Playing Dice with the Universe

WHFB – Vampires!

2012-01-29T11:33:00.000-08:00

A little late to the party but I finally got to read the new Vampire Counts army book. I thought it was about time I got back to writing something so I thought I would start with my thoughts on the book.

Overall it has some nice additional optionals including a Master Necromancer who can lead your army so you no longer need to try and balance points for a warrior-wizard Lord. Vampires got a small boost with the ability to occasionally, 1 in 6, heal if they kill something in melee. Skeletons & Zombies got cheaper, wolfs now count as core although Ghouls got more expensive. Unlike Tomb Kings Undead still get to march (if within 12” of the general). Which given there lack of shooting is something they really needed.

Magic
I find it quite amusing that the new lore attribute for Vampire magic is the same as the lore of Life; you get to heal a wound for each spell cast. Vampires already have seven spells so they did not gain any more. Although this does mean that Vampires that take a different lore no longer get an extra spell. Their lore lost the Summon Horde spell although its two effects have been merged into Raise Dead and Invocation. Spells have powered up versions you can use but you can also no longer cast the same spell multiple times a turn with the same caster meaning you are more likely to want several wizards in your army instead.

Invocation: Now heals d6+Wizard Level to all units in 6/12/18” with a casting value the same as its range.
Danse Macabre: Still re-rolls to hits and 8” move but no more charging. Level two effects all units in a 12” bubble.
Hellish Vigour: The new spell; allows a unit to re-roll to wound which is nice and level two effects all units within range.
Gaze: Still a Str 4 Magic Missile but now with a 48” range level two.
Raise Dead: Now 2d6+3 Zombies or . at level two, Skeletons.
Curse of Years: Slightly harder to cast but still inflicts wounds on the whole unit with no armour save.
Winds of (un)death: No more summoning a spirit host and it is now a magic vortex rather than hitting every enemy unit on the battlefield.

In line with all the new books the magic item list has been cut down from about forty to nine. A few of the missing items have been appropriated by special characters and the rest seem to have just vaporised. The screaming banner has been reduced in cost so a unit of skeletons can take it and I would expect almost every army using them will do so. Making fear tests on 3d6 means people will occasionally fail them! The cursed book has been re-written so you spend d3 power dice to cast a random spell. They are mainly cast on 10+ sells from the shadow and death lists which gives a nice mix. My favourite item the Black Periapt survived the transfer to 8th edition but sadly it is so expensive now that only Lords can take it.

Special Characters
Heinrich Kemmler is the new Necromancer character and you can play him in a 1500 point game. He is a lvl 4 Wizard with loremaster (Vampire) and +5 to dispel due to his staff of sorcery. He can be either ethereal or flying each turn. If he just has a ward save, even 5+, he would be my favourite character. He has stolen the Tomb Blade from the old item list and it now acts as a Sword of Strife as well as regenerating Skeletons and now Grave Guard. He gets +WS, +S, +I, +Ld* over a standard Necromancer Lord. Since he also forces opponents to reveal there magical items ethereal should keep him reasonable safe in combat. The downside is that you have something like a 50 point magic sword that is only going to kill about one foot solider a turn where as for only a few points more you could take a Vampire Lord with armour and a ward save and a much better stat line.

*His profile in the rules and unit section differ so he may not get the leadership boost.

I liked the old Vlad; you got 240 points of equipment/wargear as opposed to 200 that a normal lord could take. The downside was you could not change any of it and he had no armour. He was a decent combat general with a 4+ Ward. So for 35 points more than DIY Lord with a 4+ Ward you got an extra attack and a change to resurrect after he died. The new Vlad has at least put some armour on. He pays the extra points for it but you can still field him as your general in a 2k army. Blooddrinker though is now barley better than a Sword of Might. A normal Lord can buy ASF, but Vlad's is conditional on Isabella being in the same unit and, while improved, she is not worth the cost to play. So you now spend 69 points more on Vlad that crafting your own leader and all you get is his resurrection ability and a slightly improved chance of healing 1 wound each round in melee (you no longer even get the extra attack). As nice as his “Get out of Death Free” card is those points could be much better spent on powers/wargear to either keep your Lord alive in the first place or increase his damage output in melee.

Isabella is now a standard Vampire Hero with heavy armour (and costs almost twice as much as last edition). You pay 50 points for the blood chalice. Given that the lore attribute is healing seems a waste of a magic items points and she does not get any of the cool vampire powers. Count Mannfred is still the same with his double loremaster, but is now too expensive to use in a 2k game. I think the Acolyte Mannfred is better just for his loremaster (Vampire) although he does cost the same as a Lvl 4 Necromancer. Which means you are trading a wound and two caster levels for more spells, heavy armour and better combat stats.

Building a Lord at 1500 Point Army
I usually play smaller games with friends so my first concern is what sort of leader can I make for my army with 375 limit on my Lord.

Kemmler or a fully equipped Necromancer Lord gives an easy Lvl 4 Wizard. If we want a Vampire Lord though we have to make a compromise between magic and melee. Since magic levels are more expensive there is not a lot of choice if we want a 4+ ward save as well. We might as well just slap on armour of destiny and call it done.

The best two powers for combat are Red Fury and Quick Blood. This puts our Lord as a 300 point level 1 Wizard with WS 7, I 7 and ASF and leaves 75 points for a magic weapon and armour. Taking Sword of Might gives us gives us a 4+/4++ save; 5 strength 6 attacks. Whereas Sword of Striking gives us a 3+/4++ save; 5 strength 5 attacks, which should be hitting on 2's. Each of them performs better against some armies than the other.

Lord Options
300 Master Necromancer; Level 4 Wizard with Talisman of Preservation & Cursed Book.
350 Heinrich Kemmler
375 Vampire Lord; Level 4 Wizard with armour of Destiny.
374 Vampire Lord with Red Fury, Quick Blood and Talisman of Preservation, Sword of Might, heavy armour & shield.
371 Vampire Lord with Red Fury, Quick Blood and Talisman of Preservation, Sword of Striking, heavy armour & Enchanted shield.

The last two are really very similar so it gives me four different leaders to try out and see which I actually like in play. Troops is going to be skeletons and zombies and then some Grave Guard and maybe Black Knights. There are several new units, like the Mortis Engine, that I need to look at and see what will work well.

Time of Legends Campaign - Part One

2011-09-06T13:20:00.000-07:00

Overview: 6 week Warhammer Fantasy campaign set in an alternate universe from the Old World. Players start with a 750 point army and each week get 150-250 points of extra units depending on the results of the battle. Players also roll on the exploration chart each week to see if they find any magic items or other relics.

Background: There was a terrible time of turmoil and war that apocalyptically shattered their magnificent crystal cities, which were split into thousands of shards that scattered across the lands. Without the wisdom and the abilities of the Hiasars these shards corrupted the surrounding landscape and blighted most of the idyllic lands. On the fringe of this blighted and broken landscape small settlements grew into fledgling nations. The different races adapted to their peripheral settlements and only ventured into the Broken Lands in the desperate attempt to find the much sought after crystal shards.

These shards can still harness the elemental powers of the Hiasars, though in a greatly diminished capacity. Going into the Broken Lands for any extended time warps and corrupts those that enter and now various tribes of foul beasts and monsters roam the lands preying on desperate shard miners. Besides the mining activities there is only one other time any of the races would dare enter the Blasted Lands and that is during the Time of Legends.

There remains an enduring generational prophecy across all of the races which foretells of the rebuilding of the Hiasars crystal city in the heart of the Blasted Lands. Every fifty years when the three moons align during the lunar eclipse, the crystal city is reformed awaiting a new master to sit upon its grand crystal throne. It is rumored that whoever sits upon the throne will be able to restore the Blaster Lands and reinstate control of the lands and thus rule the world. Every fifty years each nation has sent large armies into the Blasted Lands to try to find and fight their way to the heart of the mirage-like crystal city but none have succeeded. The nations have stopped sending one large army into the Lands for this quest and instead now hope that smaller strike forces have a better chance of reaching the crystal throne. There has also been a connecting ancient prophesy which states that it will not be a famous and well known general who finally sits on the crystal throne but an unknown who endures the trials and becomes a legend in the making...

***

With a little bit of poetic licence here is the first two battle reports...

Prince Morkin of the moon-kin looked out at the devastation. The cavalry thundering over the barrow had disturbed there centuries long rest. Then the cannon balls had blasted open the sacred chamber spilling his fathers bones across the green fields. Servants were still out looking for his leg.

Unable to stand the King looked up at his son. As their eyes met Morkin felt the projection of his fathers voice inside his head. These are troubled times when men do not show respect to their ancestors graves. Gather warriors and go seek vengeance for this attack. The shades say tracks lead into the broken lands. Take my enchanted helm with you.

750 Barrow Kings
114 Prince Morkin w/ Great Weapon, Dragonhelm
70 Liche Priest Rorthan
135 Casket of Souls
130 Archers x20 w/ Champion Longshot
66 Skeleton Warriors x14 w/ Champion Boney
235 Tomb Guard x15 w/ Champion Yohan, Standard, Banner of Undying

Week One: Battle vs Chaos Warriors

Sorcerer with 15 Chaos Warriors
40 Maurders with Great Weapons
15 Chaos Warriors
5 Dogs of war

Rorthan the Liche Priest looked at Morkin. They had spent ten days in the wastelands and their was still no sine of the defilers. He thought this was a worthless quest but he was bound by blood and magic to follow the Prince, to the ends of the earth if needed, enacting the Kings will.

Morkin finished talking with the shades and informed Rorthan of the approaching band of warriors. He formed the ranks of warriors up into a defensive formation and ordered the archers to shoot down the horde charging over the hill towards them. At the same time Rorthan focused the might of the ancient casket to blast bolts of lighting into the warriors on the right flank. He watched it arc from one unit to the next searing away flesh as it did so. In response the Sorcerer blasted away skeletons with arcane fire faster than Rorthan could reassemble them.

The archers unleashed four volleys of arrows into the Chaos horde before the two armies clashed. Leading his Warriors in a glorious charge the Sorcerer assaulted Morkin's unit. A blast of arcane power burnt away one of Morkin's eyes. As he staggard backwards Yoric stepped up and decapitated the Sorcerer. Seeing their leader dead the warriors turned to run but were cut down by the Tomb Guard.

Rorthan and his archers were not so lucky as they were ground down by the other unit of Warriors. The dogs of war ripped apart the casket crew and then, together with the last few Maurders, charged at Morkin; where they died to the striking blades of the Tomb Guard. Having taken the measure of each other the last few warriors of Chaos gathered their wounded and retreated leaving Morkin the victor.

It took Rorthan some time after the battle to reassemble himself and the rest of the moon-kin. While he waited Morkin ordered his guard to cut down the trees and assemble catapults. Once this was all done Rorthan drained the power from the sorcerers charms infusing it into himself and used rituals of binding to place some of the loyal shades inside the lifeless husks of the enemy so that they could once more walk the lands.

Additions: 2x Catapults, 2 Warriors, 2 Tomb Guard, Musian for Archers. Lvl 2 Wizard.
Morkin gained Regeneration, -BS. Yohan +WS

***

Week Two: Battle vs Vampire Counts
Vampire leading 20 Ghouls
20 Revenants
3 Wraiths
Varghulf

Morkin's empty eye socket still ached from the magical wound that would not regenerate. The dying minstral his scouts had picked up told him how a vampire had attacked his caravan and he was the only one to get away. The vile vampire was using his arcane might to bind the dead into his eternal service. This was the perfect opportunity to try out the new catapults on an ancient enemy.

Channelling the mighty power of the casket Rorthan blasted the wraiths off the material plane while the catapuls smashed ghouls and revenants to dust. The Vampire used his powers to summon more ghouls while the catapults turned their attention to the Varghulf. The mighty creature lithely dodged the giant flaming stones that rained down around it. Stumbling forward across the rough ground the Varghulf eventually managed to rip the skeletal warriors and a catapult apart. The vampire lead his ghouls into a mighty charge destroying the casket and then tirning to face off against Morkin and his guards. Rorthan was charged by the last few revenants but a giant stone flew off target and crushed the last revenant leaving Rorthan and a few scattered archers alive.

As neither general wanted to risk more of there troops against the other both retreated to lick their wounds. Rorthan used his powers to pull the scattered bones of the defeated back together and bound the dead minstrels soul to his bones so he too could join the expedition.

Additions: Morkin +Att, Longshot +Att, Rowthan +W & Wizard Lvl 3.
Gained a Bard. Warriors x10, Tomb Guardx10

***

Tactics: It was not my original intent but playing against two armies with no ranged attacks I ended up using my undead as a gun-line army. While my shooting was weak I was able to do enough damage to approaching units to then actually win some combats! I did forget though that the casket explodes when it dies. I was quite lucky with the entire Vampire army failing charges for a couple of turns.

Image Credits: Wenzel Hablik, Wonder of the Sea, 1917

More Metrics (for Tyranids)

2011-07-24T04:19:00.000-07:00

Well it has been a busy month for me. I failed my Uni course and spent a lot of time getting a job sorted. The good news is I have got one sorted and it starts next month. So I have few loose ends to tidy up before I start; one of which was doing the metrics for Kirby's Tyranid army...

Kirby's 2k Tyranids

2x Prime w/LW, Bonesword, Toxin, Regen
2x3 Hive Guard
1x3 Zoanthrope
2x Tervgion w/Catalyst, Toxin, Adrenal, Cluster, Scything Talons
2x10 Termagant
2x4 Ravener w/Rending
2x T-Fex w/Rupture, Cluster, Dess

Now Purgatus pointed out that working out dead Land Raiders with a 4+ to hit in melee was a bit misleading since they will always go fast to avoid melee damage. As such I have redone all the numbers for AV 14. APC's on the other hand will often stick at 6" movement since they still want to fire guns so I have left those numbers unchanged.

So lets look at all the previous five lists again and add Kirby's too.

List	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Nidzilla	18.58	40.51	97.08	8.19
Swarm	15.78	63.75	94.85	8.43
Hulksmash	15.53	52.97	125.42	7.87
Ghostin	26.53	41.19	101.39	13.98
Purgatus	17.79	48.19	94.61	11.42
Kirby	21.03	37.82	92.92	13.46

For wrecking Land Raiders a pair of Carnifex (with 6.02) are just ahead of two T-fex (with 5.19) in raw numbers but the T-fex has the advantage of being able to shoot as well as rip them apart with teeth and claws. What is very noticeable is how much of a difference Zoantrhopes now make to the DLRpG score. I could ramble on but I do not think their is a lot more to say. If we use these six as the guide for offensive metrics our golden ratio for a 2k army would be - Shooting 19+; Melee 47+; APC's 100+; Raiders 10+

Is this achievable? I am not sure but I will let you know if I find one..

Mantic Open Day 2011

2011-07-09T12:04:00.001-07:00

Salutations everyone,

Today was Mantic's second open day. We got into Mantic Towers just after ten o'clock and were greeted by Chris, Ronnie and the rest of the gang. There were a variety of events happening including a tour of the warehouse (where Ronnie showed us the content of the secret room); a massive eight player King of War game; painting competition; demo games and of course the shop! We were not allowed to take photos of the new stuff but here are the shots I did get during the day...

I love the Dark Elf, if only I could paint this good...
Ronnie said during the tour that they are shipping out 60,000 figures a week at the moment. The next edition of Kings of War rules will have three new races - Human, Goblins and Twilight Kin (Dark Elves). They are also looking into the cost of remaking the byssal Dwarf in plastic to see if it is feasible.

Orky was guarding the secret room. Inside were the first moulds of the Forgefarther Space Dwarfs which Golum Studios are going to be painting in a nice blue colour (with a possible yellow trim) and concept sketches for the vehicles (one for each race). Forgefarthers get a quad barrels gun platform and the Pirates get a dune buggy. The painters were also kind enough to give me some painting tips so maybe next year I will have a model to enter in the competition. Overall I had a great time. I got to play a couple of more games of KoW (during which there were several comparisons to another well known fantasy game) as well as pick up a few more figures for my army.

40k Metrics - Tyranid Fex-star

2011-06-23T07:22:00.000-07:00

Carrying on with looking at the 40k Metrics of different Tyranid lists this time we will analyses a couple of Fex-star builds. Lists and full numbers are below. For those adding up at home remember that the Genestealers melee damage against APC's is capped at 15. Carnifex scores have not been capped as some of it is from shooting.

Two Fexstar's and Purgatus' T-fex/Prime Nidzilla comparison

List	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Hulksmash	15.53	52.97	125.42	23.61
Ghostin	26.53	42.28	100.84	29.72
Purgatus	17.79	48.19	94.61	18.52

The Addition of the Zoantrhopes really helps to boost MEQ Shooting and Raider killing power but the list loses significant close combat potential. That said at over 40 it is still an amazing high figure contending with the Orks. Carnifex give us a much better Land Raider killing score than T-fex but are limited to only doing do in melee which means they will most likely have delivered their cargo.

Working from just these numbers I would be tempted to replace the Raveners with Zoanthropes in Hulksmash's army and use the last few points for upgrading the primes to give us -

.	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Amalgamation	21.25	47.92	115.83	29.72

My thoughts on Ghostin's list would be to drop one Biovore and probably the Broodlord to get the second prime. That way you can play the Carnifex as two broods for better treat saturation and they each get easy cover saves due to the Primes. I like the idea of Bioplasma I am just not sure how effective it is actually going to be?

