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And for all you AdMech fans... here's a little video from my favorite fire arms historian... showing off a real Jezail!

Loving the mini battle reps Gitz, keep 'em coming!

Wonderful battle report, looked like it was great.

Please do more in the future.

Thanks Stormwall, I'll try.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Actually have some work to show you. Like... almost *real* work... almost.

Having some games under my belt, I wanted to get my two infantry squads (rangers and vanguard) up to full strength and with the proper weapons (read as "plasma culverns"). So having 4 useless arquebii ranger figures, I re-based them, cut the gun down a bit so they'd blend in with the squad more and switched out two of the for plasma guns. I also intensified the glow on the plasmas so they'd be easy to identify on the tabletop. You'll note that one of the plasma gunners is a vanguard (painted by Nerdy). He's on loan to the rangers as I'm too darn lazy to paint up a whole ranger just to change the gun.




This next batch of vanguard were obviously painted by Nerdfest09. This time I converted and extra sergeant I had him paint for some reason back into a normal trooper (the guy all the way on the left), then added glows to all the weapons simply to make them easier to play. Red for "rad", blue for plasma... and green for anything else (alpha's pistol). The unit is still one guy short so Nerdy's getting the last one to paint up shortly.




So... nothing really exciting. Just some tweaking. Good to be back fooling around with my models though.

Nice, the glows really makes the different types stand out.

Thanks s_a. And thanks for the continued support. Nice to have a comment on the blog once in a while.

Actually didn't see your last update to be fair.

I didn't mean to complain. It's not like I've posted much in the last 9 months. Just appreciate the support from all of you who still read and post.

No worries, good content deserves a comment. Interesting vid to.

Have a tournament tomorrow. Here's my army (war convocation) on a new display board made by Cam that I'm painting up. Definitely still a work in progress. Going to try and get an astropath painted tonight... we'll see how that goes. Otherwise I'll just add in a couple of extra vanguard to make up the points.

That knight is insane. Awesome. Great job on the tech priest. The whole army is impressive, great stuff.

Said it before that is an insanely beautiful army. The glow you added earlier takes it up a notch further, not sure how, it was already a 10!

Thanks guys.

@Cam: I used a really simple technique for achieving glow. Didn't even drag out the airbrush. It worked fine though so who am I to complain.

Just as a reminder that this is my only army that was painted mostly by others. Just needed it done.

Knights: painted by Ramos Asura
Most of the rest: painted by Nerdfest09
Display Base: built by Camkierhi
Rangers, Infiltrators & basing: painted by me

So, kind of a collaborative project involving a lot of my friends... which is pretty darn cool.

Nice looking force, to all who helped paint it.

Good luck at the tournament!

I love how so many pieces painted by different people with their own tricks can come out so coherently.
Must be all those years of practice for the Adepticon Team tourney.

Brief tournament report... sorry, no pics. It was crowded, competitive & fast so there really wasn't the opportunity.

Game 1: Friend of mine crushed me with two knights and 8 grav destroyers in his war convo. I made 3 mistakes right off the bat and my dice were completely dead the whole game. I think I had 2 figures left when we ran out of time.

Game 2: Eldar opponent crushed me with two wraith knights... but somehow we tied across-the-board. He would have tabled me in two more turns... maybe one. I would have been tabled already except he had two units that tried to deep strike onto the same, very safe spot, right after one another that mishapped into oblivion.

Game 3: I tabled a Salamanders player (T5). He was winning until T3 when I managed to kill his knight, then everything went my way.. He said he'd never seen anyone roll so many sixes.

Painting:
My army tied with Thing 2's army for best painted, so they gave it to him. (The lead judge pulled me aside ahead of time to let me know.) Thing 2... unlike me. had played really well and had 2 wins on the day. He was ecstatic (and he does have some of his own work in on the army... so he's got some ownership in the painting process). It was a pretty big monetary prize... enough to bring home a shiny new harpy for his Nidzilla list. I couldn't be prouder of him. he conducted himself very well throughout a very long day while playing a non-competitive army vs a bunch of competitive adults (who were dropping F-bombs constantly... really guys... is that necessary??). We played next to each other all three games (just worked out that way), which was really cool.

