Cliffs, rocks and craters.

I recently finished my latest terrain project. In the past I had a set of desert cliffs (you can probably see them in previous posts). However my friend recently made some desert terrain of his own, and I figured there's no sense in us both having similar terrain sets. That, coupled with the fact I just felt like having a change, made me set about repainting and flocking my cliffs.

Valley set-up

Plateau set-up

The Mountain (kinda)!

Having pieces like this is great for creating different board layouts to spice things up a bit. Above are 3 different set-ups I thought of, but there's probably many more. And you can make the plateaus as large or small as you like. I'm tempted to make a fourth corner piece so I can place all four in the centre of the board as a standalone plateau. I did face many issues that kept this project in limbo for a long time, but I eventually took it back up and finished it. My only lasting gripe is the gapping between the pieces. It was my fault as I used old materials from a different project many years ago, so a lot of the polystyrene was damaged. I tried to rectify it with filler, but unfortunately it didn't work out as well as I'd hoped. But I just cover the gaps with the scatter pieces and might chuck some lichen or clump foliage around to mask it some more.

I also have a set of the old GW craters, before they discontinued them and replaced them with those awful new ones, which have also since vanished. These old ones were very nice, but have been sitting on my shelf half painted for my desert board for a good couple of years. So I decided to give them a new lease on life and repaint them and flock them up.

The battle mat is from PWork wargaming: http://www.pworkwargames.com/en/
I chose the Valley mat. I've not actually used it yet, but its a very high quality and comes highly recommended by many people. Only issue is its hard to get your terrain to match exactly, but that's fine, and a small price to pay for such a nice base to your board.
For tips on how to paint and flock your terrain, check out Luke's Aps or The Terrain Tutor on Youtube. They have many great videos for how to make high quality terrain for (usually) an affordable price, and they have helped me boatloads.

I have plans to add to this terrain. I'll probably make several trees - its been a long time since I've had trees in my terrain set (aside from those plastic GW ones). As this board was created with my new Eldar army in mind, I will also add one of those new webway gates (possibly 2), and try to make some of my own Eldar terrain at some point, but I won't make promises I can't keep :P.

Cheers, all.

The Big FAQ - Words for the Word God

So a few days ago the Big FAQ was released for 40k 8th edition. Anyone who read my previous post on 8th ed will know how I feel about it. But in a nutshell, its a bit of a mixed bag. I thought I'd do a follow up, as I feel it helps highlight some of the problems I have with 40k as it currently stands.  Below are some ideas I have in response pertaining to how I would change the current 40k rules as we go into 9th in the (probably not too distant) future to hopefully avoid such shenanigans.

"Psychic Focus"
I may be a bit of an old hat when it comes to 40k, but for me psykers have always been powerful units that can manifest any powers they purchase at army creation (or randomly generated before the game in more recent editions). So where did this limit on psychic powers come from?
Why can you only cast one of each type of power, with the exception of Smite, once per turn, regardless of how many psykers have that power? When did this become an issue? Has it always been like this and I never noticed because most armies only ever had 1 or 2 spsykers at most? Or has it only happened since armies like Grey Knights and (neo) Thousand Sons came into the picture?
Am I to believe they really spent so long balancing this game and each codex that they have to place arbitrary restrictions on abilities? Perhaps they should remove the ability for psykers to cast more than 1 power per turn, instead, and reserve that rule only for the most powerful of psykers. That would make more sense to me, and be quicker and easier to keep track of.
Also, remove Deny the Witch. Its a holdover from Age of Sigmar that didn't need to be ported across.

Targeting Characters
Of course this would be an issue. There are many factors to the whole character spiel in 8th edition. Why can characters no longer join units or take bodyguards? Why bother with needlessly complex targeting restrictions when it comes to characters? Just bring back the Independent Character rule and all these problems go away. It was something they attempted to 'fix' in 8th edition, something that didn't need fixing, and is now just plainly broken.
And while I'm on the topic, why were certain models in units stripped away and made into single character models? Why is a nob with a Waaagh banner now a character in his own right? Why aren't Dark Eldar beastmasters part of a unit with their beasts? Why did they split up Imperial Guard command squads into their own constituent characters? If they insist on doing this, then the return of the Independent Character rules will, once again fix this issue, as then you could just put all these 'characters' back into their units where they belong.

Tactical Reserves
Why is this an issue? Reserves didn't need to be fixed either. What was wrong with placing units in reserve if you are allowed to by the scenario, and then rolling for each unit from turn 2 onwards? The unit would then automatically appear on turn 4 if it failed to appear sooner. It made reserves more strategic, but the randomness balanced it nicely. Should I place a unit in reserve and keep it safe but risk having it not arrive until late in the game? This is what I meant in my previous review when I spoke about removing tactical/strategic choice.
Now its a no-brainer. Keeping units, especially deep striking units, in reserve is always the better option, not only because they are safe from enemy fire, but also because you can now place them anywhere at any time, including turn 1, AND you can also still charge when you do so. I could have told you that was broken before they even playtested it (if they even playtested it), and lo and behold they're having to FAQ it.
And this can be extended to the Deep Strike and Infiltator rules themselves. Each of these rules had their benefits and drawbacks that were logical and balanced (Deep Strike had a chance to scatter and couldn't assault on the turn they arrived, and Infiltrators risked being stuck far ahead of their allies, alone and unsupported). A canny and experienced player could work to alleviate these drawbacks and maximise the benefits, which is a skill that is no longer relevant.

Battle Brothers
This became an issue in 5th edition when they added the Alllies rules. I know why they did it - so players could make super huge Imperial armies with multiple Space Marine Chapters and massive Imperial Guard regiments backing them up, maybe supported by other Imperial Agents such as assassins. The fact that other armies also benefitted from this rule was likely just an oversight on their part, amended a little with the highly restrictive Allies table. But this brought with it a slew of problems.
Now, Death Stars became a thing. If you had Allies, ALL units could now benefit from any special rules you decided to sling about, if both parties were Battle Brothers. Naturally, this again favoured the Imperial armies, all of whom were Battle Brothers with each other, much more than the other factions (Chaos Marines couldn't even summon daemons properly for a long time). To say this broke the game would be an understatement.
So 8th edition tried to fix it with the Keyword and Detatchment rules. And that's fine and it works for the most part. But of course the WAAC players found a way to break this too, so they had to push out a fix for it.
But a better fix, imo, would be as follows: all units from a single Detatchment must all be from the same Codex book. Its effectively the new Battle Brothers rule from the Big FAQ but simplified and easier to grasp - no need to check each unit's specific keywords; if its from the same codex then it can be in the same detatchment. This would fix it. Its simple, makes sense, and due to the nature of Detatchments, it won't hurt players who want to use a more diverse yet fluffy army (i.e. Chaos Marines and Daemons). This was proven in the Dark Eldar codex, where taking multiple Detatchments is actually encouraged, and works very nicely.

