Thunder Wolf WIP

Here is a work in progress shot of my thunderwolf sculpt..

This is the first mini I've sculpted completely from scratch. I intend to cast them once I'm done.

I want mine to have more armor and less bionics, hence the big "boxing glove" over the foot. It will have blades attached to it in a similar style to claws.

Still to do:
Finish the head.
Finish the saddle
Put fur to the tail.
Add straps all over.
Big mane of fur on his back, I was waiting untill the saddle and head was finished for this.

Sorry for the crappy pics, they were taken with my cell phone.



Oh yeah, and hes a biggun.. About as tall as a blood crusher, but wider.

Wild west shoot out

That was a long weekend.. I didn't take pictures for battle reports, and didn't think to write down anyones name/army lists for a write up. But I'll do a brief re-cap.

I ended up using the new Space Wolf codex, and didn't finalize my list untill the night before. I should have gone with my original instinct on the list, but ended up switching it at the last minute (something I do often, and this time it somewhat screwed me).

My list was:
Logan Grimnar

x4 Wolf Guard terminators
wolf claws
drop pod

x4 wolf guard terminators
power fists, assault cannon
drop pod
x1 wolf guard
power fist (attaches to the "fighty" grey hunter pack)

x9 Grey hunters
melta gun, mark of the wolfen, power weapon, wolf standard
drop pod

x10 Grey Hunters
x2 melta guns
drop pod

x10 grey hunters
x2 melta guns
drop pod

Lone wolf
terminator armor, thunder hammer, storm shield

x6 long fangs
5 missile launchers

x6 long fangs
5 missile launchers

GAME ONE:
I went against a guy named Zack (Zach?) from california. He had a Chaos nurgle army he made the week before for the event. 2 Princes, but no lash which was a nice change. The mission was kill points, where everything was worth 2 but dedicated transports were worth one.

My initial drops went well, I screwed up deployment of my long fangs and wasn't able to see much after I blew up his rhinos. The first few turns saw me crippling his mobility and getting punched in the face. I whittle most of his squads down and target anything thats an "easy kill". Logan arrives turn 5 and mops up reduced sized units.

Victory to me. I believe it was 16kp to 10.

GAME TWO:

Crashed piolet. A central objective you had to carry off the board.

My opponent was playing space wolves as well. Name was Charlie I think? He was a nice guy, but probably one of the slowest players I've encountered in a tournament. He had to proxy several things (which I can understand since the codex recently changed). Often forgetting to do little things, I would allow him to do so anyway..

I manage to chop his army in half with drop pods and use of a large building in the middle of the table, I opt to deploy my terminators in order to carry the objective and have my grey hunters drop. Back and forth killing for the first 3 or 4 turns, as I near the table edge he throws everything he can into stopping me or slowing me down. Noteworthy charge of 25 blood claws against logan's squads, I use his howl and have preferred enemy. I lose logan to the blood claws, but my wolf guard wipe out the smaller squad and make the larger one break, nearly walking them off the table.

This scenario was difficult to pull a win from, nearly everyone at the tournament tied this round. All my opponent had left on the table was a heavily damaged crusader.
I tied however. But wracked up a ton of victory points.

So now I'm one win, one tie.

GAME THREE:
The scenario was old school, table quarters worth victory points and night fight for 3 turns.

Went against nid-zilla. In all honesty, he was a nice guy.. I was a bit impatient after my shitty game the previous round, so the bad is on me for that one. After being slow played and the guy doing nothing more than trying to get a draw in game two, I was irritated and acted like a bit of a prick. I was also very tired by this point in my defence.. Anyway

nid-zilla with a more balanced twist than usual. Only one tyrant and 3 carnifex, but he did have a broodlord and a good amount of genestealers.

I dropped defensive with the terminators and fighty grey hunter pack. I begin grinding through his line for the first few turns, but miss a key charge with logan due to the horror and 3 bugs with psychic scream. Had I known about it, I'd have made logan fearless to auto-pass the leadership check in order to charge. This cost me nearly two squads over the next two turns.

a close, close game. I had a hand-full of models left by the end, and he had one stealer squad that just finished putting the boots to my long fangs in my own table quarter. I win, but barely.

2 wins, 1 tie. and with that, we break for the night to return for the "secret scenario".

GAME FOUR:
Shoot out. Now, I know sometimes its cute to throw out a weird scenario as a tournament organizer to hear people groan.. But this one was a bit much, I feel had it not been "secret" people would have raised hell over it. Personally, when I first saw it I was kind of pissed and felt a bit cheated that I paid $80 to come play a scenario like this. The scenario was victory points, 16" deployment zones and NO TERRAIN. None, nothing. Not a thing.

Not only this, but I was playing Ryan Shepard's vastroyans which had been punching faces for the first 3 rounds.

