A lot happens in 2 months

Good tidings my dear wargaming friends!  I hope things are going well for you all and many greetings to you and yours.  It's been a couple of months since the last update and it's been a busy time not only for myself but a lot of my friends, co-workers, and family.  Work has been killer so obviously the answer has been to turn to pursuits of relaxation and hobbying, and what a time it has been!  Hopefully it's not been as crazy for you all as it has me, but in case it has make sure to grab your favorite drink and take a few moments to relax as we dive into a shared hobby together (it might get long up in here).

So like the post suggests a lot happens in a couple of months.  For me there's been a lot of things going on in my own life that makes you appreciate the times you can snag to enjoy hobby time.  The career has been progressing in a great ball of crazy fire and times have been rough.  So what does that mean for the hobby you ask?  Well I've been putting in a lot of work on painting up models!  That's right I've been actually engaging in that oft-forgotten aspect to our hobby, at least I feel like it's the most neglected part.  It's like the icing on the cake in a lot of ways, it's not necessary for the cake to be functional but it's the difference in being great.  I felt particularly motivated to start painting at some point where a mix of staring at the horde of primed plastic/metal/resin, longing for color and creativity, and the desire to paint as part of my Blood Bowl league came together and caused me to just...start.

That's the hurdle isn't it?  Starting the process.  It's awkward at first when you've not painted for a long time but soon the fine motor skills get back to their old spot and you can even start to improve in some ways.  So I decided that I am going to try.  I won't promise to make myself do something everyday, because that's not reasonable or feasible in my mid-30s.  No, all I can say is that I will continue to make an effort to try and paint more.  I want to paint more.  I want to show up to events with painted models (because we all know that they roll better when painted amirite 😉) and not continue this cycle of buying more models without painting some first!

So now every couple of months I'll come back and let you know how this promise is going.  With that in mind I want to share with you my progress:

Blood Bowl Orcs

Blood Bowl Nurgle

Blood Bowl Humans

Necromunda Orlock Gang

Current WIP: Blood Bowl Dwarves

As you can see there is a common theme and since I've been playing Blood Bowl like a lot, it only seems appropriate to keep the pain train coming.  In total that makes 61 models I've painted in two months!  That's about a model a day, which is pretty good in my books because it was originally 0 models a day...or a month...or two months...it's been awhile.

It's a pretty solid routine to get some painting done when I get home from work and it's been lending to progress overall.  One thing I've had to learn is to let go of some high standards I have in my mind and just paint to the best I can right now.  So far I think the results have been working out and I've been able to try out a couple things, especially weathering on a couple of the Necromunda pieces/bases.  I also have been looking for opportunities to just try new things out, and I feel that Blood Bowl has some good models to be experimental with.

So while I am working on the Dwarves I am of course looking ahead for the future and I think no greater motivation can exist than attending a con.  Specifically:

Except totally not 2018

Yes sir/ma'am it is the NoVA Open.  I went last year with my brother and some friends and I had fun...buuuuuuuuut I didn't sign up for anything so really I went to watch people play games and let's be real with each other: it's not as fun no matter how hard you try.  A good break from your own game sure. Maybe to watch a friend, sure.  To watch games without really playing any yourself?

So this year it's going to be different!  I've signed up for events (yeah!), and I've got my schedule (aww yeah!), but now...now I have projects (oh).  See a lot of these events want your models painted and so now I have several goals in mind.  So to run down my list of events and accompanying model count (estimated):

• Zone Mortalis (Warhammer 30k): A One Thousand point list of Thousand Sons (heh).  
• 32 models
• Aristeia!
• 4 models
• Infinity After Dark: So it's a DnD style Infinity event where I am not sure what the model count will look like.  So I will just paint up my Yu-Jing and hope for the best.
• About 12 models?
• Blood Bowl: I haven't decided my team yet but it's an all day tournament.  I am probably going with Dwarves, but if I had access to Dark Elves I might swing that way.
• 18 models (including tokens)
• Guild Ball Regional Cup: A Guild Ball tournament you say?! WELL I NEVER.
• 0 models (I already painted my Morticians)
•  Godtear: Steamforge's new game but I don't need the buy any models or do anything other than show up.
• 0 models

So overall I'm looking at about 66 models which as I have shown myself that I can get it done in about 2 months.  So once I start the paint train I do believe I can get it done before the deadline in late August.  That and I have some plans for airbrushing the Thousand Sons and maybe the Yu-Jing that will help speed the process up.  For Thousand Sons I plan on using the method outlined by Epic Duck Studios (link right here) because not only is it reasonably quick but also I reeeeeeeaaaaaaaaally like that color scheme.  For the Yu-Jing I am looking at sticking with my usual palette of cool colors as I am used to those and would like the models to look semi-decent. I've got some friends, a couple of which are fellow bloggers, WaaarghPug and The Ordinary Wargamer, who are also going so it's going be a solid weekend I am sure.