A few other points
⦁ The Triumvirate of Ynnead thing was poorly handled in my opinion. It felt, for a time, like they were trying to unify all Eldar into one codex, and some part of me was worried that they would (with all the splitting up of Imperial factions to make even more Imperial factions, merging all the Eldar factions would have just been a kick in the gonads). A simple way to fix the Triumvirate would be to say that their rules affect all friendly units with the Aeldari keyword. Honestly, those paragraphs in the Big FAQ about this subject bored me with the list upon list of arbitrary restrictions in a pitiful attempt to balance this out. Hell, if push comes to shove, why not just make them a separate faction with their own codex? If they can string out and milk the Custodes into their own faction, I'm sure they can do it with the Ynnari.
⦁ You can now only use 1 'ignores Wounds' roll (such as Disgustingly Resilient, etc.) for each lost wound. Um, ok. I thought this was a given. You can only use 1 armour save or Invuln., so why would you be able to use more than 1 'ignores Wounds' roll? This was just bad rules writing, if you ask me. Sure, they could have missed it, despite their incredibly thorough and rigorous playtesting /endsarcasm.
⦁ This brings me to another point: the snowball effect of Mortal Wounds. Mortal Wounds were a mistake. They were a mistake in AoS, and they're a mistake in 40k. Here's how it goes - you have your basic Armour Save, which is generally good but susceptible to a weapon's AP. Then you have your Invulnerable, which is generally worse but is not susceptible to AP and can be taken against all wounds. But that wasn't good enough for GW. They had to ramp it up and add in Mortal Wounds which ignore ALL saves, both mundane and Invuln. But they still weren't done, as now things like Disgustingly Resilient can save against Mortal Wounds. This is the snowball effect. What next? What if they bring back Strength D weapons that now ignore abilities like Disgustingly Resilient? How do you fix this? Get rid of Mortal Wounds. They add nothing, NOTHING to the game. Next time, have it so players can take their Armour Save, then if that fails they take their Invuln., and after that they die. And things like Disgustingly Resilient could just confer a 6+ or 5+ Invuln. Much simpler and quicker.

Summary
Here are a few quick bullet points I'd like to see in 9th edition:
⦁ Remove Stratagems and Command Points
⦁ Remove Mortal Wounds
⦁ Bring back Independent Character rules
⦁ Bring back weapon templates
⦁ Streamline and polish vehicle damage rules
⦁ Streamline keywords and the detatchment rules
⦁ Bring back a lot of the risk vs reward - reverse the rules for various weapon types (heavy and rapid fire), Deep Strike, Reserves and so on

Conclusion
I mean, am I crazy? A lot of this stuff didn't need changed in 8th edition, and now that it was changed they're having to FAQ it to clarify and fix things. Its good that they're on top of fixing their broken systems/rules, but why are these things even issues to begin with? I dunno, guys, I see a lot of hype and praise for 8th edition, and while I certainly think it has potential, its certainly not the be-all-end-all that people make it out to be... yet.
I've got some more games scheduled against a friend next week. We're going to try 40k 8th edition again, this time with armies we've specifically built with the new rules in mind. We'll try some games with Stratagems (my biggest bugbear with 8th), and some without to see which we prefer. I'm going into it with an open mind; loads of people clearly see something that I don't when it comes to Stratagems. Unfortunately I've not found anyone willing to inform me as to why they rate them so highly. But there we have it.

As a final note I'd like to stress that I don't hate 8th edition. I think it has the potential to be great, but it needs some serious work. The core rules are functional, I'd even say 'good', albeit in need of some minor tweaks, but its all the pointless changes and rules bloat that I take issue with. I give it until 9th for them to iron out the creases. (I put this at the end as a sort of disclaimer, if you made it this far and comment accordingly then I know you took my post seriously - if you just rant and rave at me for hating 8th edition I'll know you didn't read this properly).

Craftworld Adraxia

I've wanted to build an Eldar army for quite some time now but never really got round to it. However, with this past Christmas my awesome family got me plenty of Eldar kits to be getting on with, the start of a nice little force of power level 50. I've dabbled with Eldar before - mostly my brother's old models he gave me many moons ago, which were very limited to say the least. But now with my very own collection under my belt I can truly call the army my own.
Firstly a bit of a word about the colour scheme. I came up with this scheme several years ago, back when there were only the 'main' Eldar Craftworlds in the official books/lore. I was really happy with the scheme and thought it looked awesome. But, a few years later Games Workshop reveal some 'lesser' Craftworlds, including Iybraesil, which just happened to use the exact same scheme, right down to the red spot colour. I was pretty livid of course, and at once point considered changing my own Craftworld to Iybraesil, but I decided against it and kept my own Craftworld name and fluff to keep things decidedly my own.

Lady Khalandra Soulstorm

Khalandra is a farseer. I've always wanted a female farseer, ever since Dawn of War, but GW have never released an official one (to my knowledge). The Yvraine model was perfect for this. Sure the base is larger than the average farseer, but I don't think it would make much difference in friendly games. She is the leader of Craftworld Adraxia, and its most powerful psyker (naturally). I initially wanted to remove her headdress but thought she looked a bit bare without it, so I kept it as her ghosthelm and painted it a gradient orange colour to make her stand out.

General Khaladesh Sunblade

Khalandra's slightly younger twin brother, Khaladesh is the general to her armies and leads the force from the front lines. Naturally its the Visarch model, which is pretty cool, but I wanted to swap the head out to make him look more unique and characterful. I also glued a shuriken weapon his forearm. He will use the rules for Asurmen in-game, as he is a right badass and seems to fit the character I have in mind.

The Bladestorm Concordance

When Craftworld Adraxia was fractured it was mandated that all who would fight for its future would tread the Path of the Warrior and devote themselves entirely to its safety. As a result, every individual in the army is a member of an Aspect Temple, the most common of which are of course Dire Avengers. I painted their helmet plumes the same way as Khalandra's ghosthelm.

The Watcher

Craftworld Adraxia is guarded by sentinel walkers who maintain vigil over areas of great importance. These pilots are highly skilled in battle, running circles around the foe and attacking vital points or ambushing outlying enemy units with a barrage of missiles.



Ancient Irithyll

With Adraxia's tumultuous past it was only natural that it turn to the dead for reinforcements. Because of this the Craftworld boasts a large number of ghost warriors. Irithyll was a powerful war hero of Adraxia, and military advisor to the former queen. Though he is now but a shadow of his former self (literally) he has no qualms in rising up in his wraithlord armour and fighting in the name of his Craftworld for all eternity.

Wraithguard
Long-dead Adraxian warriors have their spirits captured in spirit stones so that they may once again rise in wraithbone constructs. Not much to say about these guys, I'm sure you all know what Wraithguard are.







I'm certainly more respectful of people who paint Eldar. I wanted to do them for myself as they are probably the biggest departure from orks (my main army) in the whole 40k game. I really struggled painting all the gemstones, as you can probably see. To be honest, the photos always bring out the worst in my models, as the high definition allows me to see things I can't with the naked eye. For that reason I'm not too fussed about them being well-painted. They look fine from a tabletop perspective and that's good enough for me; nobody is going to meticulously look over them or rate them.
The thing I'm most proud of is the broken wraithbone on the bases. The wraithlord and warwalker bases come with ready sculpted wraithbone detail, and rather than wait and buy new, blank bases for them I instead decided it would be cool to do all the other bases the same way. So, I whipped out the green stuff and got on it. It wasn't too hard, just flatten a thin layer of green stuff over the base, cut it to shape and then score cracks into it. Its a simple effect but I think it looks really nice, unique and flavourful. I will be adding grass and other vegetation to it.


Finally, I'm the kind of person who forgets rules mid-game. And with Eldar there's a greater chance of that with all the psychic powers I'll be flinging around. So to hopefully counteract that, I made some psychic power tokens.

