Man of Adamantium, Iron Hand Straken. Stupid decisions

So who remembers my rebel guard army from last year? No one..? OK, not a problem. Well anyway, if you've noticed, I recently joined the lost boys gaming club in southport, and I noticed they're holding a 40k tournament this weekend, on the 3rd march.

I hadn't paid it any attention, til last weekend, just 7 days before the tournament, where I suddenly decided entering a tournament for a game system I've not played in months, and never was any good at, was a good idea. 

Wait, what?

To late, ticket bought. Shit.

So, OK, I've got 3 games of 40k to play, with an army that was built for apocalypse last year. Meta game? I don't even know whats good anymore. OK, I'm not panicking. I have a plan....

The last 2 guard armies I've played have had commissars. The latest one has Commissars and power weapons. Last weekend I started leafing through the 'guard codex to find me a plan...

Soon after, it became clear, I needed a hero.

Not just any hero.

A hero that can make a guard army with power weapons not only hold the line, but bite back!

A hero that lives by pulling people's behind's out of the fire!

A hero, I, somewhere at the bottom of a bits box, had an old school 3rd edition model of!

I'm talking about tough as old boots, swearing like the pissed off trooper he is, been in so many fights and come out alive, Col 'Iron hand' Straken, of course!

One quick paint job enough to get him on the board, and the tough of bastard is ready to rock and roll.

After I built him a horde of guardsmen ready to march into certain meta game death, with as many rapid firing guns for sheer desperation factor, I had 15pts left to spend, and a bunch of old bits boxes worth of models.

One such model was dying to be included in the army, now newly promoted from 'forgotten about' to, 'Col Straken's right hand bodguard'. 

So we're ready. The 2nd Thraxis Swamp Stompers stand ready to march to war and throw themselves under the guns of the 40k universe once again. 

The best I can hope for is to hold the line. The worse, I think I might find out how many models people can remove in a single turn.

So until next time, Where i shall report on my lack of success.

Gonders

Too many naked bums. Bile Thralls!

As you all should know, I've begun to prepare myself and my army for the tournament scene here in England. I've started to get some more competitive army lists written and better units in the army(so long, black ogrun!).

The first staple unit in a good cryx army for me, are the simply delightful Bile Thralls. Every warmachine player knows, these guys can really mess up infantry formations, if you give them half the chance, so I quickly ordered a unit and good them painted up.

Here's the first one. 

And here's his naked dead bum.

 

 The thralls were a lot of fun to paint. Weird, but very fun! 

This guy is the leader, though whoever designed him, thought that a tiny set of goggles and some shoulder pads would be enough to recognise him at a glance when all 10 of them are stood on the battlefield. He was wrong.

 

So i said there was 10? Yeah, they are all painted, but there's only 3 different types of model in the unit. They look like this.

 

And here's their naked dead rumps. 

 

 Even though I didn't spend to long painting these dudes, I'm kinda proud of them. I can't help but look at them and smile, and that, in my opinion is a job well done. 

So what else have I got to talk about apart from naked dead bee-hinds? Firstly, the tournament preparations are already well underway. I had originally planned to take(as its a steam roller event) two lists, one with The lord exhumator Scaverous heading it up, and one with my old mark one favourite, Warwitch Deneghra.

 Now, during this warmachine season, I've been hammering various scaverous lists to get him learnt, so far with mixed success. He's got some pretty powerful moves, but I've struggled to find a decent play style with him. I played a game at my gaming club Tuesday just gone, and got a win, but only because my opponent managed to get an open charge lane on scaverous with an overboosting epic stryker and didn't kill him, So all I had to do was cut the little ginger's head off with avernus and 7 focus. 

On Thursday, I played another practise game, but this time, used deneghra. The last time i used her was when I'd just bought the mark 2 battlebox and was playing 15 point games. This time I played a 50pt deathclock timed affair against my good friend, Johnny with his khador lead by Harkevich.

This was, without question, the tightest game of warmachine I've played in mark 2. Suffice to say, there was a turn where both casters had a single point of health each and it could have easily gone either way. The difference for me between scaverous and deneghra became apparent during this game. Where I botched an assassination attempt with deneghra, I could get out of the way and come back for a second(more successful) attempt the next turn. If scaverous was in that position, I'd have blown his feat and that would have been the end of that. I'm beginning to think my style is more flexible than scaverous. 

All this is food of thought for me, but I'm starting to think scaverous might be up the road, and another of my mark 1 favourite's, the witch coven of garlghast can step up to the plate. 

More practise reports to follow! 

Gonders 

 

Deathjack, Bonejacks, Ho!

I've been really hammering out the painted stuff for the last month or so, if you haven't been keeping up with me recently. This week has been no exception, and today I've got a bunch of 'jacks for my cryx army to look at.

I mentioned a few posts ago that I'd joined a new gaming club. Turns out we're all off to the WPS club challenge in Nottingham come may. I've entered into the warmachine steam roller side of the tournament, so between now and then, I've really got to get my game together. There's a good few months of list building and practise to come, and I'm really going to try and get the games in much as I can.

This means the blog may become more of a practise report than a painting blog for a bit!

Any way, on to the latest offering...

If I'm getting serious about the tournament scene, then I'm going to have to get some models with some power behind them on the table. Where better to start than cryx's heaviest, the mighty Deathjack? 

I like how this guy has turned out in my colour scheme. OK, so none of my stuff is mega converted but I think warmachine models are best pure.

Perhaps best seen on this pic, I tried out the privateer version of glow, mixed with my own theory on the deathjack's furnace. I think it looks quite good. or at least better than the effect I got on scaverous...

