The Star Vagabonds

Wraithlord... finished!

2010-04-26T23:06:00.008+02:00

Well, at last some progress. While painting my Wave Serpents, I made a break and started painting something else, and the Wraithlord happened to be laying around. That's something very usual in my painting schedules: I simply don't respect them too much. Luckily, this time I've managed to finish this model before jumping to a different one. The fact that it has just taken me four days has helped, indeed.

The model had been assembled for over a year (yes, I know, shame on me). I made some minor conversions on it: cutted and replaced the leg to give an illusion of movement (as if it were actually walking or "advancing"), and also modelled some "lightnings" on the wraithsword (a personal signature in several of my models). I was strongly inspired by Jamie's miniature on Coolminiornot, as I stated in a post over a year ago.

For the paintjob I used the very same techniques I had applied on the rest of my army: stippling of different blues with bone as the contrast colour, and details in red (spirit stones). Additionally, I tried something different with the wraithsword (which has no actual effect in gaming terms): I didn't want something too striking as the sword was just a detail and not the focal point of the model, while at the same time I wanted to get something somehow eye-catching. So I decided for a turquoise colour (which is blue-ish after all, as most of the model) and painted some reflections on the blade. I think I've succeeded, and I'm really happy with the result.

It's not completely finished, the base needs a few more washes and a bit of grass, and I want to paint a couple of white stripes somewhere (my usual army markings), but who knows when will I do it...

Ok, enough chatting, it's time for some pics. A little Photoshop et voilà. Hope you like them!

Painting for dummies – easy OSL

2010-04-13T11:07:00.004+02:00

While working my eldar vehicles, I had to make a decision when it came to paint the cockpit and the pilot. You know, it is a well detailed part of the model, but it will be rather obscured once its cover has been glued on place. Besides, being that cover made out of plastic (and not true glass, which is more transparent), the painting below won’t be really appreciable, and that is really a pity.

So instead of painting it “normally”, I decided to think of a quick and effective way to bring it out with a minimal effort, and I came with the idea of an easy OSL (Object Source Lighting) effect suppossed to be caused by the glow of the screen in front of the pilot. I painted it in less than five minutes and using only five colours (Chaos Black, Dark Angels Green, Snot Green, Scorpion Green and Skull White).

So here’s the recipe:

Paint the whole cockpit Chaos Black
Drybrush it all heavily with Dark Angels Green
Drybrush it again with Snot Green, not so heavily and concentrating mainly on the areas in which the ligh coming from the screen would fall most (front of the face, chest and inner arms)
Drybrush it lightly with Scorpion Green in the main focal areas of light impact (front of the face and hands)
Paint the screen Snot Green
Paint some lines (references or axis) and dots (objectives or enemies) in the screen with Scorpion Green
Paint the center of the dots with a mixture of Scorpion Green and Skull White to bring them out

Et voila! The cockpit is done and ready for action. Fear the Serpent, mon-keigh!

Update - Tyranid Prime

2010-03-10T13:25:00.010+01:00

Those last weeks I've been busy with lots of things at the same time: exams, job interviews, family... and regarding the hobby, I've been working on lots of projects (all at the same time): imperial guard commissions, my eldars (I have two serpents half-finished already hehe), Space Hulk, my GD project, Blood Bowl... and of course my tyranids.

Even though I'm not pleased with the last changes made to the army, I like my bugs too much to simply put them in the shelves and forget them. I've managed to design a 1.000 point list that will require minimum additions to my current army. This will allow me to keep playing small games with them while I finish the rest of my projects and feel like working more seriously with Tyranids again.

For the list I need:

- Two Hive Guards: great minis indeed, but a real pain to assemble. I will say it again: a real PAIN. The arms and legs didn't fit well in their holes and I had to pin most of them and use loads of greenstuff (greystuff in my case, as I'm using now super sculpey). That took me lots of hours, and even a phonecall to my local GW store just for the sake of complaining. Eventually I got both properly assembled, this afternoon I'll base them and tomorrow they'll be primed.

- One Trygon: no comments on this, simply a great mini with great rules and a relatively low price. Already assembled and primed, I have to paint it - I estimate between 6-8 hours.

- One Tyranid Prime: hah, there is no specific model for this bug. I suppose that GW wants us to get creative for the moment, and although I'm not too fond of self-made conversions - strange for a tyranid player, ins't it? - I picked the glove up and started thinking...

First, I wanted a close combat oriented leader, with a main role of "character killer", so twin boneswords were an obvious choice, and I decided to complement them with a pair of scything talons (because those are cool and came for free). I also decided to give him toxin sacks to maximize the chances of causing a wound (watch out Wraithlords out there!) and nothing else, so I could use it as a dangerous and at the same time cheap model.

Once the main options of the model were chosen, came the period of innovative design. I wanted it to stand out among other warriors, but didn't know very well how to do so if it was going to share most parts (arms, legs, torso...) with them. Then I read an article on the GW webpage and I found the solution. But that meant using lots of pieces and spending a considerable amount of money, unless...

... unless I could take advantage of some models I had laying here and there, and at the same time order some bits from one of those online stores that trade with GW kits (thanks Bits & Kits UK for that), and look for something special on e-bay. So I took my old Death Leaper - got it a couple of years ago, when the model appeared for the first time, and had only primed it - and chopped its arms and head, so I could use its legs and torso (with the plus of a cool looking stinging tail). Then I ordered a couple of scything talons and a head from the Ravener kit, because they are bigger and more vicious-looking than the ones in the Warrior kit, and the head has side mandibles and those look great too. And for extra armor, I gathered a couple of armor plates and toxin sack upgrades from my own bit box (full of different biomorphs after years of collecting nids).

And then I arrived to the most delicate point of my conversion: the boneswords. I had simply no idea of how to do them, and was thinking on doing something similar to this (thanks Bigred from BOLS) when while having a look on e-bay I found a perfect solution: a bet on some old plastic Tyranid Warriors from the Space Hulk set... that I won! I simply cut the hands with boneswords and attached them to the typical deathspitter set, adding to the arm with the weapon the back piece of its counterpart to make them more balanced. And tada! The model was finished!

I'll prime it tomorrow with the Hive Guards so I'll have it ready for painting... hope I'll manage to have it ready for gaming in no more than a couple of weeks!

YouTube rocks

2010-02-03T22:40:00.004+01:00

Too funny not to post it XD

Thoughts and planning

2010-01-26T23:06:00.001+01:00

New year, new focus, new codex. As a dedicated tyranid player, I’ve waiting eagerly the release of the new codex for the last months. Now I have it in my hands, and I’m completely puzzled!

This is definitely not a revision of the army but a completely new and different one, that will demand a different scope and of course a change in mentality for all the hive minds all over the world. Now the carnifex is not a good bargain, but the new trygon is, as well as the zoanthrophes. Warriors change completely, the tyrant is both a close combat monster and a point sucker; and how many new units are there in the book?

Woah, this is gonna need time to analyse properly (that’s not neccesarily bad) and of course, big changes in my army list (and that is bad). I’m not sure what I’m going to do with my five ‘fexes, and I’ll need one or two trygons, and a new carrying case, and probably convert some tervigons, and...

Man, too much work for an army I had already completed (assembled and mostly painted). It’s like starting with it again! That’s not fair, not fair at all. I feel really frustrated.

Mmmmm, frustrated. I don’t like frustration. I always try to change it into a different feeling. What about... challenge? Yeah, challenge will do this time. What about creating a cool new army? That sounds really good... but to tell the truth, I don’t feel like working more with the bugs right now; I’m not excessively motivated...

What about my old (and half-forgotten) eldars? I see a unit of guardians, a vyper and some dire avengers over here... mmm... I have an idea.

Alaitoc is back.

A new year starts

2010-01-13T23:11:00.008+01:00

Well, 2010 already. I’ve neglected my blog for too long, for certain reasons that now have been overcome. Let’s make a short summary of the last year in terms of paintjobs finished, so to see my final score for 2009:

- 10 termagants: 10 points
- 16 warriors of Gondor: 16 points
- 2 Leman Russes (commission work): 20 points
- 1 Chimera (commission work): 10 points
- 4 Sentinels (commission work): 20 points
- 20 Imperial Guards (commission work): 20 points
- 1 space marine chaplain (well painted): 5 points
- 3 gnoblars*: 3 points
- 12 Blood Bowl players (lizardmen): 12 points

Plus the 36 points collected previously, this makes a total of...

152 points!

Well, an excellent number, with only one small problem: half of them are commission jobs... Anyway, it’s already a fact that my brushes and I are in good terms again after a lot of years.

Now, objective for 2010: beat this score!

* Presents for some friends, a little of a funny experiment for me. Nice minis to tell the truth :)

Some Pics

2009-10-31T23:10:00.012+01:00

Wow. Three months since my last post. That stands as a record. I should be somehow embarrased, but the truth is I’m not. I’ve come to accept the fact that I neglect to attend my blog properly, and that’s it. Life is though when you are a blog in my hands, I suppose.

Summer is gone, beachtime is over, and my painting progress hasn’t gone too far. I’ve painted another Leman Russ and a Chimera for my usual customer, and currently I’m working on a couple of Sentinels and some imperial guards for him. They should be finished by now, but two weeks ago I was stupid enough to accept an invitation to play soccer, and I broke my thumb during the match. Hell, one year after I broke my fibula and got half-lame for the rest of my life (‘cause it didn’t recover entirely), one year since my last friendly match, and I get another souvenir from this damned sport. I’ve promised myself to practise sports uniquely in the Playstation from now on, although I fear for my fingers...

I only want to post some pics today. The first ones are shots of the tanks mentioned above, the second ones of the fire dragon exarch that won me “Best WH40K individual” prize in my local GW painting contest in June. Thanks to my friend Ergman for taking the pictures, although the tank ones didn’t have the correct exposure level selected and look a little “blue-ish”. Anyway, it’s still possible to get the idea of the paintjob. The exarch ones look great in my opinion.

More news sooner or later (who knows).

New update - really needed

2009-07-19T22:54:00.009+02:00

Hi there,

I haven't posted anything in the last weeks, as usual. But that's just been because either I've been busy doing stuff, or I've just felt too lazy to type in my laptop. Now I can't delay this anymore, so there go my news.

First, I've lost my job. That means a big reduction in my monthly income, but on the other hand a great increase in my free time (who says I don't think always positive?). I've taken advantage of this fact for painting a couple of things I entered in a local GW painting contest, winning best entry in WH40K single and placing second overall. a pity I didn't place first and won the trophy, but hey, the winner entered an old school giant that was really gorgeous. But next year I'm commited to win, be sure of that! (evil laugh on the backstage). I'll post some pics of my entries as soon as I recover them from the store, where they're currently on display.

Later, I decided that if I put together less monthly income and increase in free time I should get something like get yourself some kind of job!. Therefore, I asked at the store if there was anybody interested in my painting abilities for commisions. It turned out that one of the staffs knew a guy who wanted to get some IG tanks painted, so we talked a bit and reached an agreement. He asked me for a top-quality painted Leman Russ in urban camouflage, and the rest was up to me.

Reaching this point, I must admit two things: first, this was the first time I painted any GW vehicle, and second, for the last months I've been really interested on learning how to paint armor in historical style. In February I bought some books, DVDs, painting material new to me (such as oils) and eventually an airbrush. But I was a bit afraid to put all this knowledge in a real model, just because I wasn't feeling too confident with all this new stuff. But now I had the opportunity of trying it and get paid, so I dusted my equipment box and got my hands on it.

