Battle against "Iyanden" Eldar at Warhammer World

Shortly after I finished playing Sim at Warhammer World, I discovered a friend of mine who lives in Nottingham had been stood up by his planned opponent for the evening, so agreed to put my Guard up against his Iyanden list Eldar.

Nick is still painting his Eldar force, and some of his Wraithknight bits have been left separate for painting. So be nice - he paints a lot more than me, and quite a bit better, too. He was having some problems with bits falling off as the game went on - it is not a feature to show how many wounds the Wraithknight has taken!

We rolled a two objective mission with a lengthwise deployment. This was going to get pretty interesting as neither of us had particularly fast moving armies... His objective is to the left of the above photo, well behind his lines.

Here you can see him anchoring one flank of his line with his Wraithknight, who was leading his army, and the other with a Wraithlord. A skirmish line of Wraithguard and Wraithblades filled the line, with a Wave Serpent holding some horrible flamer thing Wraithguard (I think, confusingly, called "D scythes", although they don't do Apocalypse style D damage).

Meanwhile, I placed my objective nestled in the roof of the ruins in the centre of my deployment zone and dropped an infantry squad with a Commissar in the way. The conscripts and pretty much everyone else was to run forward and do their best to hold up the Eldar and keep them away from the objective. My command squad was placed in the Valkyrie as my one unit with a hope of making it to the enemy objective. I didn't use my Veterans this time around because I wanted their firepower on the board from the beginning to try and deter the Eldar from closing on the conscripts without the risk of some serious consequences.

Today was a good day to seize the initiative.

My Guard on the right flank (top of the picture) advanced into the ruin so you can barely see them. The Demolisher edged forward a bit to get a good shot on the Wave Serpent, and the Conscripts began Operation: Human Shield.

Everyone shot the Wave Serpent. Demolisher, Manticore, Hydra . . . and, fortunately, it wrecked, forcing the Wraithguard out. I couple of them picked up the odd wound from being caught in blast templates or other follow up fire, too! This was, as far as I was concerned, about as well as I could have hoped turn one could go.

The eldar advanced, with Perils of the Warp wounding one of their psykers.

The Storm Troopers deep struck behind the Eldar. I actually placed them closer, but they deviated away from the Eldar, and I decided that was an acceptable solution. They were far enough back that it was going to be a right pain for the slow moving Wraithguard to turn around and do something about them, but still close enough that they could cause some serious woes to whoever turned back to hold the objective.

I directed as much fire as I could on the Wraithguard nearest their 'home' objective. I was pretty sure the Wraithknight alone could take the objective off me, so my best chance was taking the Eldar's objective off them.

I also managed to trim a Wraithblade off. I was starting to realise quite how hard these things are to kill!

 Meanwhile, the conscripts advanced on the left flank while the Demolisher threw everything into reverse as it saw the Wraithknight bearing down on it!

The Wraithblades advanced on my lines... But I wasn't too worried. The conscripts were there to hold them up!

On the other hand, I was pretty sure that a wall of tanks without infantry cover were going to do very, very poorly against a Wraithknight.

I spread the Storm Troopers out to deal with the weird distortion flame thrower things the Wraithguard had. I think that the psyker may have actually blown himself up, but I might have been lucky and sniped him out. I don't remember!

Oh look, no Leman Russ. I think it was the Wraithlord sniper who did for him.

Poor missing Demolisher!

The conscripts took the expected charge by the Wraithblades remarkably well...

I mean, look how many survived! Normally, everyone gets cut down running away. Of course, I managed to roll snake eyes for how far they ran, so they do look a little silly.

The air-cavalry turned up, and the remaining back field Wraithguard started feeling a little bit lonely.

The conscripts handily obliged by failing to rally and running much further away. I then opened up with my infamous demo-charge veterans, failed to wound a single Wraithguard, and discovered that their invulnerable shield saves blind you in retaliation for shooting them. (I used my yellow Salute die for the purpose of representing this.)

I'm not quite sure what these Wraithguard were up to. I had a squad in the building to the left of the picture, who seem to have held them up remarkably well most of the game.

Unsurprisingly, the tanks were ripped to shreds by the Wraithknight. Next up, a brutal duel between the army Warlords - who will emerge victorious?

No surprises there, then.

