In the Nick of Taum

I promised myself I'd get these done by the end of the month. Mere hours away from failure, I managed a slightly high-pressure evening of fine detail work.

Nothing like staring down the barrel of a gun to get you working faster

Here, then, is a pair of Broadside suits.

The first suit is in the standard pose, the one you get by following the instructions.

Phalanx For The Memories

Eagle-eyes readers of our last battle report may have noticed a discrepancy in my army list: the big block of Spearmen that bravely withstood the Chaos hordes (mostly by getting killed in a slow fashion) was numbered at 40, whereas I only had 30 Spearmen in my collection.

I know they were all proxied in Sweden, but it still matters.

Fear not - your sleepless nights are over. I was, in fact, able to field a unit of 40 Spears, thanks to a timely acquisition and a bit of quick brushwork.

They only had three colours on them at the time of the battle.
(but that's still tournament-legal, right?)

Bridge over Muddy Waters: Warriors of Chaos vs Empire

It's All-Skype Fight Night!

Yes, we're back after the summer break. I, Kraken, will be in the Normal Corner with my erstwhile opponent Stylus the Bold.

Bold as brass, brazen as bronze and good as gold. After 18 months on the sidelines, the Dogs of Empire are back in business!

Forces

Time to experiment with mobility, I decided.

Blowing a huge chunk of points on a pair of disk-riding sorcerors felt hugely liberating. I've been skimping on character points in general, not going for the superhuman ubertooled warhunks that WoCs do so well. Partly because I've been stung endlessly by such temptations before and partly because I've had to save points up to try out the various specials I've got but still have a reasonably sized army.

Having done that, I thought I might as well finish the blowout with a second helping of sorceror - a Nurgle Lord, for the cataclysmic plague spells he'd bring. In an ideal world, Curse of the Leper followed by Rancid Visitations and then some random Tzeentchian zapping would surely bring anything to its knees. And then I could cut the remaining knees up with some good old fashioned melee troopers.

Just to really ram home the magical juice, the Mutalith Vortex Beast to really sit on any squashed toughness troops.

And a chariot. Because chariots. With a couple of decent-sized combat units, I was feeling small but evilly formed.

The Ooze Brothers

Eirik Crapton - 4th Level Sorceror Lord of Nurgle, Crown of Command, Feedback Scroll
Jarek Eblue - 1st Level Sorceror of Tzeentch on Disc, Charmed Shield
Helwood Eblue - 1st Level Sorceror of Tzeentch on Disc, Sword of Striking, Talisman of Protection
Chaos Chariot
20 Marauders of Nurgle, full command, marks, shields and light armour
15 Warriors of Tzeentch, full command, marks, shields, Blasted Standard
Mutalith Vortex Beast

We're so glad to see so many of you lovely people here tonight

My success with Empire hasn't been great, mostly because I have lots of basic infantry and what little cavalry I own, I can't use properly. I decided to emphasise the infantry, rely on combat buffs from the Light Wizard and the Warrior Priest Paymaster and ended up with something not dissimilar to a gunline.


The Long Tall Salient

John Lee Hacker - General of the Empire, Full Plate Armour. Ogre Blade. Enchanted Shield. Luckstone
B.S.B King - Battle Standard Bearer, Shield. Full Plate Armour
Sunnie Holiday - Light Wizard, Lv 2, Dispel Scroll. Scroll of Shielding
Johnny Cashback - Warrior Priest, Shield. Heavy Armour. Obsidian Trinket
Ray 'Gun' Charles - Witch Hunter, Brace of Pistols. Ruby Ring of Ruin. Potion of Speed
40 x Spearmen, Spear, Light Armour. Command Group
       10 x Halberdiers, (detachment)
5 x Knights, Lances, Shields, Full Plate Armour. Barded Warhorse. Musician
16 x Greatswords, Great Weapon, Full Plate Armour. Command Group.  Standard of Discipline.
       8 x Crossbowmen, (detachment)
5 x Pistoliers, Brace of Pistols, Light Armour. Musician
1 x Great Cannon
1 x Great Cannon

I also painted up a new miniature for the occasion: my shady-looking Witch Hunter. As he's only 50pts, and new models invariably underperform, I gave him the Ruby Ring, so he'd have a chance of making an impact.

Other magic items were mainly to boost my feeble characters' survivability, or for some magical defence.

(Keen-eyed readers may spot that my Light Wizard had illegally brought two arcane items. Rest assured, this mistake was efficiently dealt with).

"We'll put the band back together, do a few gigs, we get some bread. Bang! Five thousand bucks."

Even the background is proxied. Strawberry Fields Forever. 

Which Hunter? This One!

According the my Great Big Painting Plan, I have long-since finished my Dogs of War/Empire army and should be moving on to complete the others.

But I'm enjoying the hiatus that has followed the Savage Orc project, and have now dusted off a number of old miniatures that don't belong to any plan. I just happen to feel like painting them.

Also, the special occasion of this evening's SkypeBoot with Kraken was excuse enough to add another model to my mercenary army (I bet he'll disappoint - newly-painted miniatures invariably do).

"Stand and deliver your witches!"

Battle Masters - The Epic Game of Fantasy Battles

Now, we're all aware about HeroQuest - the attempt to boardgameify (yes, it's a word) the RPG experience - but was did anyone else know about this MB Games/Games Workshop collaboration to do the same for Warhammer Fantasy Battle?

Whilst browsing through some US comics from the early 1990s (it's important to stay well-read), I came across this three page advert:

Are the orc, the ogre and the knight actually playing the game?
That's a tough demographic to market to.