First thing I did was assembling the model. Man, that took me over two hours, how can there be son many pieces in a simple Leman Russ? It's much easier with my bugs - body, legs, arms, head, symbiont stuff. In the end I decided to add some extras to the model, such as extra supplies, canvas and so on, because I wanted to get a hardened veteran of several campaigns assigned to a regiment who has been through months of war, and thus damaged by the elements and carrying supplies for its crew. I tried some of those extras and placed them in the model with blu-tack to make myself and idea of the final result until I was happy with the result.

Then, the paintjob started. I used the airbrush for the first stages and for adding dust in the lower parts of the tank, and oils for outlining the armor plates and adding dirtyness. A light drybrush was also needed for adding subtle highlights, and then I used the sponge method for the chipping. And I was happy with the result!

The last part of the paintjob were mostly details: the caterpillar tracks, the already mentioned supplies, the heavy weapon sponsons and also the heavy stubber gunner. I limited the colour palette in all the model to greys for the main colours, browns for dirt and leather (straps, bags and the like), silver for the bare metal and red for contrast. In the end, it turned out to be a solid scheme with which I'm very fond of. I've taken some pics of the finished model, there they go.

The customer was very happy with the job, and he's ordered me another Leman Russ and a Chimera in the same scheme of colour. Well, it seems that at least I'm gonna have enough cash to pay my beers for the next weeks...

A bit of tactical advice... I think

2009-06-18T17:04:00.007+02:00

I was just thinking on writing a new post about my recent thoughts about Lictors, when after reading some posts in the Heresy Online forums, I got some kind of revelation. You see, after the release of the new and super improved Imperial Guard, new ways of dealing with that army must be developed. And while my main Hive Mind was taking a nap and my conscience was connected to the Infinity Circuit, I had a flash on how an Eldar player can field a really nasty unit against the guardsmen of the Imperium. Do you wanna know which one? This guy.

Yes, Maugan Ra, from now on the guard mower. Why? Well, he has a weapon with a reach of 36” (90 cm) that fires on the move. And S6 and AP5. And he has the Crack Shot and Fast Shot exarch powers. Does anybody see where I am aiming?

Pretty simple: here we have a unit with three wounds with Eternal Warrior and a 2+ save that can get a 4+ cover save really easily during the game, so we can say that he’s quite tough and hard to kill. This guy can move and launch a flurry of five shots per turn OR, even better, shot four shots that re-roll to wound AND ignore any cover save. With a BS7 this means 3-4 average guards dead per turn, not too impressive. But it could also mean 3-4 guards dead in a command squad – insta killing the officer with S6 – and that sounds much better. Or it could mean a WHOLE heavy weapon squad out of the game (insta killing each model with its S6), and now this expensive model becomes a real bargain. It doesn’t matter if the enemy unit is entrenched in a bunker, his crack shot power will deny any cover save, and S6 means insta killing any guard model (but ogryns of course) including heavy weapon teams due to their new rules making them count as a single model. Definitely awesome. Am, I forgot to mention that he packs four S6 power weapon attacks in close combat. Anybody wants more?

And you? Have you recently come to any original idea about how to deal with the new IG? I’ll accept suggestions for both the Eldar and Tyranid sides (ah, curse my 40K bipolar disorder…).

My new Tyranid tactic

2009-06-09T12:33:00.008+02:00

Before I start working on my entry for the local GW painting contest, I think it’s time to finally post those thoughts I’ve recently having in my mind. They all started when reading some post of my fellow bloggers, and took shape in a battle report I finished last February (soon to be published here, I promise). That was a special battle not only because my opponent was a great guy and brought with him a balanced (although hard) list, but because that was the first time I used my newly developed game tactic: the “reserve all” tactic.

Ok, I know, you’re gonna tell me “Hey, that’s not new, lots of people are using it out there with big success”, and that’s true. But on the very basis of this tactic I approach it from a different point of view. See, most of the guys who use it have fast armies mostly comprised of vehicles, skimmers, bikers and similar units; and take advantage of this tactic by a counter-deployment to their opponent’s army. They rely on confusing their opponent, and then strike first (and strike hard). They keep moving fast and concentrating their attacks in specific opponents/critical objectives, behaving like a surgeon with a scalpel. This tactic has been extensively used by guys like Fritz from Way of Saim Hann, and has proved to work well.

My approach is similar, but different. My army has no vehicles, no skimmers, and no very-fast units (I don’t use raveners or gargoyles – maybe if they become plastic…), so every model on the table moves 6” plus 1D6” if they run, and that is a VERY slow army. But, on the other hand, I field four units of 15 gaunts, a brood of shooty warriors, an ALWAYS outflanking Broodlord (outflanking is almost the best new rule of 5th Ed. for my bugs), a couple of zoanthropes and four monstrous creatures (one Tyrant and four ‘Fexes). And now guys, that is a BIG amount of models to kill (a total amount of 104 wounds, generally immune to instant death).

What do I do with this? Simple: overwhelm my opponent. It’s easy, you’ll see: I generally choose to go second, and after my opponent has deployed his units in cover, strategic places and so on, I simply declare everything to be in reserve (and the Broodlord to be outflanking). This gives me two strong points and two weak ones, explained as follows.

The first strong point is that my opponent spends his first and second turn shooting at nothing; and two turns without putting wounds on my models means that in the final and most critical turns of the battle I’ll have most of my models on the table, an amount that usually doubles that of my opponent. That’s great when you’re facing loads of gaunts and monstrous creatures, and puts a lot of pressure (and fear) on my opponent as he sees that he’s running out of time to damage severely my army, while I simply overcome his defences with a ton of bodies.

Second strong point is double: this deployment effectively allows me to counter-deploy my opponent concentrating my units where they’re most needed. This is specially useful in a spearhead deployment, when my reserves can come form ANY point of my own board edge, thus ignoring the initial limitation of deploying only on my quarter side (and having to walk a looong way to exchange “opinions” with the enemy). This deployment also gives me the first shooting turn, that meaning that I’ll strike first. Yeah, well, I play with ‘nids, and you may think that my shooting is poor. But that’s the mistake that most of my opponents make: with my full army I place every turn two S5AP3 small, two S8AP5 pinning big, four S6AP5 small, and one S4AP5 pinning big TEMPLATES (the new rules for templates are by far the best new rule of 5th Ed. for my bugs), plus some short-ranged fire (30 fleshborers and 30 spinefists and a Dakkafex). I’ve lost count of the amount of space marines I’ve killed by just spitting acid, throwing carnivorous beetles and worms, shooting toxic needles or growing strangler plants inside my enemy’s lines. And for specially recalcitrant units, the energies of the Warp Blast are like music to my ears (get a “hit” against a unit of marines in open field and you’ll know what I mean). I assure you that in my games, I almost kill more enemies in the shooting phase that in the close combat one, and that means something!

But every head has its tails, and this tactic is far from perfect. Its main weak point is the “randomlyness” inherent to reserve deployment. I mean, I’m not sure of which units or at least how many of them I’m going to have deployed each turn; these could be the units I need most at that moment or simply a bunch of good-for-nothing bugs. This is something very dangerous especially with the gaunts, who specially rely on the proximity of a synaptic creature to do their job properly. To counteract this risk I field enough synaptic creatures to hold my lines tight (my zoanthropes are also synaptic creatures, of course). I’d pay gold for a tyranid-eldar autarch, but the only unit I have that affects reserves is the lictor, and I’m not gonna field one of these for their 80 point cost just to get a re-roll for reserves each turn he’s alive, sorry. At 1.500 points I think he’s a waste of points, so I have to live with the burden of not knowing with what I’m going to play each turn; but on the other hand this adds more dramatic intensity to my games, and I appreciate that very much.

The second major disadvantage of this tactic is that, as exposed previously, my army is quite slow, and thus its performance depends heavily on the length of the game. If the game ends soon (according to statistics this means 33% of all games), I’ll have had barely time to approach my enemies and probably had chewed them less than they deserve. But if the game extends to turn six (or seven), business is done, and then it’s up to my opponent to prove if he’s a good general and can stop my army doing his job well (because my army is not unstoppable at all, you see, I’ve just prepared it as a good all-rounder list) or if he’s just one of those cheesy players I usually face (and ~~hate~~ ~~despise~~ dislike so much) who only prepares lists with the best units of his rulebook thinking in a single type of battle and doesn’t know what to do and how to use them properly if surprised by a tactic like mine (and will subsequently be assimilated by my genetically enhanced troops).

5th Ed. and this tactic have radically changed my approach to WH40K games, making of them a more interesting tactical challenge. Of course, I still retain some of that like for the random events all old WH Orc&Goblins players have (you’ll never have enough fanatics, squigs and black-orc-animosity-stoppers in your army!), and that makes much more fun out of my games (at least for me). I’ve enjoyed this new way of playing for the last moths, and just in case I had any doubt, results are there: three victories, one draw and one loss. And that loss was almost a draw, and nearly a victory; I played against a cheesy eldar army with ten wraithguard and avengers as basic units, with an Avatar and Eldrad and all that fluff, who went lucky and had the battle ended in turn five in a capture and control game… because in turn six his army would have run out of basic units (the Avatar and Eldrad were already dead), and in turn seven simply wiped out. Tails that time, heads for the next one :)

Games Day '09

2009-06-01T22:17:00.007+02:00

Well, it's been (again) a lot of time since my last post. Frankly, I haven't been in the mood for writing lately; I've simply had too many things to do besides the hobby. I've managed to play a few games and finish my participation in the "Emperor's Fist" WH40K campaign, where I haven't classified for the final round but I've achieved four wins, four losses and a draw (not that bad). And I've painted some of those new Gondor warriors I've adquired for the new "War of the Ring" game, hopefully the whole army will be ready in a few months. I've 16 ready, so my painting counter has been properly increased.

Today I'm just bringing you some pictures of the Games Day that took place yesterday. Finally I didn't bring any entry, as I've been very short of time those last months. A pity, but also a good motivation for next year. I want to share with you a few of the pictures I took in the event, some real masterpieces you only find every now and then.

First of them is the Space Wolf brought by Luis, a nice mate and great painter who holds at home about twenty Demons (half of them are golden ones). But again, the Slayer Sword was not awarded to him! I think he has some kind of curse on him with that trophy, something really weird. I'm sure you'll grab that hilt some day dude, you'll only have to surprise us one time more!

This shot is one of the firsts I made, I think those falcons are two of the finalists of the "Best Vehicle" category. I like both a lot!

And the last pic is of an entry that surpasses the rest in originality and finesse. I think that is a job of a French guy (probably monsieur Bonamant) and is simply... amazing. I don't know if it got a trophy, due to that Games Workshop policy of rewarding not only the paintjob but the games universe spirit (and this piece is not what I call "Workshop" style). Anyway, great job indeed.

Next post: local GW painting contest in June. Oh yes, I have a project again.

Dire Avenger Exarch

2009-03-26T22:25:00.005+01:00

Well, it seems that I'm not able to gather enought time to write a decent post lately. Whatever, Easter is around the corner, and with a few free days at hand I'll do my best to finish all the posts I have half-written as drafts. Or at least I'll try to, considering that some of them are several months old!

Today I'll just post some pictures I took from my latest painting: the Exarch for the Dire Avengers squad. It was intended to be finished for a painting contest in a shop close to my place, and it was indeed finished on time; but took me about ten hours of job, because I wanted to achieve a close-to top grade result. And therefore, instead of giving me one point for finishing an infantry soldier, I'm earning five because I've put an effort on it similar to painting a character - general, farseer or whatever. I think I deserve it after so many hours of hard job.

