The Pestilent & Spitefull

Greetings, the pile of shame recedes! Following a few WFB games, I have coloured in some more lead models, namely some Plague monks from the Skaven and and d3+1 Wood Elf Dryads. Contrast paints were used and following a collision with the concrete floor of my garage, some hasty repairs were also made;

Plague Censer Bearers

Following a game with Stuart's Skaven - and the fact they had been on my to-do table for yonks- I decided to finish the last of my censer bearers. These things are absolutely nails in combat and likely to give Neil's Chaos Knights a scare the first time he meets them.

A large slab of milliput masonry and a bent plague censers is the only sign of a near death experience for my models.

Plague Monks

No self respecting censer bearer goes to war without some plague monks at their rear and these are the ones. Mainly eBay rescues and some repaints of old shitty attempts by me result in these. Due to contrast paints and a total lack  of dry brushing these models have a two tone look that all the other plague monks back in the warren will envy (and possibly stick knives in them for their sartorial elegance). Two of these in the picture below had their stabbing weapons stolen before their grand eBay excursion so they got replacements. A dark elf dagger and another skavenish knife were pinned on to make sure they were fighting fit.

Volpus Pink is so hot right now! The horned monk holds a blunt dark elf blade whereas his mate to the left has another scavenged item, tres skaven. 

Shysh Purple is also so hot right now! 

Last of the Plague Monks. These were the newer models from around 1993 or 1994 I reckon.

Yoshimitsu Looking Tree Spirits

Long before Dryads were lithe semi-sexy tree things, they were blocky unattractive wooden monstrosities. They used to be quite tasty in their first army book, but sadly not so much now. They are, however, the closest thing I have in my wood Elf army to a tanky core choice. I've had a few games with them recently and although not much of a match for elites, they can hold up units not tooled up appropriately. 

More models from the golden age of me working for Games Workshop, when Dyads looked like chopped up logs glued together.

 So that's what I've been up to recently. I have a couple of batreps to finish where you can see why I decided to finish the censer bearers. Maybe next time I will make a stab at my Lizardmen army, so until then hobby responsibly and thanks for reading.

Charge of the Wild Brigade

Candaletha the Dark sat upon Griefclop her unicorn ally. From her vantage point she could see a large force of the lackeys of the ruinous powers in the valley below. The area was known as Vaul's Twins referring to the magic fires eternally burning on two hills within the valley. That the Chaos army knew about this secret place was troubling. She knew that if both hills were desecrated by them then evil things would flock here and this place would be cursed. Such a thing could not be allowed to happen. With her army arrayed behind her she gave the hand signal to form a battle line without uttering a sound. As they deployed to meet the enemy an arrow struck the Chaos general in the chest giving the wood Elf host the order to attack! 

Greetings, once again I have played a game of not 40K. Hot on the heels of my game at Neil's gaff is the rematch. Due to the summer holiday season and shift work a game of dayhammer was on the menu. Some work was done to the force (Waywatchers completed and a couple of skirmish trays were prettied up) meaning Wood Elves were ready and Neil's forces of chaos were thirsting of vengeance. Would they get it? Read on....

The Grand Experiments of Master Moulder Snippet Kwik

 Evening all. Fresh off the incredibly slow production line come some more WFB items. These models were started pre-AoS so I'm really living up to the blog title at the moment. Anyhoo, here are some creations of mine that could be considered at least 40% 

Several years ago I discovered green stuff (well not really, I found out about it). I than proceeded to spend an inordinate amount of time working out how to create stuff, become a professional sculptor and then create my own miniature range and become rich. None of these things really happened except  for some marginal progress in the sculpting department.

Giant Rats

Master Moulder Snippet Kwik liked to improve his creations with warpstone, nails and superglue. So these first two subjects  have some oversized fangs (probably from the Olde Worlde version of a reverse walrus, and an Orc head stitched on, due to the unnatural resistance of the greenskins and lashings of warpstone paste this critter survived.

 

Next up is a mole-rat and a rat with a giant spike on his head. Giant rats are very promiscuous so the trick in Clan moulder Beastmasters eyes, is finding an equally promiscuous giant mole. If you can do this then Bingo! A litter or two of Giant Mole Rat puppies.

Big Burrowing Barry and Skinny Scythehead.

One of the biggest issues within Hellpit is trying to get their pets into combat as quickly as possible, experiment #9 was a surgical graft of a horse and giant rat to increase it's speed. this was partly successful but as the horses legs are far longer than the rat's, it has limited viability. Sadly Snippet Kwik had found that the design led to many instances (8 in fact) of the back legs toppling forward and literally scraping the front half into a fine mush before the unfortunate creature expired. Number 9 however had the added rat tail for balance.

 

The next two "giant rats" are results of a couple of underlings incompetence and then stupidly not having the sense to blame someone else. This resulted in them having their head grafted onto host bodies. It's not all bad though, each one had a weapon attached to a front limb. The one on the left even got to keep his hat.

