Carthis Prime - The Imperium Strikes Back

This Good Friday I play host and umpire for 8 of my regular gaming mates.  This will see the next major event on Quintas Maelstrom's primary world.

Since the Battle for Carthis Prime in December, the Quintas Maelstrom campaign has been progressing at a steady pace.  Tau and Eldar forces continue to take worlds across the western sector hedging in the Dark Angels.  Ultramarines and Necrons move their forces through the eastern sector maintaining an uneasy ceasefire.

Killteams from these Empires have battled in ruined Forge worlds and through the ruins of lost civilisations to gather intel on the enemy and secure better transit for the greater armed forces of their races.

The different armies have met across the Maelstrom and come to blows upon unclaimed worlds, slowing the losers progress while the victors make small additions to their total force.

The Imperium lost control of Carthis Prime in spectacular fashion the last time everyone got together.  Now they return to push the entrenched Xenos forces from the planet.  The Tau have forged a truce with the Necron forces gathering about Carthis Prime and have negotiated the services of a renegade chaos marine force to fight back against the Imperium's loyal sons and daughters.

The Imperium races towards Carthis Prime with a combined force of Ultramarines, Salamanders, Black Templars, Adeptus Sororitas and allies from the Mechanicum's Knight Worlds.

Communications intercepted from both forces also report the presence of Eldar meeting with both sides...

So all players have been instructed to bring an 1850 point army each.  They are allowed to use an allied force, formations and Knights as long as they are approved by myself before the day.  After a morning of 1v1 games all players on a team will unite their armies and add an additional 1850 points for a massive 4v4 pseudo Apocalypse game.  The Additional points can buy Lords of War, further units from parent codex's ignoring FoC, Fortifications and Formations.  These must be checked by me before the day.

Here is how the teams look,

Imperium
Cody(Captain) - Ultramarines
Joel - Salamanders
Ryan S - Black Templars
Wil - Adeptus Sororitas

Xenos
Stu(Captain) - Necrons
Aaron - Tau
Ryan L - Tau
Alex - Chaos Marines

Here are the 1v1 games which the players have already been sent - the teams may choose who on their team plays what scenario.  Hopefully making tactical choices to better ensure victory and rewards for the big game.

Due to the fact that Xenos forces control Carthis Prime, the Xenos players will be the defenders in each scenario.

Table 1
Encounter at Relay Station Carthis 149/X
SPECIAL RULES - SLAY THE WARLORD, Night Fighting turn 1 only, Variable game length
The table will be divided into quarters.  The defending Xenos players quarter will have terrain representing as heavily fortified outpost, including a usable Quad gun and Icarus Lascannon.  The Imperial attacker will have the opposite quarter.
The Xenos defender sets up first then the Imperial attacker.
The Imperial attacker will go first unless the Xenos seizes the initiative.
From the third turn onwards Imperial reserves may enter from ANY table edge.
VICTORY CONDITIONS
At the end of the game the force with the greater number of SCORING units within the defending table quarter is the winner, alternatively once one side has no scoring units left, their opponent wins immediately.

REWARD

The Relay Station also contains control cogitators for a Void Shield Generator in the ruined capital city.  The winning players team gets a Void Shield Generator to use in the team game with a total of 3 projected Armour 12 Void Shields - see page 31 Stronghold Assault

Table 2
Battle across the Tharxian Plains
SPECIAL RULES - SLAY THE WARLORD, Roll for Night Fighting from turn 4 onwards, Variable Game length
The table will be played on length ways but deployment zones will be up to 18" onto the table instead of 24"
Each side must choose half of their number of units to be in reserve at the start of the game rounding up.
Roll to choose sides as normal.  The side which chooses their deployment zone sets up first.
Once setup roll to see who goes first, no seizing the initiative.
VICTORY CONDITIONS
Imperial - The Imperium's goal is to push through the Plains towards the ruins of Carthis Prime's capital.  For every mobile vehicle or scoring unit in the Xenos deployment zone at the end of the game they gain 3 Victory Points.
Xenos - The Xenos objective is to attack and contain the Imperial advance.  Every Imperial unit destroyed is worth 1 Victory Point.
REWARD

The winning players team gains a Comms Relay to use in the team game, Any player with an unengaged model within 2" of a comms relay can re-roll Reserve rolls for their Teams forces.

Table 3
Scour the Starport
SPECIAL RULES - Slay the Warlord, First Blood, Variable Game Length
The table will be setup to represent one of the derelict Starforts orbiting Carthis Prime.  "Empty" portions of the table represent space and can only be moved over by Flyers, Skimmers, Jump Infantry and Jetpack Infantry.  Jump Infantry must begin and end their movement
on solid terrain.
Primary Objective - There will be 4 objective areas on the table, they are worth 3 Victory points each.  A Player controls one of these if he has a non-vehicle model within 6" of it and there are no non-vehicle enemy models within 6" of it.
Secondary Objective - Planetary Defence Lasers, There are 2 Defence Lasers that can be fired at enemy forces on the Planet below.  A controlling unit may fire a laser instead of their own weapons in the shooting phase.  On a 5+ they hit an enemy target and score 1 Victory Point.
Hard Vacuum - The Atmospheric field generators are in poor condition.  Whenever you roll a 6 to wound they count as an AP2 hit.  Daemons, Necrons and Wraithbone units are Immune to these effects.
Reserves may enter from ANY solid starport edge, representing shuttles or other transports dropping them off.
REWARD

The winning players team gains D3+1 one shot Orbital Bombardments as per the Space Marine Chapter Masters rule to use during their shooting phases.  These can be used all at once or spread over multiple shooting phases.

Table 4
The Relic
This will use the standard Relic scenario from the main rulebook and all normal rules involved.  However in addition to the normal Relic rules when the Relic is first taken control of please roll on the Archeotech Artifact table on page 106 of the main rulebook, these effects if any will emanate from the Relic for the rest of the game.
REWARD
Whatever the Relic's Archeotech results in, it also contains a powerful Vortex weapon.  The winning players team gains 1 Vortex Missile!  In any controlling players shooting
 phase they may use the Vortex Missile.  It has Infinite range, Strength D, AP 1, Ordnance, Large Blast, Vortex - see page 13 Stronghold Assault - it can remain in play! ;)

TEAM GAME
There will be 5 Objectives worth 3 VP each spread out across the ruins of Carthis Prime's capital and a lot of Warlords on the table to slay.

I  have most of the lists in and they all look good so far.  I am really looking forward to this.

40K Campaign - The Quintas Maelstrom - round 4

Last Friday Womble and I snuck in an after work game so that his Tau forces could clear the resident Orks from a barren frontier world on his fringes.

The Ork Warboss gathered 2 large units of boyz, a pair of loota mobz and a small squadron of deffkopterz while the Tau landed with a Commander and bodyguards, a trio of Missilesides, Riptide, trio of Crisis suits, Kroot and a Piranha squadron.

The game was for 1 objective each so had the potential to be interesting.

The Tau were initially intimidated by the large number of Orks in opposition and an initial barrage of fire from the fast deffkopterz saw a crisis team take casualties then flee from the battle zone, scoring the Orks a cheeky first blood.

The Tau retaliated, Smart Missile systems really shone as the Tau forces unleashed a furious barrage of fire into the Ork hordes over the next few game turns.  Ignoring cover and LoS the Orks could do little to close the distance and the Tau position meant the greenskins could do little to get out of range.  The Orks heal out as long as they could causing minor damage to the braver Tau units which closed the distance but in the end the sands were coated in green blood and the Tau had another world.