At this point, I took an important tactical decision. I really needed to get the command squad full of melta guns out of the Valkyrie without them vanishing somewhere I didn't want them to be - so I made the decision to drop into hover mode to let the troops out - it was probably going to cost me the Valkyrie with the Wraithlord sitting right behind it, but that would be one set of shots less being aimed at five dudes with tea trays sewn into their vests and labelled "flak armour" by the Munitorium.

The Wraithblades handily carved the Veterans to pieces, and they somehow managed to safely flee out of combat, but there wasn't much left they were going to be able to do. The squad on the ruin got blinded by those blasted shields. It was all going horribly wrong on my objective!

The remaining Wraithguard near the objective was successfully gunned down - the two surviving Storm Troopers headed for the Wraithlord to take a shot at him with their plasma gun in the hope of causing some level of a distraction.

No, the Wraithknight isn't dead. Just lying down after yet another problem with him staying in one piece. His poor player was very sad. And yes, that's a bunch of Wraithguard all over my objective, on the bodies of the dead Guardsmen.

Two of the command squad were cut down by fire, but passed their morale check and made it to the objective. You'll notice the Valkyrie is off his base - immobilised but not wrecked by the expected vengeful fire.

Final Score:

Guard: 5 (Objective, First Blood, Linebreaker)

Eldar: 5 (Objective, Linebreaker, Slay the Warlord)

I managed to eke it out to a draw! I was very pleased with this result as I really wasn't expecting to do that well. It was a tight fought game, and came right down to the wire.

A few words from me...

Well, there's actually been a lot of words from me recently, but they've mostly been on the topic of Salute or similar. I planned to have a long weekend doing a lot of painting and modelling, but it turns out what I actually did was a massive amount of blogging! There are posts planned out into June now, with four or five already written and scheduled.

I am constantly amazed how productive I am when I am procrastinating something else. The amount of housework I got done over Easter is also incredible.

I've also been nominated for a "Liebster" award by a couple of other bloggers, which is really nice. I hope to have that post up next week. (I am breaking my own rule there about talking about a post in the future which I haven't written yet!)

So, what was I meant to be doing this weekend? Well, my mental plan was to finish off the Collodi crew, get out the airbrush and paint the Sarissa silos I've been meaning to finish in forever, and hopefully get a little progress on the Beastmen / start my Commissar Lord. Ambitious, but four full days should be plenty for that, right?

I kit bashed this Mk I "Thunder Armour" figure. The plan is to paint it up like it was being used as some sort of protective environment suit before being rediscovered and put in a shrine - and then pinched by an Inquisitor and given to one of his retinue.

Collodi has had two layers of water effects added to his base - and needs a third to finish it off. I'm waiting for the existing ones to dry out a little more first, though.

There is also a tiny bit more paint on some Beastmen. I really need to man up about them, and get them finished, though. Maybe if I plan to do some housework, I'll do the painting instead? Got to be worth a shot!

Edited to add:
Oh, yeah - Astra Militarum Codex. Lots of other people have talked about it. I'll save my thoughts until I've played with it! I've drafted my first army list with it, and hope to get in a game this week. There's a backlog of battle reports, though, so it'll be a while before a full report hits the blog.

Salute 2014: Accessory Companies

So, one of my favourite finds at Salute was The Dice Bag Lady. She does handmade dice bags, which are awesome, as you can see. Sim got all excited about the wool, for that is her other crafty hobby. I would definitely recommend checking the Dice Bag Lady out if you're looking for a nice dice bag.

Sphere Products make lots of clever and interesting things. They have really thought their stuff through and will do custom things for you as well - paint racks and so on. But what caught my eye was this handy iPad / tablet stand.

I was also super impressed with Dubreq Games / Etch Master - they only have a couple of sheets of etched brass at the moment, but its really good quality and Sim grabbed some to play with. There was also Name It! who make name plates to label up model display pieces and so forth.

Salute 2014: Scenery Companies

I know, I know. I have a scenery problem. So, whose stuff did I see this Salute around?

First up are some new pieces by Antenocitis Workshop, which aren't for sale just yet. This one is interesting, because Antenocitis Workshop are currently dropping some of their "Governance of Technology" range. They seem to be moving towards designing things for other people, like Mantic and Infinity. They are going for the laser cut MDF, but adding to that with resin accessories to add extra detailing. That's a really smart move, because the risk of the MDF is that it can be obviously large, flat areas, and the greebles add to the look.

This is a piece that was on Oshiro Model Terrain's stall. This is actually a mix of scratch built and Games Workshop pieces. I loved the overly tall and thin look to it. Most of Oshiro's non commission stuff is either Japanese or Victorian right now, so would be a good choice for Malifaux stuff.

