EXT: Ruined Tower

I loathe painting scenery. It's my thrifty Scottish blood - 8 square inches of plastic woodwork seems to absorb two thirds of a pot of paint. Before I know it, there's no brown left and all my spears get orange handles shaded with black ink.

However, needs must when the devil drives and your stock of models is low. If I'm going to be remote hosting battles on my kitchen floor (Mrs K is delighted that I've taken a renewed interest in mopping it), I need something more than British Survey Map standard icons drawn on paper.

This might do.

You probably spotted this Dreadstone Blight in the last battle report. It's been lurking in the back of my cupboards for some time, half-assembled and undercoated. I undercoated it Astronomicon Grey, which is exactly the same colour as GW sprues. If ever paint felt wasted going on, that was it.

Unbeaten: Chaos Warriors vs Wood Elves

It's All-Skype Fight Night!

Prebattle

After a bit of hashing out how we'd do this, General Stylus and I came to the conclusion the easiest solution was to have the physical battle at one end of the line and the other general acting as Rulebooks Monitor on the other. The general with the table would do all the movement, allowing a bit of leeway for their opponent not being able to measure as precisely as they usually would. And the other guy would check all the rules as needed. Dice throwing taken on honour, with the option of holding a camera up to particularly lucky strikes. 

I chose to set the table up, partly because I'd actually been reduced to painting scenery lately (I hate it, it's very resource heavy, dull and messy) and at least had some to show off for a change. 

What I didn't have was 

• A table
• Any scatter or artillery dice
• Templates

Easily fixed! I wasn't raised by Blue Peter for nothing. Twenty minutes of frantic PVAing, cereal box mutilation and dice defacing yielded this. 

Warhammer Island of Blood, eat your heart out

We also decided on a joint battle report! I shall be writing in standard type, Stylus is in bold type this time. 

Hell yes. Bold and beautiful.

Forces

It was with a sinking heart I started working out how to beat Wood Elves with my Warriors of Chaos army. Superlight MSU archers? Hard-hitting fast cavalry? Why the hell didn't I buy more warhounds and horsemen?

Ah well. After three drafts, including one where I had four screening units of unarmed marauders to act as ablative armour and one with a pair of low-level disc riding sorcerors, I decided on something that would at least rest heavy on my opponent's brow. 

The bulk of my painted forces are heavy infantry. Slow but deadly, and vulnerable to enemy archers. But what if I had a magic phase that could help even the odds a little?

The Bull's Eyes

Bilious Bull, Chaos Sorceror Lord of Nurgle – Lore of Nurgle, lvl 3, Chaos Familiar, Poisonous Slime - 285

Gangrenous George, Exalted Hero BsB - Banner of Swiftness, Ruby Ring of Ruin - 175

1 Chariot - 110

15 Nurgle Marauders - G.weapon, light armour, full command - 210

10 Chaos Warriors - shields, full command,  – 180

Mutalith Vortex Beast – 240

1200

Two bound spells (the ever popular Ruby Ring and the Mutalith's Aura of Mutation) plus four of Nurgle's spells - surely something any low-toughness army would blench at. And I could probably boss the magic phase as well. Heh heh heh.

The Twang! Gang

Glade Captain - Elven Steed, Shield, Asrai Spear. Hail of Doom Arrow.
Spellsinger - Lv 2 Shadows, Elven Steed. Dispel Scroll. Seed of Rebirth.
10 x Glade Guard - Musician, Hagbane Tips
10 x Glade Guard - Musician, Starfire Arrows
5 x Wild Riders - Shields, Full Command
5 x Wild Riders - Shields, Full Command
10 x Waywatchers
1 x Great Eagle

1200

The Great Bear is the mounted general (plus one), the unicorn is an elven steed and the Rohirrim are Wild Riders.
Even my proxies have proxies.

I accept this Liebster Award on behalf of...

... well, mostly Kraken and myself to be honest. Although the WoffBoot is nothing if not a collaboration, and I like to think that East's sporadic painting updates, Leofa's ingenious conversions and Kasfunatu's epic poems have played their part in our triumph.

The most humble day of my life...

Wait - what the hell is a Liebster?