On Tuesday Cody and I decided to have a campaign game.  We as a group have decided that each player may issue a challenge once per round.  These challenge games if won can gain the victor a permanent 50 point addition to their army total.  Womble has also worked out a system for buying back units from a total army economy, where worlds controlled give resources to replace destroyed units.  In a challenge game the challenger has to be able to replace lost units as normal where the defending player ignores any losses - this will mitigate any ganging up over subsequent rounds on a single player.  When we actually come to fighting over controlled worlds all losses on both sides will need to be managed.

Cody and I decided to roll for challenger as we had not formally declared any.  My Eldar forces ended up as aggressor and Womble set up the table as a ruin strewn jungle.

Ultramarine forces

Chapter Master, bike, artificer armour, shield eternal, thunder hammer
2x 5 man tac squads with plasma in las/plas razorbacks
Stormtalon, assault cannons and skyhammers
Centurion Devastators with grav cannons
Thunderfire cannon

Eldar forces

Autarch, Mantle of the Laughing God, Jetbike, Shard, Fusion gun, banshee mask
5 Dire Avengers in Wave Serpent, scatter, cannon, holo
3 jetbikes
5 Warp Spiders
Hornet with Pulse lasers
Wraithknight
2 War Walkers with bright lances

As we want to make use of some units that we don't normally play with I for the first time used the Solitarch.  It would help with reserve rolls for the outflanking Hornet and Warwalkers and be able to do some decent solo damage.  With all the multiple dice I would be throwing for shooting I didn't want to rely on the normally compulsory Farseer.

We rolled a 4 objective game with diagonal deployment and night fighting first turn.

Cody was going first and deployed his force centrally and aggressively to make use of the limited range, he put his thunderfire in a reinforced ruin on his right flank.  I set back as far as I could to maximize the night fighting rules.  The Hornet and Warwalkers were outflanking and the jetbikes reserved.

The marines had range to the wraithknight with the razback lascannons but little else.  The Centurions struggled through the central jungle choked ruins - something that would occur throughout the game.  I think Cody may have removed 1 wound from the WK while his Chapter master sped towards him.

In my opening turn I moved into range of a razback with my serpent while the warp spiders and wraithknight swung out to my left.  The autarch stayed back in cover waiting for the marines to close.  The wave serpent smashed open the razback with the cover ignoring serpent shield and first blood was mine.  Other shooting saw the Chapter Master lose a wound.

As the sun filtered through the jungle canopy the Chapter Master went straight for the Wraithknight.  Seeking to tarpit it with his EW shield.  The Centurions struggle again through the ruins and the Eldar had kept out of range of other forces.  The Stormtalon flew onto the board and unleashed its weapons at the Wave Serpent causing it to explode.  Only one of the passengers perished and they took cover in their transports wreckage.  The Thunderfire pummeled the Warp Spiders but only one had succumbed to the bombardment.  The Chapter Master charged the Wraithknight and lost a wound to the Wraithcannon fire!  The following combat saw both sides lose a wound and the melee continued.

The Eldar Hornet and Walkers both entered from the marine's right flank using the reinforced tower ruin where the techmarine and TFcannon were perched as LoS blocking terrain.   They took long ranged shots at the other razback and centurions managing to wreck the tank and wound the heavily armoured marines.  The spiders jump generators brought them within range of a disembarked marine squad and alongside the Autarch whittled down their numbers with monofilament shots.  The struggle between the Wraithknight and Marine hero continued with both sides failing to cause a wound.

The Stormtalon through a hard turn and went straight for the outflanking Eldar forces managing to destroy a walker.  The TF again fired at the spiders but caused little damage to their heavy aspent armour.  The Centurions fired at the only target in range, the Mantled cloaked Autarch.  With Grav cannons firing they scored 11 wounds but the fey luck of the Eldar Warlord saw him unscathed.  More blows were traded in assault but the Marine Lord failed to bring his shield to bare in time and was crushed by the Wraithknight's strength.

The Hornet fired at the Stormtalon failing to strike it, the jetbikes entered the fray and took position behind a massive ancient tree.  The remaining warwalker clambered into the ruined tower closing on the techmarine and artillery, assaulting after firing its lances with little effect.  The Wraithknight freed from combat reinforced the flank while the spiders and Autarch finished off another tactical squad. 

The Stormtalon scored a hit on the Hornet, stunning it while the Centurions fired with little damage caused at the Eldar Warlord.  The Warwalker beat down the Techmarine and took firing position in the tower.

The game ended with combined fire dropping the Centurions to a single wounded man before the Autarch flew into combat finishing it off.  The surviving pair of Dire Avengers took control of a rear objective while the jetbikes had already sped across the table to take another.  The Stormtalon took a hit and left the combat zone as sole survivor to report back to Marine command on the xenos forces.

This was unfortunately one of those games where Cody did very little if anything tactically wrong, but as I'm sure we can all sympathise with, had the dice abandon him.  I measured all the ranges of his weapons and did my best to keep out of them, Eldar mobility played a huge part in this game with my forces able to dance around his picking off the long ranged targets with little retribution.  It was fun to play with the Autarch and as that game sees him tick up some experience I shall field him again, I will have to build an actual model up for him.  I'm thinking of mounting him on a Hellion skyboard Green Goblin style.  That victory nets me 50 points bumping me up to 1050 per game and having more than enough resources to replace the lost wave serpent.

Stu and Womble have yet to play their Necron vs Tau game but I'm sure it will happen over the next couple days.

40K Campaign - The Quintas Maelstrom - rounds 1-3

Over the holiday period I enjoyed playing a several games of Killteam using the expanded rules found here at The Heralds of Ruin.  As my gaming group enjoys wargaming and roleplaying and has come off a stint playing Mordheim again these are great.

We also had a few 'fun' games of 40K, pairing up for team games, using Escalation rules - The Revenant got pushed around the table - generally trying to mix it up from the usual 1500 - 1850 point games we have played for the last few years.

This in combination with the Carthis Prime game day I hosted has lead us too the Quintas Maelstrom.  We came up with the idea of this campaign after a full day of gaming with fairly competitive lists.  We as a group found it no where as much fun as our recent more varied games had been.  We bounced some ideas around and I had a rummage through the volumes of gaming material in the games room and found the old GW Eldritch Storm campaign map that came out years ago.  Womble then over the following week made up a great set of rules.  These include discovered worlds being random according to a table, a chance of inhabitants being allies or hostiles and army attrition and rebuild costs depending on how you do in the actual games.

We established initial force restrictions.  1000 point lists, 1 HQ, 2 Troops, 1 Elite, 1 Fast Attack and 1 Heavy Support.  Worlds you conquer can add more FoC slots including being able to exceed the normal FoC slots by 1.  Certain worlds can also grant you more points to spend on your force giving a player a strong advantage.  Allies will only be accessible if you discover inhabited systems and then conquer/befriend them.  Killteams using the Herald's rules also need to be made for espionage missions against each other.

With this established we rolled some random starting positions.  Alex with Dark Angels is in the North West, Womble with Tau in the South West, Stu's Necrons East of the Centre, Cody's Ultramarines in the South East and myself with Eldar North of the Centre.

We each set 3 neighbouring systems to our starting worlds as a Hive World which automatically grants an Elite slot, a frontier world for Fast Attack and a Forge World for Heavy Support.  Other systems are all random.  After initial moves I think we all went for our neighbouring Forge Worlds with only my Eldar encountering a hostile force present.  I rolled an Imperial force and Alex opted to play the planetary defenders.  He chose Dark Angels as is familiar to him and Womble set the board.  Defending inhabitants are not restricted and have access to a normal FoC chart where I had to be quite selective.

Our table was set with a large series of central fortifications including towering bastions and a skyshield bridging them.  My objective was to take control of the central bastion with any infantry unit where the defenders had to keep me at bay.  Alex set up his Dark Angels defensively but did little to stop the Eldar invaders.  D-Scythe toting Wraithguard weakened the Deathwing inside the Bastion, while mass fire from paired Wave Serpents, Warp Spiders and a Wraithknight dramatically thinned the rest of the Unforgiven force taking control of the Forgeworld.