So now, when I cast a power on a unit I can just put a token next to it to hopefully remind me. Chances are I'll still forget, but this will reduce the chances of that. The Fortune token is a spare shield from a wraithblade. The Will of Asuryan effigy is from the Dire Avengers kit. The Doom skull I got from the Citadel Skulls box, and the Guide token just uses a spare shuriken catapult and two guardian helms.

This is probably the fastest I've ever painted an army. Normally, when I start a new force it follows a formula... I build everything, then start painting them: I basecoat them, then give them a wash of some kind, and then... I get bored and they sit on my desk/shelf for the next few years gathering dust. This time, I don't know how or why, I just kept chugging and got them all done! And now I have a fully painted, 50 power Eldar army, and I gotta say it actually feels pretty good. This is my second completed army (after my orks, of which I have tons). So now, after ~18 years in the hobby I can finally say I have a second army! Hooray! Now to get some games in with it...

40k 8th Edition - Words for the Word God

So a few weeks ago my oldest and most regular skumgrod came for a visit and we got in some games of the new edition of Warhammer 40,000. It was, shall we say, 'interesting' for various reasons, and I'll put my thoughts about it here in some sort of review. I know the majority of peole come to blogs for pictures and inspiration, but I thought I'd try something a little different and ramble about a subject I'm fond of. Also, as a bit of a head-up, I've never written a review before. I'll probably focus more on the negative side of things as I tend to find constructive criticism is more useful and interesting than just harping on about how good everything is. Don't take this as an overly negative post but rather a means to suggest things that may be improved upon if, by any chance, Games Workshop actually read this, unlikely as that may be. So, with the foreword out of the way, let's get on with it...

Following the belated success of Age of Sigmar, it was only natural that Games Workshop would make efforts to bring 40k more in-line with that ruleset. Whether this was a positive change is up for debate, but I don't think anyone can blame the games design team for trying to simplify and unify their different games systems. 40k and Fantasy have always had fairly similar rules; but the rift between them grew exponentially when Age of Sigmar was released. And to say the release of AoS was tumultuous would be an understatement. To put it bluntly, it was very ham-fisted on Games Workshop's part, and caused a great divide in the community. With the release of Warhammer 40,000 8th Edition, its clear they did not want a repeat of that whole backlash.

The result is a game that feels like its stuck in some sort of weird limbo. 8th Edition has clear inspiration from AoS, but is still trying to be its own game; a 'natural' evolution of 40k. Let's be real for a second, Fantasy was a fairly stereotypical/cliche high fantasy setting, and it was hard for Games Workshop to create their own niche in such a scenario. That is perhaps the reason they gutted the original Fantasy background and replaced it with something different in Age of Sigmar; the fact the rules changed so drastically was probably in response to other companies' simple and approachable rules syetems, and by that point Fantasy was far too complex for its own good. But they could not do the same for 40k. The grim darkness of the far future is a truly beloved franchise, and many of its facets, although heavily inspired by various pop culture sources, are iconic in their own right. They could not simply "Age-of-Sigmarify" 40k without suffering heavy, if not company-destroying, losses. So yes, 8th Edition is a natural evolution of 40k, though in many cases it feels a bit like a step backward.

One of the chief reasons I feel 8th Ed took a step backwards was in the 'additional' rules and all the bookkeeping that entails. I don't mean supplements. I mean the core rules that feel like they have been simply added to the system to make it feel complex, but instead just make it feel bloated and frustrating.
I think my biggest bugbear with this whole 'additional rules' thing is the Stratagems and Command Points system. Firstly, why was this system introduced? Well, in previous editions it was perfectly acceptable for players to take units and models from various different armies and codex books to create uber-powerful forces of destruction. This led to the whole "deathstar" unit debacle and generally made the game unenjoyable. 8th Ed introduced a system called "battleforged armies". If your army was built of entirely of models from a single codex, and pertained rigidly to one of the many detachment tables, your army was "battleforged" and gained additional Command Points. That's all well and good, but this system was added to persuade players to build codex armies and reward players who built armies entirely from 1 book. But surely that was the whole reason they added in the keyword system as well?
The keyword system ensures that certain abilities (such as special rules belonging to a character) only affect models from the same codex or with the same keywords. And it goes even further, right down the individual chapter, regiment, legion, craftworld, clan, etc. So what's the point in adding the battleforged system? Its redundant when the keyword system has all of their bases covered anyway (or at least it should if the writers are diligent enough). It feels like having a battleforged army just adds even more benefits to an army that already has the benefits of having the same keywords. It should have been one or the other, not both.

This brings me to the Stratagems themselves. In a nutshell, if your army is battleforged it gains a few bonus command points, which can be spent during the game to use stratagems. Stratagems are special rules that can greatly impact the game in various ways. They seem like an interesting idea in theory, but they just add more bloat to a game system that was apparently supposed to be a simplification of the rules.
I'll come back to this briefly, but to illustrate my point I'd like to mention faction abilities. These include chapter tactics, which give your army bonuses depending on the Space Marine chapter you have taken, legions tactics, which are the Chaos equivalent, and so on. These rules were missing in previous editions but have been brought back, and are a very welcome addition. They are another way you can choose to customize your force for both a strategic and fluffy addition to your army. Wasn't this enough?
Now, not only do we get faction abilities but we also get Stratagems, codex-specific Stratagems, and now also faction-specific Stratagems and unit-specific Stratagems. Its just layers upon layers of extra rules and things to remember. Whatever happened to just making units good and synergistic in their own right? It feels like they are simply adding additional trump cards into each army to cover the fact each unit isn't that interesting anymore, even though that isn't the case. I'm sure the rule came from a good place, but its just clunky and wholly unnecessary.

Another few tidbits I feel have removed from the experience is the lack of tactical choice. What do I mean by this? By "tactical choice", I mean those little moments in games where you have to make a decision that could change the future of the game in some small, but ultimately meaningful way. For example, your devastator squad only has a few of its lascannons in-range to fire at an enemy tank. Do you move the lascannons that aren't in range closer but forego their shooting for a turn? Or do you shoot at something else that is in range with all of your lascannons to maximize efficiency? Or do you still fire at the tank with reduced efficiency in the hopes of bringing it down? Or do you break from your entrenched position to move closer but lose the cover bonus? These are no longer tactical choices as you can overcome any of these situations.
Now, you can move and fire heavy weapons (albeit with -1 to hit) so that is no longer an issue. Or you can split your fire between enemy targets, so that is no longer an issue. Say an enemy unit are also baring down on you and will charge next turn. Do you forego shooting entirely to charge that enemy unit and rob them of their momentum? This, again, is no longer an issue as you can freely charge after firing heavy weapons now.
This is what I mean by removing tactical choice. Another example is cover: do I run through cover for a bonus armour save but risk not moving as far, or do I stick to open terrain and cover ground more quickly but risk being shot to pieces? Do I move my transport through cover and risk immobilising it? This is no longer an issue as cover doesn't slow movement anymore, so there really is no choice: free cover always wins.
I understand why they changed this - its lowers the skill ceiling and makes the game more approachable. Or does it? They tried to unify and condense the rules to a point where everything works on a very similar level to reduce the rules you are required to remember, but that is moot because you still need to remember that heavy weapons fire with -1 to hit if you move, so the rules are still there, they are just different. There are still things you need to remember, they've just removed the tactical choice. Its a reduction of the skill ceiling without streamlining the rules at all. Now there's no need to think ahead.
The removal of templates is another example. Not only did this drain the fun and flavour from a lot of the weapons in 40k, but it also removed tactical choice. Do I place this large blast on a vehicle - it'd most likely scatter but if it did land on target it would mess that tank up. Or do I place it in the middle of all this infantry so even if it does scatter it'll most likely hit something? Now, even blast weapons are basic point-and-shoot weapons with nothing to set them apart. I'm sure we've all been in a situation where we accidentally put our flamer at the back of our unit when disembarking from a transport. Before, we were punished for our mistake by being unable to place it's template to maximize its carnage (if we could place it at all), but now its no problem; it fires just like any other gun.

