Welcome back to the Vault! It's May Day and that means the Mayhem tournament is almost upon us, and I've been slapping paint on my last few models for the event. As I'm still trench-deep in painting Iron Warriors (and loving it!) it was inevitable I'd be taking the IV Legion to war.
Welcome back to the Vault! October is here and that means it will soon be time for Octoberfest; First Founding's annual autumnal 40K tournament. Personal circumstances mean I won't be playing this time round but I have promised to provide the usual pre-event analysis and predictions! So let's indulge in some PunditHammer!
There are 30 attendees who are bringing 20 different factions between them. For the purposes of this analysis I've decided to cover each Space Marine chapter as a different faction since each has a different supplement to provide variety to how they play (and lets face it a Dark Angel is not the same as an Ultramarine).
Welcome back to the Vault! The recent weather has been far too warm for painting models, but I have been spending some time assembling some models. If they are built I can play them, even if it's with committing the cardinal sin of unpainted models!
I've also had two games with the mighty Iron Warriors of the IV Legion. There's a lot to learn with a new codex, but I'm enjoying the army so far. My initial lists have centred around what's painted as opposed to what's competitive, but I'll change up the lists as I get more confident with the army.
I have four(!) units of Legionaries painted up; a lot of lists and reviews I've been reading about on the web seem to be minimising Troop choices and prioritising the cheaper Cultists, but I've got a definite lean towards the Power Armoured Spiky Boys as they are the iconic unit for the faction! (Besides if I want to run loads of chaff infantry I'll play my Guard).
Welcome back to the Vault! Today's post is a made of two halves, but bear with me. By pure chance I met an author this weekend; a lovely chap called Mark Llewhellin who writes and speaks about self development/positive thinking, etc. "Fill your life with positivity"; a great mantra to try to live by, and something which quite frankly I suck at. However I am looking for the positives in my hobby time (which is supposed to be fun)!
I've enjoyed my painting projects this year (more on that later); in particular the mini-terrain project of cargo containers, especially weathering the yellow box.
Welcome back to the Vault! I played a 1500 point game of 40K with my Grey Knights on Friday against the new Eldar. And got utterly battered. It was an enjoyable game but I made a lot of mistakes, starting before the game with poor secondary choices, continuing in deployment and then right through the game.
There were some poor dice rolls (at one point we worked out I'd done more wounds to myself via Perils than I'd caused to my opponent's forces), but ultimately I played like a muppet. Back to Initiate training for me!
Welcome back to the Officers Mess! Yesterday I attended First Founding's Doubles 40K Tournament, and had a fantastic day out! My write up will be briefer than usual; I'm recovering post COVID, and my energy levels are low at the moment. Enthusiasm and copious cups of tea saw me through the day.
I had teamed up with Scott who brought a Genestealer Cult force to run alongside my Guard. The sneaky cultists provided plenty of movement, tricks and close combat to complement the straight forward nature of my heavy guns.
Welcome back to the Vault! Next weekend will see 40 keen gamers attend the 2022 First Founding Doubles Tournament. Let's have a look at what factions players are bringing and teams have been formed. And then, as has become somewhat of a Vault tradition, I'll indulge in some punditry and make some predictions as to who will do well.
I don't think I've ever predicted the winner, but I've come close a few times!
Let's start by looking at the individual forces:
Welcome back to the Vault! I'm riding the wave of motivation post the Casual Serious RTT. I've got some ideas for new lists/tweaks to try out, but the imminent release of Chapter Approved with a series of points changes and modifications to army building rules may put a crimp in some of those.
Something more certain however is the need to base my Interceptors! I've got a few other models also in need of basing so I've tackled them all as a batch.
Welcome back to the Vault! First Founding's annual autumnal 40K tournament will soon be here, and has become something of a tradition it's time for me to indulge in some amateur punditry and pretend I know something about the state of 40K.
We have 28 players with 27 having turned in their army lists. Their factions have been published on the events page so lets see who's turning up.
Welcome back to the Vault my fellow Venturers! Every so often I like to take a step back from sharing the pictures of the minis I've been painting, and sharing cool stories from the games I've played to reflect on why we engage in these hobbies.
I had the great fortune to spend some time with Dave G over the weekend, and we caught up on all things 40K related, our latest painting projects and what we are looking forward to in the future. We are scheduling a game of 40K (the first table top outing for my Death Guard), and really looking forward to the opening of First Founding when lockdown finally buggers off.
