The Unending Swarm

Commander Peribon Krate leaned against the walls of the ruined building, and looked across the valley floor- behind him he could hear a litany of grumbles and curses as Number Three section worked their way through the ruins. The rest of the Grenadiers were strung out across the valley, advancing carefully across the remains of an ancient city. They weren't far from the gleaming dome of Outpost 219 now; it towered over the ruins, but Krate wasn't taking any chances- the last known communication from the Outpost had been abruptly cut short, and he didn't want to lead the Trevuntular Grenadiers into a trap. 

The comm-link in his ear crackled- "Arklay here, something moving out there. 1500 meters and closing, moving fast, over."

"Roger that, Sergeant. Grenadiers; hold your positions and take cover, contact imminent."  Krate turned to the Comms Operator, "Get on the line to Brigade, tell them we've found the scum!"

Been a while...Rick decided he wanted to play a game of 2nd ed 40k with his Tyranids. As we both had a day off work he came round and I set up a table, and dug out the Grenadiers. He insisted on playing the Tyranid Attack mission, which allows him to recycle all his figures, but requires him to wipe my forces out; a single Grenadier still standing at the end wins me the game! We played 1000 points aside.

The Trevuntular Grenadiers
Commander Peribon Krate, with laspistol, powersword and stasis grenade
HQ with banner and grenade launcher
3 infantry sections with an array of plasma guns, lascannons, heavy bolter and flamer.
Missile launcher squad split into 3 PIAT teams.
Wolverine MBT, with battlecannon, heavy bolter, and heavy stubber.
Wolfhound armoured car with autocannon and heavy stubber

Myself and the Grenadiers.

 The Swarm
Hive Tyrant with whip and venom cannon
Carnifex
3 termagant broods
2 hormagant broods
1 warrior brood
1 spore mine launcher thing with 4 mines.

Rick and the Gribbly Horde

The Grenadiers deploy for battle

The Grenadiers right flank

The Tyranid menace advances 

1st shot of the game comes from the Hive Tyrants Venom cannon,
which penetrates the Wolverine MBT and destroys it!

The steady volleys of the Grenadiers completely fail to slow the Tyranid advance.

The Wolfhound armoured car attracts the attention of the Hive Tyrant but is unharmed

The PIAT team are roughed up by the Hormagants, but
Peribon Krate is on hand to to turn the tide!

Number Three Section's flamer thins the horde slightly...

In the centre Number One Section takes the fight to the enemy,
their surprise assault destroying a Termagant Brood... 

...pity about the Carnifex really.

The Grenadiers around the ruins give it their best shot, mowing down
the smaller 'nids, but a few strays make it into melee.

The carnifex proves imperious to bayonets.

The Wolfhound charges around the enemy flank, only suffering minor inconvenience from a gribbly thing
that had snuck into the vehicle, and start giving the 'nid horde the benefit of their three sustained fire dice!

The next wave gets closer, and there's barely a Grenadier to stand against them now!

The defence of the ruins gives way as the 'gaunts close in.

The last few Grenadiers on the right go down fighting with their backs to the wall!

The wolfhound is opened up by the next wave of warriors. I didn't know
they could be recycled too!

So many 'nids, so few guns left to stop them!

The Tyranids move to finish off the last of the Grenadiers...

...but Peribon Krate, and two of his men, remain standing!

 Peribon Krate rammed his laspistol into the maw of the obscene creature and held down the trigger till its head was nothing but mist, he turned and brought his sword round in an arc that bit deep into the head of another alien abomonation , the Grenadier next to him exploded in a mass of writhing tentacles, and he snapped off a few shots at the 'nids swarming along the side of the building. At his feet the abandoned comms unit was chattering to itself; he grabbed the headset and pressed it to his ear "...age repeats, this is Nightreaper, mark your positions with orange smoke..." He dropped the headset and yelled the instructions into the grenadiers comm-net, diving for cover, his men at his heels. The orange smoke was already billowing above his head as his ears were filled with the roar of jet engines, and his nose was filled with the smell of napalm...