In general, I feel like 40k 8th Edition doesn't know what it wants to be. It feels like its arms don't know what its legs are doing. Does it was to simplify the rules? Then why bloat it with unecessary and flavourless extra rules that should be built into the units they are used for? Does it want to be more complex? Then why remove a lot of the flavour of the weapons and make tanks operate the same as infantry in an effort to 'streamline' the rules?
8th Ed is a transitionary phase. Nothing more. They clearly were inspired heavily by AoS to drastically simplify the rulesset and lower the skill ceiling, but were trying to avoid the same level of backlash AoS recieved for being so gung-ho about it. The result is a strange mishmash of ideas and concepts that seems to contradict one another. On a base level, the rules are fine and they work, but they feel like a first draft. It feels like they were toying with a lot of these ideas, but instead of refining them they simply wrote all the core concepts down in a word document so they wouldn't forget it and published that instead of a true rulebook. There is no nuance, and the flavour has been sapped from the rules in ways I don't think benefit the game in any meaningful way. The rules have potential, but so far 8th Ed has squandered that potential.
Still, on the plus side at least 9th Edition will learn from these mistakes...

So there you have it. My thoughts on 8th Edition and where I feel like it could improve. If you made it this far (and read it all) thanks, and please leave feedback in the comments. Did you agree with me? Did you not agree? Is the review in general any good? Should I do more reviews or not bother? That kinda thing.
I already have an idea for another article; one that has bugged me even more than these core rules gripes, and that is the shitshow that is the new codex format. If they change nothing else in 9th, they should change the format of each army list back to what it once was, but I'll cover that at another time.
Cheers, guys.

Flash Gitz and Sneeky Gitz

Kommandos
Kommandos are a cool concept in theory, but in practice they were little more than overpriced ork boyz that could deploy in range of enemy guns. They often cost something insane like 15pts per model, but at the end of the day they were fairly weak 6+ save models. But with the coming of 8th edition and the introduction of 'open play' and the power levels system, I feel like kommandos are finally worth taking. At only power 6 for 10 (with no added cost for the much-needed burnas and nob) they're actually a viable choice.

I had a bunch I converted a while back, and decided they were finally worth my time to paint them. I went for purely dark colours. Having bright orange decorating these supposed sneeky gitz wouldn't make much sense, even to the orks, so their clothes are predominantly black with a bit of brown thrown in for variety. I really like my converted nob. I almost gave him the obligatory power klaw, but thought he looked much cooler without it. For some games I may even use him as Snikrot if I have a spare 4 points, but for now he's my Kommando nob.

Flash Gitz
Another unit that are cool in theory, but pants in practice, are the flash gitz. In previous iterations they were little more than over-priced nobz with subpar guns. Now with the nice buff to their snazzguns they actually seem like a half-decent choice. Plus, they are different for me. I've never used them before, always preferring to opt for the more choppy and (much) more killy nobz mob, so using the flash gitz will be a breath of fresh air.

I converted the 4 'lesser' gitz a few years ago to start off a Bad Moon army, but that never came about. So instead, I converted them a boss nob (needed as the mob was illegal with only 4 models) and painted them in my usual Big Teef orange scheme.
For the boss nob I wanted him to stand out a bit, so rather than give him another big snazzgun I gave him 2 'kustom supa-sluggas', his own invention. In game terms they function exactly the same as snazzguns, though.

Reinforcements of Lachesis - Age of Sigmar: Path to Glory

So a couple of months ago, our Age of Sigmar: Path to Glory campaign started. This was my first 'true' foray into Age of Sigmar with a proper army made specifically for the game. Path to Glory is a great way start a new force, and its really fun to see how your army evolves over time. We started out with two games, which was a nice amount to kick things off. I got a good feel of how my army works (just charge forward and hit stuff!). Because these games took place in such a short space of time, we wouldn't have time to paint up any extra units after our first game and before our second, so we instead chose to upgrade one of our units.

In all, my army can be pretty tough. The knights proved hard to shift for the most part, but I generally found my own damage output to be lacking, especially against the undead who can restore lost models to their units each turn! This means I have to hit a single unit hard and fast, wipe it out completely, and then move on to the next. I tried this in the second game, but its easier said than done. However, I did manage to scrape minor victories in both games, but unfortunately I rolled a 1 for my Glory Points for BOTH games, so despite my wins I still have the same amount of points as my opponent. Chaos can indeed be fickle!

Chosen
After our second game, we would have a few months to get some reinforcements in. I took a roll on the same, basic table and got a unit of 5 Chosen. Chosen seemed pretty beastly at first, but soon after I found out they're just Chaos Warriors with an extra attack each (and maybe slightly stronger weapons). A little disappointing, but we'll see how they go.

I opted to take the command unit, as this gives me access to a banner and a wardrum, which are both welcome additions. Honestly, there's no reason not to take them!

Arcane Ettin
Outside of Path to Glory, I wanted to expand the army with something a little different. I've always wanted a Warhammer Giant. The kit looked ace, and oozes with character. But they never really fitted in with my Lizardmen or Dryad armies. But now I decided to take one for the hell of it.

You'll notice I converted it a little. I gave it 3 arms and 2 heads just to make it look a bit more Chaotic. The creature is almost overflowing with arcane energy, which has coalesced in his extremities and around his eyes. I initially painted the dark, mottled and corrupted skin on his face to make his glowing eyes stand out a bit more, but I liked the effect so I added it to his arms and feet, too (and a rogue patch on his back).

His blue skin ties him in with the marauders, but the turquoise loincloth ties him to the knights as well, bringing everything together. This guy won't feature in my Path to Glory campaign (unless I get a lucky roll on the monster table), but I will use him in other games instead, just for a laugh.

The Children of Sekhmet

I've always been fascinated by the lizardmen in Warhammer Fantasy. They were perhaps one of the most outlandish and unique armies in the game. Plus Dinosaurs... I mean frickin' Dinosaurs! My first forays into Warhammer Fantasy (after many years of pure 40k) was with the denizens of Lustria, but it never really went anywhere. I got a bunch of saurus warriors, but little else. However with the dawn of the Age of Sigmar, my interest for them has been rekindled, albeit in a slightly different way. The lizardmen have always had an Aztec feel to them, but for this army I wanted to go down a slightly different route, and create a more desert-themed force. I'll be honest, my main motivation for this was speed and ease of painting. Its so much quicker to just drybrush all their scales instead of highlighting each one, and a scheme that suits well is that of dry bone-like scales. In addition, I've always enjoyed Egyptian history and mythology, so it was a natural fit to take the army in a more ancient Egyptian style direction. Even a lot of the iconography and patterns still work, it is a fantasy after all. I've seen other desert-themed Lizardmen armies online, so I knew it would work well. Its just a case of doing it. So I've made a start.

