WFB Tournament Commentary Game One

This was Game one of the tournament that I described in the post here. Unfortunately, I did not take any notes, so I won't be giving you a play-by-play. Having said that it has been about a month ago, and the games are pretty set in my mind and I did take quite a few pictures in the first two games, and I sort of trailed off on the pictures in game three.  It ended up being a long day, but that is for another post.  

 My army that I brought was as follows:

Characters:

Lord(Lord of Pain): HW, GA, S: Runes: M. Rune of Swiftness, Rune of Fury, Rune of Cleaving, Rune of Stone, M. Rune of Spite

Thane: HW, BSB, LA: Runes: Gromril, Resistance

Runesmith(Runesmith of Pain): HW, GA,S: Runes: Rune of Fury, Rune of Cleaving, Rune of Stone, Rune of Spell Breaking

Runesmith: HW, HA, GW: Runes: Rune of Spell Breaking(X2)

 

Core:

Dwarf Warriors (X24) HW, HA, S FC

Dwarf Warriors (X24) HW, HA, S Vet, Mus

Dwarf Warriors (X10) GW, HW, HA, S

Dwarf Warriors (X10) GW, HW, HA, S

Crossbowmen (x10)

Crossbowmen(x10)

Miners (X12) vet

 

Special:

Ironbreakers (X24) FC

Cannon - Rune of Forging

Bolt Thrower - Rune of Penetrating, Fire

Bolt Thrower - Rune of Penetrating

 

Rare:

Organ Gun

 

Game 1:

 

The setup of the game was a take and hold an objective scenario basically the same as scenario 5 of the BRB, but with one major difference. Instead of the deployment zones on the long edge of the table, we had them on the short edge of the table. The were deeper deployment zones, so I only needed the 12" to get to the center of the table. I was playing against an opponent who brought up a very old set of Orc and Goblins from back in the 70's of Ral Partha fame. Here is what we had at deployment:

 

My Deployment:

and I left this out, but I have my miners to the side.

 

His Deployment:

Turn 1:

My opponent had a hard time understanding how the magic rules work it seemed as I had to help him out in determining what he needed to do in order to setup the spells for his shamen.(always a bad idea to ask the dwarf player on this) Once I got that sorted, we rolled for turns and I think that I made him go first. First turn was pretty booring, just moving to the objective. My opponent decided to take his massive unit of trolls and a Giant through the woods for the rest of the game. He had limited magic through. He did drop a rock with his Rock 'Lobba on one of my warriors unit and they fled due in horror. With the General in the unit no less.

I had no problem rallying the fleeing unit of warriors. I guess that they found their balls again. Other than that, I right hooked with with my Ironbreakers towards the objective. Filled in with my GW detachment where the warriors were to begin with. I also moved up the rest of my army. I returned fire at the Rock 'Lobba and hit a crew member. My bolt throwers did some damage to some rank and file(Black orcs?) and I tried to hit at troll with my other one. Green one was the non flaming BT BTW. Crossbows took pot shots at the orcs that they could see. Pretty standard so far.

 

Turn 2:

My opponent kept moving the same routes as before. I don't recall much magic happening this turn either, but I believe that he got of one of his magic missiles and took out a warrior on my other larger unit. His magic was pretty tepid with what I brought to the game. His Rock 'Lobba viered off to the side after trying to destroy my organ gun.

I rolled to get my Miners into combat, which happened no sweat. I posted them up on the flank and got them behind the trolls. I continued to move my unit up with my GW detachment approaching the objective. Ironbreakers continuing with their right hook oblique on the flank. Warriors with the general moving fast to catch up to the rest of the line. My whole right flank got ready to take on the trolls and Giant. I continued to shoot at the Rock 'Lobba with my cannon and I started to score some hits with it, but not enough to kill the damn thing. My Organ gun started to open up but I believe that I misfired on this turn on it. No damage, just miss the turn. My Bolt Thrower killed a Troll and started to whittle down his forces along with my Crossbowmen.

Turn 3:

My opponent once again moved forward, trying to keep all units together as all of his monsters were walking in the woods. He reformed his Wolf Riders to get ready to engage my Miners. Another magic missile on the same Warrior unit that I failed a dispel roll on. His Rock Lobba once again did no damage.

From there I continued moving forward with my General's Warriors, and GW detachment in the center to claim the objective. My Ironbreakers still doing their right hook. I move up with my Miners on the wolves, and my right flank still holding and guarding the forest with all of his monsters. Ever present for a flanking charge, I made sure that my BSB unit is maximizing the frontage that he is in. I destroy the Rock 'Lobba with my cannon. My Organ Gun takes some damage on his orcs in the center. Both Bolt throwers hit nothing, and my Crossbowmen did some damage to his center units.

Turn 4:

My opponent charges with his Giant against my other GW Detachment. I proceed to panic with my Crossbowmen and Bolt Thrower. Ironically my GW detachment were in it to win it. Likewise with my BSB unit. Its good to have the General nearby. He also charged his wolf riders into my unit of Miners. They held and took the charge. Everything else was creaping up to the objective. I was able to roll well and fully stopped his magic this turn burning the last of my Dispel runes on my Runesmith of Pain in the Ironbreakers. My GW detachment stood no chance against this Giant, fled and was run down by the Giant. My Miners put up a good fight but eventually had to run and was run down by the Wolf Riders off the board.

