PowerFisted: Traitor Sagyar Mazan, The Blazing Suns + other (5.1 general annoucement)

[Excessus]

I've had a similar plan since a long long time ago, to exchange the heads of the dkok for something else and make militia out of them. Not with these heads of course, the theme and execution of your army is brilliant!

 

 

I have a question though, how hard is it to remove the heads, and do you use a special tool for it?

[Brofist]

You should do it! Militia are a fun army if you have the patience to work on a ton of infantry.

 

To chop off the heads all you need is a sprue clipper and a pin vice to drill out a hole for the new head to go into. The clipper goes right at the seam of the helmet and collar and will remove the head 90% of the time this way. Then you can use a hobby knife to remove what's left of the gas mask tube and drill a hole. Takes probably about a min per model.

[Pearson73]

Thanks! They're really cool models and have quite the witch/plague doctor look about them. The use of the Hellion glaive is smart.

[Brofist]

Trying to work out an updated metal base color for my Iron Warriors. Some practice I did over the last day:

 

 

Not happy tbh. My highlights blew out the base colors almost entirely, but at least I have a direction now.

[lionofjudah]

I’m really liking the blue steely guy smack dab in the middle! Diff take on the traditional IW scheme

[Brofist]

Now that I’m fully painted I’m playing as a malice aligned traitors in a campaign! Feels awesome to finally play regularly.

 

Last night I took my LVO Corpse Crow list against a chill Space Wolves player on his ZM table. The loyalist fleet basically jumped in from orbit and started sending boarding parties into the traitors anchored to some massive space instillation. A detachment of wolves crashed into one of these ship with a clear mission: take down the critical ship systems, kill anything that moves, drink a bunch of ale. What they didn’t expect was a horde of miserable idiot bird men to greet them with evil cackling. It was a friendly narrative driven game, so I toned down my list to ~900pts, took less plasma, and didn’t use my good warlord trait. My defenders consisted of my queen, some discipline masters, a squad of grenadiers, medics, flame troopers, recon crows with C4, and a support squad with a few plasma fusils. They had to prevent 4 objectives from being destroyed. The wolves consisted of three brothers, led by a cowardly (IE: smart) wolf priest, his robot boyfriend bro attached to some vorax, two big grey slayer squads with another character, and some death sworn. Their pods drilled through the hull of the ship and once inside had a field day hacking through crew on their way to destroy 4 different critical systems on the table.

 

Attackers went first and definitely took the bird boiz by surprise. I had a really hard time defending all the objectives due to how deployment worked, plus a bunch of savage wolf men rampaging through the confines of a ship. Two of the objectives got nuked on the first turn and a third objective fell on turn two, leaving the birds with only one way to win: kill all wolves. “Kill everything” being more straightforward than “defend something” my birds rallied strong turns 2-4. The flame troopers had shred and rending due to the cold void rules, so they basically warcrimed through his lines, roasting both of grey slayers squads and his vorax unit. My recon squad missed their C4 throw and died like fledglings always do (terribly, in much pain), but not before they took down two of his 2+ deathsworn with buckshot (humans? overpowered) which the dark mech plasma support squad took care of when they tried charging into their gibbering tendrils.

 

Top of turn 5 was looking grim for the wolves, but fate had other plans. The fleet battle over the station caused a slab of another ship to smash into ours, blowing airlocks and collapsing passages in on themselves. Crows are tough, but they’re not marines. About 2/3s of my army got crushed or sucked out into the void (evil cackling). My support squad lost all their handlers and went rogue, not following any orders, deciding the ship crew was more interesting to chase down and kill. The flame troopers who survived the collapsing passageways were finally cut down by his robro. A relief force of grenadiers with my queen finally fought through onto the table, but by then I couldn’t catch all the stragglers. The grenadiers shotguned the rest of his wolves, Elmer Fud style, and my queen fisted his robro in a challenge. It was gory, but not enough. Bottom of turn 5 I’d tabled the wolves except for his cowardly wolf priest, who was able to escape on the other edge of the table, making his way further into the ship, dreaming of vengeance. My crows are in pursuit, my queen’s murder dragging the body of one of the brothers behind her and the other, still somehow clinging to life, as her trophy.

 

The game ended up far more brutal than I expected, and the narrative aspect really makes 30k into a more interesting experience. Two friendly lists and two friendly dudes also made it really really enjoyable. I lost during deployment, but was surprised at how it ended up only a pyric victory. Losing a bunch of idiots to falling debris was… an unfortunate setback. Malice is fickle, but there are already more ‘volunteers’ ready to chase down the wolf priest next week.

