenience, and they are making me happy.