 

From there I continued my plan of attack. I reformed my BSB unit to get into the fight more as I was worried less of the trolls, as they look to be bogged down in the trees for the rest of the game. I continued to advance with my General's unit and my Ironbreakers to the objective. I opened up on the Giant with both my Cannon and Organ Gun. I managed to nuke it completely. I continued to whittle down the center with my crossbows left and my Bolt Thrower did land a hit and took out a few of the far left flank unit which were Black Orcs.

Turn 5:

We were on the last turn as our TO was calling time on us. He managed to bring more of his units closer to the objective, got his Wolf Riders back on the board, and continued to have his trolls bogged down in the forest. No real magic to write about at this juncture. He did not do any charges on his round that I recall. I was not able to take any more pictures as we were focusing on the land round.

At my turn I did charge with my Ironbreakers unit on the flank to his Black Orcs. I managed to take him out with copious CR on my side and good CC from my runesmith in the unit.

The end of the game you calculate who is within the halo of the objective and t and I had over 500 points worth of units with my Generals unit and the detachment of GW close enough to the objective. He had nothing close enough to counter my points. It was one sided, but not as much as it could have been with more points camped around the objective like I could have had.

To be continued for Game Two...

Dusting Off My WFB Books Again

 

So I went to this tournament last weekend. It was quite a day trip from here in Charlotte, but that was due to the back roads to get there. I took a different route going home that lent me a faster trip home, I thought, but regardless it was about two hours to and from.

As far as the hobby store goes, it was nice location. Right in the middle of Aberdeen, NC which is a small town right between Pinehurst and what used to be called Ft. Bragg. It is right off of US1 and a little history of US1 is that it was the first highway stretching from Maine to the Florida Keys in the US. First established in 1025 and most of the buildings around town look to be built around that time period. There was obviously a lot of military around town but overall it was a nice sleepy old town in NC like what you would imagine Mayberry to be.

Hit Points Hobbies appears to have been located in one of these older buildings from before the war.(WWII) I got that impression form the hardware in the bathroom. The lock on the door was an odd chain lock that locked vertical with a "T" connection and two spigot's one for hot and one for cold water in the sink. Honestly I find that to be a novelty these days so I was ok with it. The shop has the usual game products, but instead of what I normally see with comic books, they had a whole room of video games. It was kind of like an arcade but only for more modern games with consoles hooked up to TV's. It was to a varying degree as far as which edition they had available. So you may find something like a Playstation 4 or 3 there instead of the newer editions for instance. I am not into console gaming so I cant tell just by the look. One other big thing that they were doing there that was different was that they offered a 3D printing service there. You could see the printers in one of the small side rooms that they had. They also had a few paint stations for someone to work on some models as well as I would assume advanced tools like an airbrush.

Overall it I thought that it was a fine store to visit. The general atmosphere and people working the store were nice folks. They do have a store cat so if you are allergic to cats, you are SOL. The cat smell was not bad, but it was faintly there. It makes the store smell more of a home rather than a store, and certainly better than some of the stores that I have been in. I guess that a new coat of paint and an annual cleaning would make things better but not by much. Here is their website with a picture section:

https://www.hitpointhobbies.com/

As far as the tournament goes, it was pretty decently run. All of us were rusty as hell in both playing games, but the TO did a good job in resolving disputes and such events. They kept us on track and got us to finish in a reasonable time in the evening. I have may be two critiques of the tournament management.

One was that they insisted that we use communal dice rather than your own. It is not a big deal to me, but who in the hell is the asshole who loads their dice to win at WFB? But who knows they may be down to that level. Another problem with it was that, the dice was weird colors so not easy to read. If this really is a problem, then I would suggest weighing the dice blocks of people and demand that we use Chessex dice, or if necessary give everyone a block of Chessex to use for the day. They had no problem with my artillery and scatter dice however.

The second was that on my last game my opponent and I were on the same table that we played our games on before. Meaning that he played game one and three on the same table and I played game two and three on the same table. It may not have been possible, but getting us on another table would have been nice.

This is their first time running a WFB tournament in a long time, so as far as hiccups goes, it was pretty small. I guess that they put this one out there to plan just as it was posted. They are planning a new event some time in January or February, and they promised that they will get to planning that a lot more sooner than they did this one, so I guess that they are working on it how. They also had trophies where one was a 3D printed dice tower.

The players were nice to play with. Almost all of us had lunch together at a brewery, and had a great conversation about painting over beer and burgers. Definitely about half were either current or former military, no surprise given the vicinity of the base. Overall I recommend the event that they put on.

Commentary on GW

So I have been pre-occupied with my new endeavor at Classic Hammer for the past year.  Back then I commented that Age of Sigmar will be a massive disappointment.  I will say that the jury is still out, but when you go to a game that is overtly a marketing ploy you are going to have all but a few people buy their product.  There was always that issue with what GW produced (the only exception is WAB books) but this was heightened to an extreme thanks to our friends in Nottingham.  Can we hire Bob the Dinosaur to give them corporate wedgies yet?

So GW is sinking further into decline.  Mark my words you will know that GW is in their death spiral when they make a Space Marine movie. 

A new Initiative

So I have a new initiative that I have just launched this weekend, but before that I wanted to talk about a little about what has happened to our friends at GW because what they have done pertains to what I am doing now.  I have been quiet on the trappings of GW for several years due to it being too easy to berate them and their anti customer practices. 

So our friends in Nottingham have decided in their infinite wisdom decided to scrap the whole game of WFB that we all know and, for all intensive purposes, love.  For those who have been hunting in South Africa for the past month, the Warhammer World was hit by a nuclear bomb or a meteor the size of New York and is no longer as it once was.  

