A Wee Update: What's Next on the 40k Front

Here are my goals for the time being: I would like to put up at least a post a week in this blog. I enjoy blogging about the hobby (I make a pretense of being a teacher, and I enjoy spreading knowledge and discussing little plastic army men).

Current Army Project

Currently, I've been playing heavy with the Tyranids. Despite the utter curb-stomping of the previous game (sharp opponent + solid enemy army list + inability to roll well = DEATH) I enjoy the TMC/Venomthrope Stelek list.

I've got a Carnifex in the works on the bench (gotta convert the arms, then attach them) and I'm pondering ways to convert up Venomthropes. I like the idea of poison-cloud-bleching bugs, though I think I'm going to go for more of a walking smoke-belching factory than the floaty tentacle thing.

I also have the remainder of my Hive Tyrant's arm bits (wings/scything talons) to complete painting. Pictures will eventually be forthcoming, but at the moment I'm not sure I have access to a solid camera. I'll sort that when I sort it.

Up Next: Power Armor

A while back, I'd contemplated starting up a Space Wolf army, and a Blood Angel army, and so on and so forth. At this point, I've acquired a few boxes of Thousand Sons marines, most of the armor I need, and I have a fair amount of other stuff (then I got Indoctrinated* by Warmachine...).

I intend to make this a work of love with conversions, as I'm a big fan of the Thousand Sons sculpt and fluff. On the other hand, their rules...well, I'm just not feelin' the CSM book. I also like the idea of marine cavalry, and I have a number of Chaos Knights left over from when I thought about doing them as cheap bloodcrushers. I think I'll be using the K-sons as the Wolf Guard stand-ins, and it'd be an easy-to-ID one.

I also owe RayJ a thanks for convincing me on the tabletop that they're as solid as I'd thought. Not unbeatable by any means, but certainly contenders. That, and I dig the idea of death-seeking warriors and all things Space Wolf in general.

In Parting

I want to thank everyone for bearing with the decreased activity as of late. Some life stressors have finally died down or bowed out. I'd like a few thoughts on what everyone would generally like to see; I'll probably end up doing unit breakdowns and the occasional batrep. When I get inspired for neat conversions and such, they'll probably show up.

I'm aiming to get a couple matches in a month, as they tend to eat a Saturday morning without a hell of a lot of trouble.

*Points for you if you get the Mass Effect pun. Slaps for you if you don't.

On Space Wolves, Tyranids, a Game, and News in General

I managed to clear time for a good 2,000pt matchup with RayJ. As I am told a picture is worth a thousand words (and he brought the camera) I figured I would sum up the battle report with a picture.

My 'nid army was something like:

Tyrant w/ 2x TL Devourers

3 seperate Venomthropes

2 Tervigons with Catalyst

2x10 Devourer-gants

2 Harpies w/ TL Heavy Venom

2 Tyrannofex

RayJ's list, from memory, had something like:

Logan Grimnar

2 Rune Priests (Living Lightning each, and some other random power that had no impact)

2 Lone Wolves (Terminator Armor, Chainfist, Storm Shield. You were expecting?)

2 Wolf Guard Squads (Sarge in terminator armor with Cyclone missile launcher, powerfists?)

2 Grey Hunter Squads (double melta, and a Wolf Guard in the lead)

2 single Thunderwolf Units (Fist/Shield)

2 Long Fang Squads (3 missiles, 2 lascannons each).

The Scenario

The crater describes the end state of my army. It's been a long time since I've been tabled. We rolled up Kill Points and Table Quarters. I won the roll to go first, brain farted, and made the grave error of going second. His stuff set up with the four melee speed bumps up front, then the hunters and Wolf Guard behind, and finally the Long Fangs with a commanding view of the field.

I set up with an eye towards making sure his Thunderwolf Cav can't get a first-turn charge off. His shooting drops a Tervigon (which takes out a chunk of one of the Devourer-gant squads. Stupid 'Brood Primogenitor' rule). At that point I'm beginning to realize what my cover saves are going to look like.

So, I unload a whole lotta gunfire into his approaching stuff. I am for the t-wolves because of their speed; I probably have another turn before the Lone Wolves reach my line. I have a metric crap-ton of anti-personnel shooting.

I inflict one wound on one of the T-wolves.

Yep. Gonna be one of them games...I made a few mistakes here and there, but my utter inability to roll cover saves or inflict wounds on the other guy (I kid you not, I had a TYRANNOFEX die while sucking up an amazing total of 8-9 wounds. Inability to make both a 2+ and a 5+....).

The Lessons

Naturally, in retrospect I should've gone first. Tyranids have very little shooting that reaches out more than 24 inches, and Rupture Cannons aren't the most reliable things for killing infantry at range. (Besides, they were trying to force instant death armor saves on T-wolves, which seemed like a good idea at the time.). It's a plain nasty Space Wolf list, and while I always figured Long Fangs were nasty, I'm now very, very, very sure that I dislike them greatly. When you get down to it, most armies don't have good ways to kill infantry from over 24-36 inches (excpeting IG Russes in some cases).

On the bright side, RayJ was a fun opponent to play against (which seriously mitigated the fact that I'm still sore from what the dice did to me...) and it was nice to not play Imperial Guard. I'm not knocking IG, but when you play against it for a while, a change-up is nice.

Other Bits

On the other bright side, I found out I'm getting transferred out of the high-intensity soul-crushing office* at work in a few weeks. What does that mean for you, dear readers? (Assuming there are still some out there, I know I've not been prolific as of late).

Hopefully, it means articles more than once a month.

Anyone interested in taking a look at a gallery of 'nid pictures can find my Tyranids here. It's what I've been laboring on for the last year, though I must warn you that picture quality is not necessarily what the interweb slang would call 'uber.' I think it's more 'servicable' myself.

*Seriously am getting out of the nasty stuff, which is just in time. I seldom bring personal matters onto this blog, though work stress was starting to leech into everything else (including chronic tension headaches, which you get AWESOME meds for...) and it's a matter of either a) not having the time/urge/opportunity to blog at the same time, or b) not wanting to inflict a Grim, Dark, Bleak, Bitter-er than usual rant on the potential passer-by.