Hulksmash's Fexstar @2000 Points
200 - Prime w/ Dual Boneswords, Toxin Sacs 2x1
300 - Hive Guard 3x2
390 - Tervigon w/ Adrenals, Toxins, Catalyst, Clusters 2x1
100 - Termagants 2 x10
420 - Genestealers 2x15
210 - Raveners x6 Rending Claws
190 - Carnifex Quad Twin-Linked Devourers
190 - Carnifex Quad Twin-Linked Devourers
14 Kill Points: 50 Bugs, 14 Large Bugs, 4 Monsters

Fexstar

Unit	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Prime x2	0.67	5	4.17	0
Hive Guard x6	2.22	2	20	0
Tervigon x2	2.22	3.33	16.67	5.56
Spawn x45	3.75	11.25	0	0
Gaunts x10	0.83	2.5	0	0
Gaunts x10	0.83	2.5	0	0
Genestealers x30	0	16.67	37.5	0
Raveners x6 RC	0	5.56	14.58	0
Carnifex x2	5	4.17	40	18.06
Total	15.53	52.97	125.42	23.61

Ghostin's proposed NOVA list @1999 Points
100 - Prime Regen, Twin Boneswords
300 - Hive Guard 2x3
180 - zoanthropes x3
420 - Tervigon x2 - cat, onslaught, tox, ag, cluster
100 - Devilgaunts x10
050 - termagants x10
284 - genestealers x14 w/ Toxic sacs, Broodlord
135 - biovore x3
430 - carnifex x2 - TL devs/brainleech, bioplasma, frag spines
11 Kill Points: 33 Bugs, 14 Large Bugs, 4 Monsters
Bioplasma-Fexstar

Unit	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Prime x1	0.33	2.22	2.08	0
Hive Guard x6	2.22	2	20	0
Zoanthropes x3	5.5	0.5	7.64	6.11
Tervigon x2	2.22	3.33	16.11	5.56
Spawn x45	3.75	11.25	0	0
Dev-Gaunts x10	2.5	2.5	0	0
Gaunts x10	0.83	2.5	0	0
Stealers x13	0	11.8	16.25	0
Broodlord	0	1.51	2.08	0
biovore x3	1.67	0.5	0	0
Carnifex x2	7.5	4.17	40	18.06
Total	26.53	42.28	100.84	29.72

Purgatus
Prime, Lashwhip/Bonesword, Regeneration, Rending Claws
Prime, Lashwhip/Bonesword, Regeneration, Scything Talons
Hive Guard x 2x2
Zoanthrope x 2
Tervigon, Catalyst, Onslaught, Adrenals, Toxins, Scything Talons, Cluster Spines 2x1
Termagants 2 x 10
Genestealers 2x 12, Toxins
Tyrannofex, Rupture Cannon, Dessicator, Cluster Spines 2x1

Purgatus

Unit	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Rending Prime	0	1.67	2.08	0
Sything Prime	0	1.94	2.43	0
Hive Guard x4	1.48	1.33	13.33	0
Zoanthropes x2	3.67	0.33	5.09	4.07
Tervigon x2	2.22	3.33	16.67	5.56
Spawn x45	3.75	11.25	0	0
Gaunts x20	1.67	5	0	0
Tox-stealers x24	0	20	30	0
t-Fex RC/DL x2	5	3.33	25	8.89
Total	17.79	48.19	94.61	18.52

40k Metrics - Tyranid Edition

2011-06-22T14:34:00.000-07:00

Nikephoros over on Bringer of Victory has posted up about 40k Metrics. His idea was to work out sum statistics for the whole army and see how that compared to other competitive armies. There were four scores he has been working out -

DMS - Dead Marines in one shooting phase.
DMCC - Dead Marines in one assault phase (assuming you charge)
DRpG - Penetrating hits on Rhinos in five turns of shooting.
DLRpG - Penetrating hits on Land Raiders in five turns of shooting.
Those armies he looked at got scores in the following ranges.
DMS = 19-22, DMCC 15-45, DRpG 60-82, DLRpG 17-34.

As Kirby suggested I have added in the average Spawn of the Tervigon which does help to bolster the MEQ killing of the lists. Since we are generating numbers assuming best possible conditions all Gaunts are assumed to have Poison and Furious Charge from mummy.

So lets see how the Tyranids compare...
Nidzilla

Unit	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Tyrant	2.5	3.7	17.92	3.47
Guard x3	0	3.56	5	0
Hive Guard x6	2.22	2	20	0
Tervigon x2	2.22	3.33	16.67	5.56
Spawn x45	3.75	11.25	0	0
Dev-Gaunts	2.5	2.5	0	0
Gaunts	0.83	2.5	0	0
Stealers 2x5	0	8.33	8.33	0
T-Fex x2	4.56	3.33	25	8.89
Total	18.58	40.51	97.08	17.92

Weak at shooting Marines (no surprise there). We only just outstrip the Space Wolves in melee and fall woefully short of the Orks score of 45 MEQ in a turn. The one surprising feature is the ability to kill APC's and a score matching the Wolves on killing Raiders. So both the numbers and experience show we can get them out of their tin cans and eat them in combat.
EDIT: Adding the Spawn has taken our MEQ killing (shooting and melee) score up to almost the same level as Dashofpepper's Ork list.

Swarm
I used Jay Woodcock's Adepticon 2011 list and to take it up to a 2k list for comparison added more Genestealers; Toxic Sacs to one brood & Gargoyles; Talons to the second Tervigon.

Unit	. DMS .	. DMCC .	. DR pG .	. DLR pG .
Tervigon x2	2.22	3.33	22.21	7.4
Spawn x45	3.75	11.25	0	0
Hive Guard x6	2.22	2	20	0
Zoanthropes	5.5	0.5	7.64	6.11
Stealers x40	0	22.22	30	0
Tox-stealers x20	0	16.67	15	0
Gargoyes x25	2.08	7.78	0	0
Total	15.78	63.75	94.85	13.51

Well we finally get a good score for Melee and our shooting does not suffer much thanks to the Zoanthropes having AP 3. The list is still good at killing APC's but really suffers against Raiders (especially once Psy-hoods come into play) with only two units that can penetrate them. Hive Guard do have a chance of immobilising Raiders, but it is still not great.

Tyranid Fex-star Analysis here.

Ultramarine Battle Reports

2011-06-22T06:17:00.000-07:00

I have spent the last week painting up the tanks I got off ebay over the last year. They are now all a uniform Ultramarine blue. Next I need to add some detail. Doing so made me want to play my marines again since they had not been out of the box for almost two years. Here is My helper setting up terrain before she goes off to bed and a couple of quick battle reports to keep you entertained.

Game 1: 1500 points Ultramarines vs Space Wolves
Dawn of War, Seize Ground
objectives: Eldar Graveyard (NW)), Webway Dialer (SW), 2 Power relays (NE & SE)
In am attempt to get his enemy to turn on each other Vect has leaked the location of an Elder Webway portal to two Space Marine companies. He had also told them a band of renegade marines were looting the area. This resulted in both armies sending an armoured company to secure the location. With the rain lashing down around them in the darkness both forces opened fire, in typical marine fashion, as soon as they saw the lights of the opposing vehicles...

Space Wolves (not all gear listed)
Rune Priest Penda leading 8 Grey Hunters & Wolf Guard w/ Fist in Rhino
Rune Priest Ozur & Wolf Priest Tola leading 9 Grey Hunters & Wolf Guard w/ Fist in Land Raider Crusader
Five Long Fangs in Lazerback
Dreadnought Vandrad
Land speeder w/ HF, MM

Ultramarines
Librarian Bolland (Avenger & Null Zone) leading ASM x5 with Flamer in Rhino
Armitage & Steel Rifleman Dreadnaughts
Dreadnaught Dante with Plasma Cannon, Heavy Flamer
Tactical Squad Alpha - Melta, MM, Rhino
Tactical Squad Beta - Flamer, Missile, Rhino
2 Squadrons x1 MM/HF Landspeeder
AutoLas Predator x3

Rune Priest Penda drove his APC into the graveyard and it sunk into the soft mud unable to move further. The Fangs zoomed forward to get a good firing position but an accurate burst of laser fire from the Ultramarines exploded the Razorback and killed four of the fangs. Trooper Sven grabbed the Lazer-cannon from the wreckage and hoisting it to his shoulder detonated Dante's power pack and arced the beam across the enemy APC's ripping the tracking from two of them. Bolland lead his troops forward and charged into Penda depleted force and the two units wiped each other out leaving the graveyard full of bones.

Driving around the eastern side of the central ruins the Land raider came under attack from the landspeeders buts was saved by its smoke. Return fire ripped the guns off the speeders and Vandrad stomped over and crushed one when it tried to roast him with its flamer. Laser fire glancing off its armoured hull the raider rolled forward with Ozur leading his forced forward to wipe out Alpha squad and Beta-gravis. The raider fired its guns at Beta-pugnus but could not dislodge the troops who were huddled around the webway dialler. Armitage charged into Ozurs troops keeping them occupied.

Aftermath: It was a fun game but quite static with the Wolves holding back until they had blasted away the melta's and my APC's getting immobilised quickly (one by terrain). I had five turns of 6 lasers shooting the Raider and all I got was one stun and an immobilised turn six! We played the extra turn at the end to see if the Wolves could kill the last 3 tacical marines on the objective but they did not have enough firepower with only the raider and Dread.

Game 2: 1500 Points Ultramarines vs Grey Knights
Pitched Battle Annihilation

I try not to proxy too much stuff but as I had to take all my folders into University for moderation I wanted an army that I could carry around easily and 27 terminators fit that bill very well. Despite being annihilation the Ultramarines used combat squads to get best use of the heavy weapons and set up in as a static gun-line ready to receive the Knights charge. Going second I put all the Knights into the SW corner behind a hill blocking line of sight from most of the marines.

Ultramarines (11 Kill Points due to Combat Squads)
Chaplain Caecilius with Jump Pack, Melta Bombs
Purpureus Tactical Squad with Melta, Lascannon & power-gauntlet
Albus Tactical Squad with Melta, Plasma Cannon & power-gauntlet in a Rhino
Plumbeus Devastator Squad with 4 Missile Launchers in Razorback with TL Lascannon
Tripudio 5 man Assault Squad with Power-gauntlet and Plasma Pistol.
Tempestas Terminator Squad with assault cannon & CML
Brother Grumio Dreadnought
Grey Knights (5 Kill Points)
Librarian with Shrouding, Sanctuary, Might
Inquisitor with TDA, Psycannon and Hammer
2x10 Tactical Terminators with 2 Cannons and mixed weapons
1x5 Paladins with 2 Cannons and mixed weapons

The Librarian lead his Squad into the ruins at the top of the hill and between Terminator armour and shrouding only three of them died (all in turn two). After wiping out Tripudio on the first turn they spent four turns exchanging fire with the Terminators killing nine of them.

The Paladins hugged the ridge of the hill for cover as they advanced before charging forward to crush marines and the Razorback in melee. The Inquisitor split off and wrecked the Rhino. They only took a single wound all game but I was constantly worried every time they got shot by a melta or laser.

The second unit of Terminator Knights did very little due to my target denial strategy. They lost one man to a scattering plasma cannon and killed the Chaplin and Dreadnought. This left the Ultramarine with 15 Marines and 1 Terminator at the end of turn five.

Losing four Knights in the second turn made me worried I would be torrented to death. However I only failed one more save in the next three turns making the final score 7-0 to the Knights. I liked playing the army but it would have been a lot harder with objectives since I barely moved any of the units forward.

21: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2011-06-16T02:39:00.000-07:00

Game 21: 2000 Points vs Horde Orks
Scenario - Seize Ground (Five objectives), Spearhead deployment

So I am busy wrapping up pass the parcels and making party bags for my daughters third birthday so just a quick battle report about my monday night game against Horde Orks. I played a full drop pod army again so nothing arrive until the bottom of turn two.

Tyranid Air Assault
Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, Hive Commander, Wings, TL Devs x2)
Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
Deathleaper
Termagants w/ Devourers x20 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
Mummy Tervigon (Toxic,Adreanl,Catalysis) [Outflanking]
Broodlord (Toxic) & 6 Genestealers w/ Toxic
Gargoyle Brood x15 w /AG,TS
Carnifex with TL Devs x2, in Spore Pod with TL Deathspitter
Carnifex with TL Devs x2, in Spore Pod with TL Deathspitter

Horde Orks
Ghazghkull Thraka
Big Mek with Kustom Force Field
Da Shoota Boys 3x30
Da Slugga Boys 2x20
Da Grots
Da Stormboys
Da Lootas
Stompy Death Robots (Killa Kans) 3x3

I knew with six troops against my three and five objectives this was going to be difficult...

Battlefield: There is a central building and ruins in each corner with some scatter craters between them. Objectives are the central building, NE, NW & SW Ruins and a NW crater. Orks win the roll off and take the NW quarter to get two objectives in there starting zone. 140 Boys spread out behind a wall of 9 Stompy Death Robots and push east and south filling the table so there is no space for my pods to drop.

Turn Two:
Hive Tyrant swoops in from reserves charging into Stompy Death Robots and manages to stun all three of them! Zoanthropes drop in an crispy fry three Robots; Fex drop in and shoot. Gargoyles dive from the sky charge into a wounded boyz squad and promptly all die. Genestealers charge into Boyz kill half of them but only the Broodlord lives. I really underestimated the damage a few Orks with a Power Klaw will cause...

Turn Three:
Da Lootas shoot up a Spore, Yeah! Boyz and Stormboys assault the Zoanthropes (one unit dies). Broodlord sweeps the Boyz and moves on to the next unit. Mummy arrived and hides behind the SW ruin ready to spew forth babies. The First fex charges into combat with the Stormboys and the second attacks the Stompy Death Robots and crushes them. Devilgaunts arrive and shoot some boyz.

Turn Four:
The one remaining Stompy Death Robot (with no arms) charges the Devilgaunts and they can not do anything about it! Hive Tyrant finally manages to kill the third robot having been constantly stunning them but is assaulted by Boyz and dies at the end of the turn. Ghazghkull and is boyz Warg for a 15" charge into Mummy and cuts her head off (I forgot to roll my FNP saves too! Sob!).

Turn Five:
Carnifex Dies; Stormboyz die; Devilgaunts die; Broodlord dies. Da Grots claim an objective. Deathleaper contests an objective and ...

Turn Six:
... Ghazghkull kills him. More Spores get shot up.

Aftermath: Win for the Orks with two objectives to zero; all I have left is two Spore Pods! There is still ~50 Boyz, Da Lootas, one Stompy Death Robot and both Ork HQ. I was completely out played by a better swarm army.

I am so used to fighting 5-10 man Marines that I forgot what damage Boyz can put out even when reduced in number. I also could not deal with Claws that were ripping through my monsters with 2 wounds a turn. This was a game where I really needed the cluster spines to kill large numbers of Boyz. I am glad I tried out pod-fex; The conclusion though is - never again. They are louse in melee and the one turn of shooting does not make up for it. I will proxy them up as Trygons for another game as some point and see if they fair any better. Deathleaper was there for Psi protection (worthless against Orks). He was fun for contesting an objective but not as useful as the Ymgarls would have been.

Tyranid Army Lists

2011-06-01T13:36:00.000-07:00

Discussing Tyranids elsewhere I wanted to post a link to Jay Woodcock Adepticon list to show that you could do well with something other than Nidzilla. I then spent ten minutes trying to find it! Given that there were also a few other recent army ideas I wanted to be able to come back too I thought I would put them all in one place for reference.

Tyranid armies fall into three flavours so I shall look at each in turn.

Nidzilla - It is all about taking as many Monsters and Toughness 6 as you can fit in. Lists are build around 6-9 Hive Guard; 2 Tervigons and required Gaunts to make them score; Either a pair of Tyrannofex or 3 Trygons and some Venomthropes. It does not leave a lot of points for anything else.

Swarm - The goal here is to have one hundred little bugs swarm the opponent and overwhelm them with more models than they can destroy. A couple of monsters are often included to give some support. Usually based around Genestealers but Gargoyles, Raveners and Hormagaunts work too.

Air Assault - Everything starts in reserves and arrives via deep strike or outflanking. Army is lead by a Hive Tyrant with Hive Commander for the reserve bonus. Not as good as it was since the FAQ stopped Hive Commander stacking for a +2 reserve bonus but still a playable army.

Nidzilla
First off I would like to give a shout out to my friend Steve Deare who took his Tyranids to the UK Students Nationals 2011 over Easter and finished joint sixth out of 40 players (3 wins, 2 draws) with the following list -

Nidzilla @1500 - UK Student Nationals 2011 6th Place
100 - Prime w/ Boneswords, regen
110 - venomthrops x2 [prime attached for wound allocation]
200 - Hive Guard 2 Broods x2
390 - Tevigon w/ AG,TS, Catalyst x2
100 - Gaunts 2 Broods x10
600 - Trygons x3
11 Kill Points: 20 Bugs, 7 Large Bugs, 5 Monsters

A lot of armies are using T-fex for heavy support since a strength ten cannon can crack any egg in the game. When supported by Old Adversary for re-rolls they are not too bad in combat. They also have a breath weapon with Rending which helps with killing all those Feel no Paint Marines that are cropping up.

Nidzilla @2k
265 - Hive Tyrant w/ Quad Devourers, Armoured Shell, Old Adversary
195 - Tyrant Guard w/ Whips x3
300 - Hive Guard 3 Broods x2
390 - Tervigon w/ Adrenals, Toxins, Catalyst, Clusters 2x1
100 - Termagant Brood w/ Devourer x10
050 - Termagant Brood x10
170 - Genestelaers w/ Toxic 2x5
265 - Tyrannofex w/ Rupture Cannon, Cluster Spines, Thorax Swarm (Beatles)
265 - Tyrannofex w/ Rupture Cannon, Cluster Spines, Thorax Swarm (Beatles)
13 Kill Points: 30 Bugs, 9 Large Bugs, 5 Monsters

Since they cost the same you could also ditched the Tyrant + Guard in favour of a third T-fex and third Tervigon. - http://yesthetruthhurts.com/2011/05/evolution-steleks-tyranids/

hyv3mynd has gone for making the second Tervigon HQ and dropping a T-fex to get the points for two large broods of Genestealers. - http://synaps3.blogspot.com/2011/05/atc-game-1.html

The Fexstar involves putting Tyranid Primes with Carnifex to abuse wound allocation and cover rules. Hulksmash posted up the following 2k list http://hulksmash-homeplace.blogspot.com/2011/05/2k-tyranids-for-kon.html

Fexstar @2000 Points
200 - Prime w/ Dual Boneswords, Toxin Sacs 2x1
300 - Hive Guard 3x2
390 - Tervigon w/ Adrenals, Toxins, Catalyst, Clusters 2x1
100 - Termagants 2 x10
420 - Genestealers 2x15
210 - Raveners x6 Rending Claws
190 - Carnifex Quad Twin-Linked Devourers
190 - Carnifex Quad Twin-Linked Devourers
14 Kill Points: 50 Bugs, 14 Large Bugs, 4 Monsters

The swarmlord is the best melee unit Tyranids have thanks to actually having an Invulnerable save in melee and making opponents re-roll their own. He is a bit weak against missile spam thanks to only having a 3+ Armour save but that can be mitigated with cover saves.

Best overall posted a 2.5k Swarmlord List
http://bestoverall.blogspot.com/2011/05/2500-point-nids-insert-swarmlord-here.html

Ghostin has posted up some Swarmlord lists -
http://midlifegamingcrisis.blogspot.com/2010/11/stuck-on-swarmy.html
I am not a fan of regeneration on the T-fex and like to see some Genestealers to really make use of Swarmies re-roll to outflank so my variation is the following.

