More Thoughts on Tyrands, Post-FAQ, and Other News

I'll start with the 'Other News.' Posts have slowed down to an extent, and there are two reasons for that:

1) Work was consuming my soul gradually

2) I started playing Warmachine/Hordes

That being said (and despite some bottled-up annoyances/disillusionment with GW) I don't intend to out-and-out quit 40k. I mean, I own Eldar, Tyranid, Tau, and Black Templar armies and the nucleous of a basic loyalist space marine army. That's a hell of a lot of money to just walk away from, and I'm not too into selling it off when I'm just drawing down the game a bit.

That being said, since this blog gets a lot of 40k traffic and I tend to blog based on my experiences (Hey, writing it down is educational for me AND sometimes helpful to the community) I'm likely to start up a Warmachine-based Spite Blog. (Shameless Plug: Check out Spite for the Unblighted. )

I still intend to post 2-4 reasonably in-depth articles for Warhammer 40k a month, but I'd like to chronicle my experiences with Warmachine/Hordes as well.

Ok, we've got the 'other' part out of the way.

Down to the Bugs

So, what's changed for what I'll take in an army with Tyranids? Annoyed though I am, here's the list of stuff that I'm less likely to take because it's a pain in the tail to get +2 to reserves rolls:

1) Drop Pod Zoanthropes

These guys got kicked in the balls by the ruling. Look, when you've got an 18" gun of DEATH for vehicles, well, you might be a target priority. Just saying. And you're the main way this army stops Land Raiders? Ouch.

Not to get ranty, but either you hope the other guy lets you shoot his Land Raiders/expensive tanks with your Zoanthropes, or you um, y'know, get hosed/hope your MCs can assault them.

2) Anything Else in a Drop Pod

Ok, honestly, what makes me nervous about facing Drop Pod marines/outflanking IG skimmers and the like is the part where it craps out template and/or melta weapons in their preferred range. We can crap out Warriors or a heap of Hormagaunts, which are considerably less scary. The stuff with guns gets to shoot them when they arrive. Our guys have to wait a turn to move into position, and if Synapse isn't close, you have to hope you make that Instinctive Behavior check. If you're not in cover, then, well, ouch. So long. Nice knowing you, little guys.

3) Trygons

Ok, sure, technically you can keep them in on the table, but if you want to get to the enemy (Hey, T6, 6 wounds and a 3+ with a model THAT freakin' tall, you aren't getting cover at all, ever. Sorry. Wait, are there MISSILE LAUNCHERS on the other side of the table? Oh, s- BOOM!).

Best-case scenario: arrive turn two, weather a turn of gunfire. Turn three, assault something. Hope to stay in assault. (It worked once: hit a big squad of IG, and his COMMISSAR decided to be an epic hero and held in assault against 5 genestealers and a Trygon during my assault phase. Then he died so very, very horribly in his...). Turn four, repeat.

Downside? You don't start being that productive until the turn after you arrive. 6-12 shots off your personal static electricty at a mighty BS3 do NOT actually make you that scary in shooting; it's like giving a helicopter pilot a sidearm: it gives them something productive to do when they're shot down and waiting to get killed off for raining hellfire missiles on folks.

4) Mawlocs

Best-case scenario? Arrive turn two, deep-strike onto something. Hilarity ensues. Turn three, thank the enemy for NOT killing it, fall back into reserves. Turn four, emerge again for more hilarity. If you still exist in turn five, think long and hard about going back underground or staying topside, since you give away your points if you're in reserves on turn five and turn six doesn't roll around.

Outside of popping up and screwing up stuff, you have a mighty WS3 and three base S6 monstrous creature attacks. Hope no one wants to assault you, and if no one does, consider assaulting them.

5) Any of Your Other Elites

Seriously, unless it's a Venomthrope, has anyone else even taken other Elites choices? I mean, a walking flamethrower is cool and all, and so are Ymgarl stealers (at least in theoryhammer) but that means giving away all your shooting, which just doesn't do much. (Except for my last game against 'nids as Tau; watching the other guy seize the initiative and his one Tyrannofex popping your Hammerheads on turns one and two while they kill a mighty total of FOUR hormagaunts is, um...I needed some Jack straight; not Gentleman Jack because I was just going to THROW IT DOWN THE HATCH and that'd be rude to the good stuff...)

So, What Now?

