Menoth!

Joey bs Menoth

Not Quite a Year Later...

That's right fools... D-9 is back on the internets. You know you've missed my particular brand of pithy hobby commentary... or at least some of my service-ably painted models. 

Well the good news is, I've missed blogging, so it's time to try to make the old valiant effort to post once again. So... what news from the Mark?

I'm a DAD: that's where the last 350 or so odd days have gone. My hobbying hasn't totally disappeared, but the time to write about it certainly did. My daughter is 15 months old next week and she is hands down the coolest thing in the world. 

WARMAHORDES IS STILL KING: Since last we spoke, I've played a lot of Warmachine. I rode the Cryx wave last year, taking Skarre and Denny to several tournaments. Some you win, some you lose, and sometimes you bring Venethrax as your second caster and wonder just how much you had to drink the night before when you made THAT piece of brilliant decision making. This year, I'm switching back to Circle for the foreseeable future. eBaldur and the Goat are my two lists of choice. So far, so good. 5-0 on the year. 

I'M STILL PAINTING: I painted 101 models last year. Lots of cryx stuff. Some random Cygnar and some Menoth for Joey Baltimore. This year, I'm starting off with more Circle while still churching out Joey Bs new army for him. Pictures shall come soon. 

PATHFINDER CONSISTENCY FINALLY ACHIEVED! Our Pathfinder group has been playing roughly every two weeks since May. I've had a ton of fun getting back into a consistent RPG campaign. We are running a modded Rappun Athuk from Necromancer Games and loving every terribly over the top minute of it. 

GUILD WARS 2: WoW is dead and gone. My wife and I are enjoying a very casual relationship with Guild Wars 2. We play, a lot, but don't take it super seriously. 

So that's that. Lots of other interesting little things in the last year, but they'll come out in the wash. In the meantime, I'm going to rev up the camera and take some pictures to share what I've been working on. 

Tournament Results

Well the tournament came and went. No repeat victory for D-9, but the GSHU team had a pretty successful day.

Round 1: Two flags, near and far. eSkarre faces off against pFeora. Let me start this battle report by mentioning that I don't think I've played against pFeora in at least two years, and then it was only once. Keep that in mind when I mention that most of my army died a fiery death in turn two. Even with that Skarre managed to score a point and thin some of his army before the judicator took it's meaty fists to her great rack and ended my round one a bit prematurely.

Round 2: I had a bye. I spent the time browsing our FLGS and watching other games. Curiously, only three hordes players in the 15 player field. Colosal/ Gargantuan representation included a Stormwall, a Woldwrath and a Judicator, plus my Kraken. I picked up the new Iron Kingdoms Urban Adventures sourcebook while I waited too.

Round 3: It never fails. Drive 15 miles, pay $10, play one of the guys I play every week. Ryan and I faced off in what looked to be a great victory for Ryan, but my sneaky Cryx-ian brain baited him to one side of the table while Skarre and the Kraken cleared the Great Bears and a Ternion off of the two objectives. The kraken wrapped its arms around the destroyable objective and tore it apart while Skarre got busy dominating the other objective. Ryan tried to get to me but it was too late; victory D-9... 5 control points to 2.

Round 4: Khador a second time. pButch again too... His army list was interesting. 2 Juggernauts, rifle corp w/ Joe, Yuri, a full unit of IFP (I think they were Black Dragons) and some support stuff. I made a hard push towards one of the control zones right away while pushing the bulk of my army towards his to see who would win the positioning contest. Turn three, he brought the Butcher forward to spell my incorporeal blood witches to death then moved the IFP in to protect Butch. I may have smiled evily at this point. I had a full unit of mech thralls, 3 blood witches, pSkarre and... oh yes, a kraken, all within threat of his IFP and caster. Skarre was sitting on 8 focus due to blood ritual the round before. Dark Guidance? check. Feat? check. Mechanithralls ripping through IFP? Yep. Kraken eating butcher? check.

All in all 3-1 isn't bad. All games were played with painted armies too, so good stuff.

Now on the painting table: Bloodgorgers!

Also, something new coming soon... keep an eye on these pages!

Steamroller 2013: Year of Cryx Edition

"Blah blah blah... I haven't posted... blah blah blah... life is busy.... blah blah blah...."

Ok, now that THAT'S out of the way... Life has been hectic. This Dad thing is taking some getting used to, but a rhythm has began to appear. Sleep is for weaklings anyways...