The pictures are again bad (too dark), and they don't show properly the level of contrast of the paint, but luckily half an hour ago I've finished building a home-made light box that I hope will greatly help me in my future shots. I painted the body of the Exarch first and then I went for the head, mixing several blues and adding turquoise for the hightlights. The weapons were black, highlighted with different greens. They were a bit rushed, as was the white tabard, because I was running out of time for the contest. The standard was the final touch; I freehanded the first things that came to my mind, and maybe should consider to add something else once I've retrieved the piece from the contest.

Hope you like it.

Miscellaneous

2009-03-11T23:07:00.004+01:00

Hi again! It’s been three weeks since last time I posted on my blog. Did you think I was being idle all this time? Not at all! I have a big bunch of news to write here, but not too much time; so I’ll try to be as brief as possible, without skipping any of the things I’ve been doing lately. Hard but...

First of all, painting job. I’ve finished another brood of ten termagaunts, already varnished and ready for battle. This means another ten points for my score, yes! I’ve also started painting two tyranid warriors to complete my five-bug brood; they’ll be ready for next week (and then I’ll add another four points to my score, yes yes yes).

But that’s not all. I’ve been told that there is a painting contest in a hobby shop in my city, and I’m planning to present my squad of dire avengers. For that mean, I have to finish painting the exarch of the squad (another point) and prepare a base to show them in all their glory. I’ve been looking for a circle-shaped one, but can’t find any with the proper size, until this very afternoon I entered a carpentry which was ending business and found some great ones at half price! I’m glad with it, and now I only have to model some terrain with a bit of clay (I’m not scared about that although it’s the first time I model terrain, but any help or advice will be really welcome).

In the picture you can see the base I got, and also two things more: first, a small tool case I’m gonna use to keep the tons of bits I have scattered around my home (that I’ve also bought today – great shopping day indeed); and second, some miniatures that belong to my recently started project... an army of Gondor for the new “War of the Ring” game! I’ve to admit that I never thought of getting some of the LotR minitures, not because of their quality (some of them are quite good indeed) but for the gaming rules used, that I disliked very much. But hey, the new system uses batallions of troops. Batallions! I’m imaging a couple of hundreds of soldiers in the board fighting each other in a somehow “historical” style and... well, can’t stop drooling :) Some of my mates had already started their armies and I simply couldn’t resist... so I picked up an army that was not being used yet, and chose the Gondorians because 1.They seem really easy to paint, and 2.I’ll be able to field lots of beautiful armoured soldiers, that can be led by Gandalf or Aragorn himself! Besides, I’have access to some really special units, like the Army of the Dead, and can include some allies too (although I think I’ll favour a “pure” Gondor army). At the same time, I’ve had an idea about how to make easier their storage, and have decided to magnetize them all to their movement trays, and then I’m planning to magnetize the trays themselves so they can stick to a metal tool case I have yet to buy.

I’ve calculated that I can keep the whole army in a medium sized case. That would be great because I don’t have so much room left at this moment! I’m using some magnets I got from the internet (as opposed to the USA, it’s difficult to buy them where I live). The result is simply terrific; and I’ve started calling it “Lord of the Magnets: the Game”, hehehe.

Wow, it’s late again. I haven’t finished writing all I wanted to, and in fact I’ve left the best part of it! Well, although I’m extremely busy lately, I hope I’ll post the remaining stuff in the following days... I’ve been working on it really hard!

IG Reference Sheet

2009-02-19T17:11:00.008+01:00

Well, the purpose of this blog is not actually giving any rules updates or sneak peeks, but I think this is worth seeing... it's in French, but I haven't found it difficult to translate (hope you won't neither).

The new IG reference sheets. I'm sure all IG players around the world are dancing with hapiness at this moment.

Inferno rifles with AP3? Those pesky mon-keigh have developed more advanced technology... we will deal with them with extreme caution from now on, huh.

Year 2009: First model finished

2009-02-16T16:46:00.011+01:00

Well, this weekend I’ve finally managed to get some time to spend on my minis. At first I had planned to start painting my Wraithlord, but eventually I just added on it some “extras” while I finished the paintjob of my first Vyper with some freehands. After that I gave it a couple of coats of varnish and took a few pictures to post them here, but before I played a bit with Photoshop again … I still have to find a satisfactory way to process my pics, but I feel that this has been a step forwards.

This model also means my first five points awarded for finishing miniatures this year! Wooooooo!! Well, to be sincere this model has actually been mostly painted in late 2008, but I’m gonna give me the points as Admiral Drax does – it doesn’t matter how long it takes, it does when it is done! And I’ve spent no less than three hours this weekend on it, so I think this is perfectly justified.

I guess I’ll start with the Wraithlord this weekend. It’s one of my favourite models of the Eldar army, and I’ve added my “personal touch” on it… more on this in a few days :)

Painting markers

2009-02-04T21:53:00.007+01:00

I’ve been very busy lately, and haven’t been able to finish any of my projects during January. Shame on me again, but I’ve made some progress nonetheless. First, I’ve seriously considered including (and mastering a bit if possible) a new painting technique to my already learned ones (more info on this soon). Second, I‘ve directed my main efforts towards painting my bugs, almost finishing a few gaunts. Third, being a bit fed up of painting always the same stuff, I decided to give myself a short break and paint something completely different but nonetheless quite useful: counters and markers. I decided going for those after playing a few games and noticing a real need of a way to control the numbers of wounds caused on a miniature, the leadership tests to be taken by a unit after the shooting phase, pinned units and so on; besides, I wanted to try a bit of freehand just for the sake of it. I’ve already finished modelling a wound counter for my tyranids (again, more info on this soon) and finished some basic markers for my 40K games.

The markers are really simple: I took some spare round bases I had laying in my bitz box and glued some circles of plasticard on top of them (to get a perfectly flat surface). I primed them black, and painted some warning symbols on them. The red ones will serve for serious leadership tests, such as panic, and will identify fleeing units too; while the yellow ones (not finished yet) will quickly identify pinned/to ground units.

I’m quite happy on how they turned out, and although I was looking for a more serious look in them, they have some kind of “comic book” look I like very much. I’m planning to do some more of those for representing objectives, psychic powers and more stuff I may need during a game. Anybody has an idea I could use for their design? I’d thank any contribution :)

Emperor's Fist Campaign - First games

2009-01-27T17:26:00.001+01:00

Well, I have already played my first two games at the “Fist of the Emperor” campaign. According to the draw, I had to play both in a shop I had visited a couple of times. Attention was excellent there, and their gaming table and scenery attached was of a very good quality. That was a nice start.

My first opponent was an old space marine player I haven’t met before. He fielded an Ultramarine army which included models of the 80’s – early 90’s, such as devastators with a shoulder-mounted heavy weapon, the old space marine captain (the one with the helmet like the new Sicarius) and, best of all, a predator of legend. All FULLY painted. It was a real pleasure to play against such a cool and balanced army, moreover when the opponent was also very friendly and easy going. And it was great to get my ass kicked by 7-4 in a spearhead annihilation mission by this army. If only half of my games were played against such a great army & opponent…

My second opponent turned out to be a bit more of a disaster. He got almost one hour late to the shop, but I admit that having forgotten your wallet at home means a bit of a mess when trying to get to the subway without money. This time we played spearhead but with the seize ground mission, four objectives in total. The game was a pain for me, having to deal with the only army I’m not ready to face: more Tyranids. In a great performance of “Brood War”, we almost annihilate each other before reaching turn five, where although I was pressing strongly his lines, he was holding 2 objectives for my only 1; then the dice decided to go for another turn, and I wiped his remaining troops from the table for a victory on my side. Hurray!

Now I got some spare time before the games to be played on February, so I’d better finish those termagaunts once and for all (still zero points in my painting score – no way!)

Last test for the Tournament

2009-01-16T09:13:00.027+01:00

Briefing: again, another battle report of my bugs. But this time, and as promised, with pictures! They may not be the best shots I could have made, but I'm proud of the result :)

Last Saturday I enjoyed a game against one of the usual customers of my local GW store. We played a 1.500 points battle in an Imperial world, where old buildings and vegetation mixed together as the result of the effects of a Tyranid bio-invasion and its common bio-spore bombardment. The Salamander space marines took defensive positions to face the incoming alien horde…

The battlefield in all its glory. The Baneblade didn't take part in the battle (luckily)

The dice decided for a seize ground mission with four objectives, with me placing two in no-man’s land and in the open, and my opponent placing two close to a table border, one of them in cover. The pitched battle deployment gave him control of that table border (d’oh!), where he deployed his troops: sniper scouts, a venerable Dreadnought and a Thunderfire cannon in some ruins on the left flank, a Whirlwind and a tactical squad (divided in combat squads) on the right flank, and a Demolisher, Tu’Shan and five tactical marines (another combat squad) in the center; plus two Ironclads with drop pods in reserve. I went for a change in my usual tactic of dividing my army in two and avoid the central part of the board – the why of this, well, I’m not sure yet; I think the idea of having Ironclads appearing in front of me and blocking my advancing route scared me :P – and deployed in a line: twenty gaunts on each flank and ten in the center, having another ten in reserve (to fill gaps and capture objectives), shooty Warriors, the Dakkafex and a Zoanthrope on the right flank, a heavy Carnifex and another Zoanthrope on the left flank, and my Hive Tyrant and the remaining Carnifex in the center. I reserved as always my Broodlord and his small retinue to do an outflank attack.

The left flank with the gaunts, zoanthrope and heavy 'fex

Right flank with gaunts and Warriors, threatened by an Ironclad Dreadnought

Center of my deployment. Note my Tyrant hiding behind a building to avoid lascannon fire

I failed to seize initiative and the battle began, with an Ironclad pod landing on my right flank, where I just had a Dakkafex (who sucks at close combat) and a Zoanthrope to deal with it. The Thunderfire cannon killed most of the central spinegaunts in his first salvo (where did this weapon came from??) while the Whirlwind fired and missed completely (I’ve noticed that indirect fire is everything but accurate). The scouts killed a few spinegaunts on the left side. In my turn, I responded with a general advance of my troops and a very poor shooting phase, killing only three miniatures after placing five small and three big templates (not a good start, actually).

At the beginning of turn two, another drop pod landed in my left flank and another Ironclad emerged from it, burning one of the spinegaunt brood with his heavy flamer that, thanks to Tu’Shan, counted as twin-liked; leaving only one gaunt alive. The Thunderfire cannon killed some termagaunts, while, the Whirlwind missed again, and some spinegaunts of the right flank were killed by frag missile and bolter fire. Some wounds were placed on my Tyrant Guard and the Carnifex of the center by lascannon fire and Demolisher shells too. In my turn, the Broodlord appeared in the left flank and run towards the building where the scouts and the Thunderfire cannon were hiding, and my reserved termagaunts appeared in the center-right of my former battle line. I moved my Dakkafex towards the right edge of the board, trying to use it as a bait for the Ironclad, and fired to a combat squad on range, killing two marines. Both Zoanthropes in both flanks failed to hit both Ironclads (both+both+both = d’oh!!), and the rest of my shots failed to do anything. In the assault phase, the heavy ’fex on the left flank charged to the Ironclad and suffered a wound, destroying one of his close combat weapons in the process. If the start hadn’t been good, this second turn hadn’t also been too good for my army.

