2nd Ed Slaaneshi Word Bearers

[Achinadav]

This was a great read through! You've got quite a bit going on and it all looks great!

 

Excited to see some more updates. And battle reports of any 2nd Ed games in the future!

 

Thanks! It keeps me out of trouble Although my furry companion, who sneaked into a couple of the photos above, would prefer that I spent more time throwing his ball.

 

In the interests of staying off the mean streets of the village I live in, I finished assembling the rest of the cathedral. Here it is in all its majesty:

For context, our dining room table, otherwise known as the Field of Battle, his nearly 9 feet long and just under 4 feet wide. The cathedral is about twice the size I thought it would be. Continuing my pattern of overconfidence, I got the top of the tower on the right on wrong, it should be turned round by 90 degrees, and the main doorway doesn't quite line up You can't tell from this distance, and it should make for a memorable battle on Saturday.

 

Here's a scale shot with a rhino, old noise marine and my favourite Dark Vengeance chosen:

 

And the Apse:

 

I discovered this afternoon, whilst tidying up my desk in preparation for tomorrow's Mammoth Painting Session of Doom, that one of the inset detail panels on the Apse didn't get glued in! I'll have to trim it, carefully, to fit and glue it.

[hushrong]

Your pup looks like he is getting in some quality lounging while you hobby :)

 

That cathedral is also sweet! That definitely a great kit there for some nice terrain. Be sure to take some pics and post a battle report after Sunday's skirmish!

[Achinadav]

Its hard work for him to fit the right number of 3 hour naps into his day. Sometimes the stress wears him out. Especially when he's also got to run around after his ball and spend at least an hour getting the thick humans to understand that he wants his dinner.

 

Will keep my phone handy for battle snaps! Looks like I'm fighting orks this time & I'm tempted to try out some daemons. Primed my 10 daemonettes for tomorrow, planning a quick scheme using washes & inks. Except I don't have enough bright washes

Edited August 2, 2018 by Achinadav

[hushrong]

Sounds like a proper pup who deserves some behind the ear scritches!

 

Definitely take some pics! And daemons too? oh yeah! Will this be with 2nd edition rules?

[Achinadav]

He's a good boy who deserves all the tummy rubs and ear scratches. I could take a pass on his flatulence!

 

2nd edition indeed. Tried 3rd and it left me cold. Finished Uni & fell out of 40k, landed in D&D. My Word Bearers are rehabilitating me ;)

[Achinadav]

Had a great game of 2nd edition today, with my Word Bearers facing an Ork horde that vastly out numbered my thin red line of devoted/demented psychopaths. My opponent wants me to tell the internet that this was his first time playing with Orks and that it wasn't his ideal army. I want to tell the internet that this puts me 2 for 2 Knowing that this was a bit of an experiment for the Orks, I play with a bit of an experimental list that used some cult marines & daemons. I figured, I might as well try something out and try to make sure that we both had some fun. So I've used the variable squads sizes to take lots of small units, instead of the big ones I prefer, and some daemonettes. This gives me flexibility and, once I've got the summoning points for the daemonettes, I can summon them exactly where I want them.

 

Here's my list (complete with the names that my toy soldiers live by in my head), with wargear cards in italics & psychic powers are underlined:

 

Characters

 

Dol Barack - Chaos Lord

Mark of Slaanesh, power axe, Master-crafted Plasma Pistol, Haywire Grenade.

 

Jarmin Moon - Sorcerer Champion

Mark of Slaanesh, boltgun, Force Rod, Hood of Hellfire (+50% tax for Imperial gear), Pavane of Slaanesh, Beam of Slaanesh.

 

First Acolyte Timour Locke - Sorcerer

Boltgun, Force Axe, Machine Curse.

 

Gul Karnak - Aspiring Champion (Veteran CSM squad)

Mark of Slaanesh, power fist, boltgun, meltagun, Armour-piercing Ammo.

 

Troops

 

1st Coterie

3 x veteran CSM, 3 x boltgun, power fist, power axe, power mail (+50% tax for post-Heresy gear).

 

2nd Coterie

6 x CSM, 3 x boltgun, flamer, meltagun, mkI plasma gun.