From what I can discern, a Liebster Award is a pay-it-forward way for blogs to signpost other, lesser-known, blogs that are worthy.

Quite simply, if you are nominated, you slap this badge on your site (with a link back to the nominator), then answer eleven set questions and nominate eleven of your favourite blogs to do the same

And if you break the chain, then so help me, something terrible will happen ... no, I don't think it works like that. It's just a nice thing to have. With no cash alternative.

Wood Elves vs Empire: Crazy Horses

On a sojourn to Leofa Towers, we decided to play a 1,600pt OffBoot. Unlike Kraken's recent experience, there were no fluffy-chinned beardlings here, just a combined age of 70+, a thin grasp of the rules and improvised scenery.

Leofa patched together (literally, in some cases) a themed Empire army, while I blew the dust off my 4th ed. Wood Elf models to try out the 8th ed. rules.

"Don't shoot until you see the whites of their eyes..."
"General! The eyes haven't been painted yet!"
"IT'S A TRAP!"

The Poison Ivy League

• Glade Captain (Great Weapon, Hail of Doom Arrow)
• Spellweaver (Lv4 Lore of Shadow, Talisman of Preservation, Dispel Scroll)
• Waystalker (Bow of Loren)
• 10 x Glade Guard (Trueflight Arrows)
• 10 x Glade Guard (Hagbane Tips)
• 10 x Dryads
• 5 x Wardancers (Champion, Musician)
• 10 x Deepwood Scouts (Hagbane Tips)
• 3 x Treekin (Champion)
• 10 x Waywatchers (Hagbane Tips)
• 1 x Great Eagle

- 1,600pts

My army selection was pretty straightforward: this was everything I had painted (or else I don't think the much-maligned forest spirits would have made it in).

The plan was to emphasise magic and shooting, and use the combat troops (such as they were) to slow or redirect the bad guys. I gave every archery unit poisoned shots (with the exception of one unit of Glade Guard, who got arrows that ignore penalties - I was already nostalgic for the old rules), plus the Hail of Doom on my general and Bow of Loren so the Waystalker could do some character sniping.

The Lore of Shadows is meant to have some good synergies with Wood Elves, as well as being appropriately fluffy. Unfortunately I rolled Enfeebling Foe, Penumbral Pendulum, Steed of Shadows (swapped for Melkoth’s Mystifying Miasma) and a free pick. Which meant I had failed to roll the best three spells in the lore - I decided to go with The Withering, hoping a lowered toughness would compliment my S3 shooting (but that meant forgoing Pit of Shades and - disappointingly - Okkam’s Mindrazor.)

The Steel Hooves of Sigmar

• Grand Master (Sword of Striking, Spellshield, Luckstone)
• Captain of the Empire, BSB (Barded Warhorse, Steel Standard)
• Battle Wizard (Lv2 Lore of Beasts, Dispel Scroll, Ruby Ring of Ruin)
• 8 x Inner Circle Knights (Full Command, Standard of Discipline)
• 5 x Knights (Full Command)
• 3 x Demigryph Knights (Full Command, War Banner)
• 5 x Outriders
• 5 x Pistoliers
• Steam Tank

- 1,600pts

General Leofa went for an all-cavalry army, with the Steam Tank adding some mechanised support. With only six units on the table, most of them expensive, he would be relying on those 1+ armour saves to get him into combat.

His wizard rolled Flock of Doom (swapped out for Wyssan's Wildform) and Savage Beast of Horros. I may have been tempted to keep Flock of Doom, as Wood Elf archers are one of the few units who would be troubled by its paltry S2 hits, but the wizard already had a ranged attack with the Ruby Ring, so went for the augments instead. The fact that all his army was on horses meant that he would get a +1 to cast for everything.

Four Whorsemen

I suppose, grudgingly, that Slaanesh ought to have some kind of representation in my army. I've got marks for the other three. It goes against the grain, though. Tzeentch 'til I die, yo.

I said I had the parts, so here they are. As ever, you can play 'spot the Giant parts' throughout. You could consider my whole army a long and drawn-out Giant conversion, actually.