What replaces the game of WFB is a skirmish game of basically the fantasy version of space marines, in the form of a game called "Age of Sigmar".  The game rules are basically a 5 page set of rules which is augmented by various elements in the form of "scrolls," and has most of the mechanics of 40K.  I have no problem with 40K but I don't want to play a fantasy version of it.  On top of the overly simplified rules, that get ever more complicated by these scrolls, the rule of "he who takes the meanest toys wins the game" is more blatant than any other time in GW's history.  Depending on your taste, the models are well done, but they hold no such drive for me to buy them.  That is not anything new as anything made for the 8th edition looked terrible.   As far as the old models that they were producing, from what I get from the website, all old stock of WFB is now being sold off.

Perhaps I was a bit too soft when I said that it was with infinite wisdom, how about infantile, as only kids would be interested in this drivel.  On top of that GW's exorbitant pricing is back in full force in that the starter set costs 125.00.  Everything else get ever more expensive as you get hooked.  You know how it works by now with GW if you have been a customer of theirs over the years. 

I think that I have not been a Fantasy customer for GW in quite a while as their new models are too ostentatious for my taste even before this major change.  What few items that I want to get will be from E-Bay from now on.  I would rather have those old models that are "not cool" any more than what they are producing.  Honestly with all of this I am more apt to say "So long and thanks for the fish."

Welcome to Classichammer:

So my new initiative is to start a website for folks who want to play previous editions.  I call it www.classichammer.com where I will be focusing on 4th to 6th for WFB and 3rd to 5th for 40K.  I may add some more editions, but honestly it is getting to a point of where I either am encroaching on other forums in the form of Oldhammer or to editions that I really don't care to get involved in, such as the 8th edition of WFB. 

This was an old project that I have alluded to for a while on this blog, and probably too cryptic for most people to understand what I was talking about.  It was part chance in that I wanted to start putting together this summer, and part because I saw some of the backlash from folks who hated AoS.  While not specifically caused by GW's decisions, I feel that this site will benefit from the angst directed toward them.  For that part I have to say "Thanks Games Workshop."

My plans are to do much more than the usual forum that most people have.  I want to try to have a method of locating opponents as well as a convention or a games day.  One step at a time however.  I encourage anyone who is interested, especially disgruntled GW customers who have large obsolete armies, to check it out. 

Alternative Systems: Armies of Arcana

 

Like many people I have had several months where I was not able to do much with my hobby.  It is not specifically because I did not have the time, nor initiative to do anything.  I have actually worked on getting a lot of my space marines built up and ready for priming.  However, we have had record cold even down here in the South of the US and good luck getting primer on anyone's models.  Now I have to look forward to getting pollen on my models if I go out and prime the models until the next month or so. 

On another note, I have been reading up on Armies of Arcana, which is the next installment of my posts on alternative systems.  Armies of Arcana is a system that I wanted to review for a while, and I would say that it is a system that does show a lot promise on many fronts, and provides a few interesting ideas. 

How it works

This is a game that is very different from the standard GW games on many fronts.  Instead of a turn system where you do all of your phases of the game and wait for your opponent to finish their turn, it is phase based system in that you each do your movement phase, and move on to magic, shooting, and Close Combat.  You roll who goes first per turn as opposed to at the start of the game.  Movement is virtually the same as in WFB of yesteryear, but you can skirmish any unit that you want and neither march nor charge moves are allowed.(Something that I will talk about later)  Magic is actually more like how 40k Psykers work but within the confines of one phase rather than throughout the game.  Shooting and Close Combat phases are more streamlined as opposed to GW's, where it is boiled down to one roll for every attack basically.  To wound rolls are more like modifiers to the to hit roll.  Other than that it is pretty similar to how WFB plays.  Fleeing works more like it did back in the 3rd edition of WFB where you actually have to kill everyone in a unit rather than just destroy the whole unit by outrunning them.  Catching up to a fleeing unit will not scatter them as in WFB but rather you get a free attack without any response. 

What I like

After reading through this game system, I really do like how they handled what is called "Step up" in WFB.  You are allowed to attack back but with a -1 to your roll.  I would equate this to a -1 to hit and you cant use any modifiers by your weapon.  It has been a while since I read the 8th edition of WFB, but I don't seem to recall step-up working like that, and honestly if it worked like that I would have no problem with it.  I am more intrigued as to how the phased based way of playing works more than anything else.  Everyone complains that your guys "just stand there and take it" when it is not your turn.  This is a way to alleviate that issue.  They also have a way to create that specific monster or army that is not already in the rules, and new armies are popping up every time from online.  Likewise they already have Roman and Greek army lists available, so if you ever wanted to see how your friends Greek army matches up against your Elves, there is a way to play that.  Most importantly, they are not using this book to sell miniatures like GW seems to do with their Basic Rule Book. 

What I don't like

I am not a fan of the lack of a marching or charging move.  That seems to me like it can get boring.  It seems that moving your normal move for a charge is unreasonable given that a charge is supposed to represent your troops running in to combat.  On another note they have their units move with more movement than what you see in WFB.  They have artillery shoot every other turn as a rule.  That seems unreasonable to me.  As much as I find it interesting that you only roll once when you attack, I think that it provides for not as much nuance as we used to have. 

Overall

Overall I would definitely like to test drive this set of rules from what I have read.  It has a lot of interesting ideas and concepts that I want to try. 

Apocalypse Gaming and handling big games

(Next time I am bringing my Wagner)

 

Well I had my first Apocalypse game the other weekend, and it was rather fun on average.  It was a 6k game with me and two other guys that had space marines, while the opposing force had two guys running a Tyranid force.  We played for four rounds after six hours and basically took turns wiping out one half of each side, with me in the center dealing with a few monsters.  I guess that Space Marines loss but it was one of those things where another turn and it would be a different story. 