 

3rd Coterie

3 x CSM, 2 x boltgun, missile launcher with frag & krak grenades.

 

1st Diaconium

3 x noise marine, 2x sonic blaster, blastmaster.

 

2nd Diaconium

3 x noise marine, 2x sonic blaster, blastmaster.

 

Support

 

Predator, twin heavy bolter sponsons.

 

Daemons

 

The Astral Choir

6 x daemonette.

2nd edition psychic powers are drawn at random from a deck of 4 cards (for Slaanesh powers) or 8 cards (for most other sets of powers). I did well to avoid the powers I didn't want in the Slaaneshi deck. My second sorcerer was there to make sure I got enough cards in the warp flux (2d6 cards in each phase, but only 1d6 if there's one psyker on the board). He's unmarked, so I selected the Adeptus deck, which is quite general with an interesting mix of movement powers, blasting powers and utility powers. I was pleased with his draw, as its another anti-vehicle power and my army is missing anti-tank fire power.

 

My opponent field a big mob of gretchin as shield with large mobs of skar boyz and goffs boyz, his warboss, a weirdboy, some boarboyz, mega-armoured nobs, another boyz mob with some heavy weapons, and a mob armed with kustom kombi-weapons. Phew! Oh, and a squadron of two bikes & a skorcha. There were loads of the blighters!

 

My forces had been despatched to Engage & Destroy (bonus victory points or destroying units/characters/vehicles) the ork force that had been fighting a Guerrilla War (bonus victory points for melee casualties). My opponent won the rolls for choosing table side and going first. But I got to deploy after him, so at least I could setup in cover (mostly) and he'd be in range of all my firepower for my first turn. My plan was to target the gretchin shield, and use Jarmin Moon's powers to force Leadership tests. This would mount up my summoning points so I could bring my daemonettes in when I wanted. With few anti-tank weapons, I was going to be relying on Dol Barack & Gul Karnak to take out the dreadnought, probably, with First Acolyte Locke neutralising it in the mean time. My predator & noise marines had plenty of sustained fire dice to bring down massed boyz & gretchin, and I could count on my forces not running away because of all those Marks of Slaanesh (total immunity to psychology).

 

After deployment, it looked like this:

 

My vets got to infiltrate outside of my deployment zone, as long as they're out of sight, so ended up slightly forwards of my line on the hill near the 3 shipping containers. My missile launcher team are on top of the L-shaped platform, along with Jarmin Moon, with 2nd coterie and Dol Barack behind it. Both squads of noise marines are over on the upper floor of the rectangular building and the predator has been very carefully placed to be obscured from everything; no unlucky first turn detonations!

 

Directly opposite my fire base is the majority of the ork horde, with skar boyz & goffs hidden by a gretchin screen and backed up by the dreadnought, warboss and a couple of oddboyz (mekaniak & painboy, I think). The other boyz mob, mega-armoured nobz & boaboyz are behind the ruined cathedral. Gloriously out in the open, but with none of my guns able to draw a bead. The mob with kustom kombi-weapon (& a heavy stubber!) are on top of the other rectangular building (by the bottle of Pepsi, it doesn't block line-of-sight). They can't see very much, so will have to move forwards and miss some shots...Oh, and there's a mob of infiltrating ork kommandos behind the tower that connects to my noise marines' position by a walkway.

Edited August 6, 2018 by Achinadav

[Achinadav]

TURN 1

 

The ork horde got the first turn after a tense roll off. Essentially the whole army ran forwards, which was pretty intimidating:

You can just see the weirdboy rocking out to the music in his head at the top of the shot. To the left, the vehicle squadron is trying to out flank me around the hill. The dread started to preoccupy me at this stage; it can move and fire, move or fire weapons and is carrying a heavy bolter & lascannon.

 

At the other end of the battle field, the boarboyz & mega-armoured nobz surged forwards. The kustom kombi-weapon squad repositioned forwards, and the kommandos looped around the tower and underneath the bridge (after I snapped this pic):

 

Not much shooting, because of all the movement. But that blasted dread made me regret my deployment. It unleashed its heavy bolter at 3rd Coterie and blasted the two bolter guys to the Warp and straight into the arms of Slaanesh. The remaining guy passed his break test. And fortunately the lascannon missed. It could have been worse!