Turn three began as always: the three times damned Thunderfire cannon blowing up my gaunts – at this point I had lost over 60% of them, and that was a real problem because they were my only scoring units – and the Whirldwind missing again. Tu’Shan and his retinue advanced to face my Hive Tyrant in the close-and-personal way, while the venerable Dreadnought on the left flank killed a few genestealers of the Broodlord retinue with his heavy flamer first, and then charged the unit. On the other flank, the Ironclad killed a Tyranid Warrior but this was a mistake my opponent realized soon, because I removed the closest miniature to the Dreadnought and thus it wasn’t able to charge (and smash) the rest of the unit. The Whirlwind missed his shot, and another wound was put in the Carnifex on the center. During the assault phase of the left flank, my Broodlord and his genestealers destroyed the venerable Dreadnought before it could attack (at last a strike of luck!), losing one of his members when the machine exploded; and the heavy Carnifex lost another two wounds to the Ironclad before destroying it completely. Two Dreads less were good news for me, and my turn started with the Broodlord entering the building towards the Thunderfire cannon with very, very bad intentions; and the wounded heavy ‘fex advancing towards that building too, and fired towards the exposed side of the Demolisher, hitting it (S8 impact!) but being unable to penetrate its plating of 11 and failing in his task of preventing the tank from firing in the next turn. In the right flank, the Dakkafex killed another space marine; while the shooty warriors killed another three and pinned them, and the Zoanthropes were unable to hit anything (again). The assault phase had the Broodlord charging the Thunderfire cannon and tearing the Techmarine operator apart. Now this was a good turn, third time lucky I suppose :)

The Broodlord making a mess of the Salamanders' troops

Turn four had Tu’Shan charging the Hive Tyrant and the remaining Ironclad taking the bait and rushing forward the Dakkafex. The combined fire of the sniper scouts and the Demolisher finished my heavy ‘fex, and the Whirlwind missed his shot again (Mental note: if I ever have to use it, never rely on indirect fire). The rest of shots from the Salamanders were ineffective (does this word exist in English or am I making it up?). In the assault phase, the Ironclad shredded the Dakkafex (four hits, four wounds, bye bye Dakkafex), and then came the big combat between the big guys. My Tyrant attacked first due to his I6, and with his WS6 and four attacks he managed to kill… one space marine. Tu’Shan hit him three times, but failed to wound the monster; and the Tyrant Guard killed another marine. But then, the veteran sergeant of the squad put two wounds on the tyrant thanks to his power fist, and I knew he was doomed. In my fourth turn I swarmed the two objectives of my side with my remaining gaunts (28% of the initial ones) and fired my weapons to the marines to no effect. In the assault phase the Broodlord ate the sniper scouts, and the Tyrant killed two marines before being finished by Tu’Shan himself. As a response, the Tyrant guard killed the remaining veteran with power fist, but The Chapter Master of the Salamanders stood firm.

My Tyrant was not enough to defeat the Salamanders' Chapter Master. Next time I'll have my revenge...

And this was the end of the battle, because it was getting late and I had to go to my grandma’s for a family meal. I was declared winner for two objectives to one, but I would have liked to know what would have happened with one or two turns more. Probably Tu’Shan would have advanced, destroying everything in his path and contesting one of my objectives. Or maybe I would have finished the combat squad holding one of his objectives with my templates. Anyway, a great game, in which the only thing I missed was a higher amount of painted miniatures, and that has giving me the urge to paint more of my bugs. Hopefully for this Sunday’s battle (the first of the “Fist of the Emperor” campaign) I’ll have finished another unit of termagaunts I’ve been recently working into, and this will mean my first painting points of the year!

Tournament list test

2009-01-07T09:12:00.011+01:00

Briefing: again, this is a long post which deals about playing with tyranids; no eldar stuff in here. And I've been writing for over an hour, so it can be a bit dense. Am, I forgot my camera at home, so no pictures in this post. This all can make the reading a bit dull; be warned.

Okay, I had my ‘Nid army list ready for action (I love old Duke Nukem 3D sentences sooo much…) and it was about time to play a couple of friendly games with it before the beginning of the Inter-Store Tournament. I arranged a battle versus one of the red shirts of my city, who also happens to be a really nice guy and a good friend of mine, and we met for the challenge of beating his new and quite cheesy Space Marines (SM) with my hyperactive bugs.

I’ve been using for some months some of the quick reference sheets published by the bloggers of From the Warp (thank you so much), so it has become a piece of cake (Nukem rules again!) the previously tedious task of setting objectives, deployments and that stuff. The dice decided that we were going to play a Seize Ground mission with three objectives, which were placed in no-man’s land and quite symmetrically – one close to the left border of the table, another to the right border and the last one more or less in the center of the table. Only the objective on the right border (from my point of view) was in cover, and it was the one deployed by my opponent. I deployed mine in the open because, although I don’t know why, there seems to be a psychological rule saying that if one objective is in cover, you must reach & hold it as soon as possible; whereas if the objective is in the open, it becomes much less tempting, and you’ll have time in the last turns to approach and take it. I didn’t want to see quick-deploying marines reaching the objectives in turn 1 (or 2) and entrench there, where they would be difficult to throw out; and I had also been reading some tactical thoughts about placing objectives in the open in The Way of Saim-Hann blog, so I wanted to give this tactic a try.

Once the objectives were placed, the dice decided for a Dawn of War deployment, what had me taking first turn and deploying my Hive Tyrant and his retinue in the very center of the table, with one unit of spinegaunts to the right and another to the left. While deploying I had a funny idea and deployed the gaunts in a row, so I had the imaginary line that divided the board in two halves almost completely covered with my ‘nids. This was a great tactical movement, because in Dawn of War the player who deploys second can place his units anywhere in his own half of the board but not closer than 18” to any enemy unit. My deployment effectively restricted his deployment area to a maximum of 6-7” from his own table border, thus preventing his squads from occupying the ruins he had in his half of the board because they were placed more towards the center of the table. I’ll have to write down this tactic for further battles… The SM deployed a tactical unit in a rhino close to the right border, obviously aiming at capturing the objective in cover, and a squad of scouts in a building placed really close to my table border (pesky infiltration rules); while I declared that my Broodlord was attempting a flank advance (more pesky infiltration rules).

My opponent failed to seize initiative and the battle began. All my army but the infiltrating Broodlord came from my border, and the scouts were annihilated by a fire storm of fleshborers, deathspitters and devourers (my dakkafex killing three of them), while the Hive Tyrant advanced lonely and the spinegaunts in the center of the table lurked while waiting for additional synapse control. In his turn, my friend deployed a drop pod (my first drop pod!) with a tactical squad and a Chaplain in the left side, backed by a Land Speeder Tornado, and a Land Raider Crusader with seven assault terminators (four with thunder hammers) in the center of the board. The termies disembarked and run towards the Tyrant, while a squad of devastators ran behind the Land Raider towards a good-and-in-cover fire point.

At this point, I had to change all my tactical principles. The seven-man termie squad was by far superior in hand-to-hand combat to any of my units, even my Hive Tyrant. The new storm shields rules give them a 3+ invulnerable save, so an assault with my Tyrant or my ‘fexes would result in perhaps a termie or two less and surely a big bug less in my army, something I couldn’t afford if I wanted to win. What could I do then? Well, fortunately my army has a good resource to deal with these events, and it’s my brand new “Wound Saturation Tactic”; or in more common words, “fire everything over there”. Deathspitter and barbed strangler templates, coupled by fleshborer and devourer fire would help me thinning the ranks of these super-humans. So the Tyrant withdrew shamelessly (and running!) towards my table border while most of my army fired relentlessly to the terminators. Meanwhile, a Zoanthrope took control of the left flank, and the Broodlord deployed in the right side (pity, because I wanted him in the left side in order to eat that chaplain) and finished with the SM tactical unit that had already (and predictably) occupied the objective in cover in a single close combat round (he killed five marines and his retinue another five - perfect result). I didn’t know that units who flanked could assault the very turn they entered the table, but one of the redshirts nicely pointed in the rulebook that non-assault-when-you-deploy rules are only applicable to deep striking units. Good new for my stealers, indeed; and second squad out for the SM army.

My opponent moved his troops, and while his Land Raider and terminators advanced forward, his devastators reached a good-and-in-cover firing point; and the squad of the chaplain occupied some ruins close to the objective to the left. A rain of fire was directed towards my heavy Carnifex, and after failing a big bunch of armour saves, he was dead; as it was later the zoanthrope controlling the left flank (the remaining zoanthrope moving towards there to prevent the gaunts from falling back). In return, another Carnifex charged and destroyed the Land Raider, and some terminators died to acid projectiles. With the destruction of the Land Raider, the enemy’s forces were severely damaged, leaving (literally) a big hole in the center of his battleline, but nonetheless the SM kept pushing forward.

I was taking the upper hand, but the battle was far from won. His Chaplain squad could advance at any moment and contest the left side objective, hold by the moment by my gaunts, his devastators could do the same with the central objective, and his terminators were heading towards the right side objective. Besides, he had a fast moving Land Speeder that could contest any objective. But I knew that everything he could get at that moment were contested objectives, so I had a draw assured at minimum. I went for the win, firing wildly to the terminator unit until only two members remained, and then, to my surprise, they failed their morale test and flew, unable to regroup due to the proximity of my Broodlord and his retinue!! This unexpected event, coupled with the destruction of the rhino by the tyranid warriors, left the right side objective in my hands without opposition. The Land Raider-destroyer Carnifex advanced and engaged the devastators in close combat, finishing them. The central objective was also mine! And at this point, in the 6th turn, my opponent elegantly conceded defeat because all he could do was contesting one objective (the left one) with his Chaplain squad and another with his Land Speeder while I kept one controlled. Tyranid victory!

Some thoughts after the battle: I felt really uncomfortable during most of the battle, because I’m not used to face better hand-to-hand units than mine, but luckily I was cold-blooded enough to keep exploiting the strongest points of my army and, although using my troops in a somehow odd way, managed to achieve a good result. Placing two objectives in the open was a great idea too, because my opponent didn’t dare to approach them at the beginning of the game and preferred to stay in cover, close to them; which allowed me to swarm them with my gaunts to control/contest them. My opponent didn’t play very well, he should have advanced the Land Raider at top speed and disembark the termies in front of my lines, directly assaulting them, instead of walking through the battlefield while being shot to death (although at a very low rate thanks to that incredible armour). My inability to deal with vehicles was stated again; it was a lucky roll what I got to destroy the Land Raider, but the Land Speeder was a constant pain I couldn’t shoot down; and it took me four turns to destroy a fast-moving and empty rhino in close combat – and it needed to be stunned first with a deathspitter salvo. I think I’m gonna have trouble with mechanized lists.

Happy 2009!!

2009-01-05T16:34:00.006+01:00

New year already! Wow, these last days have passed so fast I've barely have time to spend in the hobby. My last post is from the 16th of December! Oh my, Christmas time is sooo consuming... meeting the family, doing a lot of shopping, calling old friends, fighting the flu... every year the same story for me :)

I've had two weeks of holidays and this is the very first really free day of the agenda. So all my carefully planned painting schedules have been ruined, as always. OK, on Wednesday I'll come back to my working routine, maybe then I'll be able to keep painting at a consistent pace... I really hope so.

Meanwhile, I've taken a pinture of my eldar warhost at its current state. The Vyper is not finished yet, and I challenge you to guess which will be the next addition to the force... c'mon, its easy!

