A belated Adepticon Overview

Real Life(tm) has been rather hectic of late, and I'm just getting around to posting up the pics and thoughts from Adepticon. Took a while to go through the 200+ pictures I took and discard the 100+ that were blurry junk (I really need to bring a monopod to the shows). In any case, brace yourself for pictures - I'll be putting up some of the better ones here, the link to the full gallery is below!

Day 1 - Horus Heresy, Zone Mortalis games!

 

Sadly, I was so excited to be playing and had such a good time that I neglected to even take any pictures of the first two ZM games I played on Thursday. Suffice it to say they were rather epic! The third game however I remembered to snap some pics as the World Eaters rampaged their way through a bunch of really awesome Squats!

The guys that put on the Heresy campaign events at Adepticon and Nova are absolutely top notch, and always provide some awesome swag. This year was a set of custom dice with the various armor marks as the facings. So cool!

I was honored to be awarded best painted in the ZM event and was blown away by the super cool medal!

Day 2 - Great Crusade Era, Purge the Xenos!

The first of two games in the Great Crusade era setting saw the World Eaters facing off against the Ork hordes. As the greenskins raced across the table to get into combat, the legion dreadclaws began falling from the skies.

Utter carnage ensued, with sweeping casualties across both sides of the table. When the dust cleared the Orks held the field, but only just...

The second game was against the forces of the perfidious Eldar, and the World Eaters felt supremely confident that they would annihilate the pointy-eared gits.

However, perfidy in fact ensued and the Eldar first strike was murderous to the point of absurdity with the World Eaters being washed off the table in a hail of star- and d-cannon fire. Holy cow are 7th ed. Eldar nasty! Was a great game nonetheless, and simply cemented the Eldar as a hated foe for the Legions!

Day 3 - Necromunda!

On Saturday I was rather excited to participate in a Necromunda event that I was initially a bit apprehensive about (it being listed as a 'tournament', not my usual cup of tea), but all fears were assuaged once I met the players and the organizer ran through the rules of the day. Each table had its own special scenario, all of which were rather entertaining. The first game had some spooky events happening and the gangers had to pass cool checks to avoid panicking.

The second game was set in the ash wastes where the Guilders were ambushed by a group of Orlocks. It went poorly for the forces of Count DeMonet, but thematically he used them to save his own corpulent hide as he made his escape!

The third game took place in a railyard with a group of Goliaths looking to raid the caravan, but Mr. Hand's terrifying marksmanship and Brother Hameln's fuzzy army of bomb rats held the slabheads at bay long enough for Count DeMonet to sleaze his way to another day.

I was quite honored to be presented a second best painted award for Count DeMonet's Guilder Caravan and Traveling Show, and am definitely planning on incorporating aspects of the tournament to the upcoming Necromunda campaign I'll be running locally!

There are dozens and dozens of further pictures from the event HERE including a bunch of shots from the armies on parade area which were spectacular this year!All in all it was a fantastic trip, especially knowing I'm not going to be able to attend NOVA this year due to a scheduling conflict. Boo!

Necromunda - Count DeMonet's Guilder Caravan and Traveling Show ready for Adepticon!

Last finishing touches complete for the Adepticon trip! I gave the event packet a closer read-through and realized my assumptions were a little off for the Necromunda event, and as such I had some extra credits to spend on building out Count DeMonet's Guilder Caravan and Traveling Show. Figured I ought to snap a few pics before they got packed away in the case...

The whole crew ready to made a trip to the Underhive! Really jazzed with how they turned out - While they may not be super effective, they definitely have a ton of character! Played a few more games locally with them to get a better handle on the rules and work out any kinks in the crew list that needed addressing before the event.

Dug up the prior incarnation's cargo skiff/flying carpet and rebased it to act as a gang relic/objective marker should the scenario call for it. Count DeMonet had a few equipment tweaks and now carries a hot-hot laspistol and a stiletto sword cunningly disguised within his walking cane!

Of the two champions, Dr. Whirlygig was pretty much spot-on and has been a stand-out in every scenario he's taken part in. Some combat drugs coupled with the Count's Overseer skill and he's a cavalcade of pain! I did have to build and speed paint a replacement Mr. Hand, as his previous incarnation was carrying way too much superfluous weaponry. The addition of the Mono-sight and a clip harness should keep him well out of harm's way while still blasting opponents with wild abandon.

The husband and wife team of Harry the Hump and Minka the Ninker don't get much glory on the table but they consistently survive the encounters and keep the pressure on their opponents while the more flashy members of the team do the dirty work.

Two new gunslingers were added to the roster each bringing some short ranged but powerful weapons. Biceps McSixpack is a danger to himself and others with his plasma pistol, while Frellin' Tom's hand flamer packs a big template in a small pistol!

Another addition to the crew is the Squat adventurer Stump Chunkman, whose bolter always seems to run out of ammo on the very first pull of the trigger. Luckily he's no slouch with a mallet! The ratskin scout Eats Bad Fungus is a perennial favorite, sneaking up along the sides before blasting away with his shotgun or stealthily skewering sentries as the situation calls for.

