July 4th Rumble - 1st 6th edition game!

Over the 4th of July a buddy of mine and I got together to try out the new 6th edition rules. We agreed to try to do a fully-painted game, with him bringing his Blood Angels to face off against my Heresy-era World Eaters. It seemed only appropriate that on Independence Day the armies would be Red, White and Blue! Hah! 

The Armies

We decided to keep things reasonably small as we knew we'd be spending just as much time flipping through the rules as we would pushing lead, so 1500 points seemed like a reasonable number. Neither of us took allies or fortifications for our first game out, though we both discussed the various pros and cons of both prior to the game.

World Eaters:

Terminator Company Captain (Lightning Claw and Combi-Melta, makes Terminators Troops)
4 Cataphract Terminators (Lightning Claws and Combi-Meltas)
Bale, Berzerker Dreadnought (Drop Pod)
10-man Tactical Squad (Missile Launcher, Flamer)
16-man Berzerker Squad (Chainaxe, bolt pistol)
Land Raider Phobos
Storm Eagle (Lascannons, Heavy Bolter, Vengeance Launcher)

Blood Angels:

Codicier Librarian
Epistolary Librarian
2x Sanguinary Priests
10-man Assault Squad
10-man Assault Squad
10-man Tactical Squad
Land Raider Redeemer
Baal Predator
'Vanilla' Predator

Table Setup

 

I decided to do a narrative table setup, with one side of the table being the ruined outskirts of a city, and the other side being more open hilly/forested terrain. I added a number of various scatter terrain pieces including a couple quad-cannons, some ammo and fuel dumps and a comms relay. I really like the fact that they've added in rules for all sorts of fun little terrain pieces, it really makes the battlefield more interactive and 'alive'.

We rolled off for deployment and Dave won the roll, choosing to go second. We also rolled for Warlord Traits with the World Eater Terminators getting Move Through Cover and the Blood Angels forcing the game to start using the Night Fighting rules. We also rolled for mission and table setup, coming up with The Relic mission, played long-ways on the table. We both agreed that the various missions all sounded pretty neat and dove in!

World Eaters Deployment

The World Eaters deployed their Tactical Squad and Land Raider in the ruins of the city, reserving the Drop Pod, Terminators and Storm Eagle.

Blood Angels Deployment

The Blood Angels invest the forest with the Redeemer, while the two predators lurk on the right flank. The two squads of Assault Marines remain in reserve.

World Eaters Turn 1

 

Bale Drop Pods in, behind the forest nearest the Redeemer. The Land Raider moves up and fires on the Baal Predator, failing to damage the vehicle while the Tactical Squad advance into the cover of the ruins.

Blood Angels Turn 1

Vehicles all advance, the Baal Predator flanks the tactical squad, killing the missile launcher - earning the first blood VP, and demonstrating more thought needs to be given to individual model placement, which I quite like. Of course, the shot also removed the unit's primary means of dealing with the Predator... The Redeemer's assault cannon fires on the tactical squad, but the combination of cover and the night fighting range modifiers, they are unscathed. Similarly, the machine spirit of the Redeemer fired the multi-melta also to no effect.

World Eaters Turn 2

No reserves arrive to support the World Eaters advance. Bale enters the mysterious forest, nothing remarkable occurs however, and the dreadnought thunders through the undergrowth. The Land Raider fired its lascannons, penetrating and destroying the 'vanilla' Predator. However, the ensuing explosion kills a further 2 tactical marines! Bale charges the Redeemer, but doesn't so much as scratch the paint.

Blood Angels Turn 2

 

Both of the Blood Angel assault squads arrived, but due to a wonky reading of the descent of angels rule combined with IC's with jump packs, one of the units suffered a deep strike mishap and was destroyed. In the after battle review, that misunderstanding was corrected, so in the future they take better advantage of the reduced scatter. The Baal Predator continued to lay waste to the tactical marines, killing a further 3 World Eaters. They steadfastly refuse to break under the withering firepower, however. In the forest, the Redeemer threw its drive into reverse, and focused its weapons on Bale. The multi-melta reduced the dreadnought to a molten pool.

World Eaters Turn 3

 

Reinforcements arrive! The Storm Eagle zooms across the board, while the Terminators teleport next to the locator beacon in the drop pod. I was hoping to be able to teleport more or less right on top of the Relic, but the fact that the fences were dangerous terrain kept me from attempting it. Instead they direct their bolter fire at the assault marines, slaying 2 of them. The Land Raider pivots in place and unloads a hail of lascannon and heavy bolter fire into the assault marines. When the dust settles, a single marine topples over dead. The remainder of the squad jeers at the ineffectualness of it all.

Blood Angels Turn 3

  

The Redeemer drives around to disgorge a unit of tactical marines, while the assault marines move to flank the Land Raider. The Baal Predator mercilessly annihilates the remainder of the World Eater tactical squad. This pales in comparison however to the Tactical squad, led by a Librarian.

