2019/20 Hobby Season Review

 

Hi folks,

When I was preparing for the 2019/20 Hobby Season I was coming off the back of a pretty hard year, so I wasn't too ambitious with my To-Do list. I was a bit disenchanted by 40K, so focussed mainly on aiming to get my Space Hulk set painted. As you all know, this year really has been balls. I spent most of summer in Tasmania, which was amazing, but when I came home I always had one eye on the horizon and the other on my Bushfires Near Me app. With some time spent working from home due to the pandemic, you would think that there would be some extra time for painting, but it just wasn't the case. As a teacher, I found my workload more than doubled; things that I could usually do quickly were taking me a lot longer. Despite that, I did manage to do a whole of bunch of stuff I would have never imagined when I wrote my To-Do list. And, no, I didn't get my whole Space Hulk set painted...

Here is a trip down memory lane:

Warhammer 40K

Iron Snakes

A big year for my Iron Snakes, I managed to finish a 2000 points army that included some new Primaries figures. Squad Damocles, a 10 man Intercessor squad equipped with boarding shields, was completed for Squaduary.

Imperial Knights

For DreadTober I completed the second knight of my Walls of Ithaka detachment. This is "Theseus" Ferrum Fortis (Strong Punch!). 

Dark Angels

For Armour in April I finished this Landraider Excelsior, just in time for it to be relegated to "Legends" (or whatever they call those things now). Ah well, still a cool model, and very likely to be used in my casual games.

2nd Edition Army Challenge

Recently I have embarked on a 6 month challenge to complete a 1000 point army using 2nd Edition sculpts. I have opted for a classic Dark Angels scheme, starting the challenge with a repaint of two of my oldest figures; a Deathwing Master and Dreadnought.

Age of Sigmar

This year I managed to finish some figures that my daughter had chosen for herself. I also caught the Age of Sigmar bug and dove into Sylvaneth. To help motivate me as I started I entered some painting competitions along the way, all at my local Warhammer store. I won the Brushmaster title for the Treelord Ancient and the Kurnoth Hunters, with both the Kurnoth Hunters and my daughters Sisters of the Thorn featured for a short time on the Age of Sigmar Facebook group! Small wins, but they sure did keep me going during the tough initial slog through isolation. To be honest, the Treelord is probably my best work, it really, really, challenged me. 

Space Hulk

Well, this was meant to be the focus of my season. If you have managed to get to this stage in the post you can see just how distracted I was! I did manage to get the commanders done for each of the teams apart from the Fallen, which I painted the full team for. Calistarius, the Blood Angels Librarian was the real highlight, completed for The Jewel of July community challenge. The Broodlord was my Monster March entry.

Kill Team

I managed to speed-paint a H. R. Giger inspired Kill Team, as an alternative to my 4 Lictor murder list. I haven't tried it out yet, but I sure am looking forward to the Aliens quotes.

BattleTech

I know most of you are here for the 40K, and perhaps meander into Age of Sigmar like I do as well. But I also play a couple of other systems that do a great job of dividing my attention. With the delays to the Clan Invasion Kickstarter, BattleTech hasn't drawn my attention as much as it could have this year, but I still managed to paint a neat lance of mercenaries and a larger scaled piece for my mate Wade.

 

Phew, that's it, I think. 2019/20 has been crazy busy. I managed to get a lot more done than I ever intended, but I am still glad to put this year behind me. Tomorrow I will post my To-Do list for 2020/21!

See you across the table,

Marc

Space Hulk: Fallen Angels Boarding Party TO-DONE!!!

 

Hi folks,

I have juuuuust managed to squeeze one last project out of the 2019/20 Hobby Season. This is a squad Fallen terminators I will be using for Space Hulk, Kill Team and perhaps a small 40K army. The paint scheme for Fallen is pretty simple, so I made it harder for myself and added some checkered patterns. If you look close enough at them you can see they are not quite as neat and even as they should be, but in large amounts I think they are a cool addition.

