Chaos Pact; Small, Medium, and Large

I finished up some of my non-human players on the Blood Gryphons. They seem pretty glossy because I haven't Dull Coted them yet, the weather in my neck of the woods has been about ninety-five degrees every day with about 90% humidity...not good sealing weather. Since my Blood Bowl figs see the most (and roughest) action, I really varnish them down to protect them. Once the Dull Cote goes on they're good to go.


Slab Crag-Iron, my Chaos Ogre; Ogre Kingdoms parts


Lomnis Spannerback, Goblin troublemaker with a one strength


Critt Hakk'ck, Skaven with the (bone) claw mutation

The Blood Gryphons; Chaos Pact Team

With about a dozen games under my belt with the Gorgons I thought I would switch things up and try a new team. I'm not hurting for choices in the extra teams department and had some decision making to do. I settled on a Chaos Pact team for many reasons.

First up is that it is, in essence, a human team with its Marauders. I have a lot of experience playing a human team from way back when so this was a good foundation. Next up is that you can opt to field a Skaven, a Goblin, and a Dark Elf, so my desire to play any of those three teams (more if ccount all the different Elven teams) is satiated. Finally you get choices in your big guys, you're not just stuck with one. These can be Ogres, Trolls, or Minotaurs, or if you've got a huge treasury...a combination of the three.

Admittedly, Brian's nicely painted Chaos Pact team over at Repple Depple was the final straw that persuaded me to go in this direction.


I am using my leftover Norse team as the basis for the Chaos Pact, and the horn-helmed Norse make for perfect Marauders. The team photo at the top of the post shows most of the original paint jobs which were there when I got the team. I've only painted two members so far, the two directly above, but you can see where I'm going with the color scheme. Also, you can see I am using a female model for my team's Dark Elf.


The only good news is that this team is being made up of models I already own, or ones I am trading for. In the case of the old school Troll above, ones I'm receiving from friends for free (thanks again John). I have too many teams in storage to justify spending another dime on a new team. You can also see some of the primed figs I whipped up for the team and haven't gotten around to painting yet. In the case of my Ogre, I was too late; he died by failing a 'go for it' roll causing him to trip and break his neck. That's right, no apothecary!

Anyway, I'll still paint him up along with the others. Since there are no 'catchers' on the Chaos Pact team I plan to use the 'bear claw' gloved Norsemen figures as those players who receive the 'claw' mutation upgrade, seems a pretty natural choice. There's actually no positonal players whatsoever, you kind of create them as you go along with the wide variety of skills they are eligible for. The jar full of figs and fluids is the Simple Green soak, waiting for the next batch to prepare for painting.

Renegade Guardsmen

Two years ago I had an idea to do a 'traitor' Guard project, I even ran a poll. Last summer I posted a "where are they now?" missive, yet the non-Imperial sanctioned troopers continue to languish. I'm a bit offline right now, so this may be more of an eye-candy post. Anyway, here are the Discilian Apostates and the Sentrek Freemen.


The Apostates are pretty standard plastic Cadians, with the headswap exception. When I think "apostate", I think "hoods". The hooded heads are part of Westwind's Arthurian range and I think they fit pretty well. Above is a selection of the different heads.


Next up are the Sentrek Freemen, and when I think "freemen" I think beards and Hollywood Viking-horned helmets. 'Rag-tag' comes to mind as well. I went with Catachans for these guys, but instead of simple headswaps I went even further with conversions and parts/bits swapping. I really like the look I ended up with here.

Lots of WHFB bits are in this mix...




I didn't show off a lot of the Apostates because frankly if you've seen one hooded headswap Cadian, you've pretty much seen them all. With the Freemen however it came out where each figure is pretty much an individual.


There you go, a bunch of renegades taking up space in the "complete models" bits box.

Thirteen Times the Blood...Bowl

Needless to say, just the two hour sample of Blood Bowl we played the other day has really sparked my interest again in one of the best tabletop games around. So I went rummaging through my stuff today and drug out all of the fantasy football figs I could muster and did a legitimate inventory. Some of this stuff dates back to second edition, so there were some changes to be made, and certainly some swaps to go around.

