Enemy Ships off the Starboard Bow!

Another week (and a bit) has passed, and more progress has been made on my painting goals:

• Painted one Cobra Cruiser, three Raven Frigates and one Raven Destroyer for The Uncharted Seas. Undercoated the rest of the fleet. This now gives me enough ships to form a 500 point fleet - enough to play against my opponents. I'll shuffle the rest of the fleet down my painting list until my opponents increase the size of their own fleets!
• Resumed painting two bases of Vassal and "Crusader" Knights for Field of Glory Teutonic Order army.

My Thaniras Elf fleet engaged in their first action last meeting. I was allied with a starter set of Shroud Mages against two starter sets of Bone Griffons. I decided to try something a little unusual with my first game, adjusting my list from the generic 'starter' fleet and trying out some of the cool Elven optional choices:

1. A squadron of 2 Cobra Cruisers
2. A squadron of 2 War Dragons
3. A squadron of 2 Raven Assault Destroyers
4. A squadron of 4 Raven Frigates

A couple of pictures taken during the game:

Just after the beginning of Turn 1. Some Bone Griffon Orcas have advanced, as have the Shroud Mage frigates and cruisers and Elven destroyers.


Sometime in Turn 3: The entire Elven fleet has swarmed two squadrons of Bone Griffon Orcas. One of the Orca squadrons remained safely submerged as their colleagues were dismembered by Elven Orb-fire and Marine boarding actions.

The game was great fun, and it was a real shame that we ran out of time. I am looking forward to my next game. I think this will be a game where the basics are easy to learn, but with many subtleties that will take a long while to master.

I also had a chance to field my freshly painted Angmar army in a game of War of the Ring. Due to a high number of characters in my army (captains and command for each of my main units, a shaman for my goblins, and three Nazgül including the Witch-King of Angmar), I was feeling a little dubious about being outnumbered by an Elven army! However, the game progressed well for me. With the Witch-King offereing 'moral' support to the orc mob, they zoomed across the table through a withering hail of elven bow-fire and managed to launch successfully into combat.

My spectre was taken apart by Gandalf almost as an afterthought, but my unit of Ghostly Legion managed to neutralise two huge Elven combat units behind some impassable terrain and keep them out of the fight (2/5 of his army!). The rest of my army was then able to concentrate on his three remaining units, assisted greatly by the spellcasting ability of my Ringwraiths. Being a scenario game (capture objectives), I was able to hold on long enough until my opponent conceded defeat. A great game, well deserving of a re-match in a couple of months time.

I've now resumed painting my Teutonic Order army for Field of Glory, as this is next in line to be completed. I've been trying to work out a list to field in the next tournament, and it is proving to be troublesome. Events in the FoG world seem to be indicating the might of horde armies fielding masses of cheap troops, with the highest scorers at CanCon listing no less than 18 battle groups in their orders of battle! I can't get anywhere near this with my Order, even fielding all my vassals as poor quality, so I'll just have to run with what I can and trust in the might of the Brother-knights' unstoppable charge!

Thaniras Scout Fleet Sets Sail

This time I have a pic! But, first things first.

• Painted two War Dragons, two Raven Assault Destroyers and one Cobra Cruiser for The Uncharted Seas!
• Undercoated the next load of Thaniras ships to be painted.

Hasn't been long since my last post, so not a whole lot to report. The ships and dragons were very easy to paint to a decent enough gaming standard. Not sure I'll have the entire fleet I plan to use next weekend painted, but I'll give it a good bash.

In other (related) news, I had a surprise delivery in the post today. It seems my arithmatic about how long it would take my last order to arrive was slightly awry, and waiting for me when I got home from work was the rulebook for The Uncharted Seas. This gives me a good week to get comfortable with the rules before my first game.

Well, here's the lates pic of my fleet. With a little luck, I'll be able to post about their first glorious victory in battle. More likely, it'll be admonishing their abysmal performance at sea...

The Cult is Blooded

No photos this post, nothing spectacular to show... That doesn't, however, mean that I have been completely idle (even if I am a little later than usual in posting...).

