Wednesday, December 2, 2009
MKFT Legion!!!
While there is a lot of work left to do on this little guy (ie GS in all the holes, doublecheck for mold lines, etc), he can now hit the table. So he's just a preview of one of the best sculpts in hordes.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Painting Updates
Pyre Troll
Dire Troll Mauler
Heirophant
Thursday, October 22, 2009
DJ rebuild + Lightbox pics
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Cryx vs. Cygnar - goodbye Field Test
David (Cygnar)
pStryker
Charger
Lancer
Ironclad
GMCA
ATGM
Sword Knights (6)
Me - Irontwitch (Cryx)
pGaspy
Ripper
Ripper
Canker
Seether
Skarlock
Mcthralls (10)
Necrosurgeon UA
Gorman di Wulfe
Turn 1: (Cryx)
Run everything up, taking care to keep Gaspy out of LOS. The Cankerworm, Deathripper, and McThralls headed for his Sword Knights, while the Seether went up the right flank. Gaspy, the Skarlock, and a deathripper took up the middle, with Gorman laying down cover. The cankerworm took advantage of his extra move to get closer to those tasty sword knights.
Turn 1: Cygnar
Full advance with all units. The Sword Knights and GMCA advancing towards the cankerworm, while the Ironclad and ATGM advanced toward the Seether. The Lancer was in a somewhat middling position, not yet commited to either flank, but not in range of anything in the middle either.
Turn 2: Cryx
The ripper with the mcthralls runs up and nodes a Breath of Corruption onto the Sword Knights, killing 2. The cankerworm then charges and eats up 3 more, leaving one Sword Knight to mourn his brethren. The canker then uses his extra move to get into B2B with the GMCA to try and force some freestrikes. The Seether moves slightly forward, as do Gaspy and the deathripper with him. The skarlock shifts flanks and heads towards the Mcthralls, giving them Scything Touch.
Turn 2: Cygnar
GMCA advances and shoots the seether with the shot that pushes d3". They hit him and knocks him back 3", but no crit KD. Ironclad advances 4" to stay out of the seether's charge range. The Lancer moves to get LOS on the McThralls and the Necrosurgeon. Stryker arcs 2 3" AOE spells, the first taking out 3 McThralls, opening up LOS to the Necrosurgeon. The next one directly hits the necrosurgeon, who pawns it off to a stitch thrall. One Stitch thrall died that turn, in addition to killing off two more McThralls. The GMCA somehow makes it out alive, but I can't remember how. He runs off to go hide with Stryker and the Lone Sword Knight.
Turn 3: Cryx
The necrosurgeon pops out 5 McThralls, and they advance in front of the cankerworm. The canker moves forward a little as well. Gaspy's Deathripper moves up towards the GMCA to be in range for a little parasitic action. Then Gaspy moves forward, arcs parasite onto the GMCA, and pops his feat...killing the whole unit and replenishing his focus for another Breath of Corruption to try and block LOS and maybe do some damage. Then he teleports back out of harms way.
Turn 3: Cygnar
Once again, Stryker arced an AOE onto the Mcthralls, this time killing off the surgeon, leaving only 6 McThralls behind. The lancer then activates and charges the Mcthralls, killing all but two. The Lone Sword Knight also helped with that. Stryker and the Charger kept backing up as well to avoid getting charged. The Ironclad charged the deathripper this turn too I think.
Turn 4: Cryx
Between the McThralls and Cankerworm, the Sword knight and Lancer were both destroyed. The Seether charged the Ironclad as well, dealing quite a bit of damage, but not boxing him.
Not much else happened as David conceded soon after this point, but I gave him a few hopefully helpful tips about choosing targets when you deploy your forces and trying to get the charge rather than being charged.
