Daemons of Chaos at Crack's Call - a good send off for 8th edition

On the weekend of September 26 & 27th a small Warhammer Fantasy 8th edition tournament was held in Masterton.  It was Crack's Call and just like last years, it was the most fun light hearted event I played at this year.

This was to be the last 8th edition event I would attend and at 2000 points I took the Daemons.

My list was

Herald of Tzeentch, Level 2 Metal

10 Horrors, standard, muso
10 Horrors, standard, muso
14 Horrors, standard, muso

3 Beasts of Nurgle
3 Beasts of Nurgle
3 Beasts of Nurgle
5 Flesh Hounds, ambush
3 Screamers
6 Furies of Nurgle

3 Plague Drones, rot proboscis, muso
Skullcannon
Skullcannon

So lots of good useful units and no point sinks.

I played 5 really good blokes in the order of

Thomas with Undead - 20 point win
McCrae with Chaos Dwarves - 11 point win
Alan with Skaven - 4 point loss
Eddie with OnG - 20 point win
Aaron with Ogres - 20 point win

Once the final games were over I had secured first place with top battle points!  If memory serves Alan came second and McCrae third.  I also pleasantly picked up Best Painted so a very nice way to close this chapter of Fantasy gaming.  A big thank you to Neil Williamson who ran the event and hopefully we will see it continue using a new system.

Of course we had the Saturday night  Steeplechase game as well.  This was just as entertaining as last year but so much more bloody!  Last year I think only 2 players pieces got killed, well this year only 2 survived!  Cody with his Blood Knight surged out into the lead with a lucky teleport via the Tzeentch Hedge and wading through the carnage into second place - as everyone else got killed - nom nom nom was my Beast of Yharnam! He is the photogenic chap in the middle of the group below, in the Sunday games my opponents Eddie and Aaron were very focused on killing him.

Moving forward in the realms of square bases I am going to give Mantic's Kings of War a go.  I had the opportunity while at Crack's Call to have a good look through the 2nd ed rulebook and liked what I saw.  I particularly like the set unit sizes and that you don't remove individual models.  I already have ideas for building dioramas for the core of units that I will use.

For the Daemons though its time for a change.  They are going to get rebased to round bases.  Not for Age of Sigmar but for 40K, my primary gaming system.  I don't really like how they play in 40k(summon spam) but I won't use them for KoW and Alex is already using some of the army for his Daemonkin so it makes sense.

Painting - WHFB Daemons of Chaos unit fillers

I havn't been happy with the basing on my Daemon army since I first got them on the table.  This was a combination of time and some mismatched basing materials.

With Crack's Call on the horizon I am taking the opportunity to rebase the Daemons and really improve their presentation.

Taking inspiration from the PS4 game Bloodborne I am basing them as if they and their cultist minions are sweeping through a ramshackle ruined city.

I have built the fillers and bases out of greystuff, miniature scale ceramic bricks, plasticard and a variety of bits that Joel left me when he moved to Melborne.

Here are the first two nearing completion, there will be more to come.

 This piece will either have a tentacled cultist or Pink Horror added to it.

The repurposed Necromancer will be joined by 3 Pink Horrors and another cultist on this 5 wide base.

Building these has really inspired me to build more pieces like it for the game systems I play.

Call to Arms 40K 2015

...or how I brought the D...

Over the weekend the Wellington Warlords club had the annual Call to Arms convention/tournament.  There was a fantastic variety of games being played including 40K, Warhammer Fantasy, Malifaux, X-wing, DBMM, Infinity, Outbreak, Bolt Action and some other historical games including Vietnam and a massive Naval battle.  You can see some great photos here on John Murrie's blog.

I played in the 40K event as per tradition and as Cody wanted to take my growing Blood Angels I defaulted to standard and took Eldar.

Now if the Internet is to be believed, then Scatter bikes are the new hotness but I could not be arsed buying a whole lot of new bikes and refitting my existing ones.  I played a variety of lists in home games but couldn't find something I really liked so went back to the units that have always served me well since back at the start of 5th, Wraithguard.