Currently I'm painting some termagaunts (like the one lurking behind the blue guys in the picture), I'd like to have an all painted tyranid army for the inminent inter-store tournament; after that I'll continue with my Alaitoc force. And talking about painting and schedules, I've just read a post from Lone Pilgrim about giving oneself some kind of "score" for painting minis, and I've liked the idea a lot (thanks mate). I'm sure it will encourage me to finish my army sooner, and other minis as well. I've thought of something like this, very similar to his scoring style:

Infantry miniatures in standard round bases - 1 point
Heavy infantry (big round bases), bikes and the stuff - 2 points
Light vehicles, dreadnoughts, monstruous creatures, walkers, etc. AND top grade painted minis (e.g. commanders) - 5 points
Vehicles - 10 points
Superheavies - 20 points (although these are not in my list)

Let's go working :)

Inter-store tournament

2008-12-16T10:24:00.012+01:00

After more or less one month without visiting my local GW store, I paid it a visit last Friday, with the idea of arranging a game (with my tyranids) against anyone wanting to. As I got in, a new advertisement hanging from a wall attracted my attention. It read something like “New WH40K Campaign: Fist of the Emperor”, and was an event organised by some hobby stores of the area (GW and non GW). These events are rather infrequent where I live, and it gives me the opportunity of enjoying at least twice games per month, so I knew I have been very, very lucky to know of this on time, because I had to fill in my entry on Monday the latest. The very Saturday I was back in the store, with a copy of my army list and the money for the registration.

Both this inter-store championship and my list – and the way – I play with tyranids have already been mentioned before, so I will just make a mental exercise of reminding myself what I have to do (I’m not a frequent gamer, so this reflection is more than necessary). Well, I have this terrifying beast of Hive Tyrant and his tyrant guard, who remain yet to be beaten in close combat. These will advance relentlessly towards the enemy through cover (if possible), and will be backed by a zoanthrope and some units of gaunts (about 30 gaunts), and maybe the Dakkafex too. This will give my opponent a clear objective to shoot, won’t it? Meanwhile, the warriors will take a nice firing place and spit acid death over the battlefield, and some other gaunts (about 30 again) and another zoanthrope will hold back to take objectives and that stuff. Two Carnifexes with barbed stranglers and scything talons will hold back for the first turns (if possible, in cover) firing and weakening infantry squads, and then will advance while firing to exploit the holes made by the kamikaze assault group and hopefully cause havoc in the enemy lines (this tactic worked sooo well in my last game that I want to repeat it as many times as possible). The Broodlord and his retinue will outflank the enemy, working at the same time as a bait/fire magnet that if manages to reach an objective, will probably chew it up completely.

That’s mostly all. I tried to keep it simple in general terms, but if I face an army that I know that will kick my ass if I play in this way, I’ll try to think of an alternative. My main “Plan B” is negating a possibly disastrous deployment by reserving everything, although this is a very risky tactic, useful only if I play Kill Points missions (my weakest with this army list). Anyway, the best way of improving my tactics is playing games, so I’ll try to learn something from every one of them; and hopefully in a few months I’ll be a hard challenge in the battlefield for any opposing general.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Army List – Hive Fleet Nidhågg

HQ

- Hive Tyrant: all kind of close combat directed biomorphs, scything talons, bonesword & lash whip, Psychic Scream. Retinue of two tyrant guards
- Broodlord: feeder tendrils, toxin sacks, flesh hooks and reinforced carapace. Retinue of six genestealers

Elite

- Tyranid Warriors (5): toxin sacks, reinforced carapace and scything talons. Deathspitter (4) and barbed strangler (1)
- Carnifex: enhanced senses, twin-linked devourers (2)
- Carnifex: scything talons and barbed strangler

Core units

- Spinegaunts: three units of 10
- Termagaunts: two units of 10, one unit of 11

Heavy Support

- Carnifex: a more resilient one. Scything talons and barbed strangler
- Zoanthropes (2): Warp Blast and Synapse Creature

Total: 1.500 points, six scoring units (good!), sixteen kill points (d’oh!)

Eldar War Walkers

2008-12-12T12:42:00.007+01:00

Although I haven't finished painting my 500 points list yet, I've already started thinking on its evolution to a 1.000 points list, and the units that will be added to my army to achieve this goal. I have several things in mind, but today I feel like writing about my reflections on one of the units I like most of the eldar army: the war walkers.

Eldar war walkers have for me the strongest point to consider when choosing a unit: really cool models!! And also one of the most important secondary points: they're plastic!! The combination of these factors made them a must in my army, and when I started considering their colour scheme and pre-viewed in my mind the results, it was totally clear that I had to use them no matter the cost.

In terms of rules, eldar war walkers have some obvious strong and weak points that can be summarised basically in that they are super-shooters made of crystal. They are a nimble and versatile heavy weapons platform, being able to move like infantry and so benefiting of a safer movement through difficult terrain and the running special rule if they need so; but are also extremely fragile with an all-round AV10 which offers a reliable protection from lasguns only. The squadron rule saves you some points in spirit stones, but destroys them if immobilized, so it's neither an advantage nor a disadvantage. They pack an extra trick too, with their scouts special rule, which allows them to perform an additional move before the battle starts (which can be of some aid in certain cases as a small redeployment tactic) or make a flank attack if they are hold in reserve (this new tactic among my favourites for its inherent "Surprise!" factor). Their BS is average, scoring hits in a 4+ roll, but their basic cost is ridiculous (30 points plus weapons). All in all, an interesting unit that should be used wisely.

When choosing weaponry for your walkers, you must have into account three things:

A. They're BS3, so hitting percentage is 50%
B. They're extremely fragile, and most of the time they need to stay out of enemy range or receive cover saves for their survival
C. Their cost in point depends a lot on the weapons their carry

You can use different combinations of weapons on your walkers to fulfil different roles on the battlefield, but I've seen them more commonly equipped with a common weapon and thus becoming a specialized unit. I'll be using them in this way too, because in terms of eldar fluff I favour the idea of specialized units (it's their way, so I better won't change it). And when it comes the time for arming them, these are the options:

Brightlances: very good tank hunting weapons, with a medium-long range. On the paper it sounds very good to have a unit of tank hunters on legs, but let's admit it, these guys are not snipers (A) and cost a lot of points if equipped with these weapons (C), and it's not pleasant to see a 90 points model disabled by bolter shots (B). I consider this option too expensive and not very reliable; eldars have better tank hunters than those and with a lower prize. Not in my list unless I'm facing an Armoured Fist of the imperial guard.

Starcannons: the bane of heavy infantry, two shots per weapon, medium-long range. This option packs an average of two S6 AP2 hits per walker in the unit, which will terrify any space marine/necron/tyranid nidzilla player. But power doesn't come without cost, and at 80 points per model it's still an expensive option, though I'll seriously consider it when facing some armies such as Ravenwing or Plague Marines armies. In the last Eldar Codex, starcannons were downgraded to two shots per round (instead of three), and the new WH40K rules have nerfed them a bit more with the improvement of cover saves, so they're not the weapons they used to be; but can be devastating if used properly (just read the posts of Fritz in his The Way of Saim-Hann blog). In a tournament with fixed lists this may not be the best of the options, but can save you the day when facing one of those heavily-armoured-infantry armies, and will provide good support against most other foes, excluding imperial guard and the kind.

Eldar Missile Launchers: versatile weapons with long range. Eldar missile launchers are some of the less used eldar weapons, maybe lacking some of the eldar glamour, but nevertheless are very effective. S8 AP3 shots can deal with most armoured targets but those with AV14, but again their average accuracy (A) does not make them the best unit for tank hunting; and their S4 AP4 template is quite good when dealing with medium and light infantry. This versatility is at the same time their main handicap, not being excessively efficient in neither those roles; but when combined with the scouts special rule and the flank deployment it allows it gives you the advantage of being able to surprise a tank from its back (or rear, if you're lucky) and catching infantry hiding behind rubble in the open (and thus negating cover saves). All in all, probably the most versatile option, with a medium-high cost of 70 points, which outstands against an army in particular… can you guess which?

Eldar Scatter Laser: medium-long range weapons with an insane rate of fire. Each of these weapons packs four (yes, FOUR) S6 AP6 shots, so a unit of three war walkers with scatter laser means… 24 shots!! This is translated in 12 hits on average, or 18 if you guide the unit. Who is scared of orks now? This option is the most praised by everybody: it combines good anti-infantry firepower, specially against poorly armoured foes, but being also a threat for heavily armoured enemies due to the sheer amount of wounds they can cause (after all, 3+ saving throws are also failed); and also some anti-tank ability, specially against light vehicles such as transports or light walkers but also against heavier vehicles if you manage to surprise them with a brilliant flank deployment (this scouts rule is truly amazing). Moreover, when facing S4+ or better armies, you can place the walkers in cover or behind scenery without fear of having obscured line of sight to the enemy; their armour save will always be equal or better than the cover save you granted them in this way, and in return you get a cover save yourself, something very good for the survival of the walkers (B). With a medium cost of 60 points per model, I understand why this is the most popular option of all.

Shuriken Cannon: medium range weapon with high rate of fire. The lightest of all the eldar heavy weapons packs three S6 AP5 shots, and can be considered as the younger brother of the scatter laser, with less range and rate of fire, and a slightly better AP. This weapon option is often dropped by most players, who don't even consider it a "heavy" weapon; but as it happens with the scatter laser it allows you to use cover in your favour, and is lethal when used against orks, imperial guard, small tyranids and other eldars in the open. For the ridiculous cost of 40 points per model (what can be called a sale), you can get a unit that will surely surprise your opponent, and ruining his/her plans with such a simple unit makes your victory count as double!

After these thoughts, I guess I'll be using the scatter laser or shuriken cannon settings most of the time, depending on how tight on points I am. But I wont discard starcannons and missile launchers against certain armies… by the way, have you guessed which army is really afraid of eldar missile launchers? Of course, the Tau! F8 AP3 ammo means instant death to Crisis Battlesuits, and S4 AP4 templates can decimate fire warriors in the open. You see, every weapon has its strong point...

Edit: I forgot to mention the pinning special rule the EMS has... another good point when facing armies with average or low leadership... I definitely should try them sometime.

Advances achieved

2008-12-02T10:23:00.010+01:00

The army is growing!!

Well, not exactly a flow of troops, but I've finished painting five basic Dire Avengers. It has taken me ages, due to both the facts of still being under recovery from my broken leg and the damned colour scheme I've picked for them. It seems that I never learn…

I had first planned to paint them using the standard GW scheme, but then I had one of those moments of inspiration and decided to try something completely different. I wanted to give them a really serious looking style, standing out their elite role in the army, something generally obviated in favour of other aspect warriors; and at the same time I wanted to give them a monastic and sober look, in order to point out their courage and stoical attitude in battle. So these guys were going to have a very reduced pallete of colours, and a single contrast colour. And they weren't going to be painted in GW's style, but more in Rackham's, meaning softer highlights and different mixtures of paints.

