Tuesday, December 31, 2013

2013 achievements and what's coming in 2014

Once again I had a very busy December, though because we stayed in town this year and have had our first child, that business was having a very proper Christmas setup and a bunch of hobby time catch up!

I have to say, 2013 was another amazing year!  Due to personal commitments I didn't get as much gaming time for tournaments and such, but that's OK - becoming a father means I am going to have to sacrifice those types of things more often so best get used to it! I managed to make it to four blood bowl tournaments this year and also ran one for the first time - I got the two in that mattered the most (Zlurpeebowl and Lakeside) and managed to win the Best Appearance trophy at ZBIX.

On to other matters - first up my planned items for 2013

Of the 3 mentioned projects I was planning to attempt this year, I completed 1 - the necromunda walkways. In terms of more necromunda stuff I did get some dark vengeance cultists converted as a Redemptionist gang and am very happy with them. Once Ric @ Ricalope puts up a tutorial I plan to give it a go using his method for painting these guys - they have the same bases as my Flesh Tearers and will fit right in as cultists when using the chaos-y corsair models I built.

I had also been planning to bring my Insane Goblin Posse to Zlurpeebowl and gun for best appearance - CHECK! This required adding something more to the team (required by me) so I got a couple more basic goblins painted up.

I failed completely to paint the Ravenwing at all - partially because I needed a few more bits to finish building but mostly because GW annoyed the hell out of me with some stupid decisions and make me re-evaluate my loyalty.

I failed at painting some of the chaos-y/corsair marines I had built for my raptor legion - solely because the primer went on too thick and obscured some details - however I did get some more raptor legion marines painted and even more assembled.

However I am really happy that I managed to finish up several long outstanding projects


I managed to paint a lot more than I expected to finish with a new baby - score one for motivation/focus (ie. if I get 20 minutes to paint, spend over 15 of those minutes actually painting)


I currently have 6 terminators in progress for my novamarines - it doesn't look like they will be finished for this year, but they will give me a good start to next and that combined with scaling down the eventual plans means I just want to paint up a second land speeder storm and will consider that army "finished".  I hope to get some games in for 2014 and then may consider putting it up for sale/trade.

Other plans for 2014 include;

  • Making the Canadian Open blood bowl tournament bigger and better than ever.  Check out more information on the NAF Canada website or on the NAF forum thread.
  • Getting some Deadzone figures painted up.  I plan to start with my plague faction as I have lots of them and some ideas about using staining and washes to get a good effect.
  • Painting up the Redemptionist cultists if Rics tutorial is done this year.
  • I have some plans for a couple blood bowl teams to increase what I can use.  One is a proper team to build and paint as a themed counts as Necromantic team.  The other is a very quick & funny themed Ogre team.
  • Finishing up the Novamarines as mentioned above and getting some games in with them.
  • Once my FOLDIO lightbox arrives, getting serious about nice pictures for the blog and starting to go through my painted stuff bit by bit.
Happy New Year to my followers and best wishes for a great 2014!

Friday, December 27, 2013

(MFP) must finish project #1 - finally complete!

FINALLY finished.  Almost three years in the finishing I've got my blood bowl orc team complete. Earlier in December I finished up the reroll counters, the score counter was previously painted and I got it based at the same time and now I've finished the turn counter.
turn marker
I do want to paint the rims of the rest of the team black, so I can fix up their base numbers and add some coloured lines to make the positionals more explicit and to match these bases better.  In the new year I will take some updated team photos.

Even more WHQ monsters

As previously mentioned - I was unsure of my ability to get through a batch of 6 terminators over the christmas holidays, so I had pulled out a few more WHQ monsters to try desperately to reach that painting points goal for 2013.  Up now is the spiders..  +4 PP
no flash
Quickly the recipe was;

  • prime them with a necrotic flesh army painter spray
  • paint a triangular blend from yellow to reddish on the middle of their body round to the end of the bulb
  • paint one segment of the legs red
  • paint the pincers/mouth silver
  • drybrush black all over
  • 2x army painted strong tone on the legs
  • paint eyes silver, then lime green

flash
I actually prefer the shot with the flash, it kind of gives the impression of a light being shined on them, and it's definitely easier to see their details.  Also I am looking forward to taking better pictures next year - my parents and brother got us an amazing new camera for christmas with the new baby (including a tripod) and I got myself and my dad a small portable lightbox (FOLDIO on kickstarter - I recommend you check it out, it is an amazing deal!)

Friday, December 20, 2013

minis painted for others... skaven for hakomike!

Continuing the painting point train and also bringing my total for miniatures painted for others this year up to 5 is this skaven model I painted for hakomike. Most of my regular readers will recall the absolutely stunning harlequin that Mike painted for my Necromunda spire brats gang - truly one of my favourite miniatures and a totally gorgeous paint job. I knew my own contribution to him wouldn't be anything like that, but to his eternal credit Mike cares more about the thought and care than the actual results.

