Sylvaneth

 I have a small and growing Sylvaneth army for Age of Sigmar.   I'm using that army as a chance to get comfortable with the airbrush and making heavy use of drybrushing and washes.  Speed is the name of game with that painting project.

The big centerpiece is the Treelord.  This guy was not too difficult to paint, believe it or not.

Necromunda Redux

 Back in the 90s, one of my favorite games was Necromunda.  We played that game a lot. I had a large Orlock gang, but my color choices weren't great for that gang.  Plus, the Orlock's had some of those...subpar plastic miniatures available to them. 

Not only that, but the 90s "red era" plagued the Necromunda painting and scenery that was displayed in White Dwarf.  There was a disconnect for me with Necromunda, the Underhive, and these brightly painted gangs.

Fast forward 30 years (yikes!) and there's a niche area of the hobby that took the inspiration of Blanchitsu style painting and super-charged it with the deep dark areas of 40K.  Combination of the Inquisitor game setting with Necromunda - Inq28 (there's also AoS28 - love that too). 

I was fascinated by this style of painting and thought if I ever decided to resurrect my Orlock gang and "fix" the horrible color choices, I'd try it in that style.  And it's a chance to heavily convert figures, too.

Here is my foray into this style of hobby.  I took two of the horrible plastic sculpts, converted them a bit, and went to town.  I really enjoyed this - although it's trial and error and I am quite the novice.

Test of Honour

 Quick post.  Got to play Test of Honour for the first time at HMGS Fall-In! 2022 with both of my boys.  We had such an awesome time, decided to get two small warbands, the boxed set (V2), and two small pieces of medieval Japanese scenery for "flavor".  The goal was for me to paint the warbands and build the scenery in time for the upcoming Christmas holiday so that we could play some games.

Happy to report that I've achieved this objective! These are a collection of Warlord and Footsore miniatures. 

Two warbands - Sohei Fanatics led by a Samurai with two ashigaru followers, and a full Ashigaru warband led by a Samurai.

Offer Board or "Ema"

Not pictured, a commander's "house". 

I'll post better pictures later and a brief battle report later.

Herohammer at Historicon 2022

 It was great to be back at Lancaster Convention Center in downtown Lancaster PA, for Historicon 2022.

This isn't a full convention review, but rather a quick recap of one of the games I played on Friday.

A big highlight was a Friday meetup with some of the Oldhammer in the US guys, where we played some Warhammer Fantasy 4th edition (Herohammer, more appropriately).  Since all of my miniatures are temporarily packed away during the basement refinish project, Anthony was kind enough to bring an entire High Elf army for me to use, while he played the Orcs and Goblins.  Dustin brought some scenery, and we were able to get a great game in.  

Apologies for the poor pictures - the lighting in that particular room was poor.  We did our best, including Anthony attempting to use his phone flashlight as an additional light source, to varying success. Anthony generated the army lists ahead of time and his miniatures are beautifully painted.  The pictures do not do them justice.

Summary - 1000 points per side.  Only one mage (on the High Elf side).  Orcs had a unit of boar boyz (awesome 3rd ed metal boars), wolf riders (also 3rd/4th ed metal), Big 'Uns (Knightmare games i think), Rock lobber, bolt thrower, and a boar chariot.

High Elves had two bolt throwers, unit of spearmen with battle standard bearer, two units of archers, a mage on a horse, and a chariot.  Mage drew Fiery Convocation from High Magic as his one spell, and it would become very instrumental later in the battle. 

Here's the overhead picture of the deployment (High Elves closest, Orcs and Goblins at top of picture).

The Greenskin battle line forms...

Wolf riders!

High Elf Reaver Knights, archers, and the mage (also the general).   I kept the chariot back as a reserve (at first...)

High army book and Battle Magic book in all their glorious colors.  Also can see the old card-based High Magic spells. 

The Reavers move up with the chariot in support

After High Elf turn 1...

The orc Boar chariot charges the Reavers.  The battle is joined!

A few turns later, and the spearmen had taken a number of hits from the orc stone thrower and bolt thrower.  The wolf riders were approaching on the flank...

...here the come...

fast forward a few turns - the orc boar chariot destroyed the reaver unit - the high elf unit then destroyed the boar chariot (in pursuit), and flank charged the boar boys.  At one point we thought the boars fled on a panic check but then we remembered the the orc general had the Crown of Command, and Anthony passed his leadership check. Phew!

Anthony unleashed his rock lobber on my High Elf mage, with a perfect guess of range, then he rolled a hit on the artillery die, and proceeded to roll a one for the wound roll! The mage amazingly survived.  Which was unfortunate for the Orcs because the mage just kept frying units with the Fiery Convocation.  Easily the MVP of the battle. 

The wolf riders swung around the building on the extreme left flank of the high elves - the remaining spearmen reformed and took the charge, but the wolf riders were still getting roasted by the Fiery Convocation spell. 

