Sunday, October 28, 2012

A tale of OG Gamers Blog 3: First models completed!

The last week has been one of the most hobby heavy I've had in a long time and I've really enjoyed it. After the rain last Sunday, I managed to undercoat and clean up the first batch of resin bases I'd ordedered, along with the 20 cultists I am planning to do as part of this months 'quota'. I spent Wednesday evening trying out paint schemes for the bases. I've also completed the paint of 4 cultists - a whopping 16 points out of my 250pt limit for month one.
On the gaming side, I've managed to also fit in 5 games of 40k - two on the Thursday club night and three in this month's Planet Og day yesterday.

Without further ado, here is the base scheme I settled on:



I tried lots of different greys, but couldn't settle on any, and resorted to a good old scheme I've done before, and should work well with lots of red and bronze/gold power armour.

The colour scheme was quite simple - undercoated black, a base coat of Dheneb Stone, then a wash of Gryphonne Sepia with a final highlight of drybrushed Bleached Bone. The sides of the bases are Khemri Brown.

The skills were painted with Vallejo Bronze, then Old Gold, befoe my old friend Devlan Mud was used to wash.

As mentioned above I've also finished 4 Cultists:

  
I'm particular please how the eight-point stars have come out on each model's right shoulder, and was really simple to do. Just a wash of Baal Red over the flesh.

Anyways, I have a load more cultists to be getting on with! Until next week...

Matt


Sunday, October 21, 2012

A tale of OG Gamers Blog 2: Flavours of Chaos and plans for month 1

It's been almost a week since my last post, and the Tale of OG Gamers has been occupying a lot of my thoughts. I have been deciding upon a theme for my Chaos Marines, and subsequently have been considering what parts and kits I'll use to make a pretty unique army.

Army Flavour

Last week, I wrote a blog outlining my choice of army for the tale of OG Gamers. Not only did this include which God(s) to go for, but also legions.

In the end, the choice for me came down to World Eaters and Death Guard. Whilst I love the background for both, they are characterful and well supported with conversion options and Forgeworld pieces. I've decided though to begin with World Eaters for the following reasons:

1) On and off I've been thinking of doing some sort of World Eaters army since reading Battle for the Abyss several years ago. Whether this would be pre or post Heresy I was unsure, but here is a great chance to make either happen;

2) The Tale of Gamers has a number of Chaos players in. Hardly surprising, given they are a new codex and have a cult following. Whilst there are a range of legions and Gods being chosen, Khorne and the World Eaters were one of the ones not done by another player;

3) Slow moving, hard to kill units in the Death Guard theme seems a bit too similar to my Deathwing Army. World Eaters will require a completely different style of play;

4) Chaos Marines IMO should be getting up in their opponents faces and taking skulls; and finally


5) I get the chance to have Shatner style Chaos tourettes (KKKHHHAAAANNNN!!!!)

Month 1 Target

The month 1 target for my 250pts is:

- Kharn the Betrayer (160pts);
- 20 Chaos Cultists with no toys (90pts)

My 'before' picture for month 1 is:


You may have noticed that Kharn is missing from the picture. I've ordered model to lead the army, but GW have none left in stock. This means I'll have to wait an extra week or two whilst I wait for some more to be cast and sent over. In the mean time I'll concentrate on the cultists. I'm also thinking about an alternative 160pts should it take too long to receive a model. I picked up an Aegis Defence line in Croydon today, so could convert and paint this if necessary. I've also obtain some Khorne and Chaos bits, so this should be a fun kit to convert and offer up to the Blood God as an alternative.

At this point, I'd also like to take the opportunity to big up Dragon Forge Design's bases. I bought some of their 'Lost Empire' bases 18 months ago for some Dark Eldar I was painting up at the time and was really impressed. Decent enough delivery time (2-3 weeks) given they're often made to order and sent from the U.S., good quality castings and designs. The main reason that I was drawn to them however, was the range of quality designs that don't take over the model. Some scenic base companies make some really great looking bases, but they are so big the detail goes well over the base and often makes the model too tall.