This has been a long slog - mostly due to my own painting and other changes in real life getting in the way, but also a lack of fur meant my plans for lots of staining/washes had to take a backseat.  Well almost 2 years later he is finally done!  I am also really happy to hear from Mike that he matches the rest of his skaven army pretty well - so job's a good 'un!
warplock engineer I think??
I originally was jazzed to use a staining method for this guys fur, but he ended up having so little of it, I don't think it has as big an impact (of looking very natural) as I'd hoped for - in the end I am more happy with his weapons' blades & the "warpstone ball" on his backpack, which was simply P3 coal black with mithril silver edging, then a purple wash and then another smaller round of edging and another layer of wash.  It gives it a nice evil looking sheen.  I need to fix up the lenses because I screwed up where the little dot of white goes, but other than that, he is finished and I will be shipping him off to Mike in the new year.

Thursday, December 19, 2013

old school talisman

Last night we had a friend over who has recently moved to Denmark for work.  Even though neither he or the wife are really into wargaming or anything he's always up to play a board or card based game (usually it's Citadels) but I have recently introduced my wife to Talisman (I only have the older card based very unbalanced edition) so we pulled it out for a game.
pretty early in the game
I figured I would post this up due to all the WHQ talk and since I pulled out some figures to use instead of the stand-up cards.  I was the Priest and so used my Warrior Priest figure. My wife was the Elf (she didn't like the blue on my Elf Champion so used the Wardancer instead).  Our friend was the Prophetess - I ended up pulling out a dark elf sorceress from my dark elf blood bowl team for his figure (no pic in the link, but a decent pic below).
epic final battle
In the end, our friend destroyed me with the command spell, but couldn't kill off my wife before she made it up to the crown of command square.  I'm not positive of the rules but the game had been going for a while so they just battled it out, with our friend winning the final battle when they each had 1 life left - epic!

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

More WHQ monsters...

A few more quick PP before the end of the year. As mentioned in my previous post I had assembled these plastic bat miniatures using some old flying base stands and more bases made of washers for my WHQ baddies collection. I definitely don't want any of the monsters to look any better than the characters so for that reason these guys were done with stains/washes mostly similar to the minotaur I just finished.
4 down, 8 to go (and find!)
Really like that I decided to use the clear flying base posts instead of the plain plastic ones that come on their base - it really adds a lot to these figures IMO.

At the same time I got the last 2 goblin spearmen painted up cheaply and based.  My plan is to use a bit of watered down wood stain on them plus the night goblin archers to act as a cheap "dip" and provide some depth to their paint jobs. Quick and easy.

I've pulled out 4 plastic spiders and if I get a chance I will attempt to get them painted with stains/washes. I'm saving the novamarine terminators for my week off since they are a proper batch and will need some focus to accomplish.

Friday, December 13, 2013

WHQ Minotaur #2

Well here is another quick 2 PP.  A while back I picked up a box of WHQ monsters when I spotted it in an old FLGS (two headed dragon) it was both cheap and good value because the bat/spider figs are tough to find alternatives for.

I had packaged off the minotaur along with another fig to Dave at mini painting 4 free.  Unfortunately real life got in the way so after a period of time I just requested he send them back no matter what state they were in. He did mostly finish another figure but this guy just had a coat of black primer.
minotaur #2
I decided he would be easy to finish before year end, especially if I used a mostly wash/stain approach to his skin & fur.  I picked red & purple as colours to add because the other minotaur I have (came painted) has green & blue. I used a washer to make his base as with all my other WHQ monsters.  They are cheap and easy to do with some simple card to make broken up flagstones and a touch of flock.

I wasn't originally planning on it, but getting this guy finished prompted me to pull out the two remaining spear armed goblins I needed to finish to get up to the required 6 and I also started converting and painting the bats from the box.  If I keep several projects going I think I will have a better chance of hitting my year end target.

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

(MFP) must finish project #1 - 4 down, 1 to go!!

Just a quick one today - finishing up this project dates back to 2010!!  In February of that year, I posted about the figures to finish up - then a bit later I got the snotling score counter painted (but not based). Later in April just before the Challenge of Q'ermitt that year I had painted up 2 more each of blitzers and blockers as well as 3 star players and an apothecary.

I recently received a PM on the talkfantasyfootball forums and one of the members liked my orc team and offered me some free resin cast counters (orcy block dice) he had leftover.  Since those were the counters I couldn't figure out - I was happy to accept and now I have managed to get a quick paint job on them.
orcy block dice counters
Includes 3 reroll counters and a counter I will use for a leader reroll.  I have also gotten the snotling based and begun painting the turn counter - which will "finish" off this project once and for all (I may update the numbers/lettering on the bases at some point in the future)

I'm still gunning for my 2013 painting points goal - other than the counters I have a skaven engineer for hakomike nearly complete, a minotaur for my WHQ baddies nearly complete and 6 novamarines terminators I am going to attempt to finish over the holidays.

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

HeroQuest KickStarter

I so far have managed to be spend fairly sparingly on kickstarter projects.  Instead of jumping on every new shiny I have really tried to focus on the one's I can see myself making a lot of use of, or that I really like the look of.  Up until today I had only backed two kickstarters;

- the first being Tablescapes - by Secret Weapon Miniatures (I have a fold out grass field 8'x4' polystyrene table and couldn't resist getting something a little more urban to use for skirmish and sci-fi games) - it was moderately expensive but for the apparent quality and truly impressive level of planning & ingenuity it felt very worthwhile.