So I started with a basecoat of Enchanted Blue, washed it with a mixture of Iyanden Darksun and Badab Black (those ink products are priceless for army painters, how have I been able to live before they were released?) and then repainted Enchanted Blue in most of the armor plates and progressively highlighted them with Hawk Turquoise (two highlights were enough for me). I painted the facemask, the crest of hair, the shuriken catapult and some other accesories with Chaos Black, and highlighted them (but the facemask) with Scaly Green, Scaly + Snot Green (50/50), and pure Snot Green. Also painted all the gems and eyes in green colours. Finally, I painted the clothes, ribbons and the two stripes-for-troop-integration in white for contrast. The result was different and good indeed, at least for me, although the miniatures turned out to be a bit too dark, and the highlight work is so subtle that it can only be appreciated at close range and not in the tabletop (a real pity, but hey, that's also something I've learnt with this experiment). Also, my camera seems to have problems to distinguish between blue and turquoise, and the pictures I've taken don't do justice to the paintjob, but that's something I can't change by now.

Finally, I Photoshop-ed the pictures in order to give them a cooler look. Well, at least that was the idea; I'm not an expert on photo edition. But again, I'm happy with the results :) Those Avengers look really menacing! Shake with fright mon-keigh, the true warriors of Asuryan are coming!

Hope you like those guys. Advice and suggestions are always welcome!

Chipped paint tutorial

2008-11-17T09:22:00.017+01:00

In my previous post I posted some pics showing an experiment I had made on weathering techniques. Some people have asked me how I did it, and I’ve tried my best to write a SBS with some pictures. Hope this is ok, I’m really a noob with those writing-and-explaining things.

For some time, I’ve been amazed with the weathering effects I’ve seen in recent models. Well, with recent I mean since 2006 or so. It’s obvious that in the painting community there have been some kind of changes, evolving from the omnipresent “old school” style (McVey’s old ‘Eavy Metal style) to more diverse trends and schools, each of them very well defined. We have now the non-metallic metal (NMM) trend, for example, which has become very popular (thanks for example to the painting staff of Rackham miniatures); and opposed to it we have the True Metallics trend, which has redefined the way of painting with metallic paints. Besides, different styles or “schools” have been created, each one with its distinctive characteristics: some use glazing as the main resource, some aim at ultra-realistic painting, some use freehands extensively, and so on.

Of all these styles and schools, the best known and respected for professional painters is undoubtedly the French school. Their style of extreme cleanliness and super-smooth colour transitions, coupled with several new and original colour theories, have placed them at the Olympus of the miniature painters for a long time. This doesn’t mean that the best painters in the world are French, of course there are great painters in all the world, but their style is clearly defined, easily recognized and justly feared in all the Golden Demon contests. Moreover, recent achievements obtained by some other different schools owe to the French school part of their basis, sharing with it several concepts (such as colour theory) although following a different evolution in other fields.

One field the French painters started developing a couple of years ago were new and more realistic weathering techniques, especially focused on rust in metals and damages in paint (chipped paint). I remember being amazed when looking to those superb paintjobs in Coolmini, wondering how in Earth was possible to paint that, and firmly believing that never in my life I’d be able to do something like that.

Until last week.

In recent years, my own style has also evolved. I used to paint in the “old school” style (still my favourite for painting miniatures for gaming), but then I started becoming more interested in the new techniques I was seeing being developed. I was lucky enough to know a couple of high-level painters who were also very friendly, and they taught me different tricks and gave me useful tips for improving my painting. Also, I found in internet almost endless resources on the field of miniature painting. With the passing of the time, I have gathered a lot of resources in different webpages, hand-written notes in my notebook, and also a couple of books I’ve procured. And it was about time to put them to work.

Ok, sorry for this long introduction. Now let’s go to business: the Star Vagabonds’ chipped paint tutorial (or how to spoil nicely flat surfaces with rust). And to make it easy (and short) I’ll make it simple, using as example a plastic rod from any plastic kit (see brush for size reference).

I didn’t prime the rod to save time, and directly painted it with Shadow Grey. Then I gave it a few glazes of Chaos Black and Space Wolves Grey to give it some volume, although this effect is barely recognisable on the pictures, due to poor lighting (it is possible to see it better in the yellow painted – orange glazed rod of my previous post).

Then I took a small piece of sponge (or foam, well I don’t know how to say it in English; any help over there?). The size of its “grain” is important, as it must be very small. I used the material GW supplies with its blisters, the very same material where the rod is laying on the pictures.

I made a mix of Dark Flesh and Bestial Brown, dipped a little bit the sponge in it and carefully but quickly “hit” with it the places of the rod where I wanted to have rust. In this step it is very important to have a colour that is really rust-looking (Dark Flesh mixes are perfect), and also to place this rust in natural places for it, such as sharp edges and broken parts of the material (the edge of the rod, for example). And also, it is essential to remember that less is more, and overdoing with the sponge will ruin the general effect. Be gentle with it, and it will reward you. This is the result I obtained.

Last, you can add a few more details, such as different tones of rust (I used Vermin Brown for it) or even bare metal showing itself under the rust. But remember that those are just details, don’t overdo them. Less is more!

The final step to give real volume to the chips of paint would be underlining the rust areas with a thin line of a colour lighter than the base. That would be Space Wolves Grey in our case, but I was feeling too lazy to do it in a plastic rod. Instead, I’ll post a picture of the Warmachine Deathripper I’ve painted this weekend to show this effect (sorry for the poor quality of the picture).

This effect can be used in a lot of surfaces, but excels in flat surfaces, such as those found on vehicles or certain miniatures (space marines, for example). But the possibilities are infinite, and yours to play with them.

Sport is dangerous

2008-11-11T09:35:00.015+01:00

It’s been about two weeks since my last post, but this doesn’t mean I’ve stopped painting and/or modelling during this time for no reason. The truth is that last week I broke my fibula while playing soccer, and I’ve been very busy laying on bed and cursing my fate.

Despite this, I’ve managed to paint for short (quite short) periods of time, and I’ve made some progress with my dire avengers. One of them is already finished, I hope to show you a pic of him this very week. And I’ve made certain progress on my weathering techniques, I’ve made some tests with a plastic rod (from a Wave Serpent plastic kit) and I’m more than pleased with the results.

Apart from that, not too much to say. Oh, well, I’m really jealous of my fellow bloggers who keep on their good work with painting advices, battle reports, and that stuff. I hate you guys. But I admit that some of the articles I’ve read this week are pretty interesting, especially the FTW article on photography tricks (although I favour Photoshop over Picasa, but the methodology is quite the same).

Ow, I have to recover as soon as possible. I'm a dreadful patient. And I want to paint!

Starting small

2008-10-23T12:02:00.005+02:00

I’ve been thinking of finishing a first batch of miniatures and start using them for playing in small battles of about 500 points, mainly because it’s going to take me a looong time to finish painting 1.500 points of eldar, and I think I can have those first 500 points finished before Christmas – or during Christmas holidays the latest.

I’ve thought of a very simple list, with 3 core units and a fast attack option – the main reason being that I’ve already painted a unit of guardians and a vyper, and I’m on the way of painting a dire avenger unit. So the idea is this:

- Eldar guardians (10) with brightlance grav platform. This unit includes a warlock with witch blade and the embolden psychic power.

- Dire avengers (10), including an exarch with dual shuriken catapults and the bladestorm exarch power

- Eldar storm guardians (10), with a flamer and a fusion gun (the special weapons included in the boxed set). This unit includes a warlock with singing spear and the enhance psychic power.

- Vyper with scatter laser and shuriken cannon

Now, the main trouble for this will be finding somebody willing to play those really small battles with me…

Contest open!

2008-10-21T11:09:00.005+02:00

Fritz, from the Way of Saim-Hann blog, has started a painting contest focused on a jetbike mounted eldar HQ. Apart from applauding his initiative (great idea man!) I haven’t been able to do much more, being my painting schedule so tight currently. The entries for this contest are very original indeed, and there are several good paintjobs there too.

Check it and vote your favourite!

Monday night game

2008-10-15T16:06:00.008+02:00

Briefing: this post is quite long, and deals about playing with tyranids, currently my main army; so no eldars today, sorry. Nevertheless, if you want to get some gaming tips to use with or against these bugs, you are welcome to keep reading :) And of course, if anybody has a comment or suggestion, is also very welcome to write it down.

Last Monday I went to my local GW store, where I had to play a game against one of its friendly red shirts. Where I live, games are usually played on a 2.000 point basis, but for this time we agreed on playing a 1.500 points battle. Why? Well, basically two reasons: first, I’ve lately realized that playing against 2.000 points of nids (my army) means a battle of no less than 3 hours, including deployment and that stuff. I suppose that’s normal when you have an army of around 100 miniatures; I wonder how long will it take me to play a “Green Tide” ork player… but I’m sure it will undoubtedly be very funny! The second reason is the organization of our imminent inter-store championship; where gamers of all my area will be competing for several months, each one defending one gaming store of my county; and all the battles must have a maximum of 1.500 points per side, so this was an excellent occasion to make trials with different army lists.

I always play with the same army, more or less. It is composed by the minis I’ve got with the passing of the years, from different presents such as battleforces, plastic boxes and so on; so I have to stick to those minis I have, and I can’t make big variations in my army list. That’s not a problem, because these minis are the ones I like most (gaunts, carnifexes and warriors mainly), and are mainly made of my favourite wargaming component: plastic.

So then I ran an army with a close combat Hive Tyrant with two tyranid guards (which to date have simply eaten everything that has crossed their path – including a C’tan), and an infiltrating Broodlord with a retinue of 11 genestealers. Fire support was provided by a unit of six warriors with deathspitters, two zoanthropes with warp blast and two Carnifexes with barbed stranglers. Basic units were sixty gaunts (half termagaunts, half spinegaunts) in six units of ten, whose mission was seizing objectives. My opponent played Dark Angels, and had four squads of five marines, one five-man squad of the Deathwing, a Land Raider Crusader, a Whirlwind, a Demolisher and a Venerable Dreadnought, all commanded by Belial. Mission played was “Seize Ground” with four objective markers, with the “Pitched Battle” deployment.

I won the roll for starting the game, so I deployed first. Everything was in cover (just in case he stole me the initiative and got first turn), but the broodlord, who was in reserve to outflank the enemy. My enemy did more or less the same. First couple of turns were excellent for the nids, thanks mainly to the new rules on templates, and in my very first turn I killed 7 space marines just shooting with the warriors (five small s6 templates and a big s4 one are nothing to laugh at) and the carnifexes (adding another two big s8 templates). I call that tactic “wound saturation”, ‘cause even the finest power armour of the galaxy can’t protect all your soldiers when the enemy causes more than twenty wounds to your units in a single shooting round. That tactic is now even better, due to the new rules on wounds allocation, and a couple heavy/special weapons were lost for the marines (nice!). My opponent was surprised of this firing power – he wasn’t expecting that from the nids – and we changed roles; he advancing towards my fire line whereas I was re-deploying my troops and firing at him.

The only unit of my army that advanced forward like a furious juggernaut was the Tyrant and his retinue, managing to kill a unit of marines and destroying the Dreadnought before blowing up in a cloud of ichor and dribble when the Demolisher got a direct hit on them. It was not a problem, because their work was done; they diverted most of my enemy’s firepower – and I must say that it was hilarious when he managed to get two wounds on the tyrant firing just bolters – and destroying part of the marine’s army (at the end we made some calculations, and realised that the big guy had paid his points back – wooo!!). On the other side of the board, the broodlord advanced relentlessly towards the enemy, under a rain of fire that was wiping genestealers from his retinue very, very fast.