Great game, with some heroics and desperate fighting from the Grenadiers who proved themselves able to halt the unending swarm! 

You might have noticed an unusual vehicle in the pictures above- here it is again:

The Wolfhound Armoured Car- a repainted eaglemoss 1/43 model
of a French WW2 Panhard armoured car, with bigger guns and stowage added.

And it was only the start of a day of gaming- we had a go at Eight Minute Empire, a nice little game which Rick won. And then it was off to the gaming club to play Xwing for the evening, picking up a Y-Wing from the model shop on the way! Two games resulted in victories over Chris and his Imperial lackeys - that Y-Wing turned out to be a great buy with its Ion Turret forcing the TIE fighters and Interceptors to fly in very short straight lines whilst the X-wing and Headhunter lined up the killing shots! Also it proved impossible to kill- even with multiple enemies targeting it they still struggled to remove its shields!

Anyway, I've done a fair bit of painting this last few months. Ill try and get pics on here soon!

Thats all folks!

Daleks and Daemons

Hello!

Last night I went down to the local club to play Chris at a spot of 40k. On a whim I decided to take a slightly different force to usual- I recalled my Daleks hadn't been out for a while, and so, digging out the necron army list, I put together a little 1100 point force-
A Dalek Supreme, 4 teams of 5 Daleks, and 4 drones (scarabs).
Chris decided to throw a slight curve ball with an Daemon world force- A Daemon Prince special Character (430 points of monster that I didn't have a weapon strong enough to hurt!) and a collection of beastmen, minotaurs, and frenzied chaos warriors.

With one side screaming EXTERMINATE! and the other bellowing BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD! in an attempt to cause severe hearing loss on all sides we were expecting absolute carnage!  And, boy, were we to be disappointed...

When this veritable horde bounced off the startline and screamed towards my daleks I was a little worried- With no vehicles and shooting on his side he had no reason to hang back, and my Drones were useless. My opening volleys did precisely nothing. This didn't look good.

In a bid to slow the advance the Drones went forward to stop march moves, the daleks backing off to get some space. The Daemon Prince charged the nearest Daleks, and the rest of the army charged the Drones, eager to clear these annoyances away.

It was then that we discovered something weird. The Drones (or scarabs) are T8. With nothing higher than S4 he couldn't touch them. Almost the entire chaos army was tied up in combats they simply couldn't win...A few minotaurs dashed forward to break the Dalek line, but they went down quickly to cries of EXTERMINATE! The Daemon Prince found its own opponents were less than obliging. Refusing to engage him in honourable combat it was forced to fight them one at a time- though the outcome was inevitable it took one of the most powerful creatures in the 41st Millenium the whole game to knock down 5 Daleks, and even then he only killed two of them!

The Dalek Supreme led the rest of the Daleks towards the enemy deployment zone ( I had the dawn raid mission ), taking pot shots as they went, though most of their efforts bounced off the invulnerable Drones! Eventually, Chris tried some desperate tactics to rectify the situation- he decided to disengage from the the three drones he had rashly charged- he managed to do this without loss, but all three units were fleeing, The drones charged the routing units and they headed for the hills, but managed to rally to a man on the table edge! The drones charged again, and this time the Khornate loonies stood, having found that being in melee with shots bouncing off the drones was fare safer than letting the Daleks use them for target practice.

Thus the game ended, with minimal casualties, some very bored looking Daleks and ridiculous combats in which the two sides were so hopelessly mismatched there was no chance of either side actually winning!  In light of this The Dalek Emperor and Khorne have both decreed their respective taglines must change to WOULD-YOU-LIKE-A-CUDDLE? and HUGS-FOR-THE-HUGS-GOD! Bloody pathetic 'aint it?

Push and go Panzer IV platoon

A few years ago I found a push and go panzer IV in a gift shop on a caravan park.  It came in a box with a bunch of Abrams...  The Panzer IV at least looked like it might be close to 1/56 scale. So, as it was only £3.50 I bought one. And it was.  