- the second being Deadzone - by Mantic (yes, some astute of you will know that I am not a huge Mantic fan after this event - but with recent events prompting me to finally branch out from GW products + the fact Jake Thornton is the creator I decided to have a serious look.  The ruleset is what really pulled me in - I am pretty sure I will not be hugely impressed with the miniatures, and the cut & paste/quirkworthy nature of the rules PDF & cards I find to be annoying and somewhat unprofessional - regardless the thought of a small skirmish game that doesn't use rulers and is meant to play very quickly did appeal)

Yesterday the HeroQuest 25th anniversary kickstarter released and today it is already 565% funded.  Their simple pledge levels appealed to me and with a new baby I decided to bite the bullet but chalk this one up for him to open in the future.  I still remember opening my HeroQuest box and loving looking through all the miniatures and rules, playing with my brother and eventually starting my painting hobby by painting those figures.  I wish I knew where it had gone, since I have no recollection of ever trading it away - but I want to give my son that same feeling so today I pledged.  I also foresee a lot of stretch goals being met at this rate - there are already NINE unlocked.  Check out the video and consider it.

Sunday, November 10, 2013

5 years of Sons of Twilight contest

Here's a quick heads up post about eriochrome over at Sons of Twilight having a contest for reaching the 5 year mark.  His posts are usually at least one of; very informative (some great posts like his space hulk stats), very opinionated (good series about Reaper Bones and its quality) or very grey (this guy has the biggest collection of unpainted miniatures ever! lol ;-))
He's planning 5 winners with 10 potential prizes up for grabs - coming from his vast collection.  I'm hoping there will be some sweet blood bowl or 40K (marine or genestealer maybe?) options.  His blog is currently avoiding 40K, but you should still see posts about X-Wing, Lego, Blood Bowl and Epic - so check it out!

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Some painting finished earlier...

I mentioned in the previous post I had managed to get some painting done in the build up to the family addition.  This raptor legion tactical squad had been assembled and partially primed for a while, so I tidied up the old primer grittiness by scraping with an exacto and gave them another coat.  Then I followed the same pattern as my older models using mostly washes with a bronze metallic and some dheneb stone for details with a touch of metallic-y yellow.  They still look great IMO and are super quick to output.
test photo from within display cabinet
With the latest codex release, the Raven Guard have their own Chapter Tactics that have altered slightly from the stuff previously implemented with Shrike.  Forge World have also released some chapter tactics for the badab war chapters and it gives rending to boltguns/bolt pistols if they don't move (classified temporarily as heavy to ensure no crazy combos with the dark angels salvo banner - damn!)

I am pretty torn on these guys - I have 5 assault terminators that I think I can get assembled and painted before the year is out (I still have aspirations of beating my target of 100 painting points) and along with the models already done that would be right close to 1000 points of marines.  A squad of scouts or something would put it near that level.  At that point I am wondering if it's really worth hanging onto or if I should look into trading/selling it.  I need to cut back on the marine armies as it's obviously a bit overkill and I would rather keep armies that play differently (like the Ravenwing army) instead of tons of tactical/assault squad based armies.  Any thoughts?  Or suggestions on the one thing to add to this to bring it around 1000 points and maybe make it more appealing?

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Gamer Inbound!

The blog has been quiet of late.  I have been trying to get hobby stuff worked on in the past couple months (finishing building a Ravenwing army and getting a squad of Raptor Legion painted) - mostly because I knew I'd be super busy with a new addition to the family!
The little guy was born at 5:58pm on Oct 13, 2013 - weighing 7lbs 13oz.  He is our first and knock on wood he seems to be a super chill dude and he just abides!  I have some time off which will mostly be taken up, but I do have some pictures to take and some tournament updates to post and typing might be the easiest thing to manage while holding a sleeping baby!

Monday, September 30, 2013

double/triple secret giveaway contest

Anne over at O'Leary Miniatures has a excellent looking contest going on right now on her blog to promote her friend Patrick Hatt's written works & his amazon writers page.  She is offering up some really cool prize bundles so I highly suggest you check it out!

"This give away is being sponsored in part by author Patrick Hatt. You can find Mr. Hatt's Amazon Writers Page at http://www.amazon.com/Pat-Hatt/e/B00AGFMYVC."

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

"The Cure For What Ails You"

I would like to point your weasel-y noses (no, not THIS type of weasley) at a contest David (Laughing Ferret) is running to celebrate 200K hits and nearing 300 followers (congrats!).
Lasting 11 days, with 11 options for prizes - I dearly hope to score the dwarf referee who would match my Karak-Nhati Bengals blood bowl team (painted by David - see his post here) very well and whose post conveniently satisfies option #3 for an extra point!

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Lakeside Cup 2013 (the last incarnation), result = Wet Paper Bag

the crew
FYI - Once posted I am going to be updating the date back in time so this fits along better in terms of when the tournament actually happened.  Just a disclaimer in case it ends up being confusing.  This was the final time Peter would be running this incarnation of the Lakeside Cup, and having missed it for 2 previous years I was not going to miss out.  Here is the NAF thread.

A quick recap since it was so long ago and I just needed to make sure I posted up something.  A quick pic of each game, I will try to add something about each and some notes about my roster, skill upgrades and luck below.