After turn 5 (or 6), we called the game and the High Elves won a close victory.  It was a lot of fun. I can't remember the last time I actually commanded a High Elf army. 

I couldn't stick around for the next game, which was Dustin and his awesome Dwarf army, vs another gent that came by and was watching the first game.  

Anyway, great fun.  Thanks again to Anthony and Dustin.  Hopefully we'll get to do it again at Fall-In 2022.

Edwin Earns His Keep

 Fought a quick game of WHFB 4th edition in the continuing story of the Warpstone Conflict.

A quick recap of the most recent events: 

Lord Edwin the 3rd, newly honored as the Baron of Lietzburg, was young to his title and had not yet earned the right to bear the family heirloom, the Dragon Blade - the traditional sign of the full and rightful Baron.  He would need to prove himself on the field of battle; until then he would have to carry the Blessed Sword, a secondary artifact in the family's armory. 

So far, Edwin had not fared well as a young commander, recently attacking a Dwarf keep in the mountains of Wissenland, thinking the Dwarfs had found the warpstone and if he could retrieve it he would finally prove worthy enough to take up the Dragon Blade.  Unfortunately for Edwin, King Azegor repelled the Talabeclanders and Edwin was seen fleeing the battle field. 

Edwin regrouped, and after a few months, raised a small force to invade the Loren Forest where his commanders believed orc and goblin camp of Waaaggh Grom the Paunch and Night Goblin boss Skragg was located.  Of course, Boss Skragg was not involved in this scrap because he was too busy licking his wounds after his embarrassing defeat at the hands of Dwarf King Azegor.  Grom was also not at the camp, so the greenskins would be led by Skullface (notorious Black Orc, riding his chariot The Basher.

So that's the setting. A small battle, roughly 1100 points per side (4th ed army books).

Some Deployment shots:

Newly acquired squig hoppers in the Orc camp

Yes, that's a unit of common goblins.  A sight rarely seen on the battlefield.

Lord Edwin's newly raised force. 

Now, some action shots. 

This is somewhere around turn 2 or 3.  The Doom Diver catapult malfunctioned and shot the diver straight ahead, bouncing along the ground slamming into the first thing it hit which was...

...Skullface's chariot The Basher!  The impact killed both boars, so Skullface had to abandon his ride and trudge forward on foot.

The two battle lines approach each other. The other orc chariot on the greenskin left flank when far across the hill trying to outflank the Empire, but Baron saw it and ordered his halberdiers to wheel and counter. The common goblins were led by the NG shaman, Zom the third.  Originally they were going to hold back until Zom realized his Waaagh spell was a hand-to-hand combat only spell, so...they reluctantly moved towards the skirmishing Stirland Archers.  On the right flank, Blok the troll passed his stupidity tests by staying nice and close to Skullface, advancing towards the empire cannon on the hill, "Old Blue".   Fred the Giant was roused from a long nap and decided the pistoliers looked like a tasty snack.

It's about to get interesting...

Fred and the squighoppers approach the Pistoliers (i need a name for them, too). 

Back on the Empire right flank, the orc chariot was short on the charge the previous turn, so the halberdiers took the initiative and charged into the chariot, winning combat, and breaking them.  This caused the goblins to lose their panic check and flee.  

The amethyst wizard looks on as the halberdiers begin to chase the fleeing greenskins 

In the magic phase, the wizard cast Hold Fast on the chariot (night goblin shaman Zom was fleeing so he could not dispel).  This meant they would be stuck and would not be able to rally on their upcoming turn, potentially setting up a charge and destroy by the halberdiers next turn (cunning!).  

Nothing much happened on the next greenskin turn - Skullface and the orc boys tried to charge but were short, setting up the counter charge by Lord Edwin and the spearmen.    The Halberdiers successfully charged the orc chariot that was stuck by Hold Fast, destroying them, and causing the goblin unit to flee off the board.  The entire goblin left flank had collapsed at the hands of a single empire unit.   Also, Old Blue fired the cannon at Blok the Troll, killing him outright!

This would be the penultimate combat, as we reached the 4th turn. The spearmen failed to cause much damage and the orc boys (with additional hand weapons) caused enough damage to win combat (despite the spearmen carrying the Banner of Defiance into combat) and rout the spearmen...however...

...Lord Edwin saw his chance to prove his doubters wrong and launched into combat against Skullface with a fury he had not previous brought to bear.  Edwin used the power of the Blessed Sword and defeated Skullface, causing to fail his panic check as well. 

At this point, I called the game for the Empire.  The young baron defeated the greenskin army led by Skullface, sacked their camp, and recovered the warpstone.  Upon returning to Castle Lietziger, the seniors of the family presented the most treasured family heirloom, The Dragon Blade, to Edwin III, hailing him as the full and rightful Baron of Lietzburg.

This battle was a lot of fun, and it's time name the amethyst wizard as well as the unit of halberdiers.