oMAD

New figures for 2012 finally!!! And there’s more Cryx than Khador O.o

Ok, these guys turn the chicken count to six. First, a third Deathripper.

And a couple of Nightwretches.

Finally, the little guy who’s been bored to death waiting for paint. In fact, I have played with him, with his armor half painted and the rest of the dog primed black. And I usually got nice comments about how not many people paint the dog black (they did not notice it was just primer). So before my last game (scroll down to see him next to Vlad vs Makeda) I decided to paint him up since he was gonna be the only half painted model in the whole army. And here he is. Khador wardog.

Catch you soon with some more painting and hopefully a couple of games.

Played a game today. I’m going on summer vacation on Friday so was very pleased to sneak a game in the middle of the week. Got my Khador against a friend’s Skorne at 35 points. Be mindful the list was made with the available models, so Makeda’s feat was basically useless and he was a point short. Also, the Cryx Slayer was proxying for Tyrant Radiem, who was taken for a spin. His list was:

Archdomina Makeda (*5pts)
* Cyclops Savage (5pts)
* Bronzeback Titan (10pts)
* Molik Karn (11pts)
* Titan Gladiator (8pts)
Tyrant Rhadiem (5pts)

My list was this one:

Vladimir, The Dark Prince (*5pts)
* Juggernaut (7pts)
* Juggernaut (7pts)
* Kodiak (8pts)
* War dog (1pts)
Doom Reavers (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Greylord Escort (2pts)
Man-o-war Shocktroopers (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)

Caster kill, big forest in the middle of the board and tons of cover spread about. I deployed and took first turn, did so on my left. Everything behind a wall of Shocktroopers and the Doom Reavers flanking on the extreme left. He was basically in the middle to-his-right of the board with the exception of the dragoon (proxy) solo.

Oh by the way, I painted the War Dog last night just because it was embarrassing he was the only unpainted fig on my army. Pics soon.

So first turn we both walked/ran forward with the exception of my Reavers who went to really flank, and run till the middle of the board.

My second turn I advanced the shield wall over the cover and spread my jacks and the Reavers.

On his second turn he got a bit too close. Not a lot, but enough to let me get some charges in. Despite having Vlad’s awesome feat (making jacks charge 11″) for later, I still got to charge in which was a nice change for… well… for every single battle I play. The Shocktroopers charged the Bronzeback except for one and did more than decent damage, while only two Reavers reached the other Titan making some good damage themselves. Jacks repositioned with the Kodiak facing the forest where the dragoon hid.

On his next turn he proceeded to decimate my infantry. The Gladiator got rid of two Reavers while Molik freakin-Karn went on to kill 2 more and the Greylord. He would have killed every single one of them if they were closer together and his Titan wasn’t blocking him. The Bronzeback single-handedly destroyed 4 out of 5 Shocktroopers, and that’s only because the fifth was behind the battleline. God that bastard hits hard. The Dragoon somehow thought he would hurt the Kodiak, which he didn’t that much.

On my next turn, it was feat time. But most importantly, it was almost game over. Of the two Reavers that stayed alive, one was in charge range of Makeda. He did, and took every hit point but two of the damn warlock. The other one charged the Gladiator and killed it! Kodiak dismounted the dragoon and the remaining Manowar charged to finish him. One Juggernaut finished the Bronzeback  and the other one charged Molik goddamnyou-Karn. Critical freeze, he makes me reroll. Crit freeze, reroll. Fail the attack finally (with 4 dice… boosted + Signs and Portents). Hit with hand for an awesome 6 damage. That’s what he did on feat turn with S&P and a focus on him.

After that Makeda had to deal with the Reaver, so did the Cyclops Savage (and only because that single Reaver was still a threat to Makeda), and Molik hahaha-Karn failed his Threshold test which meant he did a bit of damage on my Juggy and nothing more. Best part is my opponent moved Makeda a bit too far from him.

Next turn the Juggy finished Molik out-of-range Karn (no rerolls biatch!). The other one Boundlessly Charged the remaining Cyclops and the Kodiak made an epic millimeter close run through the forest to engage Makeda.

Next turn she did a bit of damage to the Kodiak, but the Kodiak crushed her on the next turn.