[Brofist]

Crows went another round against my gaming bro and his space wolves. I took my full list of bird men this time, but still kept it friendly and didn't upgrade the AP of any unit.

 

The idiot birds:

• Crow queen with all the upgrades
• x2 discipline masters with axes MBs
• x15 grenadiers with shotguns, 2 plasma guns, a flag, mbs, and a power sword
• x5 recon birds with C4 and shotguns
• x9 flame troopers
• x3 medics
• x3 enginseeer auxillia with aug scanners and melta bombs
• x7 servitors with plasma fusils

Elite beer drinking vikings:

• Preator
• Wolf lord from the last game
• x10 grey slayers
• x5 death sworn
• x5 outflanking combi vets
• Contemptor with wolf bits and volkite

This time the wolves were going after my engine room. Birds had 5 objectives, 2 on each deployment side worth 1vp and a central objective worth 3vp. Secondary objectives were 'slay the warlord'. To represent our forces running in to attack/defend the engine we split our armies into two equal parts. Half started on the table and the other half had to come on later. Crows deployed their killy stuff front and center, managing to seize the initiative despite the setbacks last game.

 

Drunk Vikings committed themselves front and center:

 

We spent the first turns mostly running into position due to how the table deployment was done. My recon squad was the first serious engagement: their bomb blew up 5 grey slayers, but his lord managed to save himself from instant death thanks to a 4+. These fledglings ended life the way crows usually do.

 

His survivors didn't break and moved up:

 

About this time his sneaky vets came in from the side, but couldn't do anything due to the position of my support squad with aug scanners.

 

Turn 3 a huge explosion rocked the ship and passageways collapsed in on themselves. I was lucky enough not to lose most of my army this time around. The space wolves fared worse than before: losing a number of death sworn and most of the vets. This was just in time for my reinforcements to arrive in the form of conga line that basically trampled through his last vets.

 

At this point the wolves were in position at the middle objective. Elites score in this mission type, so at best I was hoping to deny him from holding it with my giant bird blob. Crows have a tough time with armor.

 

To win, I'd have to get to the middle in time while nuking all his scoring units from his other objective. Enter: the battle for the doorway tractor:

 

Top of turn 4 I arranged my surviving flame troopers in a position to receive his charge. The turn before they lost two men to shooting and their morale broke... luckily, the corpse crow HR committee in charge of employee welfare had attached a friendly 'discipline master' into their unit, who encouraged them by shooting them with his pistol while screaming 'you idiots! your bomb collars will explode if you run away!!'. With such glorious motivating leadership the troopers knew that the only way was forward! His praetor overheard this ruckus and barreled into their walls of death… getting toasted alive like his battle bro that came before him. Also lucky for me, his campaign character failed his charge, leaving my flame troopers enough room to cook everyone trying to seize the doorway tractor.

 

Who would win: 2 invigorated evil bird men with flame throwers or 5 Drunk Vikings? You know the answer in your heart

evil always wins

.

 

His lone survivor held it together and committed to charge my wall of death a second time. This last scoring unit was toasted, but in exchange the discipline master couldn't stand up to his campaign character in melee. Here's a shot of the final combat for the doorway tractor before they got hacked into bits:

 

At this point we had to roll to end the game or continue. If I had one more turn, I would have been able to move my giant blob into the middle of the table, contesting the 3vp objective and winning me the game. If I lost the roll, I lost the game. Fate was not on my side, even after I used my campaign ability to re-roll the dice! Malice did not want the crows to hold the engine room this week. Final score was 4:3 in favor of the wolves. Great game as always and I’m enjoying getting to know my army.

[lionofjudah]

Bulbs... that was a lot of fun to read and the narrative campaign parts are great- catastrophic when chunks of your force gets sucked into the void but ... thems the breaks sometimes:)

Your flamer dudes are really cool and have you thought about/ used grenade launchers in lieu of the fusils? May help with yer armor issues

[Gorgoff]

Wonderful battlereports. Read them both in a row and am very pleased.

[Pearson73]

Those were great fun to read, I couldn't help chuckling at the reveal of the Space Wolves' greatest foe - "horde of miserable idiot bird men".  The forces and board are both delightfully painted.