Earlier this year, at a different caravan park, I was able to pick up two more.

I removed the motors, and wheels. and the strange lugs under the turret- as bought the turret didnt turn, it merely wiggled from side to side as it moved. The top deck was rebuilt, with a central hole, and a new lug on the turret for a proper pivot.

They are not the most detailed models ever, the detail being a little soft, but its good enough that its clearly and unmistakably a panzer IV.

The camo scheme is taken from an image of a tank right at the end of the war. Im guessing here but I suspect that by this point the paint available to the jerries was little more than coloured water, as it looked very thin and hastily washed on. I quite liked the effect and watered down my paint to try and mimic it.

All in all , not bad for a little over a tenner for 3 tanks!

Of Wizards Towers and Kings of War...

Hello again, and welcome to another installment of me building, painting and playing with toy soldiers.

Since my last post the action has been all Kings of War. With the death of Warhammer Fantasy Battle, the question went around the group "What will our orcs do now!?" We had hardly played the last couple of editions of WHFB- they were fairly dire and the constant codex creep and having to keep up with the Jones' was a pain in the bum, and hadn't played Fantasy at all for ages for this reason. There were better games to be playing, but the fantasy itch was always there at the back of our collective minds waiting, biding its time.

And its time has come! We'd discussed a few possibilities. Modding Hail Caeser, renovating an older edition of WHFB etc. But little agreement in how to go about it. And then Warhammer was killed off...and Mantic announced Kings of War 2nd ed would be released soon. We had a look. We liked what we saw. And we dusted off the old fantasy figures and sat back for 2nd edition to hit. I pre-ordered the gamers edition almost immediately, and to get us going we downloaded the various Beta and Free versions of the lists and tried a few kick abouts.

What we have found is a game with a deceptively simple system, the rules are clear and concise, and don't try to be to detailed (which is unnecessary anyway when your dealing with armies with a couple of hundred figures!). We learnt to play within the first couple of turns of a 90 minute game. It doesn't take much longer to get a handle on the various special rules and unit profiles in play. The tactics are a little trickier!  And it is tactical- its a game that rewards attempting to out deploy and outmaneuver your opponent. There are gimmicks like magic swords and spells and monsters and warmachines that you can use to try and "herohammer" your way to victory, but the benefits gained for outflanking your enemy or getting behind him outweigh these by miles! Attacking in the flank doubles your attacks, in the rear it triples them. A good magic artefact might do nothing more than give you a slight advantage over an otherwise equal enemy unit. Outmaneuver your enemy and even fairly modest units can inflict a lot of damage!

Like Hail Caeser the game has fixed unit sizes and worries more about the overall footprint of a unit rather than individual models. Much better suited to a mass battle game. But dont get too hung up on your troops not being on exactly the right size base, we havn't gone and rebased all our figures and it doesn't appear to matter in the slightest.

It is proving a popular game in these parts and folk are flocking to the banners! So far my various fantasy armies have fought all manner of deamonic forces, Ogres and Samurai and I'm looking forward to many more games of this soon! And maybe a campaign...

In other news I've been building some scenery.

May I present a a wizards tower built specially for my Necromancer, Sirius Dictian.  The Core of the tower is simply a Pringles can with polystyrene built around its base. The stonework is milliput- each stone formed individually. Wood work is matchsticks, Window and door frames are built up with plasticard and then the stonework milliputted on. The Roof is a card cone, with lots of little bits of roughly shaped card glued on in rows. The whole thing took about 2 weeks.