I have another event I am going to try and get models painted up for and that's a local Steamroller in June and I've recently acquired some Crucible Guard!  With some trading done with WaaarghPug I have acquired a new project to get into and hopefully if I time things right I can assemble and get these buggers painted before June...before I paint everything else for NoVA...hoo boy.

Well that about sums up my current project completions as well as my future paintings.  I will be sure to take plenty of pictures so that with my next update I will have pretty models (and hopefully better skills too).  I hope you all are doing well and wish you best of luck in your own hobbying.  Until then, happy gaming!

A Time for Batreps Part 2

All righty folks and welcome back to another post by yours truly, I certainly hope your day is going well and you are enjoying yourselves.  We’re following up on last batrep post with another one, except this time we are going to try and cover 3 games all in this post!  Truthfully it’s because I sort of…maybe…didn’t take as many pictures as I had before?  Woops.  Anyways here we go with the next game we played, Guild Ball!  Sadly I took fewer pictures as we played, a bad habit of mine, and so the picture quantity and content is limited.  My apologies.

So starting the game off Wells wanted to try a different guild this time around and settled on the Mortician’s Guild versus me playing as the Alchemists.  Our rosters were:

1.       Obulus

2.       Dirge

3.       Cosset

4.       Ghast

5.       Mist

6.       Silence

1.       Smoke

2.       Flask

3.       Katalyst1

4.       Compound

5.       Vitriol

6.       Calculus

I felt bad for Wells because my friend here plays 40k a lot, but doesn’t get much exposure to other games and so I could tell he was having a hard time.  Throw on top of that a new team, especially one as nuanced as the Mortician’s, and it was just hard for the guy.  I can’t say for certain if he felt this way but the way he was playing suggested that he initially went defensive because he wasn’t sure of what his team could do.  Also, the terrain was randomly generated (by tossing the 2D terrain like pancakes from like a foot away lol) and so it was hard for him to maneuver around without taking penalties.  I’d say about mid-game the gears were turning again for Wells mechanically (also he had an overnight break to read about his team) and he started to work on making plays but at this point, it was too late.  The Alchemists had strong board control, kept slowly ticking away at his health with condition damage, and the scoring potential was too strong.

Right at the start of turn 2-3

In the end, the game was 13 to 3, with the Alchemists scoring 2 goals and 3 KO’s (one was the mascot).  Smoke is a fun captain I have to say with her Cloud Jumper ability and AoE manipulation.  Wells and I talked about the game afterward and his early game hesitancy really hurt his chances in the later phases.  The lack of team knowledge definitely hurt him as well and coming from a Fisherman’s coach straight into Mortician’s with no pre-knowledge was not going to be easy.  We also talked a bit about how some of his player use was sub-optimal and if he decided to try Mortician’s again what he could have done differently, for example, he rarely used Ghast except to shuffle around the board a bit when his playbook is pretty solid for damage and some board control.  I think next time I’ll see either the Fish back on the field or perhaps this new Falconer’s minor guild that might be interesting to Wells (dude loves birds).

Vitriol on the right went and scored while the middle was jammed up

Our next game was Infinity and I’m not going to lie I was really excited about this game.  I’ve been feeling the Infinity itch lately with some of the new models being published (the new JSA force is so goooood) and so Wells agreed to try it out.  We had a beginner style game at GenCon last year and he enjoyed it and so we decided to do “intermediate rules.”  This was like a style that had more than the basics but wasn’t full blown Infinity either, for example TO camouflage was the -6 to hit a penalty but didn’t have the marker/deployment shenanigans.  Our lists were 300 points and made up of the models from Operation Icestorm and Beyond OIS.  Wells went with PanO and I went with Nomads.  We settled on the scenario Supremacy from the core rulebook and because we were using starter box models/lists we decided everyone would be a “specialist troop” but in a generalized sense so they didn’t get any special abilities apart from if they were an actual specialist.  Also, we didn’t play with Command Tokens because we’re still acclimating to this game.