This was a board from 4Ground, who do pre-painted, easy assemble MDF stuff. Previously, I wasn't too interested in their WWII stuff, but they're starting to stray into areas that I find interesting. The magic words "pre-painted" also help!

I only got a quick shot of these at the time, because my darling wife threatened me quite a lot when she saw me getting distracted by MDF terrain. That then meant I needed to do a teensy bit of detective work, looking at whose stalls were between the photos on either side of this one! So, it turns out that the stall belonged to Minibits, who are actually a retailer. The MDF is by a company called Wargame Model Mods. I have seen these before (I suspect Tabletop Fix of being responsible for that). The stuff is a bit hit and miss - some I really love, other bits I couldn't care less for. But that's all down to taste, I suppose.

This board was intended as a display board for Bandua's Infinity terrain. You may remember I've already picked up a few of their shipping containers, and I may be back later depending on how the assembly of them goes.

The sign is not a mistake. Wargames Tournaments were selling all that scenery for £50. That is a lot of terrain for your money. So much, in fact, that Sim bought it. Yup. She of the "dragging me away from laser cut terrain only twenty minutes earlier" bought it on the spot when I was holding back on getting it because I was wanting to see what other stalls had before I committed.

I foresee some skirmish games in our future - quite possibly Necromunda...

Sarissa Precision were showing off some railway arches that they are going to be releasing soon. I remain a massive fan of Sarissa, but I still have such a backlog of their stuff, I didn't pick up any more this year!

More Sarissa buildings...

So, who did I abjectly fail to get photos of on the scenery front? Fenris Games do miniatures as well, but it's their scenery that interests me. Their "Arkham Avenue" range is just amazing, and I really want a Griffin House at some point. I also have all the time in the world for Tablescape, whose pre-painted stuff is the saviour of most of my current model pictures.

Salute 2014: Miniature Companies - New Friends

If your first thought was "What in the name of sweet baby Jesus is that?" then that is the exact reaction that got us investigating this stall in the first place! This is a game called "Stalagbite" by Midlam Miniatures. Now Midlam do an excellent range of adventurers and dungeon monsters very suitable for D&D players and so on.

So, this is their giant demo version - the version they sell is much smaller, but apparently they have a lot of people mentioning they're interested in the larger version. The Stalagbite models are also extra to the game, but easily worth it for the sake of making it look more awesome. The idea is that you are dwarf adventurers, trying to mine stalagmites for gold and treasure - but some are actually nasty bitey monsters that might have you arm off!

Otherworld Miniatures had a lot of good D&D type stuff. Their giant spiders are really good, to the point where some arachnophobes in my party were giving entire cabinets a wide berth.

This is Thundercloud Miniatures, who are just getting started by the looks of things. They've also bought the rights to one of the GoblinAid miniatures, now that's winding up. I look forward to seeing what they come up with.

I have never painted a bust. I now own one (actually from Infamy), but Dark Star Miniatures very nearly got me to part with some cash for one of theirs!

This adorable orc with the big tusks was the one who was tempting me into something like this, and I still absolutely intend to get one within the next couple of years.

The alien head is adorable and an awesome painting challenge. I think Sim managed to purchase one of him while I wasn't looking.

Ax Faction had a beautiful case full of miniatures, and I managed to fluff up the big group shot. Still, this was the latest release, a girl riding a giant rabbit / hare. And why not? Their women do seem to be rather lacking sensible outdoor wear, though.

Now, I've seen quite a few bits and pieces from Anvil Industry on the web before - mostly their release announcements through Tabletop Fix. I will certainly say, I'm definitely very impressed.

The dogs in this shot are brand new - and do interest me a bit. Most of the rest of what they do are definitely intended to be Space Marine alternative sculpts - and I'd really rate a lot of them alongside the Forge World Horus Heresy ones in terms of quality - but just design wise, I much prefer the Forge World ones from a personal taste point of view. They are also looking to come up with their own game soon (called Afterlife), which I will watch curiously.

This was their display table. It's a huge multi-level building / 'skyscraper'. I think it's awesome, and really want to try playing Infinity over it.

And finally, lets save the best creepy clown company in the industry until last. Mad Clown Miniatures are associated with British Indie, and one of a number of small wargaming companies which seem to be taking off at the moment.

Who did I fail to take photos of the newer people?