 

In the psychic phase, the ork weirdboy was out of range. But my pair of sorcerers were on fire! Jarmin Moon tried to blast a gretchin with his Hood of Hellfire, but was half an inch out of range (random range of 2d6+Ld). But I'd lucked out and drawn Ultimate Force, so the First Acolyte, hiding behind a wall, Machine Cursed the dreadnought! This was really a turn early, as it would prevent the dread from moving or firing, and so would be better off in place at the end of my turn. Ultimate Force means the power can't be nullfied, so it was too good an opportunity to pass up. Moon finished off by manifesting Pavane of Slaanesh on the gretchin, forcing a Leadership test and granting me 5 summoning points.

 

In my turn, 2nd Coterie climbed up onto the platform in front of them to close the distance for their special weapons. The predator trundled around the corner of the cathedral and lined up opposite the massed ork & gretchin lines. 1st Coterie shuffled forwards, lining up the vehicle squadron...Dol Barack ran around the L-shaped platform, hoping to sneak up on the dread.

 

In the shooting phase, 1st Coterie unloaded on the vehicle squadron and got helluva lucky! One shot slammed into the skorcha's fuel tank, penetrated & blew the whole thing sky high! The resulting explosion took out both bikes and left the entire squadron a twisted pile of wreckage. 3rd Coterie's missile launcher failed to damage the dread, but the Predator made a mess of a bunch of gretchin and the hordes mobile cover started to look a little thin:

Note the conspicuously absent vehicle squadron

 

On my right flank, the noise marines proved their worth. One squad got lucky; they could just see the mega-armoured nobs through the windows of the cathedral. Blasting away, two of them missed, but the third hit and the 2 sustained fire dice led to multiple strikes. One of the nobs failed his armour save, and his unmodified medi-squig save, and the two survivors ran for it! Ha! Take that, jumped up terminator wannabes. The other noise marine squad targetted the kommandos, it didn't go so well They might have killed one, I can't remember.

 

In my psychic phase, Jarmin Moon's Hood of Hellfire was nullified (maybe?), as was Locke's Machine Curse, ouch. But thanks to break tests and another Pavane of Slaanesh I now had enough summoning points to bring in all 6 of my daemonettes. They're melee fighters, though, and could only charge in my turn, so better to hold of bringing them in for another turn.

 

More to follow when i convince the photos to make their way to my laptop...

Edited August 5, 2018 by Achinadav

[Achinadav]

Turn 2

 

State of play at the beginning of the turn:

 

Note my repositioned firebase & 1st Coterie sneaking up through the shipping containers. Dol Barack is at the corner of the L-shaped platform, continuing to do nothing in any way effective. And you can just see Locke's Force Axe peaking over the top of his cover. Brave soul. The orks general advance has had a chunk bitten out of it by massed fire power, but there's plenty of gretchin left. The mega-armoured nobz continue to cower in their cover, due to being broken.

 

On my left the orks continued to rush forwards, trying to close the gap and making me wonder if they were on a Dawn Raid (we kept our missions hidden). The dread stomped forwards, leaking oil and clanking as it drew a bead on my predator. On the other flank the kommandos rushed into the tower and up to the top level. In the cramped confines, one of them was beautifully placed in the doorway with my noise marines looking on...The boarboyz charged across the open ground and into the tower's shelter, hidden from everyone.

 

The shooting phase had the potential to be nasty, if fickle Lady Luck decided to side with the orks. On my left, the dreadnought unloaded at my predator. A hail of heavy bolter shells (double 3 on the sustained fire dice!) sent showers of sparks in all directions as they rattled off its armour. None stuck the tracks, the only chance to do damage. And then the coherent lance of energy from its lascannon went wide! Ha. Ork markmanship at its finest

 