I couldn't help myself but focus on the two main characters first. I've got a small force here, namely the Start Collecting! box, and a few other bits I'm working on, but I always gravitate towards the characters as they're usually more interesting.

High Sun Priest Baal'halet'anephthis

My Slann Mage Priest, or in this case, High Sun Priest. The Sun Priests are the devoted servants of Sekhmet, the Goddess of Life and the Sun. Or they were until she sacrificed herself to defeat Chaos and inadvertently turned the lush jungles of Namu into a sweltering desert wasteland, but that's neither here nor there!
Baal'halet is a High Priest of the Sun. Though he cannot control the Sun, the Sun Priests worship it for it is said to be the gift Sekhmet left them for its Holy Light keeps Chaos at bay. In fact, Baal spent 500 years gazing at the sun looking for signs or portents from his Goddess, the result of which is pretty plain to see. Though he was bandaged by his aides, being a toad who would thrive in Namu in the days it was a jungle, he literally couldn't take the heat and became a husk. His consciousness still remains, and he is a great prophet and a powerful spellcaster.

General Sobak'ishtak

Sun General Sobak is the highest ranking military commander of the Kamun Karpak, the City of Golden Light. He is ancient beyond reckoning, some say as old as Sekhmet Herself, and marched at her side against Chaos when she and all she had made were undone. To this day he swears to avenge his fallen Goddess, and it is his duty to protect the Sun Temples and muster against their enemies.

He carries two ancient relics of his people, a sunspear forged in the heat of a volcano, and a mighty Sunfire Gauntlets that is imbued with some of the divine essence of the Goddess of the Sun. The Carnosaur he rides is a mighty steed he tamed in the Bloodlands, and place of feral beasts that have adapted to the new, harsh climate.

These are the two main characters in the army so far. I think I had more fun writing the lore for this army than I've had writing lore for any of my armies/characters. There's a lot more besides, I've written small pieces about Kamun Karpak, the great City of the Golden Light where the main bulk of the army resides (though its not quite a beautiful and golden as perhaps it once was), as well as Osiri'Anuk, the Grand Temple at the city's heart. More on that later, and more army pics to come!

Also, when taking these piccies, I've spotted a lot of mistakes I've made or areas I've missed. These will be fixed. Cheers, guys.

Ruins of Carpathia

Shattered Temple

The piece I'm most proud of is the shattered temple. Several years ago GW released a piece of terrain similar to this, but something about it didn't sit right with me. Perhaps it was the giant skulls all over it, or the fact it was clearly a Chaos temple which I found a bit too limiting. Either way, it was recently removed from their store, so I figured I'd make my own. In the end it sorta went in its own direction. You can see in the WIP shots that I intended it to be a Chaos temple as well, but in the end I went for something more generic. The ruins around the edges sorta just happened. Initially the piece was going to be completely surrounded by rock, but while building it I figured that wouldn't make much sense. I wanted there to be a sort of ruined chapel around it, but that would have been a LOT of extra work if I'd made the chapel from scratch. Then I had a brainwave. I've had those old plastic ruins since waaay back in 3rd Edition 40k, sitting around in my boxes doing nothing. So I dusted them off and used them here. I had more ruins than would fit on the temple, so I used the rest to make some scatter terrain ruins as you can see below.

The Ruins

These are some fairly basic scatter pieces to block line of sight and movement, and so on. The pieces on the left of the picture are the rest of the 40k ruins. Initially, all of these plastic ruins had the walls at right angles. But here you'll notice I changed them slightly. I simply sawed one of the walls off each piece and shifted it around the pillar by 45 degrees. I much prefer them this way. One of the ruins has a tree on it. That tree had its base cut off as it was going to be used as part of terrain piece I made years ago, but it never got finished, so I added it here.

The pieces on the right came from another set of ruins GW produced years ago. They were made of a sort of hard foam, mounted on a base and sprayed grey. They looked VERY production line, so I hacked them off the base, rebased them and repainted them. They've had a very previous iterations. First they were part of a jungle board I worked on, but when that went by the wayside they've sorta sat on my shelf doing nothing, so it was time to fix them up.

The Hills

What set of gaming terrain would be complete without some hills? These I made a few months ago as an experiment to see what I could make out of what I had to hand. It was the middle of the night, and suddenly I had the sur to make some terrain; something new, and this is really what started me on the road to making an entirely new board's worth of terrain. As you can see in the temple pictures above, I made the rock faces out of polystyrene. I'm sure many avid terrain-makers dry-heaved when they saw that in my WIP shots, but honestly I like the result. Most of the styrene isn't even visible in the finished pieces because I only use it as a sort of skeleton for the cliffs to give them their shape, and covered them with exterior filler. Its very easy and cheap to achieve, and the beauty of it is I didn't need to order anything new. When I order something, it usually arrives a few days later when my enthusiasm has waned, but by just using what I already had I was able to keep the momentum going. 

Another piece of advice I'd give to someone making things like this: don't over-plan things. Sometimes you spend ages planning something and by the time you start the actual project your gusto has gone, or maybe things don't work out as you had planned and that can be very disappointing. That's half the reason it took me so long to finish my current desert cliffs (they're still not all finished, though). With these new hills, I just sat at my table and cut up the polystyrene into cool-looking shapes. No measuring, no planning, just cutting and gluing down, using cocktail stick to pin the pieces together. I used models to check out the rough size each piece would be compared to the miniatures, but that's about all the planning I did. 

Followers of Lachesis

My Tzeentch warband is fully mustered and almost fully painted, but I thought I'd share my progress so far for anyone interested. I've been in full hobby swing the past 2-3 weeks in preparation for our Age of Sigmar: Path to Glory campaign. As well as my warband, I've been working on a whole bunch of new terrain for our games, just to break away from the monotony of fighting on my desert boards all the time. But for now, the warband:

Lachesis the Beholder

My army's General, though he uses the Gaunt Summoner model and rules, actually has a different background. I won't go into it too much here, but in life he was a great scholar and explorer, uncovering Chaotic artifacts to keep the world safe from their thrall, but naturally his line of work slowly corrupted him. As the End Times happened, he vanished without a trace, only to materialize some years later, now more daemon than man, bearing the name Lachesis.

Honestly, this is probably the best model I've painted for a very long time. I'm not the best painter in the world, and I often find it a chore to paint my models, but I spent a good several hours on this guy, and even tried my hand at wet blending which I'd never done before, and I'm quite pleased with the result.


Chaos Marauders

The Marauders are human barbarians bent to the will of Lachesis, and imbued with his magical energy. They are just basic marauders in the rules, but I really dislike the GW models so instead I used some Bloodreavers. I just removed the khornate imagery, like I did for my barbarian Lord in the last update, and painted them blue!

There's a lot of naff stuff on these guys, particularly the standard bearer's shield on the right, as my brushes are old and I found a lot of the detail hard going (harder than normal, I mean), but I will endeavour to clean them up at a later date.

Chaos Knights

My 2 units of knights. Like the marauders, they too have been imbued with powerful magic. Nobody has seen the Knights of Lachesis without their armour, which has led to much speculation as to whether they are even men at all, anymore.

Again, there's a few naff spots on these models, and a few areas unpainted at all yet, but they are very much paint-in-progress, so they should improve a little. But they are pretty much done at this point (aside from the base rims).