Since then we have made a couple more rapid campaign moves resulting in Cody's Ultramarines encountering a Khorne cult on a Hive World he was bringing to compliance.  After seizing the Initiative his newly purchased Devastator Centurions destroyed the traitor forces en mass while supporting tactical squads in Razorbacks finished what remained of the lunatic cultists.

In our last move made Womble's Tau have encountered an hostile Ork force on a frontier world, that is yet to be resolved.

As a side effect of the random encounters it has encouraged us as a group to look at finishing off the many random collections of models we own and forming them into usable 1000 point armies.  This will make it a project with quite a lot of variety which will be nice.

40k - Carthis Prime - Invasion

Last weekend I hosted a 40k get together with the local lads and some of the regular visitors.

It was a narrative team event where all victory points were added to a players team total.  This is the brief I sent out to the participating players.

Carthis Prime is a forgotten world on the fringe of the Ultima Segementum.  Carthis was once a populous world until disaster fell upon it's people. Overnight the cities of the world were torn apart, it's people vanished and the air itself was ruined with a toxic concoction causing it to be uninhabitable for centuries. 

Explorator teams from the Adeptus Mechanicus studied the world trying to divine what had caused this blight but if it was an attack or global disaster was never determined.  So Carthis was left abandoned for a very long time.  Eventually the Mechanicus installed massive atmosphere regulators on the surface.  Towering pieces of machinery which processed the trace toxins and finally brought Carthis back from its blighted torpor.

The Imperium has since deployed defence forces from the 'Hub' and installed minor fortifications on the surface and a Starport was built in orbit to sustain ships and troops moving through the region.

Now something on Carthis has attracted the attention of outside forces, be they xenos or human is unknown...

As we wanted to mix it up from the usual 1750 point games we play, each round was using different points and scenarios.

Some of the players were only available for certain rounds so I was to act as GM and fill in player where required.

So the Invading forces were

Ryan L - Tau

Aaron - Tau

Dan - Chaos Marines

Stu - Necrons

We figured the Chaos forces posing as Imperials would provoke the Tau into launching an attack on Carthis Prime.  Stu was available for the larger later game, so the Necrons reasons could be left up to the players.

The Defenders were

Ryan S - Space Marines

Alex - Space Marines

Cody - Grey Knights

All Imperial so a pretty straight forward alliance

KILL TEAM
Each player picks a force worth 200 points using the following FOC
0-1 Elite
0-2 Troops
0-1 Fast Attack

No unique units

SPECIALIST TROOPERS
Each player is allowed to pick 3 different models as being specialists.  Each player picks these models before the battle and assigns them a USR in the 40k rulebook.  For example Tank Hunter, Feel No Pain, Fearless, It Will Not Die etc  You may not duplicate special rules.

The 2 Tau forces commanded by Ryan and Aaron had very convincing wins against Alex's Marines and Dan's Chaos marines posing as Imperials.  That put the attacking forces well in the lead on campaign points.

GAME 2

SCOUR THE STARPORT
Its on page 350 of the hardcover rulebook if people have it, otherwise
Standard FOC 1000 points

 

Cody and Ryan S had then arrived for the Starfort Assault.  Both joined Alex on the defending team while Dan revealed his true allegiance and sided with the Tau.

All 3 starforts had areas of open space where only flyers or skimmers could move.  All to wound rolls of 6 were AP2 to represent explosive decompression.  All forts had a laser battery which a controlling unit could shoot instead of their own weapons, hitting either the planet or enemy fleet to score additional VP.

I allowed the teams to have a good look at the Starfort tables before hand and they independently decided who would play on which table.  I thought this was more interesting  than random table assignment as they could attempt to put their forces on suitable terrain and predict who they may end up playing.

Ryan L played Cody.  Ryan has kindly sent me a full report of his games including a couple quick snaps of the action.  I will share these soon.

 
Alex played Dan's CSM.  Dan's Helldrake was invaluable as it swept across the starport, purging the strongpoints and bastions of the defending marines.  Dan also took control of objective areas early and managed to hold onto them for a convincing win.  Alex had the laser battery and managed to score a hit on the enemy fleet.

Aaron played Ryan S.

Aaron deployed a lot of crisis suits and Broadsides in a central tower.  He did alright early on but the defending marines soon took control of the outlying asteroid objectives.  Ryan's bike star got stuck into the crisis suits and in the end the marines had a big win.

Ryan L had to head home after that and Stu soon arrived for the big Planetstrike game.  

GAME 3

PLANETSTRIKE - 1750 points per player
uses the basic planetstrike rules on page 8 in the PLANETSTRIKE book

Attackers FOC

Compulsory 1HQ... that is all
Optional - 2 HQ, 6 Troops, 6 Elites, 6 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support

Defenders FOC

Compulsory 1 HQ, 2 Troops

Optional - 2 HQ, 6 Troops, 3 Elites, 3 Fast Attack, 6 Heavy Support

They played over a 12'x 4' table with 5 bastions and fortifications set centrally by the defenders.  So each side had 5250 points in total.

The Defenders opted to leave a lot of stuff in reserve and crammed as much as they could under a central Skyshield and in the bastions.  After the fairly ineffectual firestorm the attackers came on in mass.  They took advantage of the central deployment and were able to concentrate fire on the entrenched defenders.  The defenders had bad luck and 3 of the 4 Land Raiders carrying some elite forces came on the most isolated board edge.  This allowed the attackers to easily take control of the fortress then hinder any reinforcements.  By turn 3/4 I think the attackers had destroyed every defending unit so a massive win to the Invasion force.

Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and look forward to continuing Carthis' plight.  I didn't end up playing at all, but that proved handy as I was able to remind and clarify the odd scenario rules during the rounds for the players.  It also kept the massive Planetstrike game running along in some sense of order.

So Carthis Prime has been lost to Xenos invaders, how will the Imperium react?  Did the late revelation of a Necron presence have something to do with its initial downfall?  Will the invaders maintain their uneasy alliance?

Hub Part 2 - Round 3

So after the carnage in the darkness with the spies - I forgot to mention it was night fighting for the first 3 turns. The forces in the Hub moved their operatives to take control of weapon caches and ammo dumps.

This scenario concocted by Joel had a central objective worth 3 VP.  Now if any shooting attack passed within 6" there was a chance the ammunition exploded harming whatever was nearby.

I did not play this round, my Inquisitor took to the side lines as Cody arrived with his Grey Knight force.  In the ruined streets around an Imperial garrison the elite of the Ordo Malleus found themselves surrounded by Tyranid forces.  The two Dreadknights promptly took control of the central objective while their Terminator armoured brethren took defensive positions behind the garrison's defence lines.  Alien beasts surged from the dark streets and a fierce fire fight raged.  Stray fire even detonating the coveted supplies.  When the smoke cleared I believe the Grey Knights had control of the objective and set about purging the area of the xenos beasts.

 The Blood Angels found themselves encountering an enemy from the darkest days of their history.  The Daemons had come for Sanguinius' children.  The Inquisition did not receive a report from the Astartes forces on the outcome of this engagement which bodes ill for that Imperial detachment.  The zone in which they fought had the remains of some large archaic building in it.  It is feared that it may have been a repository from the Hub's earliest days and that corrupt artifacts were present to attract the warp creatures.



Here are the intercepted communications from the Ork vs Tau battle.

Orks - sniper drones + cover + night fight = bad! However the warboss got the last laugh as the falcon claw missed, and promptly responded with Power Klaw to the face!

