A bit of all sorts

Since the last entry I've painted up the Temple Flame Guard unit attachment, seen below; they were painted identically to the main unit in this entry.  The UA will add a bit more punch to the unit and a bit more survivability, the officer's mini-feat allows the unit to have +4 armour for a round as well as immunity to knock down and stationary causing effects.  The unit also get tactics: 'Menoth's Howl' and this allows them to cause terror and have continuous effect fire on their melee weapons.  I'll look forward to fielding these pretty soon!

Temple Flame Guard UA front

Temple Flame Guard UA rear

TFG Officer close-up

TFG Standard bearer close-up

 I recently purchased the Blood of Martyr's heavy character warjack with a view to getting Thyra up and running.  I thought I'd share a good tip for assembling a model where the contact joint is tiny and the risk of damage great.  I used thick super glue with accelerator spray to get a good bond in the gap where Blood of Martyr's  long tabards are joined to the chassis of the warjack.  Following this I filled in a layer of greenstuff behind this to further reinforce the joint, making a kind of wedge.  It is simple enough technique not to be a stunning revelation, but worth noting as without it problems would undoubtedly have occurred!  See photos below:

Regarding painting I'll crack on with the second unit of Errants next, though I'm not really looking forward to them as it is a really long winded job, but they need doing so I'll have to find motivation!

Gaming wise I'm looking forward to December Domination next weekend, details of this can be seen here.

Look forward to seeing you there!

Dirty Mercs

It’s been a week or so since my last entry, I’ve not been terribly productive since then as I’m currently recovering from yet more surgery, though I have managed to paint up a few models during my recuperation time.

I mentioned a few entries back that I was planning on expanding my Severius lists to the 50 point mark so I had something ready for tournaments of this size.  Of note Vapnartak in York, early 2012, will have 50 point lists on day two.  Though my lists aren’t finalised I set myself the task of completing the following to help bolster the painted force so far:

·        Exemplar Errants min unit

·        Temple Flame Guard unit attachment

·        X2 Choir of Menoth acolytes

·        Vassal of Menoth

·        eEiryss Angel of Retribution

·        Lady Aiyanna and Master Holt

I have already uploaded photos of the extended Choir and Vassal; however below are photos of epic Eiryss and Lady Aiyanna + Master Holt.

eEiryss front

eEiryss rear

eEiryss side

These mercenary allies were painted as close to the ‘official’ colours seen in the Merc faction book.  I used a very earthy pallet for eEiryss given that she has a background in stealth, camouflage and tree huggin', like those hippy Circle folk.  The cloak was the main feature and was painted using Camo Green as a base.  I paid particular attention to the epic base she stands upon, trying to make it look like and aged stone relic of some kind. 

Lady Aiyanna & Master Holt

Lady Aiyanna  front

Lady Aiyanna  side

Lady Aiyanna  rear

Lady Aiyanna  side

Master Holt  front

Master Holt  side

Master Holt  rear

Master Holt  side

 I used a mixture of P3 and Citadel paints.  Of note Lady Aiyanna's cloak was a reddish brown created by mixing Scorched Brown and Blood Red; I’ve found these two colours mix really well and create a very smooth transition.  Holt’s blue jacket was painted using the P3 Cygnar blues and washed with GW’s Asumen Blue.

So what about gaming?

Gaming wise these mercs are very useful, eEiryss is great for anti-buffing enemy units as her very high RAT and long range crossbow can remove enemy upkeep spells and animi; it also disrupts warjacks.  These abilities are very powerful in ensuring the enemy is weakened.  Eiryss can also be used in a last ditch ‘bomb’, she can run very quickly and possibly be placed within 5” of multiple enemy warjacks preventing them from receiving focus the following turn.  She has numerous other uses of course, but the afore mentioned ones are why she is popular amongst many gamers.

Aiyanna and Holt are a unit, though they are essentially two solos.  Lady Aiyanna has three main in-game effects, whilst not being offensive she can give herself and Holt stealth, commonly used as the pair advance up field.  She can ‘Kiss of Lyliss’ a model/unit which then suffers +2 to all incoming damage rolls for a turn.  When you start combining that with Choir buffs and Eye of Menoth etc suddenly attacking models can cause far more damage than anticipated.  Her final ability is to grant a friendly unit ‘magical weapons’.  This is of course situational, however when facing incorporeal models, or something which can only be damaged by magical attacks this ability is invaluable.  Holt is a gunfighter with the virtuoso skill, so very handy up close as well as from afar.  He has a very high RAT and two pistols, thus adding a bit more ranged threat to my Menite force.  His special ability comes into effect when either he or Lady Aiyanna are shot at; he can immediately fire at the attacking model and if a hit is scored the attacking model automatically misses, useful to burn out unwary enemies attempting to gun this pair down.

Regarding more ranged support; man I wish I could have a unit of Gun Mages... ah well!!  ;-)

Golden Troll Open 2011, the exploits of Sevvy Part III

Closing thoughts and conclusions

'Golden Troll was everything I expected and more', to sum it up in a single sentence.  I really enjoyed all of my games and all four of my opponents were sporting and pleasant guys.  The whole thing was relaxed and didn’t feel hyper competitive in the least, something I had become very tired of during some of my latter 40K tournament experiences.  I felt the T.O. JT-Y did a superb job and I expected as much having been to Toy Soldier events hosted by him over the past few years.

Regarding my personal performance, I posted up that I was aiming to achieve a single win, which was a reasonable objective given my relatively low Warmachine and Hordes tournament experience plus the afore mentioned high calibre of players attending the event.  Winning three games was far more than I could possibly have hoped and as a result I placed a respectable 6^th in the event.

Obviously I was really pleased with this performance, though in fairness to my opponents most games could have gone the other way, the eSevvy game against the Gators was a horrible match up for my opponent, but he kept on trying and if he’d passed the last tough roll I could have lost quite easily the next turn, similarly in the last game I had very little time to achieve a victory and made it just before ‘dice down’.

My fellow wargamers from Hull Warmachine and York etc all had a great time too and I think my favourite bit of the event was sharing a pub meal together with them after the event, re-telling our glorious victories and horrible defeats over some good grub and a pint!  To be honest the social aspect of this hobby is what makes it so special in my opinion.

Some photos of the armies on display over the lunch break:

Some concluding thoughts on my army choices for those interested in my thoughts on Menites at war:

The Sevvy’s are probably my favourite warcasters, hence my reason for choosing them.  The prime list was really a jack of all trades as it could deal with infantry exceedingly well with the arced Ashes to Ashes and the Vanquisher’s double Flame Belcher shots.  The list had the Avatar who under Eye of Menoth and Hymn of Battle hits so hard it isn’t funny, game two he killed three Circle beasts in one turn.  I do find this list more fun to play and I seemed to gravitate to it every time.  The epic list did a stirling job during the Barnabas game (3) and was my scenario list.  I did find that the Reckoner’s just couldn’t hit quite hard enough to finish an opposing heavy, however this can be overcome by adding assistance from other melee sources such as charging Errants, or the Blessing of Vengeance.  I don’t think on reflection I’d change my lists as they’ve worked well against what ever they’ve faced during play testing and the event itself.

The Menite army is quite attritional as a faction and the Sevvy’s are attrition casters on top of that, meaning they don’t favour quick assassination games.  If I’m honest I have an attrition play style too so they’re suited to me really well!

Thanks for reading