New Book to Read: Blood Gorgons

Picked up a new book to read today, by Henry Zou titled the Blood Gorgons.

This book is part of the Bastion Wars series and so far has not let me down.

I never heard of Zou much until I really got into these books and I have to say he is a very versatile writer when it comes to him adding to this series.

Book 1: Emperor's Mercy is about an Inquisitor uncovering a plot and deception of a war with Chaos. An amazing book that was cat and mouse all the way to the end. I have always loved to read about Inquisitors and this book offered a new way to see how they operate and think.

Book 2: Flesh and Iron this was about the IG on a world they are trying to cleanse of Chaos. The IG regiment in this was very much "Swamp Rats" in theme using boats and light infantry for the most part to fight in a jungle environment. I won't spoil the ending but it shows that not everyone on the Emperor's side is good and just. A great IG book and added another layer.

Book 3: Blood Gorgons from the back is about the Blood Gorgons going to the defense of one of their recruiting worlds to save it from a plague of undeath. Their expedition is sabotaged and only one Blood Gorgon survives by the name of Barsabbas and must his his cunning to survive stranded and alone against an unknown enemy.

Looking forward to another of Zou's works!!!!!

This week in review....

Well, this week has had some mixed results. Some good, some bad...

The bad, well tried to replicate the paint job that I used on my IG vehicles. The Denab Stone and Gretchin Green. Ugh! Tried the uniform both in green and stone and the armor the opposite. The cloth looks better in Denab Stone but the Green is a little to be desired. Both to me look like crap and I am not happy with the colors. I am thinking of going to a darker brown and green, keep the vehicles a lighter stone color. Some of them is black for night fighting conditions, so they may be repainted in the deep future.

The positive stuff...

Added magnets to the Manticore so I can remove the missiles with each shot to keep track.

I had to shave down the nubs on the tracks and get the magnets to replace them in the fitting.

You may see some green paint...more on this next...

This is an example of how to properly setup your magnets.

I slap a little paint on the side that is about to be glued to the model.

This ensures the polarity is always the same for all magnets.

Shows a connection point of the missile, can barely see it.

Another view....again until they get removed you won't see them.

My converted buzzsaw for my latest koptor!

Front shot of the saw...

Better angle with more light...

The saw. Simple enough, take two ork chainswords, shave them down and glue them together.

Add one magnet and your done!

Da Ork Bomb! Converted from a flamer backpack from the IG.

Shaved the tank lines off and added a magnet. Small and simple that fits nicely.

Both side by side....

Side shot of the bomb. Once the spray hits the magnets you won't see it unless you look closely.

Product of a few lunch breaks this week....not finished but getting there...

Meet one of the Nobz....

Klaw 1 Biker Nobz, love him due to the skull plate and armor!

Shoter than the other Nobz he makes up with a bad ass chain whip!

Orkish Robocop on bike or just a Nob with attitude!

Robocops twin...

The Mad Doc, should be primered this weekend to add in.

Mad Doc Choppa!

Still have some other word to do on the bikes and they will be done. Have to touch up the warboss on bike next and then finish using green stuff to bulk up the legs on my older bikers....should top me off nicely as a full squad or just about. HEhehehehheh....

Milling over a few armies to perhaps take to a tournament in a few weeks, Not sure what yet, Demons I have never done but I would have to finish some stuff to be ready. Orks, I could add some or just go with what I got or borrow from Chris. IG has always been the classic old school of late and may be time for a change up again. Chaos has a slight appeal but I would have to get some vehicles ready for that. Demons, Chaos, Orks or IG pretty much is  my choices. Necrons are just not worthwhile enough to play in a tournament. Wolves and Dark Angels are not painted up yet.

2011 Cabanahammer

Cabanahammer was a great event for today! Many thanks to those that attended! Cameron for the beer, everyone for the drinks and food! Lee special thanks for the extra table and everyone helping out in general. I hope everyone had a good time, sounds like everyone did.

For those that do not understand what Cabanahammer is, this is the third year. I try to do this at least once a year where I live. We have a pool and cabana with bathrooms and a kitchen. When the weather is nice this is one of the best gaming experience you can have in my opinion. I ask everyone to bring something to add to the food and drinks. I always provide a meat and side dish. This year was hamburgers and hot dogs with pasta salad. We had chips, sour cream and onion dip, great bean dip and hummas along with cookies and a wonderful blueberry cheesecake. The weather was a nice 76 today with a light wind, no rain. Can't ask for anything more perfect.