Well, that's it for this season. Tomorrow I will post a season wrap-up with all that has been achieved and some of what could have been. After that I'll have a new To-Do list, full of interesting projects for 9th Edition, 2nd Edition, Kill Team, Space Hulk and Age of Sigmar. I have not decided what I will work on next; with the release of 9th Edition, the current 2nd Edition Army challenge and DreadTober around the corner, I am spoiled for choices! But I am getting ahead of myself; here is my last TO-DONE of the season!!

See you across the table,

Marc

Kill Team: Giger Genestealers

Hi folks,

Early this week I had a game planned with the guys that we ended up cancelling. The cancellation itself was not unexpected; everything is on a knife edge these days. We are all feeling pretty exposed and there is a special type of exhaustion that comes with that. I decided to spend the night speed-painting four genestealers for a new Tyranid Kill-Team, using some H. R. Giger vibe. Here is the process from start to finish, taking about 4 hours on and off (I played some Mario Cart with the boi, ate dinner and helped put the kids to bed as well!). As you will see, it is another case of just how bad miniatures can look before they actually start to look good.

Steps 1 and 2: Priming and Undercoat

I primed these bad boys black to get the most out of my metallics, using a Citadel rattle can. As soon as it was dry I added a layer of Leadbelchers with another rattle can. Leadbelchers can go on like a hot mess sometimes, but I have had a lot of luck with it, using it for my Tyranids, Imperial Knights and Iron Snakes.

Steps 3 and 4: Black Armour and Sepia Glave

Once the Leadbelchers was dry I went back and picked the armour out with black again using some quick brushwork. I then added a heavy sepia glaze that I left to dry completely before adding a second, lighter glaze to the centre of each section. I quick dry-brush around the joints was followed by a third, very light, sepia wash into the joints. This is how I highlight the "skin" of my Splinter Fleet Numereji 'Nids. The black armour wash dry-brushed with The Fang, then edge highlighted (kind-of) with 1:1 Ushbati Bone/ The Fang.

Steps 6, 7 and 8: Eyes, Tongue and Gore

Up to this stage, I have literally been flying with the brush. Shooooom. To say that it has not required brush control is a bit of a furphy: I have used brush control to go faster with just enough accuracy that I don't have to clean up mistakes. I have found that you can get away a lot if you back this up with some careful detail. So for the next step I really slowed myself down, fixed my posture, got my breathing right, gave my eyes a few extra seconds to focus and painted the eyes in Warpstone Glow, followed by a dot of bright yellow. The tongue was a mix of a Vallejo purple I have and Mephiston Red, with I then mixed with a little Ushbati Bone to create a highlight. In the final step I used my secret weapon, Tamiya Clear Red, to add some gore.

Step 9 and 10: Basing and Weathering

I quickly added a layer of PVA to the base and added some shell grit. Over night it set in place, allowing me to add some static grass with superglue. The last step was to add some orange, brown and purple to the metal grate under the Leader specialist using a stipling technique, to make it looked weathered and rusted.

Overall, I am very pleased with the final product and look forward to playing some Kill Team games with them. My Lictor team has already proven to be a potent force (perhaps too potent). These genestealers have the advantage of being able to find cover a little more easily than the Lictors can. The three Ravenors I have added can really rip around the board throwing out a lot of shots and attacks. Both are pretty squishy, though; a little less forgiving than the Lictors, so should be a bit more fun to play against. They also give all players complete license to quote Aliens all night long. Outstanding. Now all we need is a deck of cards. 

See you across the table,

Marc

Kill Team: Dark Angels Hunting Party TO-DONE!!!

Hi folks,

I finished assembling this Kill Team a while ago, but didn't get around to posting the finished product. This blog is often a chronicle of my thought processes, so, even though the squad doesn't offer anything new to look at, I thought I would post them and let you in on the idea behind this team.

