Light in the Warp

I have finally finished rebuilding my garage as a hobby room with a full sized table and hobbying space so this blog will soon be reinvigorated.

While you wait, and if you also enjoy Warhammer Fantasy check out http://asqueekinthedark.blogspot.com/

A finished unit?!

It's true I've 'finished' my first Astral Claws unit since November!

I still need to do highlights and some detail work but they're tabletop ready for this weekend's adventures with the UK Freebootaz.

I'll update you on how they do next week!

File under B for bleeding!

While filing some Dystopian Wars stuff to magnetize I managed to stab myself in the finger... I think the universe is telling me to get more of the Astral Claws done!

Assault Terminator

The last month has been lost to family holidays and work but this weekend I made it my mission to sort out my man cave and get back to hobbying. Most time was spent sorting out my painting area but I did manage to get one of my thunder hammer terminators painted. I can’t get the camera to work properly tonight so apologies for the picture quality but here’s the first of my squad done.



I’m attending another UK Freebootaz event at the end of the month and am hoping to get 1000pts painted up in time. I’ve not added any highlights or detailing to this mini yet. My plan is to tidy them up and finish them later on, probably after Forge World release the transfer sheets. At the moment I just want paint on as many minis as possible by the end of May.

Finally Forge World!

Just a brief post. The Tyrant’s Legion have played their first game but more on that later.

On Sunday I was at the Forge World open day at Warhammer World where I got some brilliant news. They have finally made Astral Claws shoulder pads (both power armour and terminator pads) and Land Raider/Rhino doors. There’s also a transfer sheet coming which is great as my attempts at home made transfers was not very successful.

I was told they’ll be out in about a month and that brass is likely to follow on from the transfers so it’s happy days to come for AC players.

The shoulder pads look great (for the terminators think Huron’s pads) but my camera is too crappy to get good pics. I’m sure some have leaked onto the interwebs somewhere, go check them out.

The Claws fight claws (with rending)

The Tyrants Legion is growing steadily, I now have all the vehicles built and undercoated and I'm 19 Auxilia away from being ready to take my secessionist agenda to the bureaucratic Administratum.

This afternoon a small detachment of Astral Claws (750 pts) faced down a Tyranid assault from a splinter of Hive Fleet Nom Nom. Each side was attempting to defend a wounded guardsman from the other, the marines out of duty to the Emperor, the Tyranids as a method of drawing more biomass to them.... shiny silver biomass!

I was in command of the ravenous hordes and I left the Claws in the hands of a friend. Two tac squads, one in a Rhino and one in a Drop Pod, a squad of Thunderhammer Terminators and my Terminator Librarian faced down a Hive Tyrant, 26 Hormagaunts, 5 Warriors and 8 Genestealers with a Broodlord.

The Hormagaunts suffered as they crossed the table but met the Terminators in a forest at the center of the battlefield 17 strong. They hit hard inflicting 12 wounds but the Tactical Dreanought armour held and the marines made all their saves. Despite inflicting heavy casualties with each swing of their mighty hammers the nearby Hive Tyrant kept the Hormagaunts in the fight as the forest turned into a killing ground.

On a hill in the marines deployment zone a combat squad with a missile launcher did everything it could to down the Tyrant on the left flank while a second squad with a veteran sergeant and flamer moved towards the beast to fight it head on. The Tyrant made short work of the nearest squad in close combat as the Genestealers burst from the flank near the missile launcher squad and devoured them in seconds.

The Tyranid Warriors defended their wounded guardsman in a deep forest using their Barbed Strangler to keep a second flamer combat squad pinned for three turns on the right flank. Their position in cover saved them from Storm Bolter fire coming from both the Rhino and Drop Pod.

As they Terminators finished off the last of the Hormagaunts without taking a wound they were hit with the Hive Tyrant's Stranglethorn Cannon and assaulted by the beast. In a close combat lasting two rounds two of the terminators were killed but the Tyrant fell to the brutal hammer attacks.

As the Genestealers advanced towards the guardsman held by the Astral Claws they were shredded by the combined fire of several units. The Broodlord managed to survive the hail of bullets and at the top of turn 5 he assaulted the combat squad holding the objective and slew 4 contesting the objective and winning the game for the Tyranids.

A fun time was had by all in a close game with a lot of great moments. Hopefully for the next battle report I will be fielding my full 1750 Tyrant's legion list.

Tanks a lot!

I've spent the last two nights breathing glue fumes and now I have two new armoured beasts to add to my Astral Claws.



Loyalists beware!!!

An Epic Battle

I was at Black Library Live this weekend with some of the UK Bootaz. The BLL event was great (though I bought far too many books).

This morning we snagged ourselves the beautiful new 6'x12' swamp board with Tau ruins and decided to play a large game. We ended up with a 4v5 game with 5000 points per side which is by far my biggest game. It was also the most fun game I've ever played.