 

Stabby Hatterson and Hatless Goiterson

Next up subject #32 answers the question "Can a Giant Rat body support a Rat Ogre head?". The answer is no, the head in question was far too bulky to be supported by a single giant Rat body. So ever the enterprising inventor Master Moulder Snippet Kwik stitched it to two bodies and hey presto! Another successful creation!

Nipper 8-Legs

Nipper 8-Legs has some venomous looking foam dripping from it's ever snarling gob.

Elven BSB

Finally, not another experiment, but rather a heroic member of my Elven Host. Rimphi the Stoic is my battle standard bearer. Originally a Wardancer, Rimphi was part of an force battling Warriors of chaos and Beastmen in the northern glades. Foul magic slew the Glade Captain bearing the banner of Lord Silias and Rimphi nimbly grabbed the banner before it fell by vaulting into the dying steed's flank and jumping back to the ground before it's death throes could crush her. Mainly due to this act and the Wood Elves were victorious and the followers of chaos were defeated. Lord Silias then made the unprecedented request for Rimphi to  become his personnel banner bearer and she accepted. The model itself is an old Wardancer model with a banner with the top of Teclis' moonstaff on the top. Although I can't use the model as a Wardancer BSB she will be see some action in my someday-to-be-finished Eternal Guard unit.

Rimphi The Stoic

She wear a mask when performing her BSBing duties.

Rear view

So that's all for now, these models will hopefully be making their way to a fantasy battlefield near you in the near future. So hobby responsibly until next time. Thanks for reading.

What I did on my Holiday. AKA The Battle of Hangover Hill.

Once again I headed over to sunny Essex for a weekend at my buddy Matt's house. The purpose was ostensibly for a 40th surprise birthday party but there was a lot of drooling over models and a lovely big 6000 point game of Warhammer 8th edition with a hangover to be played. So without further ado here is the Warhammer Porn!

A rather large scratchbuilt standard on a Palanquin jockey.

More Daemonics!

Undead made to make your mouth water!

Yes, three steam tanks and two war wagons.

Mucho Empire Characters.

The picture below has one of my favourite models in it, and it was scratchbuilt by Sculptureman himself! It's like a big chaos creature mated with a toilet and an unpleasant offspring was the result. Also some Forge World Ogres and GW Nurglings occupy this photo.

Forge World Chaos Ogres and a scratchbuilt Chaos Spawn

More Daemons.

Dark Elves and Chaos cocktail.

More Undead and a little bit of Empire

Sadly my iPhone photos really don't do justice to these models. It really is a joy to go over there and gawp, slack jawed and all the pretty things. Matt has extensive (more like humongous) armies of Undead, Empire, Dark Elves, Beastmen, Chaos Daemons and probably a few others that I've forgotten. Until such time as Matt decides to document his collection this will have to suffice.

The Battle of Hangover Hill

The following collection of words are based on a rather enjoyable game that was played the day after the 40th birthday party. Matt took 6000 points of fabulously painted Dark Elves, I took 3000 points of Skaven and my accomplice Barry took 3000 points of Orcs & Goblins. *Barry was also charged with bringing all the luck, as he is notoriously fortunate, particularly on the gaming table. As I mentioned before, I was badly hungover and in that state my brain functions weren't at their best. My army list comprised of a Grey Seer on a Screaming Bell, Plague Priest on a Furnace, an Abomb, Doomwheel, 2 units of Gutter Runners and loads of Clanrats, Slaves giant rats and Plague Monks. there was also a BSB in there too. What I didn't **bring was the Storm Banner, a cheap-as-chips Warlock Engineer with Doom Rocker and/or Death Globe or any of the other dastardly Skaven stuff that some non-Skaven players bitch about. I did remember to pack a Plague Banner though. Barry took some ***Mangler Squig's, Doom Divers, a massive unit of Savage Orcs and Grimgor Ironhide with a hefty unit of immortals plus assorted Goblin units.
Matts army consisted of (****as far as I can remember): 3 units of Witch Elves (the largest horde had a Cauldron of Blood in it, just to make it even more appealing), a big unit of Sisters of Slaughter, 2 large Executioner units, 25ish Blackguard with Kouran, Morathi, 10 Doomfire Warlocks, some Shades 2 chariots and some chaff hunting Dark Riders. There was also some crossbowmen and a Kharbydiss.

We played on an 8' table to accommodate the plethora of painted models and we set about rolling dice for table edge and whatnot. Matt lost the dice rolls giving him table edge and setting up second privileges and who places their infiltrators first (all Barry's skill), also the whose vanguards vanguards in the vanguard, but we lost the who goes first roll. Can't win them all I suppose*****. The Spider Riders (that I forgot to mention previously) vanguarded up to the woods in the vanguardery phase, effectively stopping the Dark Riders doing it.

Turn One

Matt's first turn was a bit cagey (let's face it, most first turns are). The army advanced at a reasonable pace, Morathi scooted behind the tower and proceeded to try to cast Soul Drain all game******. I think the Dark elf male mage blew up in the crossbowman unit killing 3 or 4 of them. The Opal amulet, sadly worked on him though. The Dark Elves shooting phase wasn't overly bad -a couple of wounds on the Abomb, a Mangler Squig and maybe 13 points of dead skaven. One fun thing that happened was when the Brolocks attempted to cast a spell I Sivejir's Hex Scrolled them turn the super mobile fast cavalry into movement 1 donkeys.