0-1 loss vs. Mark H. (Chaos Dwarves)
attempting to crowd push his bull centaur lost me my chance to score a TD.
nice t-shirt eh?
1-1 tie vs. Colin (Chaos Dwarves)
there is something strange about playing Colin, we always seem to tie.
playing outside was much nicer than downstairs
3-2 win vs. Austin (Skaven)
was lucky to win this one - Austin's dice were terrible all game.
Austin looks surprised
0-2 loss vs. Ryan (Orc)
getting schooled is how I remember this match.
game four day one I just wanted it over
2-0 win vs. Gord (Necromantic)
dice were perfect for me in this game
sorry no pic
0-2 loss vs. Leathan (Lizardmen)
IIRC I was under the cosh from the get go due to a thrown rock ???
no luck vs. Leathan this time

I think my main problem was trying to make my roster/skills too "perfect" or "combo-ish".  One berserker I gave mighty blow & piling on and I don't think he caused a casualty all tournament.  I did like my wrestle/tackle ulfwerener, but only having 1 meant I was low on frenzy and strength. I gave +ST and +AG to my runner, but I shouldn't have made him my ball carrier, he ended up hiding in cages too much.

In the end, I finished on the winning side - though I didn't have too much to do with that.  It was nice for the West to finally win after several years of being the Easts whipping boys.  Additionally I picked up an individuals trophy - though not one to be proud of...
wet paper bag trophy
The Wet Paper Bag - that I couldn't fight my way out of - this was for least casualties caused and is particularly embarrassing having a berserker on my roster with mighty blow & piling on. :(

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Minis Painted for Me!

Well I have been focusing on building some more units to send to Ricalope thanks to getting back my first box of Flesh Tearers and getting a game of 6th edition in.  I have been getting those figs varnished - and writing rosters for the upcoming Lakeside blood bowl tournament.  However a pleasant surprise was posted on my facebook this morning - my buddy Dan (who will unfortunately have to miss this tournament) has finished painting up a spire brat for my ever growing gang - and that reminded me I STILL owe Paul of The Man Cave a photo posted of his contribution to the cause!  So I got off my backside and snapped a quick pic of his brat as well as one painted by Mik over at Miks Minis.  Shown in order received...
a ginger brat from Paul @ The Man Cave
A ginger haired brat inspired by the man himself, I love the job he's done on the power sword! Of course if you've seen my Novamarines you will also know I am a fan of quartered schemes.
a dark reaper'esque brat from Mik @ Miks Minis
Mik chose to do this harly (I believe it's properly called a Death Jester?) up in a scheme very similar to the old 'Eavy Metal scheme used on the Eldar dark reapers.
a "Mardi Gras" brat by my buddy Dan
Dan told me he took inspiration from "Mardi Gras" for his brat.  I love the way the green mask stands out on this mini.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

First game of 6th edition (yes took that long!)

Had my first game of 6th edition last night.  Yes it's been a while since I have played 40k - a combination of our blood bowl league being full steam ahead + some lack of desire to start learning all the changes mean it has been out a while before I got a game in.

Played against a new opponent Leo who lives about 10 minutes away and we used smallish (1250pts) armies to ensure it didn't get too messy and we were able to (mostly) finish in an evening.  I brought some of my lately acquired Flesh Tearers since I just wanted to use them in a game.  We played mission 5 (the emperor's will?) and diagonal deployment.  I put my objective near him because even with the jump packs I knew he would have me outclassed for speed so I just wanted everything pretty focused.  Fortunately I rolled the warlord trait that gave me move through cover so my land raider was immune to dangerous terrain tests (Leo seemed confident this was correct, please let me know if that's wrong!)

My army had;
* reclusiarch in terminator armour
* 2x sanguinary priests (one terminator armour, one jump pack)
* 6 terminators with a cyclone missile launcher
* 10 assault marines with jump packs, 2 meltaguns & power fist
* 6 death company with jump packs, infernus pistol & 2x power weapons

His army of Eldar had a farseer, 5 warlocks, an autarch?, a couple guardian squads in falcons? wave serpents? (whichever one has that dirty new force field that it can choose to shoot with) a fire prism and the crimson hunter.

Below are some pics and a bit of description - hope you enjoy!
autarch? & warlocks flee
Probably the turning point of the game, first psychic power goes off, but 2nd his Farseer perils and he spent his last token to save himself (some helmet wargear item).  Then immediately another warlock perils and dies (no save anymore?) and being in a squad of 4 they take a morale test - fail - and flee off the board.  First Blood to me! (+1VP)  Lesson learned for Leo, keep a minimum of 5 guys to start in that squad so 1 perils doesn't cause that morale test.

land raider advances to fire on transports & death company use as cover
Leo also zoomed his transports over near his objective, near where I was setup - so I moved my land raider forward and jumped the death company in behind to hide them from his fire prism.  I left my assault squad in cover deep in my deployment zone as the fire prism LOS to them was blocked.  The land raider missed with the multi-melta and while the assault cannons hit twice they failed to glance.

land raider blocking LOS and attacking fire prism
A dismal round of shooting for both Leo and I meant not a lot happened, at this point it is after my land raider stunned his fire prism which it shook off with some piece of wargear.  He then moved all his vehicles around to focus on my land raider - after the crimson hunter caused some glances, his fire prism lanced my land raider and blew it up - all the terminators inside survived.