Anyways, something else to note is the cool new terrain pieces that I made. I'm actually quite happy with them considering that the total time spent on them is about 90 minutes, not counting drying time. The idea was taken from some modular terrain pieces that Yeti's Yell posted about on the terrain building portion of the PPforums.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
A Productive Saturday
The only bonus to my going in to the lab on Saturday was walking through the parking lot and noticing all these woodchips... At this point I remembered reading a post on the PPforums about making rocks and modular terrain pieces using original Gorilla Glue and woodchips. So I figured I'd try my hand at it.
The basic idea is that Gorilla (GG)foams up when in contact with water. First, lay down a sheet of wax paper and spread some water on top of it. Then I just start pouring on the GG until it was about the size of the terrain piece that I wanted. The next step is adding in the wood chips (some of which I cut first, some I didn't) in whatever way you think looks good. Some I did standing up, some lying down, etc. Then it's just a matter of sealing the wood with some elmer's glue, putting on some dirt/sand, prime & paint. Only one of them is painted atm. Hopefully I'll have the time to paint them up in better colors.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
July Painting Vow + New GW Washes
I also recently picked up the GW washes and started using them for my legion warbeasts. I'd tried painting a seraph before, but was not happy with the results. It might have just been the color scheme that I had tried, but I am much happier with the colors that came out of the GW washes on top of a white primer. Here's the first legion model that I did this way: a Legion Harrier. Hopefully later this week I'll have pics up of my Angelius that I've also done mostly by washes.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
July Painting Challenge Update: Devout
Friday, July 17, 2009
July Painting Challenge Update: Long Riders
Friday, July 10, 2009
July Painting Challenge Update: Grissel and Vassal
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Beginner's Corner: Overcoming your Fears
You've been prowling around the lgs for weeks now, you know you want to take the plunge, but something is holding you back...Fear.
Fear of Rejection: “If word ever gets out that I play with toy soldiers I’m ruined!”
While it’s certainly understandable to be hesitant about sharing your new hobby with normal people, from my experience there is really nothing to hide. When I share information about my hobby with non-gamers they are generally politely interested and often impressed when I show them a miniature I have painted. This hobby rewards patience, developed skills and attention to detail and I think most people can appreciate that just like they would respect those who are interested in woodworking, basket weaving, fly fishing or any number of hobbies. You might get a little friendly ribbing but that’s fine, if you can’t admit that this hobby is a just a teensy bit geeky then you’re taking yourself too seriously. Plus, seeing as how most normal people watch sports, reality TV or gameshows you have plenty of ammunition to fire back with.
Fear of Painting: “But they’re so tiny! And there are so many of them!”
The thought of taking a couple pieces of bare metal out of a blister and turning it into a dynamically painted model is a daunting task for any neophyte such as yourself. “But I’ve never even seen a brush small enough to paint that!” Well, trust me there are plenty of them, in fact there are more tools, tricks, paints and tutorials out there than you could ever imagine. You will be surprised and proud of how good your first painted miniature can look, and how much easier it is than you imagine. I will cover your first paint job in a later article, but for now calm those fears. You can paint, you can do it well, and hopefully you’ll find that you enjoy it.
Fear of Spending: “$30 for one hunk of metal, are you kidding me!?”
Ok yes, the price tag on models can be a bit steep (some more than others). Trust me you aren’t getting ripped off. A box of infantry or a warjack will run you about $30, you will spend at least 5 hours assembling and painting (depending on the complexity of the model, your painting prowess etc) and then countless hours actually fielding the model/unit in your list. On top of that you will have a beautiful model to show for your time and effort. Compared to other ways to spend your money $30 for a model or unit is pretty reasonable.
For example, going to a movie probably costs you $10 (given gas, snacks etc), for $30 you can see 3 movies which is probably about 6 hours of entertainment (assuming the movie doesn’t suck). So for about the same amount of money you can get 5-6 hours of entertainment, either from watching 3 movies, or modeling/painting your warjack/unit. With your model you also have all those fantastic games ahead of you, plus more than a ticket stub to show for your time. I’m not trying to tell you not to go see movies, or that wargaming is the most cost effective way to have fun, just that dropping $30 on a model isn’t as painful as it feels at first.