Attending was a great group of gamers, each from veteran players to new players to the hobby .Lee, Lars, Rob, Joe, Andrew, Cameron, Chris and myself were the players. We had a great host of armies including:

• Orks (Chris swapped to balance one game)
• Dark Eldar (Lee)
• Ravenwing (me)
• Imperial Guard (Cameron)
• Tau (Andrew)
• Tyranids (Joe)
• Space Wolves (Chris and Rob)
• Chaos (Lars)

Overall a nice mix, no Necrons or Eldar was to be found. Actually, we should have had to have had an Eldar player but due to the flu he could not attend.

My dice rolling along with Lars was the top runners for "worst dice rolling" of the event. I scout moved my Ravenwing forward, sped into the lines of turn 1. I destroyed one Hellhound with a multimelta bike. The rest wiffed. All my plasma either missed, failed to do anything or STUNNED the same rhino over and over.

The second game against Lee was a total cluster. Night shields and the 5+ save just is rude! Can't shoot the turns I flanked on, he hid in the center, picked me off slowly and used the mission to cleverly bait the game for the win. Our game was over quickly, and we got to enjoy watching the other games.

I am dead tired, and I feel this is a good time to wrap up. Some famous line of this morning, "This is a hard lesson learned" in my haste I tried to make the sour cream and onion dip in the dish and had should have made it in another bowl and added it to dish later. Comedy at its finest.

My wife is tickled as I only planned to serve hamburgers but my wife encouraged the purchase of hot dogs. She was happy that only one dog survived the event and was a great pick to our shopping list. Imagine that from a vegetarian!

Link of pics:
http://s22.photobucket.com/albums/b313/patrickballinger/2011%20Cabanahammer/

Thursday Random Rants and Why I didn't work on my hobby tonight!

My magnet order came in the mail the other day and due to my Blood Bowl game, I didn't have time to open it till today. I was happy with the D21 round, the flat ones I was surprised how small they was, compared to the penny in the photo, I should have went up a size. Oh well, I can make these work for several projects. The D21s are great as now I can start working on my Terminators to allow me arm swaps. I just have to find more power weapons and extra shoulder pads. I will start asking on various boards for bitz to swap out otherwise I may have to order some. Not very expensive but saves money trading stuff....

Blood Bowl: GAH! This was perhaps my worst game in history. I forgot the camera and there isn't much to say. I played the Norse player last night, he was behind about 150k in value to my team and got some great perks. The sad part is his team really didn't need it and he had some great luck. my dice just sucked....nothing else can some it up. I usually pass most of my Regeneration rolls, not this time karma hits you like a freight train when it runs out. I had amazing luck with my team until last night. By the end of the game I had two players on the field, everything else was knocked out, injured or dead (I actually took my first loss of a player last night). The bad part is it was an expensive and experienced model, not just some lame cheap player. Oh well, I can safely say I am out of playing for the top dog of a league, even if I win all 3 of my games there is no chance in hell I could catch up. That's the breaks. I may look at another team, but the investment is the catch. I do have some Orks and Humans that I may examine. Orks I have always liked and this may be a good change of pace.

Cabanahammer is on the rise, a delay tonight put me behind so I will have to drop by tomorrow after work and catch one of the key people in my community to make sure the tables are out Friday night or Saturday morning. In either case I am not sweating that. Still have to pack up some stuff and do some shopping as well as cook the pasta salad and setup the burgers to grill. Figure I will have a late night tomorrow but it will be worthwhile. We are down a guy with the flu, so my friend Lee is trying to pick up a spare player to keep it even. Otherwise, I can sit out or play a larger army. One of the guys I am sure is goign to leave after the second game due to other obligations so, we will be back to an even format again. All will work itself out.

On to why I didn't do jack last night! Besides working all day, my wife and I come home after eating dinner to find glass scattered in our dining room, as I walk out to see what broke in the living room I find the coffee table top sticking up in a jagged edge and my wife's candle vase is shattered along with her other candle holder she got from a wedding we attended. What caused this you ask? A 50+ pound basset hound that thinks he is a cat. Was he hurt? No. How? I can only say he had a guardian angel looking out for him. Not a single scratch on him or the other dog despite all the glass about. There is no other reason why the table would have shattered like that unless weight was added, the table was close to the couch. Lesson learned, don't have glass topped tables when you own a dog that thinks he is a cat.