The one thing I need to honest about here is that I simply don't need thirteen teams. But letting go of minis is so hard to do. There are obvious choices for the auction block, like my Orcs, I have three Orc teams. Three, really? I think one will do just fine. There's other choices too, like my Undead, I just never got my head around their style of play and frankly I like being more of a scoring team, not a inure-the-other-guy team. Aggressively speaking I could get rid of about half the teams I own, and maybe even use some of the money I make to pick up a sweet looking third party team and paint them up right.


The Deadrock Goyles here are pretty much a hall of fame team. Not the Orc roster, but these actual models. They were the scourge of a league we played in way back when and seeing them here makes me wince. They are definitely my 'alpha' Orcs, so they'll be sticking around. I may pull figs off the other teams to fill their ranks.


This is a bit of an expanded team of Orcs. It has the basics plus a bunch of extras like a converted Troll big guy and a couple of Goblins. It has a metal Orc here and there to boot in the form of Blitzers and regular Linemen. After I pick out whatever I need for the Goyles, this one will be fodder for sure and on their way out.


This is a stock team, straight from the boxed set. It's a very nicely painted team and although it doesn't have any extras in it, the crisp paintjob makes up for it. This is a case where although I like the team, it's my third Orc team, it's days are numbered.


Here's a great looking Human team, mostly from the boxed set and mostly awesomely painted! In addition to the plastic figs, there's four metal second edition players in there, as well as a metal star player. A large Ogre has defected from the Orc team he used to be a part of to this new Human team. The men on the team however are too afraid to ask him to change his uniform. I'll be hanging on to these guys for sure.


It's almost embarrassing looking at my first Human team. They're pretty much straight from the boxed set as well, with some fun extras too, like two metal star players (one of which will probably get snagged for the other Human team) and a fourth Blitzer figure. As you just saw though, this is one Human team too many, and these chaps are headed out the door. They'll probably be a good bargain for somebody.


They're small, they're fast, and they have armor made from cardboard. Still, you gotta love the Skaven, they have lots of options and variety, and if coached right can be solid. As you can see these guys are a bit of a work in progress as I still have some unpainted mutant figs to do, and I need to rebase the Rat Ogre big guy in the back. I'll be keeping these guys around, and probably add some basic linemen at one point in the future.


The High Elves are another team I want to hang on to. They're more survivable than their Dark and Wood Elf cousins, and are the same speed of the Humans, which I'm used to coaching. If I buckled down, I feel I could coach these guys fairly well.


The Undead here are pretty flexible under the rules we've been looking at (LRB5). I pulled a second edition Werewolf from the Human team (since they can't have him anymore) and put him on the roster. Also on the roster, in addition to the regular team, is a second edition Flesh Golem (looks just like Frankenstein's monster), a Vampire star player, and a converted Ghoul. I like the idea of the Undead, but their days are numbered.


The only thing keeping these Chaos Dwarves from the chopping block is their theme. As you can see the Dwarves (including Centaur big guy) all have converted cowboy hats. In addition to the regular team is the aforementioned big guy, a converted bluderbussier, and a second edition cyborg Orc which I'm only guessing is still legal. I'm still up in the air on this one, I never play them, so someone else might get more out of them.


Here's a good example of a rock solid team that has the basics plus a little extra. Chaos is a great team with plenty of hitting power and good versatility in their line-Beastmen. I've also got a Minotaur big guy in there converted from a Reaper fig. I like these guys, but I can't keep them all just because I like them, they're days are numbered.


If the large (and painted) Chaos team's days are numbered then these guys aren't long for the world in my neck of the woods! There's barely enough here to even take to the field, but add in a big guy and maybe a fourth Chaos Warrior and you should be good to go.


I don't mind my team having an armor value of a lowly seven if they have the speed (Skaven) or the agility (Wood/Dark Elves) to back it up, but what the heck are the Norse packing under those spiked helms? Umm, not enough to keep them sticking around! I did manage to poke around and find another official second edition Werewolf to put in there too.


Not only am I keeping these Dwarves around, they may be the first ones on the painting and refurbishment assembly line. I love Dwarves, so I see no reason why I'd get rid of these, although I need at least four more Linemen to fill out their ranks.