Fear of Horrifying Mutation:”I walked past the Sci-Fi section in a bookstore once…it wasn’t pretty.”
Yes there are those who live up to every stereotype of a geek, and when you encounter them in the wild just remember that they are far more terrified of you than you are of them. There are also those of us who live very normal, productive lives in spite of our darker urges. I am a fairly normal person in my mid 20s. I’m married to a fairly normal person, have a normal job, I’m able to carry on conversations with males as well as females without social awkwardness, I don’t live in a basement and I have personal hygiene standards well within the acceptable range. I also happen to enjoy wargaming as a hobby, I don’t think it’s something I need to be ashamed of, or grow out of. For further reading on normal people and gaming consider www.weregeek.com (Did I just ruin my normal guy cred by linking to a web comic?)
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
July Painting Challenge Update: 1st Long Rider
Monday, July 6, 2009
McThralls Set 1
Apologies for the poor lighting, but I was in a hurry.
Next up, Necrosurgeon and Stitch Thralls. (then maybe finishing all those bane knights)
-Twitch
Picking a Faction: Don't...go for the Uber B0rked
Granted it’s a lot more fun to win than to lose. However, approaching this game looking for the faction that will net you the most victories or has the cheesiest lists is a recipe for disappointment. (Cheeze is a term used to describe a list or tactic that is seen as so overpowered or cheap that it sucks all the fun out of the game for your opponent). There are several reasons why I would discourage a new player from picking a faction based on which is perceived as the most “powerful”
1. Your fun won’t last long
Most Uber B0rked combos rely on a very specific army list and very specific tactics (m0r3 Bane Knights!!! Vlad, Seraph Spam). When all you are doing is trolling forums looking for instructions on how to win at WM/Hordes you’ll find that the actual time spent playing the game isn’t very fun. The point of the game is to match wits with your opponent and try to get the most out of your units, when you are just following a set of instructions you are missing out on a huge component of the hobby. More so, following someone else’s directions and using the same list over and over again will not only get boring, but your opponents will get wise and bring lists tailored specifically to beat yours. Speaking of opponents…
2. You will run out of opponents
I have heard stories of people starting a pick-up game at their local gaming store (lgs) who upon seeing their opponent plop down 30 Bane Knights, say “No thanks” and promptly pack up and walk out the door. People play this game to have fun. Competition adds to the fun, but if you let it take the wheel you will find yourself getting stressed out instead of relaxing and enjoying your time playing. Playing an opponent whose only goal is to absolutely crush you is a bit off-putting but if that player also runs a list that isn’t balanced or breaks the spirit of the game then you’re looking at a pretty miserable time. If you are playing that kind of person you will most likely lose and have to suffer the exultant whoops of your opponent and congratulate him on being such a canny follower of directions. In the event that you win you will most likely have to deal with a sore loser armed with a couple pounds of pewter whose whole world just came crashing down because he followed the recipe for instant win exactly but the interwebz lied to him. No one wants to play that person, please don’t be that person.
3. You won’t be able to stick with one faction
For the most part WARMACHINE/HORDES factions are remarkably well balanced. In any given year there will be armies or casters that are seen as the uber powerful end all be all of the game. As the meta-game evolves and the community finds effective counters to these tactics that particular army/caster will wane in popularity and a new uber b0rked army will rise from the ashes. For example, the Skorne faction was viewed as seriously underpowered through Primal and Evolution. However, with the release of the most recent expansion, Metamorphosis, Skorne got some very powerful models which suddenly have people taking the faction seriously, and by seriously I mean crying their little eyes out about how overpowered and unfair Skorne is. Now if you asked someone 6 months ago which WM/Hordes faction was the most powerful Skorne would have ranked at the bottom of the list. Ask that question now and Skorne is at least in the running for most competitive HORDES faction (‘cuz like umm…OMG they can shoot thro wallz!). In another 6 months people will have learned how to play against Skorne (a relatively new phenomenon) and order will be restored to the universe. (Well with any luck in 6 months the HORDES MkII Field Test will be running and everything will be shaken up). It is impossible to keep up with the trends of the “most powerful” unless you have a ton of cash to dump into a new army every 6 months. In my opinion it is much more rewarding to choose a faction (or two…or three) and stick with them. You develop a sense of loyalty, get to experience all the faction has to offer, and actually have time to paint your models. When your faction has its 6 months of glory then rejoice, look down on all the people hopping on the bandwagon and wait for them to lose interest so you can get back to painting your scattergunners. I guess I could put it this way, do you want to be a Lakers fan or a Cubs fan?