Our turn was equally cagey with me advancing just enough to provoke some very long charges I angled my Plague monks in such a way as to be able to charge either the smallish unit of Witch Elves or the Executioner unit. The Spiders Riders on 'my' side of the table advanced up to completely block movement of the Dark Riders and Cold One Chariot. The Goblins, Savage Orcs and Immortuls all ambled up with a total lack of animosity. I tried to cast Howling Warpgale but Matt was having none of it. Barry's Goblin cast Itchy Nuisance of the Sisters of Slaughter severely limiting their movement. I let Barry take most of the power dice as each free die he gets from popping mushrooms is very irritating for the opponent. Our shooting was pretty ineffective this turn.

  

Turn Two

There were a few Dark Elf charges, namely a unit of Dark Riders and chariot into the annoying spider riders, they fled (like any self respecting goblin would) allowing a redirected charge into my Giant Rat unit. The smaller of the two witch elf units in the centre charged my Slave bus. The witch Elves on my right charged the Abomb. Had I a musk gland, it might have squirted a bit, but luckily I don't so it didn't. The best part was when the large unit of Witch elves failed a charge. A unit of Dark Riders did a lot of fast cavalry sneaky stuff to get all up in my warpfire thrower team's grill. On the goblinoid end the Dark elf advance was stalled by the imminent appearance of 3 goblin fanatics if any of the highly expensive Executioners went near them. Soul Stealer killed a few more Slaves (so what!) in the magic phase and I think that was it. To my amusement the Brolock that was a toad remained one. I think the Elf male wizard miscast again, killing a few more crossbowmen then dissappearing into the warp! In the shooting phase I had to say goodbye to my weapons teams due to vindictive Dark Elf bullying. A Mangler Squig was cut down in his prime also. Combat went ok, the Witch elves destroyed the Slave unit overrunning past the amused Doom divers. The second Witch elf unit inflicted a couple of wounds on the Abomb who in turn took a rank off them. The Rats vs the chariot and Dark riders ended well enough as my rats withstood the charge and due to steadfast looked good for another turn or two.

Who will win? Charging Plague Monks or Executioners with BSB?

As the forces of the lesser of two evils turn began I had some charges to declare. My Plague Monks into the Executioners, the other Slave bus into the Dark Riders and my small (20 or so) clanrats into the Chariot next to the Kharbydis. The Savage Orcs failed a straightforward charge into the big Witch Elf unit. A unit of squig Hoppers got into contact with the crossbowmen. The remaining Mangler Squig rolled something pathetic and failed to get into combat. My unit of gutter runners emerged behind Morathi hoping to poison her ass off the table. In the magic phase Barry continued his annoying magic assault on the elves whereas I played it cool only not casting anything at all. Our shooting phase did very little at all, inflicting one wound on Morathi and naff all else.Close combat was ok my Clanrats beat the chariot in combat only to have it stick around due to Matt's pesky BSB. The Giant rats held up the chariot and Dark riders for a turn. The I fought the Plague Monks vs Executioners, activated the Plague Banner and tore them a new one! Even with the BSB and Morathi's leadership the Executioners were routed which took the Plague Monks into the flank of the blackguard. Of course if I had started this combat first then the chariot would have fucked off too as there wouldn't have been a reroll, ah hindsight, we meet again. The witch Elves slew the mighty Abomb, only to have 3 rat swarms disgorge themselves in front of them.

So Much Frenzy in the Picture!

Turn Three

This was the make or break turn. with the Plague monks doing a number on the highly expensive executioner unit, Matt had to recoup some points. With that the other unit of Executioners charged the goblin shaman container (taking some wounds from running through fanatics). The Kharbidyss charged in to help the chariot vs the clanrats. The Witch Elf Abomb slayers charged the rat swarms.  The Sisters of slaughter charged the Black orcs and the big unit of Witch Elves avec Cauldron of Blood charged into the Savage Orcs. There was a tape measure fest deciding where Morathi could go and remain unmolested by skaven or greenskins*******. Shooting saw the untimely end of my would be Morathi assassins to pointy elven crossbow bolts. Magic didn't do much either as I recall. Then came the close combat whch had at least 10 units in combat there was going to be an awful lot of ASF rerolls! Most amusingly was, I thought the appalling damage done by the executioners on the Goblins (or the lack thereof). monumentally bad dice were rolled by the elves resulting in a fit and happy Shaman, Big boss and BSB! Also not enough damage was done to even break their steadfast. The Sisters were good, but didn't get any cigars for routing the Black orcs, as indeed they were the ones who fled! Witch elves vs the savage Orcs next, the ensuing cataclysmic murderfest ended in a draw despite well over 35 models took early baths. Over on the Skaven end the plague Monks caused bloody mayhem on the Blackguard and the only thing that stopped them fleeing was Kouran. The slightly less dramatic fight next door (chariot,Kharbidys and Clanrats) went badly for my lads but not enough for them to rout. The witch elves wiped out my free swarms overunning into easy charge range of the bell. The final combat (Dark riders, Chariot and giant Rats) ended as another draw and the packmasters (by means of attrition) were getting uncomfortably close to danger. 