All in all it reminded me of playing larger multi player games back in my days of playing WFB.  They are the fun to do on occasion but they have the same problems in my opinion.  Basically it comes down to how fast and comfortable of a player you are, in order to have an enjoyable game.  I would not call myself an expert, and I feel that I need some more experience in standard 40K before I take on another Apocalypse game.  Thus the reason why I don't recommend a game like this to anyone until they get experience in playing.  Playing fast and confident is a requirement in order to make the game go smoothly in a game like this where getting bogged down is easy to do. 

On another note, I am not sure that having different number of players is a good thing.  Usually when I play these games, I am usually ranking up against one guy and we never finish the game to the last model, so I rarely ever get to play other players in a game like this.  This is different, since I was in the center and attacking both opposing players at once.  The fun part is that I distributed playing against each other, but the bad news is that I have to vie for the attention of my opponent with my two other cohorts.  This lead to some confusion and having us wait on each other. 

All in all I would do it again, however like always, I want to try to do it with just me in command of the army.  It is one of things that partners in this situation causes hindrances to each other.  Like the old saying "Too many cooks spoil the broth."

Turning to the Dark Side

(Fitting given the Sci-Fi Theme)


I haven't talked much about my 40K collection, or much of anything for that matter in the past three months.  That damn real life again.  40K was not a game that interested me much when I was younger.  I am not much of a fan of the Genre when it comes to what we have in the Media.  It is something that really didn't appeal to me.  I do like the classical movies like the original Star Wars, Dune, and of course this. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8nPhsfYS5U


Recently what has driven me towards Sci-Fi is the Honor Harrington Series.  For those who don't know, it is basically like reading CF Forester interplanetary.  So that is my hook that opens up my mind to the Genre as of late.  Over the past few months I have been playing about half of a dozen games of 40K.  Space Marines are the army that I am currently playing with a Crimson Fist theme and play style.  After these games there are some issues that I have with the current edition of the game, however I would say that overall it is a system that I am liking more than Fantasy.  I won't belabor my disappointment with the 8th edition, since that has been expounded on in an earlier post. 

I espoused long ago that I would take my lessons of the past and limit my scope of what and how I do my purchases.  I do plan to keep that pledge with my space marines for the most part.  I have about 2/3 of a company that I am working on now.  I don't plan on getting anything new until all of this is up and running for Space Marines.  In addition to that, I am setting aside some time in my busy life right now to get some painting done.  Given how slow I am of a painter as well as the summer being as busy as it has ever been for me, it will certainly not happen overnight.  I will be posting my progress with this army.

New Games with Old friends

Well it has been a slow month for me so far with my miniature hobby.  However I was able to get a game in of 40K using the 6th edition last Sunday.  It is my first game and while interesting, we had a lot of distractions so it was not a great game to gauge whether it is an edition that I am fond of yet.  We were playing a 1K game and it took us over 4 hours to play.  One of the main distractions is that an old friend of mine dropped by the store that I have not seen in a few years. 

Honestly I was thinking of him as of late and wondering where had he been and if I should try to contact him.  It is kind of a chance encounter like what you read in the appendix of the LOTR with Gandalf and Thorin.  My fellow Roman antagonist for WAB told me last month that he was rather incognito due to real life issues that are occupying his time.  I know that he was not a fan of the current edition of WFB as I am, and had really not been active in any of the forums that he and I would frequent online.  As of late however he has been on TMP, so at least I know that he is still alive. 

My old friend and I of course struck up a conversation about 40K and WFB.  One of the topics of conversation was also the idea of trying to get together to play 6th edition once in a while, since we still had the capabilities to play the game.  Not to leave my opponent out in the cold, but he knew my old friend well and they conferred over an idea for a 40K apoc. game in the future. All in all it was a pleasant afternoon and needless to say I was glad to get out of the house for the time.  It is my hope that some good ole 6th edition game are on my horizon. 

Inflation: Warhammer Style

First off, I don't want to make this a rant about the prices and break my promise on bashing GW.  I will get to the details on that later.  I wanted to talk about model inflation that we as war gamers experience from edition to edition when it comes to how our models stack up.   I was inspired by a few posts done a few months back that discussed the inflation that their armies have experienced from circa 1999 to now.  We can thank the blogger, The Army Collector, for the inspiration here.  Let me explain what I mean by Model Inflation and then proceed with an example.  It was something that interested me given my professional experience being in the financial world. 

What is Model Inflation:

The best and most plainly spoken definition that I have ever heard for Inflation is that "Your money buys less now than before."  This can be on the supply side of the price i.e. drought, production failures, etc., as well as on the demand side usually in the form the fact that there is more currency and thus more people who want to buy the item.  We usually see demand side inflation when a central bank "prints more money" for the economy.  Despite my academic credentials in Finance, it took me years after school to see this and understand this.  There is also Deflation which is the opposite event.  A rare event, however, it is known to happen even in our time.  The Housing market has experienced deflation in the United States over the past five years for example on the supply side, as well as a central bank reducing the amount of currency in an economy on the demand side.

For the usual gamer we experience price hikes, which we all are painfully aware of, however there is a bit of inflation that existing models experience over the years in that the models are worth less in points over the editions than when they were originally bought. Usually from the switchover from edition to edition your models have smaller point costs.  This usually has been a rather silent cost that no one really complains about on places like Warseer or B.O.L.S. yet can be just as expensive as the usual price hikes.  What I have bought in the 4th edition to play Warhammer, cannot be as extensive of an army in today's edition.(or as many people like to say "in today's money")  This is what I call model inflation.  Allow me to provide an example.