Looking at my Dark Angels army list, I was wondering what kind of a Kill Team they would assemble if the necessity arose. My thoughts were that the Devastator squad could split, providing some heavy fire support, lead by their Sergeant. I thought the sergeant may have also assigned some scouts to the team, as part of their training. The heavy bolter scout could get some practical advice from his devastator counterpart and the sniper rifle scouts could be supervised by a boltgun toting devastator/spotter. The Reiver sergeant may be there as an advisor of some sort; the lone survivor of his squad joining a Kill Team out for vengeance, perhaps? A volunteer Primaris with something to prove? A Plains World warrior joining his brothers, in honour of their shared heritage, for one final suicide mission?

The two sergeants are very different in focus, with the Devastator sergeant taking the Leader specialism and a combi-plasma. I know from previous games that the high strength and AP of a plasma weapon is very useful. The option of supercharging is also fun, though could lead to me knocking out my own Leader (it has happened before...).

The Reiver sergeant is all about close-combat, taking the Combat specialism. Four attacks is nothing to sniff at!

The scout contingent includes a scout gunner armed with a heavy bolter, which I have given the Sniper specialism. Re-rolling 1's on a multi-shot weapon is pretty nifty. At higher levels, things like Quick Shot will really be fun to use.

The marine contingent includes a non-specialist marine with a boltgun, to join the two sniper scouts in a Fire Team. The marine with the heavy bolter has the Heavy specialism, which should provide some added mobility and punch. The plasma cannon toting marine is actual a company veteran from the Elites expansion (one Dark Angels veteran can have a heavy weapon). He has no specialism, but running around with a plasma cannon in Kill Team is special enough!

The list adds up to 125 points, which will be a nice counter-point to the Fallen team I am also working on at the moment. More about them later!

See you across the table,

Marc

Kill Team: Elites Review

Hi folks,

On Saturday I attended the Warhammer Day celebrations at my local Games Workshop in Sydney (Liverpool). The atmosphere was really buzzing, with a large turn out that included a bunch of veteran players, as well as some young kids just starting their journey in the hobby. The highlight for me was definitely the Funko Pop Kill Team game, which was just bonkers.

I picked up the last Sister Superior Amalia Novena figure, which I'll be working on during the holidays at some point, as well as the Elites rules for Kill Team.

I have been looking forward to getting my hands on the new Elites expansion for Kill Team for a while now, primarily so that I can start including Terminators in my lists. I was also interested in exploring the synergy between this ruleset and the extensive Space Hulk projects I will be working on next hobby season (starting at the end of August!). In particular, I can see myself playing a few Kill Team games with any new Space Hulk squads that I finish, using the Space Hulk gaming boards. Here are my first impressions of how this expansion will be impacting my games of Kill Team, now that I can take a closer look at it.

General Additions

 

Legendary Hunter Specialist

The book starts with some new rules for turning your Commander into a Legendary Hunter Specialist. I haven't used a Commander yet, but it looks like a lot of fun to take one as a Hunter, particularly at higher levels. To begin with, they are very resilient, gaining abilities and Tactics that negate the hit roll penalty from flesh wounds and reduce the severity of injuries. At level 4, a Legendary Hunter that finds itself in some space can disappear off into reserve and come back next turn anywhere on the board 5" away from enemy models. That will win games.

Reserves

There are also some new rules for setting up models in reserve and deploying them later in the game using the Outflank Tactic, which I think is a good addition to the game. "Sending someone around the back" is often a better option than "I don't know, I'll just set you up here", which I tend to resort to with my larger lists (or bigger models, when I run out of prime hiding spots in my deployment zone). I'll be deploying my poor, bullet-magnet, Close Combat Lictor to reserves in most games, I think.

My Close Combat specialist deploying in the alley next to the Sushi restaurant.

Sub-factions

The expanded rules for Sub-Factions is also a nice addition, allowing you to further personalise your army. Grim Resolve for my Dark Angels has stationary models re-rolling ones for shooting attacks and a reduced chance of my team being broken. My tunneling Jormungandr Nids will be obscured unless they advance or charge and my Iron Maiden themed Necrons will be firing their weapons at an extra -1 to AP at close range (the Mephrit: Solar Fury Dynastic Code). Nice!

"Out of the darkness, brighter than a thousand suns..."