A smallish unit of Witch Elves about to take some Death Frenzy love.

As the majority of units were in combat there wasn't many unengaged units, those who were (black orcs and Slaves) charged into combat to get some! The Black Orcs flank charged the ********Executioners, the slaves into the Blackguard. The Clanrats pushing the Bell ambled into the now presumable exhausted Witch elves. In the magic phase Scorch was cast from the Bell (killing 3 Brolocks including the Toadlock). They routed. Death Frenzy was cast upon the Clanrat unit, bringing the number of attacks up to a goodly amount. The only thing left on our side that could shoot was my Gutter runners and they plinked off a couple Corsairs. As I limbered up my dice throwing muscles for combat Matt conceded as he really wasn't in a position to win the game and we had to go off and get a *********curry! Handshakes all round then.

The rather big scrap in the middle saw the death of Dark Elf ambitions in this game!

Conclusion

Well I haven't played a game of Warhammer that big for a long time! It was a total blast. Tactically most of the things I tried to do went well, Barry's luck did it thing also. Matt had some poxy luck too. Our two units on either flank (my Giant Rats and Barry's Goblin unit) withstood a lot of damage, holding up things that I really wouldn't want creeping around my rear! Despite my army list being not overpowered (except perhaps the Plague Monk sledgehammer). Another thing that helped was me not having total control of the magic phase, the Goblin shaman got casting nearly everything he wanted too with near impunity due to him popping magic mushrooms all game. I suppose the biggest mistake I made was the order I did my combats in turn 2, had I started on the Executioners first I would have also routed the Chariot giving me a charge on the Kharbidys with my clanrats, not really game changing as it turned out but making me seem a bit less like a hungover dweeb. So now I can cross off winning a game of warhammer against Dark Elves with Orc & Goblin allies off my hobby bucket list. Who knows what is next? Find out in future episodes.

Thanks for reading.

Fun & Games With a Carnosaur

This battle report is an unusual one as I've started writing before it happens. Crazy time travelling, eh? Well Not so much time travelling rather I'm putting my army list and general tactics up before the event. As it stands I will be having a 3000 point games vs Vinny (1500 points of undead) and Pat (1500 points of Warriors of Chaos). I had the pleasure of watching the aforementioned opponents playing out a 1500 point a side game using said armies a fortnight ago so I have a fair idea what to expect - some rather fast moving elite combat troops backed up with cheap as chips immune to psychology undead. Best of both worlds or a hideous abomination of playing styles? The advantage of playing tag team is the benefit of a second opinion as the game progresses. The disadvantages can be the sharing of a magic dice pool, and the sacrifice of units you'd rather not sacrifice. From my point of view the advantages for me is an undiluted battle plan from it's list creation. Disadvantages is brainfarts. No nagging outer voice telling me 6 dicing Fireball isn't a good idea. So anyway, here's my list:

The Enduring Gathering of Gwanolobbi

Saurus Oldblood called Ick
Carnosaur

• Bloodroar, Loping Stride
•  Dragonhelm, Obsidian Amulet, Sword of Anti-Heroes

Slann Mage-Priest I think I will name him Munki Gwanolobbi
Disciplines of the Old Ones and other crap:
Lore of High Magic, Wizard Level 4
Becalming Cogitation, Focus of Mystery, Unfathomable Presence
 Fencer's Blades,  - Obsidian Trinket,  - Power Scroll


Saurus Scar-Veteran - Chupa Wotl
Magic Items

• Battle Standard Bearer, Shield
  
  • BRB - Dragonbane Gem, BRB - Glittering Scales, BRB - Gold Sigil Sword

Saurus Scar-Veteran - Chocka Wocka
Cold One
Magic Items : Obsidian Lodestone,  Tormentor Sword
Light Armour, Shield,  Cold One


Skink Priest called Itzi Weeni
Magic Items

• Lore of Beasts, Wizard Level 2
  
  • BRB - Dispel Scroll

Skink Priest named Ickl Bitti
Magic Items

• Lore of Beasts, Wizard Level 1
  
  • AB - Cube of Darkness

Saurus Warriors x 26, full command
Saurus Warriors x 25 full command
Skink Skirmishers x 10 javelins
Skink Skirmishers x10 javelins

Ancient Stegadon named Gack The Honourable Skewer
 Engine of the Gods, Sharpened Horns, Unstoppable Stampede

Bastiladon entitled Blastiboom Of The Radient Effervescence 
  Solar Engine

Cold One Riders x 9 full command. Known as the Entramplers

LIZARDMEN ARE SO COOL!

The Horrible Alliance of Terror AKA H.A.T.

As usual I don't have my opponents army lists but as such I will name them willy nilly in the hope that they may be more forthcoming in the future. 

The Spikey End of H.A.T.