To give an idea of what I was up against:
2 company commands in chimeras
4 meltas each

battle psykers in chimera

3 veteran squads in chimeras, 3 plasma each
3 hydras
2 manticores
2 bane wolves

Oh fuck me. Twice. I get to wake up and play against this in the round with zero big, hidey, "I'm a fkn coward" pieces of terrain to cower behind? Lucky for me he didn't include a Inquisitor and Mystics in his list, or I'd have been entirely 100% bent over.

My only hope is a good drop. First turn see's ryan hammering my long fangs. I get very lucky and one unit doesn't run off the board. His banewolfs turbo boost over, ready to spray flaming poop all over my marines, or whatever the hell those tanks actually shoot. The majority of his firing is at my long fang units, I get lucky and survive a lot of it.

My first turn drop is extremely lucky. My pods land exactly where I want them. All 3 grey hunter squads. I drop aggressively on top of him, not giving his firing line much room to wiggle away. My strategy is if I can survive the initial drop, I'll overwhelm him with power armor, krak grenades and foul language. I take pot-shots at a few transports with melta guns and blow most of what I shoot at. I stun one banewolf and prepare to bend over for the other.

Turn two, ryan shifts around a little.. Mostly just to start putting in the boots to my poor marines. Since when does Logan Grimnar, Lord of the Space wolves, High king of Fenris, victor of the first Armageddon war, grizzled old bad ass, think its wise to attack a mechanized guard army out in the complete open? His command should be up for review by the other wolf lords, he is obviously senile and losing his damn mind. Ryan sprays poo all over one long fang squad, reducing them to a single model.
His manticores nearly make one squad of grey hunters their new bitch with something like 20+ wounds inflicted. I get lucky and save most of them. His battle psykers end up doing a perils of the warp on themselves for the second time. Pot shots see my lone-wolf die. My turn two logan and the other terminator squad both arrive. That never happens for me.

So in Ryans defence, I got lucky this turn. It was pivotal.. Sooooo lucky. Lucky like I have never been. Now, when dice hose me (as they often do) it pisses me off. I hate it when a clear win get ruined by dice. He takes this turn right on the chin, smiling. If I were him, I'd be kicking children and throwing minis by this point. A true good sport, and had there been a vote for "best sport" Ryan would have got mine without a doubt.

So turn two, I blast some more tanks. My long fangs kill both banewolfs. Noteworthy shot is that one pack was only one long fang. My grey hunters swarm through the pods in a attempt to overwhelm his line. I try to do mix charges where possible in order to hit a squad as well as tanks to keep me locked in combat with both. But I throw a little too much into his infantry and wipe them where I hit them. My terminators manage to pop the battle psykers chimera.

Turn three onward I manage to pull out the win steadily grinding through his tanks and infantry a few at a time.

Win to the wolves when they shouldnt have got it. I'd gladly play Ryan again any time. He is a solid player and very cool person. The first time in a long time I have genuinely enjoyed a tournament game, win or lose and it was all due to his character.

So now I'm 3 wins, one tie and in the fighting for a spot in top 3.

ROUND FIVE:
5 objectives. Central objective is worth 2.

I go up against a nurgle based force (again) but with 2 lash princes this time (ugh).
So in game 4 the dice did piles of awesome and I stole a win, right? Well in this game, my dice decided it was time to fuck me again. In all the time I'd been using drop pods, this was probably the worst drop I'd ever seen. Every pod managed to scatter almost a full foot away from the other pods, leaving all my squads isolated and waiting to be picked off by the two lash prince tranny tag-team.

However, even with horrible dice I manage to give nearly as good as I get. My opponent's name was Doug and another very cool player. He came from california as well. The game ends on turn 7 with doug holding two objectives and with me holding one. I just couldnt quite get the rolls I needed to squeeze out a tie. Well played to him, but I think the game would have been very different had my initial drop gone well. I usually just castle up a bit at first and reinforce it with later reserves. With all my shit scattering as far away from itself as it could, I was hosed from the start.

So I finish with 3 wins, 1 tie, 1 loss. Doug and I were fighting for second.. It looked like he made off with a good mountain of stuff.

My friend Cody took third with my old Salamander army. So congrats to him.

All in all, a good tournament, I'm considering throwing my dice in the trash... I think the wonky scenarios were okay. Round 4 was a crock of shit though, and downed piolet really sucked.

I think to make round 3 work better would just be:
A: if a player gets it off the board edge, auto-win. game over
B: if a player ends the game holding the objective, its a win.

As it was, it didnt matter if you held the objective.. Or tabled the other guy. It was a tie.

Thanks to everyone for coming out from all over the country. Thanks to Romeo and Battlefoam for sponsoring the event, and thanks to Empire games and Kyle Kinghorn for hosting it, judging and never getting to have any fun punching faces themselves.

I look forward to the next one.

Empire 750pts tournament

Playing in the Empire games 750 tournament this weekend.. my list is looking like:

Kantor
x10 tactical
x5 sternguard w/ 2 plasma cannons
x5 sternguard w/ 2 lascannons
thunderfire cannon

I dont normally use kantor, but feel he should be a bit of a pain at the low point level. the Sternguard add both scoring units to the army, and some punch. Functioning like mini-devastator squads that can still kick an ass or three in close combat. Thunderfires are just piles of broken at 1500pts for 100 each, I cant imagine how retarded they are at half that points.