I ordered some of their 'Desecrated Lands' bases for the Chaos Dark Vengeance Miniatures I've bought and these arrived during the week. They're suitably chaos-y, looking like the floor of some sort of Dark Temple. Fortunately the skulls fit the theme of a Khorne army. I've decided to go with these for my Tale of Gamers army, and have put in a second order to the building for the majority of my list.

Progress

Anyway, as I write this, despite my best in planning well ahead of time things have not started as smoothly as I'd hoped for this month:

1) It is currently pi$$ing it down with rain outside. I was hoping to get a number of models spray undercoated today ready for some painting on Monday and Tuesday evening this week;

2) The afforementioned wait for Kharn; and

3) On a more minor note, there was a couple of pieces missing from a set of cultists I'd purchased from eBay. Fortunately, the vendor has been really good about this and I should have a replacements by the middle of the week.

Anyways, I'm looking to make weekly updates, so keep your eyes peeled for next weekend's installment!

Matt



Monday, October 15, 2012

A tale of OG Gamers Blog 1: A Tale of OG Gamers



A week or two ago, I noticed a thread started on the OG Forum. It was looking for interest in a ‘Tale of Gamers’. Whilst I had promised myself not to spend much more on plastic crack over the next year or so, I’ve been longing to go to town on an army with a lot of customisation and personalisation potential, some great background and lovely models. Doing this at stages of 250pts a month would be one way of doing this. I’m also managed to con myself that if I start an army now I don’t have to go nuts when the new Dangles arrive, as I’ll be focussing on another project.

Once I’d justified taking part, the first obvious thing to do was to decide which army I was going to build. To help me decide, I came up with the following five criteria to inform my choice:

A new army to me. I cannot have this army or played it before as I want to do something different. This rules out Dark Angels, Daemons and ‘Nids. I also decided to leave other loyalist marines chapters alone, as they are pretty similar to the Dangles. Whilst I toyed with the idea of Necrons, (I have always have regretted selling my army) and love some of the stuff in the new Necron codex, I thought I’d go for something I’ve not gone anywhere near before.

Background I love. The 40k Universe has such an awesome background, but there are some races/codices that don’t appeal. I’m not sold on the Grey Knights background (plus lots of terminators is too close to my Deathwing). After thinking about this, I decided I wanted to do something Evil (with a capital ‘E’); although given how fascist and fanatical the Imperium is, it really is a matter of perspective.

A wide range of custom bits and conversion opportunities.  One day I’d love to build a Sisters army, but given the limited support for the range currently, now probably isn't the best time. Similarly, if I was to do Eldar it’d have to be an Iyanden army – but I don’t want to make an army with the majority of models being citadel miscast.

No new rumoured codex on the horizon. I don’t want to spend a lot of time and effort building an army which will need big changes within a few months of completion. As the meta changes over time I’m happy to add the odd unit here or there, but a new codex is highly likely to mean vast changes to the army I’m putting together. Whilst there are certain aspects of the Tau that grab me (Battlesuits are cool, as are Fire Warriors), a codex is rumoured to be within the year – maybe they’re an army for the future.

Not too large a model count. Most of my wargaming space has been taken up, and time to get my 250pts built and painted each month is going to be tight, particularly with the customisation work I’d like to do. For these reasons, I’m put off from building an Imperial Guard army.

This left me with three options which broadly fitted my initial criteria – Chaos Marines, Dark Eldar and Orks. I then compared the pros and cons of each race against five additional criteria:

Criteria
Chaos Marines
Dark Eldar
Orks
Do I already own the codex?
Yes
Yes
No
Do I have any models to get me started?
Those from the Dark Vengeance set
5 Wracks and 10 Warriors
No
Customisation Opportunity?
High
Medium
Very High
Ally with armies I already own?
Daemons
 Daemons
 All except Nids
Storage Space Required
Low-mid (depends on list)
Mid-High (lots of transports necessary)
High – huge mobs!

On the balance of these factors, I’ve concluded that Chaos would be the best army for me to go with. They’ve got a new Codex (which I must add, is beautiful), a wide range of custom/conversion/Forgeworld pieces and they’ve got the ability to ally with my Daemons (which can get the models used in bigger battles sooner) without too much of a leap of imagination (Blood Angels and Necrons, really!?). I always have the option of chucking in some Orks later on, should I feel that way inclined. I also already have some models to start me off given I recently bought the new Dark Vengeance set for the Dangles and the mini-rulebook.

