How I reacted to some of the Age of Sigmar Rumors

I read the rumors, and talked to some people who all had me freaking out about the state of Warhammer:Fantasy. I had read they were pulling boxes off the shelves and even that GW stores were no longer allowing Fantasy games to be played. Before this happened I was determined to go into my local store and drop some serious money and buy up whatever I could.

This past Sunday (8.9.15) I was there poking through stuff I was looking for, Dwarf Organ Gun, Lizardmen stuff (more on this later), Chaos and maybe skaven; I talked with the owner/operator of the store. He asked me what brought me in, and I told him I was here to buy before Fantasy stuff got pulled. He laughed, and said that wasn't happening, and Fantasy was safe. He informed me that they were just reboxing stuff, and had just gotten some of the Wood Elf stuff back, and next week were getting some of the Skaven Plague Rats. He said he had not been informed by GW to pull anything, though he did qualify the statement by saying that he could get an email next week saying to pull stuff. So I was mollified to an extent, and decided I wasn't going to spend all of my savings on whatever I could. So instead of a way serious shopping spree I just bought a Lizardmen Stegadon, Lizardmen Saurus Calvary and a box of IG Guardsmen and Scions, to finish the squad of veterans I began earlier.

Stegadon body complete

While I have a rather large Lizardmen army it is mostly lizards and no dinosaurs, and I felt that needed correcting. So I added a stegadon to my army and to do list.

Stegadon complete. Added an extra set of horns to the head, was thinking about adding to the tail, but couldn't figure out how to make it work.

I will be running this guy as an Ancient Stegadon with an Engine of the Gods, for all the extra buffs it gives out. Will have to play test, using it fully as support, trying to avoid combat, or if I am going to let it get stuck in.

Stegadon w/ Howdah complete

Pretty awesome model, it was about this stage of construction I realized I should have painted the stegadons back before completing assembly. Always do that, never think through the painting process. I just glued the skinks on lightly so I could remove for more complete painting.

forgive the lighting- stegadon complete with skink riders (5)

One bonus to the Stegadon kit was that it comes with a skink priest and a skink chieftan, so I have two new characters to go along with my new stegadon.

I am still experimenting with lighting solutions, they are always too dark or too bright, I can never find the goldilocks lighting situation in my apt. I will have an article up on painting this guy soon.

What's on my table (Paratroopers and Dark Angels)

Greetings folks!

Bob here with an update on what is on the old painting table these days. I don't know about the rest of you, but I have a very bad habit of leaving projects unfinished as my mood on what I want to be painting changes (call it hobby ADD if you want). With this in mind I have reshuffled what is in the front rows of the hobby table in an effort to finish some of these (nearly complete in a lot of cases) models in addition to whatever my little mind wants to be painting. So what does all of this mean? Well, in practical terms it means I am working on some Dark Angels that have sat half finished for far too long and some Bolt Action US Paratroopers which have been neglected compared to my Germans.

I decided to repaint some of the pouches and bags on my Paratrooper test model after rewatching Band of Brothers and taking some notes on their uniforms. I went over to the local Hobby Town (my flgs of choice) and picked out a green-gray that I thought would be the closest match for the period material color of bandoliers and such. In the end I chose Model Masters Panzer Olive Green. My order of painting and colors are as follows:

Step 1: Prime the model black

Step 2: Dryad Bark for boots, guns, pistol holsters. Model Color US Field Drab for fatigues and helmet netting. Caliban Green for the helmet. Castellan Green for knee and elbow patches and all bags, bandolier, etc. Leadbelcher for gun barrels. Tallarn Flesh for skin.

Step 3: Apply Panzer Olive Green to bags and pouches. Mournfang Brown on gun stocks, boots, and field knife. Clean up for shading.

Step 4: Wash everything except Olive Green and gunmetal with Agrax Earthshade. Wash Olive Green with Nuln Oil.

Step 5: Drybrush/highlight raised areas with appropriate base colors. Clean up as needed and voila!

Simple yet effective in my opinion. This isn't a time consuming color scheme yet it produces a nice, post jump look for Paratroopers. I plan on hitting these guys with a dull coat to knock down the gloss and seal on the paint. Flocking will happen at some point....

Dark Angels wise I am finishing my Sacred Standard bearer as well as a Tactical Marine and two Deathwing Knights.

I bought the new Dark Angels decal sheet from GW a while back and I wanted to use one of their standards. I decided to try out Micro Sol and Micro Set to see how they handled getting the damn thing to stick and lay flat to an uneven surface. Sure enough, the banner went on without a problem and adhered nearly seamlessly to the plastic banner surface. Call me a believer in the virtues of the Micro Sol and Set system. The Deathwing Knights are taking a little longer to finish as I am having to fiddle around with all of the details on the models and fix mistakes.  Here are some WIP shots of the boys from the Rock.

Cheers and happy gaming, folks!    

DM/GM

Bob and I love playing Warhammer Fantasy. However lately it has 1: died off. 2. had some rule changes we don't agree with in the previous edition. Seeing how the game is supposed to be fun, and i think we both still get a great deal of enjoyment out of it; I figured why not spice it up. Besides the usual house rules we generally go with, I decided why not borrow from 40k with the random missions/victory points. And then I took it a step farther, why not make these random missions/victory points just random things? Nothing that would obviously change the outcome of the game (player B gets a dragon), but some funny stuff sparked by what I saw on the Desert Groups article on Gorkamorka.