Applied Model Inflation:

Now I have a very good example to see the difference in my Dwarf army book from back in the 4th.(pictured above)  In the book there was a scenario called "Battle at The East Gate of Karak Eight Peaks."  It was a scenario for everyone to get a flavor for the game and the army.  In short, there was two forces lead by General level characters that totaled up to 3000 pts.  A force being besieged and one force relieving the besieged force, opposed by Orc and Goblin forces that are separated based on the four sides of the table that totaled 3000 as well.  The scenario is that the relieving Dwarf Force is being ambushed by the Orcs and Goblins.  The scenario is based on if the Dwarves can break out of the ambush and if not can the besieged Dwarf force get there in time to relieve the relief force. 

Included in the chapter is a suggested army list for the scenario.  A very useful piece of information to determine how GW was making you calculate your armies.  With that force I took the list and tried to match it to the best of my ability with what I could be able to make with the 6.5th edition army book for Dwarves that is still the current army book. (Pictured Below)

I had a few problems with matching exactly list for list.  Unfortunately there were more toys and choices that Dwarves had back then and that made a difference in my calculation.  A Dwarf character was able to take something called the Master Rune of Death, (I don't know why they did not bring it back as a Killing Blow rule!) Runesmith's could take more toys back in the 4th, and Hammerers could elect to not take Great Weapons.  For that I could not make as accurate of an army list as I had wished.  However I believe that I did get close to it.  What I have as follows is a table of the base points for each unit and the differences:

Dwarf Inflation Sheet
Unit	4ed Points	Amendments	8ed Points	% Reduced
King Belegar's Force
Dwarf Lord	505		266	0.53
Longbeards	227		165	0.73
Thunderers	260		244	0.94
Crossbows	278		212	0.76
Total Force	1270		887	0.70
Lord Duregar's Force
Dwarf Lord	410		326	0.80
Army Battle Standard	206		125	0.61
Runesmith	246		145	0.59
Dragon Slayer			115
Slayers	368		114	0.62
Hammerers	222	20	154	0.64
Warriors	271		200	0.74
Total Force	1723		1179	0.68
Total Army	2993	3013	2066	0.69

The total army back then was 2993 but I had to add 20 pts. for the Hammerers to have Great Weapons to bring it up to 3013.  I also gave the top Dwarf Lord a Master Rune of Kragg the Grim in exchange for the Master Rune of Death.  The total army in today's edition is 2066, over 30% reduction of points.  Needless to say there are great differences in what kind of army that I could put together now as opposed to back then using the same models.  I would also point out that this army would be illegal at this point level.  Given the 8th edition rules, you would need to play a larger game to fit the characters in. 

The biggest difference is in the magic items.  We are spending over 1300 points on characters alone in this list, and that is not counting champions which were part of the character allotment back then.  The majority of those points were spent on magic items and not on the character themselves.  If you ever wonder why they called 4th edition hero-hammer, this may answer it for you.  I also calculated how many models in this army which is quite striking as well.  There were 43 in each contingent for a total of 86 models for this army. 

Now it may be just me but an army of 86 feels rather small to me now as it did back then.  Also the units were very small as well.  The Slayers (including Dragon Slayer), Hammerers, and Longbeards were 10 models each.  The missile troops were 16 each, and the warriors came up to 20.  Ironically there were no musicians however everyone had a standard.  Given the lack of troops in the 4th edition list, I was rather glad for the inflation when I came back in the 6th edition.  They actually felt like actual armies rather than just your character and a few beer buddies and hangers on. 

Honestly I could see doing a 3K game using this scenario very easily and I wished I that I was able to find a willing Orc and Goblin opponent to play this with.  However the army that I would be using for this would be more like 140 models or so easily and using two lords.  I would not specifically say that we are going to get significantly more inflation down the line in this magnitude.  Magic items would be what I would be looking at if that happens again.  Given that I am only really interested in playing with 6th edition rules, I really don't care how much inflation happens in subsequent edition. 

My problem with Finecast

I have heard the horror stories as every one else has about fine cast.  They are prone to melting in the trunk of your car.  They are riddled with bubbles so much that GW made their own liquid filler that you have to buy. (I would call that insult to injury)  They come with bent items and given the strenght of the material are prone to breakage.  The obvious cheaper material of finecast yet more expensive cost of them.  All of these issues would normally would detract me from buying the miniatures.  However I originally thought that they dont effect me nearly as much as they would have in the past.  Mainly due to the fact that I am not buying anything new from the lines. 

I have decided to go for older models on average for most of my armies that I do still collect, so I should not care about finecast, and I really don't care.  Everything that I collect for my fantasy armies will be from an older edition to match more easily historical miniatures.  However I am not just collecting only fantasy miniatures.  I am still in 40K a little bit, and with the new edition I will proabably will be playing that more often than not.  The problem that I have with GW is that instead of re-vamping new miniatures with finecast so we collectors know which model has which material, they have taken existing sculpts and casted them in finecast as well, as with these guys that I was going to add to my army:

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440176a&prodId=prod1160097a&rootCatGameStyle=

This is what I really dont like what GW has done with their policies.  I can understand using finecast on new sculpts, but this really casues trouble as to what exactly you are buying on the secondary market.  Along with that I have been informed that stripping off paint from finecast is a chore and most likely will ruin your model.  Usually you may have to worry that someone is giving you a counterfit sculpt from time to time made from this material, but here GW has done it for you.  Now if I want to make sure that I am getting the model made out of the right material, I have to see them stripped.  I have to say thank you for making my life harder GW.  Ironically I really can't afford to be one right now, but in the event that I do become a customer once again, it will be of the classic editions and not of any of this crappy finecast that GW seems to think is the greatest thing since sliced bread.  I will still buy the plastic units from time to time, albeit sparingly.

