Another Change of Direction

Well it seems that my wargamming is going to take another new fresh change of direction.  I did plan on painting a Dark Elves army, but the army is being sold on ebay.  Got to admit after purchasing the miniatures I couldn't find the motivation to paint them.  Plus with the new Warhammer Fantasy rules coming out next month, and I think the Ogres and Warriors will need some more units painting.  Will still definitely be playing the new Warhammer Fantasy rules.  But a new army is being put on hold probably until next year.

Reason being... Well recently my son Tyler has got back into the hobby.  So instead of investing in another Warhammer Fantasy army which can be very expensive, we opted for a demo game of Warmachine at Maelstrom Games.  Having had the demo Tyler has opted for a Khador force and I have chosen the Protectorate of Menoth purely for the painting possibilities.  Hence the selling of the Dark Elves army to aid in purchasing two Warmachine armies and the Rule Book.

Also I won the Infinity rule book at Summer Incursion for my last place.  At first glance of the book my initial reaction is that it looks like a kids game, with a cartoon look n feel.  But Dan at Maelstrom Games informs me that is it one of the best tactical games that they sell.  So will probably be putting together a small force to play some Infinity.

Plus recently myself and Tyler have been attending a few gaming nights at Maelstrom Games playing Warhammer Fantasy up until now.  
Whilst there I noticed some people playing Black Powder with Napoleonic 28 mm figures.  The battlefield looked stunning, this has really caught my eye.  So will probably get some Vitrix or Perry miniatures to paint, see how that goes.  Will start with painting some units and get the rules at a later date.

So the title of this blog is going to have to change may be to "My Wargamming Blog", and possibly change the banner!  Will have to find the time to make some changes!

Summer Incursion Aftermath

Had a brilliant weekend, six great games and opponents.  Tournaments at Maelstrom Games always live up to expectations.  The tables, scenery, food and overall experience was excellent as always.

The gaming hall during Saturday morning

Game 1 - Andy with Tomb Kings

Loss by 1298 victory points (Massacre).  Andy only took three units of chariots, which all ended up in his dead pile.  The Ogres high strength attacks took care of those!  Yet I couldn't get to grips with the scorpions and magic.  Excellent game and I didn't expect to get anything out of Tomb Kings.  

Game 2 - John with Beastmen

Loss by 2087 victory points (Massacre).  This was a bloodbath!  A very different build of Beastmen army to that I had faced before, with a lot of of monsters.  The minataurs are nasty especially in a unit of six.  Everything I threw at them just bounced, but in the end the unit was below half strength.  John managed to remove all of my army from the battlefield, it wasn't pretty on the start of turn 6 so I conceeded.

Game 3 - Dan with Skaven

Loss by 993 victory points.  After two massacres in the first two games I faced Skaven with the Furnance.  I did managed to kill the Furance in turn 5 along with a few other units.  But I just couldn't get to grips with Dan's army.

Game 4 - Sam with Daemons

Loss by 604 victory points.  This was Sam first tournament and Sam's first win!  Sam took a very small Daemon army with a Lord of Change, two units of 10 Bloodletters and two units of 20 Daemonettes with a few Heralds thrown in.  My Leadbelchers put a couple of wounds on the Lord of Change, and the Scraplauncher impact hits finally got him down to half wounds!  My Ironguts managed to see off the two units of Bloodletters, but the Daemonettes units stayed around.   This was a hidden deployment scenario, I wrote where in my deployment zone I was placing units then Sam deploys his whole army.  Sam deployed all of his units behind a building in his left corner and the Lord of Change behind a wood on his right.   Unfortunately this only left one flank available for me to attack and a very small frontage because of the building and other terrain.  

Game 5 and 6 were against brothers Dave and Edward Barfield.  Two of the best opponents I have ever played.  These guys play the game and have a laugh, absolutely the very best two games of Warhammer I have played by a mile.

The Barfield brothers face off for a battle!

Game 5 - Dave with Orcs n Goblins

Draw (15 victory points difference).  At last a Orc n Goblins player.  After 25 tournaments games since I started playing tournaments I finally played a Orc n Goblin army!  This was a random deployment (roll a dice and lookup on a table for which type of unit to deploy).  Again another length way deployment, so a lot of combats in the middle of the battlefield.   I didn't expect Ironguts to defeat Dave's two units of Black Orcs, but they did!  What aided in me losing the game were the Fanatics (of which I entirely forgot about!).  I found my self needing to slow down the progress of a large unit of Night Goblins, plus take some Wolf Riders on the same flank.  So I stupidly charged my Tyrant out of the Maneaters into the Night Goblins (Yep you guessed it)  two Fanatics putting four wounds on my Tyrant!!.  Then the Black Orc hero finished the Tryant off in the challenge.  A really fun game and at least I didn't lose!!

