2016 Hobby Plans....

Once again I want to step back a little and try and make a plan for my hobby for 2016. The first step is to look at how hard I failed in 2015..


I wanted:

1 - A game a month.

Fell well short of this but I did get more games in that 2014...so that is a positive

2 - Master an army

Fail

3 -  Tidy up gaming space and sort out terrain.

Success!!  Although I do still have some unassembled GW terrain ready to work on

4 - Finish off Orks

Massive fail


With all that in mind I plan to set some simple 2016 goals.

1 - Game more than 2015.

By all account I only got in around 7 or 8 games in 2015. Target is to beat that. To be honest I think I am gonna need to arrange some game with Josh and Aaron to make this happen.

I think some sort of narrative or at least interesting gaming scenarios might lend towards this happening a bit more.

2 - Paint an army...or at least paint more

Always hard for me as I chop and change ALL THE TIME. Thinking maybe Iron Warriors or Daemonkin as I have most of the models for both of these armies.

For this I am thinking some sort of monthly challenge with myself or others, continuing / rebooting the escalation league with a twist and maybe starting circa 1000 points.


Edit:

I am going to randomise a force organisation slot each month and aim to paint a models from that slot.
For January I roll a 2 on my chart which is HQ. So January will be an Iron Warriors Siege Breaker

Terrain - Manufactorum

A spur of the moment purchase, and equally spurred paint job.  Pretty happy how it looks.
Not that you could really stuff up a paint job on a partially destroyed building in a war zone..

Bruce, did you leave the microwave on again?

Completed unit of Ork Boyz and Runtherd

Thats right, its all ten Ork boyz in the unit completed, including the Runtherd from the Grots.
No special write up, just assorted picture of them all.

Y we following dat lousy Runt'erd?

Get him boyz!

Its not eazy bein green

I fink we lost him...

'Er he iz.

Cutting the time down between models!

Thats right, only three weeks since the previous ones were finished.  Verily, I am on fire.

Bazza, Baaza, and Baza

Hot on Bazza's heels

More Boyz racing to the end line.  Nearly done with another three.

Gazza, Shazza, and Frank.

Ork Boy Bazza done!

Average pictures of the complete Mr Bazza.
The rest of the team are catching up swiftly.  Should be all complete before they have their next outing.

Ork Boyz WIP

Long time, no post.  Still making progress on my Ork Boyz and eight Kans.

Here is a shot of Frank.  And yes, thats Khorne parts under him, and also doubling as his pack.

Not Troll with axe.  Ork wif axe!

Ork Boys

WIP of Ork Boyz.  Just finished the highlights on their skin, not that it really shows here.  Oh well, still working on something at least!

Bazza

Bazza, Bazza, Bazza, Bazza, and Jeff.

Grot bases

Paul demanded I put up more shots of my Grots and their broken plascrete bases.
So like umm, here they are.  Unfortunately the S6 is not at home so the photos are with my shitty old phone.

Watch out for Klanky!

Started Painting the Striking Scorpions I got from Rob.

Have also mostly finished my wraithlord, the aim is to make him a mini me of the wraigthknight. Should get picks up in the next day or two.

Mostly happy, The photos however show all of the mistakes. Big problem I have is that where I paint the lighting is pretty bad. Bases aren't finished yet, and the rest need more Highlights.

Karandras and Exarch: Needs the highlighting tidied up. Pretty happy overall with the chitin effect though.

Going the give the rank and file a light dry brush of yellow mixed with the green to pick the details a bit more.

3k+ 1k game, 4 players per team.

Played a 3k + 1k game of 40k today, 4 players per side. i.e. 16000 points per side.

The set up was 2 tables:

TL;DR:
Massive game, good fun but ridiculously hectic. Stomp is OP. D weapons are necessary with super heavies and gargantuans. The dice were definitely not my friend today.

1 underground table: unit restrictions like no flyers, large blasts set of cave ins etc.
1 overground table: Length of 3 standard tables,
The defenders (3 chaos) deployed in the centre with loads of ruins., the eldar and guard set up behind a wall that blocked us off from the centre section with an 18" high wall with a 12" wide gate in the middle.
On the underground table, necron set up at one end opposite chaos marines at the other.

Effectively that was the beginning of the end for us.

The Ork player had a looooong run into massive fire including a (counts as) warhound, which blitzed his stompa first turn (4 D-shots make it go bye-bye)

Myself and the guard player trapped behind the wall. In hindsight we should have taken the wall down. Put us in a choke point. Negated my mobility, and the Guard player had to run the length of our table. On the underground board we did better, but no transports made for a long slog.

Effectively we were too spread out and got defeated in detail. If the Eldar and Guard had swapped deployment with the Orks, we would have had a much better beginning position, I would have had better mobility and the Guard player would have had more targets to shoot at.

Helldrakes are ridiculously difficult to kill.....Except for dark reaper exarchs with icarus lascannons.
What was really difficult was when daemonettes got a 2+ invuln save. absorbed an absolutely staggering amount of fire. 2+ Invuln Save was created by a couple of Daemons and daemon princes and the warp storm table, a mixture of abilities and psychic powers

Centre of Above ground table. Wall is just out of shot to left.

From centre of table looking at wall. Wraithknight went through and did about 600 points damage in a turn and a half. Stomp is OP. got taken out by a 666 point daemon prince. We had lowered his I due to Slaanesh Musk, but turns out that fearless are immune. possibly could have done more damage. It's important in my opinion to tell opponents not only what a rule does but what the exceptions are. 