• 13 Moria Goblins and 20 Ghostly Legion completed. This concludes my Angmar army for War of the Ring, except for the movement trays. Only half-way through month two and a painting target has been reached! Not that it was much of a target...
• Started painting two Raven Destroyers, two War Dragons and a Cobra Cruiser for my Thaniras Elf fleet.
• Stuck together a Leman Russ Punisher and converted a standard Leman Russ into a Vanquisher (I knew the Basilisk I never use would come in useful for something... the Vanquisher now has a very long main gun...).

As implied in the above, my The Uncharted Seas fleet has finally been delivered. Quite happy with the way they look (except for, unfortunately, some excess resin lumps on two of the Assault Boat hulls). I was impressed to find that the fleet box came with a set of card game markers and turning templates. I plan on having at least a few models completed by the end of this weekend, and will post some pictures then.

The Chaos Renegade Militia had their first test run in a battle last weekend (with extensive use of proxies, so no pics there, either), pitted against the raucous might of a Noise Marine force. I was quite happy with their first action, despite a rather decisive defeat, and only made a couple of minor tweaks to my intended list.

The Daemonhost and his attendant plague zombies (Psyker Battle Squad) managed to surprise the Slaanesh with a corrupting blast that reduced their Predator to a pile of twisted metal and rust. The rest of the battle was rather non-eventful until they were all fried then ripped open by a pair of Obliterators deep striking in.

The Demolisher was a disappointment, a scattering main weapon shot failing to kill even a single Noise Marine, let alone the targetted Land Raider, then suffering Crew Stunned, Weapon Destroyed and Immobilised results in just two turns of enemy shooting. It then managed to get itself destroyed by the half-strength blast (S4) of my Daemonhost after it's psychic blast deviated off the Obliterators... /sigh.

The Punisher was deployed in a dreadful location, and took far too long (rolling 1's for it's Cruising speed movement) before bringing the Gatling cannon to bear. However, it more than made up for this by successfully 'obliterating' the Obliterators in a fusilade of laser blasts. It then went on to 'terminate' four Chaos Terminators the following turn. More than paid for itself!

The rest of the force was average. The mutant beastmen (Penal Legions) managed to absorb a bit of enemy fire (three even surviving!), and the command squad and one Disciples squad (Veterans) died gloriously in Nurgle's name bringing the fight to the Noise Marines in close combat.

Hopefully the tweaked force will behave itself a little better next battle, and with a little less use of proxy models! Now, time to get back to painting up some Thaniras Elven ships for Sunday-week's battle!

Land Ahoy!

Ok, keep the momentum flowing: progress! Not a huge amount of progress in the painting department, but at least I'm getting miniatures assembled...

• 14 Moria Goblins (WotR) completed (well - except for the bases... I'm getting slack with bases it seems...)
• Painting initiated on another 13 Moria Goblins (WotR), and 20 Ghostly Legion glued together and awaiting painting.
• The command squad of my Chaos Renegade Militia (WH40K) glued together, being: 1 Champion (Lord Commissar), 1 Icon bearer, 2 militia troopers, a militia artillery spotter (Master of Ordnance), and 2 mutated beastmen brutes (Bodyguards). The previously glued together Enforcer will work nicely as the Senior Officer of the squad.
• Finally, I glued together two of the Parliament Cavalry (WECW) that I received a couple of weeks ago. I'm still marvelling at the detail Warlord have managed to sculpt into their plastics!

The Forge World models are continuing to impress. The sword of the Champion had warped a little, but a short soaking in hot water and a bit of pressure quickly straightened it up. I found a sprue of chaos mutations from an old Chaos Marine box that gave me a nice set of conversion pieces to knock up the beastmen. Maybe I should start painting these guys before I lose a bit of inspiration...

The islands I started making for The Uncharted Seas have come up quite nicely! Five of them, large and small, should do quite nicely as a starting point. The darker flock in the pictures didn't apply very well with watered down PVA glue, so I had to change my plans slightly and use them only sparingly in crevices where they had more than a flat surface to stick to. Ah well, still happy with the result.

I also finally received word that my order for the Thaniras Elf fleet has been dispatched! With just a little bit of luck I'll get them before this weekend (yeah, right) and be able to start painting them - with just two weeks before the scheduled game at the February club meeting...