It was a great game and I find myself so comfortable playing against an army that has a similar playstyle and characteristics as mine. I must have played against Skorne only once or twice before, but I can “see” everything almost clearly from the get-go. Something that doens’t happen to me against other trickier armies.

Black Ivan is probably the lamest warjack name coming out of PP ever. I mean, really. “Hard Vodka Comrade” would have been less silly and obvious, but whatever, still a good Destroyer on steroids. And even though I don’t usually like character warjacks with such obvious bonds to one single caster, I think he is worth the extra point (to a Destroyer) if you have a good use for him, his extra RAT, and the few abilities.

Anyway, here’s a couple of pics of the posing and base work before painting. There’s no plastic jack I ever posed without messing around with legs, arms and whatnot. And this was not the exception. So to match his better RAT I thought I’d make him resting on a bit of cover, supposedly surrounded by a few fellow Winter Guard Riflemen behind the sandbags.

With the silly excuse of talking about going from pencil and paper to digital sketching, PP’s Insider gives us a couple of pictures to drool on and wonder about. (Isn’t that what we love the most of PP’s online presence?)

The second piece specifically shows what’s clearly sketches for Vlad3, with his mount as shown on this preview.

Now, I know it’s a lot to hope for with all the nice plastic jacks, heavy-ish infantry, and now beasts coming out, but it seems to me that the next obvious step is to turn all those beautiful (and extremely expensive) cavalry units into full unit plastic kits.

Don’t you think?

Today I played against my usual Circle opponent.

Spent a whole hour of my life and brain power coming up with ways to kill those obnoxious druids to find he had none in his 35p list. He’s practicing for a tourney coming up which I won’t be able to attend cause I’ll be on the beach. I did bring a nice list though.

He had Kromac with Megalith, a Stalker, another big bad wolf and a unit of Tharn ladies with weapon master spears (O.o) and an attachmente. Also some “shepperd-like” solo and I think that was it.

I brought my usual eVlad with Doom Reavers + attach, full MoW Shocktroopers, Widowmakers, a Spriggan, and added a new full unit of yet unpainted MoW Demo Corps. Some lessons from the battle.

Stay out of the fucking woods!!!! I know, I know, I should know this already. But somehow I built my MoW wall with a forest to a flank, and he used it as his base of operations for the bashing.

Widowmakers kick ass. The last 3 or 4 battles I couldn’t use them properly. Meaning I wasn’t shooting at squishy infantry from 14″ away. People know them and fear them so they know how to make them useless. Except they are SO kickass they can stand their ground against anything. Killing his Tharn cavalry last game was followed by an impressive point black gun-to-the-stealth-face round of shooting against the Tharn girlies. They even survived around of melee with Prey on them and the last dude managed to kill a Tharn with his sword. Hand of Fate on them rocks.

Stalker wolf-thing is a beast!! Berserk + Prowl + Sprint or some combo like that. He took over 4 of the five MoW Demo Corps in one round of brutal attack, attack, move, attack, attack, move and whateverthefuckhewantedtodo. Bastard went back into the woods after doing all that.

Megalith is obnoxious as all hell. I’ve killed him twice already. But in a staring contest, the fucker is just such a bother. Rift making rough terrain in front of my MoW eager to charge. Rough terrain around him protecting another wolf from proper “inch-tight” charges. Defense and ARM debuffs and whatnot with Kromac nearby. Such a pain. Oh, and ARM 21 with a spell on him. FFS…

In the end I killed a lot of stuff, he did too, but It was gonna end up pretty much being Kromac and Megalith against eVlad and the Spriggan (sitting on a bad spot after rightfully killing a completely healed Stalker in one swift, 3 focus + Assail charge turn… gotta love Khador jacks, and I play an infantry caster… um…) We did play the killing turn but was more theorymachine and rolling dice than anything else.

Thoughts on the game and list: stay the fuck out of the woods goddammit!!!! Play scenarios. Even on friendly games. When an army ignores terrain completely, the board is no longer an equal playing field for caster kill games. Get some mercenaries into the list building process. I’m one of those that hardly ever plays the Wardog, because I just don’t have an extra unspent point. But getting me a Saxon Orrik to give pathfinder when needed (specially my MoW wall playstyle) will do good against many, many opponents.

Anyway, a nice afternoon of pain and obnoxious Circle play. At least he doesn’t win on turn 3 anymore. Sorry for the wall of text, no pics were taken.