From the shadows of Badab

Talk about deploying from Daughter of Tempests... BFG Lamenters in 2020

+PREPARE FOR GLORY+

Mega Battle

Photos from a 3v3 battle at Dragon's Lair using 2 combined tables. My Blood Angels + Ultramarines + Space Wolves vs. Blood Angels (traitor) Grey Knights (traitor) and Necrons.

Just finished my new blood angels captain...

Painted this guy up this evening, just under 5 hours. Not my best painted mini ever, but really pleased how he came out.  My first model to adjust for the new Blood Angels codex! Will put up better pictures when there is light.

Wargear; Storm Shield, Artificer Armor, Valour's Edge (AP2 power sword for those non-BA players). Will take digital weapons if I have the points, giving him an overall cost of 145-155. The BA captain entry in the new codex is lightyears beyond the old codex. Might not be a super turbo killy street fighter, but nonetheless still very psyched. I mean, even artificer armor is a totally foreign concept to me...

Blood Angels 7th edition codex first impressions

My first honest reaction to the new BA codex was utter sadness and frustration.

The cynic in me looked at the changes of tactical marines (and scouts) as the only troops choices as a clear money grab by GW to push their new BA tactical marine box set. GW full and well knows that many 5th Ed BA players competitively stacked their lists with the former Assault Marines as troops, whether in a jump packing army or mechanized list.

However, this change was only the tip of the iceberg for me. Baal Predators moved to Heavy. Land Raiders moved from Dedicated Transports to Heavy for all but terminators. Sanguinary Priests are now HQ, and can no longer take Terminator armor (that makes my 2 sanguinary priests in Terminator armor unplayable).

This completely screwed over my Lamenters army, which now has no troops choices to field nor ability to use my Sanguinary Priests.

It also crushed my Blood Dragons army, which cannot field half the tanks it used to. With 2 vindicators, predator destructor, 2 baal predators, and land raider redeemer all competing for the 3 heavy support slots. The icing on the cake; my 4x plasma gun honor guard squad is no longer legitimate.

I was furious.

But then after giving it a few weeks to think about, I have to say I do enjoy this new codex even if GW was indeed going for a money grab to push new models.

...Because the new codex is genuinely back to BA's core roots. Baal Predators used to be heavy support. Rhino wall rushes with Tactical marines used to be BA's bread and butter. And now they are once more.

I think in terms of power, the codex is spot on. Yes I'm upset I have less tanks to field for my Blood Dragons, and will have to paint up new tactical marines for my Lamenters, but when I update my armies I'll be happy.

Because we're getting 140 point (bare bones) 10 man marine squads with free furious charge, and a free +1 initiative for following the Baal detachment org. 185 points with the fast rhino included. This is a serious improvement, as the same unit would have costed 35 more points in the 5th ed codex and without the free abilities to boot. Other down-costed, mainstay units: predators, baal predators (5 point storm bolters anyone?)... Cheaper librarians, vastly improved captains. Valours edge and artificer armor? Hell to the yes. It goes on and on.

So for all the doom and gloom that came with the new codex, I am actually excited to tweak my armies for the new codex and get BA on the table again. It's like classic blood angels but on steroids.

My X-Wing Miniatures 100 pt Squadrons

Golden Blade of the Rebel Alliance:

Inspired by PC Game X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter, repainted to gold squadron colors.




Emperor's Sword of the Galactic Empire:

Inspired by the SW TCG, (canonized from ROTJ). Space blue scheme with jet black paneling, instead of prepaint light grey scheme with very dark grey paneling.


I always told myself I was going to get into this game I'd have to put my own flavor into my fleets. Stock ships simply won't do! Not that there's anything wrong with X-Wing prepaints, they're quite excellent.

Lists I've been running them as:

Rebels:
4x Green Squadron Pilots w/ Push the Limit & Stealth Device

Imperials:
7x Academy Pilots, Backstabber



More to come.... still working on a Flesh Eaters 40K army.

A brutal battle for the Relic

Lamenters vs. Imperial Guard (1500 pts)

+SEGMENTUM ULTIMA, VERIDIAN SYSTEM+

+Inquisitorial Class C Encrypted Message:...Retrieve [REDACTED] heresy relic at any cost:... Local units may be TRAITOR..... Battle Barge Daughter of Tempests Mission Status: AFFIRMATIVE+

+Artifact Secured+

+Pict-Log M41.997+ Brother Captain of the First Company leads a heroic last charge

One last attempt by the traitor guardsmen to prevent the Lamenters from stealing their tainted relic

24 of 28 deployed battle brothers lost. Mission success. Deploy the servitors for body retrieval.