Next up I have 2 units of 2 Chaos spawn to add. I have 1 unit already complete from my Word Bearers army. I have the models for the second unit, largely painted, but I've not taken piccies of them yet. That will come soonish, I hope.

I'm actually quite looking forward to our campaign. I've done a lot of poring over the warscrolls for each of our units, and things seem pretty even, so it should prove interesting.

PATH TO GLORY - Age of Sigmar

Before we learned about the 40k Path to Glory rules, my friend and I wanted to start our Age of Sigmar collections by doing a small Path to Glory campaign and seen in the General's Handbook. Our 40k campaign took precedence as we already have enough models to make those warbands, and would take less effort and money.

However, in the future we plan on going ahead with our Age of Sigmar campaign. Our warbands have been rolled for, and now all we have to do is get the models and paint them up.

My opponent always wanted a Vampire Counts army in Warhammer Fantasy but never got around to it. Now is his chance to scratch his necromantic itch and start a Death warband. His warband comprises a Wight King, 3 units of skeletons, 2 units of Grave Guard, and a unit of Black Knights. He wanted one of his skeleton units to be archers as seen in the defunct Tomb Kings rules.

As for my army, I went for a Chaos army (this was before we decided to do a 40k Path to Glory campaign). I've always had a bit of a soft spot of Tzeentch. In my Word Bearer's daemonic allies force Tzeentch was my second choice of patron after Slaanesh. Now was my chance to do an entire Tzeentchian army. So I made my rolls, and got a unit of Marauders, 2 units of Chaos Knights, and 2 units of Spawn. My friend also allowed me to use the Gaunt Summoner as my army's general, simply because GW have yet to release a Chaos Sorcerer on Disc of Tzeentch that I like.

When the first issue of the new and much improved White Dwarf came out, they released it with a free Khorne Slaughterpriest model. Jumping at the opportunity for free stuff, I snapped up my copy and set about converting the Slaughterpriest for my own nefarious ends, taking off all the khornate imagery and adding greenstuff flames to his sword and enclosed fist. With this simple conversion, I had a future Chaos Lord for my Tzeentch warband. I used him as a sort of test model to try out the colour scheme I will use on my marauders (and the rest of my army).

In the end, I quite like the result. I wanted him to look like a barbarian, but fueled and strengthened by the magic of his Master. Also, as this was a single model, I spent a bit more time on him. I still find it hard to maintain my interest when painting, but I think I found an ok balance here.

PATH TO GLORY - 40k

Recently, my friend and I started on a 40k Path to Glory campaign. For those who don't know, Path to Glory is a small campaign system whereby each player chooses a small warband of models at the beginning and evolve the warband between games. Warbands are generally randomly chosen from a series of tables by rolling a D6. The campaign is Chaos-centric in the base rules, but I see no reason why people couldn't make random tables for their own armies. I was tempted to do orks for the campaign, but I play orks too much so I stuck with Chaos. My friend also stuck with his Death Guard army, only using models he has available in his collection. Myself, on the other hand, decided to dig out some of my old models and spruce them up a bit, effectively making a new army for the campaign.

I had a plethora of metal sonic weapons from way back in my Emperor's Children days, but as I moved away from Slaanesh and made a Word Bearer army, my stash of sonic weapons went into my bitz box... until now.

We selected our Lords using the normal Path to Glory rules, and randomly generated our warbands (give or take a few units so we could build things using models/parts we already have). You can see our starting warbands below.

 My opponent's army consisted of his Lord, armed with a Lightning Claw and the Murder Sword, and wearing terminator armour. He has a second Lord armed with a simple power sword.
For his troops, he has a squad of 10 Chaos Marines with the Mark of Nurgle, and a unit of 7 Plague Marines with free rhino.
For his final roll, he got a Chaos Spawn.

For my army, I chose a Lord with twin lightning claws. He also has an attack familiar, simply because I've had the dark eldar slave models for years and wanted to put one to some use. My second in command is a Sorcerer.
For my troops, I rolled for a unit of Chaos Space Marines, which I gave the Mark of Slaanesh, a unit of Noise Marines, and a unit of Raptors. However, I soon decided to swap the Raptors out for a second unit of Noise Marines.

A squad of havocs rounded out the force nicely. I converted them to look like Noise Marines themselves, just for flavour, but count as being armed with 2 missile launchers and 2 heavy bolters.

Opening Skirmish
We opened the campaign with a mission rolled for in the main rulebook. We rolled a Dawn of War deployment, with The Scouring objective. During the game, my Noise Marines held 2 of the objectives in my deployment zone, while the 10-man Death Guard unit held one in theirs. In the middle there was a large scrap between my Lord, my 10-man unit, the Plague Marines and both enemy Lords. Somehow the Slaaneshi marines held against this onslaught just long enough to win me the game. My sorcerer also got involved, but due to me not knowing his Force Staff was only AP4, his impact on the battle was lackluster at best. He did, however, manage to get off some powerful Psychic Shriek attacks.
For my victory this game, I got 2 glory points, while my opponent got the 1.

Game 2
When rolling between games to expand our warbands, we both rolled for a vehicle. I got a Maulerfiend, which is handy because I already had one in my Word Bearer army, and my opponent got a Defiler.
For our second game, it was much more of a close game, a veritable bloodbath which is how we like it. This time we had an Emperor's Will objective (an objective in each of our deployment zones). My Maulerfiend got stuck into the Plague Marines and lesser Lord early on, and held them up for nearly the entire game. He slowly mashed his way through them, being lucky to avoid 90% of their meltabombs, krak grenades and power fist attacks.
The enemy defiler, however, was a bit more destructive, turning the 10-man squad of Slaaneshi marines into mush in turn 1 with its battle cannon, leaving only the Lord and a few guys alive. But even this devastating attack was not enough to stop the remainder of the unit marching forward and contesting the Plague Marine objective.
Later in the game, however, the defiler finished the job from its firing position on a ridge to one side of the battlefield, and even managed to rip apart the Maulerfiend in close combat into the bargain.
Midway through the game, the Nurgle terminator Lord Deep Struck into my side of the battlefield to claim my own objective, but my Havocs and Noise Marine squads managed to keep hold of it until the bitter end.
After seven turns (Nurgle's favoured number indeed!) I still held my objective, and Nurgle did not hold theirs as their backline had been decimated by my Sorcerer some time before, and victory went to the followers of Slaanesh for the second time.
As for glory points, I rolled 3, giving me a total of 5 to my opponent's 2.

Rolling for new units, my opponent got another character in the form of a Warpsmith, while I rolled another vehicle. This time I got a predator, but I swapped it out for a Chaos Vindicator as I already have one of those in my Word Bearer force.

In all, the campaign has been very interesting. I quite like the random nature of warband creation, but only wish I had the funds to stick to it and build the army I actually rolled for, instead of swapping out some options for ones I already have.
My Lord is somewhat lacking in terms of his damage output. I gave him lightning claws in the hope he would be very killy and choppy, but he doesn't do much, and his attack familiar is yet to cause a single casualty in both games! My sorcerer, while pants in combat, is pretty destructive with his psychic powers, and I look forward to seeing what he can do in the future.
I stand by my opinion that Sonic Weapons are a mixed bag. I am glad that Path to Glory doesn't use points values because I find sonic blasters verging on useless for the amount of points they cost. I've probably killed, maybe 2 models in total with the sonic blasters. The blastmasters, on the other hand, are brutal. A strength 8, AP 3 blast is nothing to scoff at. Like large boyz mobs are to the nobz that lead them, I feel like the rest of the Noise Marine unit is just a delivery system to keep the blastmaster alive while it works its magic.