terminators destroy the fire prism
So in my turn the terminators duly charge his fire prism and wreck it without even needing to resort to power fists!!  Go go Reclusiarch Crozius!  The cyclone did fire before charging but missed with both krak missiles (never hit once all game with krak missiles!)  No consolidate move?  Yikes!

assault marines fail charge roll - damn difficult terrain
I had also decided to finally charge my assault marines into battle.  Perhaps failing this charge actually turned out to be beneficial as I think Leo was still more worried about the damage possibly caused by my terminators.  Oh and my sanguinary priest was the only one to fail a difficult terrain test, and he promptly failed both armour and feel no pain to die outright! D'oh!

transport explodes, terminators in the open
This photo looks quite a bit later in game, so I'll try to fill you in.  His crimson hunter flew over and shot at my death company, missing with 1/2 it's shots.  Then my assault marines blasted it out of the sky with their meltaguns (fortunate they both rolled 6's to hit!)  Leo disembarked his Farseer and guardians from 1 transport and used it as cover and shot at my terminators - who lost a couple guys.  His other transport fired at my death company and killed 1.  Now this looks like right after my terminators charged into his transport (I cared less about his squad and more about their ability to move, they are nearly 1/2 the table away from the objectives at this point) I blew up his transport and in his turn he shot a bunch at my terminators who tanked without any casualties.  His second squad tried to battle focus to get within range of my assault squad and shoot them, but I rolled every save I could (a couple shots were AP2)

eyes on the prize
In my next turn I turned around and focused on that second guardian squad with my assault marines and my terminators, gunning down something like 6-7 of them and they failed their morale test and ran off, they would continue to fail and flee for the rest of the game.  I also assaulted his second transport and wrecked it with my death company.

death company can assault vehicles rear AV10 pretty well thanks to furious charge
This is nearing the end of the game (we had to finish on turn 6 which was lucky for me, as in turn 6 his guardians basically wiped out my terminators except for the sanguinary priest - which allowed them to charge him and a possible turn 7 could have seen a battle go on for one of the objectives) that's slay the warlord for Leo (+1VP) so I decided to jump my assault marines into the furthest objective to capture it (+3VP) and jump my death company to the nearest one to deny it and that's where we had to stop - which left me winning.

If we had the time to go to turn 7, it was very probably that Leo would have been able to capture the nearest objective to his guardian squad with farseer (unless my lone sanguinary priest could have held them up) thanks to their battle focus they could have probably consolidated from assault, moved, ran, if within range of objective - shot up my 3 remaining death company - if outside of range wait and assault them and thus move close enough and capture the objective which would have given him the tie (we both got the bonus VP for Linebreaker.  So I felt pretty good that the worst I could have achieved was a tie.

That was completely down to being smart with my one scoring unit and I think a combination of poor dice luck and perhaps a bit of getting caught up in killing units by Leo.  He probably should have been more cautious with his movement early so he could have gambled a bit more later.  All in all a pretty fun game but man did it really feel like a 5th codex vs. a 6th codex.  His eldar seemed really awesome for the points cost - especially those transports and I'm pretty sure if his warlocks hadn't fled off the table in turn one that would have changed the complexion of the game entirely.  Codex creep seems alive and well!

Monday, July 8, 2013

Limited Ed. figures - Max and Carol!

I wanted to bring to your attention the chance for a very cool set of Limited Edition figs that are available to help fund/promote the Mike Kriger memorial cup blood bowl tournament. You can read more about the tournament in a post by BFG over on our group blood bowl blog - Merry Mayhem News.
Carol & Max
A blurb about the figs from BFG
"With a limited cast of 50 of each (sold together), the figures are made from pewter (37 and 17mm respectively), and are sculpted by Rykar, who will also be sculpting a new 'monster' from the book every year.
Each set (with both figures) costs 25USD plus shipping, and aside from helping funding their tourney, a donation will be given to the PA's fallen soldier fund."

If you are interested, the best method is to get in touch with John (bound for glory) directly through the TFF forum in this thread (http://www.talkfantasyfootball.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=38415)

Monday, June 10, 2013

Zlurpeebowl IX - result = Best Appearance + no spoon! (33/40)

Well Zlurpeebowl IX is done and dusted and for me, it was mission accomplished!  Our team also did really well and I'm sure the Eh Team was close to the top of best team again (we also got our trophies from last year - thanks Xtreme!!) and bar my nearly catastrophic blunder early on in our road trip down (I'm the moron who forgot to bring his passport and cost us several additional hours of driving) pretty much the entire trip was a huge success! We ended up at Xtremes a bit late Friday night, but did manage to get some Deathroller Racing in and hang out a bit.

This year I decided to bring my Insane Goblin Posse and aim for a Best Appearance award. Since I wouldn't likely be challenging for top tables with a goblin team, I chose to also use a FTLOTG roster (Zlurpeebowl does not use the usual stunty rosters - instead there are even more handicapped rosters who challenge for a "For the Love of the Game" cup) since this would gain the Eh Team an additional team point.