As promised I am trying to limit my rants on GW from now on so this will have to do for the next six months.  I will try to make it to the end of the year folks, I will really try.  Hopefully I will have some good things to say about 40K when I get the rulebook.  So far it sounds like a game that I may be interested in.

Bashing GW is just getting too easy.

While in the process of moving, I noticed that I have sold over half of my collection that I had in boxes.  The good news is that hopefully those miniatures will see the light of day with someone who will appreciate them.  The bad news is that I am compelled to sell them as opposed to using them for what I originally was planning for them.  I guess that is a good thing that I sold all of my current models given my lack of enthusiam for the game and the company in general.  This is really for both 40K and WFB. 

I could write several articles as to how I hate what the current management have done to a company that I have liked and have done business with in the past.  Looking at the bloggers that I do follow, there is plenty of people who have what seems no end in sight of rants ranging from the failings of finecast to the annual June price hike from the wisemen in Nottingham.  I am sure that there will be plenty more to come in the future. 

However that is getting to be booring for me overall.  I have tried to limit the "I hate GW" rants on this blog for the most part as of late.  Don't get me wrong, I have a bevy of complaints about GW, including their foray into finecast which I really have been silent about.(which I may still do a Finecast rant for several reasons)  I may do a rant from time to time, but I have other issues to deal with now-a-days than the obscene prices and the apparent lack of quality and service that you get from GW.  The only hope is that the current management get sacked and a massive re-organization of the company.  I may start paying more attention after that if it ever happens. 

Perhaps this is my real life interfering with my hobby life.  Right now I am focused on other issues and my other hobby that I can do actually.  As of right now I really can't even paint unless I figure out a new arraingment at my new place.

Eulogy of Warhammer Ancient Battle.

It is with great sadness that Games Workshop has announced that Warhammer Ancient Battles has passed into the realm of used book stores.  Warhammer Ancient Battle was originally published in 1998 as a stand alone game using most of the rules from Warhammer Fantasy Battle.  The original creators of the game was the Jervis Johnson, Rick Priestley, Michael and Allen Perry.  While very similar to Warhammer Fantasy in game mechanics it had its own flavour and made it a more enjoyable experience by using experimental rules that actually worked well for the game.  I was once told that it was sort of a pet project of the four creators.  It had no miniature support yet sold well enough to last for 14 years and only needed one new edition and a retouch in between.  Not to mention a series of supplements for the various periods that were not covered in the basic rulebook.  It was killed in an apparent car accident when the driver drove Warhammer Ancient Battles off of the cliff.  Ironically everyone else survived. 

Warhammer Ancient Battle is preceeded in death by several less than stellar game systems and several that paved the way for Warhammer Ancient Battles to become the rules that it is.  While the original creators are still alive and kicking, most of them have left Games Workshop, to lead other pursuits.  Warhammer Ancient Battle will be missed by the many fans of the game.  Most hurt will be the gamers that have been waiting on their particular supplement of choice to be created as promised.  Those who are happy with what they have should play the game with honor.  I know that I will.

A bit of yellow journalism

Well, I was contemplating the next post as I am currently running out of a few regular posts to do, and the intersection of my wargaming hobby and the real world found a dark corner today.  I was online for my daily read through Warseer and I found this post. 

http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=325498

It is also linked to this post from this blog.

http://cadia122.blogspot.com/2011/11/bad-journalism.html

The synopsis of these posts is that a reporter went to a 40K tournament and did a story on it for a greek publication.  Sad to say, this story was clearly a hit piece on our hobby, and from the second post it was even more sarcastic that protrayed in the english translation.  This woman did interview several of the participants that came to this event as well and they did not help the situation if they were accurately quoted and translated.

Honestly I have no idea whether this is an accurate translation or just someone trying to cause a fuss just because they were boored on a Wednesday night.  Since the second link is one of the guys in the picture, and he took the time to do a translation, I have a hard time believing that someone would take the time to translate and cause this uproar if it is not an accurate translation.  Now, some hippy reporter in Greece really should not bother me and usually it does not, but I do have some problems with this article.  This article is laced with insults ranging from the usual to the more obscure and more potent about gamers, expressed below.   

Wargamers are Shut-in Geeks

A common sterertype that all wargamers get from time to time.  Anyone who spends a lot of their lives gaming especially in their adolescence have experienced this bias.  Some of it may be founded and some of it can be unfounded.  I would have to say that I really did not have a problem with this since it just indicated to us her bias.  It told me her type real quickly as one of those judgemental, pushy, people that will denegrate someone just to make them feel better.  Anyone that has gone to high school has experienced these people.  If it was just this I would have dismissed her and not even write this post. 