Lamenter's Death Guard Army

Lamenter, over on the Drunk Dwarves website (which I've been a fan of for a couple of years now) has posted pics of their amazing looking Nurgle Death Guard army. It posted this summer, but I just stumbled across it the other day (or I would've posted this over the summer). There is a lot of technique used to unify the overall look, and it's quite refreshing that they purposefully shied away from the bloated, icky type Nurgle followers and went with a more "used" look. Anyway, I don't want to hijack their post, it's worth checking out for yourself in more detail. Here's the link one more time!

WHFB Incoming: Chaos and Dark Elves

The Dark Elves

Hot on the heels of making more room for new stuff (and the additional five Blood Bowl teams) the miniatures keep on coming. Here I'll detail two Warhammer armies I also picked up from my buddy Marc. They're not completely painted, but that doesn't matter too terribly much. As cool as it is to add these to the collection, for the time being I've simply inventoried them, and boxed them up together in cold storage.

A rough look-through shows units of Witch Elves, Swordsmen, Corsairs, Crossbowmen, Harpies, and some guys with big axes (Executioners?). There's also a pair of Bolt Throwers with crew, a unit of six Cold Ones, and a whole slew of heroes on critters. These include two Witch Elf looking characters, one on a Cockatrice, the other on a Night Mare. There's also a stout looking general on a Griffin (don't know if that's still legal) and finally, a good ole dragon rounds out the army. All in all, a good sized force.



Chaos Warriors

There's also a starter Chaos Warriors army in the mix. There's not a lot to go on here, but it's a good foot in the door at least. In the back is an army general riding atop a large, two headed dragon. It will require some work, but it's pretty impressive looking, even for an older model. There's also a six strong unit of Chaos Knights, who back in the day seemed to hit pretty hard if memory serves. Last is my favorite of the bunch, it's a very old Bloodthirster of Khorne, this one has a giant dog's face wearing a large, spiked pickelhaube helmet. It's old, sure, but it exudes nothing but character, I'll have to do it justice.

Hacker-Pschorr, Chaos Blood Bowl Team

Hailing from the Northern Wastes...Hacker-Pschorr

Yes, more Blood Bowl shenanigans! I'm curious how long this Blood Bowl momentum on the tabletop will last once the video game comes out? This Chaos team hasn't actually seen some action on the blog before, both here and here. It's funny, looking back at those two posts, almsot two years ago, it seemed we were on the verge of doing some long-term, organized play, but it never really materialized, which is too bad.

I like the Chaos team quite a bit. The Chaos Warriors might be a tad slow (but not terribly so), but they hit hard and have good access to skills...and mutations. I also love the Beastmen, they play like human lineman which is great, but they also come with 'horns' and get access to mutations as well. The Beastmen are the staple of the team, with the Chaos Warriors sealing the deal. I only have fourteen men on the roster, leaving me two slots for big guys. I can go ahead and use the Troll from my Orc team, and I'd like to add a Minotaur too. If I had my druthers I'd use this Orboros Gnarlhorn as my minotaur!


Full complement of Chaos Warriors, including Lord Borak


The Beastmen with lolling tongues...and mutations

In the back you'll see I've converted one Beastman with the giant lobster claw. There's another one with a stump awaiting his new mutant graft, but I didn't feel like drilling and pinning prior to taking pics, heh. I've got a "big hand" somewhere around here, I think it came off the Skaven mutant player, I just need to find it. I know they have also made 'official' Beastmen players with mutations already on the fig, but I don't have any of those.


The "I'll get you!" fist waving Beastmen

Blood Bowl Bonanza

Geez, Blood Bowl season is definitely in the air, haha. So much so, I've been too busy to even post updates here! I'd like to report on all the games that we've been playing, in person, but I simply can't, Hacker-Pschorr only has three games under their spike-studded belts. It's been great so far, and the games we have played have been every bit as fun as I remember from the old league days. The Chaos team takes some getting used to, but I'm transitioning well. The good news is that we're garnering some interest from some of the players from our other games, so it looks like a new league is in the making. I'll have to scrap this team, but I'll start over using the same figs.