Here is the list I took - I was really happy with everything except I think I would swap jump up on the Looney for a simple dodge.  Usually when the chainsaw goes down - his armour is broken.  Stopping him from going down as frequently would have been preferable, since I barely got the chance to use jump up.
Bombardier - hail mary pass
Fanatic - mighty blow
Fungus the Loon
Looney - jump up/leap
Pogoer - jump up/sure feet
3 Goblins - side step
5 Goblins
3 Rerolls
3 Bribes

Game 1 vs Dan 0-5 loss
I had never really met Dan before, but I remembered him from zlurpeebowl last year - he won some dancing contest and when I brought it up he said he'd been practicing for this year! Dan brought a dark elf team which comprised of; witch w wrestle, 3x blitzer w dodge, blitzer w guard, 5x lineman w block, 2x linemen

This game was quite rough for me.  For the first few turns, I turned over nearly immediately.  I did manage to stun a lineman with the Looney, but this is how my dugout looked after two turns.
OUCH!
and it didn't get much better - the one shining light of the game was his witch elf managed to trip herself dodging and I managed to take her out with my Fanatic - woohoo!!  This tournament was all about the little things!  Here's how my dugout looked at the end of the game - I did manage to avoid having to look up the rules for what happens when you get tabled!
one goblin left alive!

Game 2 vs. Mike 2-0 win
Mike also brought a cheaters list - though very different from my list.  I recall him playing at Chaos Cup when I was there in 2011.  Mikes list had; fanatic w guard & mighty blow, looney, pogoer & 4x goblins w sure hands, 9x goblins. He said straight away he came to lose five games!  I found out later he managed a win vs. a lizardmen team where his fanatic and chainsaw destroyed the poor girls kroxigor & saurus.
an early scare!
Mike gave me an early scare when after receiving - I couldn't pick up the football, then he managed to waltz into two tackle zones, pick it up and dodge away!  I had to completely block his route to the end zone to ensure he wouldn't just dice his way into the end zone.  Fortunately for me it seems it wouldn't have mattered as he failed his first attempt to dodge away anyways.  The rest of the first half I tried to cause more attrition but failed - though I did score at the end of the half.  Luckily for me in the second half, my bombardier pulled off an epic toss that hit and killed outright his pogoer carrying the ball.  Regardless of the daunting casualties I took, I applied as much pressure as possible and managed to score a second touchdown late in the game.

Game 3 vs Anthony (@KhorneliusPraxx) 1-2 loss
Anthony had to wake up at 4am and drive for several hours to arrive to play at the tournament.  I was truly frightened when I saw his list.  He only had 5 saurus and no kroxigor so he could afford 4 rerolls, but every saurus had block and three of them had mighty blow.  One of his skinks also had sure hands.
goblin side stepping cage!
Pretty sure I had Anthony sweating it out big time.  He scored on turn 4 and I managed a very epic goblin cage which saw me make a mistake giving him a chance for a 1 die block instead of 2 die uphill - but fortunately for me, he rolled a skull - allowing me to tie it up at half time.  For the second half, things could have gone very differently if I had chosen to reroll my blitz on the first turn where I rolled double skulls.  I chose to keep the reroll, and it resulted in a goblin death.  Then his first block resulted in another goblin death.  It put me under the cosh a bit, but if it wasn't for a failed dodge with reroll I still could have scored a second touchdown and I still nearly held on for the draw.  Anthony managed to score a touchdown on the last turn of the game (my Looney and Pogoer knocking down his ball carrier twice in the interim) but he pulled it out!

Game 4 vs Brian (@B_C_Harmon) 0-1 loss
Brian is a great buddy of mine since he roomed with me at Chaos Cup in 2011, but unfortunately we have not ever had a chance to play a game - so this was our first! Again it was scary to have to play a dwarf team with my goblins that did not even have trolls!  Brian was having a pretty crappy tournament from what he told me.  Not only that but he had a very VERY strong list; runner w block, runner w dodge, 2x troll slayers, 2x blitzers w guard, 5x blockers w guard.
amazing first half!!
Brian also got a really big scare! I won the coin toss and chose to receive - and for the first game my Fanatics were pretty epic - smacking his dwarves around - killing one in the first turn.  My Bombardier also managed to kill another dwarf.  Throughout the first turn I dragged his dwarves all over and spread him out.  Eventually I had about 6 goblins within scoring range and most of his dwarves too far away to be involved.  So it was time to hail mary pass the ball down the field.  The best Brian could do was get a single tackle zone on the ball, and tie up my other goblins.  Unfortunately for me, my Pogoer failed a dodge with reroll - and in two turns I was unable to get a chance to pick up the ball.  In the second half Brians luck began to turn and he pulled off a quite standard dwarf grind to win the game, I managed a blitz on his ball carrier but my chainsaw didn't break his armour - but again I was happy to have had him sweating.