The struggle against 40K Flyers & Lords of War

Fight fire with fire, right?

I never expected things like Shadowswords to be legal in standard games of Warhammer 40K, but apparently that is now the case. I'm not saying they're too good or anything - actually I think it's pretty awesome, the problem is I am late to the bandwagon of super-heavies. Mega-tanks and walkers aren't even the issue though - well placed Terminators can usually take care of them. It's the rampant amount of Flying vehicles in 7th edition that is really giving me trouble. My army has no anti-air weapons at all, and when I'm almost guaranteed to be facing off against some flyers every match - something's gotta give.

The first thing that came to mind was my Stormraven. But just as I was placing my army case down on the floor... one model I own caught the corner of my eye as I spotted on the bottom shelf of my desk.

BEHOLD!

Snap crackle pop. Can't wait to dunk some of those Necron croissant buttheads into the freakin' DIRT!

More to come

40K 1000 pt doubles tournament, 7th ed

So at the local store today there was a doubles tournament using 7th edition rules. I was paired with a random partner who turned out to be pretty cool. He was playing Tyranids. Even though we only managed 1-win on our record, I'm not sure if that's really indicitive of our performance. One of the other matches would have definitely been in our favor had the time not elapsed before we had a chance to finish the bottom of turn 4 (we went second, so that was pretty lame). The other game we faced 2 knight titans, pylon shield fortification things, basically one of the most cheesiest doubles lists I've ever seen. The guys playing the lists were nice though, and I understand it is a tournament so people are allowed to bring whatever the rules allow.

Here are some pics. Lots of flyers and big scary crap on almost every table. I am getting a much better grasp on the rules though. I think after a few more games I might be able to get my mojo back.

More to come

Back from the dead

It is a new era of Warhammer 40,000!

After not playing any 40K for quite a long time, I figured the advent of 7th edition would be a good time to materialize into realspace once again and crush the enemies of mankind.

I liked 6th quite a bit, but I only played it at the very beginning. Maybe a dozen games or so. Real life made me have to take a step back (moving to a new city, new job, starting my life in the real world). After more than a year of no Warhammer in my life, I had a craving that could not be controlled. I need my GW toy soldiers! The emperor commands me.

Anyways, bought the new rulebook a few days ago, and went down to Dragon's Lair in Austin last night for my initiation into the Thursday night casual play scene.

The game seems so foreign to me. I saw so many bizarre models. There was a time in 5th edition, when I was heavily involved in the competitive scene, where I could have recited the stat-line of any unit in the game from memory. Now I cannot even name half the models on the tables, let alone what they do, or if it's  a creature or a vehicle.

Riptides, Helldrakes, Necron ring-pop fortress city with cthulu arms. Eldar wraith knights. This is not the 40K I remember, but that's okay. I still had fun.

Played 2 matches (using 7th rules), 1 at 1250 points vs Necrons and 1 at 1500 pts vs Space Wolves. Both were pretty crushing defeats for the Lamenters, but I was putting myself in unfavorable situations on purpose in order to put myself in a position to learn the rules better. I think the 6th edition competitiveness of my Lamenters is mostly gone. BA psykers and the way psychic powers themselves work has been totally changed. Almost everyone I saw playing was using flyers, my armies have no AA (What's this skyfire shenanigans?).

So what is the next step? Tournament on Sunday. My skills might be as rusty as a total newbie, my armies may be so last year, but as a faithful servant of the imperium I must put these xenos pretenders to the sword - or die with honor.

More to come

6th 1750 batrep BA vs GK

Here is a rundown of the match I played at the BFS club vs. GK. A different GK player than yesterday, but a somewhat similar list. Lots of foot PAGK with psycannons. This army however had 2x psyrifle dreads and a LRC, with a unit of standard terminators.

Battle deployment was the diagonal one again. Still can't remember what it's called. Mission was big guns never tire w/ 4 objectives. But do I really care what the mission is? Not particularly. With 2x five man scoring units, my objective is to utterly destroy my opponent.

Grey Knights had first turn and deployed first, but for the first time ever I seized the initiative! Aww yeah. Not only that, but first turn was night fight. ME GUSTA. That right there really sealed the game in my favor.

Starting deployment. As usual, termies mounted up & assault squads behind.

End of turn 1. LRC had shield from librarian, Baal was smoked.  With night fight, most of my units were receiving 4+ covers from his shooting, which only managed to knock off a couple hull points from glancing hits spread between my tanks.