We've only played three games in person, but in looking for Blood Bowl material, Andy found the FUMBBL site. Holy crap. It's an online Blood Bowl community where you play your matches via a java app on your computer, head to head against other coaches. It's as simple as that, and there's been almost a million matches played to date. You're playing against strangers mostly, but so far the peeps I've encountered have been friendly and good sports. The mayhem and carnage is increased by a factor of ten however, so if you have a roster of fragile TD queens, they will have their lunches eaten. I've played seven matches so far, all of which have taken time away from painting and playing in the real world, heh, but it's a blast. What will be nicer is if I can get some of my buddies who have moved out of town on board, that way we can still play matches without having to drive hundreds of miles. Here's my team, an injury ridden Wood Elf team named the Silvan Slammers.


Andy's team bested mine during our last game, using his speed and specialist players. Here's a nice shot of the field with one of his catchers grabbing a touchdown. This will be the last time you'll see a match report with Andy's team unpainted, he claims to have been working on them. I have no idea where he finds the time, he's played twice the number of FUMMBL games as I have!


Eirik gets yet another skill roll, and he's been the MVP twice now. He feasts on the corpse of a rookie Beastman who was slain during the match. On top of the block skill, he's now got mighty blow.

Enter Hacker-Pschorr

Named for the excellent beer, this Chaos Blood Bowl team hails from the north. Game night was going to be Wednesday night this week, but we had a last minute switch-up. At such short notice though, we didn't have anything planned, so we dusted off Blood Bowl, truly one of the greatest miniatures games...ever. Basically it's football, played with fantasy monsters and races, easy enough. It's got a set of rules that a newbie will know the ins and outs of by halftime, the replay value is high, and overall, it's just awesome to play. I truly forgot how much fun and how great of a game this is.

Maybe it's because fall is here, and I've been watching a lot of pro football, maybe it's because I am absolutely getting my butt kicked in our money fantasy football league, or maybe it's just because it's simply overdue, but we decided to kick it off Blood Bowl style, hopefully we can get the players on board. Back in the day, I think we hit our heyday in a pretty massive league; we numbered twelve players and had a deep league with tournies, a great commissioner who put out weekly newsletters, and updated league results at the local comic shop on the wall. There were some great times to be had back then, this was about twelve years ago or so. We've always had something going with Blood Bowl to one extent or another however, just like now. Here's a match report!


Here's the setup for the kickoff at the beginning of the second half. My team is a Chaos team, Andy's was a Human team. They're unfinished/unpainted because neither of us had ever played our prospective teams before. In the past Andy has been a stalwart Skaven player, and myself usually Wood Elves or Humans, and yeah, those teams are painted, heh.


Up top we've got a scramble for the ball. It doesn't look good for me since Andy's got a Sure Hands Catcher up there, with the Dodge skill too, no doubt. A pick up, a dodge or two, and it's open ground to the end zone...


...it didn't happen though! We burned through some reroll counters and had a few bad rolls. Needless to say, Horns on my Beastmen were kind of a saving grace thanks to the extra strength on a blitz. My Chaos Warriors already had the increased strength, so I was able to clear out some breathing room. Agility scores of three aren't too bad, but I don't have any of the specialized types like on a human team, so no Pass, Catch, or Sure Hands skills. I got the job done though and flung the ball down field. I had a Beastman make a quick pass to the Chaos Warrior seen here, who's making a mad dash to the end zone as fast as his speed five will let him.


Andy managed to get some of his team around my guy, much to my surprise, but they didn't have enough move to put me in multiple tackle zones. All I had to do was make a single dodge roll and I'm home free...which I did, woohoo! It was a grinding game without a lot of scoring, but still a lot of action. Possession of the ball changed hands more than a couple of times, and had a few good hits, one human getting taken out of the game. I'll hang with Chaos too, they'll take some getting used to, I like my fast and agile Elves, and my multi-purpose Humans, but a change of pace will be nice. Plus, as you can see from the pics, I can add a new project to the minis queue, which is refurbish my Chaos team. Oh, and I'd like to add a Minotaur.


A sight for sore eyes! Any Blood Bowl player will recognize this circle, it's part of the post-game ritual. We only had one player on either team earn enough star player points to get a skill roll, my TD scoring Chaos Warrior was the candidate. After much deliberation, I took the rather vanilla, but imperative, Block skill.