Swarmlord @2k points
280 - Swarmlord
130 - Tyrant Guard w/ Whips x2
300 - Hive Guard 3x2
400 - Tervigon w/ Adrenals, Toxins, Catalyst, Clusters, Talons 2x1
100 - Termagant Brood 2 x10
140 - Genestealers 2x5
120 - Gargoyles x20
265 - Tyrannofex w/ Rupture Cannon, Cluster Spines, Thorax Swarm (Beatles)
265 - Tyrannofex w/ Rupture Cannon, Cluster Spines, Thorax Swarm (Beatles)
14 Kill Points: 50 Bugs, 8 Large Bugs, 5 Monsters

Swarm Armies
Jay Woodcock went 6-0-2 climbing all the way up to 4th out of 256 players in the Adepticon 40k Championships with a Stealershock list featuring 55 Genestealers.

Swarm @1847 Adepticon 2011
220 - Tevigon w/ adrenals, toxic sacs, catalyst, crushing claws
195 - Tervigon w/ adrenals, toxic sacs, catalyst
300 - Hive Guard 2 Broods x3
180 - Zoanthropes x3
560 - Genestealers 2 Broods x20
210 - Genestealers x15
182 - Gargoyles w/ adrenal glands x26
9 Kill Points: 81 Bugs, 9 Large Bugs, 2 Monsters

Hulksmask posted up a nice swarm list using the Parasite that does away with all the Inititive one units so that it more resistant to Jaws of the Wolf. If I ran the list I would boost the prime with regen (since it is so cheap).
http://hulksmash-homeplace.blogspot.com/2011/05/jotww-can-suck-it-building-nid-list.html

Swarm @2000 Points
160 - HQ: Parasite
090 - HQ: Prime w/ Dual Bone Swords
450 - Hive Guard 3x3
120 - Hormagants x20
630 - Genestealers 3x15
350 - Raveners w/ Rending Claws 2 Broods x5
200 - Gargoyles w/ Toxic Sacs & Adrenal Glands x25
12 Kill Points: 90 Bugs, 21 Large Bugs.

Yermon posted a swarm army with a pair of Tervigon as the HQ similar to the Adepticon list. I just swapped the pod to have the Deathspitter as it is another anti-tank weapon.
http://thebrownpaintbrush.blogspot.com/2011/04/im-sorry-did-you-just-get-eaten.html

Tyranid Swarm @2000 points
195 - Tervigon w/ Adrenals, Toxic sacs, Catalyst, Clusters
195 - Tervigon w/ Adrenals, Toxic sacs, Catalyst, Clusters
300 - Hive Guard 2 Broods x3
170 - Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ Deathspitter
680 - Genestealers w/ Toxic sacs 2 Broods x20
140 - Genestealers 2 Broods x5
320 - Gargoyles w/ Adrenals, Toxic sacs 2x20
12 Kill Points: 90 Bugs, 8 Large Bugs, 2 Monsters

Air Assault
Not a very popular Tyranid build at the moment so I do not have any lists to link too. I have decided that Gargoyles really need to have Adrenal glands so they can glance APC's and I am not really happy with a Hive Tyrant that costs over 300 points so thinking about replacing him with a walking tyrant with big gun. Still this is my current list -

Tyranid Air Assault @1500 points
310 - Hive Tyrant w/ Old Adversary, Hive Commander, Wings, TL Devs x2
170 - Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
170 - Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
161 - Ymgarl Xenomorphs x7
250 - Termagants w/ Devourers x20 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
195 - Tervigon: adrenals, toxic sacs, catalyst [Outflanking]
148 - Broodlord & 5 Genestealers w/ Toxic
096 - Gargoyle Brood x12 w /AG,TS
11 Kill Points: 44 Bugs, 5 Large Bugs, 2 Monsters, 3 Pods

Image Credits: Olovni, goofeegrins & Lord Hannu on Deviantart.

Grey Knights vs Ultramarines

2011-05-29T10:20:00.000-07:00

Game 1: 1500 Points vs Ultramarines
Scenario - Capture & Control (4 objectives), Spearhead deployment
With the new codex I can no longer add my two squads of Knights into my Ultramarine force. They have to be played as a faction in their own right. Only having 25 Knights I do not have enough Psycannons for a full army so I proxied them with missile launchers and power-gauntlets for the Hammers. I at least had some time this week to to start work on my Riflemen arms so the Dreads were correctly armed.

Grey Knights @1500
Castellan Crowe in the Henchmen's Razorback w/ Psi ammo
Cardinal Ximinez, Inquisitor; Power Armor, Psychotroke, Rad grenades, 3 Survo-Skulls
Mega-City Judges (Warriors) x3 with a Meltagun
Alpha Purifiers x8; 2 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino
Gamma Purifiers x8; 2 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino
Omega Purifiers x8; 2 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino
Rifleman Dreadnought x2; Quad Autocannons w/ Psi Ammo
Rifleman Dreadnought; Assault Cannon and TL Autocannons w/ Psi Ammo
Kill Points 13; 29 Men, 7 Vehicles

Ultramarines
Chaplain Caecilius with Jump Pack, Melta Bombs
Purpureus Tactical Squad with Melta, Lascannon & power-gauntlet
Albus Tactical Squad with Melta, Plasma Cannon & power-gauntlet in a Rhino
Plumbeus Devastator Squad with 4 Missile Launchers in Razorback with TL Lascannon
Tripudio 5 man Assault Squad with Power-gauntlet and Plasma Pistol.
Tempestas Terminator Squad with assault cannon & CML
Brother Grumio Dreadnought

stardate: 901.M41
The planet had official been declaired clensed of Lugft Huron's renegades for three days. However reports kept coming in of small pockets of resistence remaining. Responding to these reports Cardinal Ximinez came across a small detachment of marines. These loyalist marines failed to recognise the cardinals mixed force and opened fire...

The Cardinals forces arrived from the south-east heading towards the central ruins (objective). Gamma squad stopped on a small hill (objective) to get a good shooting position. The Ultramarines had been repairing a power generator in the west and a second in the south west (objectives) but had been searching some ruins in the north-east when they spotted the dust cloud of approaching vehicles.

Turn One:
Seizing the initiative Purpureus Squad ran into the central ruins. Albus-gravis drove their APC to the South-Western Power generator while Albus-Pugnus headed to the western power generators (5 marines at each). Missiles shattered the drive motor of the first Rifleman and detonated Omega Squads APC killing four Knights.

Ximinez lead Alpha Knights to the west to protect the power generator; the Judges ran into cover while everything else opened fire on the renegades. When the smoke cleared 14 marines were dead leaving just a single Lascannon from Purpureus squad in the ruins and an empty APC in the south-west.

Turn Two:
Supported by Purpureus's lascannon Brother Grumio and the Terminators stomped around the northern side of the central ruins and opened fire on Gamma Knights. The APC seemed to lead a charmed life; with only its storm bolter destoyed. Caecilius and his troops jumped over the ruins and charged into combat with the third Rifleman. The Castellan jumped out of the APC and charged into the Assault Marines swinging wildly. Two Judges are killed. The cardinals men turned their attention to the second power generator and killed four marines (just the melta gun left).

Turn Three:
The Terminators continue their relentless march but Brother Grumio is immobilised and shaken; the other Rifleman is wrecked. Purpureus Squad is wiped out but the last man from Albus will not die! Three Knights from Alpha squad are killed by missiles. Caecilius can not attach meltabombs to the Rifleman and Crowe finally kills some assault marines.

Turn Four:
Gamma's APC continues to lead a charmed life. Crowe finishes off the Assault Marines and Caecilius with cleansing flame and runs towards Brother Grumio. Judge Dread takes out the last tactical marine with his meltagun. Alpha Knights exchange fire with the Devastators; both squads lose a couple of men. A couple of Terminators fall to the combined fire of Gamma & Omega Knights.

Turn Five:
The Terminators finally destroy Gamma's APC! Return fire from four Psycannons & stormbolters kills four including both heavy weapons (snake eyes on the saves). Alpha Knights surge forward to protect the Power Generator and wipe out the last of Plumbeus Devastators. The Knight's Razorback glances the damaged Rhino into a wrecked state.

Victory to the Knights: Two objective to zero.
Ultramarines have - 2 Terminators, Dreadnought (immobilised), Razorback (Immobilised, no gun).
Knights have - Dreadnought, Razorback, 13 Purifers (including all 6 Psycannons), 1 Warrior, both HQ.

Summary:
I was expecting more from Crowe. However the assault squad was spread out around the Dread so he could not make use of his sweep attack and kept rolling one for his D3 attacks. I did not get to try out the funky grenades or Halberds in combat as there was so little melee in the game. Psycannons were amazing at putting wounds on the Terminators and the Str 7 was useful for dealing with armour.

Barrow Kings Battle Report: Game 1

2011-05-28T04:17:00.000-07:00

With a little bit of help from a Space Marine Dreadnought (Colossus) my Mantic Undead graduated from Tomb King school for their first game last night. Since I am not a fan of random spells I went for Khatap the special character with loremaster so I could try all the spells in the new lore. We rolled the Watch tower scenario but as my smallest unit was 21 Archers I could not start anyone in the tower.

Barrow Kings @2000 points
High Liche Khatap
Prince w/ Armour of Destiny, Great Weapon
Necrotech w/ Silver Steel Armour, Dragonbane Gem
Archers x21 w/ Banner, Musician
Warriors x30 w/ Light Armour, Full Command
Warriors x30 w/ Light Armour, Full Command
Tomb Guard x30 w/ Full Command, Undying Banner
Skull Catapult x2
Casket of Souls
Colossus w/ extra hand weapon

Skaven Army @2000 points
Warlock Engineer leading 40 slaves
Battle Standard Bearer leading 40 Clan Rats with Warpfire thrower
Plague Priest leading 40 Plague monks
Grey Seer leading 40 Clan Rats with Warpfire thrower
40 Slaves with slings
Doomwheel
Cannon

Deployment:

The plague monks held the centre of the Skaven lines. The Engineer and Standard bearer were on the left flank with the cannon, wheel, Seer and Sling slaves on the right flank.

The Casket and one catapult started in the graveyard on the right flank while the Prince took centre with a unit of warriors on either flank and the archers and colossus behind them. The second catapul was on the far right flank.

Turn One:
The Skaven bombarded the risen dead with magic and warpfire. However all the injuries were easily healed by the Liches magic as he protected the whole army with spells of protection and marched them forward. The graveyard catapult misfired and the other missed.

Turn Two:
The Plague Monks garrisoned the tower and withered the Tomb Guard. The Doomwheel managed an 18" charge straight into my catapult crushing it completely! On the left flank the Warriors charged into the clan rats. On the right flank the Tomb Guard failed their charge. The cannon shot bounced off the Colossus as it battered into the Seers bodyguards for a single wound that was parried. The Liche irresistibly gave the undead a ward save and promptly lost the rest of the power dice and a few archers in the ensuring explosion.

Turn Three:
The Seer continued to detonate skeletons with magic while weight of numbers dragged the Colossus to its doom (curse you crumbling). On the left flank the slaves charged into the Warriors flank. While on the right the other slaves charged into the Tomb Guards flank and were defeated by the Prince and overrun. Unable to swiftly reform the Guard lost time reforming. The Doomwheel rolled into the other Warrior unit and crushed several. The catapult and archers killed some Plague monks but the horde held fast in the tower. Once more the Liche irresistibly gave the undead a ward save and promptly lost most of the power dice due to feedback! This allowed the Seer to easily dispel the Caskets light of death.

Turn Four.
The Seer fluffed his spell but the Plague Priest continued to wither the Tomb Guard who were trudging slowly back towards the tower under heavy cannon fire. In shooting the catapult misfired and destroyed itself. The rats overran on the left flank while the Warriors on right destroyed the doomwheel but failed to swiftly reform leaving them too far away to be of any further use in the battle. The Liche sent a vortex of screaming skulls through the rats and promptly forgot his most important spells as he was reduced to a level two wizard!

Turn Five:
Guess what? The Liche irresistibly gives the Archers extra attacks and is prevented from casting any more spells. The undying banner fails to cast making the casket an easy target for the seers counter spell. Plague winds consume several archers as they continue to pepper the monks with arrows. The prince fails to charge into the tower (by one inch). The Skaven did not do much better with one warpfire thrower exploding and the other burning plague monks.

Turn Six:
Accompanied by six guard the Prince charges into the tower. His Necrotech companion having been felled by a cannon shot. He slaughters some plague monks and then promptly died to crumbling. At least the Liche was able to enhance him with some magic during the final turn...

With twenty Monks still in the tower and two units of Clan Rats the Skaven drive off the remaining Barrow King back to their mounds to regenerate.

Conclusions:
When I got him into combat the Prince did very well. Perhaps I should take a pair of them next time rather than a Necrotech? For the extra one hundred points over a normal level four with dispel scroll I do not think Khatap was that useful. I did make use of his re-roll a couple of times but it just does not seem enough. My opponent kept his dispel dice for the Casket and since I lost most of my power dice each turn it did nothing other than generate a couple of extra dice each turn. The colossus can not take a unit on his own; I need to hold him back as a counter-charge unit next time.

EDIT: I have just found out the Colossus has a Thunderstomp attack for an extra d6 hits each turn! Do not think it would have changed the overall result but he would have been able to chew through the Clan Rats and and Seer rather than just dying.

Project: Casket of Souls

2011-05-21T03:15:00.000-07:00

I am working on a Casket of Souls using Mantic Game's Undead models.

Concept

A Liche King Keeper is casting spells from the spell book held by the elf slave. The casket is behind him with the body of a scarified victim whose life blood is powering the spell. At the front the two casket guard are directing the newly raised skeletons into the battle.

I have mocked up my design on a movement tray and it seems to fit well on a 75-80mm square base. So what do people think? Do you think when painted up this will be a nice looking Casket of Souls? You can see the official casket picture above. I have tried aa few different layouts; I think having the slave on the Keepers left (picture 3) is the best.

Liche King, dead elf & Wraiths from Mantic Games.
Elf Slave from Shadowforge miniatures.
Casket, something I purchased so many years ago I have no idea who made it!

Nobody Expects... the Spanish Inquisition!

2011-05-07T04:21:00.000-07:00

I am sure this title has been over used since the Grey Knight codex hit the shelves but I really have not had much time for posting anything recently. I really like Terminators (even if they are not the best value point for point) so having a codex where they are troops without needing a special character is nice to see. Of course twenty terminators and a HQ sets you back about 1000 points so does not leave a lot of room for other units. This is where the Inquisitors help as they give you a cheap leader that still adds value to your force. Sadly the new breed of Inquisitor can not purchase a psychic hood so all these armies have to rely on the Knights natural aegis. If I can keep the Terminators within 12" of one of the Dreadnoughts then enemy psykers are down to Leadership 6 which is a good defence.

Miles Militis Xenos @1500
64 Inquisitor; Psychic Communion, 3 Survo-Skulls
55 Inquisitor; Psychic Communion
36 Henchmen; 2 Multi-Melta Servitors, 4 Warriors
470 Terminators x10; 2 Psycannons, P-Ammo
470 Terminators x10; 2 Psycannons, P-Ammo
405 Rifleman Dreadnought x3; Quad Autocannons w/ P-Ammo
Kill Points: 8; 28 Men, 3 Vehicles

For less than the cost of a Grand Master I can have a pair of inquisitors with Psychic Communion and some ablative wounds with a pair of multi-meltas. The army also has Survo Skulls to stop the enemy from scout/infiltrating near the Inquision and they also assist with acuratly deep striking the Terminators. Three Rifleman Dreadnaughts are included for some long range fire power and open up some transports so the Terminators can assault.

Game plan is to hide the Inquisitors in terrain and then get a +2 reseves roll on second turn to bring the Terminators down. Four squads of Terminators two of them having a pair of Psycannons for anti-armour the other squad has five men with stregth 5 storm bolters & Inititive 6 Force Weapons for taking out infantry. Each squad also has one hammer for dealing with Dreadnaughts and Monsters.

Primo Squad - Psycannon/Sword, Psycannon/Halberd, Hammer, 2 Halberds
Secundus Squad - Hammer, 4 Halberds (including Justicar)

For 1750 I would give one of the Inquisitors a Conversion Beamer. Add a Chimera so there is more deployment options and also a Strike Squad in a Rhino to travel with the second Inquisitor (who may get grenades) and offer protection from enemy deep striking.

Miles Militis Malleus @1750
89 Inquisitor; TDA, Psycannon & Hammer, 3 Survo-Skulls
80 Inquisitor; TDA, Psycannon & Hammer
226 Purifiers x5; 2 Psycannons, 3 Halberds, Plasmaback
475 Terminators x10; 2 Psycannons, P-Ammo, MC Halberd
475 Terminators x10; 2 Psycannons, P-Ammo, MC Halberd
405 Rifleman Dreadnought x3; Quad Autocannons w/ P-Ammo
Kill Points: 9; 27 Men, 4 Vehicles

No reserve manipulation this time so everything is probably starting on the table. We get 22 Terminators (even if two of them are toughness three) but not a lot else so this is very much an elite army. The Inquisitors add extra Psycannons and Stubborn to the Terminators. The Purifiers bring even more Psycannons and anti-horde with their absurdly good cleansing flame power.

The Plasmaback is the only item I am debating. It does give low AP which is otherwise missing completely in the army. Other than that it is just a weaker (and cheaper) Rifleman that can transport some marines around. Leaving them in a cheaper APC though does not leave a lot of points for anything else. Maybe a Banner on the Terminators? However that is only really good if I am keeping them as a ten man unit.

I really like this army but it is a rock/paper/scissor build. Some opponents are going to cry facing twenty Terminators and other are just going to laugh as they unleash long range laser/plasma death.

Inquisitor Crowe @1500

150 Castellan Crowe
72 Xenos Inquisitor; Power Armor, Psychotroke, Rad grenades, 3 Survo-Skulls
72 Warriors Three with a Meltagun in Razorback w/ P-ammo
267 Purifiers x8; 2 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino
267 Purifiers x8; 2 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino
267 Purifiers x8; 2 Psycannons, Hammer, 5 Halberds, Rhino
405 Rifleman Dreadnought x3; Quad Autocannons w/ P-Ammo
Kill Points 13; 29 Men, 7 Vehicles

Now I know a lot of people do not like Crowe because he can not join units and does not have a force weapon. However he rends anything (Wraith Lords, Hive Tyrants, Thunderwolves) on a 4+ without needing any Psychic powers. He can also penetrate the armour of most vehicles, or glance Land Raiders, in melee. The issue is he can not buy his own transport so he has to hijack one. For 100 points you can get an Inquisitor with Power Armour and one of the special Grenades together with three henchmen in a Rhino. Crowe can take the Rhino and the Inquisitor enhances the Purifiers he joins and you get the really versatile Survo-skulls as an extra option.