Not Infinity, but Smoke on the top left scored the last goal of the game

So I won the initial roll and chose deployment zones and order and let me tell you this was my crucial mistake.  I chose a bad zone and I paid for it dearly.  This game was in Wells’ hands from the beginning and it was like shooting fish in a barrel for him.  My active turn 1 had my Spekter, Intruder, and my Kriza Borac all go unconscious because of his sniper Nisse.  Oh man, this was going to be rough.  Then my Reverend Healer acted as if she was a bad anime trope as an MMO healer and ended up killing off the Kriza with a natural 20 on her Doctor roll.  At this point, I lost a significant chunk of my firepower and it just went downhill from there.  My Mobile Brigada Lt. was able to move up along a building edge and take out the Nisse before being able to move in and secure a computer for 1 point.  On Wells’ active turn it was just a slaughterfest.  He jumped his Akhali out of LoS from anyone, moved him up, and took computers for his ever-increasing score.  He moved his Father-Knight up from out of cover and was able to take out my Lt. and hold the zone.  Turn 2 and 3 there wasn’t a whole lot of interesting action, as Wells bagged the game early on with his sniper.  So the score ended up being 9 to 1 with PanO walking away from this fight with barely a scratch.  Rough game but it taught me many lessons about Infinity in general and it’s still a game I very much enjoy, even when I am dying by the droves.

Do you see the Spekter and Intruder down for the count?  The peeking Kriza in the bottom left was down too!

Our final game of his trip was a match of Dark Age and we played a 1000 point match where I made a couple lists I had been using (not that they are super-efficient or anything since I’m still newish to the game also) and we played Kukulkani versus Horde Skaard, Wells and myself respectively.  The scenario was Ancient and Bloody Wasteland where the goal was to kill each other dead.  You gained a VP per 100 points (rounded up by to the nearest 50) killed off and whatever Secondary Objective VPs gained.  Think Secondary Objectives like the Tactical Objectives from 40k, randomly drawn objectives but with the caveat that you can tailor the deck (as long as you have at least 16 cards) with whichever cards you think you can get that game.

I’d like to spend a lot of time on this game as Dark Age is a pretty solid game overall.  I only took one picture however and Wells having only played 2 games before was not prepared with knowledge to know how to best use his guys.  As a result it was a pretty harsh game for him as he struggled with a lot of the nuanced rules that K3 have and as much as I tried to help remember which rules he had, there was only so much that could be done.  The other part was not knowing how to use the models to the best of their abilities.  I give Wells credit it though he started to piece some things together pretty quickly and started using squad-links and combos here and there.  The nature of Dark Age is that it’s a brutal game and by the time the gears were turning, the sand was stained deeply with Kukulkani blood and littered with crystal skulls.  The game ended with a big advantage to the Skaard with a total of 13 to 3 VPs.  The Warhead gave a lot of damage out that, at times, was absolutely terrifying.  When down to only 1 hp that lummox hits with a PW of 14, and if you happen to be prone that’s x2!  For those unfamiliar with Dark Age mechanics when you hit someone they then make an armor check where you take your armor value and subtract the attack’s PW.  In a game where you are rolling low that means even if you had the highest armor value of 20 you’d still only be able to avoid a hit like that on a 6 or lower, and if there’s a damage multiplier then you roll that many dice and need to save on ALL of them to not take a wound.  Oh yeah, he was nasty.

How to ensure that no one else plays with you

So overall despite the beatdown Wells seemed to have enjoyed Dark Age and my impression was that with more games for experience and perhaps a different force then it would have definitely been a different game.  I think the big difference was that K3 is a wonky force in my opinion and the learning curve, while not too steep, does require some practice games in before it starts to click.  There were a lot of little rules here and there that ended up making a big difference and I think once taken into consideration I think our future games will be vastly different. 

Well, that’s it for gaming my fellow wargamers and I hope you enjoyed the batreps despite the lack of pictures and further details.  We pretty much played a game a day and so the details started to get hazy at times and the longer I play the more likely it is I forget to take some snaps.  Anyways I hope you’re enjoying your hobby and time and until next time have a fun game and may your dice be kind!

Why throw heads when you can throw the ball? The Morticians!

Great tidings to you all fellow wargamers and welcome to another exciting episode of Wargamer Ramblings!  Today I wanted to go over another team in Guild Ball and it happens to be the second team that the household currently has: the Morticians!  As in the previous team review post you can view/download the stat cards for free right HERE.