Last but not least is Brother Hameln and his bomb rats. Not once has his furry little ordnance managed to do anything but be comic relief, however I just can't help but take him in the list!

Really looking forward to the event at Adepticon, and can't wait to see what other wild and wonderful crews will be taking part!

Necromunda - Gang Plank and Guilder (Venator) gang ready for Adepticon!

Been plugging away on projects for Adepticon, and between World Eaters stuff I took some time and sorted out the Necromunda side of things!

One of the things that's been in the backlog for a while is an MDF "Gang Plank" from Prometheum Forge (available here: https://everylittlewar.com/products/gang-plank-event-tray). I'd picked up a couple a while back and other than having built them I hadn't done much. Busted out some nice bright colors and got to work!

It's a cool little magnetized tray that can hold the cards, dice and tokens for the game, and offers a nice way to display and transport the models between games. I've settled on taking my Guilder gang out to Adepticon, Count DeMonet and his cronies are ready to engage in some skullduggery and profit in the Underhive! From left to right (front) Harry the Hump, Minka the Ninker, Count DeMonet, Dr. Whirlygig, Biceps McSixpack, and Eats Bad Fungus. (back) Frellin' Tom, Brother Hameln and his Bomb Rats, and Mr. Hand. 

Back to the World Eaters next, the deadline is bearing down worryingly quickly!

Necromunda - Eschers and others on display!

Managed to get my mitts on the new Necromunda on Friday and couldn't help but dive right in! After a good day of gluing my fingers together and a fair chunk of brush time the newest iteration of the Eschers were ready for their close up, and some old faces got taken off the shelves for a bit of fresh air!

The Militia of Eth Ridge (har!) is the first time I've actually done any Eschers - When we played years ago several other of the group played them so I never gave 'em a try. The new plastic set is really fantastic and I rather enjoyed building them, fiddly as they may be! Stuck fairly close to the 'default' paint scheme on them, and tried my hand at some zebra stripes and leopard spots here and there. The front 90 degree facing is important in the new Necromunda, so I marked out the bases in white, though in retrospect I think I'm going to turn it into black and yellow hazard stripes.

While I was putting the models into a tray to run down to the GW shop, I figured I ought to dig out what Necromuna models remained in the depths of the Closet of Doom, and uncovered my House gang of choice - House Delaque. The Cobalt Snakes were never a particularly effective gang, but over time there sure were a lot of 'em! Really interested to see what the new iteration of their models will look like!

My other favored gang from back in the day was Hunt Team Phi Sigma Rho, a group of Spyrers comprising one each of Orrus, Malcador, Yeld and Jakara. I'm really hoping that GW will continue on beyond the 'original six' and delve into the models and rules from the Outlanders supplement, including the Spyre Hunters, Ratskins, Scavvies and of course The Redemption!

I held on to a couple special characters and follow-on gangs from the Outlanders book and Necromunda magazines, including Bull Gorg, pit fighter extrordinairre, and Kal Jerico the most badass bounty hunter in the Underhive. ...At least that what he'll tell ya! Rather pleased with how this particular pic turned out, with the inestimable Jerico menaced by the beast while the guilder and his cronies look on and jeer from the stands!

Speaking of, one of my very favorite 'gangs' were the guilders, with my particular band led by the portly-but-surprisingly-dangerous Count DeMonay and his pack of henchmen, cronies, bodyguards and hired guns. I initially didn't hold out much hope that we'll see the Guilders, but they're mentioned in surprising detail right in the main rulebook alongside the house gangs, so perhaps Count DeMonay may see the table again earlier than expected!

Last but not least, the Arbites of Precinct 13 ("Unlucky for some"). I really hope we'll see these guys walking the beat again at some point in the future as well. With as well done as the new Escher and Goliath (and as of today Orlock) models have been I am super jazzed to see what else they come out with!

Got a chance to play the basic game yesterday (to come to grips with the main rules before adding on all the Gang War campaign expansion stuff) and I gotta say I REALLY enjoyed it. The lineage of the 1st edition game shines through, with a few tweaks to the old rules and a few new additions that all added to the experience in.my opinion. I really dig the small update to the flesh wound/serious injury method and the bottling out process, and the gangs definitely feel more differentiated from the outset than they did in 1st edition. Used to be it was really only after a few games that your gangs started for show their house flavor. The tactics cards added a nice extra bit of spice without being overpowered (at least the ones we drew), and while I was initially down on the ZM tiles (I much prefer the 3d terrain of old) it was actually rather fun to rumble in the tunnels for our learner games.

I will say that to me the Eschers were definitely the standouts of the two. Far more customizable than the Goliaths, though I understand why that's the case - with all the exposed musculature they had to make the arms fit on the Goliaths in a very specific way to look good. I found it amusing as well that the Goliaths are actually showing more skin than the Eschers, and am rather happy that the girls aren't hyper-sexualized. They are feminine without being cheesecake which to me is quite welcome.

As of now I'm giving it a 9/10 - nostalgia filters in place for me of course as Necromunda was always my favorite specialist game, and I'm appy to report that my fears that they would mess it up were unfounded. This is more or less exactly what I hoped the reboot would be, a loving adaptation of the old system and not a complete rewrite from the ground up. Good stuff!