Originally I was just going to leave the three warriors in reserves as a 12 point tax on getting Crowe a ride and if anyone wanted a kill point from them it would at least soak up some fire power. However I had a few points left at the end of list building and thought that with a Meltagun the unit offers some threat value so opponents can not ignore them completely.

So what does Crowe offer us for the extra 50 points over a normal Brotherhood Champion? We get +WS, +I, +W, Fearless, an extra Psychic power and Purifiers as troops. That seems a pretty good deal to me. Occasionally he is going to give opponents Furious Charge. I just do not see this as being too much of a problem since he is running around on his own anyway. Once in a while it will be annoying if they get off a multi-charge. At higher point levels though I think the Grand Master is a better choice since he can make your Purifiers score if you really need it and if not re-rolls to wounds, scouting or counter attack are so much more useful.

Uppsala Legion - Take Two

2011-04-20T14:27:00.000-07:00

Red Orc is still working on ideas for changing his Ultramarines into Space Wolves. We are relaunching the Ultras as the Uppsala Legion, from the planet Schveeden! While reading MVBrants Reliability vs. Min/Max I noticed that will little more than adding a Grey Hunter squad each time the tournament list scaled quite well from 1500 to 2000 points. While it lacks Assault Marines it suits Red Orc's style of just being marines in APC's.

Space Wolves @1500 points
Njal Stormcaller - 245
5 x Wolf Guard w/ 4 Combi-Melta, 5 Fists - 210
5 x Wolf Scouts w/ Meltagun - 85
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
5 x Grey Hunters w/ Flamer, Plasmaback - 150
5 x Grey Hunters w/ Flamer, Plasmaback - 150
5 x Long Fangs w/ 4 Missiles - 115
5 x Long Fangs w/ 4 Missiles - 115
4 x Long Fangs w/ 3 Missiles - 90
13 Kill Points: 51 Marines, 4 Tanks

Now if you are not keen on the Standards you can replace them for other upgrades or replace them and one Combi-weapon for the extra Long Fang. The Wolf Guard do not count as a kill point since they get to go and be squad leaders for the Grey Hunters and Scouts. Finally if you do not like have a super-psyker has your leader you can replace him with a pair of cheaper HQ.

Space Wolves @1750 points
Njal Stormcaller - 245
5 x Wolf Guard w/ Combi-Melta, Power Fist - 215
5 x Wolf Scouts w/ Meltagun - 85
5 x Wolf Scouts w/ Meltagun - 85
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Rhino - 160
5 x Grey Hunters w/ Flamer, Plasmaback - 150
5 x Grey Hunters w/ Flamer, Plasmaback - 150
5 x Long Fangs w/ 4 Missiles - 115
5 x Long Fangs w/ 4 Missiles - 115
4 x Long Fangs w/ 3 Missiles - 90

16 Kill Points: 64 Marines, 5 Tanks

Space Wolves @2000 points
Njal Stormcaller - 245
6 x Wolf Guard w/ Combi-Melta, Power Fist - 258
5 x Wolf Scouts w/ Meltagun - 85
5 x Wolf Scouts w/ Meltagun - 85
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
8 x Grey Hunters w/ Meltagun, Wolf Standard, Rhino - 170
5 x Grey Hunters w/ Flamer, Plasmaback - 150
5 x Grey Hunters w/ Flamer, Plasmaback - 150
5 x Long Fangs w/ 4 Missiles - 115
5 x Long Fangs w/ 4 Missiles - 115
5 x Long Fangs w/ 4 Missiles - 115
18 Kill Points: 74 Marines, 6 Tanks
Personally I would be tempted to take a third Plasmaback and a couple of MM/HF Speeders rather than the fourth Grey Hunter squad (and Wolf Guard) in a Rhino.

Wrath of Khan

2011-04-08T15:23:00.000-07:00

I have not played my Space Marines since the Tyranid codex came out. I had three lists I tended to use Bikers, Terminators and my "Wrath of Khan" list which was Grey Knights being lead by Kor'sarro Khan. Now I can hardly make any claims to it being a competitive list it suffers all the problems of any single land raider build; however strength 7, Initiative 5 Marines tended to chop through a lot of competition and being a troops choice could score the objective they had taken. The basis of my list was as follows

1500 Wrath of Khan
160 Kor'sarro Khan
275 Grey Knights x10
205 Tactical x10; Flamer,Missile, Rhino
190 Telion's Sniper Scouts x10
190 Sterngaurd x5; Rhino; 2 Lascannons
115 Dread w/ Plasma Cannon
115 Dread w/ Plasma Cannon
250 LRR w/ MM
26 Marines, 10 Scouts, 5 Vehicles - 10 Kill Points

So with Codex: Grey Knights hitting the shelves I can no longer ally in my Grey Knights. However I can build something similar with the new book. As much as I liked Telion's ability to assassinate melta and power-gloves he was just not consistent enough in play to be worth taking an actual assassin. We could take henchmen with magic monkeys to be a cross between the Sterngurad's Lascannons and the the scouts however I would prefer to keep it all marines.

1500 Grey Knights
190 Grand Master w/ Rad Grenades
283 Purifiers x10 w/ 9 Halberds, Hammer, Psybolt Ammo
180 Strike Squad x5 in Plasmaback
140 Strike Squad x5 in Rhino
182 Purifiers x5 w/ 2 Psycannons, Halberd, Rhino
135 Dread w/ TL-Auto x2, Psybolt Ammo
135 Dread w/ TL-Auto x2, Psybolt Ammo
255 LRR w/ MM
26 Marines, 6 Vehicles - 11 Kill Points

We have lost ten warm bodies and gained a vehicle. Between Rad grenades and Hammerhands we still have (effectively) Strength 6 and have gained grenades and power weapons all round. The Librarian is probably a better HQ choice but Grand Strategy means we can still have a scoring unit jumping out of the Land Raider if needed. I am sure I could build (or just cut-n-paste from the internet) a more competitive list however this allows me to play by old marine list how that Codex: Demonhunters is defunct. It is not really playing to the Knights strength of staying at 20" and waiting for the enemy to assault you. It is purely just for fun.

I am not sure on the lone Plasmaback? Maybe I should use the extra points for some Psycannons on the Strike Squads? The second Purifier squad has only a single Halberd just because there was nothing else to do with two points! At hight point levels I would bump them up to ten strong and buy an APC, for the Purifiers in the Raider, so that I could combat squad the unit and have them all mobile.

I like the 40k background but have never been one for building my army based upon it. To me marines were always Space Knights and tactical marines never really lived up to the ideal I wanted. Grey Knights on the other hand, running around with assault weapons and vorpal swords, really do capture my imagination as Space Knights.

I own Brother Stern and about 25 Grey Knights so with a mix of blue and grey marines I could play this list as is. However if I want to build it any higher I am going to need some more Psycannons. Now that suits me just fine as I had seen these lovely miniguns on maxmini and wanted to have some marines running around with them. Now I finally have a good reason to buy them. They also have some decent hammers and steam punk weapons.

Of course I still need time to finish off my Tyranids so none of this is going to happen before the summer and probably not until much later this year once my training is out the way and I have a job again.

20: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2011-03-19T08:06:00.000-07:00

Game 20: 1500 Points vs Space Wolves
Scenario - Seize Ground (three objectives - moisture vaporators), Spearhead deployment

I played a full drop pod army again so nothing arrive until the bottom of turn two. This gave the marines plenty of time to position themselves ready for the attack. They just did not know where it was going to come from...

Tyranid Air Assault

Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, Hive Commander, Wings, TL Devs x2)

Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter

Ymgarl Xenomorphs x7

Termagants w/ Devourers x20 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter

Mummy Tervigon (Toxic,Adreanl,Catalysis) [Outflanking]

Broodlord (Toxic) & 5 Genestealers w/ Toxic

Gargoyle Brood x12 w /AG,TS

Space Wolves (not all gear listed)

Rune Priest Penda leading 8 Grey Hunters & Wolf Guard w/ Fist in Rhino

Wolf Priest Tola leading 8 Grey Hunters & Wolf Guard w/ Fist in Rhino

Five Long Fangs in Lazerback

Rune Priest Ozur leading 4 Terminators in a Drop Pod.

Dreadnought Vandrad

Land speeder w/ HF, MM

The hive ship drifted through the star-system drawn towards the transmissions from several moons orbiting a gas giant. As the ship approached its autonomic nervous system began launching spores towards the planetoids. Sensing this activity the hive mind stirred from its hibernation and started to listen to the transmissions of its prey.

Ozur's pod was buffeted by the moons strong winds as it dropped towards his brother Penda and the troops already on the ground. The pod landed in the north-east edge of the plateau next to one of the moisture vaporators. As his retinue took up position around the pod Ozur could see Penda repositioning his troops in the north-west. The two APC's parked up back-to-back in front of a tumbled down keep near another vaporator. Inside the keep were the long fangs with brother Vandrad to the west and the Lazerback to the east. Between the two groups of soldiers was the wreckage of a crashed shuttle amongst which a third moisture vaporator was somehow still operating.

Unfortunately for the marines Xenomorphs were already lying dormant in the keep and as the spores fell they burst out of the ground tearing through the metal hulls of the APC's and the exposed pistons of brother Vandrad's mighty power claw. Devilgaunts disgorged from a pod killed all but one of the Fangs. Penda was able to dissipate most of the Zoanthropes psychic energy but one of them blasted the Lazerback forcing the crew to spend precious moments re-routing power cables to get the guns back on line.

Ozur was too far away to join the fray and he could see a swarm of gargoyles and a gigantic beast both heading towards the keep. He ordered his men to shoot at the near by spore blasting chunks of wet flesh from it. His men were so busy they did not see the genestealers creeping up behind them and all the terminators died in the ambush leaving just Ozur fighting alone. Penda tried to summon lightning from the ether but the psyhic choir of the brain-bugs broke his concentration and the return fire carved the APC in half forcing the troops out on to the moons frigid surface. Tola roasted some gaunts with a flamer but it was not enough as the swarm of gargoyles descended on the immobilised APC and tore it to shreds, one panel at a time, killing everyone inside. The Xenomorphs ripped the stabilisers from brother Vandrad's legs while contining to be to agile for him to crush any.

Another psyhic blast stripped the tracks from the Lazerback but the crew were able to get the guns back online. They just had enough time to zap the hovering form of Tyrant descending towards them before the vehile was annihilated in a massive fireball. Pedra got revenge for his fallen kin by wiping out the gargoyles but several of his men fell to the hail of needles from the devilgaunts. Mummy charged forward biting deep into Vandrad's power pack silencing the mighty fighting engine.

Its engines open at full throttle the land speeder rushed towards the drop pod burning genestealers with its flamer. Unfortunately they were not quick enough to save Ozur who was eaten by the hulking leader of the alien brood. Pedra did not long survive his brother being skewered on a spike by the Tyrant as the last of his men died to the Xenomorphs.

With nothing to now hold back their warp blasts the Brain-bugs obliterating the drop pod and destroyed the engine on the speeder forcing it to land next to the broodlord who quickly slaughtered the crew.

Aftermath: Victory by annihilation for the Hive Mind (I also had two objectives).

The game may have been a massacre but tactically it was very close to a draw. I killed the last grey hunter at the end of turn five so if I had not been lucky in wiping out a whole squad in their transport they would still have had men contesting the western moisture vaporator. Mummy only managed to spawn three babies this game and the Zoantrhopes kept glancing the APC's. However the dice gods did give my opponent bad rolls too. Snake eyes on the terminators saves was harsh and the rune priest and Dreadnought kept rolling one and two to hit even with their magic necklaces.

Sunday Smackdown: T-Wolves (part two)

2011-03-06T14:56:00.000-08:00

I was asked what would happen if the Wolf Lord was with his unit when they were fighting the Xenomorphs. Now my first thought was that they would just get slaughtered. Since (when I started typing this) my daughter is just running up and down the room I thought I would roll some more dice...

In the Green corner, weighing in at 426 points we have a Broodlord and 19 Genestealers all with sything Talons and toxic sacs. The Broodlord gives the bugs the chance to soak a few extra wounds before loosing combat efficiency and with higher strength he gets a re-roll to wound against the T-Wolves. He also has hypnotic gaze which help reduce incoming attacks.

In the Red corner, weighting in at 440 points we have the same three Thunderwolf Cavalry now joined by a 230 points Lord. All decked out with magic necklace; shiny runic armour; Frost Blade; Mount; Storm Shield. He could take more bling but I do not think he need it. WS 6 makes it 4+ for the regular stealer to hurt him and Necklace and Str 6 he is hitting on 3's and slaying bugs on 2's anyway.

I mocked up three battles. Just like before the Wolves got the charge. I was amazed at the difference the re-rolls made to the bugs. The Cavalry were dead turn two every time! The Lord lasted until turn 4-5 taking one wound a round once the cavalry were dead. The bugs do loose the first round of combat by 2-3 points so with out synapse it would be possible for them to get swept. Mostly though they just just take the 'no retreat' hit and carry on clawing the wolves eyes out...

Image Credits: Pictures from www.dakkadakka.com

Sunday Smackdown: T-Wolves

2011-03-06T04:04:00.000-08:00

I have quite enjoyed Gmorts Sunday Smackdowns where he has pitted one hero against another in single combat. As I was discussing if Thunderwolf Calvalry could beat Genestealers I thought I would put it to the test in an actual battle. After all rolling a few dice helps to distract me from the work I should be doing!

In the Green corner, weighing in at 204 points we have twelve Genestealers with toxic sacs and rending claws. Twice as many wounds as the cavalry and striking first they are going to need those rends to overwhelm the single Wolf Storm Shield.

In the Red corner, weighting in at 210 points we have three Thunderwolf Cavalry with mixed weapons for wound allocation tricks. #1 was a Thunder Hammer, #2 a Storm Shield and #3 a Pistol. Thunderwolfs have four attacks each with Rending and strength five. They are striking second but with two wounds each it is difficult for the genestealers to take any out in the first round.

Math-hammer says it will be a fairly bloody battle taking about four rounds of combat and be too close to predict the winner. If the wolves can kill some bugs with shooting it shifts the odds in their favour.

I mocked up ten battles. The Wolves got the charge in all of them. They managed to kill one stealer with shooting in half the battles. Genestealers inflicted ~3 wounds in the first round. Sometimes they were lucky and killed a T-wolf however this did not seem to change the cavalry's performance as they still killed 4-5 Genestealers in 9 of the battles. The second round was where the battle turned in most games with the Genestealers inflicting enough rends that the Shield-bearer died. Without the invulnerable save the Wolves went on to lose the battle of attrition. The longest battle was five round and was won by the Wolves. The shortest battle was eleven bugs killing all the Thunderwolves before they got to strike on the first round (eight failed saves out of 11 wounds).

Results: Ten Battles, Genestealers 6; T-wolves 4.

So the Hive Mind just pulled ahead. In the four battles Wolves won they survived with a single model at one wound. With striking first the bugs usually had at least three models left. What I found with actually rolling the dice was that the T-Wolves were quite susceptible to results that had deviated from the statistical average (both up and down). If I rolled a low number of wounds with a high number of rends (3 Wounds; 2 Rends or 7-4) the Wolves could not stack them all on the Shield. Equally if I inflicted 10+ wounds the shear number of saves caused cavalry to die.

In a real battle both sides would have support from other units. It is therefore unlikely they would ever face each other at full strength without support. It was a fun exercise though to see how effective each unit can be. Twelve Xenomorphs is the minimum size brood I like to run. Although I may increase that if I start to see more T-Wolves on the battle field.

Image Credits: Pictures from www.dakkadakka.com

19: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2011-03-04T02:38:00.000-08:00

Game 19: 1500 Points vs Ultramarines
Scenario - Seize Ground, Spearhead deployment
I played a full drop pod army so nothing arrive until the bottom of turn two. This gave the marines plenty of time to position themselves ready for the attack. They just did not know where it was going to come from...

Tyranid Air Assault
Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, Hive Commander, Wings, TL Devs x2)
Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
Ymgarl Xenomorphs x8
Termagants w/ Devourers x20 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
Tervigon (Toxic,Adreanl,Catalysis,Talons) [Outflanking]
Broodlord (Toxic,Talons) & 5 Genestealers w/ Toxic
Gargoyle Brood x11

Ultramarine
Chaplain Caecilius with Jump Pack
Purpureus & Albus Tactical Squads with flamer, missile & power-gauntlets; Albus in a Rhino
Plumbeus Devastator Squad with 4 Missiles
Tripudio Assault Squad with Fist and two Flamers.
Tempestas Terminator Squad with assault cannon & CML
Brother Grumio Dreadnought

* = Objective
Purpureus & Plumbeus Squads formed up on the top of the hill in three squads guarding the first weather mast*, they were backed up by Brother Grumio. Caecilius lead Tripudio over the hill and formed up on the second mast*. Tempestas advanced to investigate the bio-signs* from the ruins while Albus squad zoomed their APC forward and jumped out to investigate the petrified forest*.

File: 20110225/excom Date: 0736903.M41
It had been three days since the space hulk had dropp+d out of the w+rp int+ the system. It is broa+casti+g a st+tic disruption s+gn+l +n +ll ch+nn+ls. +++++ some+++ c++ ++c++ve this. At t+++ ++

Kellerman watched the transmission from the masts. Three large meteors dropped from the sky. Two of them impacted at the bottom of the hill; the shells cracked open and the floating form of the alien Zoanthropes emerged. Searing balls of psychic plasma erupted from their elongated heads and vaporised three marines. The last spore impacted by the ruins disgorging termagants who opened fire killing six Tripudio marines. Swooping down from the sky behind the meteor spores was the gigantic form of a Hive Tyrant. It swept down in a long arc racking a deadly hail of spikes into the injured assault marines and engaged Caecilius in melee combat. Over the intercom he could hear the screams from Albus squad as genestealers ripped them apart. Only Sergeant Lucius, hypnotised by the Broodlord, was left alive after the first assault.