Globbule The Ballsy Chaos Lord (?) of Tzeentch on a Disk

Thighchafe of The Splayed Knees  Chaos BSB on Daemonic Mount

2 x Chaos Chariots

Chimera

3 x Dragon Ogres

2 x 5 Chaos Warhounds

Chaos Spawn

The Dead End of H.A.T.

Knoblbly Nees Master Necromancer, Invocation of Nehek, Vanhel's Dance Macabre, Gaze of Nagash, Raise Dead.

Undead Mike Wight King BSB

30 Ghouls

20 Grave Guard

30 Skellingtons 

Mortis Engine

Spirit Host

30 Zombies

3 Crypt Horrors

Tactical Burbling

Deployment (exludes chaos chariot & Spirit Host)

The last game I had against Pat was vs my Wood Elves and to give him a different enemy I thought I bring my Lizardmen. I decided to just bring stuff I like so that consisted of my two large units of saurus with skink javelins with as many monsters I could fit in the army. As Vinny was tag teaming with him I thought the monsters would be useful against his mainly infantry army (stomps). I also took my Oldblood on a Carnosaur as I like the model and I really think it can do a job on those heavily armoured Chaos Warriors and chariots. two beast skinks meant I would be Wyssaning my way around the battlefield and a unit of Saurus cavalry would hopefully be lawnmowering their way through anything that got in their path. Another consideration I had was having the Bastiladon and Ancient stegadon with their bound spells, to winkle out dispel dice off of my opponents before I cast my high magic spells to get other spells using the ever so useful lore attribute. During set up I went for the old deploy-like-I'm-going-to-deploy-normally-but-then-go-mainly-on-the-right trick. Unfortunately the only units that were deployed on my left were a spirit Host and a Chariot. At least the spirit Host was at least 3 turns away from my Bastiladon leaving me free from reliving the most pointless combat in Warhammer history. I won the dice for picking sides and for going first so all boded well for the upcoming game!

Turn One

Most of my units remained still like a crocodile waiting for a wildebeest to take a drink, ready to pounce. All except my Carnosaur who blundered into a blood forest (ffs). I then realised I'd made an error in placing my Cold Ones. Stuck behind the skinks and possibly having to traverse a river with the inherent DT tests I hindsighted that over to the left of my Carnosaur would have been precious. Anyway, I had a decent magic roll only to curse the Chimera and nothing else. The Bastiladon proved to be a worthwhile addition as the beam of chotek spell caused a rather interesting debate as to whether it should be dispelled. It was dispelled.but if there is something that can put the willes up your opponent, it's the possibility of 2D6 St 6 hits. I then declared I was going to cast Fiery Convocation on the Grave Guard using the Power Scroll so it was a very castable 10 but then Stuart stuck his nose in telling me how the power scroll didn't do what I thought it did but instead something else and rather than argue it out did something else, unsucessfully I might add. 2 minutes later Stuart guiltily confirmed my original proposition after checking it on the errata. As an aside I think I might see that item again in the hands of Stuart's Grey Seer who has a lot of trouble casting Curse of The Horned Rat a fair bit.  No shooting and no combat, my end of turn one.

The Mighty Mustering of Gwanolobbi Advance!

The zombie unit found it was standing in a wildwood (careless). Whilst some of the faster moving chaos units found the river was made of blood. Apt really but it didn't really effect the game much. The Chariot on the left advanced to within a reasonable charge distant of my Carnosaur and the Spirit Host started meandering towards the battlefield's centre. The zombies failed to get out of the wood so it kicked the shit out of 4 of them. In the magic phase they were brought back to life so by the end of the turn it was a case of as you were. Globbule The Ballsy flew his disk to within a rather easy charge range of Stagadon and large Saurus unit. I had heard about unkillable Tzeentch lords and I was soon to find out just how unkillable. I scrolled raise dead as I don't like units popping up all over the place interfering with my cunning reptilian plans.

Globbule The Ballsy laughs in the face of Ancient Stegadons

Turn Two

I declared a charge on the chariot who fled (not very chaosy if you ask me) so I had the choice of redirecting into skeletons or Grave Guard. I picked the grave guard as I had a point to prove with my Carnosaur. The ancient stegadon and saurus unit charged Globule. Wyssan's is cast on the Stegadon to buff his St & T to an impressive 7.  I make a mistake by not casting either beam of Chotek  to target one of the many unpleasant things arrayed before me! My skinks take two wounds off of the chariot shootingwise. Close combat with the Tzeentch Lord was surprising as I rolled one impact hit against him but Pat failed his save. Sharpened horns made 1 wound 3 so he died rather anticlimactically impaled on the face of my dinosaur. The Carnosaur combat was a win for me but certainly not enough to crumble the unit and there were undead units ominously lurking on both of my T Rex  Carnosaurs rather long flanks.