Well, there is Smart Max. They make Smog 1888 and Mauser Earth, which are very pretty games I'm considering taking up in the future. I seem to have done a lot better with photos of the stalls I'd not seen before.

Salute 2014 - Miniature Companies: Old Friends

I'm breaking down my Salute posts into something coherent and . . . aw, who am I kidding? This is the only way I'll get my Salute posts done at all. Aiming for coherency is just pushing my luck.

This post consists of photos I remembered to take during the day, so is rather erratic in its coverage and focus.

So first up are Heresy. They of the Dragon. In short, Heresy have been making a Dragon model for absolutely years. There have been epic number of delays, and the pre-order backlog is currently sitting at 164, with a handful actually sent out.

But they are still going, not dead, and starting to do the resin casting by hand, one by one. I have the utmost respect for that determination in the face of adversity.

This chap is the Netherlord, one of their old metal sculpts, redone in resin to help pay the bills. You may be guessing already that Sim had a teensy bit of a budget slip at Heresy. Some day she will not be painting a titan commission and hit some of her own backlog!

One of Sim's favourite purchases from last year, Troublemaker Games were there again this year. In addition to Timeline 300, they are now working on Defeat in Detail, which is a 6mm Sci Fi wargame with plastic pieces. It successfully funded on Indiegogo during the year, and there were plenty of examples available, which I'll be showing off in a later post.

There was also Taban. I was super tempted by the Puppet Master and the Escape board game, but I decided to leave that for another day.

I liked JoeK minis' stuff last year. This year I bought some! He's also planning a Kickstarter soon.

There were also a couple of miniature folk who we already know who I didn't take any photos of. Forge World unsurprisingly got a ton of my money, but didn't have any miniatures on display that I saw. Hasslefree also gleefully parted my darling wife from her money in a pretty cheerful fashion. Sphere Wars is also something I really want to get into - I'd signed up to demo games for them, but had to back out as work has gotten super busy. We also said a quick hello to Warploque Miniatures, who had a lot of the Kickstarter models for Arcworlde on display. Studio McVey remain awesome people who put out excellent stuff, although this year I didn't pick anything up - I still have to paint the one I got from them last year!

Sa-lewt 2014 - The Revenge of the Shopping

How did Operation: Go Shopping fare this year?

Well, Forge World unsurprisingly got a pile of my money. I'd pre-ordered a Trojan Support Vehicle, an Ork Trukk with Enclosed Cab, and a variety of doors and hatches for an Inquisition Rhino I have in my queue. At the end of the day, I spent some of my last few pounds on one of their new T shirts.

And yeah, yeah, I know, it is a bit "Yo, that's fifty dollars for a T shirt", but it's a nice design and not overdone, so it will see some use.

The recipients of my last money at the show were Bandua Wargames. They have started to do some "Designed for Infinity" stuff. As a result, I ended up grabbing a few shipping containers to feed my habit. One in particular has a lovely tube design which I haven't seen anyone else do yet. Very cleverly done.

There was, obviously, the show only miniature and a free dice, but the rest of my money was taken up by the various folk from British Indie.

I felt I really had to pick up an Evil Clown from Mad Clown Miniatures. It will be a nice, fun, quick project to do. Infamy Miniatures are going to be doing a crowd funding campaign soon to pay for their game, but for now I picked up the Uncle John bust to paint. I've never painted a bust before, so I'm quite excited about how that will turn out.

I then picked up four miniatures from JoeK minis. Who are also planning a crowd funding campaign. I'm sensing a theme here... I picked up the strange alien chap with the staff, the demon with the ray gun and baby, and then the two evil scarecrow critters from the Oz range.

I'll be putting up a bit about the companies I saw which I didn't buy from but intend to in the future, and the general Salute experience later. There's also some thoughts in my head about the new Guard codex which I need to translate into something coherent.

Painting 9 to 5...

I had today off from work, so decided, as an experiment, to see what would happen if I tried painting "9 to 5". In the end, it was about "9:30 - 4:30, with quite a long lunch break", but that's still more painting and modelling than I've done in ages.

Collodi was still not glued to his base.

Collodi is now glued to his base and just needs water effects to finish him as a model.

I've done the skin base coat on the first nine Beastmen.

And I mocked up (with blu tac) a kit bash Mk I Power armoured character for inquisitorial type things.

I then started prepping and assembling him properly.

This really isn't a lot of progress for a 'day' of modelling and painting. But I am now getting progress where I had completely stalled without any movement. So I'll take that as a small success, and keep pushing forward.