Tau - Rumours of an ork force in the mountains led the Tau commander to move in for suppression. Despite the low light conditions the Tau forces used superior firepower and night vision technology to utterly annihilate the Ork forces, leaving some straggled young orks sulking in the background. Despite complete tactical superiority again the Tau commander issued a challenger to the Ork commander who was presumed to be almost expired thanks to the many rounds of fire his squad had suffered. Slinging his guns the ork and Tau commander charged each other. Despite landing a direct hit the siege gauntlet suffered a major malfunction and did not damage, the commander ejecting to safety and his bodyguards fled but were cut to ribbons. (Loss 2-1)

So even though the Imperial forces suffered losses this round their early successes had put them back in control of a majority of the Hub's strategic areas.  As the various commanders healed from their injuries and reassessed their forces, information about the whereabouts of their most hated opponents came filtering in.  Little did they know they were being lured into a trap!

Hub Part 2 - Round 2

So a few weeks ago we played the second session of our local narrative 40k campaign.  Here is the next report at last.

Game 2 was an interesting one that Joel had concocted.  Each side had their 750 point force but at the bottom of both turn 1s, a spy would arrive for each side.  This unit had the stats of a Space Marine Captain including Iron Halo.  They had to be placed 12" away from your own units then scatter 2d6.  You could only score Line breaker with your spy but it would be worth 3 points.  We had a standard objective each as well.

So the match ups were my Inquisitorial force vs Daemons.  Orks vs Blood Angels and Tau vs Tyranids.

My forces met the Daemons in the ash wastes outside a storage complex.  The Inquisitorial mechanised forces formed a defensive line amongst the slag heaps.  Flesh Hounds lead by a Herald rushed the right flank using the terrain to counter fire lanes.  Invoking the Book of Names the Herald bolstered the Hounds save.  The Great Unclean One took a defensive position behind a massive heap to cover any agents escape while Daemonettes and Horrors headed toward my lines.

The spies arrived and the Daemonic agent hung safely on the left flank well behind the daemon infantry.  The Inquisitorial agent misplaced his rendezvous position and found itself deep in the enemy lines, end zone in sight but the Nurgle greater Daemon close by.

The Chimeras and acolytes within did their best to thin the Hound pack but their increased save and speed had them barrelling through the Imperials back lines.  The Inquisitorial agent failed to escape the GUO and did its best to fend off the monstrosity but the Iron Halo failed and he was destroyed.

The Daemons agent ran up the flank now dealing with the Flesh Hounds but last minute mass fire destroyed that agent as well.

I think the game was a draw or minor win to the Daemons and I learnt that the Flesh Hound pack is a very fast threat on the table.

Highlights from the Tau and Ork camps

Orks - Both spies happened to be in the same building! As they broke from cover they both got brutally cut down. This game ended a turn too early for the Orks to claim the necessary objective (only got 3 rounds in).

Tau - After a tactical withdrawal into the ruins outside of the city, the force was again ambushed, this time by the tyranids. Accurate fire from the sniper drones brought the big monsters down quickly and the fire warriors moved to secure vital supplies for the expedition. The headstrong commander wished to try his new onager siege gauntlet issued by the fire caste, leading his bodyguards into a withered ground of tyranid warrior class creatures. Severe almost mortal damage was averted thanks to overall control off the battlefield though the loss of all crises suits was disappointing. (Win 8-4)

If we were to play that scenario again the agents would have to come in like normal reserves as one player would always be at a disadvantage with both arriving at the same time, then one being very vulnerable.

This round resulted in an even bigger advantage to the Imperial Forces and their allies. Next round involves some resupplying

Hub Campaign - Part 2 - The Imperium Strikes Back - Round 1

This past weekend we finally got organised and had the second part of my narrative 40k campaign.  Joel from Brush of doom had concocted some interesting scenarios for us to play out, all of which bit him in his green Ork arse!

So the participants on the side of the Imperium were Ryan with Tau, Conan with Blood Angels and myself with Inquisition/Grey Knights before Cody took over. We were flexible with force building for the narrative so instead of Coteaz I took a normal Inquisitor and we counted that they unlocked the Henchmen as troops per Coteaz's rule  The forces of Destruction were Stu with Daemons, Aaron with Tyranids and Joel with Orks.

All the games were 750 points with no flyers, special characters, fortifications and allies.  Only one troop was required from the players codex but like last time a force had to include either a Chaos cultist unit or an Imperial Guard squad.

I will report on games I played in and have some notes from Joel and Ryan to add.

I used a kitted out Ordo Malleus Inquisitor, 3 units of Henchmen - 2 units with plasma in psybacks, 1 with melta in chimera, Eversor Assassin, Psyfleman Dreadnought.

The first round had a suprisingly destructive rule attached.  Due to the forces of Chaos laying booby traps/IEDs or having daemonic forces lurking in the Hub's shadows, whenever any save made by a model in cover was required, the targeted unit had to make a leadership test.  If passed normal armour or cover saves were taken, if failed the cover save was worsened by 1 and the unit took d6 S3 hits in addition to what they were saving from.  

I played Joel, Inquisition vs Orks.  I got the warlord trait which allows the warlord and unit to outflank so after a couple turns of our forces exchanging fire my Inquisitor, his attached unit and their chimera rolled onto Joel's back field and poured fire into his Loota block.  Joel did take out my Imperial Guard squad holding an objective with his Nob bikers but prior and post assualt shooting took them out. The Imperial fire combined with shadowy attacks ruined Joel's boyz.  Joel also failed to notice an Eversor Assassin hiding behind a Razorback which took out his scouting Deffkopta in the first turn.  Joel suffered badly from the scenario rules loosing a lot of Orks to weakened cover saves and the S3 hits.

The other games were in the 'good' guys favour putting the forces of Order way out in the lead.


Joel's perspective - the biker gang found themselves on the wrongside of the tracks getting intercepted by the Hub Inquisition.  Despite putting on a good show a late sneaky back field arrival by the Inquisitor put an end to the fun.

and Ryan's - A patrol was ambushed in the city ruins by Daemonic forces while performing reconnaissance for a potential Tau outpost.  Significant loss of life from the Fire warriors Drone section of the expedition, however the Daemons were held back and the objectives secured.

I believe the Blood Angels and Tyranids performed mutual destruction on each other either getting a draw or minor victory to the Blood Angels.

Next, Game 2 involves a bit of espionage...

Raven Guard Dreadnought - Horus Heresy

Here is the Raven Guard Dreadnought I decided to do as a cheap option for the project.

It is simply the Dreadnought from Assualt on Black Reach on a nice Blasted Wetlands base. Not a competitive option but thats not what the Campaign project is about. The Raven Guard had to rely on Dreadnoughts for heavy support with their vehicles destroyed during the drop. I may build a couple arm options for the Dreadnought as well.

I have added some lichen and flock to the base and those of my marines as they were very dark and had little difference to the Raven Guard armour - Thanks for pointing it out James. The scenic effects break it up nicely now. Next is the Mark IV apothecary I got from Pete a couple weeks ago, if anyone needs medical assistance its the Raven Guard after the massacre.

With the release of the Recon marines from FW I will be making an order where I will get the Raven Guard transfer sheet as well. Then I can add the Legion symbols to the Dread and the Tactical marines I already have. Other suitable units for the fluff would be a couple heavy weapon and Assualt squads. With the Raven Guard not getting specific rules until the third book I'll just have to make some generic safe choices in the meantime.

New Mourkain - Dark Valley campaign

Last weekend I had a fantasic time at the House o Dunn playing in the now dubbed 'Dark Valley Campaign' ooh err.

As I had posted I took the Ghoul King led hordes to forge a new Undead home and I guess I was successful as I carved out my Northern corner in the mountains. You can see on the final campaign turn I'm the grey tiles. Cody - white, Pete - Blue, Ryan - Orange, Wil - Green, James - Purple, Joel - Red and Mike - Yellow. Cody might be in for some not so friendly games if I want to expand my kingdom.