Zzodzog's Ambition Campaign Chapter 1 - Reinforcements...

Zzodzog opened his eyes to a dull grey sky. He wasn't sure how long he'd been out, but it couldn't have been long. He remembered his fight with one of them stinky boyz from one of the portals. He remembered the black, jagged blade piercing his skin. It hurt a bit (though he'd never admit it) and it takes a lot for an ork to feel pain.

"Better get Scruffa to look it over anyway." He though to himself, checking his arms. The wounds were deep, and wept with black pus. "Oh, wait. He got squished!" He chuckled to himself, and hauled himself to his feet.

Looking around, he saw he was in a crater. Not one caused by a big bomb blast, or a boom gun, and not even by his shokk attack gun. Its caldera was lined with cracks as deep and black as infinity, and they rippled with streaks of purple electricity. Stepping to the crater's rim, Zzodzog peered over the top, and some meters away he could see a large gathering of daemons. They crowded around something. They were facing away for now, looking at whatever they were huddled around. They were making noises, like guttural gurgles, growls and belches. Or were they chanting in some evil and sinister language known only to the morbid denizens of some forgotten realm?

He didn't care. He had a slight itch for a fight. His shokk attack gun was lying in the dust a few feet away, but he felt like a bit of a brawl to stretch out his limbs after his nap. But a new feeling gripped him. He almost didn't want to fight. Looking around, there were no other boyz to back him up. He was on his own. He was no use anymore. No need to throw his genius away in a senseless fight he wouldn't win, right?

If orks are good at anything, its running; either headlong into a swirling melee with sluggas and choppas flailing, or away from the enemy when things get a little... boring. Scrabbling out the far edge of the crater with his favourite weapon in tow, Zzodzog lumbered for the nearest ridge dragging his big gun behind him. Sparing a glance back, he could see a mist rising from amidst the daemons, it swirled purple and green, pulsating with energy, twisting the fabric of the reality around it. It looked exactly like one of the portals that had opened up before. He knew precisely what to do.
After a while of walking, he came to the top of a great sand dune, and peered down. The sounds greeted him first as he squinted down in the harsh sunlight. Another camp was below him; he had reached his destination. He heard gunfire, and the revving of engines, and the bellowing of orks. He was reminded of last night, standing on his balcony overlooking his own settlement below. He wanted his tower back, and he was going to use these other orks to do it.

As he entered the gate to the camp, all the orks about the place hushed and aimed their guns right at him. Zzodzog shrugged and dropped his gun to the sandy floor, and started towards them, but a booming voice rang out from the back of the horde somewhere.
"Hold it!" It called, and from the swarm there pushed and barged a much larger ork, one of the nobz no doubt, and behind him came 4 others of equal stature. They were dressed only in brown, tattered trousers and heavy, steel boots. Their torsos were pockmarked with metal implants and plugs for inserting wires.
"Look what da squig dragged in!" The nob continued, and began circling the big mek. "What brings a little runt like you to my camp?" He kicked at the large gun on the floor. He stood only a few inches above the Big Mek, but his ego far outweighed his height.
Zzodzog simply growled. "You seems ta be gettin' ready fer a fight." He replied. "I got a good fight for ya, up dere in Junktown." He motioned over his shoulder, speaking to the boyz around him, rather than the thick-headed nob who taunted him; he knew this nob well, and also knew he'd get more co-operation out of a well-fed bullgrox.
"Oi, you speak to me or I thump ya. When Zagablud is out of town, den Azragg is da biggest and da bossest!" He bellowed, thumping his chest.
"Den mobilize da boyz." Zzodzog shouted in retort. "We'z got a fight on our 'ands, and its gonna be a good'un. Deze portals opened up, *boom* and den deze weird stinky boyz started pouring out. I seen 'em before, but dey iz itchin' fer a fight. Saddle up ladz, and lets go krump some 'eads!"
The mob began to cheer and bellow loud "Waaaghs!", but they were soon hushed when Azragg spoke. "Oi, you all listen ta me. I'm biggest so I'm da boss." He thwacked Zzodzog sharply on the back of the head.
In truth, Zzodzog held a higher rank in ork heirarchy than Azragg, who was merely a boss of his relative mob. He was also a meganob, and the metal implants and plugs on his body were how he got wired in to his suit.
"And lets not forget who made you yer big, shiny mega armour!" Zzodzog snarled. He turned and threatened Azragg with a fist to the face. They were almost evenly matched if Azragg wasn't in his armour, and the meganob knew this. He laughed, and shoved past Zzodzog, pushing him away and shouting.
"Saddle up, ladz! Let's go krump some 'eads!" Azragg yelled. "And get me mega armour oiled up."

Zzodzog grimaced to himself. He thought of himself as far superior to the orks around him, but this was not unusual for orks. He enjoyed a fight as much as the next ork. If he didn't, he'd still be a runty yoof in some boot kamp somewhere. But he loved making things more. Gunz were his favourite, but he also fancied himself as a sort of armoursmith. He made many suits of mega armour, as well as dreads and kans of all shapes and sizes.
He hoisted his super-shokk kannon onto his shoulder, and prepared to move out. With the stubborn meganob boss out of the way, he began to bellow to the boyz.
"Mangy runts, y'all followin' me now. We'z gonna 'ave a good scrap wiv dem stinky boyz up in Junktown. Dey makes a satisfyin' pop whenever dey die, hurhurhur. And even better iz dere's tons ov 'em. We can krump stuff until da squiggoff's come home. Who's wiv me?"
The crowd of orks let out a bellowing Waaagh! at the top of their lungs, and was followed by the mass dakka of guns and the stomping of boots as the orks marched out of the camp. The kicked up sand choked the air. Streaks of purple lightning began to break through the clouds, and thunder rumbled across the horizon like the Gods themselves were marching to battle.

Azragg drove past on his trukk, his fellow meganobz whooping the boyz into an ever greater frenzy. Cannily, Zzodzog managed to quickly leap onto the side of the trukk; a quick ride it was back to Junktown, but while clinging on he saw a familiar face amongst the clanking behemoths on board. It was Scruffa Orkfixa.

"Oi, Scruffa... you jammy git!" Zzodzog bellowed, as they crested the ridge. The Battle for Junktown was about to begin in earnest...

Zzodzog's Ambition - Mission 1: Rumblings in the Warp...

MISSION 1: FIRST CONTACT
750pts Battle Report
Chaos Daemons vs Orks

Set Up
As per the mission rules, the table is split into quarters, and an objective placed at the centre of each quarter (or as close to the centre as we agreed). We then rolled some dice to determine the number of each table quarter and the objective therein.
The Oil Rig was objective 1, the Boyz Hut was objective 2, the Tin Tower was objective 3, and the Junkyard was objective 4.

The orks deployed their army on the board using the random deployment method detailed in the mission's rules. I tried to set up my orks in a narrative way. The meganobz were to be placed by the oil rig, so I deployed them to look as if they were getting an oil change by their mekboy. The shootaboyz were set up as if rummaging through the junk pile in quarter 4, and so on. Not strategic, and just a little detail, but its these things that I enjoy.

