Blood Bowl All Dayer and the Night After

So our Christmas all dayer at club has come and gone, and boy did we have a blitz! We got four games of blood bowl in, there was some 40k, and the pirates squng their hooks around in the air again too!

So blood bowl consisted of 4 players... Me, Morgan, Alun and Louis. 3 human teams and Morgs Norse didn't mean much in terms of diversity, but it did become very much about tactics as we knew all the strengths and weaknesses of the others! 

My first game was against the Norsemen, and it started well but then bad dice rolls started to affect my game..

And I lost 2-1 in a reasonably close game. Louis on the other hand gave Alun a thumping... 4 or 5 - 0 I believe... ouch!

Owain was a miserable deck swabber...

Cappin' Huw soon put paid to that with a healthy dose of encouragement! 

Heres the game between Louis and Alun

Things like 'Billie Piper went for it but fell!' and 'you killed Elle Macpherson' were just some of the hilarious things heard during games with Louis and his Bunny Girls.

Pirates!

I somehow forgot to take pictures of my game against Alun, probably because it was incredibly close and exciting! We ended with a 2 - 2 draw and smiles on our faces. Morgan lost 1 - 0 to Louis in a really close game. This left me against the bunnies and Alun and Morgan to play! I needed Alun to beat morg to make it to the final and beat Louis who had won his previous two games... No chance! 

However... there was one... I beat Louis 4-0 in a one sided game, where dice rolls decided to be my friend! I managed to injure a few of his players and he was unable to stop my ogre bounding around picking on swimsuit clad ladies. 

Alas, it was not to be... Alun lost to Morgan and I was unable to play in the final despite my confidence. 

And the final? Morg won 4-1, the injuries I cause on the Bunnies meant Lou was missing a couple of players giving Morgan an advantage from the get go... and a big win. What an awesome day though! It made me realise how much I miss Blood Bowl and I hoped to get my revenge against Morgan... Luckily... I didn't have long to wait...

 Next night we arrive to club and eagerly set the board up. Myself and Morg have a match, both extremely confident, me coming off a big win and getting a couple of advances and a lot of money to buy a blitzer and a catcher, and Morg having a rising star player in a ST 4 runner....

Morgan taunts my ogre before kick off, saying his dauntless st4 runner will take my ogre on. Fair enough I think. I recieve, blow a hole open allowing my ogre to run down and blotz Morgs star player runner. Knocked down... injured... misses rest of the game at least. First turn, complete success!

From there I slowly gather my pace and roll up the pitch to go into half time with a lead and a couple of players up. From there Morg finds it hard to get back into the game and I win 3-0. REVENGE!!! As you can see, casualties for Morg were a tad heavy!

Always a good sight!

A sad Morgan means happy club. HA! Awesome game and I win 80,000 gp's from the game, I've been earning a lot of money fair dues! Every game thus far I'd won 60,000 at least, cannot complain. 

Elsewhere the last club night of the year saw young Corey take on Chris and his Dark Eldar, a game in which the youngling won by tabling his opponent!

Mike attaching weapons and arms to his pirates, ready to punish some scurvy sea dogs no doubt!

Most ship building takes place in the docks, but theres so many hookers hanging around them now we have to revert to the old table instead. 

After my match Morg plays Owain and his Dark Elves, a game I think Morg won 2-0. 

Lastly, Edmund brought over a Warmaster/Lord of the Rings game, with this really awesome little board to play on. Looks great!

And thats 2012 wrapped up as far as club nights go, we'll be back on the 7th of January, but we should be getting some gaming in before then, hopefully some Blood Bowl and even some other systems I'm yet to try... so look out for more posts over the holiday period!

Deathshroud Revealed

So Forge Worlds little bit of fun has finally been revealed.... and its just what we all thought.

The Deathshroud.

I believe these are the elite of the Deathguard, bodyguard of Mortarion, which could mean the Primarchy will be available soon too. Exciting times!  Here are a few of the images released by Forge World

I think they look pretty awesome, really want to see someone make a Typhus conversion using one of these as a base as I think theres the potential there for an amazing model.