I kept holding back and firing my enemy until turn 4, when I advanced to claim the objectives. The already punished units of marines were not rival for my carnifexes (which also had scything talons – who said multipurpose ‘fexes don’t work?), and they wiped out two combat squads and the Land Raider. The Broodlord survived a specially intense turn of fire, in which the Crusader fired everything it had to him and the last member of his retinue, and again thanks to the new wound allocation rule it caused him four bolter wounds he saved with his reinforced chitin (3+ armour save), while the genestealer died from two wounds of assault cannon, two of bolter fire and one of multimelta. Then, he chewed up a combat squad of marines and the whirlwind. Nasty beast :)

On the other hand, the Deathwing squad advanced towards one of the objectives no matter the rain of fire falling on them. Albeit I left the unit very, very weakened – leaving just a lightning claws terminator and Belial himself – this couple managed to open a bloody path through three units of gaunts (killing one every turn) and a zoanthrope, and there they stood claiming an objective (Belial’s special rule allows him to pick terminators as core units, being able then to hold objectives)… until the warriors shot them and killed the last termie of the unit.

After seven turns, my opponent only had the Demolisher and a wounded Belial remaining, while I was controlling two objectives. Great victory for my bugs!

As a conclusion of the battle, I must admit that the few games I had played before under the new 5th ed. Rules had served me well in tactical terms; thanks to what I’ve learned from them I knew well how to time my movements, and for the first time in years I had a real tactical plan with my army, instead of just deploying and advancing wildly towards the enemy. New template rules are terrific with some troops, and the tyranid warriors were claimed “unit of the game”, killing in total 10 space marines and the last scoring termie (the one mentioned above), and even wounding Belial himself, just with shoots and more shoots; and providing the synapse necessary to allow my gaunts to hold two objectives; having lost just two members out of six. Amazing performance! The Broodlord was also terribly effective when it reached combat; now the feeder tendrils allow you to repeat all failed rolls to hit and that rule is terrific! The Hive Tyrant was also good, a close combat behemoth as always, although he was dead for turn three; and the Carnifexes also did an excellent job. Nice!

Next game I’ll make a “small” adjustment to this army list, dropping from eleven to six the retinue of the Broodlord and reducing the squad size of the warriors to five, to count with some more punch… in the form of a Dakkafex, a Carnifex with two twin-linked devourers. Cool!!

My first fire dragon

2008-10-13T11:28:00.009+02:00

Although I’ve decided to stick to non-vivid colours when painting my eldars, sometimes I simply can’t help making changes on the way (and that’s something applicable to every aspect of my life). Thus, I’ve devised a good painting scheme of blues & bones for the core of the army (that means guardians and vehicles), but now I can’t think of applying the same concept for the specialist warriors, who are different and peculiar troops (“special(ist)” troops we could say). It also must be said that sometimes I suffer from a weird disease called “painters' fever”, whose effects are hallucinations with different sizes of brushes and pots of paints mixed, coupled with the imperious urge to capture all these ideas on a mini.

The combination of all those ideas was the decision of painting my specialist warriors breaking the main colour scheme of the army, and also trying something different with them, something even daring, both in their colour scheme and in the technique used.

First specialist warriors I decided to paint were the fire dragons (because the minis are just so cool). Well, I haven’t painted all of them, just one; but that’s because that’s the way I usually do things when experimenting with colour schemes, and only once I’m pleased with the results obtained (usually after a lot of that on-the-way changes) I start with my standard “painting line”.

So the first consideration was: how was I going to paint them? Let’s take a look to some fire dragons painted in a standard colour scheme (GW’s one):

They look very nice, don’t they? Bright and hot colours, fitting very well to their “flame-ish” background and their “melta” role and weapons. But… there is something missing here… there is no contrast between the undersuit and the reinforcement plates, and although that’s not a problem with darker colour schemes (such as dark reaper’s ones), I don’t like it for brighter colours, so… what to do?

Well, first, choice of colours. After some minutes of thinking, I decided to stick to a limited palette of two main colours, a contrast colour and an extra neutral colour for some parts. Thus, I decided for dark red and blue-ish white for the main colours (undersuit and reinforcement plates, respectively), with dark grey (almost black) as the neutral colour, and some dots of blue for the contrast on details. While black and blue are easy colours to paint, and I’ve recently mastered (more or less) a red-painting technique of my own recipe, white is a colour that demands a lot of work and is very difficult to paint properly, but if painted carefully can lead to excellent results. I also went for a grey basecoat, the one I favour lately above the rest just because I’ve achieving very good results with it. And after a few hours of trying different combinations, the mini was finished.

I’m really pleased on how it turned out. The picture is not good at all, I’m sorry; I’ll try to shoot better ones once I finish making my light box – based on this excellent article – but shows quite well the idea I’ve trying to carry out: a contrast nice to the eye, and a different scheme for a miniature. This result reminds me somehow of the Star Wars stormtroopers hehe; with the undersuit black instead of red he could be one of Lord Vader’s personal guards.

I attempted some OSL in the mouth of the weapon, but didn’t turn out well, so I dropped it for a simple glowing effect like the one you can see on Warmachine miniatures (this is difficult to see in the picture due to light reflection, hope to solve it someday). I also like the eye very much (I admit that I’ve been veeery lucky with its result), and also the blue ribbon hanging from his waist; the two stripes it shows are being used as a technique of “troop integration” and are being painted on very infantry miniature of the army, in different places and colours (see eldar guardians soon).

So I’ve finished my first specialist warrior! Only seven more to go, hehehe. I’m planning to paint them on two groups of three, and finally paint the exarch; but due to my painting schedule – really too many projects currently – that won’t happen until March next year. Meanwhile he will be a nice addition to my bedroom cabinet :)

About the last Games Day

2008-10-07T15:15:00.025+02:00

A couple of weeks ago was hold the main and most popular of all Games Days around the world, the UK GD. Crowded with thousands of people, from dedicated gamers to master-crafted painters; and full of all types of Games Workshop imagery, to an extend never seen before, and blah, blah, blah.

Well, at least that’s what my friends have told me, since I didn’t have the chance to attend the event. What they’ve told me is that it has nothing to do with any other games Day they’ve seen (and that means many), this one being much bigger and crowded than the rest. I suppose that the fact of being at its home place has something to do with it.

But what I can say without any doubt, and I don’t need to go there to make sure myself, is that the Golden Demon Contest hold there is by far the most popular of all, to which people of dozens of different countries travel to show their stunning pieces of art. Every year, some of the best miniature painters of the world gather there and compete to win a Demon Trophy and the UK Slayer Sword, the ultimate prize for a painter of Games Workshop miniatures. And every year we, simple mortals, are presented with some of the most amazing creations anybody can dream of; from exquisitely painted miniatures to scratchbuilt conversions, all of them full with a small spark of that thing some people uses to call magic.

This year I’ve seen some really new and interesting jobs, especially in the “Duel” category; where the entries have been really great. May this serve me as inspiration, because I’ve been working in a project for the Golden Demon for over a year… yes, I’m that slow at painting. The Slayer Sword was awarded to Nano, who sculpted and painted a superb Space Marine; congratulations to him and all the winners! I must say that his mini is not exactly my cup of tea, specially the choice of colours; but I admit that his technique is perfect, and the Sword is well deserved. Here there are some pics of the green and the finished piece.

Next post: my first fire dragon…

So many ideas in my head…

2008-09-30T11:08:00.004+02:00

... and too many things to do preventing me from posting!

Last week I’ve been really busy and I have barely had time to write some lines in the blog. But that doesn’t mean that I’ve been idle on my eldar project, not at all. First, I’ve spent some hours trying to pick a colour scheme for my fire dragons, and after a few hours painting on a model I think I have it (hurray!). I’ve also played two games last week (what is a lot for a person who used to play a game every 2-3-months) with my nids, being defeated once by some hard-hitting black templars and snatching a last-turn draw from a serious defeat in a game last Sunday against imperial guard (3 hellhounds giving me a lot of trouble with my smaller nids). Aaand I’ve also been reviewing the pictures from GD UK ’08, specially Golden Demon ones, and I have to admit that in some categories, it’s definitely been the best of all times (just check the “Duel” entries, simply a step forward from the typical dioramas we used to see). And last but not least, I’ve got some magnets that will help me a lot with my idea of a fully customizable eldar army.

I expect to write all this down in the following days!

Prices rising!

2008-09-25T16:37:00.005+02:00

I'm in a rush at the moment, 'cause I've just noticed that in a couple of days Games Workshop is increasing prices in all their non-plastic products; and I forgot it completely! This afternoon I'll head to my local store to mail order the last bits for my alredy planned 2.000 points army, such as a farseer, autarch, specialist warriors blisters, a special edition ranger and that stuff around 100 € (that is, 150 $). Saving between 15%-30% of that money will be great!

If you also forgot about the new prices, you'd better hurry up too!!

Recurrent problem (and big tamtrum)

2008-09-22T11:55:00.008+02:00

Shit happens. Everybody knows. But some things really drive me nuts.

Imagine that you’ve just finished painting a model you want to use in your games. You may have invested a lot of time and effort on it (specially if it is a relevant model on a table, like a commander or so) and you don’t want your finely painted model to be damaged during a battle (battle damage is cool when painted on a model, not when suffered by it). So what can you do? The answer is simple: protect your model. How? Well, you can use different methods, such as glass covers and stuff (seriously, I’ve seen it!), but for miniature gamers the most broadly extended method of protecting miniatures is varnishing them.

Varnish. The sound of that word gives the creeps to most of the top miniature painters I know (and I know several Golden Demon winners). They keep reminding me not to use it, and I keep telling them that apart from painting I also play with the minis, and therefore varnish is essential to keep them in good shape and avoid as much as possible those eventual scratches that come with the use, touch and falling (ouch!) of the miniatures; so it is a must for me. By the way, I have to congratulate Nano for his well deserved Slayer Sword in the last UK’s GD, your painting really rocks man. Keep up the good work!

Now back to our subject. There are plenty of varnishes out there in the market, lots of different brands and types, and in different formats (mainly intended either to be applied by brush or by spray). Personally, I don’t like a gloss finish on a mini, I mean, I DON’T LIKE IT, because in my opinion it ruins all the careful work of layering, blending and glazing a miniature giving it a completely different look. Even with miniatures to which I haven’t dedicated too much time (such as typical core troops – for example gaunts in my tyranid army) I really hate having a glossy finish on them. I think that gloss varnish should be used only for really glossy surfaces, such as watery or bloody ones, for example, but not for faces, clothes or even weapons.

Ok, no problem – you can think – just use a matt varnish. Matt varnish. Hah! As if it were so easy to find a REAL matt varnish! Most of the “matt” varnishes I’ve checked are not real matt, but satin varnishes. Crap! And as far as I’ve checked through the interned and talked with loads (and loads, and loads…) of other painters, I’ve discovered that there is just one real matt varnish in the world: Testors Dullcote. And I’ve also discovered that it is impossible to get it outside America or the UK, due to shipping restrictions on the product. Super crap!

So in the last years, I’ve trying different brands of varnishes available in my local stores (not only GW stores). I’ve found that GW’s “Purity Seal” is a satin varnish that luckily suits quite well the look of my nids (in the future I’ll post here some pics of them too), but is unacceptable for other minis (like high elves). I tried several other brands till I found the one that, although not completely matt, gives a minimum satin effect to my miniatures: Vallejo’s Matt Varnish. Currently I’m happy with it, but I use it only in my gaming minis, not the display ones.

At this point, everything was more or less wine and roses with my minis and the varnish, until yesterday I made – again – a mistake when varnishing a mini: I oversprayed it A LITTLE. I’ve done this too many times, but I find it impossible to control when applying varnish with a spray. The result? First, a super glossy surface in my carefully-painted-with-all-my-love weapons platform; then, some round circular spots with a white borders; finally, cries of anger of the painter (yes, that’s me).