The other flank also had the opportunity to be interesting. Kustom kombi-weapons don't roll to hit, so the hard cover I thought my noise marines were in was useless. Their range and strength is random, d6x10" for range, artillery dice for Strength (so 2, 4, 6, 8, or 10). A misfire gives a 50/50 chance of the ork dying in the inevitable explosion. The squad unloaded at my noise marines and the very first shot rolled a Strength of 8, turning one noise marine into nothing but a greasy smear. That was all she wrote and I was left with one jammed sonic blaster, from the sustained fire dice in the previous turn, but otherwise a pretty good result:

[

 

There was also an unlucky misfire rolled, and a small mushroom cloud blossomed on the other side of the table, so casualties on the exchange of fire were so far pretty even:

 

Not a lot in the psychic phase. I learnt my lesson with Machine Curse and was holding on to it for my own phase. Jarmin Moon's Hood of Hellfire got nullified and I filled up Jarmin's Force Rod & Locke's Force Axe with force cards in preparation for an apocalyptic, maybe, psychic phase next time round. And in the final act of the phase, Jarmin Moon's screeching exhortations to Slaanesh reached their peak and in a stinking cloud of warp excreta half a dozen daemonettes popped into the real world over by the noise marines. I was able to position them so they could see the boarboyz

 

In my movement phase I continued to reposition 1st & 2nd Coterie to line up their trio of special weapons. The predator rumbled around and headed back to line up against the ork boyz coming through the cathedral. Dol Barack ran up to join 1st Coterie, preparing to sidle up to the ork dread with his Haywire Grenade. Humming dischordant tunes, the daemonettes scampered into close combat with the front 3 boarboyz:

You can the fruits of my labour on Friday here. Not very happy with how they're turning out. Look like I was holding the paint brush with my feet!

 

Shooting went my way! As one noise marine cleared his jammed sonic blaster, by carefully retuning it, his companion drew a bead on the kommando outlined by the door into the tower. One hit roll later and a wall of cacophonous sound ripped the squad apart as I rolled d6+4 for its Strength and got 10. Every kommando was ripped asunder and the tower walls were splattered with chunks of ork. Huzzah! The other noise marines managed to plink away at the boyz with kustom kombi-weapons, I think they did a bit of damage.

 

Gul Karnak carefully sighted the ork dread, his mutated left hand manipulating his meltagun and trickling a flux of warp energy into his power cells (i.e. he used his Armour-piercing Ammo). His overcharged blast slammed into the dread's hip, spinning it round, fusing crude ork hydraulics and melting straight through its upper leg. The dread crashed to the ground, effectively destroyed! The rest of 1st Coterie showered the skarboyz with frag grenades and everyone unloaded at assorted orks & gretchin. When the dust settled, things were looking good:

 

My predator didn't do too well, ended up jamming one heavy bolter and its autocannon The daemonettes made up for that in the close combat phase by ripping all 3 boarboyz apart in artistic goats of fungus-blood and then followed up into the remaining two.

 

Um, can't remember the psychic phase very well. There might have been an attempt on Gul Karnak by the weirdboy, but I'm pretty sure that was in ork's psychic phase, because I nullified it so he could blast the dread. I did use Locke to dump another Machine Curse on the boyz coming through the cathedral. They had a pair of heavy weapons and I didn't want them scratching the paintwork on my predator:

Edited August 5, 2018 by Achinadav

[Achinadav]

Turn 3

 

This had to be the last turn of the game. We spent too long sharing our Adeptus Titanicus enthusiasm before we got started. And then paused for a bit of a blether, without really meaning to, around the end of turn 2, so ran out of time. Ooops. Did get all the way through turn 3, though, so at least we had a kind of conclusion.

 

The ork advance slowed as everyone moved forwards at a walk, so they could fire. The gretchin "bravely" crowded in front of the skarboyz & goffs. In the cathedral the boyz moved out from the Machine Curse, although in practise there wasn't much they could do against my pred. The mega-armoured nobz had rallied. But they were out of position.

 

Ork shooting was ineffective. At least as far as they didn't kill any Word Bearers! A couple more kustom kombi-weapons detonated in their users hands and the squad broke! I think this was my second favourite moment, the first being blasting that pesky dread.

 

In the close combat phase, my daemonettes finished off the boarboyz. They basically munched their way through without any problems. This is when I realised my mistake; if there had been a fourth turn, they had no other targets and were out in the open in front of the kustom kombi-weapon team. It had worked out in my favour, because the orks were broken. But this was not a target rich environment.