What are your thoughts? Impressed? Disappointed?

Batrep Evandalists vs Imperial Guard

So Sunday I get a message from Alun, my Elven nemesis. "So, I'll be at club tomorrow. You want a game? If so, state the points!"

"1850! Or 2350! Choose!" I reply. 

"2350! A rather random amount!" Alun settles. 

I wasn't sure what force Alun was taking, so I went for something I thought was adaptable. My force looked like this...

Captain on bike, artificer armour and power weapon, bikers and attack bike

Chaplain, with termies in land raider

2 tactical squads

dreadnought with twin linked heavy flamer and heavy flamer in drop pod

whirlwind

Telion and scouts

dreadnought with plasma cannon

Missile launcher armed devastators

Storm talon

Aluns force was roughly....

4 Leman Russ tanks, one with Pask

4 chimeras with veterans, company command, and comissar lord

squad of veterans with aegis defence line and quad cannon 

valkyrie with veterans

Deployemtn shown above, and Aluns reserves and tank contents below

I go first, and immediately bring down the dread in drop pod ready to toast me some guard. My main force advances along the left flank while everything else gets into postion to fire. I take out two chimeras with heavy firepower, and kill some of the veterans inside them too. The dreadnoughts flamers are unleashed and every guardsmen becomes a hot tasty snack! That quad cannon  wont be shooting my storm talon next turn! Having no cover or armour saves is amazing, Alun upgraded his guardsmen to veterans with carapace armour, so heavy flamers are the way to go. 

Alun fires back, and doesn't cause a lot of death... the dread dies, as I expected when placed in front of two lema russ tanks, and I lose a couple of tacitcal marines and bikers.

Turn two was more quiet for me, I advanced into positions to charge with termies and bikers but both were just out of range of what I rolled. I wanted to blow up the chimera but shooting didn't work and wasn't able to assault either so had to leave it! 

Sly Marbo... deadly little bugger he is! Kills 7 tactical squad members, then assaults them the turn after and finishes them off. There was a hilarious moment when I tried to kill him with some scout fire and a plasma cannon plus those two tactical marines and was unable too, I mentioned that I'l probably roll a 6 in overwatch then a one to wound. What happened? EXACTLY that! Amazing sequence!

After a quiet turn three my chaplain assault one squad while my termies did a disorganised charge on two of the leman russ tanks. I lost my bonus for charging but managed to blow them both up, while my chaplain duelled with the veteran sarge and failed to kill him!

The Bikers were able to sweep around the left  and despite losing a couple more of their number got into

with the Commissar Lord and his squad. It took two turns but I was able to kill them just as the command squad charge in, and the game ended with this combat still happening. 

The final scoure was 11-7 I believe, although had it gone on for another turn I think I may have been on my way to tabling Alun. Had a great laugh, good to face the elf boy again! I think the dreadnought with flamers works amazingly well against anything not in power armour, especially against troops in cover. Bikers performed well, their jink saves helping them to keep enough numbers wise to get into combat and be able to still take out a unit or two, and the termies blowing up two Leman Russ tanks was awesome! The storm talon, which I failed to mention didn't do much, hence why I forgot about him! I was disappointed with the Chaplain but he's done well before so I forgive him. Biggest disappointment was the missile launchers, they didn't do an awful lot. I've had a couple of games with them and they've done ok before, but even after blowing up a couple of chimeras in the first turn they failed to do anything! 

We had some Battlefleet gothic happen at club, looks like a great game fair dues, would love to have a go sometime and I've always wanted to incorporate this and epic into a campaign.

We have another all dayer this sunday, and this time theres a few of us having a day playing blood bowl! I'll probably be taking my humans, and I have a nice idea for a team ready to roll out that may involve me painting a star player to use as another model.... we shall see though! Expect much blood bowl to be mentioned in my next post among the other games that take place on sunday!