So if there is one thing certain about living is that death is inevitable and well someone has to take care of the grisly grave work.  That is where the Mortician's guild comes onto the scene and they will take care of your loved ones...maybe?  The team definitely has the feel that whatever they do off the pitch is not quite ethical.  Each model has the look and demeanor that something isn't quite right about them and whatever drives them is malicious.  Gameplay-wise the Morticians are about manipulating the enemy team and influence to fit the plans of the guild of death.  I find that it might be best to look at the models and get an idea of what they do to really make sense of it all.  Given the complexity of the team this might be a lengthy post so get a drink/snack and let's get to it.

Guild Symbol

Alright let's look at the captains.  First off we have old man Obulus who has a pretty decent stat-line save his movement and kicking potential.  That's not why you take him though, you take him for his character plays!  For 1 Influence he can have an ally re-roll all dice for it's next attack or character play.  Next you can use him to steal Influence off of an enemy model though and give it to a friendly model.  Finally you can force an enemy model to one of the following: jog/pass/attack and during this action it's counted as a friendly.  Character traits help Obulus move around the field some and get out of sticky spots if engaged.  His legendary play steals all of the enemy team's MP and you gain that MP.  So let me just say Obulus is quite the manipulator.  Being able to force the enemy striker to pass the ball to a fellow Mortician, to steal Influence that might be desperately needed for a possible score, and to steal ALL of the MP from the enemy?  That's pretty intimidating if you ask me.

Start box with Obulus, Cosset, and Graves S1

Scalpel is the season 2 Mortician's captain and she offers a different take to the guild's playstyle.  Her stat-line is a bit beefier than Obulus but with less overt influence manipulation.  Her legendary play will bring every enemy model within 3" into her which then allows her to bring some pain!  She can manipulate Influence but not to a degree like Obulus.  She can transfer them around to other enemy models which in the right circumstances can be annoying.  Her character traits seem to suggest she favors a bit more of a risky gameplay than Obulus, with benefits to reducing armor and gaining defense on parting blows.  Finally she provides some utility for her team's movement with Second Wind, and helps some people stick around with Wake the Dead.

Graves season 1 has some interesting stuff to bring to the pitch, starting off with a Tackle result with only 1 success in melee!  His kick is decent too, so he can easily snatch the ball from an unwary opponent.  His character play allows him to damage all models in his melee range (careful it includes friendly ones too) for a quick 3 points of damage, but also triggering his ability to put a bleed condition on as well.  Should you get 6 hits he can put Rabid Animal on someone for a -4/-4" move and give the poisoned condition.  Graves season 2 plays a bit off of the season 2 mascot gaining some buffs if nearby the rats.  His stat-line changed to reflect his now increasingly paranoia, and his character play Gravedigger benefits a team who is trying to go for the knock-out win by adding a VP when a targeted enemy model is taken-out.

The overall mood of the Mortician's: gloom and doom

So looking at the other players I want to start off with Cosset.  She is what I consider a risky card in your team, in that she can take 3 damage (with only 12 health to start) to gain +3 to her TAC.  She also can charge for free so combined she can bring 11 TAC to the charge.  She only has a max of 2 influence to spend so it's either to claw out someone's eyes or to use her character play, Lure, and get someone to make a jog directly towards her.  Ghast is a solid choice as well with a decent stat-line and offensive capabilities.  His character play only triggers on 4 hits but it is a nice pulse to push every (again that is friendly models too) 4" away and to give them 3 damage.  The first time he takes damage each turn the team gains 2 MP, so that could deter someone wanting to slap him a bit.  Bonesaw is a bit of a whirlwind of options.  Keep in mind his base size is 50mm but he can pass over other models with his heroic play (if he has the movement to do so) and after his activation he gets +1 Defense from attacks/character plays.  His playbook is short so with a couple of hits he can take the ball and the next attack make a character play to give someone 2 damage and then make a kick, which isn't a bad move if you ask me.  If he does manage to fall he will get up each turn before being officially knocked-out and heal up 3 HP.

Let's talk about my growing favorite, Silence.  At first I am like "that's a good stat-line except for his move..." and then I see his character plays.  Wow.  Just wow.  Being able to force an opponent to activate a specific model next...AND also being able to force them to activate a model LAST is unreal.  Think about it: you set up your guild members to steal the ball and pass it to your striker in prime position and then BAM you can't activate that key member until it is the last one.  How annoying is that?  The only downside is that each costs only 1 Influence so you might need some MP to ensure a hit.  Casket is your big 'ole team member.  He is slow, has a lot of health, can hit hard, and has some neat utility options.  For one he can make it harder for the enemy to charge one of your friendlies, and with 2 hits from his playbook he can debuff an enemy model with -4/-4" and -2 dice on their TAC and plays.  He has a legendary play though that is quite nasty.  If he lands the knock-out blow once per game he nets you an additional 2 VP's but, and I say BUT, THERE'S MORE!  The model knocked out cannot receive icy sponges this turn and in the next maintenance phase!  So you knock out someone and they stay knocked da eff out!