 

My right flank after the close combat phase:

 

In the psychic phase, there was a little bit of back-and-forth. The only important thing that happened was the weirdboy using 'Eadbutz on Jarmin Moon. It stripped a wound off him and prevented him from casting any powers. With Locke's Machine Curse in play, the phase came to an end.

 

My movement phase saw the daemonettes running towards the kustom kombi-weapon mob. Basically in "play like there's another turn" moment, as it felt wrong to do anything else. 1st & 2nd Coterie shuffled around, with Dol Barack & Locke both moving to make shots. Then everyone let rip! I did a poor job of focussing my fire and blew chunks out of whatever felt good. So I made a bit of a mess in general, just didn't finish any squad off completely, so no bonus victory points for my mission:

 

No close combat this turn, straight on to psychic phase. Jarmin Moon FINALLY got to melt a gretchin with his Hood of Hellfire, which was satisfying if a little of an after thought. In the final act of the battle the weirdboy tried to Brain Bursta Gul Karnak and I, rather pettily, played the Daemonic Attack warp card. It auto-nullified the power (nice), but the orks only draw the ire of the daemon on a d6 roll of a 6, instead of 4+. The die rolled and bounced and skittered...and came up a 6! The weirdboy got nommed and I got to end on a high point

 

Here's the final state of the table:

There's a nice pile of ork casualties on the top left I managed to thin out the horde on the bottom left and between my noise marines and daemonettes, my right flank is pretty much unopposed at this point.

 

The game was great fun. The report probably sounds a bit one sided, and I know I've forgotten a few details along the way, but there are a couple of places where I was really lucky and a different die roll would have meant, e.g., the dread survived. I only lost 2 CSM and 1 noise marine! But that's largely because the orks were running forward all the time and couldn't stop to fire en masse. They needed to get into melee to score victory points, I just had to destroy things. If there had been some transport vehicles, or even if the boarboyz had been on my left with the vehicle squadron, then I think my opponent could have disrupted my gun line and upset my plans a little. What really told here was that each of my marines is better quality than an ork and that this was the first time my opponent had used orks. He learnt a lot about how they function, and I think a second dread is coming my way And I was very lucky with the hits on the skorcha's fuel tank, with a bolter, and the dread dying from one meltagun hit. Always aim for the legs!

 

Things I would have done differently. Well, one missile launcher can't do jack against a dread. If I was choosing the army again, I'd either ditch 3rd Coterie for another 3 daemonettes or swap the missile launcher for a heavy bolter. Another pair of sustained fire dice might have finished off that gretchin screen. Or I'd have filled out 1st Coterie with more Veterans of the Long War. Psychic power selection worked out well. Locke had nothing to do once the ork vehicles were destroyed. He could have been handy on the other flank, keeping the kombi-weapons non-functional. But I had to keep psykers 16" away from noise marines or risk them damaging themselves.

 

Against a horde like this, I was able to force plenty of Break Tests, so Jarmin Moon really only needed one further power to force Ld tests. Next time I'd have him take an Adeptus power and hope for something blasty, like Lightning Arc. He was my man of the match. A persistent pain who was able to use his Hood of Hellfire to draw out nullifies, contributed in the shooting phase (he shot a gretchin) and piled up the summoning point with Pavane of Slaanesh. He even had a shot at the ork Warboss with Beam of Slaanesh. I might promote him to Master Sorcerer, and a 3rd power, as a reward He's definitely going to get paint (sometime in the next decade...).

 

Deployment-wise, I took too much of a risk by putting 3rd Coterie and Jarmin Moon on the L-shaped platform. I should have put 2nd Coterie up there, in front of them, to shield my more valuable assets. I'm happy with the rest of my positioning. 1st Coterie weren't ideal, but the best I could do with them having to be out of sight.