Wargamers don't think

She really disapproved of the fluff of the 40K universe, and though that anyone who thought it through would also approve of her disapproval.  Therefore anyone who liked the 40K fluff did is not a thinking person, even though there were plenty of highly educated people at the tournament she stated.  In addition she also made sure to insult the british with her disdain for the 40K world.  I don't remember if I have ever stated this, but I cant stand the fluff that GW produces.  So painting a brush on all of us based of the fact that some of the people like the drivel that GW puts in their books certainly annoys me.  It makes me wonder if she saw a couple of guys playing a game of Armies of Arcania, which apparently has almost no fluff, and would still have the same attitude.  Somehow I think that she would disapprove based on the concept that wargaming fosters warmongering in her mind.  This closed mindedness that if you are not enlightened enough to be a left-winged community organizer, you are dumb as a fence post really gets under my skin.  World view is not an indication of intellect!

Wargaming Promotes Nazism?

That is a salient point of the article that either you are a Nazi sympathizer or a sympathizer in training.  Now this was very insulting to me on several levels becaue of the context. Apparently, this problem is rampant here in America.  Now, it has been a long time since I have been to the hazing rituals to join the wargaming community, but I don't seem to recall them including getting nazi tats.  All of it was hersay from what I gathered from the article, or her perception based on the loosely on the iconography that is in the GW fluff that she despised.  Throwing the Nazi word around was usually a cardinal sin for the media to use without evidence.  So not only insulting the gamers but Americans, and of course anyone conservative.  To be honest I have seen all walks of life play this game from the very hippy liberal, to the most libertarian.  I really don't check their political card at the start of the game to see if they are someone that I care to associate with, since I never thought that it mattered.  Apparently it does to this woman.


This entire article was decrying the zenophobic attitude of the gamers, but I wonder if they were trying to single out these gamers for their own political dialogue that is happening in Greece.  Remember that this was a published article in a newspaper so I am assuming that an editor actually read the story like you see in All the Presidents Men.  Clearly I get from this article that 40K gamers are a bunch of rich nazi's that have too much time on their hands.  With the strife that they are having in Greece, denegrating people will not end well for Greece, or for anyone else that starts this kind of attack.

My apologies for taking this post into a political realm, and perhaps making this more than just a reporter being short sighted and meanspirited.  It is my hope that no one takes this article seriously, but it does poses the question what is this world coming to when a fictional game can be taken in this light.  I have a hard time seeing this woman denegrating recreational sex or drug use, so why should she or anyone else give a damn what someone does in their spare time.  Add this to my musical hobby, where it is apparently illegal to make quality instruments here in the US regardless of the paperwork(Google Gibson Guitar Raids if you have no idea what I am talking about).  It makes me wonder if I will be running out of hobbies in the future, and when that happens wait and see how expensive the damn models will be then.  I guess that I should go out to the shooting range before that is not allowed either.

Alternative Systems: Summary

Yet again on my sojourn from GW I have taken another step away from GW this week.  Given my post on comtemplating different manufactureres, (located here) I went looking for other manufactureres this week.  In addition to finding a few notable manufactureres that do interesting fantasy models, I also saw one manufacturer that has their own rules.  Now I know about Reaper so this was no specific suprise, but it got me thinking what else is out there that is an alternative to Games Workshop's rules. 

I took a trip to The Miniature Pages, and found a few posts of people asking the same question as I was.  Apparently, I am not the only one contemplating this.  The four posts that I found are the following:

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=231833
http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=232273
http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=233715
http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=222852

After going through all of them I found the following systems as the answers to what is the alternative to GW's Warhammer Fantasy Battle:

List of Fantasy Game Systems:
1: Warhammer Fantasy Battle (Games Workshop)
2: Kings of War (Mantic)*
3: Fantasy Warriors (Miltron)*
4: Armies of Arcana
5: Mighty Armies (Rebel Miniatures)
6: Hostile Realms(Piquet Master Rules)
7: Songs of Blades and Heroes
8: Hordes of the Things*
9: 100 Kingdoms*
10: For the Masses (Majestic 12)
11: No Quarter
12: War Engine/Shockforce
13: Pride of Lions
14: Impetus*
15: Battle Systems 2 ed.
16: Rally Around the King
17: Reaper Warlord

* Free online rules

I may have missed one or two, but I think that I got them all.  Now I fully do admit that I am biased toward the 6th edition so much that a perfect world would be the combination of WFB-6 and WAB.  Given that, if I am impressed enough with a new system, then it is something notable for me.  From what I have been reading on the posts, some of these very much may not be what I am looking for based on the descriptions that some people have put up.

To me I would equate it to buying a car when you have brand loyality prevalent in your decision.  It is not that much of a suprise to me given that we invest a lot into this hobby.  Think of all of the time spend on reading through rules, painting miniatures, let alone the cost of the models.  So I am sure that I will be doing quite a few posts after I go through some of the rule sets.  Of course I am going to try out the free online ones first, and preferably get a game or two in to see how it feels as you play it along with the core rules review.  Even though the free ones are first in line, I have noticed that almost all of these rules are insanely cheaper than Games Workshop.  When I say cheap, I mean the most expensive ruleset so far including most armylists is cheaper than what the going rate is for the old paperback books after the price hikes of late.  Yet another example of GW's hubris. 

What is it you are looking for?

I believe that I should provide some attributes on what exactly that I am looking for.  Some of this may change and perhaps added as I go through the systems.  There may be a deal breaker that I dont know of just yet.  For right now, here is the following attributes that I am looking for:

1: 28mm model based game single bases.  I really don't want to rebase my dwarf army into large group bases. 

2: Same variety of units as what I am currently used to .  I want everything from monsters and warmachines to lowly infantry. 

3:  Robust magic, but not overpowering magic.  Odd from a dwarf player, but I have no problem with magic as long as it is not game-winning as it can be now in the 8th. 

