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That's really cool. So much weight and presence in the model.

Alright!


AT tournament at Kuopio, Finland 5.-6.10.

I came, I saw, I conquered.

~10 players, five rounds and lots of fun for all even though I might have taken a bit rough list for the occasion given the synergy offered between my strong list, good tactics and somewhat sparse terrain which resulted from larger than expected attendance and stretching to have a fifth table operational. My Legio Favilla, the brown and baroque Ashen Gods in the pictures, took the field by storm and pounded the opposition to dust pretty convincingly. Though the tournament was more for fun and the prize Reaver kit was randomized at the end between all, I did end up getting it anyway for good measure biggrin.png

The event called for a 1750 point list, so I tried out an idea I had been brewing for a while: how about a reliable firebase combined with a mobile hammer for flank attacks to harry the enemy into bad position while they are under an unceasing bombardment that will hit them hard unless they compromise their own maneuver game by spreading out, except if they do that they come to my trap? Suits my fluff and playstyle, check. So, custom legio rules open and let's see how to crack some worlds.

- Splinter Legio (Fortidus) to swap a titan with roles intact for a Warlord lead Venator.
- Elite Magos for some reliability on my Hounds' reactors, because they are going to get hot at the aggressive front lines.
- Warchest (Earthbreaker Missiles) for another tool in the Swiss army titan set, cutting movement in half could be useful in missions like Retrieval or Breakthrough (part of the tournament pack).
- War Doctrine (Quake Shells), as we get 3 command points I needed this for one cheaper for the master plan to go off. The other two points will then go to Strafing Run so that every turn opens with a massive steel rain on the opposing side.

Basically I took two Venators, one lead by a melta-Reaver pushing a pincer move with a squadron of two aggressive forward Hounds (twinfeeeeernoooo, baby!) while the other had a Mori/Belicosa Warlord in the lead to lend artillery support from the edge of the battlefield in maniple with two separate Hounds that roam the field further up stripping shields and giving the Lord a bunch of opportunistic extra shots with the big guns, especially Quake. Okay, one was a double turbolaser doggie Shieldbaning last shields off here and there.

Here's the synergy:
Strafing Run causes d3 hits on every unit in a 4" wide line, which is rather nasty if one is infamous for rolling high. This combines with Quake Shells, that also tickle some shields here and there but more importantly they push engines around regardless of shields falling or not. That is rather strong and caused horrible damage on more than one list that did not realize the danger in their deployment, because Collisions are a thing. This barrage, which to reiterate, drops down every turn, taxes shields pretty nicely and allows the roaming Hounds to more easily activate their leaders' Venator abilities time and again without overreaching themselves. Melta, Belicosa and Mori shots were flying often enough that any slip in the defences was quickly exploited to deadly effect. It also helped that because I almost always agressively pushed my squadroned Hound pair to the fore, they had to be focused on and soaked fire for two or three turns before turning to fireballs which left my Reaver and Warlord almost untouched for most of the time, giving them time to brutalize their intended targets. If sprung on an unexpecting opponent or a newer player, this can snowball.

First game vs. Mortis, the Quakes smacked his Warlord so that it crushed all his Cerastuses to death and caused havoc in general to the extent that they conceded the game before turn two after some good rolling saw me almost cripple a Warhound in addition. Well, got time to take photos.

Second game vs. Fureans with lots of big guns but not that much volume to break shields. They focused my Warlord to death (only time in the tournee), but their Fortis maniple lost most of its benefits under the quake shelling and was eventually annihilated. Twinferno Hound licked their Warlord to flaming ruin, woo!

Third match vs. Gryphonicus that had taken only heavy engines, quickly reduced to a survival game as their forward Reavers came too close on Full Stride and my Hounds got the pounce to kill both. Their Warlords did stand until the end, though.

Fourth vs. Fortidus proper, again a match I'd basically won from turn one because Warlord and Reaver would have annihilated each other through double collisions but we agreed on the spot to let quake shell results of "Hit" stay still and rather have a good game. And it was, the one I enjoyed the most as it got tough when his 24" wide Dangerous Terrain minefields basically stopped my Hounds in their tracks and immobilized my midfield quite hard (and literally, there were lots of leg injuries in the midfield full of burning Hounds biggrin.png). It was nominally a Retrieval scenario for both, but by turn three it was clear NOBODY was going to get it off from the blazing inferno that was raging in the middle and it got quite close by kill point secondaries, but as his Warlord was a smidge too close for his carapace lasers he could not finish off my Reaver and the Ashen Gods carried the day. This game is the one on the snow table with everything burning at the Fortidus' Warlord's feet.