 

During the game I should have done better at remembering my mission; complete destruction got bonus victory points. I should have left my predator in place for one more turn, to use those 5 sustained fire dice on the gretchin, and risked the dreadnought's lascannon. As it worked out, Gul Karnak toasted it anyway so it would have been less of a risk than I thought. I could have just ignored the boyz mob in the cathedral, they had no targets bar what I gave them. I think I'd have kept everything the same on my right. My daemonettes ran out of targets, but did a sterling job of protecting my noise marines position. If I'd had more, I would have brought a trio in very early on my left (psychic phase of ork's first turn) and used them in melee asap over there.

Edited August 5, 2018 by Achinadav

[hushrong]

Great battle report with pictures to boot! The new cathedral looks great in the center of that battlefield.

 

Pretty interesting to read through an edition of 40K I never got to play. I do hope you keep this going.

[Gorgoff]

Man, that takes me back. I started with 2ed 1993 myself and I love it till this day. Still the cadillac of all editions, if ya ask me.

Great report thank you for that.

If I may I have a little hint for you.

Take out the mission cards Guerilla War and Engage& Destroy. The former is way to hard to pull of and the latter is way to good. And boring too because killing the opponents units is what you do in every game anyway.

And getting one victory point for three dead enemies in cc is very hard to pull of. Compare that to the 5 points you get when the objective is to secure... the objective. ;)

[Achinadav]

Great battle report with pictures to boot! The new cathedral looks great in the center of that battlefield.

 

Pretty interesting to read through an edition of 40K I never got to play. I do hope you keep this going.

 

Thanks! We lined the walls of the cathedral up so its laid out the way I think that Plast Craft intend. In hindsight, its sufficiently big, and dominates the centre of the table enough, that we should probably have spread it out more. That way I could have driven my predator through it It would actually make a pretty good objective to seize or try and hold.

 

Let me know if there's anything that you'd like some more words on. I rattled it off pretty quick (then obsessively edited to correct typos). Next game is scheduled for the beginning of September, so hopefully momentum will keep us going.

 

Man, that takes me back. I started with 2ed 1993 myself and I love it till this day. Still the cadillac of all editions, if ya ask me.

Great report thank you for that.

If I may I have a little hint for you.

Take out the mission cards Guerilla War and Engage& Destroy. The former is way to hard to pull of and the latter is way to good. And boring too because killing the opponents units is what you do in every game anyway.

And getting one victory point for three dead enemies in cc is very hard to pull of. Compare that to the 5 points you get when the objective is to secure... the objective.

 

2nd edition definitely has an undeserved reputation for clunkiness and bad rules. In fact, the rulebook is pretty short and most of it is well written. Except the ork codex. For some reason Jervis Johnson felt the need to write 3 paragraphs where 2 sentences would suffice. I'd brought into the internet theory of it being a really clunky mess and have been very pleasantly surprised that its nothing like that at all. By the end of the game it was starting to flow quite well, even if we did forget a few things like a Fear test when my daemonettes charged the boarboyz or exactly how you're meant to position templates...

 

We didn't bother keeping track of VP's, or even totting them up at the end, it was pretty clearly a green massacre! I think the issue with Guerrilla War is you have to come prepared with a close combat-based army that can get stuck in really easily. If the orks had had their battlewagon they might have been able to do just that. Of course, the small size of my Word Bearers force does also put a limit on just how easily they could rack up extra VPs from their mission. If a melee equipped marine army got in amongst Imperial Guard, they could slaughter them by the handful and get lots of bonus points!

Edited August 7, 2018 by Achinadav

[Gorgoff]

Transports doesn't work in 2. editions. It's one of the few flaws it has. You get a automatic hit with strengh equal to the distance they drove befor they disembark. ;)

Nontheless I want to play second now.

[hushrong]

I think the cathedral looked great where you have it. You could space out its parts and add rubble between to show just how much was destroyed in future battles. That way tanks and walkers can duke it out in what's left of its once hallowed halls.

 

I think your breakdown was great. Reading what happened and why was nice. I am definitely looking forward to the next game. I say take more pics and notes for more details if anything. I do think those cards for powers were neat. I'm trying to remember if in 5th you just bought the powers you wanted to use...before 6th made you roll for it randomly. I also like seeing the psychic template. I really miss templates...

[Augustus b'Raass]

Man, that takes me back. I started with 2ed 1993 myself and I love it till this day. Still the cadillac of all editions, if ya ask me.