The daemons would not be deployed, but would be arriving from the Warp on turn 1.

Daemons Turn 1

Plaguebearers arrive surrounding Objective 2.

The Daemons began to materialise from the Warp on the first turn. Everything was set to appear from the get-go, and most of the army arrived successfully. The only downside was the Plague Drones, who scattered into a nearby ork unit and went back into Ongoing Reserves.

The Plaguebearers appear on and around objective 2 securing it early and threatening the nearby mobs with their foul presence.

The Horrors, led by the Changeling, materialise in the centre.

The daemons of Tzeentch appeared in the centre.

The Changeling attempts to unleash his powers, but he must have woken up late and forgot his morning coffee, and all of his powers failed.

The Plaguebearers attempted to throw their defensive grenades at nearby mobs, killing 1 of the 'ard boyz.

Combat is met early by the Ork Meganobz.

As we agreed that units arriving from reserves could charge on the turn they appeared, the plaguebearers on the ground charged the meganobz.

Although the nobz managed to torch a few with their skorchas, the Herald of Nurgle issued a challenge, which was gladly accepted by the mek in the unit who didn't want any scratches on his newly-finished meganobz. Safe to say, the mek was slain, and to make things worse, the Meganobz lost two more of their number anyway, and fled the combat.

The orks turn their attention on the Plaguebearers who
wiped out the Meganobz.

Orks Turn 1

Unfortunately, the fleeing meganobz had zero faith in their new shiny suits, having not properly tested them yet, and fled from the table. 

The 'ard boyz advanced on the Plaguebearers who made a mockery of the Meganobz, while Zzodzog stands still and braces himself to fire his Shokk Attack Gun at them.

The Lootas exit the Tin Tower, ready to bring
their guns to bear next turn.

The big mek tries out his new gun in combat for the first time, and true to form it malfunctioned. The template was placed on the 'ard boyz instead, and naturally it didn't Scatter, destroying half of their number. 

The shootas boyz are roused from their Junkyard rummaging,
and advance towards the Horrors.

The shoota boyz unleash a volley on the horrors, but did little damage

In the assault phase, the 'ard boyz barely won a fight against the Plaguebearers, but the nurgle daemons show their true worth and hold firm. 

The shootaboyz assault the horrors, and after a flurry of blows manage to wipe them out. The blue horrors retaliate and cause plenty of wounds in return. 

The shootaboyz nob challenges the Changeling, inflicting
only 1 wound.

The newly recycled Horrors unleash a devastating Tzeentch's
Firestorm on the Lootas.

Turn 2

The horrors that were wiped out last turn got recycled and appeared near objective 3 to threaten the newly-emerged lootaboyz. 

The plague drones also arrive, buzzing into the Junkyard.

The horrors unleash their psychic powers against the lootas and kill over half of them.

The 'ard boyz barely hang on against the onslaught
of the Plaguebearers.

The combat between the plaguebearers and the 'ard boyz was pretty indecisive, with them still locked and causing minimal casualties. 

Although the orks won this round again, their numbers were dwindling in the face of overwhelming odds. The shootaboyz nob managed to see off the Changeling with his big choppa.

In the ork turn, the shootaboyz about-face and move towards the oil rig (objective 1).

While the lootas do nothing in this turn of shooting, the shootaboyz manage to wound one of the nearby plague drones.  The big mek turns his shokk attack gun on the plaguebearers on the roof of objective 2, but it scatters off the roof and does nothing.

In the assault phase, the plaguebearers on the ground finish off the 'ard boyz.

Zzodzog and Be'Lathor square off.

Turn 3

In the daemons next turn, the horrors fail their psychic test; the lootas are safe for another turn. 

The plaguebearers and their herald assault the big mek, with the big mek issuing a challenge to the herald in order to avoid the attacks of the other daemons. 

No damage is done between the two.

The shootaboyz, having defeated the daemons of Tzeentch,
move to claim the Oil Rig.

The ork shootaboyz advance closer to the oil rig, turning just enough to fire at the horrors, inflicting a few casualties. 

The lootas, meanwhile, retreat into the safety of building 3 again.

In combat, the plague herald wounds the big mek, but he holds firm.

Turn 4

The recycled 'ard boyz appear right near the Plague Drones
in the Junkyard.

The horrors use Tzeentch's Firestorm on objective 3 to try and rustle out the lootas, but it has no effect. 

In combat, the plague herald finishes off the big mek.

The penultimate ork turn sees the 'ard boyz recycle, moving onto the board near objective 4 to confront the plague drones. 

The shoota boyz finish off the nearby plaguebearers with a little help from the lootas, leaving only the herald alive, who begins to advance on their position. 

The 'ard boyz charge the plague drones, and inflict heavy casualties for little in return.

Be'Lathor assaults the Shootaboyz, who have
secured the Oil Rig.

Turn 5

The plaguebearers who died last turn recycle, but scatter off the board. The horrors on the ridge Firestorm objective 3 again, but again the attack does no damage.

The Herald on the ground charges the dug-in shootaboyz to attempt to dislodge them, and although he wins the combat, the shootaboyz hold their position. 

At the end of the game, the 'ard boyz claim their prize, a
great big pile of junk.

The 'ard boyz finish off the last plague drone.

In the final ork turn of the game, the lootas attempt to do something and shoot the plaguebearers on objective 2 opposite, but do no damage.

The 'ard boyz make an assault against the horrors nearby with a very lucky assault range (12"). Finishing off the horrors, they then make a 5" consolidation back towards objective 4. 

The Herald kills 2 more shootaboyz, but this is still not enough to dislodge them.

CONCLUSION

After turn 5, we decided to end the game. And what a game it was! While we had a few issues with regards to certain special rules, this game was designed to tell an opening narrative to our campaign. While some parts were a bit flimsy, it kind of works, and felt very hectic all the way through. 

Darren: What a fantastic game to kick off our narrative campaign with. It was small but it made its point. The random deployment added a really interesting element to the deployment and represented the mayhem of a suprise attack perfectly. As always, the Orks of Da Big Teef Klan were worthy opponents as I took them on in their home turf and the sneaky steal towards the end game really paid off. I’m really suprised at my Herald, Be’Lathor, cleaving his way through the Orks toughest units and clearing the gaming board of those pesky Meganobz in the opening phases. That 10pt Lesser Reward was so worth spending the points for. Ultimately, although I lost, it was a fantastic match-up and my foe cleverly outmanuveured me. Well done!

Jason: I enjoyed this game a lot, and it was a very worthy opening chapter for our new campaign. In many ways I prefer these smaller games, as every unit feels worthwhile, and losing even a few models can feel like a tragic loss. It was very touch and go from the ork perspective at the start. My opponent dropped in his Plaguebearers and they quickly saw off my strongest unit without so much as a scratch. And after my Shokk Attack Gun misfired I thought I was history. I was struck with the New-model Curse it seemed, until the rest of my army pulled it out of the bag somehow. And kudos to my canny opponent and friend who showed true sportsmanship throughout. Very enjoyable game!

After a poor start from the orks, they eventually managed to gather steam, and scrape Victory from the jaws of defeat. However, the forces of Chaos are not yet done with this world, and as the tattered remains of the Big Teff savoured their win, another Warp Rift burst forth amidst Junktown, and more legions of daemons poured forth...

A Warp Rift opens in Junktown, setting the scene for
our next mission, The Battle For Junktown!

To be continued...