No brainer right?  With the D attacks they bring they are pretty OP so I ran a full Wraith Host formation with all the trimmings.  Now comp allowed no triplicates unless troops or dedicated transports so I had to use a Wraithblade unit.  Though it did let me add a new painted unit to the Eldar collection which I always try and do.

Spiritseer
5 Wraithguard(cannons)
Wave Serpent, twin scatter, cannon
5 Wraithguard(D-Scythes)
Wave Serpent, twin scatter, cannon, holo
5 Wraithblades(Axe & shield)
Wave Serpent, twin scatter, cannon, holo
Wraithlord, 2 Eldar Missile Launchers, 2 flamers
Wraithknight, 2 scatter, sword & shield

I have traditionally run the Wraithknight with 2 heavy wraithcannons but I find he always gets into melee and sometimes tarpitted.  With the new gargantuan upgrade and the threat of grav weapons I have been enjoying the close combat build with a 5++ instead.  More chances to 6 those Canoptek Wraiths of the table ;)

Over the 5 games of the tournament I played in order,
Michael Graham with Tau
Scott Engerbretsen with Space Marines
Sean Sullivan with Necrons
Robert Ransom with Adeptus Sororita
Daniel Salter with Eldar and Harlequins

 Michael Graham's Tau

Robert Ransom lines up a shot from his Adeptus Sororitas as they convoy through city streets towards my Eldar.

I think for the first time in my many years of tournament play I won all my games! I only dropped 2 points over 5 games and they were both for First Blood.

My favourite game was against Sean Sullivan which was a rematch from our last round at Maelstrom where I had taken Blood Angels and had a last game brain fart and played stupidly cagey with ,my Imperial Knight which had resulted in a tight draw.  This time I had the Eldar and it was the only game I rolled Invisibility in and it was the Relic mission.  Turn 1 the Invisible Wraithknight picks up the Relic and holds onto it for the rest of the game as Destruction reigns around him.  Sean is a highly entertaining player and was my pick for best opponent.

All my opponents were great guys and I had no issues in any of my games, though I did help clarify some rules in neighboring games.

Daniel was the only one to take down the Wraithknight in the event with mass fire rewarding him with many 6s to wound from shuriken shots.  We also had a good chat afterwards about how with little effort he can make his unit selection even better for next time.

In between games it was good to catch up with some of the familiar lads in the Fantasy event and I got a good run down on how Malifaux works from Simon the Malifaux TO.

At the end of the event I won First place and Best Presented, so an extremely good result.

Here are the full results.

WELLINGTON WARLORDS CALL TO ARMS 40K RESULTS 2015
	PLAYER	BATTLE POINTS	SPORTS	TOTAL	ARMY	OBJ. POINTS [TIEBREAKER]
1	G. BURFIELD	73	25	98	ELDAR	41
2	S. SULLIVAN	63	25	88	NECRONS	24
3	C. STEWART	54	25	79	SM/AM/GK	28
4	D. HODGETTS	53	25	78	ORKS	40
5	D. SALTER	51	25	76	ELDAR/HARL.	23
6	R. PIKE	50	25	75	ELDAR	21
7	N. BRYAN	49	25	74	DARK ANGELS	31
8	J. STOTT	49	25	74	INQ/TAU/IK	29
9	M.GRAHAM	49	25	74	TAU	24
10	R. RANSOM	48	25	73	SISTERS	29
11	A. NEIL	40	25	65	NECRONS	22
12	S. ENGERBRETSEN	39	25	64	SPACE MARINES	18
13	A. TWOSE	38	25	63	SPACE MARINES	30
14	C. MOORE	38	25	63	BLOOD ANGELS	27
15	C. PARLATO	38	25	63	BLOOD ANGELS	20
16	J. PIESSE	37	25	62	ORKS	35
17	T. DUNBAR	37	25	62	BLOOD ANGELS	25
18	M. PRICE	25	25	50	TAU	10
19	M. TALKS	25	25	50	SPACE MARINES	8
20	C. TALKS	13	25	38	TAU	13

FIRST OVERALL	GLEN BURFIELD
SECOND OVERALL	SEAN SULLIVAN
THIRD OVERALL	CRAIG STEWART
BEST SPORTSMAN	CAMERON MOORE
BEST PRESENTED	GLEN BURFIELD