QFT

 

Also, his idea of taking out those two particular mission cards is exactly what my pals used to do back in the mid-nineties.

 

Transports doesn't work in 2. editions. It's one of the few flaws it has. You get a automatic hit with strengh equal to the distance they drove befor they disembark.

To circumvent this, use transports with heavily armoured troops like terminators (who can ride Rhinos in 2nd!), high toughness guys, or those with invulnerable . :tu:

[Gorgoff]

 

 

Man, that takes me back. I started with 2ed 1993 myself and I love it till this day. Still the cadillac of all editions, if ya ask me.

QFT

 

Also, his idea of taking out those two particular mission cards is exactly what my pals used to do back in the mid-nineties.

Transports doesn't work in 2. editions. It's one of the few flaws it has. You get a automatic hit with strengh equal to the distance they drove befor they disembark.

To circumvent this, use transports with heavily armoured troops like terminators (who can ride Rhinos in 2nd!), high toughness guys, or those with invulnerable . :tu:

Ogryns can ride transports as well, because the have several wounds and don't care when they miss one due to disembarkation. But there is another problem with transports. Look at the damage chart. If you penetrate the hull on the transport section and throw a 4+ everone on board is dead.

No saves.

Just plain dead.

;)

[Achinadav]

...That way tanks and walkers can duke it out in what's left of its once hallowed halls.

A game I really fancy playing is using the cathedral as a defensive emplacement with one side assaulting and the other camped out in it. Now where can I find tiny church pews?

 

...I do think those cards for powers were neat. I'm trying to remember if in 5th you just bought the powers you wanted to use...before 6th made you roll for it randomly. I also like seeing the psychic template. I really miss templates...

For some reason shuffling the cards, and getting to exchange powers you don't like, seems so much better than just chucking another die! I never played beyond 3rd, when powers were suddenly fixed. Grrr. For some reason every power has its own template, even those that are just another 2" radius one. It makes for a colourful battlefield. Why they ditched them I don't know.

 

 

Transports doesn't work in 2. editions. It's one of the few flaws it has. You get a automatic hit with strengh equal to the distance they drove befor they disembark.

To circumvent this, use transports with heavily armoured troops like terminators (who can ride Rhinos in 2nd!), high toughness guys, or those with invulnerable .

 

That's exactly what I did in our first, 1000pt, game! Three slightly deranged terminators leapt out of a speeding rhino. The less suicidal approach would have been accelerate to combat speed & end turn 1 behind cover, then decelerate to slow speed & move a max of 10" before disembarkation in turn 2. Hey presto, Strength of hit is 0. My way was more fun

 

...But there is another problem with transports. Look at the damage chart. If you penetrate the hull on the transport section and throw a 4+ everone on board is dead.

No saves.

Just plain dead.

Hence my terminators' leap of faith. Its one of the things on my mental checklist of "stuff we should consider tweaking".

[hushrong]

I know 8th has that 'stronghold assault' game mode where its a defender holding a position and an attacker trying to push them off. It sounds like fun but haven't really looked into it. I think they had started something like that with 7th but I didn't paly it then. Still, I think that would be a fun game to play for a one-of battle or part of a narrative. As for pews...maybe balsa woodworking may be in order?

 

As for templates I think it was ditched for expediency. Instead of putting a template down, determining who got hit then wounded, and going through that they just said "flamers have d6 hits at this range" and done. I really miss templates, especially for my noise weapons. I miss dropping that pie plate on tanks and putting some hurt down or outright blowing them up and erasing enemy infantry. Those were good days.

[Achinadav]

Balsa wood! Now that might be the answer, thanks. I can make them the exact size I want then too.

 

And yeah, I can understand expediency, and it probably has nearly the same effect. But why let practicality ruin our games of toy soldiers set the grim darkness of the far future. The 4 part thudd gun/venom cannon template has got to be one of the most fun parts of the game! Even if it does take too long and make no practical sense whatsoever

[hushrong]

I need to see this thudd gun template! I personally miss putting a template over a group of my opponents toy soldiers and saying ‘yep, these are goners, just look at that’ before point at each one and rolling a die to see if the dice gods saw fit to kill them. Now with just rolling hits and wounds then seeing you opponent pick out who is gone sucked the fun out of it haha.