Pub Quiz: I think I got 1 question right, but got a second point by answering "Richard Gere" to one of the questions which tickled the TO. Funny thing was about 30 seconds after turning in my quiz, I thought of the actual answer for the Richard Gere question... so I suppose it all worked out.

This was a new store for me... little over an hour away. Really nice bunch of folks, both in players and store ownership. Definitely have plans to go back. Plant Chaos in Ft. Atkinson WI... thank you!


Found a pic of Thing 2's army in action!

Well done. Congrats to Thing2 for his win. Nice to see the Nids in Action.

Well done to Thing2, Sounds like a great day was had by all. Nids look good on the field.

Ended up 10th out of 21. Thing 2 came in 9th!

it's still good that you got a bit more experience with your Mech. So upper 1/2 is good.

Yep, that's true. Practice makes perfect.

Have a game tomorrow night at 1500 pts. We'll see what I can do with a really pared down list.

As I've yet to get into the gaming side of things, I feel the best painted result is much more important. Well done to both of you.

Thanks Dr H!


I've got a little 1500 point game set up for tonight. Thought I'd try something goofy and non-war-convo-like. Try taking advantage of all the fun little formations you can have that I can never take to tournaments because somehow limiting the number of formations prevents really powerful builds and balances the game.

Start out with some basic mechanicus...

Cult Mech Cad:
HQ: Dominus
TP: 3x grav destroyers
TP: 3x arc breachers

Skitarii Maniple:
6 rangers
6 vanguard
1 dragoon
1 dragoon
1 AA dune crawler
1 S10 blast dune crawler

Space Marine Allies:
HQ; tech marine
TP: 5 marines in pod, melta
HV: TFC

Inquisitional Representative:
Astropath, L1

Inquisitional Representative:
Astropath, L1

Inquisitorial Representative:
Coteaz

Assasinorum:
Callidus assassin


Coteaz pods in with his marine bodyguard. Astropaths with divination buff the heavy servitor squads. Assassin does her thing. Techmarine and Dominus could play multiple parts... either pod it or hang out near the vicinity of the two dune crawlers keeping them in good repair.


Should be amusing and unorthodox at the very least. Opponent is bringing Necrons, but I have no idea what variety.

Lots of bases covered.
Look forward to the game update.

Today's battle report is brought to you by.... the ghost of Spuds Mackenzie!




1500 point game last night. Didn't know what I was facing... but it was supposed to be "casual" AND "competitive". Since my opponent is a regular Tau player... I assumed I was supposed to be casual and he was going to be competitive. In any case, I threw together that goofy list above, just to try things out. I don't have a lot of pics of the game... but I'll try and string the few I have together as best I can.

Mission: Big Guns Never Tire
Deployment: Hammer and Anvil
Table: Winter themed, mostly ruins and LOS-blocking rocks with mid-sized LOS-blocking rock in the center.
No night fight.
Necrons go first.


My opponent Andrew had a new Necron army he was trying out. Not optimized, but not bad either. Had the two main formations giving everything resurrection protocols. Unusual bits were a monolith & 2 units of flayed ones. In deployment, we both set up across our short board edges taking advantage of whatever cover we can find. I deploy to try and make deep striking difficult as he's the flayed ones and the monolith coming down.

Part of the experiment is finding a good use for the Astropaths as I'm kind of thinking I'm going to make them a permanent part of the army. Even at L1 it gives me back the psychic phase and two extra dice... Astropath #1 is escorted by the Arc Breachers, while Astropath #2 supports the TFC. I would normally have put one with the grav destroyers... but since I had Coteaz that was covered. BTW I'm guessing the two astropaths (old D&D figures) were probably painted over 35 years ago... so don't be too hard on me.

My astropaths seek the Emperor's light for guidance (literally... as they'd be casting prescience all day).




