Good tidings folks! We've managed to make it through the first month of 2020 and barely any issues at all (except for the whole US/Iran thing, Australian Wild Fires, threats of a plague)! So I hope wherever you are you are doing well, safe, and following your hobby heart wherever it is leading you. So let's get started with a wrap-up of this month's progress.
So I set out with a goal this month of trying to get to work on some Ossiarch Bonereapers. I originally didn't intend to do GW's challenge of a "New Year, New Army" ya know because I feel like that's just marketing shenanigans. That being said I did happen to get started on an army for Age of Sigmar and managed to get a solid 2k point list in models so why the hell not? New year, new army!
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| First hit with ink and contrast paints |
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| Vallejo Air Metallics cover up white primer REALLY well |
Yeah I know my historical stance on Age of Sigmar has been pretty rocky. Admittedly I was one of those salty folks who hated the change from Warhammer Fantasy and vowed to have nothing to do with AoS. Then the second edition came along and it went from this really awkward kind of game in my eyes to a game with some potential. The armies started to divert from their historical fantasy roots and now we started seeing Little Mermaid elves, distinct chaos armies, angry ghosts, and so on. In most fantasy games I favor the undead and so originally I wanted to get into the Nighthaunt but never really committed myself to them. I got a half of the Soul Wars box but to be honest their awkward packaging of units (like 5 Stalkers, 4 Reapers? That won't work in matched play, wtf GW?) really turned me off from going any further.
Then came the Ossiarch Bonereapers and then my interest went from "yeah one day I'll get into it," to "I really need to get into this game." Fast forward some time and a fortuitous event and I managed to get the following list:
- Mortisan Soulmason
- x2 Mortisan Boneshaper
- x3 units of 20 Mortrek Guard
- Gothizzar Harvesters
- Unit of 3 Necropolis Stalkers
- The Endless Spells
- Bone Tithe Nexus
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| 2k points of Bone Daddies! |
Add in the Mortrek Shield Corp Battalion option in there and I'm hovering around 2000 points. So my goal was to get these bone daddies assembled, primed, and started on the painted train. Unfortunately, I was not able to make that goal this month, which while I'm a little disappointed in myself for personal reasons I did manage to pass some of the metrics. So while I didn't get to a spot where I could have primed the army, I got them assembled and I even managed to get a game in with them!
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Setup was really close and I foolishly thought "how well can the Bonereapers take an Ironjawz charge turn 1?"
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I spent the first half of January cleaning and reorganizing my basement, but by the time I was done half of the month was already gone. Weather has not been too kind and frankly, I didn't really want to airbrush about 60 Mortrek Guard when I knew the first Monday in February the weather would be warm enough to rattle can them to paintable levels. So when I was able to get some painting in I started testing out acrylic inks and using some techniques on some Goliaths I had for Necromunda!
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| They can take it...sort of...not really...they need Shieldwall. |
Turning out great so far, but I'll tell you after that game? I'd rather get started on those Bonereapers. It's not often I talk about when I game here and most of that is because I forget to take pictures and I don't want to just type about the game without some nice pictures! I really enjoyed the game with my good friend Corey and he was a great teacher for how the game rolls. It's got enough similarity to 40k that I could pick it up but with enough differences to have a distinct feel. So to summarize here's what I learned and loved about the Bonereapers:
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| A really good game and it was violent! |
- Mortrek Guard and that Shieldwall ability? Good lawl that's ridiculous staying power on top of the recursion mechanic with the Harvesters and Boneshapers
- While I like spears for their reach, having the sword option on the Mortrek and the rend that comes with it can be so nasty (especially if you can buff them up)
- Gotta protect the Harvesters in a list like this, losing one can put a strain on the frontlines that a single Boneshaper cannot keep up.
- The Crematorian legion trait is a fun one but without the recursion mechanic to keep it strong, it loses its appeal. If you have the Harvester/Boneshaper keeping the numbers up though...kaboooom!
- The Discipline mechanic (i.e. alternative command point for this army) is really cool and useful and I think it rewards smart use.
- Gimme them bones boy
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| Gimme dem bones hee hee hee! |
So I'm hoping to knock these Goliaths out real quick because here in the near future (couple days I would say) the weather will be ready for some Bonereapers to be primed and then my focus will go to them. I've got a couple of ideas floating in my head for color schemes but my painting focus will be "speed at the best quality I can." We'll see how that goes, but until next time fellow hobbyists have a great month!