Underground table. All players had a 1000pt tunnel rat army. Which got deployed from reserves onto this board. Got pretty messy, loads of carnage. Gazgkul Thraka Formation Survived for 4 turns and did the most damage on this table. Karandras, killed the necron lord, but then got killed in retaliation strikes. To be fair he was annhialated thanks to my abysmal rolling.

Length of table. Big Pink Slaaneshi Warhound in foreground. Almost single handedly tabled the Ork Player. Titans need to be FOCUSSED down fast.

We dubbed this the flying circus. 2 Valkyries, total of 5 Heldrakes (not all in shot). They Vector striked on the Valkyries to kill them. right hand side was eldar deployment. Guard deployed on left. 

The red and black terrain feature was a generator (AV14 4hp) when it was destroyed, created Apocalyptic large blast and created a crater in the overground map which took out a bunch of necrons.

The unit at the bottom of the shot never moved, shot, assaulted...anything. Thats how out matched we ended up being, the other team had units literally to spare!  :)

Good game, almost stupidly hectic. Trying to keep track of two armies on two different tables waas very difficult. There was an ability to move units between the above ground and the underground, but the unit had to embark then disembark on the next turn so it wasn't really used and had no real bearing on the game.

I can post the lists if anyone really wants to see them.

Killa Kan

Finally got more paint...or anti paint on Klanky, the first of the Kans for the Dread Mob.

Zugzug

So there he is.  Still WIP.  It may look a bit much on the rusted bases, but I figure this one is the bottom of the pile and bought out of 'deep storage' for Orks, which means they found it at the bottom of the trash.

Super Heavy hobby challenge 2016

Hi guys.

Next year Aaron and myself are looking at buying ourselves a Warhound titan each and both constructing a sweet diorama/display to show it off.

I was thinking we could do it as a group challenge if any of you are also keen.

For guidelines I was thinking the following :-

1. Must be a Super Heavy or Gargantuan Creature

2. Must be on a 2ft x 2ft display base (Realm of Battle tile size)

3. Must have some friendly support troops, and at least 1 enemy model

4. Must have some form of terrain included in display

For example, my board will involve a scene in the HH novel Betrayer where the Warhound supporting the World Eaters is advancing with the Astartes. It will have Kharn and his command squad as a secondary feature and also some Ultramarines making their final stand.

And I think Aaron was looking at doing a Nurgle themed Warhound with some Deathguard / Plaguebearers in a swampy shithole.

This is obviously meant as a large, long term project, hence the massive scale, so it may not appeal to all.

Anyway, have a think about it and let us know what you think.

And...done! (except the bases...)

That is it.  My first batch of Grots complete...well except the bases, but I need to collect some stuff for that.  Needless to say it will be on junk piles.

I am very happy with how these guys have turned out.  So much smaller than even a Skaven Clan Rat.  Surely this means my Orks will be even better.

Also the first time we have used my wife's new phone with the light box, and I am very impressed with the quality of the pictures.  She went free for all in the set-ups and the quirky positions are awesome...even if I am bias.

Da boss Grot, or so he finks.

Rest of da skum.

Organised as ever.

More WIP of the Grots

Nearing completion of the little light green freaks.  Very happy with their progress.
Also test greens on the Grots wrangler dude.  I like the difference between the two races.

My narrative for this army is they are initially at the bottom rung of society.  Surviving on the mere scraps from their crashed Rok,  hence the absolute derelict weaponry.

Rust ahoy!

Escalation League - Da Nurdz!

Finally been able to put some paint onto some plastic.  I have been thwarted thus far by humidity and a nasty cough.<queue sympathy>

As usual, I am trying to expand my skill horizon.  These grots have had a black prime, deathworld forest base, biel-tan green wash, and then the skill test.  Rather than dry brush on the next layer, I have attempted to do like highlight stuffs, or whatever its called.  Not getting the recesses, and paint the raised surface.

Anyway, the result is below.  What it has highlighted for me thus far, is these grots are farkin ripped!

Which way do we go?

All those hours doing crossfit seem to be paying off!

Iron Warriors contemptor

Kit bash yeah!

My first attempt at kit bashing stuff!  Yes, it does not look like much, but it is a big shoot arm from a killa kan, with two melee arm drills on it.

FEAR THE ORKSIES.

First Iron Hands squad complete!

So I have finished painting my first squad of Iron Hands. It is just a basic 20 man tactical squad. Only 70-odd infantry to go!

Old stuff is good

I find as I do more work on weathering, that I really do love old decrepid decaying buildings.  I also love rust, seeing how it forms, what it does, and the fantastic range of colours.

But that aside, more work on the Rhino, yes.  Completed work on rust, smoke damage, lenses (first for me), and base coat on the tracks.  Yes, the tracks are bone coloured, as my army is based on limestone/sand, and as such the tracks have been discoloured.

Weathering powders up next. 

 

Vehicle weathering

These are my first attempts at weathering a vehicle.  Thus far I done rust with some water marks, mainly on rivets and as of last night chipping.

WD40, Stat!

Wraithguard - First Eldar Unit Finished

Iron Hands infantry.

So after starting work on my hobby project I was enjoying it so much I started assembling some of my Iron Hands. Well. All of my Iron Hands infantry. I am looking at starting to paint this weekend. Hopefully the weather is amazing.