So to summarize, I believe that choosing an army based on a perceived amount of win will limit your amount of fun, limit your number of opponents, and limit the amount of time you can devote to one faction.
Beginner's Corner
Friday, July 3, 2009
Painting Update
Basecoated, Predip
Notes on dipping: Read instructions first. I tried painting on the dip, and the worked ok, but it doesn't catch very well in all the grooves (probably due to my not cleaning it well enough). So then I just dipped the whole model in and used a brush to clean it up. Not a big deal till I realized that the brush needs to be cleaned with Turpentine or Mineral Spirits... neither of which I have. Hopefully I haven't ruined one of my better brushes, but only time will tell. So remember to use a crappy brush if you don't have paint thinner to clean this stuff up. I also need to put some matte sealer on this guy cause he's waaay too shiny... the work is never done.
Here's a quick pic of my progress on eDenny. She's all assembled and the joints are GS'ed. Now I just need to prime her and slap on some paint. The question is, prime in white or black? The white might make the ghostly part of her bottom half easier, but armor not as good, etc. I'm leaning towards white at the moment.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
July Painting Challenge!
Here is what I have vowed to paint by the end of July:
Long Riders x3
DTM
Grissel
Heirophant
Their state as of 11:00am July 2nd
I went a little easy on myself since it's my first challenge. Also I've done a bit of conversion work on the Long Riders and I don't want to waste all that effort by doing a rushed paint job. Plus I've also got a Warlock in there, and while Grissel's sculpt isn't my favorite, she is a 'lock and so she deserves some extra attention.
I'm trying to punch up the Scottish theme for my Trollbloods and I thought it would be pretty neat to have my Long Riders on highland cattle instead of buffalo. So I added more fur the the face and hindquarters and threw in a couple Balmoral hats while I was at it. I'm not satisfied with the cattle's fur color at this point so I'm going to have to put some work into that. Anyway, here's a picture of my Long Rider when I started on it today, and another after a couple hours work.
I've got to finish the base, paint up the kilt, figure out what I'm going to do with that fur, add more highlights and do all the details (mini keg, amulets etc). I'll be taking a break until monday though but hopefully I'll be able to finish it up early next week and tackle the other 2.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Troll Goal
I am a big fan of WARMACHINE MK2 and I can’t wait for HORDES to get the same treatment. Rumor has it that the HORDES field test will appear some time in January, soon after mk2 is officially released. With that in mind I’ve set myself a goal, to paint all of my Trollblood models by January 2010. I’ve got a pretty good start on these guys so I think I can pull it off. I currently have 14 models painted and 19 left to go (yikes!) But a lot of the models that are unpainted are more run of the mill infantry that I don’t need to lavish with detail. Here’s a rundown of what I have finished and what I still need to work on.
Wraithwitch Deneghra Conversion
I liked his conversion so much that I had to try it myself. After proxying eDenny in 15pt MM this weekend, it motivated me to start putting her together...or cutting her apart, whatever the case may be.
Here are all the pieces, followed by the cutting and splicing. I had a few problems with eDenny's Witch Barbs being very fragile. The middle one broke off, and the other two are close to following. They're a little to thin to pin with paperclips, so I might resort to staples as a pin or just GS'ing them on.
While I aspire to painting like Scrollmaster, I doubt I'll be able to pull that off on this model. As it is, this is definitely going to be one of my better models, so I'll be taking my time on it.