End of Lizardmen movement

The Marauders and Chaos Dags charge a unit of skinks (and due to my ineptitude or Pat's tactical genius, only got 3 shots of which none did any damage). The ghoul unit and Skellington unit charge the Carnosaur. The Chaos Spawn wanders into the other skinks. In the magic phase Invocation is cast on the Grave Guard and Vanhel's is cast on all three units in combat with the Carnosaur. The Chimera halitosises 3 Saurus to death. Pat was going to use his Spawn's breath attack on the Skinks but me (trying to impart my tactical nous upon him thought such an attack would be overkill as "that Spawn will rout those Skinks"). My Skinks then obviously outraged by my flippant disregard for them proceeded to inflict two wounds on the Spawn drawing the combat! In the Carnosaur combat I issued a challenge and Vinny accepted with some Grave Guard champion, and perhaps I was being a bit gammy by challenging but by accepting he totally negated his massively superior number of attacks on me! A fairly hefty overkill on the armoured skellington meant that even with all of Vinny's massive combat res I could stay in combat on a 4 or less. All I can say about that is thank Odin for the cold blooded rule! I actually think that being sandwiched between the Ghouls and Skellys counteracted each others rank bonuses. or something.

End of H.A.T. s movement phase

Turn Three

I'd like to from now on refer to this turn as The Turn of Predatory Fighter Rape. Not very catchy but apt. So I send one unit of Saurus to attempt to save the Carnosaur who in my opinion, wasn't going to get away with another challenge con. I also decided to send in the cavalry, into the BSB skulking around my back line. I also aligned both the ancient Stegadon and other Saurus unit to receive charges from the chariot and Chimera respectively. I manage to cast Wyssan's on the cavalry. That was all I managed to cast (I think I forgot my two bound dinosaur spells again). The Cavalry against the BSB wasn't fun. Pat pulled the challenge stunt that I had against Vinny last turn. I thought I'd see how tough a 1+ save Saurus Scar veteran is. Not very it turned out. I failed to crack the armour and ward saves of the BSB and he twatted the Scar Vet with his big bloody great weapon, killing him! The cavalry didn't run but now I knew I needed combat res to rout this bugger. On the other side of the table my Saurus infantry did a number on the ghouls. Out of the 11 front rank attacks I rolled 8 6's. Coupled with the second rank I managed to inflict awful damage on the Ghouls flank. The Old blood and Carnosaur directed their attacks on the now largest enemy unit - Skeletons and I managed to take a lot of them off thanks to a rather sweet thunderstomp. I was also very lucky Vinny's attacks back as the Grave Guard didn't inflict much damage and neither did the skellys. The Ghouls did wound the Carnosaur but he was at the end of the combat still on a wound. When the combat resolution was totted up I had won combat by 15! The exact number I needed to pop all three units! Yay Predatory Fighter!

End of Lizardmen Movement

Horrible Mess

A Better View of the Horrible Mess

The forces of H.A.T. wanted revenge! The Chaos Chariot and Crypt Horrors charged the Ancient Stegadon and the Chimera charged the Saurus unit containing the Mage Priest. The Spirit Host failed a long charge on the Old Blood backside (that could've been embarrassing). The Mortis Engine did something horrible that killed a Skink Priest who was labouring under the impression that he was safe, along with some Bastiladon and Stegadon crew. A low magic Phase (2 +  2) didn't help the forces of evil. The Stegadon weathers the chariot charge well and only takes a single wound from the Crypt Horrors. Gack sticks around because he's stubborn. The chimera inflicts 8 wounds on the Saurus but steadfast saves the day. The cavalry against the Chaos BSB results in another challenge. This time the Daemonic Beast causes 1 wound on my champion meaning the dude with the great weapon can't attack. He causes 1 wound and I win by 1 with static combat res. Pat wouldn't oblige me by failing his break test twice though. We call the game at the end of turn 3 as time constraints meant another turn wasn't possible. A swift bit of calculating results in a win for the Forces of Order.

Apply Saurus

Remove Undead

Conclusion

I think there is definitely an advantage to playing 2 vs 1 from the perspective of the single player as a single battle plan is probably better than two different ones, especially if the armies involved rely on different methods to win a battle. From my point of view once again the Mage Priest was a waste of points. Dispel-wise he stopped a lot getting through, But I completely forgot my Arcane Vassal rule. Had I remembered that I could've been casting spells through the Skink Priests. My planned single dice bound spell barrage was pretty much forgotten about after the first turn but it is a valid tactic.  My other big mistake was the deployment of my Saurus Cold One cavalry. Had I placed them to the left of the Carnosaur as support and general lawnmowing duties I think they would have achieved more. If I had though, who knows what damage the BSB would've done? I also think another turn or two would have been interesting. My Carnosaur was poised to charge the zombie unit with Necromancer in it and I think the Saurus would've gotten back into the fray as well. Of course it has to be said Pat's crap luck with his general helped my case immeasurably. Vinny's uncertainty regarding challenges was also a factor, one that I'm sure won't be again.

The War Against Chaos Continues

Glitterbane The Fey stared at the amassing Chaos Warband. For the second time this month a foul Chaos Warband had encroached on the borders of Athel Loren. The previous one now lay in a pit thrice purified by spellsingers and warded by glyphs of confusion. The previous interlopers were followers of Nurgle, foul polluted creatures born of nightmares, these (though no less vile) were followers of Tzeentch the changer of the ways. They would be no less deadly. Glitterbane, signaled to the surrounding elven force to advance forward. Glancing towards her second in command Gargamel The Swift she used her kinband's hand signals to tell him "No quarter, these like the previous group seemed intent on searching for something. The only thing they will find, is death".