They opened up on the Terminators with 14 bolter shots, a melta gun and a max roll Smite, which managed to kill all four of the Captain's terminator bodyguard - the final terminator leapt in front of the melta shot that would have killed the Captain. I thought that was definitely a fun mechanic. The Captain was unfazed by the carnage however.

World Eaters Turn 4

 

The Land Raider goes hunting for the Baal Predator, and manages to strip a hull point off of it. The Storm Eagle enters Hover mode and fires its Lascannons into the Redeemer, also removing a hull point. The Vengeance launchers miss pathetically. The Terminator Captain decides discretion is the better part of valor and moves with intent toward the Relic.

Blood Angels Turn 4

The Baal Predator moves to flank the Storm Eagle now that it's acting as a skimmer, but fails to damage it. The Redeemer however does manage to strip a hull point. The Tactical squad moves up and unleashes another torrent of fire into the Captain, reducing him down to a single wound.

World Eaters Turn 5

 

The Berzerkers disembark and move towards the Relic, while the now grievously wounded Captain takes refuge in the nearby Land Raider, which then pops smoke. The Storm Eagle pivots and obliterates the Baal Predator. Vengeance!

Blood Angels Turn 5

 

The Assault squad ignites their jump packs and land on the Relic, while the Redeemer moves up to unleash twin gouts of flame over the encroaching Berzerkers. 4 World Eaters are slain. The Tactical squad also unleash their frankly terrifying volume of fire into the Berzerkers, but Khorne protects the World Eaters and not a single wound is caused.

At this point the die is rolled for extra turns and turn 6 is played!

World Eaters Turn 6

The World Eaters had a chance to wrest the Relic from the hands of the assault squad, and though the Berzerkers roll a simply terrifying number of attack dice, they only manage to cut down 5 of the assault marines. The Assault marines manage to slay two of the Berzerkers in return. The morale check is passed and they fight on.

Blood Angels Turn 6

The assault marines are whittled down to a single battle brother, but manage to inflict so many casualties in return that it is the Berzerkers who must pass a Morale check. They do so and they remain locked in combat.


The final die is rolled to see if there is a turn 7... But there is not!

Tallying up the VPs, the game went 4-0 to the Blood Angels - First Blood (+1) and Control of the Relic (3) to the boys in red. Neither of us accomplished the Slay the Warlord objective however.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I had an absolute blast with the new rules! The game took us the better part of 5 hours, but that was primarily due to us going through the rules with a fine toothed comb for every phase and every question. There were a number of times we started to do something using the 5th ed. rules but stopped to double-check how it worked in the new edition. While many things remain the same, there are a lot of subtle changes as well. Now that I've had a chance to see how the game plays out, some of the little changes that seemed odd on their own make perfect sense in context with the other little changes here and there.

While I can see that the new edition may throw the competitive world into a frenzy, as far as just having a fun game with friends goes I definitely thing this new rule set is absolutely fantastic, and I'm really looking forward to playing more games in 6th edition!

Imperial Guard - Beastmen painting in progress

What's this? Actually working on models for the army the blog is named for? Unbelievable! With the fluff section of the new rulebook mentioning various Abhumans, it seemed like an ideal time to pull out a unit that has been lurking in the Closet of Doom for literally over three years now. Beastmen!

The original Mordian 7th D Company actually contained two units of Beastmen, led by Packmasters Org and Raakt. In the current build however I've just built a single unit. In-game I run them as Penal Legion with the Knife Fighters skill, at the cost of having no ranged weapons. At this point they've just gotten the fur complete and I've just started blocking in the rest of the main colors.

In other news, a buddy of mine and I had our first game of 40k using the new rules on the 4th of July, so a post battle report will be coming shortly! Still organizing pics and doing the write up. Suffice it to say it was definitely Red, White and Blue!

Iron Hands - Iron Father on Bike and Bike Squad painted

The weekly Kill Point challenge continues this week - be sure to check out Dark Future Games for all the other cool work that's being done, and by all means, join in! The more the merrier!

I've really been struggling to keep motivated on the World Eaters of late, and that's gotten me rooting around in the Closet of Doom for other things to work on. This time around, it's a unit of Iron Hands that were given to me by a good friend of mine - he's been gallivanting around the world for the last several years and has had to more or less give up the miniatures hobby. Like me, he also had a predilection with the Adeptus Mechanicus, and had built quite a significant amount of Iron Hands as they are closely aligned with the Red Priests of Mars. This unit was mostly built but unprimered when I got a hold of them, and after a bit of re-basing and minor repairs/tweaks, I set to painting!

The unit consists of an Iron Father on a bike, five bikers and an assault bike. The Iron Father is made primarily from a biker Chaplain model, with the addition of a Servo-arm and a bit of a cog update to his Crozius.