Ironwarden w/ Trollhammer Torpedo

These could just about be anything, just some ideas off the top of my head.

1. Tug-of-War. A unit from either side activates the "card". the closest enemy unit is "poofed" (mark the original location) over to "combat" with the initiating unit. a round of combat is "fought" the winner wins the tug of war and gets the victory point. (no casualties are assessed from the combat, the combat is merely the tug of war) The poofed unit is then poofed back as if nothing had happened except for the victory point. The controlling player of the winner gets an extra victory point if that unit is still on the table at the end of the game. (fleeing is still on the table)

2. Feeling Orky. When this card is activated the unit rolls a D6, on any roll but a 6 the unit fights amongst itself (D3 hits +1 per row of 5 models). if any models are removed from the infighting that unit may now move again and for the rest of the game has +1S +1M +1A. on a roll of a D6 the unit just moves again.

3. Where does this go? Initiating unit finds a rather large and inviting tunnel and decides to explore (can opt out at this point only). the controlling player then rolls a D6 and is moved to the corresponding card location. if the number rolled was this card the controlling player can place the unit on any board edge, as if it had just returned to the table, this unit can move, but not charge from its new location. This could also spark combat (if an enemy unit is sitting on the rolled number) or activate the "new" card. the hole is only activated once.

Irondrakes, from this angle the blue is more prevalent

4. What do we have here? The unit finds treasure worth 2 VPs! However this unit can no longer move, as long as they control the VP. you can "abandon" the VPs. this unit however is now unbreakable and acts as if they have no flanks or rear as they circle up on the treasure, assuming they haven't abandoned the prize.

5. Hot Potato. This card is worth 1 VP to the controlling player at the end of the game. The discovering unit brings this card with them. For every turn the controlling unit holds the potato after the first turn they get burned and lose D3 troops, no saves. The potato can be passed to friendly units by coming within 2" of an un-engaged unit. A unit with the potato stuck in combat is stuck with the potato, and can't transfer the potato until combat is over. The potato can be dropped voluntarily, the potato is dropped if the unit flees for whatever reason. The potato can be passed as many times as possible in a turn but can not return to a unit that held it that turn (no givesy backsy). A word of advice, never go full potato.

6. What is that? Random low level monstrous creature is spawned on the spot. bring me its head. after determining the creature (whatever you have on hand) roll a D6. on a 1 the enemy places the creature wherever he wants (not within 6" of a unit) the creature then moves off in a random direction 6". on a 2-5 the creature is placed at or near the center of the table (not within 6" of either sides units) the creature then wanders in a random direction 6". on a roll of a 6 the iniating player gets to place the creature according to the same rules as a roll of 1. When one side kills the unit it gets the creature as a trophy worth 1 VP. this can be stolen in combat (if you run) or lost if you flee. even a ranged kill nets the killing unit the trophy.

Ironwarden has gold arm bands instead of the blue and green of the drakes

7. Hey Y'all watch this! Desperate to get on youtube this units champion decides he is going to challenge the enemy (any model capable of receiving a challenge) that champion's player receives a VP if he survives the encounter (for one round of combat), or the enemy says no. (challenge can only be issued under the usual circumstances). It does not matter if the champion dies later, even if in a second turn of that challenge, the moment is captured on camera and he will live on in infamy.

8. This is my Hill(random object/place/piece of scenery)! Initiating player gets to nominate a place, if at the end of the game the unit occupies that location they get a VP. Unit is stubborn if occupying the location.

9. Charge of the Light Brigade! (no associated card just a random way to get a VP) first player to have a unit successfully complete two charges (actually get into combat) in the game gets a VP. The unit doesn't have to survive the second combat, but obviously should survive the first to have a chance at the second.

10. They don't look so tough! Initiating unit gets a victory point if they win a round of combat against the enemy's most expensive unit (including any character in the unit).

From this angle the green is more prevalent

11. Spitting Contest! Both sides nominate a champion, and then roll a dice. Add that characters wounds to the total. who ever "spits" farther wins a VP. This champion has to survive the battle to claim the VP.

12. Hey look over there! Controlling player can "break up" a combat at the end of any turn. however when this happens the opposing player gets to move (if they want) with a random unit that is currently not in combat. The unit(s) that was distracted at first (enemy unit in combat) is then moved back 1" and turned in a random direction.

anyway, just something i was pondering after the Gorkamorka randomness. I doubt i ever get Bob to do this, but maybe this gets some one else to try fantasy out for once. I would love to hear anyone's ideas or stories with this.

Attached some pics of my newest Dwarf unit, the Irondrakes, can't wait to use them in a game. In the effort of keeping the Dwarves mostly painted I got these up to a pretty good level. I still haven't gotten the lighting down yet, for anybody to pick out any of the limited detailing i have done. I will have another article next week on my recent purchases and my conversation with the store owner down here.

A brief note about scale in Age of Sigmar

Hey folks,

Bob here with a brief look at the scale change in Age of Sigmar and some thoughts about various scales of models in general. Last week in my rant I touched on how the scale of figures for Age of Sigmar is noticeably different from that of Warhammer Fantasy. For this article I would like to highlight this difference by taking a look at the new Chaos models and their Fantasy equivalents as a clear and definitive example of the change. I chose a Warrior and a Marauder for my comparison.

While the photo is at a slight angle, the difference in the Warriors is very clear. The Age of Sigmar models are simply bigger.

The same goes for the Marauders. Thanks to my friend Scott for letting me use his models for this little demonstration.