The winds of Chaos are blowing strong in Cavan at the moment as we have a new member of our gaming group - Pat - and he is another follower of the ruinous powers. This time Tzeentch. Pat is new to Warhammer and contacted me through the Wargaming Ireland forum. A few texts were exchanged, a telephone call and lo! Another gamer enters the fold. So following my game against Aaron I tweaked my list a little bit (but with 1500 points there isn't much tweaking to be done). Got rid of the Elven Lord and exchanged for a Spellweaver with Metal magic. An extra unit of Waywatchers and a few cosmetic changes. I skimped on the BSB's equipment as I decided I wasn't going to risk his hide in combat - just a Hail of Doom arrow for him.
My Army consisted of:
Unicorn Spellweaver Lore of Metal 4++ Ward Save and *Scroll of Shielding, Plague Of Rust, Searing Doom, Glittering Robe
BSB Eagle HoD Arrow
**Branchwraith, Shield of Thorns.
8 Glade Riders Hagbane
13 Glade Guard
2 x 5 Wild Riders
2 x 6 Waywatchers

From memory Pat's army was
Level 4 Mage on foot, Tzeentch, Blue Fire of Tzeentch, Pink fire of Tzeentch, Bolt Of Change, Treason of Tzeentch.
BSB also on foot, Tzeentch
20 chaos warriors of Tzeentch
3 x 5 Chaos hounds
3 Dragon Ogres
5 Chaos Knights
5 chaos marauder horse

Not sure what (if any) magic items were on the characters but I'm sure they weren't pleasant.

Technical Ineptitude and Tactical Preamble

The technical ineptitude comes in the form of the soopadoopa camera that Stuart lets us use for photographic evidence didn't have its SD card in it at the start so some of my best ever camera work has disappeared into the ether. This was noticed some time in turn two when Stu noticed the card in his bag or about his person. As far as set up was concerned, Pat went for a strong centre (Chaos Warriors and Knights) with units of Hounds splattered along the table. The Dragon Ogres skulked the far side of a forest on my right side. I placed my free (Venom Thicket) right next to another wood to give my Elves a sense that Athel Loren was near.  My set up was both units of Wild riders on opposing flanks, the Glade Guard, Unicorn Weaver, BSB and Branchwraith were loitering around the forest just right of the centre. Once Pat had finished deploying I placed my Waywatcher units either side of the central group (the set of Waywatchers on my right started inside a mysterious wood which turned out to be a Blood Forest). I won the roll for starting turn so that gave me an extra round of shooting before combat. I vangarded my left hand Wild Riders up around 9" forward (relatively close to the Chaos Knights) and the ones on the right (opposite the Dragon Ogres) a more respectful 7" or 8". Got an ineffective Arrow of Kurnous off and the game began.

Set Up

Turn One

With the utter nastiness of some of the WoC units I was reluctant to go bowling up to them giving Pat the benefits of a charge and thusly giving myself the penalties of being charged. Also it's generally a good idea to get as many turns firing at the enemy as possible before the inherent squishyness of the Wood Elves becomes evident. I hardly moved forward at all except for the Wild Riders on both flanks. Magic was a non event. Shooting was better. I got both the central and right Chaos Hound units down to one each but neither fled. I considered using my HoD on one or other unit but felt it was a waste of a decent 30 point item. In my head I shook my fist at both Warhounds and muttered ' Your days are numbered sonny!'. Hopefully Pat wasn't watching my internal utterings (it was, after all the first time we met). My Waywatchers killed two Chaos Knights as well. All in all a satisfactory turn.

Wood Elf Turn 1

Pat then started some movement jiggery pokery that I wasn't overly pleased with, he marched his two lone Chaos Warhounds to foil my plans. One Warhound was placed within easy charge range of the Wild Riders whilst at the same time he angled his Dragon Ogres to flank said Wild Riders even with an overrun. The other Warhound got all up in the face of the Waywatchers.  The Marauders moved towards the Waywatchers, using the single Warhound as a canine shield. The unmolested Warhounds on my left moved to block any charge from my Wild Rider unit in the Knights, whilst angling them away so an overrun would be annoying. The rest of his army moved forward. In the magic phase Pat got off a Bolt of Change on the flank of the Wild Riders on my left. I pulled out a Scroll of Shielding only to find out it was a dud! 4 dead Wild Riders! He also cast another Treason of Tzeentch at the Waywatchers (who had foolishly decided to deploy in a blood forest) managing to kill just the one when the woods got all funny. Maybe they knew what they were doing anyway. Then the forest ambled forward to envelop the Wild Riders.

Chaos Turn 1

For some unknown reason Battle Chronicler (the program I used for the above picture) decided to make the marauders into single file unit even though they weren't. Sorry for the confusion. Also I didn't manage to figure out how to move terrain mid game. No if you can all imagine a Disneyesqe cutaway where the cartoon images somehow transform into real life - a bit like the movie Enhanted - thanks.