Total War-hammered.

Creative Assembly, makers of the highly successful Total War series, has obtained the rights to make games based on Warhammer Fantasy Battle, previously held by EA.

“We have enormous respect for SEGA and Creative Assembly and have felt for a long time that the combination of the enormously rich setting of the Warhammer world, and their stunning development talent is a match with huge potential,” said Jon Gillard, Games Workshop's Head of Licensing. “Now that we’ve managed to bring these two giants of gaming together it is safe to say that some truly amazing products are going to be unleashed as a result. We are excited at the possibilities, and are enthusiastically working with the team at Creative Assembly already.”  

Meanwhile at CA...

“With this year being our 25th anniversary,” said Tim Heaton, Studio Director at Creative Assembly, “it seems fitting for us to embark on such a dream project with such a well-established partner. The incredibly rich and detailed Warhammer world is something we grew up with, and has left an indelible imprint on us as both designers and gamers.” “We’ll be doing the Warhammer universe justice in a way that has never been attempted before. We’re bringing those 25 years of experience and expertise in extremely high-scoring games to bear, delivering a Warhammer experience that videogamers will absolutely love.”

So what effect will this have on not only the videogames industry but the tabletop side too? I've heard from a small group of people how they got into tabletop or pc gaming through one of the earlier licensed games, be it Shadow of the Horned Rat, Final Liberation etc. Its probably happened to some extent since with Space Marine, Blood Bowl, and the very popular Dawn of War series. This has the potential to reproduce that, it already has a strong following and if any of those players are tempted into tabletop gaming then I'm sure they'll find some love for the strategy and grandeur of the tabletop games. 

The price of videogames also makes it an accessible way in for potential gamers too. Paying £30-40 for a few races, many battlefields to fight over, and even an opponent anytime you wish to play, is a great way for creating new fans of the Warhammer World. The one thing that scares a lot of people into going in to a Games Workshop store is not knowing enough about the product to converse with the retail staff. If you've played through a campaign on one of the games however, you'll know enough to be able to talk about something you're interested in, which makes that first trip a little easier.

The games success won't be measured by how many units it sells or what scores it gets by reviewers, but by how well it bridges the gap and recreates the look, feel, and oddness of the Warhammer world. If more gamers are intrigued by videogames as a result, and vice-versa, then GW and Creative Assembly will yell 'WAAAAAAGH' and drink much ale. And thats a good thing.

Blood Angels vs Space Marines BatRep 2000pts

So being a little late this week at club we pretty much got right into the game. I took a fairly different list this week. This is a rough list...

Captain on Bike, + 5 bikers and attack bike

Chaplain leading a tactical squad

2 other tactical squads, one in rhino

3 dreadnoughts, one in drop pod

2 dev squads, one all missile launchers and one all plasma cannons

storm talon with typhoon missile launcher

Mikes Blood Angels list is roughly...

Dante and 5 sanguinary guard

8 assault marines

10 death company in rhino

tactical squad

devastator squad, 2 plasma 2 lascannon

baal and autocannon predators

dreadnought

stormraven with 5 assault terminators

Mike won the roll off to deploy and go first, then I set up. I went for a static left flank and centre, and the right would advance aiming to take out the dakka pred. Otherwise we'd see what happened!

First turn, no first blood but a couple of models killed either way. I glanced the baal and DC rhino twice each but couldn't get the first blood, but if I could weather the second turn of incoming fire I could pick one of those off to get a vital bonus point!

Mikes storm raven comes in and adds fire against the bikes and devs but fails to really do anything. Mikes assault squad manages to make an 11" assault into my central tactical squad, and a combat erupts! In my turn, I'm able to destroy the Baal and the DC rhino. First Blood!

Also in my second turn, my bikers advance even further and fire all their melta weapons at the dakka predator, and promptly blow it up. Another victory point! 