Game 6 - Edward with Vampire Counts

Loss by 1362 victory points (Massacre).  This is getting to be too much of a coincidence, facing Vampire Counts on the bottom table last game of a tournament.  In the seven tournaments I have played this is the third time this has happened.  As per usual another massacre against Vampire Counts.  Having only a single butcher and a single scroll I couldn't stop the contant raising, needing to keep the dispel dice for the movement spells.   Most of the Skellies and Zombies were upto full strength by the time my units hit them so a bit of a bloodbath.  I never play well against Vampire Counts with Ogres and this was again one of those games.  But Edward was an absolutely brilliant opponent to play.

Final Words

So in the final placing I finished in last place, my third last place in seven tournament!  But had a brilliant weekend, the Barfield brothers were the highlight of my weekend!  So where did I go wrong?  I should have played smarter against Sam and his Daemons, at least getting a draw.  Not remembering the Fanatics and stupidly charging my Tyrant out of the unit most definately lost me the win against Orcs n Goblins.  

For my last place I was awarded an Infinity rule book, which is a sci-fi skirmish game.  So will probably get a small force for that together and give it a try!  

I would like to mention Craig Johnson who also took a Ogre Kingdoms army and finished in 4th place.  Well done Craig!!  In the hands of a very good general the Ogre Kingdoms can put up a fight against the other armies.

I will most definately be returning to Maelstrom Games in the near future.  I am planning on attending the Dragon Slayers one dayer in July and the Autumn Incursion in August.

Tomb Kings and Beastmen

The draw for the first two rounds of Summer Incursion has been posted on The Warhammer Forum, and my Ogre Kingdoms have been drawn against Tomb Kings and Beastmen.  Both of these armies allow my Ogres to take an additional 250 points.  So what to take?  

I have the option of two units of two Leadbelchers, or a unit of two Leadbelchers and a unit of  three Bulls with additional hand Weapons, or a Hunter with Beastkiller, or a Hunter with Seigebreaker.

Against Tomb Kings I think my best bet is probably the Hunter with Seigebreaker auto hits and D6 wounds should make a mess of some chariots. I have seen this Tomb Kings army at Gobstyks earlier in the year and it has a bucket load of chariots, so tempted with the Hunter.  Also we have the Bullgorger cast on my three units of Ironguts for smashing chariots, should be fun.  Could the Butcher with his immune to poison tackle the swarms, may give it a go?

Against Beastmen again I am tempted with the Hunter with Seigebreaker or may be the two units of two Leadbelchers.  Depends on how many chariots I will be facing.

I haven't played against Tomb Kings or Beastmen with my Ogre Kingdoms yet, so the first two games should be fun.

D' Oh

I had a game over the weekend with my eldest son. I played with the Ogre Kingdoms and Tyler played my Warriors of Chaos in a 2,250 point game. The Warriors of Chaos came out on top with a marginal victory, which isn't bad as Tyler hasn't played for around three years and only just picked up the Warriors army list before the game!

One thing came up in the game which got me thinking. Tyler cast a spell with his level four Deamon Prince. The spell was cast successfully, yet Tyler picked up a dice to re-roll because the Deamon Prince had Tendrils. I said "Why are you doing that, the spell is cast?", Tyler replied "Because changing this roll of a one makes it harder for you to dispel". 

D' Oh.... Bleeding Obvious, yet I had never considered re-rolling a dice for a successfully cast spell, Stupidly in my mind I would only re-roll a dice for a unsuccessfully cast, that being my reasoning for that item being in the list. 

Yet Tyler didn't have any preconceptions behind my reasoning why the item was in the list. Because of this his view having only picked up the army list was completely different to mine. The item says can re-roll a casting dice, so he did. 

So a very valuable lesson learnt. Even though you don't need a re-roll to cast a spell, taking the option could improve the chances of Irresistible Force or making it harder to dispel.

This may seem obvious to others reading this post, but to me at the time it wasn't.