Next up, a pair of the crazy new flapper guys for the cryxians, scavengers.

Not gonna lie, I bought these guys out of pure novelty, and don't know how many competitive lists they'll make it into. Having said that, one of them got the killing hit on the butcher in my last game at the club, with a little help from scaverous!

Well fun to paint and play with. couldn't help but laugh to myself making and painting the little fellas.

Continuing the Sunday bonejack medley, I picked up a couple of ripjaws, just to give me more arcing options in my lists.

To finish for today, I also got a helldiver. not used him properly in a game yet, so report to follow.

Not quite as fun to paint as scavengers, but still, looks OK to my eyes.

Well, that's it for the moment, now I've actually run out of cryx models to paint, well at least until the next order arrives...

Gonders

The Satyxis Selection, and some dirty Mercs.

These last couple of weeks I've been hammering out the infantry side of my cryx army. Firstly, I finished off the rest of Croes Cutthroats, who've been doing much better in games since they've had a lick of paint. 

With the camera never lying, I do realise I can't paint eyes on privateer models to save my life. The guy in this shot on the left proves this utterly. Still, I've just have to get my practise on. 

The next unit I've been tackling are these satyxis raiders. They were also a tough unit to paint. OK, their eyes are mostly covered, so no really problem there, but there was alot of processes to get them to the tabletop, and I think the end result isn't as good as it should've been

I painted the sea witch's spear tip glowly green, just so my opponents can pick her out and aim everything toward her. 

Think it'll be awhile til I tackle a full unit of something again after these girls...

I also have solo captain to paint next, then I'll be done with the satyr for a while methinks.

One final note, I started building a couple of these machines this morning, and got to this stage and had to take a picture. "Raawwrr-not-so-steady-guys-rraawwwr!!" Just made to laugh :-p

Well, still got loads to paint, so till next time.

Gonders 

Skarrifaction... Cryx Style.

My modelling surge continues. This time its my second 'caster, pSkarre.

I was looking forward to painting this model since I started back with mark 2. Mainly because I saw the studio version and wished I was that good. 

It was the face that really captured the look for me, which I knew I had to do my best to match. When I came to paint her, I started with the face, knowing that if I did a good job, it'd spur me on to do a good job with the rest of the model. 

I got as far as almost the last highlight and realised I'd make a mess of the model I was looking forward to most... one second base coat later and I started the thing again. The pictures here are of the second try. 

OK, so it's no PPS fluffy, but I'm kinda proud of it. I've never painted in enough detail to paint a model's make-up before, so that's a first for me. 

What I took from the experience, is that when painting character models, where you only get one shot, sometimes its much better to have two. 

One of the things I like about painting Warmachine, is that I can keep a consistent army colour, but it seems easy enough to use different colours on specific models and they still fit in. 

On skarre's cloak here, I wanted to get across the sea faring aspect, in that, she's a pirate. I think the blue tone I've hit does well for the sea theme. I probably wont use it again, but I think she'll still fit in with the purple of the rest of the army. 

Anyway, that's plenty of rambling. 

Gonders

More Warmachine, The Lord Exhumator, Croe, and The Glamorous Assistant!

I think I've got my painting head back on for the start of 2012, thankfully. I'm starting to settle back in to the privateer worlds and games too, I've given the mark 2 practise games some hammer recently. 

Based almost entirely on the model, I bought my first none starter box caster for the cryx army, and I'm determined to learn how to use him, despite several defeats so far. 

So first up, it's Lord Exhumator Scaverous. 

I tried The Osl method from the Cryx Faction book on his face, but I'm not overly pleased with the results to be honest. I think I'll stick to my method in future, a la the slayer from a couple of posts back. 

Playing games with this guy has been hard so far. I suffered 7 or 8 crushing defeats in a row with him over the last 3 weeks or so, but I managed to claw back a win a couple of days ago. This has boosted my confidence enough to carry on running him, at least for a while longer. 

After a few games running him with Black ogrun and a handful of 'jacks, I realised to get anything out of Scaverous I need units with some serious synergy to support the big guy. After scouring the lists, I hit on the idea of taking Croe's Cutthroats, as I can use telekinesis to get those back strikes Croe's gang love so much. Also, a nice change from painting purple.

Finally for today, the guy no 'caster should be without, a Scarlock thrall. Admittedly, I painted him in a hurry to get him ready for a game a couple of weeks back. If nothing else, the soul looks good!

There's more coming soon, Including a review of the new gaming club I've started to attend, and the second part of throgmorton and swift's!

Gonders

Cryxian Re-enforcements, Reaper Helljack and Black Ogrun

Now Christmas is out of the way I've finally found sometime to crack on with some modelling and painting for the cryx army I'm trying to build.

So far, I'd just painted the starter battle force box, but I've since ordered a handful of stuff to get me started on an army proper. I'm still very much trying to get my head around the mark 2 rules, so I've just started by browsing battle college and taking what caught my eye, that I hadn't taken in my previous cryx army a few years ago.

So to start with, I bought a new heavy, just to give me options. I've gone with a reaper because i wanted to see how useful it is with it's upgraded drag rules from mark 1. So far its only been as disappointing as it was the first time, but i have time to work on that.

To carry on the theme of dragging folk around, I bought a black ogrun boarding party. I figure if I can get a decent amount of board control between the two it might be able to open up some options for assassination runs and so forth.

Even though they look like monkeys, these models were great fun to paint. I also only realised warmachine units come in 'model A, B, C...' to late... 

In other news, I've found a couple of local gaming nights that I plan on starting to attend, so hopefully I can get some games in and train my mind to play the game again. The first meeting I'm going to is next week so I'll report my results in my next blog! 

Til then

Gonders