Gaming Board

Sorry for no recent updates. Recovery from the surgery is going well but I also dropped my camera two days ago, so I can't put up any new pics. All the marines are finished though and I'm working on the Rhino and the Dreadnought at the moment. I have also done some work on the magnetized HQ, pics will come when I get ahold of a new camera.

I had plannes to finish my gaming board properly before posting up pics, as well as making some more terrain. However seeing that I can't provide pics from my models I thought I just put up my own board (these photo's are from about a week back).



This is the board, 6 tiles measuring about 2 feet by 2 feet (60x60cm), so the total gaming area is 4feet by 6 (120x180). There still needs to be some minor work, the brown patches on the board still need to get some wood varnish (to represent muddy pools) and I think I want to make some fields with scorched grass.



Here a pic with the board filled with the current terrain I have. Not every piece of terrain is again 100% finished, I just made the already playable (or atleast painted and with grass, makes it more fun to play with). I'm planning to do some bigger terrain pieces in the feature so that real LOS can be avoided.





This is one of the first terrain pieces that I made and finished. 2 Woodenslates with some paste from the local hobby store to represent a little hill, together with paint and scenery material ended up with this. As you can see I use for almost every small terrain piece a CD, I have still dozens of them left, CD's that are old, broken or were demo's of some kind are good to use. They are thin, and most of the time the perfect size for a base.




This is one of the 3 rock formations that are fully completed. As you can see I added 2 colors of static grass, some bushes and some moss on the rocks. The other formations are just painted, sealed and there was added one color of grass, to let them look good on the terrain (but still need to be redone).



One of the CD-bases with trees. This was actually the very first terrain piece I made a very long time ago (even before I had this board and started with 40k). The trees are a bit wobbly, the reason for that is that I made some 'holders' on the base, so that I can remove the trees if necessary (gaming purposes or switching trees). However I didn't made a good system, and the result is that the trees aren't fitted that well on the base.
On the background of the photo from the CD-base with the rock formation, you can see my new system. I glued some straws on the base, taped the trees to make them thicker, and now they are fixed on the base very well (and still easily removed from the base). However this system is still WiP, as I'm planning to add some bushes on the bottom, so that the eye doesn't spot those straws anymore.


Well that's it for today, I hope my camera gets fixed soon, or that I can get ahold of another cam to update the blog. In the meanwhile I will work on the models and terrain, so the next update could be quiet huge ;)

Initiates /w tabard

So I have worked on these initiates some more. The tabards aren't finished yet, but as I am going to get a surgery I wanted to update the blog before I go. The light isn't perfect, as I didn't do my best for these photo's, sorry for that! When I paint new tabards I will put up a tutorial on how to paint them. Until next update!

1st Xenos battle! (through the eyes of a newbie)

So today I had my first battle against an army other than Chaos Marines. Since I started the Black Templars I have made a own board and terrain (will come up soon), played quite a few battles with my friend and learned the rules quite well. So after asking to borrow a Chaos Rhino and Predator, I was good to go to kick some Xenos scum!

I had absolutely no clue what to expect, after doing some research I was surprised to see that the Firewarriors had only BS3, I would have thought them to have atleast 4 or perhaps even 5. These are all such things one would find when not knowing allot of armies yet! Another thing was that I was expecting allot of casualties from shooting, and that it would be quite hard to kill them, even in CC!

So, the battle began, we rolled annihilation and had Pitched Battle. He fielded 2 Hammerheads, 1 squad of Pathfinders, 2 squads of Firewarriors, 1 Devilfish, a squad of 3 crisis suits and a crisis suit HQ. I had 3 Rhino's with different initiates and neophytes, an EC and another Castellan and a Predator (autcannon/LC sponsons).

I deployed everything at the 12" mark, I knew I had to get into CC asap. The predator was deployed somewhere back, in between buildings for the cover. I rushed all forward, failing to do anything on the Devilfish with the predator (he continued to shoot it until the Devilfish finally wrecked in turn 4!). One rhino got wrecked (Castellan+flamer squad), some initiates from that rhino killed due to Firewarrior guns, and one LC sponson got destroyed.
In turn 2 I rushed my Rhino with EC further to a building where the suits, 1 squad of firewarriors and the 2 Hammerheads were 'hiding' at. I dismounted to get melta shots on the Hammerhead, but did nothing. The Castellan squad ran towards the Pathfinders, not in range to assault yet. The 3rd Rhino drove towards the Devilfish.
Next, I lost all but the EC and Powerfist marine from Tau fire (lesson learned, don't dismount unless you can charge! Even if the hammerhead causes you fear! :P), Predator got stunned, and 1 or 2 marines in the Castellan squad died. Again I got lucky on the predator, either having the cover save help me or bad rolls from the opponent, the predator lived till the end!

Well this is where the massacre began. The EC killed the crisissuits with HQ, although the powerfist didn't survive it. The Castellan squad killed the pathfinders, and the other squad from the Rhino killed the Firewarrior squad that just disembarked from the devilfish (they shot the rhino but didn't do anything). Turn after the EC single handily killed the other group of Firewarriors, and after that he had only the Devilfish and 2 hammerhead remaining, one of which was immobilized (can't remember how).
The predator shot the devilfish down, and the EC wrecked the immobilized hammerhead in turn 5. This is where we decided we stopped, since the remaining hammerhead could do nothing anymore.


So, perhaps this post is somehow a bit chaotic, but I didn't write the turns down so no real battlereport can be done. The things I did learn however, is that Tau REALLY suck at CC, which I would not have guessed. A thing that comes in mind here, is that mostly all of the Chaos Marines units my friend is fielding are fearless, so there are no sweeping advances. And sweeping advances were just the thing that kills all the Tau! Since they don't have super high morale, can't kill anything in CC, they will almost be always caught.
Sure I know all you players know this, but this is one thing I really, really wouldn't have thought of! This day was full of lessons, and with allot of new insights on the game. I am already looking forward to all the next battles versus different races, to see how they react and learn even more!

I hate Black armor!

So, as I'm finally doing some painting on the marines, I thought I'd give you guys an update. Not much done yet, most of the highlighting on the armor is finished though. The pic with the 3 marines showing miss some final highlights. I tried to capture the highlighting on the armor, but I guess that's something to see better in the future (due to the lighting). Expect updates soon now, as I'm getting the hang of the 'batch' painting!
But I don't like painting it.. there is only highlighting, but you can't do too much or it will look too gray. Marines with other colors are more fun to paint I think, as you can do more things with the armor (real blending etc), ah well, there is still much left on the model to paint with that in mind!

Restyle and upcoming plans!

As you guys see I've redone the style on the blog, must say I like this template better!
Since my brother hasn't returned yet, I might aswell tell you guys what my plans are for the few weeks.
I contacted Col.Corbane for his new column on the FtW Blog regarding terrain and playing boards. Recently I have finished my board, including some scenery. I will finish the several scenery pieces and I'm planning to do some tutorials on several of them.
Next I'm planning to give some hobby tips. I have a few of my own, and I think this could help several other gamers, even if it is just one gamer that found it useful I'm happy!
And regarding the painting.. I have to finish a LotR model, doing it as a commission piece and this one has priority. Other then that I'm currently working on 7 marines and a Rhino.

Guess these are my plans for the next couple of weeks, if anyone wants some thing clarified just ask!