With the start of the campaign opening in an mass land grab from Pete's Skaven forces and Ryan's Blood Dragon VC, I consolidated the North east mountains while Cody's Chaos took the North West. Wil's Ogres took the south west swamplands, Mikes Beastmen and Joel Wood Elves haggled over the southern coastal resorts and James skaven/Chaos had some western lands.

Over the two days I fought all the others except Ryan which makes sense as why would the Undead nation need to squabble... yet. Even though I ended 5th in Empire points - due to not being able to build cities in the mountains, see what do Dwarves know, I was very happy with the armies performance over all. I won vs both Chaos players, Ogres and Beastmen but lost to Skaven and Wood Elves. I took the following.

Ghoul King, Red Fury, Flying Horror, DBG, OTS, Ogre Blade
Master Necro, Level 4, Death

Vampire, Level 2, Forbidden Lore(Heavens), Aura of Dark Majesty, Heavy Armour, Shield, Hellstead, Dragonhelm, Sword of Swift Slaying
Necromancer, level 1 Vampires, Ruby Ring, Dispel Scroll
Wraith x3

40 Skeletons, FC, Banner of Swiftness
21 Zombies, standard
20 Zombies, standard
20 Zombies, standard
5 Direwolves
5 Direwolves
5 Direwolves
5 Direwolves

3 Vargheists
3 Fell Bats

Terrorgheist
Terrorgheist

Subtle I know, now I tryed out the Vampire with Forbidden Lore for Terrorgheist support and yes he did occasionally mean an additional screaming wound was caused but I think he got killed in 5 of the 6 games and gave up nearly 300 vp each time so he is going to be let go. We may see him rding a bus in the future...

The Terrorgheists did very well most of the time and I think my use of them is improving thanks to good Dire Wolf and Fell Bat placement. Pete's skaven did manage to smash both of the Terrorgheists on turn 1 with his warmachine and magical shenanigans while Joel whittled them down with his mass shooting but that's going to happen against some armies no matter what. They really proved themselves as usual against the both James and Cody's chaos forces. Targetting those elite units and bypassing the armour saves is gold for the VC.

Death magic was overall exceptionally useful, keeping the pressure on target characters with sniping and forcing through Doom and Darkness every turn for extra Screaming results.

Vargheists do what they always do, go bat shit and hopefully kill stuff, most of the time they earn their points back and are a great distraction unit.

Now there was some discussion on my use of Skeletons over the usual ghouls. I took the skeletons for their flexibilty and passive bonuses. With the Wraiths deployed in the same unit the Ghoul King can sit in the second rank happily most of the time and with Flying Horror can still launch out on opportune targets. The ability to swift reform was so nice to have and a simple banner and a couple parries did make a difference. I like the ghouls but the Ghoul King and Wraiths do all the damage and blocking so the ghouls were not getting used that well. I'll take extra bodies and maneuverabilty thanks.

Looking forward and still resisting the cut and paste bk bus build I will drop the solo flying Vampire and Flying Horror on the Ghoul King - I rarely use it and sometimes when I do it really does not pay off. In return I can add my 8 Crypt Horrors back in, thats 24 toughness 5 regenerating wounds! It should protect my Skeleton bus quite well and I do miss having them in there.

As a bonus everything is painted and all I need to do is magnetise a few zombie bases and thats the army I'm comfortable with all done for now. I did get a finecast mounted Manfred in excellent condition for a bargain from trademe a couple weeks ago so I may paint him for when I do buy thast bus ticket... helps to have a nice lord model ready to ride.

To build a new Mourkain

This coming weekend Cody, Ryan, Wil and I are all attending a fun Warhammer Fantasy campaign weekend in Wellington. It's a small group playing and we are using some simple Mighty Empire rules that proved successful at a Wellington campaign weekends a couple years ago.



Now I was going to bring back old Team Resplendant which was full of High Elven goodness that did it's very best to hold it's borders even going so far as to ally with the Dwarven team at the time! But the two shelves of painted Undead far outweighed the incomplete collection of Elves from Ulthuan so Vampire Counts it is.

I almost, almost decided to use the ever popular BK bus but no I shall persevere with my Ghoul King and his court. This is a campaign so it is my Ghoul Kings intention to wrestle the lands of the living from its weak lords and fashion it into a new Mourkain where his army of darkness shall restore the Strigoi name to its former glory. We have been told to have no alliances so I shall be wary of Ryan's Blood Dragons and any emmisaries. Cody is using the new Warriors of Chaos and Wil is commanding his successful Ogre forces. Intercepted communications tell of Skaven, Wood Elves and Beastmen in the area and I expect to see the new incarnation of Daemons invade the mortal realms.



With most of my models ready to go I have set upon some units needing a little attention to finish properly. Today I finished the Vargheists and mounted them on some left over Graveyard bases I had from my Titan forge Crypt Horrors. I painted them to match the GW ghouls I have in my army to unify the look. Now to repaint some infantry bases from the old goblin green of 4th and 5th ed to the steel legion drab I use now. Then my forces will be ready to fight for Ushoran and a new Mourkain!

40k Campaign - Violent street fights in the Hub

So yesterday had some brutal small scale firefights in the depths of the Hub.

Some modifications and clarifications were made to the lists. Yes players could use special characters and the cultist or Imperial Guard unit could be used as their compulsory troop.

We all played the Battlefield recon mission from the back of the hardback 40k rulebook. It entails sides only having 1 objective each worth 2 points and the bonus points from warlord, first blood and linebreaker.

Round 1 - Ashen Angels vs Daemons
I took charge of the Ashen Angels as they made preperations to enter the sub levels. As they coordinated with PDF units holding an Imperial garrison, daemonic forces in league with cultists tore their way free of the warp.

The Tzeentchian fiends took the Marines by suprise and after a volley of warp spawned flame the tactical squad was seriously depleted. As the marines and guardsmen desperately attempted to hold the strongpoint Terminator reinforcements arrived from the left flank, pouring bolt rounds into the Flamers.

The Sorcerous leader of this coven raced down the barricaded streets flinging bolts of eldritch energy into the Terminators while gibbering horrors materialised to take hold of the now defenderless Imperial base.

After a heated firefight between the towering Imperial bastions the Terminators were reduced to a single man, though with Assualt cannon churning he failed to withstand the Sorcerers onslaught of magic. Having cleared the defenders from this key location the cultists who had observed the skirmish from the safety of a bastion headed off under the guidance of their daemonic lord.

Win to the Chaos side.

While we played that out Joel and Conan had a streetfight between Orks and Blood Angels in the sub industrial zones. Joel can report in more detail but I believe after the Orks failed to dislodge 2 guardsmen from their objective the control of the territory was a draw.

Round 2 - Ashen Angels vs Orks

The Orks seeking out their newly spawned kin happened upon a patrol of marines in a former habitation block which had fallen into disrepair. The marines entrenched themselves at the end of a clear thoroughfare sighting the mass of greenskins marching into the area.

With a whir of rotor blades the Orks copter swung through the tenemants spying the black armoured marines and hailing his fellows let fly with his rockets! A marine was torn apart as the missile hit its target and the Ork warboss encouraged by the prospect of a fight belted down the street with his warbike, swerving into the shelter of a ruined plaza as the Imperial guns attempted to fix on him.

Marines moved into the ruined apartments and let fly with bolter and plasma rounds at the Orks while the guardsmen failed to strike the warboss who now bore down on them. As the Ork boyz bustled down the street towards the Imperials, filling the air with rounds from their shootas, the warboss broke cover and crashed into the guardsmen. With dismay the humans flailed at the green warlord but with a bloody crunch of his powerclaw he easily broke the unit and ran down the survivors.