 

The bike squad is led by a sergeant with a power axe - again, the cog-themed bits help tie them in with the Adeptus Mechanicus, and apparently in 6th edition the power axe is a fairly nasty weapon!

 

The specialists in the bike squad are armed with a meltagun and a plasma gun, respectively. The meltagunner is fairly standard, while the plasma gunner is represented by an arm off a Servo-harness which I thought made for a neat look.

 

The attack bike driver has a buzzsaw arm from a Necromunda Pit Slave, and while it may not have any particular effect on the tabletop, it does look fairly threatening!

 

Definitely a fun little diversion from the unrelenting white and blue. I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do with this unit - I have no real plan to make an Iron Hands army, so they'll likely just end up going on the auction block. After all, I need to build up the hobby fund a bit after nearly emptying it out upgradung to 6th edition!

Terrain Projects - Skullvane Defense Laser

Been eagerly devouring the new 6th edition rules and am really quite excited about it. One of the things I really like is all the varied new terrain options, which got me fired up to make some new buildings!

A while back I got a great deal on the Skullvane Manse set, which I'd schemed on making into a defense laser emplacement. And a rummage through the bits boxes provided the basis for a big power generator and some various aerials.

 

One of the things I've always liked is the contrast of medieval architecture and modern tech that is seen in a lot of the artwork, and I tried to capture the feeling that it's just an ancient building that has been re-purposed, rather than a purpose-built emplacement.

There are several other large terrain pieces lurking the the Closet of Doom, and the renewed enthusiasm 6th has stirred up means they might see a paintbrush soon as well!

Victory is mine!

So the guy at my FLGS thought he was sooooo funny when he said "Yeah, so we probably won't be getting a GW shipment until next Thursday, what with the holiday coming up..."

Funny guy. Was able to pick up my copy this evening, can't wait to sit down and really give it a good read-through!

Heresy Era World Eaters - Tactical Squad painted, colorado wildfires raging

It's been an interesting week here in Colorado, with sustained triple-digit temperatures and some serious wildfires burning to the north, west and south of us. Over 87,000 acres burned in the High Park fire about twenty minutes north of here (though thankfully that fire is now ~75% contained), and 30,000 residents have been evacuated down in Colorado Springs due to the Waldo Canyon fire. Of more immediate threat is the Flagstaff fire burning on the outskirts of Boulder, quite nearby where I live, and directly threatening a friend's house - he's been on pre-evacuation notice for several days, which has been very stressful. The fires have been fought tooth and nail but were cresting the foothills just a mile outside town overnight:

In the interim, it's been swelteringly hot up in the hobby loft, so it's been a challenge to get much done. I did manage to finish off the ten-man Tactical squad for the World Eaters in time for the weekly challenge being hosted by Dark Future Games however:

On other gaming fronts, we recently finished the Rogue Trader RPG campaign that I've been running, and my friend Dave has offered to run a Dark Heresy campaign for a while, so I also painted up an Anima Tactics model for use as my Sanctioned Psyker. It was a nice change of pace to work on!

At this point I'm struggling to stay motivated on the World Eaters, so I rooted around in the Closet of Doom for some other small project to work on for a bit. Next up on the painting desk is a unit of Iron Hands bikers. I figured painting a mostly-black unit would be a good counterpoint to the mostly-white of the World Eaters!

Waaagh Mo'Dakka - Dakkajet painted

Another week, and another Kill Point completed for the Dark Future Games Kill Point Painting Contest League Thing. Hit the link for more awesome work from Old School Terminator, CVinton and the rest of the DFG crew!

I couldn't ignore the roar of Mork and Gork in my head any longer - they demanded I "Stop paintin' dem humie gits and work on sumfink Orky fer a change". I honestly needed a little break from the white and blue of the World Eaters and the Dakkajet was just the thing!

 

There are still a number of Orks lurking in the Closet of Doom, consisting of a number of different clans - I have a predilection for the Bad Moons (as my last name is Moon), but I like to include other clans as well for fluff purposes and in order to give me an opportunity to paint other color schemes. It seemed to me that the Dakkajet ought to be painted up in Speed Freek/Evil Sunz colors - which also allows for the use of the "Red Paint Job" upgrade.

 

I usually go with a heavily weathered look on my Orks, though the technique is rather different than how I've been doing the Marines. Rather than paint it up pristine and then weather it down, I started by giving the entire plane a heavy metal drybrush, then went over the main panels with the red paint colors, leaving the edges of the armor plates' metal finish exposed. I painted a couple of the panels various other shades of red to add to the ramshackle look, and added some yellow flames  to give it some spot color.

I thought the underside of the plane needed something, and a little insult from the pilot seemed appropriate! Overall I have to say this kit was an absolute blast to build and paint, and the amount of options and bits provided in the kit were fantastic. I'm quite looking forward to building a Blitza-Bomma at some point soon!

But for now, back to the World Eaters!