Pictures for your amusement.....uploading here is slow, so I put themon my photobucket account.

http://s22.photobucket.com/albums/b313/patrickballinger/Bassets%20of%20Chaos/

Book Review: Angels of Darkness

All I can say is Wow! I want to pick up my paint brush and get my Dark Angels going again! For a book by Gav Thorpe it isn't half bad. The story tells itself from two tales, one of Interrogator Chaplain Bores and the story of Astelan. The book alternates between the past where Bores interrogates and attempts to redeem Astelan of his past sins and learns some dark secrets of the Dark Angels unknown to him and lost to history. The second half is that past episode haunting him and the effects it has on him as he comes to understand the truths about the Dark Angels.

This was a great book that now posts another deadly bit to the Horus Heresy events about the Lion. Who really was the enemy at Caliban? Why did the Dark Angels, one of the best legions of the Emperor tarry to make it to defend their father? Perhaps the Lion was waiting to see who was the winner and declare his allegiance? The book offers some interesting views into the Dark Angel history and about the Lion, things you would not read in the other books about their psychology as this dips into the dirty secrets of the chapter.

I guess this is why I have always in some way respected the Dark Angels as they are not the "goody goody" Marines like the Ultramarines or some of the other chapters, there is that stain and shadow that follows them forever. Even so, what happens when they find all the Fallen? What then?

Weekend Wrap Up

Been a few days since I posted up anything. Been busy spending time with the wife, home repairs and doing a variety of things.


To start off the weekend I pushed out the Anthem Games 40k League Rules and sign up has started.


http://forums.anthem-games.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=3343


I tried to build a league format different from others, trying to bring in the elements of playing, painting and building the community. My hope is that I captured that and that I should be launching the Anthem 40k League Blog shortly that is going to be a great tool to post up League news, missions, leader boards, player blog links and much more.


Ordered 300 magnets from KC Magnetics (see my links). 250 D21's, these are great for backpacks, arms and more. The other is a long thin magnet that should be great got about 50 of them for mounts for guns and missiles for the Manticore. It will be great to be able to pop a missile off each time it fires to keep track of how many shots are left. The Vendetta can swap back to a Valk also.


Finally got around to putting squad markings on my Ravenwing, still need to touch them up but I put the photos on my photobucket account:

http://s22.photobucket.com/albums/b313/patrickballinger/40k%20Dark%20Angels/


I used Microsol for the decals, this was my first try at using the stuff. The red bottle is the one I used that works great for angles, shapes and such on a figure to get the decal to conform. Much like plastic glue it melts the transfer into the plastic, if you remove it, you remove the paint. What is great about this is that it removes the look of the transfers and makes it look almost painted on.

Primered some models to at least be ready to paint. May try to get some of these done for Cabanahammer next weekend perhaps.

Burna Boyz

Leftover Kommandos, one burna two Nobz with Klaws

Some Power Weapon Ravenwing models to paint (yes, I don't glue my models to the bikes to swap them out)

Mek with gun

5 More Lootas a few short of a full squad with the others I started to paint.

Top of a battle wagon. Converted turret to have a boomgun option.

Space Wolves Objective Marker

Wolf PUPPIES!

Next! I need to plan to make a list of follow up things for Cabanahammer for this weekend. Looks like it will be a blast with a full house of 10. Be nice to be able to have more but at that point we would have our own mini convention! At this rate of 10 we rival some tournaments! I have plates, forks, knifes, spoons, napkins, cups already. Missions are done and ready to be copied. Everyone should have the address, knows the points and everyone is bringing something to the food pile to go with the burgers and pasta salad I am making.

Things to do:

• Follow up with everyone.
• Buy meat and pasta salad stuff. Make Friday night and prep the hamburgers the night before.
• Make sure the long tables are out of storage at the cabana and that there is gas in the grill (have backup at my house anyway).
• Make copies of the mission.
• Pack up armies and scenery.

Dear GW: How to not write an Article

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/blogPost.jsp?aId=15200017a

WHAT WAS GW THINKING? This is a good example of a bad article that should never have been posted on the GW site. Take a look at it for a moment, this is little more than some general suggestions on what they tease in the tag line as "ways to kill an angel". This is little more than trying to plug some key products to make more sales. Look at the first one talking about Dark Eldar. Pimping bikes or giving good advice? Pimping bikes is my vote. GW should consider that many newer players would visit their site more often and pay attention more if there was some articles of substance. In the past they have done a great job producing some top notch work then other times they just spew crap in an overrated LL Bean online advertisement.

How to deal with Blood Angels or rather any army like them. Mainly a deep striking list is what is common in their features. Be they marines that use drop pods, jump packs, flyer's or any other means of getting to the field quickly, use shock to your advantage and maintain that grip to win their games. The key to these lists is to understand first how to break them.