Chaos Marines are also an incredibly diverse army list; given that there will be a number of other players (who may also feel the lure of Chaos) – hopefully this can mean less likelihood of me running a similar list to another person taking part, despite them being so popular with a new book and all.

Inevitably, solving one problem can lead to another. Chaos marines are a very diverse list, and which flavour of chaos to go for is my next decision to make…
 

Saturday, October 13, 2012

I'm alive!!! (and upcoming plans)



The last six months

As with many gamers, real life can get in the way of our hobby. In the last few years, spring and summer are peak times for me at work and I can find myself travelling all over the country, working late into the evening (and weekends). Sadly, this leaves next to no time for hobbying.

Getting back into the swing of things this year also took longer than it usually does. A combination of being hooked on the Olympics/Paralympics, catching up with family and friends and a big project at work kept me busy until September.


I'm aware that I've not posted since the beginning of April. Initially, this blog was intended for the 'Battle of Varlislia' 40k campaign is was running at the Charing Cross Club earlier in the year. If I'm honest,  I was overly optimistic about what I could achieve with it and it died off towards the end. Building a narrative that encompasses so many factions was simply too ambitious and too much work for me.

New things in my hobby

There have been some big movements in my wargaming world recently.

As with the rest of the 40k community, I'm getting to grips with 6th ed. So far, I've played 4 games with my Dark Angels, all against different opponents and armies (CSM, Eldar, Necrons and Woofers). I must admit I'm very impressed (although I'm not sure how much that says; I can be a bit of a fanboy). The scale, breadth and depth of it is absolutely huge! Hopefully this will bring a more varied game, that holds players interest for longer.

I'm hoping this seriously dampens any notion of a global 'meta', something that has becoming increasingly strong over the last few years with the internet and tournament scene. The problem is that a few list dominate. Hopefully the range of options available will mean that one style of play or list doesn't dominate. Variety is the spice of life, and part of what sets 40k apart to me are the directions in which you can take your own hobby and 6th ed really boosts this.  At this stage (I know its early days) I can't see this happening with 6th ed. With the introduction of psychic powers, allies, FW units etc. When 5th ed came out in 2008, I thought it was a big improvement on 4th ed, although towards the end it began to get a little stale. GW seem to have finally found a way of peddling more plastic crack to boost their bottom line, whilst giving the gamer a lot more freedom with their hobby. Its more intelligent than 'buy this new overpowered codex' and should serve all parties.

I have also started attending the OG Games Club in Wandsworth on a Thursday evening. Some of the guys I used to game with when I was a student in York attend (I'm looking at you, Sami Michael). whilst others know some of the guys I know from York from campaign and tournament weekends. Im really looking forward to an OG North v OG South ashes style event currently being planned for the end of November! It'll be great to get everyone together, have a few beers, throw some dice, push some toy soliders around and generally have a good time!

Going forward

Anyways, I've rambled on enough about the last six months. The main reason I wanted to post this blog is to let people know that I'm looking to start posting again. I've signed myself up for a 'Tale of Gamers' campaign down the OG Club. This will involve building and painting a 1750pt 40k army over a period of seven months. Each month has a deadline of building and painting 250pts towards this force, with gaming events at certain points. Taking part will be a good way of getting to better know some of the people down the club, make sure I have a fully painted army (giving myself deadlines) and it should be a lot of fun. For the last couple of years, I've wanted to go to town on an army that's properly painted, includes lots of customisations etc. This campaign presents a great opportunity to do this. I'm angling towards Chaos Marines my army; either Khorne or Nurgle in flavour.


Resurrecting the blog will help me monitor my progress over the next seven months. I'd love comments and feedback, as I'd love to make this the best army I possibly can. It hopefully will also enable me to also keep in touch with one or two gamers I've lost contact with.

So please, keep an eye on this blog. I'll be looking to tidy things up and plan to post regularly...

Enjoy!

Matt