A unit of four, giving me a set of actual chaos ogres rather than relying on the goodwill of my opponent to let me field a minotaur, a troll and two ogres in Empire gear as such. The other chariot horsehead got a sprue pole covered in marauder flail heads and a big shield made from a Mierce base with a warshrine icon stuck on. That's as near to a banner as this lot are going to get.

Grislywygs

The eagle-eyed amongst you might have spotted the Nurgle-marked marauders in my last post.

Obviously, the most important thing for my army right now is more marauders. Chancing upon a rogue pocket of 25mm bases tucked in the bottom of my Space Hulk stuff (and I have no idea why I'd put them there either), it was clear to me that this was a message to build more.

The gospel according to Photobombed!

Warriors of Chaos vs Skaven: Ugly Pug

Time to take the training wheels off these Chaos Warriors, I think.

I've been collecting and painting them for a year and a half, and they've never played a single match. This feels frustrating, to say the least.

Thanks to the UK's interminable processing time for any bureaucracy, I wouldn't have been able to get to this year's 'Boot, I was waiting on a new passport. But the original reasons I couldn't make it (money and being in a sitcom) turned out not to be valid come the actual week. I got an unexpectedly large tax return, and the director postponed the filming for three weeks five days before it was due to start.

I'm not a patient man, sadly. I just couldn't wait any longer to unleash a tide of darkness upon the realm of mortals. So I entered into a pact with an entity whose very name is redolant with horror and corruption of the weak, and did something very few reasonable or sane men would contemplate.

I went into the local GW on their late opening night.


General Kraken - The Unbloodied

2000 points of WoC

Chaos Lord - Helm of Discord, additional hand weapon
Sorceror Lord - Lvl 3 Lore of Shadow, barded chaos steed
Sorceror - Lvl 1 Lore of Fire, Scroll of Shielding
15 Chaos Warriors - shields, full command, War Banner
25 Marauders - Mark of Khorne, light armour, flails, full command
25 Marauders - Mark of Tzeentch, light armour, shields, full command
15 Marauders - Mark of Nurgle, light armour, great weapons, full command
1 Chariot
1 Chaos Warshrine

"You can't field that," the store chap says. "It's too many points for the hobby night. Half it, there's a table free soon. These guys are nearly finished."

So before I've even started, I take a truckload of hits with no saves allowed.

General Kraken (revised) - The Unexpectedly Bloodied

1000 points of WoC

Exalted Hero - Additional hand weapon, Helm of Discord
Sorceror - Lvl 1 Lore of Shadow, Barded Chaos Steed
10 Chaos Warriors - shields, full command, Gleaming Pennant
15 Marauders - Mark of Khorne, flails, light armour, full command
15 Marauders - Mark of Tzeentch, shields, full command
Chariot

VS

General Ratbeard - Ratmass

1000 points of Skaven

Warlord - Warpstone armour, not sure what else
Engineer - Dispel scroll
Engineer - Lvl 2, Condenser
30 Clanrats, banner
30 Clanrats, banner
20 Stormvermin with halberds, full command
Poison Wind Mortar
Warp Lightning Cannon

Slackjaw

The rumours are true - a new edition of 40K is coming.

That's not why my jaw is slack, it's about as surprising as facing a Nurgle daemon horde at a Woffboot these days. My jaw is slack at hearing key designer Jervis (on the GW homesite newspage today) refer to a new system of 'unbound armies', where you can take whatever you want within points limits.

Whatever you want.

I guess sales must be dipping again; I can only dream in twitching spasms about the horror this could unleash on 9th ed Warhammer, which will presumably be swung on us by year's end. But talk of all-special-character armies or massed ranks of nothing but Land Raiders does do the job - it makes me remember the original Rogue Trader, where you could design your own vehicles by points cost.

It's good and bad, open to terrible flights of potent rule maxing as well as creative fluff heaven. And yours is to say which of those is good and bad, of course. But it certainly does the job. I suddenly have a sparkle of interest in 40K again...

They Be Back

Space Marines are like twiglets, for me. I don't particularly like them, but I've had one, I can't stop myself.

It's a long time since this lot have

• Seen a lick of paint
• Got away with this size of base
• Been used in a game of anything