Unfortunatly this last few months has seen a lot less painting than normal. A few extra elves were painted, Work has begun on what might eventually be a war elephant.  A tank arrived in the post- something called a bronekorpus tank, from a Russian company, only £3.50ish, and not bad for the price, It comes with a lot of bits so you can pick and choose from a variety of weapons. and assamble them in a variety of ways. Mine got the same colour scheme as the Cataphracts, as seen in their recent battle against necrons. It will count as a Predator, though with a different weapons fit- a Conversion Beamer and a Missile Launcher. I'm not entirely happy with the paintwork- something weird happened when I varnished it and a lot of the paint bubbled up. No matter, it was cheap and cheerful and it will go well with the Cataphracts.

Also on the painting table- an array of odds and ends mostly- a couple of beastmen, a pair of riflemen (thanks Rick!) a handful of Romano-British horsemen, and a few stray medieval chaps. Also some tanks. I picked up a couple of the new zvezda models- the Grant and the Stuart. And very nice they are too. The Grants went together a bit easier than the Stuarts but a bit of pushing and trimming and they went together ok. They are quite a lot smaller than my battlefront Grants and Stuarts, so they wont be joining those companies but may be the beginning of new forces. Did you know in FOW midwar that you can fit two British armoured Squadrons of 16 Honey Stuarts each into a 1500 point force? Thats 32 fast tanks.  Food for thought perhaps...

. 

On a recent trip to South Wales I picked up a pair of 1/56th Panzer IV's. I'd already got one of these models from a caravan site in Yorkshire, and was pleased to find another two to go with it. They were a mere £3.50 each, and it was the work of moments to remove the push and go mechanism, and rebuild the turret ring so the turret rotates properly. Once I'd done that with the new pair I went back and did it with the original one too, (I'd previously only glued it in place!). Now all three are undercoated and on the painting table awaiting a suitable latewar paint job. I don't do a lot of 28mm wargaming for ww2 these days but I'm sure I'll find a use for them, and you can't really say no to a 1/56 scale panzer platoon for around a tenner can you?

 

Raising the Dead

I've been meaning to get an Undead force for a while. Could never find a Necromancer that I liked though. And it had to be a Necromancer, of course. Because of Nicol Williamson.

And then I heard about Frostgave. Went to Northstar to have a look. And there found I my Necromancer!
So I ordered a box of the Wargames Factory Skellies (had my eye on those for a while!) and to the painting table we went!

Sirius Dictian, and his apprentice Gunther Tripe, commanding his Undead horde.

Some of the Arcane Armorial inspired shields I've been trying

Behind the Archers, Sirius Dictians pet Snail, Snaegl. A pet more loyal to his master you never saw... 

Had another go at some freehand banners. What is life without Whimsy?

Snaegl, by the way, I found at a Carboot sale for 20p and simply couldn't say no. I'd like a whole unit of them but I've never seen anymore like him.

The skellies were painted thusly- Humbrol Dark Brown spray as the undercoat, Bleached bone drybrush, Revell Watercolour MudBrown (heavily watered to make a wash) washed over and then a Bleached Bone Drybrush. Seemed to work quite well I felt.
The Wargames Factory Skellies are excellent models, this is the new improved version with sturdier limbs etc, which is probably why I had no breakages.  Theres a bunch of raising dead (4 in the pics above and more on the sprue) that I will use for a diorama I think.  You might notice some unusual weapons amongst them .  I quickly noted that they are compatible with almost any of the Historical plastic kits around at the moment. So I raided my bits box and equipped some as Zulus, others as Romans, and some as 18th century British infantry! I think theres even a 15th century knight in there too...

I am especially happy with my shields and my banners. What do you reckon?