The marines retaliated and with concentrated fire brought the Warboss down. However the Shoota boyz were not be to discouraged and with a roar continued to advance adding more ammunition to the hail of fire from their crude firearms. After the early salvo the ork copta had harrased the power armoured marines but with little success had fallen back to a safer distance to add to the marines suppression.

With the green tide thinning and marines still falling the firefight ended in a stalemate. A handful of Tactical marines and the terminator sergeant hunkered down and the avenues end while Ork 'yoof's retrieved thier immature spores growing in the rubble.

While that was played out Aaron and Conan had a dispute over territory with the bedraggles Blood Angels coming under attack from Alien monstrosities. It seems a Xenos cult had been dormant within the labour forces and with the growing violence made their move against the Imperial establishment.

A massive Hive beast successfully spawned numerous 'gants' throughout the conflict, threatening to overwhelm the Imperial defenders numerous times. However as the local defence force held their stongpoint and the marines met the alien horrors out on the street, the imperial defenders eventually taken over by the Brood forces.

Round 3 - Ashen Angels vs Tyranids

With things not going well for the Imperial forces, the marine patrol moved to the industrial area where the greenskins and Blood Angels had come to blows. Picking their way through the metal works and catwalks the astartes came into contact with the reported xenos hive beasts. Taking position in a tall steel structure the Imperial Guard layed down long range fire as the marines moved out on the ground level to halt the xenos progress.

Cutting down Genestealers early on did little to halt the swarm and with some success the identified Tervigon added more to the infestation. As the small xeno forms swarmed through the girders and bracings a unique bioform floated into view. The marines held their distance as this 'Doom' pulsed out waves of psychic attacks but the marines managed to weaken it before it ruptured itself with a burst of psychic energy.

Eventually the Imperial forces were reduced to a solitary marine as the remaining guardsmen fled from the alien creatures. With any resisitance cleared from the area, the brood followers found an abandoned drinking establishment and sated themselves on the spoils while the hunter-slayers spawned by the brood mother stalked off in search of new prey.

Again a loss and Conan fared a similar defeat at the hands of the daemons. However a glimmer of hope appeared as Cody having arrived from work brought the cheese into play. With an Imperial Guard squad as minimum he used a Heavy incinerator Dreadknight and none other than Draigo himself. Needless to say things did not go well for Joel's Orks and a single victory point was gathered for the oppressed Imperial forces.

So it had been a very one sided day with the agents of disorder running rampant over the Imperial defenders, this would make it very difficult for the authorities to maintain their fragile hold on the deepest parts of the hab blocks.

With a grind of stressed servos the power armoured figure hauled himself atop the towering steel framework. Striding across the groaning steelwork he halted at the platforms edge and gazed out through crimson lenses at the foundation of his new domain. Gunfire barked out in the stygian gloom and this leader of traitors and murderers smiled within his horned helmet.

It mattered not that his blade had yet to be drawn here. It mattered not that his own chosen were veritably seething at their restraints to engage in the disorder. His agents had whispered their words into the ears of those dissident and they had acted against the Imperium with their own means, however alien or eldritch they may be. Screams of rage and terror alike joined the gunfires melody and the Lord of damned warriors was pleased, knowing that the corpse god's ignorant followers were being put to death.

Let them dispatch their pitiful guardsmen and feebly loyal Astartes to quell this chaos, the more they sent down here into the depths meant an easier climb upon the heap of their remains to the next fields of conquest.

Playing both sides - GM'ing the Campaign

This weekend I will be hosting some players for a variety of gaming. These will include the start of my narrative 40k campaign, some D&D(my regular players can use their Monday night characters) and NZTC practice with Warhammer Fantasy.

Joel and Conan have been kind enough to send in their backgrounds and Initial lists for the campaign so as GM I'd better point out what I'll be using. Now as GM I plan on using forces for both sides and filling in where needed.

"This is Henry Mackryn for the Chyrossian News Network, reporting from outside the Governor's Palace on Chyross Prime.

Chyrossian Governer Marcus Towerson has relayed his official apologies to Imperial institutions in the Sector, in regards to a decline in productivity on the IDCC/the Hub. His office has informed the numerous clients and dependants as to the investigation and ongoing performance management of high ranking staff running the IDCC. This aims to determine where the breakdown between the indentured population and the administration has occured. He has assured that the manufactorum facilities of the Adeptus Mechanicus will be unimpeeded by any delays in components or materials handled and distributed through the 'Hub'.

Governor Towerson has authorised the deployment of additional Defense Forces to the habitation blocks of the Hub and assures the public that the rumoured reports of Xenos and Astartes sightings are the ramblings of obscura addled vagrants. Our sources have been very specific in their descriptions of Astartes sightings. Red armoured marines in the sub manufactorum districts, engaging in street level firefights with criminals in green gang colours and tribal markings and the leak of pict captures showing a small strike craft of the Ashen Angels chapter docking in the PDF bays on the main Orbital defence array, portray Governor Towerson's comments as simple words to placate the affluant Chyrossian citizens on the Prime world.

This reporter thinks that a conflict on the Hub was inevitable. With a historical decline in housing and services for the working population and a massive increase in interstellar trade and the stresses in must be putting on the security systems and protocols something was bound to give in the bustling heart of our sector.

Back to you in the studio Jansah."

Since I bought Dark Vengeance as soon as it was released I thought I would use both forces included to form the basis of my campaign forces.

For the Dark Angels I will label them as the Ashen Angels, then I can nicely use the various Blood Angel models and parts with the Dark Angels and any new additions that may come out in the new year. For now I will use the Space Marine codex for simplicity.

5 man Terminator Squad inc Serg with Power Sword, Assault Cannon and Chainfist

10 man Tactical Squad inc Serg with Plasma pistol, Plasma gun and Plasma Cannon

10 Imperial Guard inc Grenade Launcher and Autocannon

This will nicely represent an Astartes Strike Force allying with the resident defence force. I can combat squad the Tactical squad for flexibilty and the Terminator Sergeant will be the functioning Warlord until I include a real HQ choice.

For the Chaos side I came up with the following

Chaos Lord, Khorne, Plasma pistol, Axe(Sword)of Blind Fury, Sigil of Corruption, Vet of long war

5 Chosen inc Champ with Lightning Claws, Power axe, Power Fist, Vets of long war

10 Cultists inc Flamer
10 Cultists

Obliterator

Much more aggresive build with the Lord and Axe in there but they're Chaos and they're on the Hub to cause some serious trouble! Represents one of the Chaos Warlords who has infiltrated the Hub's Industrial levels and herded out some cultists to cause mayhem.

MIA Blood Angels - Hub campaign

Next campaign force to debut was sent in by Conan who will be playing on Saturday.

FIRST THERE WAS THE LIST.

Brother-Chaplain Tiberius (formerly Sergeant Tiberius).
- Make-shift Crozius Arcanum (really just a bloody big power-mace), Rosarius (an Iron Halo taken from the corpse of the former mission-commander and forged into a mask bearing the visage of Sanguinius) & an infernus pistol. [115 pts]

Tactical Squad 'Spada' (now in the grip of the Black Rage and practically Death Company).
- 5 Marines with bolters and close combat weapons. [100pts]

Squad Delta747 aka "McManus's Iron Weasels", "The Iron Weasels" or more commonly "those Weasel bastards..."
- Sergeant McManus, his latest 9 PDF recruits of questionable moral fibre & a rather handy flamer. [55pts]

Terminator Squad Invicta
- Sergeant Quintus & 4 Terminators with an assault cannon. [230]

Total: 500pts.

THEN THERE CAME THE FLUFF...

