Khador Drakhun - WIP

The Drakhun fills an interesting role in the Khador army. Khador, typically known for being big and slow, is actually very fast. Using the right caster, you can slingshot this guy straight into its target. Strakhov with his feat and Vlad with his stat boosting are two quick ones. I've been working on my color scheme for the regulars in the army. This guy needs to stand out but still show he can throw down. So red on him with some damage. He's currently in progress so it'll change a bit from this state. The main colors I think are about done.

Flash with a little bit of light

Keep it red and dirty

High-ho giant horse! Away!

Profile with direct lighting

I'm looking forward to finishing this guy, possibly this weekend. I still need to track down a Shocktrooper for the dismount, but I can always use my Kovnik in the meantime.

Gift horses, gifted to myself

My buying habits are a little crazy right now with the holiday season, but I think I'll be good with my recent purchases to keep me busy through a few months. After my game last night, I picked up a set of Khador Uhlans and Kovnik Markov. Plus, waiting for me at home were the Man-of-War Drakhun and the Widowmakers I ordered online. I have a serious back log of painting to do now.

Last Thursday was my usual Warmachine night, but I hadn't played in a few weeks. I met up with a buddy of mine, Caleb, at the FLGS. We actually played a two-versus-two match with some other guys at the shop. Everyone dragged 25 points out. My partner was another Khador player. Instead of intermixing our armies, it was pretty much one-on-one until someone died to support the other. So Caleb was my opponent with this more-or-less:

pDenegra
-Ripjaw (2)
-Slayer
-Spell Cast-astic guy attached
Mechani-Thralls (10)
Pistol Wraith
Machine Wraith
Nerco-surgeon

To match, brought this:

eVlad
-Kodiak
Iron Fang Pikemen (6)
Great Bears of Gallowswood
Greylord unit (3)
Koldun Lord
Demo-corp (3)

The plan was to use Transference, Hand of Fate, and eVlad's feat to just smash face. Here's what actually happened: first turn just got my line to jump forward; Caleb tried to Cripple my Pikemen through an arc node but was short by an inch, so I tried to charge it with the whole unit and almost one-shot it a CMA combined with Hand of Fate, which resulted in a very damaged light jack early.

Here's where things got nuts quickly. He moved the damaged jack just enough to free up one of the Pikemen who had a decent looking line to the caster. So, popped feat, got 5 guys all jacked up and tried to take out the witch. Pikemen slides in, gets within melee range, but his buddy gets a free-strike for breaking combat and with one die gets killed by the light jack. Super-Pikeman nails her, uses Transference to boost the melee damage, and causes 11 points of damage. This is turn 3 or 4, by the way. I used one of the other feat boosts on a Greylord - charge in, with battle wizard, kills four Mechani-Thralls with the melee/spray combo. A few other guys smack around some Mechani-Thralls, and my Koldun Lord takes out a Pistol Wraith. Little did I know, this made his Necro-surgeon the scariest model on the field.

My noble Pikeman gets crushed by a Slayer. Deneghra pops her feat (everyone gets sickly). Thralls come back and my Kodiak gets possessed by a Wraith. Koldun Lord gets eaten by a light jack but he took out the Pistol Wraith in the previous turn. So my scary turn gets turned on me completely and I end up behind the ball. Everyone being sickly means no charges or double attacks with the Great Bears. My Kodiak couldn't shake the Wraith, so in an act of pride, the Great Bears attack it from behind to kill the Wraith inside. No one dances with my girl but me, so that guy had to go. I knock out both its arms leaving legs intact. The Wraith pops out, then the cortex gets damaged, so the Kodiak is now a blocker. Until it gets smashed to pieces by combo-strikes the next turn.

Major threat now becomes the Slayer who finds his way to Vlad. Knocks Vlad down to 5 boxes with two attacks. Vlad hulks-out and destroys a healthy Slayer by himself using Martial Paragon and additional attacks. Here's where I lost the game. After the attacks destroyed the jack, I didn't move him far enough away. Next turn, Deneghra spells him with a boosted hit, beats his armor and does 6 damage.

Insane game and I'm really starting to learn the combos that work. eVlad might have to be my caster for a while now. I was incredibly impressed with the way he can do almost anything. The only weak point of the list was the Kodiak. I'm not sure if its because I used him incorrectly or if Caleb managed to control him out of being a threat, but its probably going to get phased out. I might throw in a Destroyer for the AoE or replace another unit for range other than the Greylords.

On a side note, I started writing this Friday and thought I had posted it. In the time between, I've managed to assemble the Drakhun, three Uhlans, Kovnik Markov, a unit of Windowmakers on resin bases, and an Assault Kommando Flame Thrower. So I've been busy.

I also managed to paint-up the Drakhun watching Monday Night Football. Photos coming later. I got a game set for tonight, so I'll try to take pictures and get a battle rep up too.

Hobby update and the big man

I finally took the big leap into nerdhood. Past the miniatures and painting, past the bad sci-fi movies and Monty Python jokes, but not quite past the ren-fest and costumes.

I played Dungeons and Dragons.

This was a big step. I'm glad that I'm out of college and what-not so it wouldn't become an on going event, but Tuesdays are now the gaming nights in my group. It all started with one of our friends who had always wanted to play but never had a "safe" group of guys to sit down and give it a shot. My friends knew all about my Warhmmer and Warmachine experience and just figured I knew all about D&D 4th edition. My knowledge extended only to that there were miniatures and d20's. So in order to get the full experience, my friend dove us head-first into the game.