Luckily, it has only affected a small area (the back part of the brightlance), and it wont take me more than two minutes to fix it, but it could have been much worse, and that's really annoying.

This problem happens to me not really very often, but yes every now and then. I spray the minis from a reasonable distance, in an open environment (the balcony of my flat), and quickly. And even that, this shit keeps happening. Guess I’ll have to live with it, but I’d kill for a can of Testors, or for some good advice on varnishing miniatures with spray…

First and (probably) last painting session

2008-09-15T16:16:00.014+02:00

Well, at least for my girlfriend, hehe.

Last Friday I had the brilliant idea of arranging a painting session at home, and I asked my girlfriend to come and try her skills with the brush. So I cleaned part of the kitchen’s table, brought there my lamp, water, paints and that stuff; so we can have a nice environment this first time painting together.

I gave her one eldar guardian, already assembled and primed; and I took another, so I could explain her what to do while I did it myself. That seemed me a good idea, and proved relatively effective, but for the fact that she was barely listening me and was doing all the things on her own. Damn girls…

After an hour or so trying to teach her about the importance of thinning down paints or the best way to apply paint with the strokes of the brush, we both gave up, she admitting not having patience for this (patience is not one of my hot-tempered honey qualities). Well, at least she tried; and in the end we reached the agreement of she learning a bit how to play the game and visiting and supporting me when I played, and I doing all the painting business. If somebody there thinks that’s not a good deal, I strongly disagree. It’s FAR more than what I had before, so it’s ok for me and I’m happy with it.

Oh, and I must say that even with her lack of patience, she wasn’t doing bad at all, as the “end of session” picture shows. Pity she won’t go any further… well, maybe I can take her as an assistant when making scenery; we’ll see.

Alaitoc Guardians: First idea

2008-09-10T11:26:00.022+02:00

Guardians are the most basic eldar troops. In fact, they are not exactly soldiers, but civilians, who have been called to arms due the serious lack of troops from which the surviving eldar Craftworlds suffer from. They can be equipped with a short-ranged weapon with a high rate of fire and average potency called shuriken catapult, or with melee equipment such as pistols and swords. They can also carry some special weapons such as flamers and meltaguns, and also heavier weapons mounted on grav platforms, allowing them to fire on the move. Eldar technology is that great!

I love guardians. Simply love them. I think they are among the best miniatures designed by Games Workshop. Soft curves and simple but effective poses for basic minis. The new heavy weapon platform is also really cool (and bigger than the previous one). And they all are plastic! Even better for handling and gaming :)

So, undoubtedly, I knew beforehand that my army needed at least one unit of them, though I'd like to include more (maybe this will be more than necessary due to the new 5th ed. gaming rules). Tactically, I see the guardians in a multipurpose role, both valid for defense and attack, but also not specially good in neither of those roles (well, civilians after all). But the essential point of units of guardians is that they are Core Units in the army organisation chart, and therefore able to hold and take objetives in the battlefield.

So if I had to start with some minis, it should be with those. As I've previously mentioned, the Alaitoc colour scheme includes a blue-spot pattern of camouflage, using the yellow colour as a contrast. But as I wanted to avoid "horrible vivid colours", I had to do a few changes to it... and thus I decided to change the yellow colour for a bone one; and use red for details to create a good contrast. So I had the reference (a guardian painted by Games Workshop, see picture) and my own idea... would it fit?

Back from holidays

2008-09-09T11:48:00.018+02:00

… and working again. Dammit!

Well, best things don't last forever, and holidays are over. I haven't posted anything lately, and I think it was about time; because in the last months I've finished painting the first unit of the army: ten eldar guardians with a brightlance platform! I am very proud of the work I've done, not because of the quality of the paintjob (that I consider more than tabletop acceptable) but because the colour scheme I picked up turned out really well. I applied it again to an eldar vyper - a unit that under the new rules won't be used very much I'm afraid - and the result was again more than satisfactory. Hurray! Now I only have to take some pictures of the units on all their glory to show them here, mmm, maybe next week.

I've also finished my eldar wraithlord modelling project… more on this soon, but for the moment just want to tell you I got inspired by Jamie's miniature (from Coolminiornot). Really an excellent example of a dynamic miniature (and a brilliant paintjob too), and that's the feeling I want to give to mine...

The Alaitoc Craftworld

2008-08-11T17:55:00.012+02:00

"Occasion, servants of the Almighty Emperor may be fortunate or skilled enough to capture an Eldar alive. The majority of those who fall into our hands are from that caste known by our military forces as the Rangers. These Rangers can provide us with much information about their people, under correct inducements. Over the last two millennia, a surprising proportion of these captured Rangers hailed from the craftworld of Alaitoc. Perplexed by this course of events, my predecessors began a detailed analysis of this craftworld which I have attempted to continue. This has been a very hard task, as Alaitoc is one of the most secretive craftworlds, drifting on the very edge of the galaxy. Ever since war broke out between them and the Emperor's righteous armies, following the Beelze Conflict, they have shunned all direct contact with other races.

Intrigued by the propensity for the Alaitoc Eldar to follow the so-called 'Path of the Outcast' I endeavoured to find the root of this from amongst their number. The information I managed to elicit was interesting but unfortunately the subject died before it could reveal anything of depth or detail.

It appears that the Eldar of Alaitoc are the most puritanical adherents to the culture known as the Path of the Eldar - that lifestyle by which an Eldar will dedicate itself to the pursuit of knowledge in one sphere of life at a time. This zealous attitude has led to many of the Alaitoc Eldar becoming Rangers - either made outcasts by their masters for some slight misdeed, or tiring of the harsh discipline of their craftworld. For some, the very isolation which the Alaitoc Eldar value has only served to heighten their curiousity and inquisitiveness regarding the greater galaxy.

Although disenchanted with their craftworld, those on the Path of the Outcast still remain loyal to Alaitoc and many of them return to it in due course. Due to its isolation, the craftworld makes much use of its many Rangers to gather news, keeping it informed of the actions of other craftworlds and alien races so that the Alaitoc Eldar might respond if necessary.

When the Alaitoc fight a war, they gather their many Rangers through the webway, sending them ahead of their main force to sow disruption and anarchy in their enemy's army. The Rangers are highly skilled at destroying supply dumps and ammo caches, pinning down units trying to attack and generally breaking apart any coordination and cohesiveness the enemy army might have. When the Alaitoc make their major attack, the enemy will already be half-defeated - having spent days or even weeks chasing shadows, they will be desperately trying to gather together the fragments of their army into a fighting force."

Inquisitor Czevak - Teachings on the Unholy, Chapter XI
'The Tyranny of Alaitoc'

Alaitoc craftworld lies in the eastern edge of the galaxy, the frontier region which has never been reconquered by the Imperium. Before the days of the Imperium it was colonised by humans, Orks and Eldar, and even now it remains a sprawling zone of border empires and outlaw worlds.

This melting pot of races and cultures lies far away from the immediate threat of Chaos, but even so the threat cannot be ignored. Numerous parties of Eldar Rangers, who retain their ties to the Alaitoc craftworld, explore and patrol the thousands of worlds beyond the reach of the Imperium. They secretly monitor the isolated civilisations and strange races that live there. All Eldar craftworlds have Rangers, but the stringent devotion to the Path of the Eldar that inhabitants of Alaitoc follow means that this craftworld produces a greater proportion of scouts than any other.

The sword symbol of Alaitoc represents the Sword of Vaul, the weapon forged in the Smith God's desperate battle against Khaine the God of War. It represents the defiance and determination of its people, a sign that no matter how hard the fight the Eldar will never abandon it. Alaitoc is associated with the colour blue, or with the mixture of blue and yellow. However, the Pathfinders and Rangers who accompany the forces of the craftworld to war wear camouflaged coats that blend into their background.

The Eldar

2008-08-04T15:28:00.009+02:00

The Eldar are an incredibly ancient alien race, who once ruled a vast empire across the stars. Then came the hideous times of the Fall, when the Eldar fell from power. Though they are now few in number, the Eldar are one of the most technologically advanced races in the galaxy.

The story of the Eldar is one of regret and decline. Millennia ago, their race held the galaxy in their grasp. Their power was great; the Eldar could reshape entire worlds by the power of thought alone. Nothing threatened their dominance, and the Eldar began to lose themselves in the decadence of their comfortable existence.

However, their decadent indulgences exacted a terrible price. Unbeknownst to the Eldar, the energy from their depravity had caused increasing disturbances in the Warp. Eventually, these disturbances coallesced into a Chaos god who came to be known as Slaanesh. When Slaanesh was born, the energy from his birthcry travelled through the Warp and obliterated the minds of the majority of the Eldar race.

The few survivors, scattered on craftworlds on the edge of the galaxy, realised what had happened and committed themselves to avoiding the same fate. By devoting themselves to self-discipline, the remaining Eldar avoided the decadent follies of their brethren. Now, the Eldar fight to keep their ancient race from extinction.

Dawn of War II

2008-07-17T23:03:00.011+02:00

Sorry, but I can't help posting this...

Do you wanna see REAL eldars (and some pesky marines) in action??

OMG, I'm gonna love 2009...

About WH40K

2008-07-04T12:51:00.013+02:00

Well, I’ve been thinking of writing some general ideas about the WH40K game and its universe before started posting more specific things on my Alaitoc army. Briefly, WH40K (or Warhammer 40.000) is a wargame played with high quality miniatures made of plastic and/or metal, that one has to but, assemble and paint before gaming (although the painting point is not always respected), which makes it a game with a broad range of possibilities for a dedicated hobbyst. And I am a dedicated hobbyst :)

WH40K is settled in the far, distant future of the 41st millennium, after humanity has conquered the stars and wages war against a myriad of enemies that threaten the named “Human Empire”, through the whole Milky Way. At the moment, the 5th edition of the game is about to be released, with a new revision of the rules and some interesting additions to an already vast and rich background.

For more information about the hobby, visit the Games Workshop webpage. And for more information on the WH40K background, check the wikipedia or other sources in the internet; or better, get some of the fantastic WH40K novels available from the Black Library.

The beginning of this all...

2008-06-30T11:10:00.003+02:00

Well, here I am, writing my first post in this new blog I've created in order to make a small following of the new army I'm working on. To be sincere, it's not exactly "my" army, but my girlfriend's, and as all the armies of WH40K have "terrible ugly figurines" but the Eldar, there was only one option for her to choose. What a shame for a devoted Tyranid player, but hey, a new challenge in the hobby after more than 13 years painting & playing is always welcome.

Now that I've clearly stated the "why?" of the Eldar, it's turn of the "why?" of Alaitoc. And again, the answer is clear: "I don't want to have figurines painted in those horrible vivid colours!". So bye bye Saim-Hann and Iyanden; and Ulthwe too (because I'm fed up of paiting armies with black as the main colour). I started thinking on painting the minis on my own choice of colours, when I fixed my gaze on the Alaitoc vyper of the Codex: Eldars. Mmmm, nice blue spotty effect... it's so different from what I've painted to date, should be a nice change... and blue is not "horrible vivid", but yellow... mmm, and what if I change the yellow colour for a bone one? .... Hey, I got it!! We're going for an Alaitoc army!!

Aaaand, once decided the basic organisation of the army (basically the miniatures she liked most), I started cutting, glueing, assembling... and painting.

More posts to come soon!