Well, frankly, most of the time a solid core for a list for me starts with 20 Termagants, 2 Tervigons, and 6 Hive Guard. This is still 490 points of troops and another 300 points and 2-3 of your Elites choices.

As it stands, then, there are a couple of lists I'm down to considering.

1) Shooty Bugs

Take 3 Tyrannofexes and a Prime. You're at 1680. At this point I consider either more shooting (you might be able to fit in a couple of Harpies with Heavy Venom Cannons) or some mid-range shooty/assault support in the form of a warrior squad, or even filling out my Fast Attack with Spore Mines for the laughs.

2) Horde Bugs

Take a couple of Primes as HQs, take six Hive Guard, three Venomthropes and three Tyrannofexes. This costs you a minimum of 1420 (ok, maybe drop a tyrannofex) and then fill the rest of that with things that scuttle and bite.

Hope you don't meet Land Raiders or mech spam.

3) Try Reserves Anyway

Now, thing is, there's STILL a way to get +2 to reserves off the bat; you take the Swarmlord AND a Hive Tyrant, because Alien Cunning and Hive Commander still stack. Here's what I can think of as a prototype for that list:

Still Looking For That +2 Reserves, Thank You Very Much...

Swarmlord [280]

-3 Tyrant Guard w/ Lash Whips [195]

Hive Tyrant [220]

-Heavy Venom Cannon

-Lash Whip/Bone Sword

-Hive Commander

-Leech Essence, Paroxysm

Tyrant Guard w/ Lash Whip [65]

2 Hive Guard [100]

2 Hive Guard [100]

2 Hive Guard [100]

11 Termagants [55]

11 Termagants [55]

Tervigon [195]

-Catalyst

-Adrenal Glands

-Toxin Sacks

Tervigon [195]
-Catalyst
-Adrenal Glands
-Toxin Sacks

7 Genestealers w/ Toxin Sacks [119]

Mawloc [160]

Mawloc [160]

Total: 1999/2000

Thoughts

I feel light on shooting, but that's because I don't have Tyrannofexes. On the flip side, I can ram the Swarmlord down someone's throat with Feel No Pain, and potentially threaten them with the other Hive Tyrant.

The Mawlocs and Genestealers are supposed to make folks worry; with the Swarmlord I can reliably place them on the side I want, and then the Mawlocs SHOULD be there on turn two. Hopefully I've put the enemy into disarray, and then the brick of tyranids starts advancing.

Cons? My significant shooting doesn't reach past 24", as the Heavy Venom Cannon will at best annoy the other guy by making his heavy armor not shoot for a turn, or if I'm lucky take a gun off. (which is cool against people with just one main gun, mind you...).

What would I change? I'd frankly LOVE to get another big critter in there. As it is, I could maybe drop a Hive Guard off the Swarmlord and lose the Genestealers, then go up to a third Mawloc and find a place to put that other ~25 points.

Anyway, thoughts/curses/well-wishes/rotten produce? I'm looking at you, TKE.

Avatar

No, not the Bloody-Handed god, but the movie. I'll relate it to 40k, though, by the end. Just watch.

The Movie
In short, go see it.

Now, I will tell you that you have heard this kind of story before. Have you seen The Last Samurai? Catch Dances with Wolves, if you're not really in my generation? Read something like 'Things Fall Apart' in any of your English lit classes? Then you have an acquaintance with the story. The suspense probably won't keep you on the edge of your seat.

No, it's the visual effects that you're paying to see. Frankly, I forgot that I was watching a CG-heavy film pretty much off the bat. All of the creatures move realistically.

The attention to detail in the critters is pretty astounding. Other than having a thing for six legs and long-limbed aliens (...which, in fairness, you can chalk up to a lower-gravity world), it pretty much looks like a jungle. Hell, all the stuff in the jungle looks like it belongs. There's a nod towards creating a fully believable ecosystem, for example. A lot of films just don't seem to have that kind of detail in them. I mean, I like aliens. It's part of what got me into 40k: neat aliens. (Mmm, here come the Tyran- wait, I was on another subject...). Moreover, I like believable aliens. The ecosystem of Pandora reads right.

And, well, frankly, I always wanted a pet dragon-thing, but I was always afraid to ask. Plus, I'm pretty sure feeding and cleaning up after it would be a pain. Still, if you think bird crap is bad, think about training your pet to dive-bomb a rival's vehicle.

