Painting Challenge: The Ash Guard (Dire Avengers) pt. 1



Got started yesterday at trying to complete my challenge of getting my Elthrai Warhost painted. I had already some of the Dire Avengers in varying stages of completion. I was able to completely finish one, get another to the step of only needing basing, and three more needing only final washes, detail work and basing. So almost got half of the first squad done one day into the challenge. Boo ya. I am pretty pleased with how they came out. I wanted to do something different from the standard Aspect Warrior colors, atleast for my DA, as they are my beloved models in my army. I wanted them to embody the fluff behind my army, which the short version is an Ulthwe Force upon an Ash world. So I did a Codex Gray base coat and applied several layers of Badab black wash to darken the gray and add the dirty sooty look of fighting on an Ash world. With the wraithbone aspects, I did a bleached bone base and applied one to two washes of Devlin mud to add the desired rough bone look. The crest is a base of Scab red, one wash of Baal red, one wash of Badab black and dry bush of blood red. Most gems are just base blood red to be a sharp contrast to the darker colors. Sadly I am still working on getting gems to have that layered/multicolored effect that you see in most GW gems. Hopefully today I will get the rest of these five Dire Avengers finished and started on the last four plus Exarch. Here is a close up of the one completed and one lacking basing.



The Warhost - A Painting Challenge

Despite being uniform, Naked Plastic Gray makes a poor army scheme.

I woefully admit that despite my long time playing this game I have never had a fully painted army, save my very first army. When I first went to the local game story to inquire about DnD groups I saw a game being played on a table and went to observe, that game was Warhammer 40k. Being a fan of real time strat games I almost instantly fell in love with this game. Despite neither of the armies I observed were painted I got this notion that an army must be painted to play with it. So after my 3rd ed space marines battleforce showed up at my door I frantically got to painting 1500 pts of SM. Now I can't say how I managed that feat  but I got them assemebled and painted in that time, with the only real thing I got from that week of furious painting was a permanent copy of the dialog of StarShip troopers embedded into my brain as I set the movie to loop while I painted.

Now granted that many of the models were poorly put together, flash was rampant, and the paint was caked on to the point where my 'Arch  Angels' were more akin to a marshmallow with a splash of black and red on them than Space Marines. None the less I was pleased with it, then came my first game which my opponent was quite surprised I had painted a whole army in the span of a week. However a majority of the local gamers, which sadly consisted of mostly d-bags and TFGs, completely debased my paint job saying for the most part it would be better if I had simply thrown them in the microwave with an aerosaul can and played with the mis colored mush than what I put on the field. That statement coupled with the fact that I did not know the rules had a profoundly negative impact on me when it came to the game. Looking back on those days now I just shake my head as most of those that insulted my first army had the same army scheme my Eldar have now, Uniform Naked Plastic Gray. Where I am going with this little tale is that after that army I never again tried to paint my armies, because I always felt that I would not be able to paint well enough to truly do the models justice.

However after joining in with a new gaming group for a couple of years and slowly painting little things to increase my skill and confidence my local gaming club, Unbroken, has set a painting challenge out for this month. My pledge was to get my two large DA squads and my Seer Bike squad painted before the first of May and a hopefully a majority of my whole army painted by a tournament on the 20th. This will be the first time I have ever pledge to get things painted, hopefully this will keep my motivated to paint and finish my Eldar. I'll post WiP as I get them.


p.s. Stevo from Tainted by Xenos won the Bash at the Barn this past Saturday, Congrats to him and go Unbroken!

Of Mechdar and Shenanigans

Nothing says Awesome like Rerolls!

    Got another game in with my Mechdar this last Saturday at the Battlebarn. I have to say it was by far one of the best games I have had in a long time. It was a 2500 pt game vs Space Wolves. Normally I don't like to play games above 2k as I feel that the higher you go the more abusive deathstar units you can throw out and that extra 500 pts is just a perfect niche for one. With a 2500 pt tournament next weekend alot of the local guys are wanting to get in some practice for it so I figured I would just throw together a 500 pt squad ontop of my normal 2k list. I chose to build an Eldrad plus 9 warlock buddies squad. Oh... My... God.. what that squad did to the SW. I didn't even use the 6 destructors in that squad either, just mainly assaulted.