Final game vs. Ignatum, custom rules for extra repairs, extra shots and an overcharged +4 plasma weapon. The original plan worked like a charm: artillery Warlord took position and others maneuvered so the enemy was stuck in its fire arcs, bombs rained from the sky and Hounds took remaining shields down effectively enough that the Mori cannon punched their Reaver to its death against the Warlord behind it. On turn two there was a memorable nuclear blast on the left flank as I accidentally shot my own critically injured Hound to death, which exploded and killed the shooter, which exploded and killed the enemy Hound near it, which exploded and caused the imminent destruction of their Warlord behind it and... By turn three, they had a single remaining Lord on the field. The mission was to have lots of Scale near the center of the field, and even though I already had more Scale in my remaining Warhounds there, as a last act of spite my Warlord managed to punt theirs out of the scoring range with its Mori cannon, because of course it did. Brutality.

Immense fun, good people, awesome venue. If you're somehow stuck in Kuopio, check them out at the Bunker 34 smile.png

~50 pictures here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/H7qXX15gqgqbhnWe9

On the workbench, at last it was the time to bust out the chunky bois. First guy is a test subject to see how horrid the feet will be and is there any hope for alternative poses (surgery, here we come...) but man are these guys bulky. Aesthetically, I love 'em.

Some springs under the mortar, a skull or two and he's ready to stomp. I'll probably try to model a small flood rushing out of the broken chem-pool after painting for funsies.

Amazing battle shots. Congrats on the win!

Thanks, youwashock! Always a pleasure to see and photograph beautiful armies at each other.

On the building front, I cut the next one's leg above the knee and pushed the thigh cabling a bit to get more motion in its stride as it's crashing a store house. All sorts of caps are just the best for this scale's tactical rocks

Huh, got all four built and ready to gather dust unpainted for... a time.



There was a lot of chopping going on with some of those legs, like this guy who is sort of hopping on the building under its right foot. Both knees got cut, toes and armour bits were bent, hydraulics rebuilt and so on.



There's also a wounded little guy on the base here:

Adventures in smolscale continue, tanks galore!

They aren't yet ready, but I'm happy with how much got done in a day. Tomorrow it's correcting decals and numbers, weathering, battle damage and small details like headlights. Now my third mechanized can drive around without super-heavies

Rhinos look fantastic. I love the little guys milling around on the bases.

Thanks youwashock!

On the painting front, the damn tanks are finally finished. These blighters are just too cute for their own good.

Oh, I missed the Predators in the first photo. Very cool. These are some of the most lavishly painted Epic models I have ever seen.

Yea, I'm impressed - look at those teensy decals!

I'm flattered, lads.

Decals come from the AT Cerastus box, little skulls of just the right size. They miiiight even just fit the marines' pauldrons, if I want to go back at them and apply 100+ little skulls on. That would require some investing on the Knight front, though, so not to be expected on the immediate front

On somewhat bigger front, I finally painted the Blightspawn! Phosphex for everybody, we'll see how he fares against Custodes tomorrow (damn invulnerables everywhere!). It's nice to have the style down so it only takes an afternoon to knock one of these guys out.

Had a few matches versus my pal's Custodes and after splatting them left and right with the dreads my love for them was rekindled again. So here we go, another go at making the monopose horrors from BaC look like they're actually doing something. I got some second-hand pieces lying around, so a lot of chopping later this guy is shaping up nicely. Green stuffing and cabling to come. Funny sidenote, terminator lightning claws fit right in at the dreads fingertips to elongate them to claws

Not visible here, but I tore the ammo boxes from the fists and replaced them with death's head containers to represent something nasty. I'll probably paint some radiation warnings on the sides and use them as Soulburners as this merry box of murder thunders down the field.

Burner looks great, and that is one aggressive looking Contemptor. Nice job.

Thanks youwashock, amping up the aggression now that he's also stuffed up

Meanwhile, got the dread done and tried out my tube rollers finally. Lovely tools, those, though it seems to take some time to understand how much stuff they want to have put in at a time.








And while at it, I made another one

With BS 2+, 5++ saves and no minuses to hit from moving, DG Contemptors make for very nice shooty support so some anti-tank was in order. Didn't have that many lascannons hanging around currently, so I scratched a conversion beamer for the other arm instead. It might be nice and flexible against Guard, question mark? At least it was fun to make, which is mostly what matters.

Roight, report time! Clicking on the pictures gives a clearer view, this might get heavy.

My buddy, reasonably new to 40k, finally got his army
of rough and morally less than shining Custodian death
squads painted and what better way to celebrate it than throwing down. Them golden bois are so points heavy we ended up throwing some ~2200 points on the table as the XIV clashed against the lapdogs of the Master of Mankind.