Turn Two

The single Wild Rider on the left charges the Warhounds ahead of  him as I was certain I'd a) win the combat and b) overrun out of the charge arc of the Chaos Knights. My Glade Riders arrived and deployed directly behind the Dragon Ogres. The Wild Rider unit on the right was a different kettle of fish. Rather than charge the single Chaos Warhound, destroy it, overrun and get flanked by the Dragon Ogres I thought amble back a few inches would be preferable.Overcoming their surprise at the forest wandering into their midst they passed their Ld test and away from the snarly dog they defiantly go. Very little else in my army moves - probably something to do with the split infinitive in the previous sentence. Cast Plague of rust on Chaos Warriors, then cast Searing Doom on the same unit (total brainfart). Shooting kills 2 lone dogs. The Glade Riders take wound off Dragon Ogres. The  Wild Rider routs dogs on left then catches them.

End of  my turn 2

In Pat's turn the Marauders charge the Waywatchers who double tap them to death. The Chaos Knights charge into the Waywatchers on the other side. The large unit of Chaos Warriors also declare a charge but fail it marginally. The Dragon Ogres realising their Wild Rider trap wasn't going to work attempted to march forward, failing to pass their Ld test due to the glade riders being up their jackseys. Magic was uneventful (according to my notes anyway). Now onto close combat.  This was a worry for me as in my lack of a plan with the Eagle riding BSB I had stupidly placed him directly behind the Waywatchers, just as the Chaos Knights crashed in. Knight actually as stand and shoot had picked off another two. All I needed now was Pat to fluff his attack dice and I'd be fine. Now, as regular readers of my battle reports may have noticed I complain about poxy luck ruining my carefully wrought plans. Seemingly, Lady Luck, having read a few of my battle reports took pity on me. the Waywatchers dutifully attacked their virtually impervious enemy 4s to hit, 5s to wound 2+ armour save. I managed two wounding hits on the Knight and Pat (very generously I thought), failed a save making the Waywatchers early contenders for MVPs of the game. 

My poorly placed BSB

The Chaos Warriors failed charge was significant

Turn Three

There were no charges for me to declare, just keeping out of charge arcs. I did however put my BSB within a possible, but rather improbable charge of the Dragon Ogres (I think a 10 or 11 was needed). Everything else just made sure it was nice and safe. The slayers of the Chaos Knights went and hid in the tower. We had a 12 dice magic phase. Plague of Rust was cast on the Warriors again (armour save was now 5+). Shooting kills a Dragon Ogre. The Hail of Doom arrow is fired at the Warriors and due to some crap rolling to wound I only kill one. A 30 point item causes 16 points of damage.  Oh well.

Elusive Elven troops #dickmoves

In Pat's turn the Dragon Ogres fail their charge on the BSB and the Chaos Warriors continue their march into painful arrow death. The magic phase didn't do much - a single Waywatcher was killed.

Turn Four

The only charge I had to declare was the wild riders into the flank of the Dragon Ogres. The magic phase was nice to me I cast Glittering Robe on the Glade Guard and Plague of Rust on the Chaos Warriors. Now that the Chaos Warriors effectively had a 6+ ward save and nothing else, my archery did horrible things to them. I think I took off  half a dozen models from shooting. Close combat was brutal, the wild riders wiped out the Dragon Ogres causing 12 unsaved wounds. They overran and were halted 1" away from the Glade Riders.

The Dragon Ogres receive some flanking Wild Rider love

Yes my Wild Rider could have charged. #dickmovenumbertwo

Pat's army now consisted of a unit of Chaos Warriors with only the whims of Tzeentch as protection. Undaunted he declared a charge on my Glade Guard in the woods. Lady Luck was indeed on my side today as they failed their charge roll. I killed another few to stand and shooting so the unit was down to 8 models. The game was called as another round of shooting would have pretty much done for the virtually naked followers of Chaos. We didn't count VPs but it was a pretty solid victory for the Elves.

The End is Nigh for Tzeentch

Conclusion

The margin of my victory was I think, misleading. Had we played another turn I'm confident there would be possibly the BSB and General left at best. I think Pat's army was ideal for me to fight as it consisted of lots of small, easily picked off units. There was also the matter of Pat's craptacular luck in this game. Failed charges notwithstanding (I had deliberately left long charges to tempt him), the Chaos Knight would 9 times out of 10 routed the Waywatchers (pursuing into the BSB) which could have netted quite a few points and the Dragon Ogres failing their march test gave me the time to deal with the other threats. All in all I think (hope) Pat enjoyed the game and I know from experience he learnt from this defeat to designed a much more unpleasant army list.

*This turned out to be a worthless item.
** Not one mention of the Branchwraith in my notes. 75 points well spent I guess.

Glitterbane The Fey watched the remaining followers of Chaos skulk away from the battlefield. Casualties had been light and the enemy thwarted. Whatever these foul minions of the ruinous powers were after, the weren't successful this time. She was sure though, they would return.........