Here is my normal 2k List:

The Elthrai Warhost

HQ:

1x Farseer - Runes of Witnessing, Runes of Warding, Spirit Stones, Eldar Jetbike; Doom, Mindwar, Forturne

1x Warlock Unit

    3 x Warlock - Eldar Jetbike, Destructor

    1 x Warlock - Eldar Jetbike, Singing Spear, Embolden

    1 x Warlock - Eldar Jetbike, Enhance

Elite:

1 x Fire Dragon Squad (5)

     1x WaveSerpent - Spirit Stones, TL S-Cannons

Troops:

1x Dire Avenger Squad (9)

    1 x Exarch - Shimmer Shield & Power Weapon, Bladestorm, Defend

    1 x WaveSerpent - Spirit Stones, TL Brightlance

1x Dire Avenger Squad (9)

    1 x Exarch - Shimmer Shield & Power Weapon, Bladestorm, Defend

    1 x WaveSerpent - Spirit Stones, TL Brightlance

1x Dire Avenger Squad (7)

    1 x Exarch - 2 Avenger S-Catapult, Bladestorm

    1 x WaveSerpent - Spirit Stones, TL S-Cannons

Heavy Support:

1 x Fireprism - Holofields, Spirit Stones

1 x Fireprism - Holofields, Spirit Stones

1x NightSpinner - Spirit Stones

    This has been the basic template that I have been playing with, it has changed slightly a few times to test different units or upgrades but thus far this load out has been the most successful. In the game I recently played against the Space Wolves I just switched gave the WaveSeperent that used to belong to the small Dire Avenger squad to the Eldrad Squad of Doooooommm. I kept the now foot DA squad in reserve and hoped they would stay there for most of the game. I have to say having this been the first time I have played Eldrad in a long time his Divination ability is just nice. The set up was two obj, one in each deployment zone, and I put my obj directly across from his and deployed my bikes, the two full DA squads beside them and a Fireprism pretty much surrounding my obj and a staggered line of the rest of my forces stretching out to the other side of my deployment and table edge. As expected the SW player depolyed his LR with Deathstar, and 2 Wolf lords on Thunder Wolves with wolf packs around his obj and directly infront of my forces on my obj. He depolyed his LF squads in a similar staggered line across his deployment to mirror where my tanks where and a razorback in the middle to go where needed close to the second Wolflord squad. Knowing ahead of time of Eldrads Diviniation I had hoped he would build up his forces close to my build up and when it came time to roll I lucked out and rolled a five so I was able to completely redeploy the forces around my Obj and place them near my other table corner across from his weak flank.

I left some the one of the DA squads to hold and harass things coming towards my obj. The game started out real well with my Nightspinner hitting directly one of his Wolf lords and killing a good handful of his wolf shields but the real kicker was pinning him! The first fireprism knocked out the razorback and the second killed a few of the wolf's in the second wolf lord squad. The rest of my shooting wasn't as effective with the Bright lances failing to do anything agains the LR and the rest of my forces going full speed towards his weak flank and the long fangs. The SW turn saw him rushing towards my Obj and shooting at my tanks but unable to do any real damage as most were glancing and were unable to shoot results. The second turn was the true defining moment in the entire game. Apart from my foot Da coming in when I didn't want them to the shooting in my phase was about avg but it was the fact that I wiped out the rest of the pinned wolf lords woves with my Nightspinner not only causing the wolf lord to be pinned again but causing them to take a break test which he failed and ran off the board. To which I jested before he rolled the second pinning test and break test, Beware the Silly String! To which after I pantomimed "Its in my beard, its in my beard!!" So for everyone who is struggling against SW I have found their bane, Silly String.

Good for parties, pranks, and keeping away the Wolves of Fenris.

The rest of the game went well for me baring a turn or two of really good shooting by the SW. I completely swept everything he had in  his depolyment zone, which included his two wolf scout squads he decided to have come in on his deployment to try and reinforce. Which brought me such joy to have made them deploy like normal people. Also it was fun to watch his LR and Termie squad inside start to come back to his Obj to only run into a solid wall of Eldrad, his squad, my Seer Bike squad and promptly reembark and turn around and head back to my obj which by this point had two gunless tanks flying around it to contest. Even though it went to turn 7, a usual bad thing for Eldar, and the last two turns having each of the two contesting tank taking about 20 glancing hits each, the holofield roll 2 dice take the lowest made my opponent clench his jaw and fist in frustration, and cursewords abound. To which I must admit again tickled me greatly. In that final turn it saw my Eldrad squad and Bike squad assault the remaining forces on my Obj and my two contesting tanks flying around and a DA squad sitting on his obj for a Solid Win for the Eldar. After all was said and done I still had a good 75% of my army left with the SW only having 3 things left on the board. Good times was had though probably only mainly by me especially when I failed all but two of my saves on my Seer Jet squad and then picked up all the failed dice and rerolled cause of fortune and made everyone.

Forgeworld.