Game 5 vs Josh (@Aldis_Snow) tied 1-1
I played Josh and his orcs at zlurpeebowl last year and he pulled off an epic last turn 1-0 win.  This year I pulled something close to the reverse this year.  This is the first time I've gotten a result other than a loss against any team other than goblins - woohoo! Josh had a pretty standard looking orc list; 4x black orcs w block, 3x blitzer w guard, blitzer w dodge, thrower w block.
greenskin vs. greenskin
A lot of the details of this game are eluding me now - probably due to the amount of alcohol imbibed Saturday night.  From the photo I've taken I must have won the coin toss, and I can see that neither Fanatics are on the pitch anymore and I'm slowly remembering rolling skull/both down for each of them.  You can see that the ball has been hail mary passed down to his end, but I know that he stopped me from scoring - and I remember him needing 4 GFIs with his thrower to attempt to score and failing one of them, leaving us with no score at half time.  In the second half he scored about midway through and I had about 6 goblins left, including my Pogoer.  I had an opportunity to score with my pogoer and again he let me down, failing his dodge with reroll after picking up the ball in 2 tackle zones.  So in the final turn with no rerolls, I decided instead of just going for it with the pogoer again - I dodged 3 goblins into the end zone next to the ball so that if I failed to pick up the ball and was fortunate with the scatter I might get a chance of catching the ball in the end zone.  In the end, I was fortunate enough to not worry as my Pogoer finally redeemed himself by picking up the ball in 2 tackle zones and dodging out successfully to score the fourth and final touchdown of the tournament for me.

Game 6 vs Sarge 0-2 loss
Sarge won best sportsman at zlurpeebowl last year and for the first time ever the repeat was pulled off - he won it again this year.  Gearing up to zlurpeebowl I inquired about playing him in the grudge match (an excellent convention and one I plan to implement at the Canadian Open) - Sarge also played a FTLOTG roster which was based on khemri without any tomb guardians; 2x blitz-ras w tackle, 2x throw-ras w block, 2 skeletons w tackle, 10 skeletons & 7 fan factor.
FTLOTG vs. FTLOTG
This game didn't go well from me from the start.  I did get to receive but with all his fan factor, Sarge won +2 FAME.  Then within 4 turns I had burned all my rerolls on kickbacks and fumbled bombs.  Then in the fourth turn I fumbled a bomb again which exploded and stunned my Bombardier.  Sarge got some tackle zones on the ball and while I had a couple chances to hail mary it away from trouble - the lack of rerolls was telling and Sarge managed to score.  In the second half I managed several chances to blitz his ball carrier - and was successful once, but he was very cagey with his positioning and it meant too many dice (generally without rerolls as kick offs usually resulted in me losing rerolls or Sarge winning rerolls) and Sarge finished the game scoring a second time - congratulations to him!!

As usual - Bryan, Jonny and I took our usual photo!
natzlurpim v3.0


best appearance!
I managed to win the Best Appearance award I had been gunning for, while Dave (@doomington) & Alex (@alexmatusiak) managed to finish in 4th and 5th place respectively (although the trophies for 1st - 4th are determined by tournament points among the 4 players on the 2 top tables - which Alex and Dave did not play on in final round.) but both finished with very impressive final records of 4/1/1 - and Tyler (@tkohlmetz) tied for most touchdowns but lost out on tiebreakers.  Excellent results for the Eh Team!

You can also check out the results thread here on the zlurpeebowl forums.

dual posted on Merry Mayhem News

Thursday, May 23, 2013

F*** You GW! (fs/ft part 1)

the straw that broke the camel's back
Well, that's it.  I have stood loyally by Games Workshop through price hike after price hike (whether really required or not) through consistently failing to support games beyond the big two (sometimes even actively destroying that gaming community) and I've finally had enough.  Below is an except from the latest NAF newsletter, explaining that after 10 years of allowing NAF to produce block dice for it's members, GW has refused to renew the license.  I completely fail to understand the point of this decision, although I bet it has something to do with the recent Cyanide blood bowl game and somehow thinking stopping block dice from being made will increase sales of that game.  Considering their recent announcement to stop producing figures from the Specialist Games range, I highly doubt it is because of a new blood bowl box set.
Crimson Fists
So I have decided it is high time that I seriously consider why I continue to support this company that clearly cares so little for it's long time customers/supporters in favour of gouging the newcomers repeatedly.  I will definitely keep my specialists game related figures as I have no need for GW to continue enjoying playing those games, and I will likely keep my flesh tearers since they incorporate my space hulk terminators as well as possibly a fantasy army since it may well fit with other games.  But my mass of space marine armies (in various stages of completion) are gonna start getting sold off.  First up is a small cadre of Crimson Fists, some painted and some primed.  Here is the full list.

Pedro Kantor
10 Sternguard (2 heavy flamers, 2 combi-meltas)
6 Terminators (1 heavy flamer)
10 Tacticals (1 flamer, 1 missile launcher)
10 Devastators (4 heavy bolters - old style)
1 Rhino
1 Land Raider Redeemer. * multi-melta piece needs fixing
1 Objective.
as many Crimson Fist decals as I can find
Also was planning to make a small fluffy honour guard squad with 3 metal vets, all with power fists and bolters w grenade launchers, see this pic

I am interested in blood bowl or necromunda figures, or cash for now.
I could be interested in terrain - GW or not.

Here is the excerpt from the newsletter.

Dear Members 
This is always an exciting time of year as the NAF announces new dice. We are keeping this tradition but sadly, after ten years, Games Workshop has brought this great tradition of new block dice to an end. 
We tried many angles with GW, but ultimately the licensing department would not renew our deal meaning that, for 2013, a new colour of blocking dice cannot be issued. We have good relations with GW and hope that with continued communication this may change in the future. 