[Brofist]

Thanks guys! Hope you are ready for more! Our group hosted a private ZM event this last weekend with about 10 people in attendance. I played my friend #loyalistsareboring NLs army, another mates White Scars, and some Blood Angels. I went 2:1. Still learning the ropes of milita, but it's my favorite army to play so far and continues to be my ongoing passion project.

 

Getting my ZM terrain painted is a high priority because of the huge difference it makes. That black resin bothers me greatly.

 

Some combat photos from the event:

 

Gallery with more pix:

https://imgur.com/a/3HPEo4I

[Charlo]

Awesome pics, you're truly running the heroes of the Heresy!

[Brofist]

Just wanted to thank all you thread regulars for following along this hobby blog of mine. It's been a long passion project that's been all over the place. Thanks for staying tuned in and following me along on this crazy journey Seeing you guys pop in now and again definitely keeps me motivated! Edited March 13, 2019 by Bulbafist

[Pearson73]

It's certainly been/is enjoyable watching this project evolve and develop; your's is certainly my favourite non-Astartes and one of my favouirte heresy-era armies.

[SkimaskMohawk]

Your group has some quality armies there bulbs, both fully and nicely painted.

 

I find it hilarious that there's swarms of dreads, terminators and such, while you have a bunch bird men running around

[Brofist]

Crow Force had its first campaign victory today. My friend’s Blood Angels got sent in to massacre what was left of my idiot bird people aboard a doomed ship in low orbit over the campaign planet. The wolves had crippled the engines and destroyed most of the support systems, but managed to avoid killing most of the crazy bird crew. The Blood Angels had to clear this mess up throughout the rest of the ship. The crows had to get their together and repel these attackers. In the end, the angels had a hard time dealing with the crow's chittering dark mechanicum support units, which locked down parts of the ship and put a heavy toll on their assault units. The queen of crows slew her 3rd preator, which makes 1 for each of her campaign missions. She's now rocking T5 after campaign upgrades, so I look forward to her further misadventures. Final score was 6:2, putting me out of the losers bracket

 

My friend was great sport and took some awesome photos of our game:

 

You can check out the rest here:

https://imgur.com/a/zJBLXNx

https://imgur.com/a/XK4Cwne

Edited March 25, 2019 by Bulbafist

[lionofjudah]

Glorious victory!! Great pics

[Brofist]

Tonight I had the privilege to play on one of my new gaming friend’s incredible space wolf themed winter table. This was easily one of the most cinematic games I've played. It was a custom mission I never played before- putting the traitors on the defensive in the middle of the map as the loyalists attempted to find a key VIP hidden somewhere within our ranks. This was part of our ongoing narrative campaign and we doubled up: my crows and IWs with SoH against salamanders with our host's space wolves.

 

Overall I was surprised how many swings the game had- it was super lethal and had a lot of tense moments in a cool thematic way. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves, but I really really hope we do a follow up! Final score was 7:2 in favour of the loyalists, though one of my mates cheated and we let him get away with it which ended up costing us the game.

 

Highlight was having each recon squad take down a grey slayer squad using their demo packs and shotguns.

 

 

Even more pix!

https://imgur.com/a/FKwxq03

[Pearson73]

That's an absolutely fantastic board, looks like one of those found at Warhammer World; amazing looking game too.

[Charlo]

Utterly beautiful stuff. Tip tier Heresy on display right there.

Utterly beautiful stuff. Tip tier Heresy on display right there.

[MegaVolt87]

I honestly don't see myself putting that much effort into mere Auxilia flesh. Reading the bat reps, seems they are actually pretty decent on the tabletops though. 

[Brofist]

Cheers dudes! I've found milita to run better than how they look on paper. Medics and Dicipline masters go a long way to making units much more survivable. Grenadiers are really solid in SotDA lists and everybody knows how effective huge blobs of rending levy can be. I find that you have to lean really hard on the -1 AP modifier warlord trait in order to compete with better legions.

 

That said, there are some big gaps in the list. They are probably best with allies or in an army of dark compliance. Abhuman Helots with SotDA is the way I run them now, but I hope to switch over to Tainted Flesh + Abhuman Helots when I have enough models.

[Brofist]

Crows holding the line!

 

[Brofist]

Been cranking on an updated IW metal base colour. Here are a number of new tests. These are without highlights, just the base color:

 

 

I think I like the ones on the far right. Here are are on some unfinished bases. They should pop pretty well I think:

 

(zoom for ultra detail)

[SkimaskMohawk]

The based ones have a really nice contrast between cold and warm metals. It looks like it's reflecting the earth actually