First Turn

If they win the roll and choose to go second, one of your best options it to castle. What is a castle. That is boxing in your army instead of spreading out. Making it harder to get to your army in a very specific part of the board and creating a greater risk for deep striking. Drop pods are the hardest to deal with a castle because if they scatter into your army they won't mishap. Your only hope is that they scatter off the table for a mishap. On the other hand any other means could make a unit scatter off the table, land in scenery and making them take tests for dangerous terrain by jumping into it or landing on your unit.

This intimidates some newer players as they won't take the risk of the loss of a great and valuable unit. Others throw caution to the win and play their luck. So, the next layer of the castle comes into play. The disposables of your list. Decide what is important and keep that to the very edge of a table edge, place a unit(s) that you are willing to throw away making any victory they create a hollow one. For example, if your playing IG use conscripts or a cheap line unit with a flamer to buffer an area. Placement is key here as you want to keep them far enough away from your valuable targets like armor that their melta guns (which is a favorite of most deep striking marine lines) to get the extra dice to their penetration roll. Instead make them take a chance they may not hurt your vehicles or be forced to shoot at the disposable unit(s).

The Double Castle

The double castle is a unique thing that I have suggested in the past to players to deal with deep striking armies. Split your forces in this case of being forced to go first. Spread out your army into two parts, keeping important units balanced between the two.  Use the disposable units to buffer your important units while you setup a crossfire that keeps them off balance. They too have to split their army to go after yours and they have to work harder due to the fact that not all your eggs are in the same basket now. They are forced to split their thinking which can throw off their game plan.

It's a TRAP!

Admiral Ackbar had this quote dead on. Make them feel that they control the game, that they have your castle in hand. Plan to hold some units in reserve perhaps to react by placing some expendable bait out or perhaps nothing at all. Holding all in reserve by going second can be a gambit. With nothing on the table, they are either forced to land in a safe spot and figure out what your doing or take a risk and get close. If they get close focus fire and punish one unit at at time, remove it from the table. One less unit is one less problem, a unit reduced is still a unit that can be a threat. When you place out of reserve, setup your units to get the best shots or rather the most shots and to avoid making themselves a target, again if possible keep an expendable unit near to lure them away from a prime target. A smart player will see this and avoid it, this is the point where you accept that they are a loss and continue to punish them for their actions with concentrated firepower.

Also, when you hold all in reserve, if your list allows for some method to include some type of bonus to reserves like an Astropath, Pheromones or some other advantage is not a bad investment if you feel that it is important to your army build. For some lists, the idea to delay an army can also be very painful in the case of IG. By simply having a Master of the Fleet a player may choose to not deep strike and will setup their army another way. In this case if you let them go first, they setup, you could hold all in reserve, now they have to waste two turns moving around hoping they get into the right spot. Then you have the remaining turns of the game to focus on the goal of the mission.


Deployment can set the tone for a game and adapting your army against your opponent can also help make or break a game. A little luck with the dice can't hurt either. I will try to come back later and develop this in a second article giving some army specific ideas on how to clip the wings of an angel.

Necron Army Feature

Sarah Conner? Paging Sarah Conner, you left your lights on....

Got around to taking some pictures of my Necron Army. I thought it would be nice to have all my armies on photobucket at some point and this is my first step. Attached below is the link to enjoy the album. This is a work in progress, so many albums will be empty until I get around to filling each of them.

http://s22.photobucket.com/albums/b313/patrickballinger/40K%20Necrons/

Fantasy Battles: Magnetic Paint

Tried this as an experiment and it seems to work very well. Paint a few coats of magnetic paint (that can be bought at Michaels or any craft store). This paint has metallic fillings in it that gives a surface for the magnet to attach to.

I was talking to a player and store owner about this method over gluing sheet metal to their bases. The advantage is that it can be painted over and isn't as obvious as the metal sheet. Sure you could primer over it and paint it but I don't think it would work as well.

The above picture has a long chain of flat magnets to show that it can hold weight upside down when challenged against Mr. Gravity. This will move slightly if you shake it so larger and heavier models may need a stronger pull that what I am using. For a single one in a base on say a plastic rank and line figure these guys won't go anywhere.

Random Stuff

Here is a few pics of things done...

Da Witchdocta!

The orange snake offsets the green and is an ode to the old 80's Yoda figure.

Need to touch up the sandbags...

Rear of Manticore

Side shot

Front

Rear of the Demolisher, modified adding a Predator Power pack to the back..