The Terminators stomped forward crushing termagants under their boots. Purpureus-Pugnus and Dreadnought Grumio charged into the Zoanthrope broods but were not able to penetrate their mystical protection. Meanwhile the Hive Tyrant finished with Caecilius and glides over the landscape to rend Plumbeus apart. Xenomorphs burst out of the ground and leaped onto the Terminators slaying half of them. Over the intercom could be heard Lucius' screams as he was torn limb from limb, the intercom then thankfully went silent as the aliens swarmed over the APC and torn it, and its transmitter, apart.

Purpureus-gravis opened fire on the gargoyles descending towards the hill, while Grumio and Purpureus-Pugnus continued to battle ineffectively against the Zoantrhopes. The Hive Tyrant launched itself at Grumio tearing off his arm and then shattering his cooling systems causing him to seize up and only be able to watch helplessly as the Tyrant effortlessly glided over and munched the last of Purpureus squad.

Kellerman hit the side of the screen trying to clear the static. In the distance he could see the dark shape of a large monster spuing forth termagants as it advanced towards Tempestas squad. He could see the last of his elite soldiers fighting against Gaunts, Xenomorphs and Genestealers. While they held there own for a few moments the shear weight of enemy numbers was over whelmed them. Kellerman turned to the servitor and ordered him to activate the teleportation system and bring the injured men back to base. Surrounded by a halo of violet energy six bodies, more dead than alive, materialised in the control room. The medics rushed over to adminster to them.

File: 20110225/excom Date: 0736904.M41
++++ t++eat has ++++n th++selv++ to be T++++ds. Alien spor++ have been bom+bar+ing the +++++ ++++++e. Our marine contingent has successful repelled the first attack with minimal casult++++ Assist++++ req+++++. TRANSMISSION END. TIME STAMP DISCREPANCY DELAY IN ARRIVAL 278 DAYS.

Victory for the Hive Mind by annihilation (I also held three objectives)

WHFB: Vampire Counts vs Dark Elves

2011-02-27T05:30:00.000-08:00

WHFB :1500 Points, Battleline

Yesterday I got to play my fourth game of 8^th Edition Warhammer Fantasy, it is also my fourth game of Fantasy this century! I do not have the full list of equipment for the Dark Elves and I have not bothered to include the majority of spells each turn that were countered. I also forgot the camera.

Vampires

Wytch-Queen Shareth (Lvl 4 Vampire Lore, Hauberk, 4++ Talisman, Periapt) leading Twenty Skeletons with Command & Warbanner

Wight King Morkin (BSB, Great Weapon, Damned Crown & Shard) leading Thirty Grave Guard with Command, Great Weapons and Barrow Banner

Twenty Skeletons with Command

Five Black Nights

Dark Elves

Sorceress (Lvl 4, Sacrificial Dagger, Ward Talisman and Dragon Egg) & Hero (BSB with Pendent of Khaeleth and Great Weapon) leading thirty Spearmen with Command and Warbanner

Eighteen Crossbowmen with musician

Twenty-one Wytch Elves with Command & Banner of Murder

Six skirmishing Shades with an Assassin

The Battle

Shareth felt the Elven blade slice through her neck. As the head fell to the floor her link with the walking corpse was severed and her consciousness was jerked back into her own body. So it seems that parleying with this maundering war band was not an option. She stepped out of her tent and with a click of her fingers the silent night was filled with the sounds of marching feet and clanking armour.

Shareth's skeletal retinue formed up around her as she marched forward. To her right was a second regiment and beyound them was Morkin and his men-at-arms. The Knights glided along to her right. Extending her senses she looked across the landscape. An open field between two hills lay before her. An old tumbled down cottage was built close to the left most hill and she could hear the skirmishers clambering into position within the rafters. Directly in front of her was the Sorceress who refused to join her army. To the right were the archers and left the Wytch-women. If the Elves would not join her in life then they would swell the ranks of her forces in death.

Shareth marched her forces forward; the Knights crested the nearer, left most, hill and prepared for a charge on the building. Encanting arcane words Shareth flung a handful of inscribed bones into the dirt and watched as a horde of 22 zombies rose to do her bidding. These newly risen dead shuffled towards the archers moaning softly. The Sorceress responded with her own arcane power and drained the souls from half the Zombies and hexing the Knights into forgetting how to use their weapons. The archers were easily able to finish off the zombies. The skirmishing Elves were able to pick off three of the Knights from there vantage point in the building.

Shareth marched her infantry forward and held the Knights back. She summoned more Zombies and sent them into melee with the archers by invoking the dance of the dead. However her attempts to heal the Knights was thwarted by the Sorceress. Ripping the heart out of the soldier standing next to her the Sorceress exploded the last of the Knights. The Wytch-women charged into Shareth's retinue inflicting a wound on the Vampire herself and tearing half the bodyguards to shreads. The last of the zombies crumbed under the archers blades but once more the distraction has prevented them from shooting at the heavy infantry.

The skeletons charged forward to engage the archers allowing Morkin to charge his grave guard revenants into the Wytch-womens flank. Their blades enchanted by Shareth's magic they hewed through the Elves and trampled the last of them underfoot reforming to face the Spear-elves. Sharteth was left standing with just two undead bodyguard’s, one of whom was still holding her war banner. The three of them faced off against the Skirmishers who has now left the safety of the building. Seeing an opportunity the Assassin leaped at Shareth his envenomed dagger glistening in the moonlight. The blade cut effortlessly through her hauberk but was turned aside by her protective wards. With one swipe of her sword she beheaded the assailant. That moment of lost concentration allowed the Sorceress to incinerate a dozen revenants.

Channeling the power of the dragon egg the sorceress spat green flames at the revenants. Not wanting to feel the heat of the flames on her skin Shareth joined the revenants and used the dance of the dead to engage and slaughter the Skirmishers in melee. She also called on her invocations to reform warriors in both unliving units. The archers just managed to finish off the skeletons they were fighting allowing them to shoot a volley of quarrels obliterating the last of the other skeletal warriors. Incinerating those standing next to her the Sorceresses managed to cursed the revenants then her concentration was shattered; not even slaying her own kinsman helped.

Charging forward the revenants impacted with the Spear-elves. Their own banner helping to counter-act the curse their mighty two-handed weapons hacked through the opponents causing them to flee as the corpses pressed the attack. The Spear-elves rallied behind the archers and the combined might of quarrels and magic whittled away half the grave guard.

Unperturbed the revenants charged forward and slaughtered the archers, pursuing on into combat with the Spear-elves. Shareth scattered some more encribed bones on the floor and another dozen zombies rose up behind the Spear-elves. These zombies ripped the Sorceresses apart when she broke and ran as the last of her kinsmen died under the scything blades of the dead.

Aftermath: Major Victory for the Undead.(1575 vs 655 Victory Points)

Despite the actual scores the game was very close and there were a couple of points (like the assassin attack) where the Elves could have won the game had the dice been in their favour.

Image Credits: Pictures from www.dakkadakka.com

Tyranid Project: Parasite & Guard

2011-01-24T12:32:00.000-08:00

I got to do a bit more work on my Parasite of Mortrax this weekend.

I have added the rending claws and used a Hormagaunt's claw to make the tail spike for his implant attack. Tail still needs a bit of work around the join. Overall though I think it is looking quite good compared to the codex picture? Of course the official picture does not even look like it has rending claws...

Next up is my Hive Guard. I love playing these guys; I think they are the best addition to the codex. However while the models look lovely they are annoying to play. The first bit of raised terrain and they tumble over.

The only solution is to replace their Impaler Cannons with plastic guns. I have ripped them off and used warrior Venom Cannons. The new guns are going to need some more work to make them look less Venomy. I think some flesh hooks to make spikes on the end will help them mimic the Impaler Cannon and I shall clip off of the spike under the barrel. Next month I should have all six of them modelled with VC's...

Image Credit: Parasite from wh40k.lexicanum the rest are my models

Tyranids: One Year on...

2011-01-15T12:45:00.000-08:00

There has been a lot of recent discussion about whether the current Tyranid Codex is better than the last one. Of course if you really want to have a look at how tyranids have morphed go read the second edition codex review. Tyranids do not seem to have made any real impact on the tournament scene. This is not helped by the fact that bugs struggle against Mech Guard and Rune Priest armies. The only list I see people still talking about is variations of Nidzilla. While this is not quite such a mono-build as last edition the real choice seems to between how many hive guard and Trygons or T-fex.

I can understand why many dislike the codex. Carnifex & Tyrants are too expensive; Hormagaunts lost beast; many units lost fleet, move through cover & assault grenades. Added to which almost all the customisation of units has gone. Personally I think the gains outweighed the losses. Removal of grenades is an interesting, and I think appropriate, design choice. Some of the other changes needed to be make. So lets take a moment to look at what they did gain.

Awesome Psychic powers (even if they are all shooting attacks)
Cheap bugs with poison attacks
Heavy Weapon Squad returns (Hive Guard)
A scoring Monster that spews forth termagants
A much better layout and weapons are easier for opponents to understand

There is one other reason to dislike the codex. In game Tyranids do not really live up to the expectation set in the background. They are billed as the première melee army; a claim they can rarely fulfil. Tyranids end up being much more a Mars Attack B-movie monster than Ridly Scott Alien menace. The main problem though is less the codex itself but the fundamental change in the game rules. Bugs won combat by dragging enemy down by shear weight of numbers. Outnumbering meant you changed a lost combat into a draw; now you just remove the unit from the table and hope the next brood can do better.

New Tyranid Releases?

The rumour is August will be Tyranid 2nd wave:

Doom blister
Tyrannofex/Tervigon plastic
Harpy
Lashwhip/bonesword blister direct only
Ymgarl blister one pose direct only

I got a "Gribbly Monster" voucher for my birthday and was about to spend it on a 'fex for Tervigon conversion. However this rumour, together with the fact I am not going to have the time to build it before June, means I might as well wait and see what actually comes out.

The Harpy is something that is a bit vulnerable compared to most of the monsters. A decent kit could however see me add one to my hive. As for the rest; I already have Boneswords and do not want any more metal figures. Doom and Ymgarls will not be added to my fleet.

Shrikes & Parasite of Mortrex
Last year I converted a Warrior into what was going to be my first Shrike. As I am new to modelling it took quite a bit of work to get the Gargoyle wings to fit flush with the carapace. I like the flying pose but by taking the legs off it stops me using the models as warriors. Now Maxmini is releasing wings which I shall be adding to my collection of magnetised arms. This way I will have a dozen models that can be used as Warriors or Shrikes depending on my mood. So this just leaves my original test convertion; he can get upgraded to be the lord of Mortrex - The Parasite himself. Since I was building him as a Shrike the middle arms are magnetised, and I have not get any rending claws to put on him yet...

Image Credits: Pictures from www.dakkadakka.com, The Eye of Terror & maxmini

18: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2010-12-31T12:26:00.000-08:00

Game Eighteen: 1500 Points vs Salamanders

Hive Fleet Lyracian
Junior Prime w/ Swords, Toxic, Deathspitter & Regen
Hive Guard: 2 Broods x3
Zoanthropes x3
Mummy Tervigon w/ Catalysis, TS, AG, Talons
Aunty Tervigon w/ Catalysis, TS, AG, Talons
Termaguants: 2 Broods x10
Xenomorphs (Genestealers) x10
Tiny the Tyrannofex w/ Rupture Cannon, DL, CS

Salamanders Last Stand
Boiled Egg - Librarian Dallas and Beta Squads; Five Tacticals in Razorback
Bread roll - Alpha-Gravis; Five Tacticals w/ Missile Launcher
Bacon - Alpha-Pugnis; Five Man Tactical in Razorback w/ Flamer & Combi-flamer
Pancakes - Gamma & Delta Squads; Five Tacticals in Razorback
Maple Syrup - Epsilon Devestor Squad w/ Missiles
Inedible Rock - Predators XXI & XIX w/ Hvy Bolter Sponsons
Inedible Pebble - Two Typhoon Landspeeders
Inedible Stones - Armitage & Steel; Two Rifleman Dreadnought

Mission: Spearhead, Seize Ground (4 Objectives)

File: 798553/excom Date: 0736998.M41
Subject: Species Record - Tyranids
Rating: Caucus Theta
Our expandability force had been sent to Ceti-Alpha VI to investigate strange energy reading that were belived to be from a missing star liner. While investigating the ancient ruins discovered our scout speeder detected the advancing alien swarm skittering over the hills towards us from the south-east. Ordering the troops back into their APC's we prepared to eliminate this minor threat before continuing with our mission.

Trooper Lambert designated tags to the larger creatures based on observed behaviour as they approached. The Mummy and Aunty monsters were seen to be spewing forth tiny gaunt's from eggs nestled between their chitinous plates as they charged into the ruins. Tiny, the hulking monster behind them, stopped on a hill giving it an excellent firing position over the ruins.

Master Dallas was able to suppress much of the psycic potential of Junior and his Zoanthrope entourage. However a single blast of warp lighting incinerated half of Epsilon squad while XIX was wrecked and XXI stunned by salvoes of cannon fire. All available artillery was used to obliterate the Zoanthropes while their power was nullified by Master Anderson.

The losses did not seem to effect the hive as Aunty shuffled into one of the ruins to lay more eggs. A continuing torrent of heavy weapon fire prevents several APC's & XXI from shooting however Armitage, Steel and the Typhoons are able to critically wound Mummy.

We had little time to celebrate this victory as Beta and Gamma squads were forced to go to ground following the destruction of their APC's. Bellowing with rage Mummy thundering into cover as her babies spread out wounding Epsilon squad with small arms. It seems that Mummy was feeling no pain as she shrugged off missile fire that found its way into the ruins.

XXI managed a single shot wounding Aunty before Tiny's cannon penetrated the hull and killed both crew. This monstrosities next two shots disabled Armitage and Steel who were valiantly trying to put down Mummy. Gamma Squad and Beta squad (along with Master Dallas) were overrun by gaunts with poison dripping from their fangs.

Mummy emerged from the ruins her loud screeching showing her dominance over the lesser Xenos as she rallied them for a final mighty charge against Delta Squad. To the north Aunty also hurled her babies into the fray against Alpha-Gravis. Both were supported by the hulking forms of the Hive Guard shooting down the Landspeeders.

Salamander expeditionary force eliminated six minutes after contact with Xenos. Battle data compiled from records recovered with the sole survivor, Dreadnought Steel, who has now been rebuilt and returned to service. Recommended cause of action - Nuke the planet from orbit. – Magos Biologis Alder Garrick.

Tyranid: Air Assault

2010-12-29T10:01:00.000-08:00

Concept
With the arrival of Mycetic spore pods in the Tyranid Codex it is now possible to field an all reserve army. Every unit has Deep Strike, outflanking or other non-standard methods so that nothing has to join the battlefield from your own table edge.

Tactics
Everything starts the game in reserves. The majority then arrived turn two with the aim of assaulting turn three. Therefore only giving the opponent a single turn of shooting before they are overwhelmed by all the threats.

Core Units
You need a Hive Tyrant with Wings, so he can Deep Strike, and Hive Commander for the bonus to reserves. Originally you wanted a pair however the official FAQ stopped Hive Commander stacking with itself so there is no point to a second Tyrant now. Our main anti-tank comes from Zoanthropes and the Spores they are travelling in. We also need some Gargoyles to act as a screening unit for the Tyrant. Two small units gives us some redundancy should one not arrive on time or die on impact.

For our troops we have Devilgaunts for their massed shooting (they kill an average five marines a turn); A Broodlord Commando team for surgical strikes; The ever popular Mummy to spew forth her babies.

Weakness
Unlike my usual robust Nidzilla army this army is very dice dependent. You now only get 66% not 90% of your army on the second turn and have no control over which elements arrive. While they can not kill themselves on landing Pods and Trygons can still veer off course making them ineffective. That said I think it is going to be fun to play.

Army List: Air Assault @ 1500 Points
310 Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, Hive Commander, Wings, TL Devs x2)
170 Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
170 Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
140 Deathleaper (Ymgarl Stealers or Parasite)
240 Termagants w/ Devourers x19 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
200 Tervigon (Toxic,Adreanl,Catalysis,Talons) [Outflanking]
150 Broodlord (Toxic,Talons) & 5 Genestealers w/ Toxic
120 Gargoyles 2 Broods x10
12 Kills Points + Spawn. 45 Bugs, 6 Large Bugs, 2 Monsters & 3 Pods

Army List: Air Assault @ 2000 Points
310 Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, Hive Commander, Wings, TL Devourers x2)
170 Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
170 Zoanthropes x2 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
161 Ymgarl Genestealers x7
250 Termagants w/ Devourers x20 in Spore Pod w/ TL Deathspitter
225 Tervigon (Toxic,Adreanl,Catalysis,Regeneration) [Outflanking]
150 Broodlord (Toxic,Talons) & 5 Genestealers w/ Toxic
144 Gargoyle Brood w/ AG, TS x18
210 Tyrgon w/ Adrenal
210 Tyrgon w/ Adrenal
14 Kills Points + Spawn. 56 Bugs, 5 Large Bugs, 4 Monsters & 3 Pods

Options: Guns for Mycetic Spore Pods?
Usually I put Cluster Spines as the extra gun on Pods. However since this army is lacking in anti-tank I think the Deathspitter is better. It has the added advantage that, since Pods must fire every turn, it can not scatter back and hit your own troops.

Options: Deathleaper, Ymgarls or Parasite?
This is the spot in the army that I am not really sure about until I have played some games. At low-points Deathleaper helps by dropping Psi Hoods down from 42% to 17% chance of stopping the Zoanthropes shooting. His pheromone trail can also help any unit that did not arrive turn two (assuming he did). His ability to go back into reserves means he can try and contest an objective late game. Ymgarls get to assault the turn they arrive but are limited to area terrain. Which can be a problem depending on the battlefield. The Parasite boosts up a unit of Gargoyles, his claws can kill tanks and creating free units never hurts. Alternatively I could also drop Regeneration and this unit entirely and take a third Trygon...

Options: Trygon, Raveners or Skrikes?
The advantage of Trygons is their ability to tear apart tanks. The weakness is vulnerability to meltas, missiles and power fists. Also since I do not own any Trygons I would have to proxy them with Carnifex or use alternatives. A Trygon for 210 Points cost the same as a unit of six Raveners or five Shrikes. So either could be a good replacement? Both bring more wounds to the table, although at Toughness 4 they are easier to kill and neither has safe Deep Striking.

Hive Tyrant Pictures from www.dakkadakka.com T-Shirt logo from www.hahnssurplus.com.