 

 Adeptus Astartes

Note the wrist-mounted grenade launcher on the Captain...

Space Marine Commanders get a bunch of new options in Phobos armour, to support the new Shadowspear release, which I couldn't care less about at this stage. The Terminator options, though, made my eyes spin. For the commander slot, you have the option of a Captain, Librarian or Chaplain in Terminator armour, with the Captain having the option of a wrist-mounted grenade launcher. That option is as oldschool as hell, harking back to the original Space Hulk!

Troops-wise, there are options for all of the new Phobos marines (Infiltrators, Suppressors and Eliminators) all of which would make for an excellent Kill Team. For me, though, it is all about the Terminators and the excellent wargear they can bring to the battlefield. Deathwing Terminators can even bring their plasma cannon to the party.  I was surprised (I don't know why) to also see every flavour of astartes veteran in there as well (including Sternguard). That means I can field a pure Sternguard Iron Snakes list (YASSS!) and I don't have to use the Deathwatch rules for my Fallen Squad anymore, which I was feeling particularly cheesy about.

Necrons/Asuryani/

The new option for Necrons include Lychguard or Triarch Praetorians, both of which I have very little interest in dabbling with. In fact, looking at the Asuryani entry, I would be more likely to splash out on some Striking Scorpions, which fit the vibe of this game perfectly.

Tyranids

With the Commander option provided in the book being Deathleaper (!), it opens up the possibility for me to diversify my usual list a bit, if we ever do end up giving Commanders a craic in my gaming group. Taking a look at the new options, the one that really stands out is the Hive Guard. Sure it only hits on 6's most of the time, but a 36" strength 8 AP -2 double tap that doesn't require line of sight in Kill Team is a huge advantage. The trick will be keeping it in cover, as it is a tall model and will draw fire. The Ravenors are also an interesting choice, particularly as I have Aliens-themed ones. They are fairly expensive though; you can't get two for the price of a Lictor. Being as efficient as they are, I think I will miss their gribbly faces too much if I swapped out two Lictors. Perhaps I just need to bite the bolt and make a second Tyranid Kill Team.

"What do you mean they cut the power? They're just animals, man!"

Missions

Until I have had a go at some of the missions provided, I can't say too much about how fun they will be. We have played a few missions already that were really hard for one side to win, that would even out over time if we played more battles.

Surrounded, in particular, seems very hard. As the defender, you start the game caught in an attacker sandwich and will probably end the game there too.  Rampage, in which an attacking force just cuts sick in the enemies backfield, scoring Rampage points as they take out models, score mortal wounds and cause injuries, looks like an absolute hoot.  Escape the Facility looks like a great narrative game; it ticks all of those classic "great escape" tropes. I can imagine my gaming group having a really fun time with it, particularly if we do some kind of "Thunderhawk down" story to drive it. Crush Their Champions looks like a reworking of the classic "Battle at the Camp" scenario, i.e four-way backstabbing fest, where alliances rarely last longer than the first clip of ammo. Shifting Priorities is a mission I could see us snaffling for regular games. It is a 40K take on the "Crazy King of the Hill" multiplayer mission from Halo, where objectives move around, disappear and reappear. Each game would be very unique and have blisteringly unfair moments, which my gaming group appreciate greatly.

Overall Review 

I love what this expansion brings to the game. I am gravitating more and more to the skirmish side of 40K, allowing me to experiment with multiple factions and really focus on what makes certain units special from an individual model perspective. I am also enjoying the focus on modelling and painting much smaller units. Kill Team: Elites builds neatly upon the foundation I am already loving the guts out of, without adding too much complexity. There will be a tipping point in Kill Team, I think. If they ever start adding vehicles, we may as well just all start playing patrol sized games of X Edition 40K. We are not at that tipping point yet, though, with this book adding some diversity that the game really needs at this point. I strongly recommend that, if you are a fan of Kill Team, you pick this book up and take a look. The potential applications of the rules are far-reaching in terms of new gaming experiences.

See you across the table,

Marc