-Twitch
Monday, June 29, 2009
15Pt Pre-Wedding Mangled Metal
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Crusader
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
35pt Battle - Kreoss vs eGapsy
Game Summary:
Turn 1: PoM
Micah won the rolloff, so he started the game. He advanced and cast lamentation (stupid making spells expensive...). Other than that, not much happened. Since I was playing eGaspy, I advanced behind my rolling cloud of doom, 3 x 3" clouds to block LOS.
Turn 2: Kreoss advanced enough to get the clouds in his ctl range, and casts purification so that his Redeemer can shoot up my biles before they get too close. He managed to kill off 3 of them. The Monolith Bearer also popped his mini-feat to help out the Zealots, while the priest did the whole no spell targeting thing. That was annoying, so my remaining biles went up and one of them purged on the front line of zealots, giving 4 of 10 corrosion. The DJ then charged in and threw one of the zealots at the priest, but it missed and clipped another zealot instead. Since they couldn't take dmg that turn, none of them died, but 4 were going to at the start of Micah's turn. I was hoping that Micah wouldn't want to spend so much focus on both purification and lamentation again, so I roll out my clouds and advance a little more... oh the poor foolish cryxian.
Turn 3: Kreoss advances and once again casts purification and lamentation and then pops his feat. He also gave the redeemer 3 focus, so the redeemer now has LOS to a KD eGaspy. With the help of the vassal, the redeemer pops off 4 shots, but even with pretty high rolls, they don't do much to a arm 19 caster. Thank Toruk for Gaspy's beefiness. Too bad the zealots and KE's together took out the DJ. Roh well. On my turn, I use a skarlock to cast excarnate (wondering now if it actually can do that) and add a bile to finish off the rest of the zealots. My ripper then stood up and advanced up behind where the zealots were to be able to arc a spell, so it sac'ed its action and waited. Gaspy then moved back out of purification range and arced in a Death Knell to hit Kreoss, bunch of choir boys, reclaimer, and a devout. Not too much dmg to Kreoss or the Devout, but everything else died.
The next two turns consisted of Gaspy Death Knelling and Excarnating to add in BK's who charged Kreoss and finished the game.
Twitch: My thoughts: 35 pts was waaay too much fun. Micah's list could have used some tweaking. He didn't ever use his revenger, and he didn't need 10 KE's. Probably too much casting of purification too. One round would have been good enough I think, then hand out good buffs to the rest of the army. I really enjoy eGaspy, especially at the higher point level. A good lesson to remember is that if your enemy is willing to pay the focus for a few spells one turn to rid you of cover, why wouldn't he the next turn. *shrug* life goes on. Good thing for me that Gaspy was tough enough to take it. I also liked the long range spellcasting of Gaspy to win the game. I didn't ever use his feat, which is a first for me with eGaspy. Lots of holy crap moments in there, along with joyous victories. In all, t'was fun.
Jolly Angus: My thoughts: 35 points is a blast. Since we never played more than 500 points in mk1 or 25 points in mk2 I was a bit intimidated by the prospect of playing our largest game yet. I was worried that things would take too long or my army would seem too unwieldy. Fortunately that was not the case. The game really opens up nicely at 35 without being cumbersome. At 25 points I felt like most of my army was support (choir, vassal, wracks, heirophant, blah blah blah) with no room for more heavy hitters. I definitely have different plans for my next 35 point army and I feel like I learned a lot from this game (aka got my ass handed to me). Some things I learned/realized this game: 1) PoM is better played as an attrition army than an assassination army. I need to focus on decimating my opponent's army more than opening up a hole to their caster. 2) I play reactively, which works decently for Trollbloods but instead of spending all my focus counteracting what my opponent does I need to be setting my own plans into motion. 3) every one of pKreoss' spells is useful and I need to take advantage of PoM's ability to gain dominating amounts of focus so I can cast all those delicious spells. So even though I got omgwtfbbqpwnd I am really excited for our next game to see how I can improve. I expect many more crushing defeats before I get the hang of PoM but I'm hoping once I do it will all be worth it.