I considered dropping the lascannons for missile launchers which would allow one squad to get a power weapon.. But I think I'll stick with the lascannons for now. Picture update soon...

Nevermore

"In the darkness all men are equal, save those who embrace it."

So here we finally have the Ravenguard I've been promising. I themed the army around the 5th company (black) as I think the red or green rims stand out a bit much against the black armor. Plus with Captain Shrike being 3rd company, I wanted something a bit different.

Over the years I have found no matter how much work and effort I put into black, it all looks the same at 4' away. I can drybrush and wash it, or blend highlights till my nose bleeds.. And all the work is lost.

So with that being said, I went for a fast "table top" standard on these fellas. Drybrushing and some neat detailing was the order of the day. Since GW doesn't make a Ravenguard transfer, I had to hand paint the chapter badge. While not 100% exact, I feel its close enough to not be mistaken for who they are. I may do a tutorial if there is some demand.

Anyways, enough prattle. Onto the pictures:

First up is a simple black reach captain. I use him as a "counts as" Cato Sicarius. All I did was remove the bolter and some chest detail and add the plasma pistol. Backpack is from the pastic captain boxed set.





Next up is the Librarian Decimus. Yeah, I know.. Lousy joke.
Terminator armor/storm shield is a obvious choice. I will likely use use him with gate/vortex. Possibly subbing in vortex for null zone. Stock model with minor shield conversion work to make it fit.





Pair o' dreads. I did these fellas because 99% of the time when I use marines, I think Dreadnoughts tend to be a waste of points and effort. Which is a damn shame considering they are some of my favorite models ever. I always enjoy painting a couple and adding them to any marine army I'm working on. HOWEVER, since drop-pods beat so much ass, these fellas have found a home in my list. The multi-meltas and low points cost make for some handy turn 1 anti-tank. And usually tends to make people press their "oh shit" button.





Some wip scouts. I originally intended to use these with Captain Shrike to make for a nice 1-2 punch. Only conversion is the Sergeant, I added a power weapon for a simple weapon swap.







The assault marines were the first unit I painted for this army. I had the intention of infiltrating them with Shrike, but have moved onto Sicarius instead. They are a pretty cheap squad however, and may find their way into my lists at lower point games. White arms and helmets usually designates Captain, but I thought it looked really cool, so wanted more than 1 mini in my army with it. So the odd Vet Sgt. here and there will have it.





The mk6 corvus or "beakie" squad. In the old Ravenguard fluff, they supposedly have a boat load of mk6 armor available to them. To be honest, I really hate the helmet. I honestly avoid it whenever possible. But I felt it wasn't right to do the Ravens and not have at least a few guys with it.. So in my army this is the tactical squad I dont put in a pod. They baby sit my deployment zone and camp objectives. When Sicarius is in command, the squad has a lascannon, plasma gun and combi-plasma. The idea being if I need to give a squad tank-hunter.. Its going to be these lazy gits. The plasma cannon has since joined my Rhino Squad (not finished yet).





3 Tactical squads compliment the dread's for some hot drop pod action. Pretty basic, 2 with power weapons and one with a power fist. Drop, shoot bitches, dont die too fast is the usual objective. one is a standard tactical box, the other 2 squads come from the black reach set. Black reach sgt's have been converted to have power weapons













Sgt.Telion and his sniper's. I've had mixed sucess with this unit. Telion is godly, the snipers are meh. I went with brown camo-capes to somewhat match the desert basing. Telion's cape isn't finished yet. They dont often appear in my final list, but usually pop up in smaller point games where busting a cap in someone's sgt is oh-so-dick.





Pair o' Multi-meltas. These are usually swapped out for drop-pod tactical's missle launchers. I still need to paint one more. The melta gun and lascannon are also for swapping out in the above tacticals.





The handy dandy rhino. This is for the sicarius list.. My 5th tactical squad rides in it. It it armed with fist, flamer and plasma cannon. Ideal on the plasma cannnon being that its only 5 points. If I fire it, great. If not, the pos only cost me 5 points. This squad will typically recieve the Scout rule from sicarius if a turn 1 charge is possible or needed and I dont need tank hunter.




THINGS STILL TO DO:
x5 Vanguard veterans (almost done)
x10 more tactical marines (not built)
x2 Iron-clads (built but not painted)
x4 more drop pods (built and primed, one finished)
Finish shrike

Hope you all enjoyed. Sorry for the horrible pics, black is a moderate whore to photograph when you dont know wtf you are doing.

Recipes:
Black primer
paint black
heavy drybrush with 50/50 black and codex grey
light drybrush with codex grey

paint all metal bits chainmail.
Then wash all metal and black all at once with badab black
add details and voila, instant ghetto ravenguard

Add squad numbers