Recycling old Toys

2010-12-28T12:54:00.000-08:00

I am a believer in recycling. It is good for the environment and O.K. for you. I apply the principles to my hobbies as well. When I stop playing one game I tend to sell off toys I will not be needing anyone and use the cash to invest in my new passion. Before Wizkids went bust I played a lot of Heroclix. Whilst the game has been re-released no one seems that interested in it any longer so I sold off my rare and powerful pieces and invested the cash into tanks for my Space Marines. Shopping around on ebay I get tanks for less than £10 each so I was able to get three Predators with just a single Batman figure. I also picked up some spare turrets, Rhinos and Las/Plas Razorbacks.

New Biomass for the Hive Mind
My friend is not impressed by this years Tyranid Codex, in fact he would rather play Necrons! He gave me about £150 of stuff for nothing, so I gave him some Space Marine tanks I did not want. I got a Hive Tyrant; Carnifex; 6 Warriors; Zoanthrope; a Score of Genestealers and a dozen Termagants. Now one third of my army is painted red, one third green and one third unpainted. I just have to decide which colour scheme I am going to go with...

Turning Pearls into Diamonds

I started playing Magic the Gathering (MTG) in June 1994 with the release of the Legends set. I have dipped in and out of the game for the last sixteen years. Early on I manage to get some of the very early cards that now sell for over £100 each! Since their not Tournament legal for the Legacy format I play it really was time to get rid of them. So I have exchanged my Mox Pearl for four Mox Diamonds and twenty other cards. Mostly for my Black 'Eva Green' deck and a few foils for the wife's Fire & Lightning Deck.

Happy Warhammer-day Tyler!

2010-11-06T11:31:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was my friend Tyler's 40th birthday. So he got together with Will, James and myself for a day of Warhammer. We booked a couple of tables at our local shop Tabletop Tyrant . We decided to play the same mission on each table and rolled for random opponents; first round was Dwarves vs Undead and Empire vs Empire.

Background
From behind the curtain Shareth watched the Baron. Despite being completely in her thrall he still had a commanding presence. She watched as he marshalled the troops and prepared their commanders for tomorrows battle. If only the assassins blade had found its mark! His accursed younger brother had escaped from the castle only a week ago and already men flocked to his banner. For centuries she had plotter her revenge for the death of her father at the families hands. She was not going to let one whelp ruin her plans now. She felt the blood lust rising. She could feel the heartbeats across the room; pounding in her head like a drum. All she wanted to do was stride out into the council chamber and tear the Barons throat out and drink his hot warm blood. She turned away and walked down the passage way calling for the servant girl to bring her some wine. What did one more corpse matter now. No one would find it until after they had left anyway...

The young boy knelt before Thane Oakenshield. He raised his head slightly and looked up at him. “Rowthan told me you were wise oh Thane. For the honour of your fathers-father as well as mine I beseech thee to join me on the field of battle tomorrow. Let the blood of our clans flow together for freedom else the shadow of the pale moon will fall across us all”. Men of both races cheered as, after a moments thought, the Thane nodded at the wise words he had heard from the young human in front of him. “Rise Baron, for I recognise that title belongs to you, together we will see of this interloper and restore justice to the land.”

Forces of Wytch-Queen Shareth the Heartstealer @1500 points
Shareth - Lvl 4 Vampire Magic, Helm of Command, 4+ Ward
Wight King Morkin Great Weapon (the Battle Standard), Crown (4+ Ward, Stupid)
30 Skeletons with Command & Banner of Hellfire (Flaming Swords)
10 Skeletons with Command & Lichbone Banner.
30 Grave Guard with Great Weapons, Command and Banner of Barrows (+1 to hit)
Five Black Knights of Nee!

Game One: vs Dwarves
Mission: Battle for the Pass
Dwarven Army: Thane, Oath Stone, Great Weapon (General)
Thane, BSB & Runesmith, GW, Rune of Spellbreakng
Two regiments of Warriors with Shields & Full Command
Two regiments of Hammer-men, one with Full Command
10 Thunderers
5 Slayers
Grudge Thrower, & Bolt Thrower

Deployment: Avoiding the mysterious woods the Dwarven regiments set up in a line to the north-east with both war machines and thunders on the two hills to the east. Undead lined up in the west facing them.

Turn One: The Undead marched forward. Scattering the enchanted teeth onto the ground Shareth summoned a horde of Zombies and used the danza macabre to manoeuvre them into combat with a regiment of warriors. The Slayers charged into the Zombies flanks while the other regiments marched forward. The stone thrower dropped a rock on its own head and the bolt thrower killed one of the knights, another was shot to pieces by the thunderers.

Turn Two: The Knights charged into the Warriors flanks while Morkin marched the Grave Guard forward and reformed ready to engage the Dwarves. Unfortunately Shareth's power deserted her (failed the first spell) so the dance of death did not get him into combat. This gave the Dwarves the advantage as they were able to sweep away the zombies and charge into the knights finishing them off. Morkin was also charged by Warriors and Hammer-men.

Turn Three: The skeleton horde failed to charge so Shareth had to waste power dancing them into melee. Unfortunately the Runesmiths power was strong and he countered most of her other spells. Morkin and his men wiped out the smaller Hammer-man regiment.

Turn Four: As the battle grew desperate Shareth charged into combat slaughtering the rest of the slayers and restoring the Grave Guard. She was then charged by the Thane and his hammer-men and forced to flee the battle (combat resolution damage). Morking was left to watch in horror as his unit crumbled around him even though he was able to sent the last of the warriors fleeing the battle.

Turn Five & Six: Surprisingly Morkin and his Guard managed to make it through two more turns before dying! He killed the Battle Standard Bearer and the Runesmith in this time but was finally lain the rest by the Thane. Meanwhile the forces of light were crushed by the forces of Shadow in the Empire civil war.

Game Two: vs Empire
Misison: A Chance encounter
Empire Army: Combat Lord, Lvl 2 Fire Mage (Fireball & Shield), Lvl 2 Beast Mage
Two regiments of Spearmen, two regiments of crossbows
Two troops of Outriders
Steam Tank & Cannon

Deployment: With the spearmen and one mage in reserve (due to mission rules) the empire set up the Steam Tank in the centre with outriders flanking it. The Cannon set up on the northern edge with crossbowmen on the North-western hill. Shareth and her skelital bodyguard started facing the steam tank. Since the Grave Guard were in reserves Morkin was leading 30 Skeletons protecting her eastern flank with Knights to her west.

Turn One: I won the roll to start (needing a six) so the guard marched onto the field of battle. The Knights failed to charge and two men were sent back to the grave from the outriders stand and shoot. On the other flank Morkin marched his men towards the other Outriders. Summoning her necromantic powers Sharath raised a score of zombies and danced them into combat with the tank. Her attempts to surge Morkin's men into combat were thwarted.

The spearmen marched forward flanking the cannon along with the second regiment of crossbowmen and the Fire-mage. Shareth easily countered the Fireball he tried to summon The Beastmaster toughened the Outriders who promptly shot down a few of Morkin's minions. The rest of the shooting concentrated on Shareth's bodyguard in an attempt to eliminate the Wytch-Queen. Unfortunatly the cannon misfired. The steam tank burnt the zombies down so only two remained.

Turn Two: With only three bodyguards left Shareth joined the advancing Guard. Morkin and the Knights both charged into combat with outriders. Raising the dead Sharath returned her skeletal bodyguards to full strength and created more zombies to fight the tank. She also drained the life from the empire army creating a ghost in the process who attacked the steam tank. Eastern outriders were slain; those in the west lost half there number and fled. Empire shooting killed the knights and few more skeletons. The mighty steam engine was able to obliterate the zombies, but could do nothing to effect the ghost. Shareth easily countered the feeble efforts of the Empire magicians to effect the battle.

Turn Three: In the western flank skeletons charged the crossbowmen. Shareth charged into combat with the Lord and his retinue of spear-men. Morkin failed to charge into the crossbowmen on the eastern flank but a surge of necromantic power pushed him the final steps. Shareth used the rest of her power to replenish her regiments to full strength. Morkin slew the Fire-mage and scattered his men to the winds. Shareth caused the Lord to flee and she surged forward into combat with the other spear-men. These were then slain and she pursued back into battle with the opposing Lord. With both mages dead and only the canon and fleeing outriders unengaged there was little the Empire army could do.

Turn Four: It looked like a complete massacre as Shareth lead her Guard into combat with the Lord and Morkin charged the Cannon. Unfortunately the magic phase turned against the necromancer. She was sucked into the warp and half the Grave Guard were killed! Fortunately the Guard were still able to extinguish the life of the last few Spearmen; Morkin killed the Cannon; the other unit of Skeletons finished the remaining troops.

Turn Five & Six: As Shareth's spirit fled back to its phylactery her minions just had to survive crumbling and a few shots from the Steam Tank (ghosts were dead). Amazingly the Skeletal bodyguard unit did really well rolling 2,3 and 6 for its three leadership tests giving the Undead their first win!

Meanwhile the Dwarves struggled against Shadow magic finding too many of there number were sucked into the abyss. The final standing for the day was

First – James; Shadow Empire (2 Wins)
Second – Tyler; Dwarves (1 Win)
Third – Michael; Vampire Counts (1 Win)
Fourth – Will; Empire (0 Wins)

16 & 17: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2010-10-25T12:46:00.000-07:00

Goodbye old Friend!
My first month at university has been very busy. Unfortunately before I got a chance to post up my last two Tyranid games my computer decided to fry itself. I lost the outline write up of both games along with all the photos, and all the software I had installed on the computer. Since I do not have the time to write them all up again I am just going to post the highlights.

Game Sixteen: 1750 Points vs Ultramarines
Dawn of War, Seize Ground (5 Objectives)
I played double Dakka Tyrant list and Red Orc played his usual Chaplain lead foot marines.
Chaplain and assault marines spent a whole turn fighting the Tervigon with no wounds being inflicted before Daddy stomped over and won the battle. On the other side of the table the Terminators were giving me trouble. Six of them killed Junior even with only having Weapon Skill one! Start of turn five saw the marines only having 5 Marines (2 Devs w/ ML, 2 Tacs with ML and one with Bolter) and 5 Terminators left. I held three objectives. By the end of the turn Mummy was dead and the Terminators had overrun a second objective so I just scrapped a 1-0 victory.

Game Seventeen: 1750 Points vs Orks
Spearhead, Capture and Control.
Expecting a lot of melee I took Swarmlord & a Dakka Tyrant. Orks seized the initiative and rolled the battle wagons forward. Deffcopotors put three wounds on Mummy and a few gaunts died. After that the green tide was turned. Tyranid shooting destroyed both wagons and a Khan then steamrollered forward throught boys and mega-nobs. Genestealers arived turn three and eat the looters then ate the Nobs on the objective turn four. At the end of turn four the Orks had a Warboss, one Deffcoptor (fleeing), One Kill-Khan (Immobile, no gun). I had only lost a unit of Hive guard, some cannon fodder gaunts. Mummy had even managed to regenerate her wounds! Since I had both objectives we did not both playing turn five. 2-0 win for the hive mind.

Undead Project: Raising the Dead

2010-10-24T07:21:00.000-07:00

Horde of Zombies!
My wife is at work; My 1500 word paper is written; Cassandra is playing with her train set. I actually have a few hours to play with my toy soldiers! Of course by the time I had got myself set up on the table, my assistant has given up playing trains and is trying to hack one of the sprues apart with the pliers...

Mantic's Zombies
Each sprue has parts for three full zombies and two bits allowing you do make four possible zombies from each sprue. There are 10 sprues in a box although I had an extra one as an appology for a shipping error they made. Mantic had said the zombies would be compatible with their ghoul range so I decided to see about mixing a few ghoul parts into the horde and see if I could make forty zombies from a single box.

Sadly the size of the hip joints on the ghouls is not quite the same as the zombies so the parts do not mix very well together. At least the meat cleaver and other spare weapons from the ghouls where useful in adding some extra variety to the zombies. I found I loved the style of the 'legless' zombie pulling itself along the ground so much that there were still a couple of pairs of legs left when I had finished. Since I still had some spinal columes I just made more! So I finished with 42 zombies.

Pictures of the infantry
I made one zombie who was missing a head and in the process of putting in back on. His buddies can be seen in the background lurching around. To help with the limited number of poses I used a craft knife and repositioned some of the arms at shoulder or elbow.

These are the two ghoul torsos together with a group of spinal-tap zombies. The ghouls have zomibe head and hands to help them fit in to the group. Also pictures is my zombie champion rebuilding himself from bits after having lost a fight. You can not see it in the photo but there are some severed hands crawling along with the spinal-tap zombies.

Here you can see the extra weapons added; meat cleaver; dagger; rake-hand, together with a row of legless zombies. As well as the champion above I made six of these crawling minions.

The last of the shambling horde. Corpse at the back is holding up a second head that is looking around for its body. The way the parts combine means some of these are really hunched over. Fortunately with a half-zombies in front of them they still rank up.

Results
I pre-ordered the zombie horde when they were advertised as a box of 50. Since they then changed the size to 60 and with half-zombies you could make a possible 80. I therefore sold off my second box as I did not need that many! In the end I spent £14 on a box, which with the free sprue made me 40 zombies; which equates to 0.35p per zombie!

I would say that pushing a single 'thirty zombie' box all the way to 40 models is a bit of a stretch since you would end up with a lot of spinal-tap zombies. I would expect most people to get 35 models from a box. The extra models are great for raising the dead in WHFB but not much use for Mantic's own KoW rules (they have fixed unit sizes) unless you buy six boxes to get enough spares for a whole regiment.

Uppsala Legion

2010-10-10T09:52:00.000-07:00

My friends Ultramarine army is still very much a third edition gun-line. Sadly this is not that effective with the latest fifth edition game rules. Ultramarines still have a few nice options, mostly involving tanks, however Space Wolves and Blood Angels do foot armies better. So we are relaunching the marines as the Uppsala Legion, from the planet Schveeden!

The Ultramarines @ 1750
Chaplain with Jump Pack leading Assault Marines with Fist & Flamers
Terminators x10 with two heavy weapons
Dreadnought
3 Tactical Squads with Flamer, Missiles & Fist in Rhinos
Devastator Squad with 4 Missile Launchers
11+ Kill Points; 10 Terminators, 46 Marines, 4 Vehicles

Two main problems have been hampering the army. First the Dreadnought, being the only armour, just dies too quickly. Secondly they just get raped by psychic powers. The answer to both these problems is to replace the Dreadnought with a Librarian in Terminator armour. We would have to drop an upgrade from one of the units to get his armour; however since we are converting to Space Wolves what we drop does not matter at the moment. So our aim today is to convert the army to use the Wolf codex without buying any extra models. There is going to be a few bits of extra wargear that we are going to have to kitbash

Uppsala Legion - Phase One
First of all we just want to convert the units over as closely as we can to the Space Wolf units. A like for like conversion gives a few things to consist. With the loss of combat squads we have to decide now if we want five or ten man troop units. Grey Hunters also lack any heavy weapon options. While this makes them better on the move you lack the option of leaving a missile launcher with four ablative wounds guarding the home objective. If however you add a Wolf Guard squad leader he can bring Cyclone missiles. Not only does this mean you get two shots per turn but you can move and fire as well. We will take thirty marines as troops and organise them into four squads.

Rune Priest would most likely take Lighting and Hurricane. The first can take care of light armour and monsters the second deals with hordes and slows their movement. Jaws is also worth considering (especially if you know your opponent is going to be playing Tyranids).

1750 Uppsala Legion
130 Rune Priest with Terminator Armour, Chooser of the Slain
135 Wolf Priest with Jump Pack, Wolftooth Necklace
460 Terminator Wolf Guard x8 with Power Fist x4, Wolf Claw x4
190 Wolf Guard x4 w/ Combi-melta x4, Rhino
220 Grey Hunters x10 w/ Melta x2, Power Weapon, Wulfen Mark, Rhino
215 Grey Hunters x10 w/ Flamer x2, Power Weapon, Wulfen Mark, Rhino
75 Grey Hunters x5 w/ Flamer & Wolf Guard Sgt in Terminator Armour w/ CML & Wolf Claw
75 Grey Hunters x5 w/ Flamer & Wolf Guard Sgt in Terminator Armour w/ CML & Wolf Claw
110 Skyclaws x5 with Flamer, Power Weapon
140 Long Fangs x6 with 5x Missiles & Wolf Guard Sgt in Terminator Armour w/ CML
13 Kill Points; 12 Terminators, 46 Marines, 3 APC's

In the above list the unit cost for the Wolf Guard includes the men reassigned as leaders. Since this is done at the start of the game you do not have to attach them to other units. We still have three squads in APC's that can surge forward while leaving two scoring units protecting our home base. We are also still able to fire eleven missiles a turn. We have lost out on power fists (both the number and units with them). However the Wolves have a lot more flamer and melta weapons as well as shear volume of melee attacks.

Uppsala Legion - Phase Two
There is a second Devastator Squad in the army case and since Long Fangs are so good we might as well use them; also Skyclaws do not really help that much. This time around we have replaced the Skyclaws with Long Fangs and used the points remaining to boost the Wolf Guard unit since the Wolf Priest will now be leading them.

1749 Uppsala Legion
130 Rune Priest with Terminator Armour, Chooser of the Slain
110 Wolf Priest with Wolftooth Necklace
460 Terminator Wolf Guard x8 with Power Fist x4, Wolf Claw x4
229 Wolf Guard x8 w/ Power Fist & Combi-Flamer x2, Pistol & Sword x6 in Rhino
220 Grey Hunters x10 w/ Melta x2, Power Weapon, Wulfen Mark, Rhino
220 Grey Hunters x10 w/ Melta x2, Power Weapon, Wulfen Mark, Rhino
75 Grey Hunters x5 w/ Flamer & Wolf Guard Sgt in Terminator Armour w/ CML & Wolf Claw
75 Grey Hunters x5 w/ Flamer & Wolf Guard Sgt in Terminator Armour w/ CML & Wolf Claw
115 Long Fangs x5 with 4x Missiles
115 Long Fangs x5 with 4x Missiles
13 Kill Points. 11 Terminators, 49 Marines, 3 APC's

I like this configuration better. Twelve missiles split between six targets each turn is a decent amount of long range dakka. The Terminators act as a hammer unit support by three APC's full of marines. I am not sure if the Grey Hunters would be better off with Flamer & Melta; I just like having the double shot as it is so annoying when a single melta misses.