Pseudo-Coteaz wants YOU... to report heresy wherever you find it!



The Necrons lead with two groups of 4 or 5 scarabs which will be an immediate threat to several of my units (including vehicles) on turn 2. The warriors (save for the group sitting on their objective) move forward as does a small unit of wraiths and a Canoptic Spyder. As there is nothing really in shooting range... that's pretty much it.

Data from the Dominus overseeing the operations screams through the vox units built into all the AdMech's armor. "Eliminate the scarabs"... "Help is coming." Out of the sky a supersonic green streak plummets towards the planet's surface. Just before impact massive rockets decelerate the pod, and it lands with tactical precision in-between the two units of scarabs. The "help" has come in the form of the Mantis Warriors... lead by their tech marine. A short burst of code comes from the controlling Dominus through the vox... it can only be described as... a feeling of satisfaction.




The sudden roar and lurch of heavy, tracked vehicles is a startling new experience for the two astropaths who have never seen a battlefield before. Their alarm bearing on panic is so psychically palpable that it strikes Coteaz like a blow... and all three miss their opportunity to use their psychic powers. (Yes... I forgot that I had a psychic phase.) The entire army opens up on the two units of scarabs, and in spite of doing considerable damage... can't do enough to either to eliminate it (LOS considerations prevented me from concentrating my fire on either unit). Unfortunately, most of the scarabs were able to reassemble themselves. On the AdMech left, the two dragoons prepare to move over some ruins and charge in to finish off one of the scarab units. One vehicle moves into the ruin only to find that the footing is far too unsteady to make for a good charge. He is unfortunately... dangerously exposed at this point. The other dragoon wisely decides not to follow.

The Necron lord signals for his reserves to arrive, and two units of flayed ones answer. One erupts out of the ground in the AdMech right rear flank (white, armless unit at the very top of the pic).


The other however is subjected to an error in translation, and appears in the far corner of the Necron deployment zone... never to be seen again. (Whew!)

The Necron forces continue to advance down the AdMech left flank, threatening the drop pod that is securing the central objective.


Shooting ensues and the lead dragoon is destroyed. One unit of scarabs (2 left) charges the pod, the other (4 left) charges the Mantis Warriors. One marine exchanges his life for a swarm.


Everything in the mechanicus' deployment zone turns to fact the newly arrived flayed ones and give them a proper Admech welcome... which they do. The lone surviving dragoon moves to join the marines in assault with the scarabs. Having finished off the flayed ones, the dune crawlers turn back towards the Necron lines.


The Mantis Warriors (with the help of the dragoon) are ultimately successful in getting rid of the scarabs, though they eventually get gunned down by massed warrior fire. For a little group of 6 guys... they really made a mess of the Necron advance.


Unfortunately the other group of scarabs finally finish off the pod. Fortunately my Arc Breachers do their job as well on the monolith.


The Callidus came on in T3. She didn't really do much as Necrons are a very bad match up for her. I chose not to infiltrate her as I figured she'd just get gunned down.


In the end... we shot the livin' bejeezus out of each other. Center table with the all-important center objective became a death zone. The Necrons were in a pretty good position to take the center until my last two shooting phases... which were more vacuum cleaner like & eliminated the threat. The Necrons end the game considerably shot-up... but that doesn't matter in the final tally. They win by getting first blood... 5-4.


Hope you enjoyed it! I learned a lot. Think the two little psychers are going to have a permanent place in the army.

A cracking read as always! Almost makes me want to play 40k again.

Ah, we know you love the bat...

That sounds like fun, proper scrap. Love these Batreps, just as Graven said, makes you want to break out a table, great stuff.

Thanks Cam, glad to hear they can be a little inspirational.

Started working on the freshening-up of the two astropaths last night. Once I get a little further down the road I'll post a pic.

Really enjoy reading your batreps Gitz, always fun too see your armies clashing with someone elses. Your use of older models for the astropaths is a good one and I may steal that idea for my own.