Ouch! As you can see in the following pic, the assault termies come out of the Storm Raven and slam into my tacitcal squad... this won't last much longer! The Tactical squad makes it to my turn with just a sarge and chaplain left, but then they can hold on no longer. I start losing more too, with my dread dying in the centre of the field.

My storm talon comes on and shoots at the devs. I manage to kill 2, but they hold firm. As I mentioned the assault squad and termies butcher my chaplain and tactical squad and consolidate towards my left flank. My bikers advanced again however and melta spoke death to the dreadnought, melting it to slag. For their efforts however Dante is finally able to enter play and charges them with his sanguinary guard. My captain challanges Dante who accepts, and a very close fight erupts between the two Space Marines heroes! The bikers however are unable to hurt the sanguinary guard and all bikes are killed after two turns of combat.

 Last turn heroics needed! At this point neither of us knew the points, so we kept fighting and decided to count up after the battle ended. Mikes 3 assault troops leapt into my left most tactical squad, but overwatch took one out and then I killed another without a loss. The sarge retreated, and Mike was able to save himself a point as his last terminator charged in. In my previous turn I'd shot at his termies with a lot of firepower and killed four... So close! The termie however misses with all but on attack... then rolls a one to wound! I failed to penetrate his armour however until my dreadnought stomps in and deals the fatal blow. Termies killed! 

I'd manage to whittle down the death company slowly but there was a couple left, so a vp denied. Dante and my captain was a close fought fight however, and the game ended with them still fighting. Captain Torgeaz had 2 wounds left, whereas Dante had one. Turn 5 was the last however, and we counted up victory points.

Counting up the points I'd won 7-6, first blood proving crucial! We knew it was a close game as we were playing, but that was incredible, I really like not knowing until after the battle and it proved an entertaining affair. Heck of a game fair dues, Mikes getting to know his army fairly well.

Elswhere at club a game of Gorkamorka went on, but I have no idea what happened apart from hearing much laughter from the table... must have been a good time!

Crusade of Fire... I Have It!

I made a post about the upcoming Crusade of Fire campaign book, and how I was tempted to get it. Well, I'm very happy to say I've obtained a copy two days before release! I've had a flick through, and I'm pretty impressed thus far. Theres several pages of backstory, of which I'm yet to read but the basic structure is set in a part of space that no-one has been able to access... until now. A Crusade has been sent to reclaim it yet as they enter local space... Chaos and Xenos are there too. Intriguing!

As you can see, the cover is pretty darn nice. Nice to see a Hellbrute depicted in a pose that isn't like the model... Hopefully a boxed poseable version of him soon!

Each commander gets to pick an overall 'Grand Warlord', and these traits give you campaign points. There are Servants of Ruin, the Chaos forces, Crusade of Fire, Imperium, and then the Prophets of War which represent the Xenos can choose which table to pick, Campaign points can be granted for killing or capturing enemy HQ's, capturing objectives and so on depending on which trait you roll.

I had to take a quick snap of these, Kevin Chin's Imperial Fists are sublime. The guy has 9 dreadnoughts and two full boarding marine squads, totally suiting the Imperial Fists! 

Also included are rules for dogfighting with flyers, and they seem interesting. Whether I'll get to use them I'm unsure as not many flyers are at club, so we shall see. From what I've seen though they could be a good bit of fun. 

Speaking of fun...

The Arena of Death is a place to save your captured commanders and characters. If you win, you can escape. If you lose, then you're probably dead! As you can see from the above picture, you get bonuses for attacking from the side or rear, and you also get bonuses via 'Roar of the Crowd' tokens which you earn from how well you do. There are also some cards to photocopy and print which give you certain actions to use. It looks like a heck of a laugh and I'm hoping to rope some of the guys at club into having a go and maybe doing a videoblog on it. We shall see!