Happy President's day weekend to everyone out there. My wife and daughter went to visit her parents for the weekend leaving me with a nerd weekend of legendary proportions. Tonight, Magic Sealed Deck, tomorrow Warmahordes Tourney.

My last tourney appearance ended with a first place finish. Hoping to make a repeat this weekend. I'm taking Cryx armies exclusively to any and all events until at least June, so here are my lists.

LIST ONE:
eSkarre: Theme Force Tier 4 35 points

eSkarre
-Slayer
-Deathripper
-Leviathan

-Min Satyxis Raiders+ UA
-Min Satyxis Raiders+ UA
-Min Satyxis Blood Witches+ UA

-Satyxis Raider Captain
-Satyxis Raider Captain

This list is fast. I should be able to jam most objectives and destroy the destructable bases very quickly while allowing eSkarre to use her battle group to tangle up any enemy heavies. If a collosal is possible this list will go for the feedback kill early on. Ideally this list won't see any Hordes' opponents.

LIST TWO:
pSkarre: 35 Points

pSkarre
Skarlock Thrall
-Kraken

-Max Mechanithralls
-Necrosurgeon and Stitch Thralls
-Min Satyxis Raiders+ UA
-Min Satyxis Blood Witches+ UA

Not as fast as list one, due to the loss of the captains, this list is built more for attrition. The raiders will jam early, and die early while the mech thralls and witches will work for objectives using Skarre's feat and the witches mini feat for additional survivability. The Kraken is there to move onto objectives and bring things down at range. 35 points really hurts this list as I have no arc node, but Skarre will become a much more mid field caster with blood rites and her feat.

Everything is painted and ready to rumble. I will post pictures and results tomorrow!

Happy New Year!

2013. In your face Mayans!
Happy New Year to one and all. I hope everyone had an enjoyable holiday. Good ol' D-9 was out playing a gig last night and is a tired papa this morning, even with a baby who slept straight through the night.

2012 was a great year. Many real life accomplishments and also many gaming achievements, but now it's time for that post everyone loves to read... the dreaded "NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION POST."

So, what does 2013 hold for me? I'm finding painting to be my best stress relief (short of being on the bike) so I hope to get a lot more done this year. My goals for 2013 (at least to start) take me back to my Cryx with...

1: A Kraken
2: 6 (more) satyxis raiders
3: a 2nd sea witch
4: 10 bane thralls
5: bane thrall UA
6: Tartarus
7: 10 bane knights

so that's 31 models to start. Hopefully that will be done by April or so. Work has already began on the Kraken.

Happy New Year!

-D9

Drow Retribution: Kaelyssa Tier 4

Finally got a few minutes to photograph the finished army. I'm only missing the arcanist. Enjoy!

2012 in Review

Greetings from a proud new papa! I've been off on paternity leave for the last several weeks and while actual time to hobby has been limited, time spent thinking about hobbying has not!

GAMING
2012 was a big hobby year for yours truly. Back in January, our gaming group started up a slow grow league for Warmahordes. I started with Grayle the Farstrider and went to work. Over the next few months I played a lot of games, branching out to other Circle casters, until finally winning a local Steamroller with Grayle and pKrueger. I also took eKaya to a tier list tournament where I definitely didn't win. Warmahordes continued at full tilt in the garage with gaming happening almost every week.

Pathfinder was the other game of choice as always. This year saw three campaigns played at various frequency. Our main group is currently three modules in to the Curse of the Crimson Throne adventure path and loving every minute.

I think I played one game of 40k in there somewhere...

Video games saw the end of several years of World of Warcraft, a short torrid affair with Diablo 3, an incredibly dissappointing run at Star Wars: the Old Republic and then a return to Guild Wars and migration into Guild Wars 2 which has died off with the baby's arrival as I've fallen back to xbox.

PAINTING:

In 2012 I painted 90 models. I'm pretty proud of that number. Lots of Circle Orboros models and a few Cygnar ending the year with my drow themed Retribution.

So... time for my Top 3s!

BEST GAMES OF 2012:

1: Pathfinder
2: Warmachine/ Hordes
3: Guild Wars 2

BEST NEW PRODUCTS OF 2012:

1: Stormwall: Cygnar Collosal
2: Guild Wars 2
3: Descent of Angels (Horus Heresy)

BIGGEST GAMING DISSAPOINTMENTS OF 2012:

1: Warhammer 40k 6th Ed.
2: Star Wars: The Old Republic
3: D&D Next Play test