Several years before the current situation on Chyross IV aka "The Hub" a squad of Blood Angel marines were sent to assist with an Inquisitorial investigation. They never reported back and the Ordo Hereticus never disclosed their true purpose.
Recently reports of the rapidly escalating chaos on the planet reached a nearby Strike cruiser with sightings of black-armoured Space Marines claiming to be Blood Angels. The ship's commander ordered a swift response, despatching Terminator Squad 'Invicta' to deal with what could be brother-marines suffering from the Black Rage. They teleported to the planets surface to meet with the less-than-reliable witnesses, 'McManus's Iron Weasels' - a local PDF squad, who claimed to know the errant marines' whereabouts.

Finally tracking their objective to deep within the under-city, Squad Invictus were prepared for a bloody but brief confrontation. What they did not expect was fully-aware marines, holding on to their sanity and led by an unknown Chaplain. This 'Brother-Chaplain Tiberius' turned out to be the former sergeant of the squad, and went on to reveal that they have been fighting against the forces of Chaos - the influence of which is amplifying the effects of the Black Rage. He claimed that he had seen visions of Sanguinius, beseeching him to don the armour of a Chaplain that he might guide his battle-brothers away from madness.

Eventually convinced that the Chaplain's words were true, Squad Invictus joined forces with the remains of Squad Spada to invesitgate and combat the worshippers of Chaos. As "McManus's Iron Weasels" had a reputation for frequenting the less savoury districts of The Hub, they were ordered to assist and begrudgingly complied. Now this unlikely force, united by (somewhat) common goals ventures deeper into the bowels of a city gone mad. Who knows what horrors await them there...

Orks in the Hub!

Joel from The Brush of Doom sent me through his background to post for his campaign force.

In the depths of the Hub a community of orks has been growing from some spores that were accidently smuggled there by a a sushi chef. These "yoofs" are starting to shed there teef and become "da ladz" and the next generation is coming through. Meanwhile a Missionary warboss and his trusty copta buddy have found themselves on the planet having hijacked a transport ship. Working their way (read "speeding dangerously") through the lower levels causing havoc (humans are less tolerant of evangelical Gork followers than the average ork) they chanced across "da green gang" who became disciples of Gork and seek to spread the Waaagh whereever they go...once they figure out how to get out of the Hive.

Warboss: Warbike, Pklaw, Attack Squig, Cybork body 150

30 Shoota Boys: Nob-Pklaw, 'eavy armour, Bosspole,big shoota 230
10 Nurgle cultists "yoofs": flamer 75

RokkitCopta 45

500

This is a perfect example of what I want out of these early steps for the narrative campaign. Fantastic job Joel!

40K campaign - Heresy in the Hub

The Imperial Distribution Centre for the Chyross system or The 'Hub', has been the centre for transport and goods in it's region of space for centuries. The world on which the IDCC was built was once Chyross IV but with cavernous storage facilities, sprawling habitation blocks for the indentured labour forces, skyhook relays for the orbital transit platforms and fortress like spires filled with Imperial bureaucracy, it bares no resemblance to the planet surveyed by the Priesthood of Mars.

In recent months criminal activity and violent crime has seen a steady increase within the labour population. The security forces based on the Hub have been stretched to their limits, with extreme cases of Arbite units going missing in the subterranean hab blocks. Civil unrest and public protests against the ruling administration has also been reported. The Chief Administrator Gollen Corschel has applied to the Imperial Governor on Chyross Prime for aid. Governor Marcus Towerson has authorised units from the Chyrosian Planetary Defence Force to reinforce the Hub until the civil unrest has been quelled. If this behaviour in the labour population was to escalate further, the effect on the systems and production of the Hub would be disasterous for the sector.


The forces responsible for these increasing disturbances are agents of the dark powers of Chaos itself. Units of Traitor Marines have secreted themselves within the labyrinthine levels of the Hub's Industrial zones. Making contact with minor cults within the populace, they have fanned the fires of resentment in the beleagured labour clans. Letting the newly heretical fanatics take the brunt of Imperial pacification, the Traitor Astartes siphon more resources towards their nefarious goals.


This is the outline for the setting of a narrative campaign I am about to start for 40K. This campaign is open to any players I know in the area, even those a bit further away could participate if they want too. My intention is to provide a localised setting for our games other than a random collection of terrain on a table. For newer players and those who have made the transition to 6th ed it could be a way to start a new army or just get some models painted that have been neglected for sake of competitive play, It could of course have the end goal of getting a nicely thematic army painted up for competitive play as well.

As I am taking part in a 'Tale of X Gamers - Horus Heresy' set up by Pete at Fields of Blood, this could be an oppurtunity to learn the ways of Warhammer Pew Pew Pew(as someone called it)and help shape those Heresy forces too.

I am currently painting up the Chaos forces from the Dark Vengeance box set because without this the fantastic miniatures would just join all the other hordes of grey plastic and metal in the boxes of my gaming room. I know that some of the DV units are not that flash if at all for competitive play, but on a smaller initial scale they could be perfect for causing trouble on the Hub.

This Saturday will have the first games for the campaign at my place - Sunday will be more Fantasy focused though with small forces we can always do a bit more 40k. Forces are to be based around '40k in a flash', combat patrol, 40k in 40 minutes etc. Wins for either side at this stage will stack points and start to indicate how initial encounters are shaping the environment and inhabitants of the Hub. I have no restrictions on any codex I can think of as long as the player can come up with an appropriate reason for being on the Hub. Its a very large, very old place so whether its a 'counts as' Genestealer cult, Eldar Outcasts or an Inquisitive Necron Overlord I don't mind at all, just pick a side you will contribute victory points to, either the Imperium or Chaos forces.

Later on I plan on having random events happen within games as one side or the other brings greater forces to bear on their opponent. Team games are always fun and in the future if people are enjoying it a bit of Apocalypse could be planned.

For those chaps coming to game this weekend and wanting to start shaping the narrative these are the restrictions around your forces.

Army limitations
Each player’s army must conform to the rules below:
• Armies are no more than 500 points
• You must have one troop choice
• You may have one HQ choice but no more than one. You do not have to take an HQ choice.
• You may spend any remaining points on anything from your codex list from the Standard Troop Organization chart.
• No special characters allowed
• No vehicles with a total armor equal to or greater than 33 for front, side and rear armor combined.
*Depending on your alliegence you MUST include either 1 unit of Chaos Cultists from Codex Chaos Space Marines or 1 single 10 man unit of Imperial Guard chosen from the Infantry Platoon(this does not include the usual platoon command and 2-5 squads - just 1 10 man squad is required). These represent local forces embroiled within the growing conflict. They will be treated as Battle Brothers to your parent forces under the 6th ed ally rules for purposes of the narrative.

Usually these type of rules have a restriction on wounds, monstrous creatures and 2+ armour but unless players have any major issues I would like people to play with what they like within the limitations. Someone may really want to paint up and use a Terminator squad for example. I have a lot of various Imperial Guard, Chaos Cultist and Necromunda models if people want to make use of them or proxy for their 'local' forces.

If interested, have questions or already coming please feel free to comment here or email me. I have already been sent a brilliant story and list From Joel at Brush of Doom about his Ork 'Priest' and his cult of Gork!

Should be good fun and motivate me to post more narrative battle reports.

Horus Heresy - Raven Guard serg WIP

Quick post updating my HH progress.

So before I get to play with any real Forge World models I've been working on this chap with the intention of using him as my sergeant. Pics just quick ones with the phone, I'll post better quality pics when completed.

Using the model from the previous post, I found a single MKIV head from the old Black Templar sprue(should have molded copies before I took to it with a knife for damage - doh!), lightning claw and a BT pistol.