Many people may look at the book and wonder "why couldn't this have been in White Dwarf?" Well, it may have been possible and it wouldn't surprise me if they had thought of releasing it in this way initially. It works really well though as a book, although the £25 price point may put some off. If you're into campaigns and want something designed for 40k, this could well be for you. Seeing the participants armies is great, I could look at others armies all day! They go through the different games, add rules for fighting in Daemon worlds, for me its worth the money. If you're not a campaign person, then this probably won't be for you. For me though its a good little pick up. Lets hope people at the club can be persuaded to get involved!

Tau vs Tyranids Battle Report!

In the first time in quite a while at our club, we had a battle that had no power armour. Ok, so a few models had a 3+, but they didn't belong to any sort of Space Marine. Chaos, Astartes, or Grey Knight. I took 1000 points of my Tau against Jacob and his Tyranids. First time for me against Tyranids, and I'm still pretty inexperienced with Tau so I wasn't expecting a lot of success! I was expecting a lot of fun however.... 

The forces are pictured below.

My force, two Hammerheads, pretty much everything is WYSIWYG, apart from my Shas'o who had the airbusrt fragmention device. 

Jacobs force had a LOT of mini's! Those warriors scared me, 9 in total all with three wounds... It would be hard to whittle these guys down AND contend with the mass of gaunts!

We played the Scouring, but as we were on a 4x4 board we decided that 4 objectives were plenty and had a one point, 2 two points, and a 3 point objectives. We placed objectives and rolled for deployment. Jacob won and deployed where there were two objectives, whereas I had one and the last was in the middle. After deployment, I had the one point objective and Jacob had the 3 point objective... This game became incredibly more harder to win!

Jacob sends his Tyranids forward into the guns of the Tau.

 Needless to say, Turn two arrived and combat had began! Not enough guns and the worry I had for those flying warriors were justified! I lost my two Fire Warrior squads, although I did gain first blood.

I lost 3 of my stealth team to Termaguant fire, and tried to use as much as the board as possible to delay the inevitable close combat.

Not long after this the game ended with me being wiped out. Painful game! Thankfully rhough the fun I hoped for was reached, it was great fighting Tyranids and I'll have to take them on with my Space Marines, should be interesting. The things I learnt about this game is I forget tactics. Going into the game I knew synapse creatures would be lethal and concentrating fire on these could help me win the game... but what did I do? Forget. I didn't concentrate fire enough, and should have dealt with a unit before shooting at something else. This, I need to drill into my brain... I also learnt that Battlesuit commanders are great, even in combat. Mine finished off the flying warriors and lasted a combat phase against Jacobs Warrior Prime, so deffo glad I chose to lead my force with one. If I could change my force I'd perhaps either drop a hammerhead or the stealth team and take another fire warrior squad and an ethereal so I could upgrade the squad to have 1+ BS. I think the numbers may have helped... although the Hammerheads took a lot of fire and verbal abuse from Jacob! Great game though, look forward to revenge!

Elsewhere, Louis' evil laugh rang through the hall...

I'm afraid I have no idea of the score, but I know Louis won because his laugh was even louder and even more evil and maniacal after the game ended. Louis seems to be on a roll and his list is unbeatable so far! I fancy a return game though and fingers crossed when I do my dice won't fail me as they did in the last one!

After the game Louis sat down with our youngest member and helped talk him through the creation of a Gorkamorka gang. There'll be a game or three going on next week and its a good way to get the younglings involved. I started with Blood Bowl, and its a great entry level for people to get into the hobby. Doesn't require too many models, is cheaper, and just as much fun!

Bam and Mike also got a game in, with Mike's Thousand Sons holding out for a win over Bams Space Marines. They also played the scouring, and the game finished extremely close. If one of Bams termies had survived the result would have been different, but Mikes last Obliterator was able to smash the two Terminators down and helping a Thousand Sons squad claim a vital objective. 

A good day then! We've got another all day session coming up in about 2 weeks, so we'll see what happens as we're undecided as to what to do. I may have one game, but I also fancy seeing about having a nice little Blood Bowl tourney and taking some footage and pictures, generally spectating and enjoying the action! We shall see anyways, and that concludes this post. 

Eyes peeled for more posts!