The military hardware is also pretty sweet-looking and well done. The mechs (they're not powered armor because you sit in them...) are a believable size. They're integrated in the forces believably. Hell, given the terrain, you'd not even want to THINK about wheeled or tracked vehicles. The control system is similarly intuitive: screw the joysticks, you pretty much have gloves with some braces and wires attached for the arm controls, and presumably pedals. That way, you can take someone with some infantry know-how, train them on the controls, and then just get them to realize that they're a 15-20ft tall infantryman with a redefined version of 'handheld' weapons. All the VTOLs are neat as well.

Amazingly, Sigourney Weaver is in this one without trying to kill the aliens. Then again, the aliens aren't trying to use her body as a yolk sack for their young.

And Now, That Promised 40k Tie-in
Hey, you've all heard of Death Worlds, right? Right. Well, Pandora IS one. The atmosphere can kill you in a few minutes. Gas masks are standard issue. That also makes the atmosphere the slowest killer on the planet. The native humanoid species favors a hunting bow, and if putting a meter-long stick through your heart/lungs/other important bits isn't enough, the neurotoxin on it takes you out within a minute.

And, well, the wildlife? The protagonist's first outing on the planet kind of sums it up. He's approached by a large, six-legged hammer-headed armored rhino the size of an elephant. Mind you, he's in his Avatar body, which is about 9-10 feet tall and wielding a machine gun like mere mortals wield an assault rifle.

"So, what do I do, shoot it?"
"No, no, it's territorial! Just stand your ground! And, your gun isn't big enough to hurt it."
Jake yells and makes threatening gestures. Creature runs away.

Creature runs away because there is a 12-foot-tall-at-the-shoulder six-legged armored panther thing walking up behind Jake.

Doctor's pro tip: "No, no, this is the one you run from!"

Everything else is just hungry and/or generally inimical to human life.

On the movie technology front, if they can pull off this kind of feat, then they can bring Tyranids, Necrons, or anything else in the 40K universe to life. This, of course, assumes they have the budget involved. I believe motion capture is a bonus as well.

Overall
I enjoyed the movie. Definitely see it in 3D in the theaters if you're going to see it. The story isn't bad. The story is enjoyable, but not original. Then again, a movie sells an experience, and more movies these days are about a neat experience than they are about a heady, in-depth plot. I mean, you can do that with movies, but I honestly think books are better at giving us depth, breadth, and all that stuff.*

Go see the movie for the eye candy and the thrill. Oh, it's also about two and a half hours, but you won't notice the time unless you had a hefty drink prior to entering the theater. You won't want to leave once it spools up.

*I know there are exceptions to this, but good books like the actual Starship Troopers novel, anything Dune, anything Asimov wrote...some stuff just isn't going to make the trip from several hundred pages of novel to a couple hundred pages and ~2 hours of screen time.

Maybe I'm just getting old, but I still read. On the other hand, I think that a good TV series can pull it off, but we're talking something like 12-20 or more hours of storytelling.

Life Update

As pertains to blogging, at least.

Work's going to get a little crazier this month, and school's papers are starting to weigh in, so I'm anticipating blog posts might slow to a crawl. It'll get better after that, though, as I'll be graduated and 'educated.*'

*I'll have a piece of paper that says I'm smart. Considering how dumb some of my classmates are** and how most jobs will train you anyway, I'm not sure what it really proves.

**as in, one of them stood up and told the teacher he thought the test was crap, mostly because he didn't want to write an essay in a class that's all essay, because it takes the place of a thesis. No, he actually said "It's crap that I have to define the points. That's grade-school crap." Yes. The professor really WILL assume you know everything when he's the last course you have to pass before you get your master's. Isn't that a little condescending? "Hey, we both know I know it, so how's about you just let me not write it instead? I'll do the 'essay' in bullet points, too!" MORON.

Blog Pupatation

At least, I think pupatation is a word. Moving to larva, to pupa, to adult? Or am I pulling this out of a dark and smelly place? I do not know.

At any rate, I've made some changes after pondering some and being prompted to finally make some. Stelek had some good suggestions, and I'd meant to fix the whole stupid column-width thing I had going on.

These changes include:
-Comments moved to a popup
-Color Scheme Change
-variable width

The variable width is staying. I'm looking for angles on the color scheme change, and the comments-to-popup. I think I might keep the popups, as it allows a reader to look at the original post and/or pictures within, without having to move back and forth so much.