End of my turn 2. By now, the battle was basically won. His LRC had 1 hull point left and was immobilized. By the end of turn 3, nearly every grey knight model was off the board.

On turn 4 he was officially tabled. Good game and fun opponent. I am really pumped that the Lamenters are kicking ass in 6th. My hobby army just became my competitive army overnight.

More to come

Reports from the front lines

So I played 2 games today.

First match was 1850 points, basically I used my 1750 list below, dropped some sergeant wargear, dropped the baal pred, and added 5x more terminators with a CML.

First opponent was foot-based GK with Draigo and 2 units of paladins. Lots and lots of psycannons, I want to say at least around fifteen.

Game type was 4 objectives with diagonal deployment.

I had first turn, combat squadded my 10 man terminators and put 5 in the LR with the other 5 on foot (with both CMLs). Assault marine squads hide behind LRs. Moved 18" with both raiders on turn 1.

His first turn, dropped my LRC to 1 hullpoint from tons of glances with all his psycannon shooting. He tried to assault my LRC with his draigo+paladin squad but failed to do any damage.

My next turn, I tank shocked, dumped all my models, and assaulted. There was some shooting here and there, but the focus was the assault. In 2 turns of assault I wiped draigo and his unit of paladins for the loss of 1x TH/SS and my captain (he got insta-killed by draigo when I failed my look out sir).

By turn 5, I had moved on and wiped his other paladin squad with my deathstar, and my opponent surrendered. A very solid victory with minimal casualties, not a common achievement for the lamenters. My LRC did get destroyed, but the other LR remained untouched even after repeated bombardment by psycannons. I think my prediction of raiders still being viable for 6th was right.




Second game was vs. orks. Horde army with 130+ models led by ghazkull. Same mission, 4 objectives, but with pitched battle deployment. Unfortunately we didn't have time to finish our game as the store was closing. We made it to the end of turn 4, and things could have gone either way. Basically I spent the entire first 3 turns turtling and doing as much shooting as possible, then on turn 4 I disgorged both LR payloads into the heart of the horde and did a lot of damage. Can't say if I would have been overwhelmed or not. It was close.

Lamenters 1750 list

HQ (2):

Captain - 165
w/ Terminator Armor, Lightning Claw, Storm Shield

Librarian - 145
w/ Terminator Armor, Storm Shield, Force Axe

ELITES (3):

Sanguinary Priest - 85
w/ Terminator Armor, Power Sword

Terminator Assault Squad - 225
w/ 5x Thunder Hammers & Storm Shields

Dedicated Transport: Land Raider Crusader - 260
w/ Multi-Melta

Terminator Squad - 230
w/ Cyclone Missile Launcher

Dedicated Transport: Land Raider - 260
w/ Multi-Melta

TROOPS (2):

Assault Squad - 115
Sergeant w/ Infernus Pistol

Assault Squad - 140
Sergeant w/ Infernus Pistol, Power Fist

FAST ATTACK (1):

Baal Predator - 125
w/ Flamestorm Cannon, Stormbolter

General strategy is to have all termies mounted up (Capt, Libby & Priest go in LRC) with Jump marines moving up behind the land raiders.

LRC goes in front, moves flat out first turn for 18" total while Lib casts shield (can I still do that?) giving it a 5+. I know that there isn't a 6" bubble around the vehicle anymore though, but that's okay. Standard LR will move 12" and stay behind LRC to also grant it a cover save, machine spiriting 1 las somewhere.

Baal will either outflank or stay close to deathstar, depending on opponent, mission, whatever. I'm not too concerned, it's almost always worth its points no matter how I play it. There are 2 reasons for the stormbolter upgrade: #1, it essentially gives me a 50% save vs. a weapon destroyed, #2, I can always fire it full BS whenever I'd be firing the flamestorm anyway.

I am not a fan of throwing in the extra crap (Infernus pistols particularly) on the Assault squads, but I had extra points and didn't know what to do with them. Might give extra armor to the LRs instead.

Obviously, this list is focused on getting the mega deathstar unit into melee (Furious charge, FNP, preferred enemy, with everyone but the priest toting 3++.). The standard LR and termies are there for backup.

Like always I am open to critique here. I realize a few things are not exactly competitive, like the Captain. I just like the model too much not to use him.

I should have reports from the field in a few days. May tweak the list before then. More to come.

Lamenters land raider crusader

Looking forward to bringing this into battle.

Storm shield update

Finally mustered the courage to chop this guy up and give him the stormshield I've always wanted.

More to come