1000 points of my Astral Claws held the right flank for the entire game against just over 2000 points of Salamanders, Sisters of Battle and a few Guard. I was finally wiped out in turn 7 but my job as a speed bump was performed well and my team won on kill points 27 to 17, thanks to some great play by my 3 team mates.

Here's a pic of my dreadnought just after bursting out of the woods and blowing up a Sister's Rhino in close combat:



I've also purchased my Chimera (and IA 10) so I have everything I need for my 1750pt Tyrant's Legion list. More updates to come.

A Blog Reborn!

After a busy few months at work and socially the blog has died again and my Astral Claws still need a lot of work. Last week was my birthday and I decided it was time that my Tyrant’s Legion list from Imperial Armour 9 started to take shape. To that end I have drawn up a 1750 point list which I’ll post below. The list is very fluffy, mainly models I fancy building and painting but I’m hoping to get it built and play tested in the next few months. After that I’ll start tweaking it to make it more effective.

HQ – Lugft Huron, 235pts
HQ – Legion Centurion, storm bolter, bolt pistol, 60pts

Elites – Terminator Assault Squad, thunder hammer and storm shield, Land Raider Redeemer with multimelta, 450pts

Troops – Legion Auxilia, 39 auxilia, 1 x flamer, 1 x grenade launcher, 2 x heavy stubber, 1 prefect with bolt pistol, 165pts
Troops – Legion Space Marine Cohort, 9 marines, 1 x flamer, 1 x multimelta, 1 veteran sergeant w bolt pistol + power fist, Rhino, 225pts
Troops – Legion Space Marine Cohort, 9 marines, 1 x flamer, 1 x multimelta, 1 veteran sergeant w bolt pistol + power fist, Rhino, 225pts
Troops – Auxilia Armsmen Cadre, 10 armsmen, 1 master at arms w close combat weapon, bolt pistol, melta bombs, Chimera with hull mounted heavy flamer, 145pts

Heavy – Vindicator w siege shield, 125pts
Heavy – Predator w lascannon sponsons, 120pts

As a birthday treat to myself I ordered a lot of plastic. I now have everything I need to complete the 1750 list except the Chimera which I’m hoping to pick up next week after I get paid. I’m using the Wargames Factory Shock Troops as Legion Auxilia (the IG forces under Huron’s control) as the models look great and are just different enough from standard IG minis to give the TL list a secessionist flavour. The models are currently quite hard to get hold of as WF has recently been bought by a Chinese company but I found 3 boxes on Upanatem Games (http://www.upanatemgames.co.uk/store/shocktroopsgreatcoattroopers-p-129.html). Delivery was quick and now I have more than enough Auxilia to make several different lists (I already have one box won as a raffle prize at the UK Freebootaz tournament in November).

My plan for the blog is to detail my Tyrant’s Legion as it grows. I am going to try and update at least once a week and include pics wherever I can. This weekend’s plan is to start the build phase, I currently have the predator sprues in detergent solution and the Auxilia sprues are already washed and dried. I have 5 individual marines to build: 2 veteran sergeants, 1 flamer marine, 1 meltagun marine and my Legion Centurion. I spent an evening kit bashing the other day and have all the bits I need for these 5, just need to get filing and gluing which I’m hoping to do tomorrow.

Some units, like the assault terminators, are already built and I’ll post pics as soon as I get some paint on them. I have a busy week next week, including 2 meetings with UK Freebootaz (one for beer and one for games.... and beer) and Black Library Live so I suspect little will get done, as such I’m focusing on getting a great start this weekend.

Watch this space!!!

Battleships Ahoy!

Just a quick update with some shots of my Dystopian Wars battleship.

Sniper Scouts

As promised 5 minutes ago here are some shots of my Astral Claws scouts with sniper rifles. Apologies for the photo quality.



I've used these scouts in several games now including the tournament in November. They're great for holding objectives in cover as the camo cloaks give them an extra +1 to cover saves and combined with going to ground can effectively give them a 2+ invul save.... until the enemy gets in range, flamers will wipe them out easily as will being assaulted but for 90 points they've tied up many an enemy unit for a long time and have even dropped a few wounds on Mephiston for fun. The only thing I have to keep reminding myself is they're scouts so, while sniper rifles can be very effective weapons, they only have BS 3 - my solution will be to add 4 more scouts and Telion at some point in the future.

A brief update

I have several Astral Claws units I've been wanting to upload but I'm struggling to get decent pics (need a new camera!).

In the mean time I thought I'd upload a mini I finished in about an hour today. It's a frigate for the new Spartan Games steampunk miniatures game Dystopian Wars. The resin minis are very detailed and I wanted to show some of that detail and add some bold colour contrast. The result is slightly cartoony but I like it. I think the fleet will look great when complete.

Claws to follow soon I promise. I'll try and get my scouts uploaded in the next 48 hours.