My list, pretty much all the stuff I had painted sans one Rhino, was pretty heavy on (tactical) dreadnought armour while the Custodes brought mostly guard-trios spiced with some variant spears. Sadly, I still have to proxy my witches with vexillas for the time being before they get proper models done. Pretty basic CA18 missions, CoD terrain rules and go go it is.

First match, characters with intel score points by hanging near the bubbling tank in the middle.




Both sides held large chunks of reserves, Allarus and terminator squads rearing to jump into action in their teleport chambers.



Death Guard take the initiative and surge forwards to take the centre with heavy armour in the fore, Predator claiming one guardian in the opening salvo as everything on my right flank opens on the Vertus bikes, hurting the foolishly optimistic captain at their front before they dive in the cover of the trees.



There is a furious firefight on the right flank, with the human auxilia exploding to fine red mist in the middle as the XIV blow apart most of the bikes before their inevitable charge as the air cracks and terminators emerge on the field guns blazing. More appear north of the previous picture, catching the Custodes' line in an iron pincer.



Another flash at the backfield sees the meltaspears hit the field, led by captain Enkidu Akhianus. Though they unsurprisingly blast the opposing auxilias protecting the tank to kingdom come without breaking sweat, this proves to be a grave tactical error as they are too far away to charge the Predator and thus effectively misplaced for the rest of the battle.



At the main front, things heat up as the superior creations charge everything but are stymied by the noxious vapours emanating from the Destroyer (Blightspawn) in their midst. In the left flank guardians crash against the second line of terminators who stand their ground, as the Contemptor seizes the moment and rips the wounded bike captain, Setanta Hadrias, down from his saddle as he tries to impale it. Fighting with the fury of a dying man, even in death Hadrias strikes back and carves the ruthless machine open for the Vertus squad to finish off. The guardians next to the flaming wreck brutally murder all auxiliaries while the astartes witches (almost killing themselves in the process) rip them apart with eldritch energies in return as the line marines open fire and down the bikes as they fly through the burning Contemptor.



(Note the one brave mortal left on the battlefield under the bridge, surviving where others fall is the one true way to get inducted into the ranks of the XIV )

After this mutual destruction, there is a sharp clap of pain and the paintrain of heavy armour rolls up on the Custodes' line. Leviathan smashes through the recently arrived Allarus in its way, as do the terminators who deny death against everything thrown their way while the two astartes captains butcher captain Harkynn and his aide is soon overwhelmed in a wave of terminators without mercy or hesitation. The single remaining Custodes group sees there is no way to remedy this disaster anymore and is whisked away in a flash.




Ouch, that was a pretty thorough thrashing the golden bananas received in their first outing, taking mainly the cultists and one dread with them. But such things happen when trying the game out, so we immediately threw another one down.

Take two, aerial supplies floating down at the places marked with green dice. Imperials have misplaced their drop and our sneaky recon forces are trying to seize the opportunity for supply gathering. A rapid counterstrike of murder bananas is dispatched to deal with this annoyance.




The situation seemed a bit more favourable for this retribution strike Custodes were mounting to avenge the previous disgrace, but their low numbers would pose a real problem if they were to follow their orders instead of simply carving a bloody trail of vengeance through the astartes.



There is barely any shooting in the beginning, as the bikes swerve left hard intending to take the Leviathan out without getting shot by its horrendous guns and othersrush towards the middle objectives. Their eagerness betrays them, though, as the Custodes commander ponders why exactly did he not leave someone to take the first objective right in their lines. Predator opens fire and claims the first kill again, punching though a single guardian like paper as the marines advance forwards to catch all supplies that they can pocket before the imperial warmachine retaliates in force.



Captain Hadrias, miraculously recovered from the previous encountered, leads his praetors on their left flank and utterly crushes one tactical squad before swinging into the Leviathan's side while the right flank crashes into the Contemptor but is halted as the mechanical monstrosity defies their blades. With fitting contempt, the veteran inside burns with desire to take its pound of flesh for the destruction of its previous prison and rips apart some of its assailants, sucking their vital essences into its ever hungry reactor (from two wounds remaining, this thing managed to rip and tear its way way up in wounds through the battle ).




The bike brawl spreads as witches, a termie captain and others join in while the Predator escapes Allaruses that appeared behind it. Wounds abound for all as men clash, bikes killing the captain, Leviathan smashing Hadrias down again and general mayhem ensuing.



Another crack and a flash, as the terminators arrive to take the enemy line from behind. This prize is ours now, scrum. Amidst bolt fire and falling comrades, Iblim Dysion decides this area is lost and instead falls back to charge the Leviathan, which he then fells to avenge poor Hadrias!



On the backfield, brave auxiliaries rush to delay the golden terminators threatening their tank.



What's the worst that could happen?