Mantic Open Day

2010-10-09T12:10:00.000-07:00

Today we got to visit Mantic Towers in Nottingham and meet the talent behind the toy solider company. The show was across two floors. The first floor had two gaming tables for learning to play Kings of War as well as tables to meet the sculptor and artists. The second floor was the store together with a couple of display cases. I got to see some work in progress on the Ork army (due out next spring) as well as seeing one of the new plastic-resin Knights and WWII Zombies!

Dwarf King

Plastic-resin Knight
I asked Ronnie about these. Apparently the resin plastic is a half way product between metal and normal plastic. Ten Knights should cost £20

WWII Zombies
Warlord plastic nazis with Mantic zombie parts. A new idea they are working on.

Lich King raising a minion

Ork Warrior - Work in progress

Ork boar rider - Work in progress

Skeleton Archers
These are half metal/half plastic figures to keep the cost down. They are using the same plastic legs as the other undead models with a metal body.

Kings of War(hammer)

Kings of War is Mantics own war-gaming rules system. It has been written by Alessio Cavatore (the man behind 5th Edition Warhammer 40k). I got to play one game with my friend; who was so impressed with both the figures and game he went and purchased the Dwarf army afterwards! The game design is very similar to its main rival - Warhammer Fantasy. It is a turn based system with each player having a Movement, Shooting and Melee phase. Troops are organised into ranked units with individual characters roaming around separately.

The main difference with the game is how damage is resolved. Instead of removing models as a unit takes damage you use tokens, or dice, to track the total damage. Then the unit takes a Nerve test (similar to a Warhammer morale test) with a modifier based on the total damage inflicted. This means that a unit could brake having only taken a couple of points of damage or it could stay steadfast with twenty wounds (and a roll of snake eyes). In our practice game it took my Elven King three turns to kill a regiment of Dwarfs, but my Knights crumbled with only three points of damage. The game took ten turns with the last couple of them being just the characters battling it out as all the troops, and war machines, were dead. The game was very fast paced and even with us learning as we played only took a half hour.

Tyranid Etymology

2010-09-25T06:44:00.000-07:00

The Tyranid Threat
Since our first sporadic contacts with Genestealers there have been many misconceptions associated with them. We first thought they were indigenous to the moons of Ymgarl, later this was determined to be in err and subsequently a xenocide campaign was conducted on said moons. When the Tyranid hivefleets came upon the Imperium, the creatures were named in relation to the first notable plant to fall before their advance, the exploratory station of Tyran. – Draco Legion Biomedical Reserch station: NewHallefuss

Origin of the Species
Most of the Tyranid organisms in the Warhammer 40k universe have been given Latin or Greek names. This makes them sound more exotic and fits with the general use of Latin by the Imperium. I can not really take credit, beyond compilation, for this etymology as it is all taken from other websites, particually Wiktionary.

Biovore – This suffix comes from the Latin vorare (to devour), and is used to form nouns indicating what kind of a diet an animal has. From Ancient Greek βίος (“life”). Therefore, a biovore eats life.

Carnifex – The public executioner at Rome who put slaves and foreigners to death. It was also his business to administer torture. This office was considered so disgraceful, that he was not allowed to reside within the city.

Gargoyle – The term 'gargoyle' was derived from French gargouille meaning 'throat', which originated from the Latin gurgulio meaning 'gullet'. Gargoyles were used to decorate buildings, and to provide a spout for rainwater run-off. A decorative carved grotesque winged figure on a building. There is also a French legend about a dragon-like monster called Gargouille.

Gaunt – Meaning lean, angular and bony

Harridan – Modification of French haridelle (“old horse, nag”).

Harpy – Greek Mythology. One of several loathsome, voracious monsters with the head and trunk of a woman and the tail, wings, and talons of a bird

Hierodule – From the Greek "temple" + "female slave"), was a temple slave in the service of a specific deity, often with the connotation of religious prostitution.

Hierophant – From ancient Greece is an interpreter of sacred mysteries and arcane principles.

Hormagaunt – A legendary undying monster that steals children and lives on the supposedly mythical planet Thamber in the Killing Machine (1964) a science fiction novel by Jack Vance. The only real world reference is Hormah (meaning "devoted to destruction") in the Bible. Numbers 21:3 – And the LORD hearkened to the voice of Israel, and delivered up the Canaanites; and they utterly destroyed them and their cities: and he called the name of the place Hormah.

Lictor – Perhaps derived from the Latin verb ligare (to bind), because the lictors had to bind the hands and feet of criminals before they were punished. They were a member of a special class of Roman civil servant, with special tasks of attending and guarding magistrates. They carried axes that symbolized the power to execute. So this would probable have been a beter name for Tyrant Guard father than a chameleon assassin.

Malefactor – A criminal. From Latin male (“ill”) + facere (“to do”).

Morloc – Maw is from Indo-European *mak- ‘bag, belly’. The upper digestive tract, especially mouth and jaws, or a perilous opening. Loc from Latin locus, meaning place or location. There is also Morlocks who are a fictional species created by H. G. Wells for his 1895 novel, The Time Machine.

Mycetic Spore – From the Greek and Latin roots, -mycete means fungus and from ancient Greek spora, “seed, a sowing”). Also a thick resistant particle produced by a bacterium to survive in harsh or unfavourable conditions (in this case dropping from orbit onto a planets surface).

Norn Queen – In Norse mythology) Norns are any of the three goddesses of fate or destiny.

Narvhal – Closest I can find is the Narwhal (a small arctic whale). Given that the Narvhal is a space-whale I suspect this is where it is from.

Parasite of Mortrex – May come from the latin word "mortis" meaning death and “rex” meaning king. If only he had Eternal Warrior he might manage to be the King of death!

Pyrovore – This suffix comes from the Latin vorare (to devour), and is used to form nouns indicating what kind of a diet an animal has. From Latin pyr “fire”. Therefore, a pyrovore eats fire.

Ravener – From medieval French raviner 'rush, seize by force', itself from ravine 'rapine', from Latin rapina 'plundering, loot', itself from rapere 'seize, plunder, abduct'. plunder; food obtained by violence.

Shrike – Any of various birds which are known for their habit of catching other birds and small animals and impaling the uneaten portions of their bodies on thorns

Tyrannid – A passerine (perching or song) bird of the suborder Tyranni.

Termagant – In Medieval Europe, Termagant was the name given to a god that the Europeans believed Muslims worshipped. Centuarys later because of its use in theatre the term came to refer to a bullying person particularly to a quarrelsome, scolding woman. In Jack Vance's 1962 book The Dragon Masters, a subspecies is the man-sized termagant.

Trygon – Any one of several species of large sting rays. Who are capable of inflicting excruciating wounds with their venomous tail spines.

Trannofex – From the Greek words τυράννος (tyrannos, meaning "tyrant") + fex (from facere, to make or do). Literally “Maker or bringer of Tyranny”. Not quite sure how this big dumb monster makes it though…

Venomthrope – Venom is a toxic secretion in animals that is actively delivered to the target organism, either to paralyse or incapacitate. from Latin venēnum, poison + Greek anthrop- man. Literally meaning a poisonous man or person.

Zoanthrope – The word zoanthropic (Origin: Greek. Animal + man) is a descriptive term for a mental disorder in which people believe themselves to be animals. Zoanthropy kind of monomania, or delusion, in which patients are convinced that they have been transformed into an animal.

Now it has become impossible to tell where the Tyranid warrior ends and its weapon symbiotes begin. I think we can be assured that the Norn Queens will continue to work tirelessly towards forms more and more perfectly adapted for killing the inhabitants of this galaxy just as they have in others before ours. Simply put, over the coming centuries we may be out-evolved to the point of extinction. – Magos Biologis Alder Garrick

Mathhammer for the Hive Mind

2010-09-21T02:05:00.000-07:00

I actually enjoy doing mathematical analysis to see how efficient different units are. Dice can be fickle but the more dice you roll should bring you closer to the mean. Not that this helps my constantly under-performing Tervigon. This page is intended as a mathematical reference for Tyranid players and I shall be adding more analysis (and formatting) later.

Calculus for Hive Tyrants
Pythagoras' Theorem will help with guessing ranges but beyond that maths will not win you games. What it will do is help you to know what performance to expect from your army. Of course knowing that your Hive Guard should kill three Rhinos in a six turn game does not help if they underperform for the first three turns.

Tyanid Ranged Anti-Tank
Here is the chance each unit has of opening a tin can. I have calculated the probability of dealing with armour in a single shooting phase. I have chosen to display this as a percent since 66% reads much better than 0.66.

First three columns are the chance to Immobilise or Kill AV 14, 13 & 12.
Next two are killing AV 11 & 10. The last column is to the chance to stun AV 12.
Anti-Tank . . . .Immob+ . .Immob+ . Immob+ . Kill . . Kill . . . .Stun+
. . . .VS . . . . .AV14 . . . .AV13 . . . AV12 . . . AV11 . . AV10 . . AV12
3 Zoanthropes . 66.51% . 66.51% . 66.51% . 61.35% . 66.51% . 88.18%
3 Hive Guard .. 10.61% . 36.98% . 56.53% . 50.67% . 61.79% . 91.22%
2 Hive Guard .. 07.20% . 26.50% . 42.61% . 37.57% . 47.34% . 80.25%
T-fex – Rupture 18.50% . 25.85% . 32.85% . 25.85% . 30.56% . 65.97%
HVC . . . . . . . . 02.89% . 05.78% . 08.67% . 05.78% . 7.22% . 26.00%
Harpy TL HVC . . 03.78% . 07.56% . 11.33% . 07.56% . 09.44% . 34.00%
Stranglethorn . . 00.00% . 00.00% . 01.44% . 02.89% . 05.78% . 08.67%
TL Deathspitterx2.0.00% .00.00% . 00.00% . 00.00% . 22.54% . 00.00%
TL Brainleech . . 00.00% . 00.00% . 00.00% . 11.87% . 22.54% . 55.12%
TL Brainleechx2.00.00% . 00.00% . 00.00% . 22.33% . 39.99% . 79.86%
Mycetic Spore . 00.00% . 00.00% . 00.00% . 05.43% . 10.61% . 29.03%
3xLictor FHooks 05.43% . 10.61% . 15.55% . 08.05% . 15.55% . 40.67%
For Comparison -
Marine Lascanx2.14.27% . 24.25% . 33.61% . 27.43% . 33.61% . 69.14%

Carnifex/Trygon Vs Fast Tank (6's to hit)
SK = Screamer-Killer, AG = Adrenal Glands. Claws assumed +2 Attacks
. . . . . . . . . . .Immob/Kill Imm/Kill.Imm/Kill . . Kill . . . Kill . . . Stun+
. . . . . . . . . . .AV14. . . .AV13 . . . AV12 . . AV11 . . . AV10 . . AV12
AG-Trygon . . .. 40.79% . 50.74% . 57.81% . 61.45% . 65.22% . 87.22%
Trygon . . . . . .29.91% . 40.79% . 50.74% . 55.89% . 61.45% . 82.54%
SK-AG-Fex . . .. 50.60% . 53.74% . 55.62% . 56.35% . 56.35% . 83.85%
Skreamer-Killer .46.02% . 50.60% . 53.74% . 55.25% . 56.35% . 82.84%
Dakka-Fex . . . .27.88% . 31.09% . 33.35% . 34.46% . 35.28% . 58.68%
Claw-Fex . . . . 36.72% . 40.62% . 43.33% . 44.65% . 45.61% . 70.99%
Claw/Talon-Fex . 41.54% . 45.77% . 48.69% . 50.09% . 51.13% . 76.93%

Carnifex/Trygon Vs Tank (4+ to hit) Same assumptions as above.
. . . . . . . . . . .Immob/Kill Imm/Kill.Imm/Kill . . Kill . . . Kill . . . Stun+
. . . . . . . . . . .AV14. . . .AV13 . . . AV12 . . AV11 . . . AV10 . . AV12
AG-Trygon .. . 74.44% . 84.82% . 90.42% . 92.74% . 94.76% . 99.90%
Trygon . . . . . 59.63% . 74.44% . 84.82% . 89.04% . 92.74% . 99.58%
SK-AG-Fex . . . 85.77% . 88.46% . 89.92% . 90.46% . 90.46% . 99.90%
Skreamer-Killer.81.28% . 85.77% . 88.46% . 89.64% . 90.46% . 99.85%
Dakka-Fex . . . 65.09% . 70.24% . 73.59% . 75.15% . 76.27% . 96.42%
Claw-Fex . . . .77.09% . 81.68% . 84.50% . 85.76% . 86.65% . 99.05%
Claw/Talon-Fex .82.66% . 86.80% . 89.24% . 90.31% . 91.05% . 99.72%

Charging Monsters
Number of Hits (not Wounds) when Charging WS 4 Infantry.
So here is the math for various Carnifex builds and a Trygon. Keeping a single Talon turned out to give better results than I expected...
Claws assumes +2 Attacks
Carnifex with .. .0 . . . . . .1 . . . . . .2 . . . . . 3 . . . . .4 . . . . . .5 . . . . .6 . . . . .7
Dakkafex . . . . 03.13% . 15.63% . 31.25% . 31.25% . 15.63% . 03.13% . 00.00% . 00.00%
Screamer-Killer 00.10% . 01.46% . 08.79% . 26.37% . 39.55% . 23.73% . 00.00% . 00.00%
Gun/Talon . . . .01.26% . 08.79% . 24.62% . 34.46% . 24.12% . 06.75% . 00.00% . 00.00%
Claws/Gun . . . 00.78% . 05.47% . 16.41% . 27.34% . 27.34% . 16.41% . 05.47% . 00.78%
Claw/Talon . . .00.22% . 02.14% . 08.97% . 20.94% . 29.30% . 24.63% . 11.49% . 02.30%
Trygon . . . . . 00.00% . 00.00% . 00.03% . 00.37% . 03.00% . 14.39% . 38.37% . 43.85%

Screamer-Killer is getting 4+ hits 63.28% of the time.
Claw-fex . . . . is getting 4+ hits 50.00% of the time, 6+ hits 06.25% of the time.
Trygon . . . . . is getting 4+ hits 99.60% of the time, 6+ hits 82.21% of the time.

15: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2010-09-21T01:11:00.000-07:00

Game Fifteen: 1750 Points vs Demons

Splinter Fleet Lyracian
Daddy Swarmlord & two whip Guard
Junior Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, Shell, TLBDx2)
Zoanthropes x3
Hive Guard 2 Broods x2
Xenomorphs (Genestealers) w/ Toxic Sacs
Mummy Tervigon with TS, AG, Catalysis, Talons
Termagants one Brood x12
Tiny the Tyrannofex with Rupture Cannon

Demons of the Warp
Primary Wave
Cake: Epidemius & twelve Plague Bearers
Toffees: Nurglings x9
Stew: Ku'gath the Plaguefather
Light Snack: Pink Horrors x10

Secondary Wave
Pizza: Skulltaker & ten Bloodletters
Hot Sauce: Flamers of Tzeentch
Raw Meat: Pestilence; Winged Demon Princes of Nurgle
Pot Roast: Tulu; Demon Prince of Tzeentch

Mission: Spearhead, Capture and Control.
Deployment: The demons are roused to war by an arcane signal telling of an ancient phylactery, buried in a graveyard, they have been charged to protect for over two millennia. Apparently the planet is about to be obliterated. Having found a quite hillside mummy, protected by Junior and Tiny, starts to lay more eggs. Hearing strange noises from a graveyard in the north-west Daddy Swarmlord advances towards some central hills to see what is happening.

Turn One
Warping in beside the graveyard were Epidemius and the Nurglings. The Plaguefather materialised behind the hill; unfortunately the Horrors had chose the same spot. They burst forth from his chest sending him screaming back into the warp.

Turn Two
Galloping his steed through the fading portal Skull-taker's cohort sprang forward into the south-eastern foothills. Instantly lightning bolts burned several bloodletters down to just charred bones.

Pestilence rose up from the ground behind mummy. His rotting stentch provoked Juniors wrath. He opened fire with his guns and mentally fried Pestilence's central nervous system allowing mummy's new babies to charge forward and devour the foul creature. Splashing through the larva Swarmy runs towards the hill where the Horrors are cowering under Tiny, and the Hivers, torrent of fire.

Turn Three
Tula slipped between the ever shifting planes onto the planets surface and seared the carapace from a Zoanthrope with his fiery breath. Clambering into the Ruins Skull-taker decapitates the Hivers; he is then nerve-shocked by Junior. Melting the sand below their feet to glass Tzeentch's Flamers landed in front of the graveyard. While they were still disoriented from the trans-location the Xenomorphs jumped out of hiding and charged forwarded devouring them. Jumping the flowing lava Swarmy eviscerated the last Horrors.

Turn Four
Scurrying out of the graveyard the Plague Bearers assault the Xenomorphs killing four. Burning him with flaming breath Tula leaped at Swarmy; only to be felled by the whirling sabres (and rending talons) of death. Swarmy then stomped into the Nurgle swarm. Skull-taker finished the last Zoanthrope however with poison dripping from there fangs gaunts finish him off and swarm over the hill towards the graveyard.

Turn Five
Struggling against there tougher opponents the Xenomorphs are reduced to a single alien. Fortunately help arrives with Hivers and Gaunts mulit-charging into the graveyard rumble. As the twin suns on the doomed planet set Swarmy leads his horde into the final assault on Epidemius.

Aftermath: Victory for the Hive Mind (one objective to zero)
Loosing one sixth of the army to a first turn mishap was a real set back for the demons. It put them on the defensive and they were just not able to threaten my objective all game. They kept playing for the draw and came very close to getting it given how hard it was to chop through all of Nurgle's minions.

The Swarm from LV-426

2010-09-19T20:38:00.000-07:00

Building the Tyranid Swarm
The Tyranid army I play is fairly static so I have been coming up with ideas for the other archetypes available in the codex. I am going to start by looking at the swarm. I do not have enough Hormagaunts to build this at the moment; I do however have a ton of Genestealers I can proxy them with.

Concept
Just like the Aliens or Starship Troopers films the idea is to have a seemingly endless horde of a hundred or more bugs swarming across the table toward the opponent. Hormagaunts, Gargoyles and Genestealers are all great for this. I wanted to avoid Monsters, however the Tervigon is just too good to pass up on. Raveners 12" charge helps get them into melee quicker and their claws can destroy tanks. Orinally I was going to use two broods of hormaguants; as I do not own those I instead went for Devilguants.