The dirty black look is from an adeptus battlegrey base with multiple black and earthshade washes giving plenty of drying time between. Highlights are a combination of thunderhawk blue, fortress grey and stormvermin fur. I still have more work to do on the lightning claw and have only base coated the cloak in thunderhawk blue. I plan on weathering this marine heavily as they are on the run from traitor forces following the Dropsite Massacre.

HH Raven Guard - pre planning

Nice to see people jumping on board the Horus Heresy project with enthusiasm over at Fields of Blood. Welcome to 40K or should I say 30K for a few gamers including Sam at Hashuts Right Hand and John at Stumpy Heaven.

Looking at what my initial purchases from Forge World will be, has brought me to the following.
1 X Legion MKIV Maximus armour
1 X MKIV Maximus Armour
1 X Umbra Pattern Bolters

This will give me 10 marines in the appropriate armour for the Dropsite Massacre on Isstvan V. The Ravenguard primarily used the MKIV armour as they were outfitted later in the Great Crusade than some other Legions.

Once we move past the initial confrontations I will use a lot of MKVI Corvus pattern bodies as per Deliverance Lost. This wont be too bad on the wallet as they are a bit more abundant in the common plastic box sets.

Rummaging through my plentiful bits box of Marines stuff I found 3 of the 4 Marine characters from the Masters of the Chapter box set. This one in particular seems to have the appropriate armour so I thought I would do minor kitbashing and use him as the Sergeant in artificer armour. I plan on changing the head and both hands. Should be able to give him a bolt pistol and lightning claw(its suits the Raven Guard) without too much trouble.

Tale of X Gamers - Horus Heresy - Raven Guard

Pete over at Fields of Blood is setting up a Horus Heresy ongoing project and campaign. This is awesome and I encourage other gamers in the area to participate.

After throwing around the idea of Blood Angels losing the plot on Signus Prime or Imperial Fists defending Terra, I'm not going to do either of them. Instead looking at the early stages of the Heresy and the Dropsite massacre on Istvaan V in particular, I'm going to work on Raven Guard(thanks for the suggestion Pete).

The initial force will be based around the survivors on the run with Corax. No Rhino transports as they will have been destroyed by the traitors, just footslogging beat up Raven Guard marines. Thinking fairly desolate dark rocky bases, model a few marines crouching or in sparse cover.

With the next HH FW book hopefully containing the Massacre stuff I will get some special rules around the Raven Guard Hit and Run tactics and assault squads.

Other future possibilities include making some of the deformed 'talons' from Deliverance Lost as well. Could even sneak in a couple Alpha Legion.

WHFB - Shadows stir in Tristhafen

Recently the other lads I game with have cottoned on to Fantasy. I have thoroughly enjoyed 8th ed for a while now and have also been lucky enough to have had some very good weekends in Wellington playing with the local crowd which I can happily thank Pete Dunn for. I think now the other Levin guys have a good grasp of the rules and Cody is now making his foray into buying some Empire models while Stu rebases his Daemons from 40k to Fantasy! So I thought lets take a break from the 2400 point games and have some more fun narrative ones with the total 2400 point force being the goal while they build up their collections.

I thought 600 points would be a good place to start. Quarter of the 2400 goal yet enough for people to get some models painted(themselves) over a month or two. The games will be fast and easy to build a narrative with. So with Cody definitley taking the new Empire we set it in the Border Princes/Badlands and after not accepting his suggestion of New Tristram (wonder what hes been playing) as his campaign town we have the town of Tristhafen.

Now with Cody's initial force comprising of a level 2 Light Wizard, block of Halbediers, a Hellblaster Volley gun and a trio of Demigryphs we know that there is a variety of miliary forces in the region. Stu playing Daemons is easy enough to work in - bad men do bad things and summon Daemons. I am toying around with a couple different things, I have plenty of Vampire Counts though that wouldn't really encourage me too much to build a new force though I can always add to the collection. An awful lot of Orcs and Goblins sitting in boxes, then there are High Elves and Warriors of Chaos. Well have to see where the story goes.

So Monday night with D&D postponed for a week(public holidays means a couple guys can't always make it) we had some games.

Game 1 - Empire vs Daemons - Meeting Engagment
After locals had seen strange lights and heard disturbing sounds coming from the old ruined tower(cliched I know), the local Wizard set off with a contingent of troops to investigate. Upon reaching the ruins, Daemonic forces amassed under the control of a fel spellcaster formed up to destroy the mortal interlopers. Hellblaster fire and Light magic whittled down the bloodletters advancing on the Empires lines. Flamers of Tzeentch bounded from the tower and hurled fel fires at the state troops forcing them back. The trio of Demigryph knights of the Order of the Griffon crashed into the worn khornate unit and tore them apart with talon and lance and followed suit by destroying the Herald and his Horror coven. Alas the Light Wizard was badly injured but his surviving troops lead by the Knights carried him back to Tristhafen in victory.

Game 2 - Daemons vs Goblins - Dawn Attack
Following the defeat at the tower, the scattered forces of the Tzeentchian Herald moved to the nearby hills to summon more of their kind. There they ran across an encampment of Night Goblins, heading down the foothills to pillage the outlying farmsteads. The Shaman leading the raiding party screamed at his diminutive raiders to form up as the Daemons rushed out of the woods to attack them. Flamers made short work of the Spider Riders and as the pair of Night Goblin units hesitantly moved to face the Bloodletters the early morning assault showed its effects. Some of the worst fantatic performances shortly showed as the bewildered goblins stumbled towards the daemons at a less than impressive speed. As the Bloodletters navigated about them, the fungus addled fanatics either crashed into each other or whirled off away from the fight towards the woods! The pitiful morale of the goblins quickly became apparent as under magical and flaming attack the spearmen blocks fled or were ground under the cloven hooves of the bloodletters. The one Rocklobber which after some of its earlier accurate success had been undone by the Heralds adept control of Life magics, saw it fit to abandon the field also as the little trio crewing the machine ended up being the only things standing after the assault.

Game 3 - Vampire Counts vs Empire - Dawn Attack
Having recuperated from his encounter with the Daemons, the Light Wizard(who Cody can name!) saw fot to set to work cleansing the rest of the local area of dark forces. A local recluse academic of poor social standing had been seen frequenting the local graveyard. The townsfolk were concerned and with good reason! As the towns military arrived at the old Garden of Morr they found the scholar finishing his depraved work and had raised undead forces including several monstrous creatures of stitched flesh. The revealed Necromancer gathered his skeletal bodyguard about him and read from his Cursed Book, spurring a shambling mob of Zombies and his Crypt Horrors towards the men. The Light Wizard used the same magics which were so effective against the Daemons against these foul creatures too with great effect, immolating thier forms with blessed light. The Necromancer countered reading from his book, casting waves of dark magics to destroy the morale of the state troops and refilling the ranks of his dead charges. The Crypt Horrors lunged across the graveyard with suprising speed crashing into the Demigryphs and became embroiled in melee. The battle looked like it was favouring the dead as fell bats swept across the field to assault the artilery crew, but as the Necromancer called forth his most powerful magics from his tome he lost control! A Wind of Death burst forth from his gnarled grasp sweeping through the halbediers, but the winds of magic were too much for this novice and the knowledge was seared from his mind. Bewildered and unable to animate his forces the Necromancer grew panicked as the Knights wore down the Undead Horrors. Shortly the Order of the Griffon claimed another evil spellcaster and the Empire succeeded in protecting its townsfolk again.

So a fun start to the campaign. Serious gaming they are not with some entertaining comments thrown across the table and 6 dice on spells being thrown at every opportunity just to see if you can make a mage explode. I do now have a goal to actually model this town of Tristhafen and have it as the heart of the campaign. Characters can be named and grudges developed and while the players are not bound to use the same list every game I can see units coming back for more and hopefully modelled and painted to reflect the story.

So if you're in the area and want to come join in at any stage let me know, the more the merrier!