The color scheme...up for debate. I'm a guy that thinks in terms of the cooler colors, and while red might be more spiteful, I think blue/grey has a nice, cool feel to it that makes it tolerable to stare at.

EDIT: I decided the title border needed something other than black, and decided the top bar needed to not be blue.

Deathwing Update 2, Marathon

The Deathwing cometh (along). I finally got some of the Green Stuff in. I'm talking the 'bulk-rate' green stuff, where it's like $12.99 for an inch wide, four inch tall cylinder. That's why these bases are texture with the stuff.

I'm also using the Deathwing project as an excuse to use some good ol' Pig Iron heads. I'm sorry, they do sweet work. Those are the visor-down heavy armor helmets. Sweet, yes? Yes.

The next step will be doing some green stuff. The guys have cardboard superglued to their crotches as a guide for tabards. I suspect that one way or the other, I'll have learned a lot about Green Stuff by the time this is over.

Admittedly, I've been working a bit slower. I...kind of found Marathon (that will run on my PC. Huzzah). Yeah, it's the old-school mid-90's Bungie shooter. This came out the same time as Doom, and...honestly? Kicks the crap out of doom. There is an actual plot other than "DEMONS BAD! SHOTGUN GOOD!" Admittedly, I enjoy Doom and Doom 2 for mindless fun, but Marathon's got a bit more challenge to it.

I'm not sure how to relate it to 40k, other than you're basically playing a Space Marine (minus power armor, plus ancient tech, minus the bolter). However, the W'rkncacnter sound a whole lot like the C'tan, 'cept the C'tan EAT stars and the W'rkncacnter are imprisoned in them. Plus, the eldar god/gods that are the W'rkcacnter kind of CREATE chaos and/or destruction.

However, the Pfhor are a bit more melee-oriented. I'm not sure how they'd be best represented, though the Melee Guard with Commissars could work out. Red pfhor for the basic guard, purple for the sarges, and the Enforcer for the Commissar? (since said Pfhor carry whompin' sticks, and the Enforcer kind of keeps his buddies in line with a gun sometimes).

Productivity will likely pick back up, but 'til then the aliens need a little cyborg-assisted death. Flamethrowers in a space ship = first (and last) contact. I suppose I could equate the game with Space Hulk, and I am a squad of Terminators in a can.

District 9

My girlfriend ended up insisting we go see District 9 tonight as it opened. In other words, she's what we call a keeper.

I can tell you, in short: go see it.

It's an honest, intelligent take on an uncommon sci-fi scenario. High tech aliens manage to maroon themselves on earth. I mean, we're talking tech. Humans are more or less modern-day level in here.

Comparatively, the aliens have energy weapons, powered armor, intergalactic travel, and yes, even a gravity gun. One of the sweeter moments in the movie is when someone uses a gravity gun to pick up a slaughtered pig and blow someone away with it.

The movie certainly earns its R rating, though. We see what's basically an anti-personnel bug zapper, and it gets a lot of use. I mean, people literally explode in a shower of gore. But, the violence and well-done CG aliens are not the stars of the movie. It's as it should be; they're window-dressing and a part of the movie. This isn't Transformers where the whole point is "Look at my million-dollar SFX budget." I'm certain that they did spend a heap on special effects, but never to the point that the movie's all about the shiny.

I can't give away much about the plot and scenario without giving it up. I will tell you that it's an original scenario. The plot is not that hard to guess at, but the pacing is well-done. The human lead is a new guy, but he does well in the movie and he is very believable. He is not Billy Badass. He's a paper-pusher, a nice guy thrust into a situation that rapidly deteriorates. Yet, he deals with it well.

The villains...well, I'll just say that you cheer when any of the villain-types get what they deserve. Some of it is very satisfying to watch, if a bit gruesome. (Ok, screw 'a bit.' The aliens are burly enough to rip your arm off, but they'll run off and chew on it rather than beat you down with it. I'm sure they could do the beat-you-down with it, though.)

I will naturally not spoil the ending, but I'll tell you that it's a believable ending. It is not perfectly happy, it is not perfectly tragic, but it is fitting. It keeps the movie from being too black-and-white, and the thing is that the movie does a good job of showing shades of gray and realistic reactions on both sides.

Well, what are you waiting for? Go see it. If all else fails, there's a damned gravity gun and death by flying pig carcass.