To be honest, its actually pretty fun. We all grab a few beers and our character sheets, I'm painting everyone's characters, and if we need goblins or other strange creatures, I probably have it in Warhammer models. I'll admit: I always judged D&D as the pinnacle of nerdhood. The ultimate form of the modern nerd. But I am happily alright with the game. I think it all has to do with who you play with. Your group can either make it a huge deal with earth shattering consequence, or just another fun board game with an infinite level of potential. I have yet to buy my own d20, but my roommate has promised to sneak one into my stuff and  release an Ogre-style "NERD" during a party.

So that has taken up a good chunk of my hobby time. Work, as always, gets the better of me when I have to drive home in the dark. My airbrushing has gotten a lot better and I picked up the Forgeworld Masterclass book. Fantastic book, highly recommend it to anyone who wants to step their game up. Ironically, I've been practicing it on my Warmachine stuff. I had a Berserker just laying around. I figured that if it can blow-up if you use it too much, they'd probably recycle the pieces or not use the best parts to make it. I went for a weathered and rusty  look. The plan is to source-light the furnace and other elements to make it look like its going to pop at any moment.

big axes, tiny feet

Heavy boiler on the big man

Don't look it in the eye! Its a challenging gesture!

With red being a strong Khador color, I'm debating on the plan to update the other jacks, but I will say my Kodiak is getting camo and some damage added. Until then, roll high and stay warm.

Primed to prime

Priming is one of those subtle arts that our hobby is connected to whether we like it or not. Personally, I always found priming annoying because Virginia is a swamp. A months ago, I found a great article on Massive Voodoo about a different priming method than most people use.

Snow priming involves black primer, white primer, and good weather. First step, prepare models:

Jr. and Nemo (click for larger)

Here we have Nemo and a Journeyman Warcaster from Warmachine. Get 'em ready, get 'em in a box. Start with a traditional prime of straight black.

Your models are black!

Sorry for the focus issue, but you get the idea: the models are now black.

Now here comes the tricky bit. Take your white primer, hold it far away from the model, just enough to dust it. If its humid out, hold it closer otherwise it'll dry before it hits the model. The ideal angle is 45 degrees above. You only want to spray it from the top angles. The result should look like this:

Snow prime for the guide coat

What this gives you is a model that has a built in shadow and highlight. By keeping the spray only on the topside of the model, the white areas are where light would hit in normal lighting conditions. I've been using this trick for a while now and its very effective in setting up your light/dark relationships. If you wanted to be really clever, when you paint the first coat, water it down a lot and you can keep the set highlight you have here. Not always the best but very quick. Here's a close up on Jr.:

No flash used for this one so you can see a little better with one light source

I haven't tried this trick with any other colors than black and white. There are a lot of different companies that make great colored primer. No reason why something like this wouldn't work with other colors. I am tempted to try it in reverse and have a model "lit" from below instead of above. If you got any neat priming tricks, let me know. Getting a good prime coat down really helps the model out as a whole.

P.S. Here's a link to the Massive Voodoo article where I learned initially about this.
 http://massivevoodoo.blogspot.com/2009/11/tutorial-kongs-priming-thoughts.html

The Un-Dead Post

Definitely not dead. Just busy with life, work, and the rest. I've been going through a small crisis with Fantasy and been trying to find my way through it. Doing so, I've come to a few conclusions:

1) It seems like the magic system has finally been totally dominated by Life Magic. Every time option comes up, Life is the immediate answer. Its become a crutch for players that like the instant gratification play-style. Throne goes up, 6 dice go down for Dwellers, main combat unit removed. Playing with my wood elves, I've been experimenting with Beasts. Beasts is an incredibly rewarding set, even without the top spell. Its most basic spell can turn any losing battle into a fair match. Even the old lores are good. My recent acquisition of some Vampire Counts is going to see some Fire/Vampire/Death combos flying around the board. 

2) The fun is still there, so long as the Internet sits out. The Internet is a fantastic resource for information, tactics, opinions, and character builds. My issue is when that becomes the sole resource for list building. Its a shame when you see two lizardmen players using the exact same build for their Slanns with the same gear on their Skink Priests. They just seem to be running through the numbers during play, following their guides to win without knowing what to do if the field changes. The games I've found the most rewarding are the ones where I've had to adapt a whole new strategy because my plans fell through. 

3) Purpose leads to performance. There are some awesome units in the army books that almost never get played because they are difficult to use. My opinion on this is that they're being used incorrectly. These forgotten units and heroes can add a lot of variety to the army and create interesting situations. Seeing 4 units of 10 skinks doesn't look interesting, but throw in terradon riders and a razordon unit, spice of life people. Play the units you want to play, learn where they're strong, and they will perform. Warhawk riders: I'm looking at you.

I think a lot of the problems I've had with 8th edition stem from stagnation. The group I play with are not fans of adjustments or trying new tactics without reading them on the Internet first. I decided to take a slight break from Warhammer, not playing as many games, but picked up something new to revive my love for the hobby. 

I picked up Warmachine a long time ago, but got a bad taste in my mouth after playing a game with someone who had a reputation as a power gamer. It was probably my fourth game ever, still learning the rules but my opponent agreed to play me. Needless to say, I lost. Badly. It wasn't just the loss, it was the attitude the guy had. As a new player to the group and the system, you always end up eating teeth to learn. Being a tool doesn't help new players at all. Disheartened, I put the models up on the shelf. So when I hit a slump with 8th, I looked more into some elements of Warmachine and re-read the rule book. Slowly but surely I'm figuring it out. Each game I get a little closer to the caster-kill. 

By no means am I quitting on GW games. Just taking a slight break from them to stay fresh. If you've been having some hard times with 8th, it always helps to take a breather. Focused in on some painting projects, like my new Vargwulf. Maybe I'll post up some of the Warmachine stuff I've been painting. Until then, kick back a bit and watch the leaves turn colors.