Raid on Research Station 217

      High above the shining orb that was Hetraxis Prime, Captain Coruscant gazed down through the viewport. Restless, he drummed his fingers on the sill, the servo-assisted gauntlet leaving impressions in the metalwork. Six months they'd been here. Six whole months on this clapped out freighter in high orbit with nothing to do but gaze out of viewports. And wait. Still, the pay could be worse, though the lack of activity and anonymity of his employers was beginning to grate. Wait, they said, and when the alarm sounds head for the Teleporter. That was another thing- a rust bucket like this had no business containing such an enormous and advanced teleporter suite. And the secrecy- Even as the commander of the Cataphracts he had been unable to see anything of the ship, or even more than a handful of the crew. 
        He turned back to face the room full of Cataphracts on stand by. All were in full power armour, armed and waiting. The rest of the company were stood down at the moment. His gaze moved from face to face and saw boredom on each one. And the room was strobed with red light, and a keening noise filled his universe, and with a start he realised the alarm was sounding. He jammed his helmet on and headed for the Teleporter, the deck pounding as twenty of the toughest mercenaries in the Segmentum followed. The comm-link in his ear was alive with chatter and he strained to pick out the intel he would need, "Contact, hostiles sector 5...we're pulling back...Sergeant Drayma, respond...fast movers inbound in s....no life signs detected" The Cataphracts took their positions around him, as the blast doors closed, "Nothing on Auspex, we can't get a lock...med-evac to sector 5, we are taking heavy f-aaarrrggh..." , the suite was filled with a blinding white light as the Teleporter powered up, its energies reducing the vox chatter to garbled static but just before arcane technologies whisked him through a tiny crack in space and time Captain Coruscant was just able to make out a transmission that chilled him to the bone, "contacts identified, ident confirmed...Necrontyr..."



Hello and welcome back. Today, a Battle report. I had a couple of old friends, Dave and Ali over the other weekend, they used to do a fair bit of gaming with me back in the day and after a bit of a hiatus were keen to have a game over a beer or two. So I cooked up a scenario and bought some beer and set up a game for them. I decided we'd use the 2nd ed rules as it would be vaguely familiar to them and it was something I'd been playing a bit recently. And I asked Ali to bring his Necrons.

The Scenario
The Inquisition have found an ancient artifact of obvious alien power. Being totally unimaginative they named it the Shard of Infinite Darkness. Desirous of its arcane cubic secrets they took it to a secure and top secret facility-Ordos Xenos Research Station 217 on the planet Hetraxis Prime. Here, they studied it and attempted to unlock its power but despite years of effort had failed to make any headway. The Station itself is defended by several mercenary contingents, who are not even aware that they in the service of the Inquisition, some of whom openly patrol the surrounding area, and others who await in a disguised freighter in high orbit.
Half a galaxy away, in a forgotten tomb, the Necron Lord Rubix was annoyed. One of his favourite toys, that had kept him occupied during the eons between bouts of exterminating all life in the universe, had gone missing, and he couldn't find it anywhere. Despite turning out every cupboard and looking under all the sarcophagi it remained elusive. In frustration he turned to more arcane means of searching and eventually discovered a website where a conspiracy theorist named the StarChild claimed to have seen a similar cubic artifact in the hands of a human inquisitor. Swiftly, he revived enough warriors for a raiding party and boarded his personal Starship in pursuit!

The table was laid out with the research station in the centre of the table. Large mountains and jungle and ruined buildings were placed around it.

Dave took the Inquisitorial forces under his command-
The Research Station is armed with a Twin Linked AA Autocannon and 2 lasguns covering the walkway.
A Security Team of 7 men armed with lasguns and laspistols.
A Cyborg with powerfist and Grenade Launcher.
These would all start on the table, the security team patrolling.
In Reserve he had Captain Coruscant's Cataphracts- A Captain with Thunderhammer and plasma pistol, wearing power armour, and 4 combat squads of 5 Cataphracts, Variously armed with Lascannon, flamer and heavy plasma guns. These would arrive just off table and move on after the alarm was sounded.

Ali took command of Lord Rubix and his raiders.
These consisted of a Lord,  14 warriors and 4 Destroyers.

I would Gamesmaster.

Ali's task was to get as close as possible without being spotted by Daves patrols or the alarm going off. In hindsight I may have made this a little too easy as Dave managed to raise the alarm almost immediately! He then had to get into the research station and search it (without getting killed) , find the Cube and escape off the table! Simple eh? To be honest I didn't think he'd find it difficult, Necrons have a beefy statline!