Army List: The Swarm from LV-426 @ 2000 Points
050 Termagants x10
160 Hormagaunts x20 w/ Toxic Sacs
160 Termagants x16 w/ Devourers
250 Broodlord & Genestealers x11 w/ Toxic Sacs
250 Broodlord & Genestealers x11 w/ Toxic Sacs
150 Gargoyles x25 (Mobile cover for the other units)
210 Raveners x6 w/ Rending Claws

Brains options 1
110 Tyranid Prime w/ Bone Sword & Whip, Deathspitter, Regeneration
220 Zoanthropes x3 in Mycetic Spore
250 Hive Guard x5
190 Tervigon w/ Catalysis, Toxic Sacs, Talons
Has 93 Bugs (single wound models), 17 Large (multi-wound) Bugs , 1 Monster & 1 Spore.

Brains options 2
390 Tervigon w/ Catalysis, Toxic Sacs, Glands x2 (one HQ; one Troops)
180 Zoanthropes x3
200 Two Broods of Hive Guard x2
This gives 93 Bugs (single wound models), 15 Large (multi-wound) Bugs & 2 Monsters

Alternative units
1. Raveners could be replaced with Shrikes for more Synapse and extra shooting.
2. Swap the Prime (and a Hive Guard) for a second Tervigon.
3. Drop the Spore and walk the Zoanthropes with the horde; Spend the extra points on more bugs. Combines quite well with option two.

Tactics
Genestealers outflank (or infiltrate) to threaten the sides of the gaming table; Meanwhile the Hormagaunts, Raveners & Tervigon are the main horde to charge up the middle of the board. Tervigon gives Feel No Pain (for a 4+ Save) to the front rank of the swarm. They in turn give everything else a 4+ cover save. The Prime goes with the Hive Guard so we can direct our shooting and gives them some combat potential. Zoanthropes will deep strike in to help with Synapse and destroying tanks with their psychic attacks. The Termagants can hold the home objective or join the horde as required. We also have the Tervigon's Babies that will push us past the target of one hundred bugs.

Strengths: The core units are fast moving (Beasts, Wings and Bounding Leap) so should be getting into second or third turn assaults. Combining this with Genestealers attacking from the flanks (or infiltrating) will help minimise the time available for enemy shooting. Even with blast weapons a hundred bugs is a lot to take out.

Weakness: We only have three Synapse units so we are likely to end up with some units running on instincts. This should not be too bad as we want most of them to just charge at the opposition anyway. This list is light on shooting, and while that was part of the design, it may struggle in games against heavily armoured and/or fast tanks. Most of the army gets no save against common handguns; it is reliant on getting cover saves from terrain or other Tyranids.

Other Point values
For higher points - I would add a second Tervigon (as HQ), Hive Guard #6 & Shrikes. I actually put together a 1k list which I like. For 1500 I would add in the Prime and make Tervigon a Troops unit.

1000 Points - The Swarm from LV-426
220 Tervigon: Catalysis, TS, Talons, Regeneration
200 Hive Guard x4
160 Hormagaunts x20 w/ Toxic Sacs
160 Termagants x16 w/ Devourers
170 Genestealers x10 w/ Toxic Sacs
090 Gargoyles x15
Total: 7 Kill Points; 61 Bugs, 4 Large Bugs, 1 Monster.

14: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2010-09-19T06:08:00.000-07:00

Game Fourteen: 1500 Points vs Blood Angels

Splinter Fleet Lyracian
Swarmlord & two whip Guard
Zoanthropes x3
Hive Guard 2 Broods x2
Xenomorphs (Genestealers) w/ Toxic Sacs
Mummy Tervigon with TS, AG, Catalysis, Onslaught, Talons
Termagants one Brood x12
Tiny the Tyrannofex with Rupture Cannon

Blood (Space Vampires) Angels
Starter: Reclusiarch Carstein leading the Death Company (Power Sword)
Energy bar: Konrad & Manfred Two Sanguinary Priest
Meat pie: Alpha and Beta Tactical Squads
Soup: Scouts with Sniper Rifles
Inedible rock: Stormraven Gunship
Inedible rock: Vindicator
Inedible rocks: Vlad and Isabella Furioso Dreadnoughts
Yet more Inedible rocks: Two Typhoon Land Speeders

Mission: Pitched Battle, Capture and Control.
Deployment:
Vlad and Death Company were inside the Stormraven. Priests joined the Marine combat squads by the NE ruin.

Turn One
Spurring his minions forward the Swarmlord advance in the east. While Zoanthropes and Hivers advanced in the west. Urged on by mummy the Hive guard ran forward and managed to snipe the vindicators cannon with shots into its side armour. Only a single gaunt fell under the long range shots of the marines. Gunning its engines to full throtle the Stormraven lauched itself over the tower and disgorged Vlad and the Death company. Charging forward Vlad slaughtered the Hivers while the Death Company rendered the Zoanthropes into jelly.

Turn Two
Tiny and mummy’s new babies blasted away at the Death Company killing two. Then Tiny launched himself into melee, doubling the death count. Abandoning his underlings the Swarmlord charged to the left crushing Vlad under his hooves as he went. The Swarm advanced while the Hivers detonating Isobella with well placed shots into the arm joints. Creeping around behind the marines the Xenomorphs leaped out and multi-charged Alpha-flamma & Beta-flamma. When the dust settled only three marines and Konrad were still fighting Xenomorphs. Under a barrage of missiles and sniper fire both Tyrant Guard and one Hive Guard perished. Now fighting alone Recusiarch Carstein wounded Tiny. Butchering Konrad and his troops the Xenomorphs advanced on Beta-gravis.

Turn Three
Xenomorphs eat Beta-gravis, while Swarmy clambered into the ruins and chopped down the scouts with his whirling blades. Tiny rips the armoured plates off the Vindicator and the sole remaining Hive Guard blasts the gyro-stabiliser from a speeder causing it to crash. Feeling no pain Swarmy survives marine shooting with one wound remaining.

Turn Four
Alpha-gravis were dispatched under Swarmy's whirling blades. The Xenomorphs crown around the Stormraven scratching its paintwork. Forming a conga-line the gaunts stretch out from the ruins to reach the marine objective and stay in synapse. In at attempt to contest both objectives the speeder turbo-boosted south, while the Stormraven jetted east mowing down gaunts with its assault cannon.

Turn Five
A Mighty blast from Tiny's cannon finished off the speeder and the Stormraven was immobilised as the remaining Xenomorphs clambered over its hull.

Aftermath: Win for the Hive Mind (Two objectives to zero).
Despite the marines having a bad shooting phase by the end of turn one it was looking bad for the hive mind, however the next two turns saw the game swing around completely. Tiny and Swarmy were both down to their last wound and without FNP wound have probably died. Once more Genestealers were the perfect unit munching through the infantry.

1: Lords of Midnight

2010-09-05T08:41:00.000-07:00

Game One – 1500 Points vs Dwarves

Vampire Army
Witch-Queen Shareth Level 4 Mage, Death Magic, Crown of the Dammed
Leading Skeleton Regiment x20 with Command & Banner of Hellfire
Wight King Luxor w/ BSB, Sword Of Kings
Leading Grave Guard Regiment x15 with Command
Vampire Tarithel w/ Forbidden Lore (Light), Sword of Swift Slaying, Flayed Hauberk
Leading Grave Guard Regiment x16 with Command
Skeleton Horde x20 with Command & Banner of Eternal Flame

Dwarven Army
Lord Thorin Oakenshield w/ Shield Bearers, Rune of Spite & Great Weapon
Leading Hammers x18 w/ command
Thane Dwalin w/ BSB, Rune of Swiftness, Oath Stone and Rune of Stone
Leading Warriors x29 w/ Command
Thunderers x10
Slayers x7
Warriors x10 w/ Great Weapons
Bolt Thrower w/ Rune of Burning
Stone Thrower (modelled as a Stone Giant) w/ Rune of Reloading
Gyrocoypter

Mission: Pitched Battle
Deployment
The Dwarves started in the north with Thunderers and bolt thrower on a central hill. Thane Dwalin was to the east along with the Slayers. To the East was Lord Oakenshield along with the 'copter and giant. To the south between a graveyard and a small hill were Shareth and two units of skeltons. King Luxor was to her west and Tarithel on the east.

Turn One.
Shareth marched her army forward and spirit leached one wound from Thane Dwalin. Tarithel captured Dwalin and his warriors in her net of Amyntok. The dwarves responded with a barrage of gunpowder and rocks shattering half a dozen skeletons and displelled the net. Gyrocoptor, Lord Oakenshield and the slayers advanced..

Turn Two.
King Luxor failed his charge into the Hammers. Most of Shareth's spells were countered. Only one spell succeeded and the Fate of Bju... Thorin was to only fail a single ward save! The gyrocoptor flew over the graveyard and several of Shareth's bodyguards melted under its fiery breath. More followed under a volley of black powder weapons. Luxor was charged by Lord Oakenshield and watched his barrow wights crumble under the dwarven hammer blows leaving him fighting alone. Tarithel fought the slayers killing half of them herself.

Turn Three.
Shareth wheeled around towards the Gyrocoptor and unleached a torrent of magic. Surviving spirit leech and caress it finally fated to fell from the sky to her third spell. The last of her Magic reassembled some of her bodyguards. Luxor held his own until finally falling at the end of the turn while Tarithel was left fighting a single Slayer. The other Skeleton surged forward charging into Thane Dwalin's warriors but lost half their number in the combat. The stone giant got bored and wandered away from the battle (misfire – destroyed).

Turn Four.
The winds of magic did not favour Shareth (three dice). Using all her might she summoned a purple sun that swept through the dwarves ranks killing a dozen of them. Gathering the resulting energies she tried again to leech Thorin's spirit but he held resolute. The last slayer died, but so so did the Skeleton horde. Thorin led the charge with the miners joining him. Shareth's spirit fled into the ether as her bodyguards crumbled back into the earth. Without Shareth's will holding her barrow-wights together Tarithel decided to flee and return another day for Thorin's skull.

Aftermath.
I had a lot of fun learning a new game. As for my army 700 points in characters was just too much, especially taking two mages. I just did not have enough units to counter charge or enough magic dice to use my 15 spells. I need to get a unit of Knight build to replace the second vampire. Also replace the skeleton horde with Zombies to be a tar pit unit and make good use of Invocation (five to ten Zombies per casting is good going).

Tyranid Project - Acquisitions

2010-09-03T03:08:00.000-07:00

I got another Hive Guard and a second Broodlord this week so my Splinter Fleet continues to grow. It is still quite limited on options though with the core army being either a Nidzilla or Air Assault build. I now have -

Edit - I got some more Termagants off ebay!

HQ
2 Hive Tyrants (Magnetised so can be Swarmlord, Flyrant, Dakkarant or even a Harpy)
Tyranid Prime
3 Tyrant Guard

Elite
5 Hive Guard
3 Zoanthropes

Troops
45 Genestealers & 2 Broodlords
81 Termagants (enough for the second Tervigon when I get it)
20 Devilgants
11 Hormagaunts
1 Tervigon
3 Myceptic Spores

Fast Attack
5 Shrikes (Unfinished Warrior/Gargoyle convertions, again magnetised)
17 Gargoyles
10 Spore Mines

Heavy Support
1 Magneto-fex (Magentised so it can be Carni or T-fex)

What Next?
First I need to paint everything I have got so far! So it will propably be next year before I add the following. One more Carnifex to make a second Tervigon and to give me my fourth set of Brainleech Worm Devourers. For anti-tank I need one more Hive Guard. Finally another box of Gargoyles so I can finish off the Shrikes and have a larger brood of Gargoyles. That is about £50 from my FLGS.

In the future?
They are expenisve but I really like the Forge World Rippers. Dispite them being really bad this edition I will eventually get some (probably only to use as objective markers). A unit of 5-6 is about the same point cost as a Broodlord and it would give my army a few more options. I would also like a unit of 6 Raveners. However the new plastic kit is also way too expensive (even more than the Rippers) for three figures so I shall wait untill I see some on ebay. I also need a box of Hormagaunts so I have enough for one unit.

13: Tales of a Splinter Fleet

2010-08-27T23:19:00.000-07:00

Game Thirteen: 1750 points vs Ultramarines
Games 1-12 can be found on DakkaDakka

Splinter Fleet Lyracian
Daddy Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, TLBDx2) & one Guard
Junior Hive Tyrant (Old Adversary, TLBDx2) & one Guard
Zoanthropes x2
Hive Guard 2 Broods x2
Xenomorphs (Genestealers) 2 Broods x10 w/ Toxic Sacs
Mummy Tervigon with TS, AG, Catalysis
Termagants one Brood x10
Tiny the Tyrannofex with Rupture Cannon

Ultramarine
Snack: Chaplain Caecilius with Jump Pack
Canned Fruit: Purpureus & Albus Tactical Squads with flamer, missiles, Fist and Rhino
Canned Veg: Lucifer Tactical Squad with flamer, Hvy Bolter, Power Sword and Rhino
Dinner: Plumbeus Devastator Squad with 4 Missiles
Tea: Tripudio Assault Squad with Fist and two Flamers.
Appetiser: Tempestas Terminator Squad with assault cannon & CML
Inedible rock: Brother Grumio Dreadnought

Mission: Capture and Control, Spearhead

Deployment
Marines deployed in the north-east with all the tactical units in combat squads. The Sgt and flamer went in the APC's while the heavy weapons were stationed in the ruins.

The marines were defending the communication equipment (objective) on the roof of the four story ruined tower in the east. Squads Plumbeus, Purpureus-gravis & Lucifer-gravis were all in the tower. Albus-gravis was on the roof of a small building to the north. Tempestas & Tripudio were in front of the tower next to the water silo. Purpureus-pugnus was on there right (western) flank while Brother Grumio, Albus-pugnus & Lucifer-gladius were on there left flank.

Tyranids deployed in the South-west. Daddy and Junior formed the centre behind a small hill. A line of Termagants is in front of them with hive guard ether side. Behind them mummy was concealed in a ruined bunker where she was laying eggs (objective). To the east of the bunker was Tiny being escorted by the Zoanthropes.

Turn One
Brother Grumio, Tempestas, Tripudio and the three APC's all advance toward the centre. Between them they kill half the Termagant screen and put one wound on Juniors guard. Squads Plumbeus, Purpureus-gravis and Albus-gravis all fire there missiles at Mummy. She makes most of her cover saves and only takes a single wound (lucky Mummy).

Hive guard open fire wrecking APC-Purpureus and immobilising APC-Lucifer. Junior kills the terminator with Assault Cannon while Daddy and the Zoanthropes slaughter seven members of Tripudio including the Sargent. Finally Tiny manages to immobilise Brother Grumio. Mummy produces a dozen babies who rush forward to form a new screen. She unfortunately pops a blood vessel trying to make herself immune to pain.

Turn Two
Chaplain Caecilius leads his three men into battle against Daddy (having managed to wound the Hive Guard with the flamer). Meanwhile Juniors guard and Termagants evaporate under rapid-fire from squads Albus-pugnus & Lucifer-gladius (who have left there APC's) and Tempestas. All the missile launchers shoot at Mummy inflicting two more wounds. Caecilius is ripped apart and the survivors of Tripudio flee being chased by Daddy. The two APC's have formed a barricade to the east of the water silo stopping any advance while Tempestas hold the northern route.

Mummy makes herself immune to pain and pumps out another dozen gaunts to replace the dead. Daddy advances on Tripudio, but shoots at Albus-gravis forcing them to flee. Advancing Junior nerve shocks Tempestas and kills one Terminator. Gaunts assault Purpureus-pugnus. Tiny shoots and charges Albus-pugnus wiping them out. The first unit of Xenomorphs arrives in the west and heads toward Mummy and her eggs (objective).

Turn Three
Squad Tripudio flees the battlefield while Albus-gravis rally and return to there position on the roof. Brother Grumio finally manages to wound Tiny with his Mult-melta (one out of three is bad). Lucifer-gladius shoots and assaults Tiny. Purpureus-pugnus finish off the gaunts and climb onto the hill. Unable to shoot straight Tempestas only manage to inflict a single wound on Junior. The Heavy Bolter kills more Termagants while the missiles try and finish off Mummy. She shrugs off the shots feeling no pain.

With the rest of the Xenomorphs arriving in wrong place (right behind there brothers) the game is looking very drawn. Having spawned her last ten babies Mummy advances killing another Terminator under a hail of spines. Daddy charges onto the hill, rips Purpureus-pugnus limb from limb, and clambers down the far side. Zoanthropes vaporise APC-Albus. This leaves an open route for Tiny to run forward as he has finished eating Lucifer-gladius. Junior and his gaunts charge into Tempestas. The two remaining terminators fail to wound Junior (darn snake eyes) but hold firm.

Turn Four
A barrage of missiles puts another wound on Mummy. Daddy takes a wound from the heavy bolter. Brother Grumio misses tiny again! Zoanthropes explode both of the dreadnoughts arms while hive guard kill one marine from Plumbeus and reduce Albus-gravis to a single marine with a bolter. One brood of Xenomorphs rush north while the other guard the eggs. Everything else runs towards the tower with Junior making it.

Turn Five
Plumbeus inflict two wounds on Junior while Purpureus-gravis & Albus-gravis wipe out the large Termagant brood at his heels. Junior charges up the tower into combat with Albus-gravis. Tiny and three Termagants made into the tower while everything else shoots Purpureus-gravis. Zoanthropes killed four marines with warp blast and Daddy finished them off.

Turn Six
No longer having an objectives the marines try for a draw. Plumbeus put a barrage of missiles into the Xenomorphs hoping to make them flee (it fails). The lone marine from squad Albus runs forward but is cut down by Xenomorphs. Daddy and the Zoanthropes obliterate squad Plumbeus while Junior does the same to Albus-gravis. Hive guard manage to shoot the gun off the immobilised APC.

Turn Seven
Ultramarines start the turn with a Dreadnought (with no arms or legs) and an immobilise Rhino with no gun. The Zoanthropes finish Brother Grumio while the APC withstands all my other shooting! Finally Daddy has to charge to rip it open. We did not really need to play it, but the dice said there was a turn seven. I just wanted to see if would actually be annihilation or not.

Aftermath: Win by annihilation (I had both objectives as well)
Warp Blast and Brainleech Worm Devourers were the MVP's this game. Zoanthropes killed half the assault marines, a couple of terminators and most of the marines holding the objective on there own. The sheer torrent of fire from the Tyrants was outstanding. I did miss the 2+ save from armoured shell but I will try this configuration for Tyrants again.

I finally painted some Tyranids

2010-08-26T15:35:00.000-07:00

I finally got some time to do some painting (first time this year) and was able to get about half my Tyranid army covered in read and black. I was also able to finish off my Hive Tyrant and Zoanthropes.