Terminators swoop in on the left with the Contemptor, crushing captain Harkynn and his men though Phaeston Gordias puts up a remarkably long last stand with his Vexilla held high.



Eventually the Allarus punch their way through the last auxilias and rush the middle as the last bikes flew past to decimate the left tacticals only to meet their end in the Contemptor's hands.



Brutal and effective, the golden boys crack the tank out of the way to rush towards the objectives. That victory will however be short-lived, as the terminators in front countercharge the captain, shielding the sergeant behind them (who's too busy stuffing his bags with munitions). As captain Enkidu falls, so too do Iblim and the last Allarus, felled by foul sorcerous powers amidst the broken forms of astartes engines. No more than a singular Custodian is left watching the carnage, jaw tight and vexilla clutched in hand, as he too is blinked away from a bitterly lost skirmish.



Phew, a bit tighter match this time as the bikes absolutely destroyed everything they charged (on my turn, too, the buggers!) and the first points for anyone were scored on turn three as the objectives kept moving and slipping from anyone's grasp. As the game went on, it however became clear that the purely golden boys simply didn't have the numbers to sit on any objectives while exerting any force further down as my terminators relentlessly drove them in front of them, claiming ground as they went. We'll see how things change, when he tunes this group with an allied slavegroup of AdMech support and gains more experience on the field. Good show, if a bit of a bloodbath when lines closed

Also, a fit of painting! More Contemptors and testing things with chipped steel-nmm finished in a day.

Great reports! Custodes vs Death Guard is much more entertaining to read about than the usual tournament-level reports I typically read (i.e. Eldar flyers and NuMarine netlisting ) ...

Really dig the claws on your Distraction Contemptor, and the dynamism you've added to his old plastic derp pose

Thanks Boss! Glad you liked them, always fun to scribble something for posterity.

The claws were kinda serendipitious, as I just out of curiosity tested if the terminator claws would fit in the dread's fingertips. Might happen again, if I come across a fourth one cheaply enough at some point. The idea of a melee dreadnought spewing flames and radiation everywhere as it crashes about is just too appealing not to make more of these.

He's naturally going to die as the first thing this weekend, I bet, as the Echoes finally try their hand against the Primaris...

Great painting on the Contemptor. Solid BR, too.

Thanks, youwashock

Some Titanicus after a while, too. I finally got motivated to get some terrain painted as there's an upcoming convention nearby and I will not demo games on a substandard board, damn it! So, here's where we're at after three days of furious brushbuckling (apologies for terrible lighting):





It's all about this quality, two or three layers of grey with brown glazes and lighter edge work everywhere as drybrushing just ain't doing it for me:




















Also a bunch of bunkers, silos and storage units made with Epic in mind as well as finally, some pools! Water features are something I always like seeing on battlefields but that are often absent.

Great terrain, please put up pics of your table when it's done. I'd love to see what you consider 'standard'.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Great terrain, please put up pics of your table when it's done. I'd love to see what you consider 'standard'.

I'll try to take some on the weekend. My little Epic guys will also be running there as scenery to make it a bit livelier for the con-goers

And to bring some life among the industrial buildings, some defensive works and brave souls manning them:

Wow. Those gun emplacements are works of freakin' art.

Thanks youwashock! Bringing some life to the urban greyness.

...and more greyness.

Roight, proper pics from the last week's hurdle coming together at the demonstration table!


I went to Tracon Hitpoint, a small gaming convention at Tampere, and demoed some 7-8 games of AT over the weekend. Lots of folks came to see and compliment the visual display, some quite convinced they might buy into the game too after seeing it in action. A resounding success, almost as grand as Edax Rerum's heroic action in one game where I managed to first in a single volley of bolt and plasma to kill a Hound from zero to silenced with four criticals, next turn run under a Reaver's shields and do the same thing to it AND survive to tell the tale even as the third opponent tried to avenge its comrades but only managed to take Edax to three crits on its legs. Brutality


I went with a Reaver + 2 Hounds on both sides, as three moving parts are required for proper tactical decisions on the field, games took between 1-2 hours depending on the players. Felt good, will do again, though next scenery projects will include ruins and glowing craters too. Some height for Warlord LOS-blocking also required, though for demos this setup worked very well. Some hard blocks, lots of -2 and difficult terrain to tackle.


These pictures really benefit from you clicking them larger. Hope you enjoy them too.

Really good looking setup. The chem pools are fantastic.

Thanks, youwashock!

I agree, they turned out real nice for being simple plastic lids painted green and plastered with water effects. It's nice to have options like that on the battlefield, too: doesn't block sight or movement, but running through slows you down and might melt legs off from your engines. Letting players choose their own poison if push comes to shove is always fun.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The Epicalypse continues, now with more minisuperheavies as the 10th Bavarian rolls out in support of the XIV