This year we will instead be issuing matching coloured sets of 2D6, plus a D8 and a D16. In the great tradition of the NAF, the new colour and unique design will be announced at the NAF Championship 2013 and attendees renewing their membership can get their new dice. A picture of the new dice will go up on the website shortly afterwards. 

We are excited about our new dice, however we also have stocks of some of the classic back catalogue of dice and are very well aware that many would like to get their hands on some. So until further notice, when members renew or sign up, we will be able to fulfill their request for block dice. Current supplies are Red, Yellow, Light Blue, Light Green and Silver. 

We hope you're as enthusiastic as we are about this fabulous opportunity for NAF members to expand their collections of Blood Bowl accessories. The brand new dice sets will be available from June 1st this year, but members will have the option to request dice from our classic collections (as above) instead. 
Happy dice rolling! 
Dave 
NAF President

Saturday, May 4, 2013

minis painted for Axt - ZOMBIES part 4

The funniest thing of all, receiving a painted model of yourself as a zombie!  This is exactly what happened to Axtlinge (aka Axt) with the final figure of the fab four.  I chose to make Axt a rugby player because he loves the all blacks and the zombie pieces I had suited it.  First the legs weren't proper shorts and seemed to have some extra padding/protection which makes more sense for a proper contact sport.  Secondly the hand with the thumb pointing up reminded me of the Haka dance that his favourite rugby team the All Blacks perform.  I had a bit of help from Abraxis who sent me a couple photos of Axt so I could get him right without giving away the secret - thanks buddy!
zombie Alberto
As with the others, I built up the base with filler.  The flock is the same as used on my figure but underneath I gave it a coat of brown paint instead of green to try and show how rugby fields are usually more torn up than footy fields.  I used some bits of medical gauze twisted and glued to create the long beard and pony tail.  I also used a little water effects for the blood on the recently ripped off leg he's carrying around ;^)

Hope you enjoy them pal!

dual posted on Merry Mayhem News

Friday, May 3, 2013

minis painted for Axt - ZOMBIES part 3

Second to last, here is Paul - of The Man Cave fame.  This was actually the inspiration to do "us" as zombies.  You may not be aware, but Paul is a honest to goodness real life ships captain/commander in the Australian navy.  In fact he just shipped out on a new mission called SLIPPER.  Anyways as soon as I saw this body (it was the only one where legs/torso were attached) with the long coat all I could think of was a ships captain (obviously the ship this zombie was commanding was a bit different to the one Paul commands now!) so as soon as I thought "ship captain" I equally as quickly realized "MMN crew zombies"!
zombie Paul
As with the others I built up the base, and then instead of using flock I just attempted to paint a wooden deck using various browns.  One side has a line of tin paint to make it look like an edge or something like that.  I also used my now pretty common style of painting reddish/ginger/orange hair which involves starting with orange, and using washes of both a reddish/metallic colour as well as simple red wash.  The reason for the metallic choice is it gives a bit of sheen to the hair, without actually colouring it metal.

dual posted on Merry Mayhem News

Thursday, May 2, 2013

minis painted for Axt - ZOMBIES part 2

Next up on the dock is Paulo aka Abraxis, winner of the Zlurpcast Meatloaf Fan award.  As soon as I got the bare torso piece off the sprue I knew I had to have Paulo running with his jersey off after just scoring a goal.  I leveled the base with filler as on the other figures and I made a jersey out of a napkin with paint. After painting the zombie and jersey separately I superglued them together.  I also used an extra coat of painted varnish to try and give the jersey some strength before I gave the whole figure a spray coat of varnish.
zombie Paulo
In case you are unaware, Paulo's favourite football team is Benfica, so it's very appropriate I am posting this today, as both his team and mine are in the second leg of the Europa League semi-finals tonight.  Chelsea have a 2-1 lead and are playing at home, while Benfica are looking to reverse the tie (currently 1-0 for Fenerbahçe) and are also playing at home - the Stadium of Light.  Good luck to Benfica tonight, with any luck we will have a Benfica/Chelsea final in Amsterdam and we might all use skype to hang out while we watch the match!

dual posted on Merry Mayhem News

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

minis painted for others - ZOMBIES part 1

I am going to break this post up into series like I did with the necromunda walkways.  You may remember, long ago I received a couple harlequins painted for my spire brats gang from my MMN crew buddies in Portugal - Abraxis and Axtlinge.  Well I think I covered myself with glory in recompense to Abraxis by running the "Give him a Goblin" contest, but I still owed Axt something - and he had requested a painted zombie.  Originally the plan had been to paint him a zombie fan of my undead blood bowl team - but clearly after such a long time that plan was not motivating me.

I finally decided to just bit the bullet and get some zombie figs (warlord games I think?), hoping that would motivate me - and it did!!  As I put them together a brilliant plan started to develop and I would paint fans of my undead blood bowl team - US!  Here is the first one, which is zombie me in Chelsea kit with a football.  I painted our names on the front of the base and used our online nicknames for the back of the jersey.
zombie Tristan
I built up around the base attached to their feet to fit the square base with filler.  Each base was painted/flocked slightly differently.  Probably the hardest thing was getting the design on the football right.  Also those shoes are painted like my actual cleats!  I found the detail on these miniatures was not the greatest but hardly surprising when they are about $0.50 each!  Up tomorrow is Abraxis :^)

dual posted on Merry Mayhem News
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