I apologize for the absence having been lost in the warp known as ASP.net projects I have returned and boy was this weeked productive. Being a victim of cronic laziness that big beautiful str D slinging death machine set in its pretty little Forgeworld bag for about a year now. I can't tell you really what possessed me to finally dig it out and go through the process of putting it together but I started out with the simple goals of just putting its legs on its base. Now as a long time hobbyist superglue + skin + shaving of said skin is a well known and accepted tradition, however.... when it comes to my man beard that crap is off limits. It was on that woeful day that I had to shave part of it to be rid of a jump pack exhaust port that had lauched out of my fingers richocheted into my chin pelt that it became personal. Long after the legs were pinned into place and glued to the base I was trudging away at getting this bad boy finished.


But then in the majesty of the moment I glued the last piece into place, that devil upon my shoulder whispered dreadful words into my ear. When will you ever use this? That got me thinking, I like most people who play Warhammer 40k look at the forge world and see pieces that make me go oooh and ahhh and entice us when we have money to purchase said pieces. Anyone you ask in this hobby about some new hotness in Forgeworld will agree that its cool or say that they are not into it etc etc. but when the subject is brought up to play with said piece most people seem to take a step back and say well they don't play with forgeworld stuff/rules. While I can only speak for the local gaming community I wonder why that is? If we can agree on FW pieces are cool then why do we always seem so resist to try these out. I know the general consensus is that FW rules are usually far from balanced, but if you go to any 40k forum you will find that exact same description for dozens of entries in dozens of codices.  How are FW all that different? Granted their rules are printed in a different book from the Codex but how is that greatly different from the various flavors of Space marines they all seem to adhear to a similar template yet just have different options at different costs with each of their rules in a different book.

Now before anyone starts to cry out well they are play tested and balanced I would just like to mention again about the whole balance/fair issue that was posted above. In the end its really based upon everyone perception and opinion yet even I fall into the masses that agree FW stuff is cool yet are very resist to play with it. One day though I hope that my lovely Titan gets throw down on a table and make some people believers in the might of the Eldar. Until then it would seem he gets to lord over the rest of the mini's on the table.

Bringing a Scalpel to a Knife Fight.

Sadly the pic I posted in the last post would have worked much better for the this topic but alas I did not forsee this conversation. This topic came up earlier today while talking to The Grizz about Stevo's uncertainty on the playstyle of his Dark Eldar. The Grizz's rough description was "He hates the feeling like he has to play gay and fly around and shoot stuff before assaulting instead of just charging in." To which I replied "Thats Eldar, they bring a scalpel to a Knife Fight."

Eldar units are specialized for the most part in performing one primary role, Dire Avengers -> Shooting, Banshee's -> Close Combat etc,etc. Given the right circumstance they can perform their primary tasks quite well. But given the right circumstance, while the banshee's are queens of close combat charging into a thirty man strong orc mob is not going to turn out as well as one would hope. But charging banshee's into a squad that has been softened up by some of our shooting support units or Farseer powers the outcome can be completely different.

Playing Eldar one of the first facts that you must come to grips with is that you are most likely going to be out numbered by the enemy be it in tanks, troops etc. There are ways that the Eldar can out number their foes but in truth when this usually happens the opponent has highly skilled and tooled out choices. While the Eldar boasts some of the most specialized troops in the game they are not the singular best. Other armies can turn out things that the Eldar have no direct counter to, Thunder Hammer Stormshield Termies come to mind. Eldar Units seem to sit at a nice middle ground as for skill and pts cost with usually a rule that gives them an advantage at a right circumstance. Such as Banshees on the charge etc.

Pound for pound the Eldar cannot go toe to toe with equal pt cost troops specialized in the same thing your Eldar troops are specialized in for long on an open and even field. Our stats are just not designed for it, while having a good WS and great I stat our strength toughness and medium to weak armor save means battles of attrition will almost never go in our favor. So you have to play in a manner in which you choose the battles where you have the most favorable advantage. Be it ones the opponents open up for you or ones you create yourself.




While this may sound weird I actually enjoy this fact that my troops did not win because they had super human stats and great armor or overwhelming numbers but struck with percision and overwhelming power. While I will admit it is fun to wade into a nice big blood bath and see who comes out the victor those are just not the fights the Eldar should enter, we are a dying race after all. While your opponent might have some choice words or sigh about you avoiding combat with an obvious assault oriented unit or army remember that once your army starts to take damage the synergy and cohesion of your army breaks apart quickly. This brings me to an important point, our units do not do well alone, yet when working together as one unified entity they can be utterly amazing, like a symphony of destruction and pain, with you as its orchestrator.

Eldar Trickery.

Fritz from Way of Saim-hann has used these words many times in his Youtube bat reps, Eldar Trickery. In truth I don't think there is any more accurate way to describe the very spirit of the play style of Eldar than those words. At the very core of our army is based the common notion of bending or out right ignoring some of the fundamental rules of the game. This was much more prevalent in the 3rd ed days when our tanks could move shoot during their move and then finish their move. While some of those curse word inducing silliness is gone there is some of it that remains.