4:  Close combat is incremental, and not all or nothing.  I like how I can take a few models off of my unit and not specifically loose the whole unit when I loose a combat.  It is anticlimatic to me when I just take a unit away.  Even when I loose that unit eventually I get the 300 feel of the combat. 

5:  Dice only and preferably only D6 dice.  If I really wanted a card game I would play texas hold-em.  and if I want a DXX dice game, I would proabably play DnD. 

6:  Main line company level game.  I am not looking to play games where a unit is a batallion, nor am I looking for my faction to have 20 models.  Skirmish games is a different analysis and deserves different parameters.  Note, I have no problems with skirmish units. 

7:  Must have atleast the standard fantasy factions that we all know and love.  I dont want to see fishmen with no elves in sight. 

8:  None of the annoyances of the current version of WFB.  I dont see how I can elaborate further. 

As stated before, the list will most likely grow as I go through a few of these and determine what I like and dont like.  I will try to have a running ranking to see what I like given what I have already gone through.  I have already downloaded a few of these rules, and I can tell some differences.  Some are over 20 years old, and will not ever change.  Some are just coming out and will be subject to change.  Having clunky rules is not a problem with me, which should not be suprised given my penchant for the 6th edition.  Truth be told I am interested in seeing what is out there exactly.

A moment of Clarity

I had a moment of clarity over the past week.  For those who follow my blog proabably already know, but for those who don't, I am not buying as much as I used to from GW any more.  There are several reasons why this is the case.  One is the price hikes that everyone is complaining about.  I don't deny that I am curtailing my purchases for that reason.  The fact that I am not playing as much as I used to in Fantasy has definately put a damper in my purchases as well.  My personal financial situation also has limited my options as well, among other reasons. 

What I have been doing as of late is putting a lot of things on the auction block.  I have sold all of my new Bretonnians that I had, as well as most of my chaos army that I still had in boxes.  What I have been doing with the proceeds is to buy classic miniatures.  Predominately models that I have not really seen in a while if at all, but I have been buying some regular old metal Bretonnians as well.  I got them to have something to compare with other manufacturers, and also that I believe that you can never have enough variety in your Bretonnians.  So I am looking for models that fit what I have for the Bretonnians and yet still use them for WAB.  FireForge Games might do the trick for more flamboyant knights, and there are a plethora of manufacturers for a more subdued knight look. I have as of yet to make a decision as to where I want to go with them, but the magic 8 ball is saying both. 

Now I have also been picking up some Chaos models as well.  The older metal knights as well as the Marauders more specifically.  And now for the momenty that you have all been waiting for, the moment where I have what apparently Alcoholics call a "Moment of Clarity" this week (You can thank Pulp Fiction for that, especially when I have visions of Jules when I had it).  My moment of clarity is "why am I still looking for Marauders when the Viking range from a series of different maufactures should be just as good for my taiste?"  I really do see Marauders more as a Conan the Barbarian type of guys rather than the Chaos worshipers like GW is making them.  Likewise my ideas of Chaos Warriors is more of what you would see from the movie "Willow" as well rather than what you get from GW.  I guess that this is yet another way that I am drawing away from GW. 

I was not that sure about how the historical ranges would fare.  Would they have what they need, and is it really what I am looking for?  Well, I did troll through some of the various manufacturer, and found that as a matter of fact, yes I think that I can do it depending on the comparison sizes for viking ranges.  I have not found anything, but I am also looking for Atilla the Hun, or Cossack troops for variety reasons in a Chaos army.  Chaos was my only holdout for human armies that I was going to collect GW models, but with the exception of Chaos Warriors, I believe that is not going to happen as well.  If anyone has any ideas as to what would be good "Kurgan" Marauder, or Chaos Warrior models, I am all ears. 

This is not just stopping at human armies as well.  I collected characters from the Vampire Count Ranges of GW as well as some parts of elite units, mainly because they are cooler models that what GW is using now, and I really did like the bloodline idea back in the 6th.  As far as common troops I really dont have much, however Mantic Games is really catching my eye.  I need to take a look myself with these guys to see if it is what I am looking for, but I am liking what I am seeing.  Some factions that I want to or already are collecting simply have no comparison in my opinion. I really like the Elf lines from Games Workshop, and I have not seen many other lines that compare to them, along with the Orc and Goblin line.  The Chaos Warriors line may be one of them, I have simply not looked for an alternative just yet.  Reaper is another option but on average is not my style. 

I am also looking very carefully as to what is in my inventory that I really want to continue based on the looks of the range.  For instance, the new dwarves are by far a different army type than what I have here in many aspects.  I like a lot of what I have seen in the army but right now I am not sure if this exactly what I want to do with part of my dwarf army.  Despite my penchant for GW Orcs and Goblins, I may be looking for an Orc replacement that is more slimmed down and would fit the other ranges that I am looking for. I am not sure at the moment for new line of orcs, and I may look at classic ranges from GW as well to see what the differences is.  Wood Elves are another quandry for me as well.  I can either use the army currently sold which "looks" like they fit with the other Elf lines, or to collect the older line, which has a limited scope of models compared to the new models, but still looks great.  The good news is that if I dont see myself fielding a classic wood elf army, I can always play a Silvan High Elf army in the likes of Averlorn should I decide to collect the classic wood elf armies.  Clearly I am going to make a few decisions over the next month or two to see which way I am going with what is my primary army for some of the factions that I collect, and not to mention that more comparison pictures will be down the pike as well. (Oddly enough, I dont see that many people doing this for fantasy figures, however I see it all the time for historical figures.)  Either way both my wallet and my WAB armies will benefit no matter what.