 Opening moves; the Necrons try and use the ruined city to cover their advance but
Trooper Drek spots them instantly and sounds the alarm, and is immediately killed! 

The Destroyers head for the station, the now active Cyborg and Security team respond.

The Field of Battle with the Cataphracts arriving at the far end beyond the Research Station.
Most of the Security team are dead, though the AA guns atop the station have taken a heavy toll
on the Necron Destroyers.

The Catphracts Advance!

But the Necrons are closing in!

With the AA guns knocked out the Destroyers head for the Objective.
Landing on the Parking Platform they dismount and smash their way in. Unfortunately
once inside they get lost- One falls down an elevator shaft and other manages to get into
the Xenos enclosures where its is promptly eaten by an Ambull.

Despite the Combat Cyborg's efforts the Necrons mop up the remaining
 Security Troopers with little difficulty.

                                   

Both sides advance to the Station and the Necrons split up- Some fight their way in while
Lord Rubix and his Warriors hold back the Cataphracts!

Lord Rubix prepares to run "DiePunyMortalDie.Exe" but repeated whacks from a thunder
hammer turned this into a "Fatal Error" and he promptly crashed... 

More Necrons surge into the Research Station and take up the search. One
 ends up in a Trash Compactor but 1000010 01101111 01100010 finds the cube and
they head for the exit!

With Necron casualties mounting time is running out- The Destroyers on the landing pad were
out of action so two warriors hotwired the parked Skycar to take the cube to safety . Their fellow
 Warriors provided covering fire as they sped off, gunning down Captain Coruscant!

Only seconds after takeoff they are hit by a stray plasma bolt and the Skycar
goes out of control wedging itself in the side of a ruined building. 01000010 01101111 01100010
and 01010011 01110100 01110101 dive clear

They climb down and sprint for the table edge but around the Research Station the
Cataphracts firepower proves too much and another Warrior falls. Unable to resist the call of ancient
 technosorcery the remaining Warriors phase out!

01000010 01101111 01100010  jumped clear and managed to land on the walkway, and rolled for cover. Not a moment too soon as the primitive SkyCar exploded behind him. 01010011 01110100 01110101 must have bought it, he thought, but stood up to see 01010011 01110100 01110101 stood on the walkway, looking slightly battered, but the living metal already repairing itself. Clutching the Cube they leaped down and climbed through the rubble to safety. Nearly there, thought 01000010 01101111 01100010, just a few more yards till we've cleared their Teleport Jammers. Catching his foot on a tangle of ancient wiring he went down, the Cube falling from his grasp, metal fingers questing for it, and as he felt the irresistible call of the Tomb from half a galaxy away the searching became more desperate. He forced himself to reach it, his fingers brushing its surface, and then closing through it as they lost their physical form, the panic rising as he scrabbled for it as it faded from view. The cube lay there amidst the ruins of a long forgotten civilization, the breeze gently covering it with dust and vegetation, and there, with  its six brightly coloured sides untarnished by the millenia, it lies still.

Conclusion:

This must have been one of the greatest games I've ever had the pleasure of taking part in. Partly the scenario worked pretty well, and partly it developed its own narrative as it went; the Necrons were so close to victory being only a single move from safety when they Phased out! Partly its down to the models and Scenery which all looked the part, and of course the atmosphere of being with two old friends, beer and music was just great!

In future I'd make some changes- Make the Necrons harder to spot in the Sentry phase at the start, and make sure they bring scarabs to disrupt the Cataphracts shooting- Their disruption field would have been very useful! 

Credits

Beer consumed was Stella Artois Cidre and Marstons EPA.

Music Provided by Two Steps from Hell (The Battlecry, Invincible and Skyworld albums) . 

Ankles were duly nudged by Bella.

Scenery Chewing provided by Monty

Inquisitorial forces from Em4 Miniatures

Necrons from Citadel. 

After Action vittles from Kash22. I had the Blue Buffalo...