While Fluff does not reflect rules I think the essense of an ancient and enigmatic race is represented well in the regards that we can do things that few if any others can. While I do have my criticisms about our current Codex all in all I am enjoying pulling shenanigans upon my opponents. I know what your thinking. "Elthrai, your just telling us, great and powerful almighty shenanigan wielding Eldar players things we already know." or in the case non eldar players. "Durrrrrrrrr pointy ear fairies durrr... I like power armor durr." ;)

But I ask you, what does Eldar Trickery truely mean? I have defined it above as what it means in a sense to the army and somewhat to the game in the regards to rules.  But in truth it goes beyond that, beyond the codex, and the rulebook, to the players themselves. While I strongly do not advocate any kind of psychological warfare upon your opponent to gain advantage in a game with little plastic men and fickle d6. An effect still occurs, The Eldar Army as far as I have seen has been the one most people cock their heads to the side and ponder what crazy tricks is going to be pulled out of its hat. The reason being is the Eldar follow closely enough to the standard formula and rules that people get a base sense of what will happen yet that complete uncertainty of the 'trick' that is coming. While the game and rules are based around two armies battling each other when you boil it right down it is two players playing against each other and that uncertainty can affect the actions and tactics of said player. Does this give you an advantage? *Shrug* Maybe.

What ever affect it does have the one I enjoy the most is being able to completely say something off the wall about some upgrade or combo I have worked up with my Eldar. For example I told Stevo once that my seer council had purchased all Ctan weapons as upgrades. Stevo cocked his head to the side and said "No way." but his eyes narrowed and his tone spoke more of his thoughts of ... Seriously... While such things are completely absurd the effect of Eldar Trickery is strong enough to give them a moments pause and wonder if it is just another trick in our hat.

Lions, Tigers, and Brightlances Oh My!

My what wonderous webs we weave. To my infinite shame I must admit it have just recently returned to the Glorious Eldar. Due greatly in part of reading http://saimhann.blogspot.com/ often. I had shamefully hidden by the wonderous kool-aid of Sanguineous praying that a new codex was on the horizon. Though I still love the kool-aid and The Sanguinor I felt a calling to return to the rightful shenanigans that had carried me through most of my time with 40k. Accepting that Foot Eldar/Starcannon spam lists of the past were just not going to work in this new edition of Mech craziness and having Stevo's Nob bikers ramed through my teeth and out my cinnamon hole more than once I turned to Seer Bike Council and Mechdar.


First Impressions:

Holy Jesus.... The Seer bike squad can take fire like no other of our pointy ear pals. The last game I played with them against a Space Marine player one turn he dedicated a TFC, ten rapid firing sternguard, las plas razorback, and a tac squad with a missle launcher and a tac squad with plasma cannon firing at them and after all the dust had settled and the saves rolled my Farseer suffered only one wound and the rest of the squad untouched. I can only really say one word to sum up that caused the most hair pulling, curses of a deeply pornographic nature, and mindless animalistic noises.. Rerolls. That squad would have probably died three times over if it had not been for Fortune.


The NightSpinner:

I have read alot of negative things about this ugly duckling of the Eldar world. The In-tar-webz general consensus is they are for the most part completely useless. However let me share with you my experiences with it. The very first game I used it was in a cap and control against the Dark Emodar with Vect. Now I have seen what Vect can do to people in clost combat. Let me tell you my poor Autarch was not looking forward to facing him in a fight. But being a master of strategy and tactics he changed into his brown pants and ordered all guns to open fire. Following the usual trend my Fire Prisms completely scattered off, then atlast came the firing of the NightSpinner. Placing it where it would hit two transports and with some luck hopefully down one and atleast make the other take a dangerous terrian test, well unlike the FP it hit on the scatter yet failed to glance Vect's transport. Thinking it had no chance with a Str 3 to even touch the paper mache armor 10 of the venom I remembered yet another lovely word.. Rend. Laughing to Stevo at the odds of that actually happening to his Venom I proceeded to roll said six then follow it with a five. "Well Bolly Sir." I said as I got a pen, "Well it is a negative one for being ap -" to which Stevo replied "Its open toped." Rolling a base die on the dmg chart I was hopeing for at best an immoble yet rolled a 6. Good times to be had for the Nightspinner. Yet better was still to come in the following turns knocking out Vects transport and causing a few Incubi to die to dangerous terrian and the rending hits of the web. But the greatest moment, quite possibly the moment I feel in love with this ugly duckling of a tank, was when I hit Vects squad and wounded Vect himself. Confident in his two up invul save Stevo rolled the die and it came up one... There was a moment of silence. Followed by a question. "Does Vect have Eternal warrior?" to which the answer was a no... Praise be the Eldar Gods! So with a performance like that it warranted to be taken in future lists and thus far performed well for its points.