One of my favorite paint jobs, credit to: Battle Brush Studios right here

Finally the mascots.  Dirge does a lot of support when he flies around the field.  His move is high, can mark an enemy model so that friendlies gain +2 to their TAC pool, and if the enemy takes him out they straight out lose 4 MP.  That's not an appealing move if you ask me.  Vileswarm, the pile of rats, is more or less meant to be annoying as hell.  It takes only 1 influence to charge most players and if they take him out then everyone in 3" takes damage and are now poisoned.

Phew what a mouthful!  Compared to the Alchemists the Morticians definitely have a lot of complexity underneath the dirt.  I'm sure with some careful digging you will be able to find the bone of their techniques and get a head of the game!  Anyways bad jokes aside the Morticians have a lot of depth to them and a skilled player will be exceptionally annoying to play against.  Hopefully that gave you some insight into the players of the team, happy gaming everyone and roll well!

How the wife and I got started with Guild Ball

Good day to you fellow wargamers and welcome to another set of ramblings!  I hope you have been making progress with your models in whatever way it is.  For me I’ve been working on assembling models from GenCon and so I wanted to talk briefly about a particular set of them.  In this case I’m going to go over Guild Ball, yes that’s right the game of low-fantasy medieval rugby!

So while we were at GenCon I was excited to see that Steamforged Games had a booth and of course being the excited gamer I went by to check them out.  The amount of people rushing the booth was incredible.  That boot was so busy it was unreal, I’m not sure Steamforged realized how popular they would have been.  I think it was just a glob of people watching demo games and they were just running demo games over and over and over.

So when Courtney and I were able to get a demo game in it was pretty quick and straight-forward.  Our demo guy was a great guy by the name of Jaime who is part of the GBHL crew on YouTube (link to their channel can be found right here).  He did a fantastic job of teaching us yanks the basic mechanics behind Guild Ball.  We could tell he was worn down since he probably ran demo after demo non-stop.  He took the time to give us a rundown of each faction, mostly for my wife’s sake than mine (I’ve been reading up on GB for a while now). 

So those who know my wife knows that she is a gentle, quiet kind of woman who’s interest in miniature gaming can be best described as mild.  She enjoys the occasional game of Warmachine, has been getting into painting, and likes being a part of our local gaming group.  She does not get super excited and obsessive like I do when it comes to gaming.  So when my wife, after being given an explanation of Guild Ball mechanics/factions, rather quickly declared her chosen guild and said we should buy into it before I did, well you can imagine my surprise and delight.  So she chose the Alchemist’s and I went with the Mortician’s guild.  Some money exchanged later and we were on our way to getting ready for some matches.

So today I wanted to just give a quick little blurb on the models themselves.  The models are made from white metal and to be honest are fairly easy to assemble.  Out of the 21 models I’ve assembled only a few had any noticeable flash on them and even then it was not in large amounts.  Mold lines were minimal and so most of them were not hard to clean off.  There were a few places that were a bit odd to get a file in there but I think I either managed to get at them with some angle work or I decided to leave it alone and hope for the best.  The larger models had nubs and spots for pieces to fit in but mostly were solid pieces requiring no pinging whatsoever.  Overall they were quick to assemble and once I cleaned them up it took about an hour to get a whole team up.

The one thing I will say is that the tabs for the slotted bases were either hit or miss.  Some of the models’ tabs were perfect fits and clung to the sides allowing the super glue to hold on.  For other models thought the tabs were waaaaaaaaaay too skinny to be effective and required some bending to get the connection points in.  I would say the ratio really was about 50/50 in terms of being perfect or not but it really wasn’t an issue.  More of a minor inconvenience really.  Speaking of the bases most of them will require some sort of filler to close the gap in if you care about that sort of thing.  I am thinking of using green stuff to fill it in but will take suggestions.

As you can see I was able to get both of our teams assembled and put together in about 2 days work (2 hours per day that is lol), so the wife and I are now ready to toss around the ball and knock each other’s teeth out!  That’s about it for our introductory foray into the game of Guild Ball, if you are interested here is a link to Steamforged Games.  The rules are free as well as stat cards and even paper doll cutouts if you want to try the game before buying in.  Until next time fellow gamers take care and happy gaming!