[Gorgoff]

I need to see this thudd gun template! I personally miss putting a template over a group of my opponents toy soldiers and saying ‘yep, these are goners, just look at that’ before point at each one and rolling a die to see if the dice gods saw fit to kill them. Now with just rolling hits and wounds then seeing you opponent pick out who is gone sucked the fun out of it haha.

That.

Not much in a nerdlife more satisfying as putting a flamer template over a unit of enemies and stating: "I hit them all."

[Achinadav]

Here you go hushrong, one thudd gun template:

 

You were meant to use split pins to hold it together and I never quite got around to it. The arrow on template 1 points at your thudd gun and then you use a d12 to position the others. It's awesome! Even if I only ever got to use it when a mate got into tyranids and sent a hive tyrant armed with a venom cannon at me.

 

Most of the other templates are pretty standard, except for the Foot of Gork (or maybe Mork?), which is footshaped! The heavy flamer template is massive, and there's a double-sided psychic power about the same size.

 

I quite like the little stand up magic doorways for the Adeptus power the Gate, which makes a tunnel through the warp. It wins the award for best use in a battle report; in a bunker assault mission the Space Wolves used it to get directly into an Eldar bunker. The Eldar then used another power that creates a psychic storm and pinned the Space Wolves to the walls of the bunker. Njall Stormcaller opened a Gate between two bunkers hoping that the Wolves would get blown through...It didn't work But it deserved to!

Edited August 13, 2018 by Achinadav

[Achinadav]

This week's hobby time (yay for lazy Sundays!) was spent repainting my daemonettes. I wasn't happy with the first attempt and so stripped them and started over. Acetone-free nail varnish remover worked great on my tester, but I left the others just soaking just slightly too long. The plastic softened and I think the scrubbing process blurred the detail slightly. I don't honestly care; they're horrible to put together, because of how the arms join below the shoulder, and to paint, because some arms obscure the bodies. I also found that the close inspection that painting brings left me uncomfortable with the aesthetic. I think its the stories that have been in the press in the last year or so.

 

Anyway, here they are in slightly blurry glory:

 

I used a coat Fenrisian grey, which was bluer than I expected, and then drybrushed with Menoth white highlight followed by pure white. Then worked my way through a bunch of shades to do the skin, after using the same colour to do their corsetry, although I just used whatever was to hand. To be honest, I was too heavyhanded with the Menoth white highlight and also too uneven. Except that worked out OK, because its given them patchy, reptilian skin in places. Then I used the complimentary colour to pick out the claws and hair, with a wash of the relevant shade. The one on the right in the top row is my tester, which I used Ulthuan grey for the base skin tone and it was too light.

 

On some of them its worked really well, like the yellow/purple combinations. On some the skin came out really well, like the green-bodied ones, and the claws haven't. Casandora yellow is a beautiful colour! Fuegan orange is quite brown and muddy. It gave me a chance to try them out before I shade any of the armour on my Word Bearers or their motor pool (which just grew by another predator...This one to be dual lascannon & turret autocannon, and I'm going to use my extra armour on it that I scored for cheap).

 

Thanks for looking.

Edited August 20, 2018 by Achinadav

[hushrong]

Nice repaint and the vibrant colors will please Slaanesh!

 

Also, that template is insane! I love how it uses a D12 to see where the following hits land. That is a lot more thematic and fun than what we have going on now. Heck, I bought Adeptus Titanicus and was happy to see some templates in a box set. That was like seeing an old friend.

[Achinadav]

Well thank you, although it didn't work out quite as well as I hoped! It did teach me a certain amount about the shades, though. If I could be bothered I'd strip the green/red & blue/orange ones and redo them in purple/yellow or yellow/purple.

 

I've just realised that I didn't do any red bodies with green claws! What was I thinking :)

 

Honestly, the only template that rivals the thudd gun one for pure fun is the Foot of Gork. Its actually a spell/template that carried over from the first big box of fantasy battle. I was very happy to see it.