Welcome back to the Vault! Hobby time has been incredibly limited this week, bar the very welcome Friday night D&D shenanigans of Immerel and company. (High level adventurers we may be, but it looks like we've been duped. Again. At least it wasn't by a group of giant monkeys like last time, so that's good I guess.)
I keep a notebook where I can scribble down hobby and gaming ideas; occasionally the muse will strike, and if I don't note it then inevitably I'll forget it. Currently I'm trying to come up with some 5th edition character concepts which may eventually get elaborated into fully fleshed PCs. The aim is to sketch out a character per class, so if the opportunity comes up to play something I've got a head start on what I'd like to try out.
Welcome back to the Vault! In today's post I'm going to expand on the previous Bard Stones post, again inspired by my friend Chris's blog. We've homebrewed a spell and set of rules for allowing Bards to enchant crystals to store Inspiration dice, so it seems appropriate that there's a poem to help aspiring Bards remember the properties of the various gemstones. Perhaps this verse is the Verbal Component for the Stone Singing spell?
Welcome back to the Vault! I've been spending some hobby time painting base colours onto another Death Guard unit and I'm pretty sure you don't want to see *more* pictures of half finished 40k models, so today's post is something different.
My friend Chris has been posting some articles about various properties associated with different gemstones. I've been on a bit of a D&D campaign planning kick recently and the articles got me thinking about incorporating some of this information into D&D.
Gemstones have long established associations with magic in table top RPGs:
Welcome back to the Vault once more! Hobby time has been pretty limited this week; I've played in the weekly 5th edition D&D game and the players have been plotting an upcoming battle (which I must blog about some time), but I really haven't felt any motivation to pick up a paint brush.
Having been a player in a regular game for almost a year has got my creative juices for D&D flowing again, and I've been toying with a few ideas for a new campaign/adventure setting. Nothing serious beyond some initial notes (a kind of mood board) at this point, but I'm thinking about committing some effort to it.
So a Dark Ages Arthurian-esque Albion campaign with plenty of opportunity to explore related mythology and influences:
Welcome back to the Vectorium! This week hobby time has been spent reading through the new Death Guard Codex, and making a concerted effort to finish the Plague Burst Crawler. The Daemon Engine is now complete and I'm happy with the results.
Welcome to the Vault! Today's post is a new subject for the blog; 5th edition Dungeons and Dragons. I've been involved in a campaign for a year or so now and really enjoying the play experience.
One of the aspects of 5th ed I like is how overt extra-planar influences have been baked into the core game; Celestials and Tieflings (extra-planar lineage species) are available for players, and Sorcerers and Warlocks have a variety of multidimensional bloodlines and patrons to choose from.
Happy New Year everyone! This time last year I was blogging about my gaming and hobby activities during 2019; how different 2020 has been.
Lockdown and social distancing has meant there has been a lack of face to face gaming, however I've filled the void with plenty of painting and gaming/hobby activities via the wonders of the Internet.
Without the regular tournament events in the diary my painting has been driven on the basis of whim and fancy, starting with a number of fantasy models and culminating with a mini-40K Death Guard project.
Welcome back to the Vault once more. I should warn you that today's post is a bit of a ramble; it's not the usual "Varchilde slowly paints another model affair", and there might be a moan or two.
Games Workshop has been dabbling over the last couple of years with products outside of their bread and butter model kits, paints and rulebooks. I'm thinking of the child-friendly novels, Funko Space Marines, and the Blind Pack "Heroes" ranges. Whilst a lot of these items don't particularly interest me, I think providing more "cool stuff" for hobbyists and fans who do like these product types is great.
One sort of merch I usually avoid are the "lucky dip" types. I don't understand the appeal of Loot Crates; yes you may end up with items worth more than you've spent on the purchase, but if it's a load of stuff I don't want then it's worth to me is zero. I'd rather buy the items I want with certainty than gamble.
Recent posts have covered my initial forays into painting Death Guard, and I've fallen in love with the detail and individuality of the Plague Marine models. So when GW announced the UK release of the Death Guard "Space Marine Heroes" series my interest was suitably piqued.
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Welcome back to the Vault. Usually at this point in the blogging year I would have been working towards Octoberfest and writing about the process, culminating in the Punditry Posts and Tournament Report. Alas the tournament has been cancelled and with the local area heading into Tier 2 lockdown even games with friends at home are not possible.
So this means my hobby focus will continue on modelling and painting, and I've written my first Death Guard list to guide my efforts.
