Fast & Furious AoS One Dayer, Leeds

Attended my first AoS tournament last weekend, Fast and Furious in Leeds. It was a one dayer, but having 5 games of 1000pts rather than the standard 3 of 2000! I took my newly finished Freeguild list.

Order

LEADERS

Freeguild General (100)

- General

- Artefact : Relic Blade

- Command Trait : Reckless

Celestial Hurricanum With Celestial Battlemage (320)

Witch Hunter (60)

UNITS

Freeguild Guard x 10 (80)

Freeguild Guard x 10 (80)

Demigryph Knights x 3 (200)

Freeguild Greatswords x 10 (160)

TOTAL POINTS: 1000

My first game was vs. Ed Bennett's Stormcast. One of the more worrying lists I'd seen prior to the event, with 4 Fulminators!

Ed Bennett

Order

LEADERS

1x Lord-Cellestant on Dracoth 200

- General

- Trait:
- Artefact: 

UNITS

5x Judicators 160

5x Judicators 160

2x Fulminators 240

2x Fulminators 240

Total: 1000

Thankfully (or maybe not) Ed had to swap out 2 Fulminators to fit into 1000pts, replacing them with a Lord Relictor and Lord Castellant with Gryph Hound. This came in handy for Ed as the battleplan we played ended up being Three Places of Power!

He got first turn and rushed his heroes onto the 3 objectives where they all stayed for most of the game, he got a major win. I was too cautious in the first turn I think, should have ran up and tried to get the heroes off the objective ASAP. I did manage to kill his Lord Celestant with my hurricanum, Castellant with my Demigryphs, and one unit of Judicators, and actually nearly tabled him by the end! But I got no points for the Objectives.

Second game was against Matt Hinton with Bonesplitterz

Matt Hinton

Destruction

LEADERS

Wardokk (80)

- arcane treasure: Mystic Waaagh! Paint

- extra spell: Roll each game!

- Big Spirit Stikk

- extra spell: Roll each game!

- extra spell: Roll each game!

- extra spell: Roll each game!

UNITS

Wardokk (80)
Wardokk (80)
Wurrgog Prophet (140)
- General
- Trait: Waaagh Monger
- Artefact: Big Wurrgog Mask
Savage Orruk Morboys x 10 (120)
Savage Orruk Morboys x 10 (120)
Savage Orruks x 10 (100)
Savage Boarboyz x 5 (120)

BATTALIONS
Kop Rukk (100)
Drakkfoot Warclan (60)
Total: 1000 points

The battleplan this time was escalation. I managed to get the first turn and ran  units (sword and board guard and the greatswords) onto 2 of the objectives. The demis managed to briefly get on the 3rd objective before being smashed/blasted off by Matt's Orcs and powerful magic phase. I kept two units on objectives throughout the game for a major win! My hurricanum was the unit of the match here, with it's Storm of Shemtek damaging his boarboyz early on as well as other bits. 

I think Matt spent alot of points on wizards that didn't manage to do much in the game + two battalions that reduced the numbers in the army. Having said that there was still a whole load of orcs on the board! ice one to Matt for taking no shooting in a Bonesplitterz army too! Very characterful.

Next up on table 6 (!) was Jon Green Order alliance army. Another army that I looked at before the event and was very scared of... I just knew somehow I'd end up facing it!

Jon Green

Order

LEADERS

Auric Runesmiter (100)

- General

- Trait: Tenacious

- Artefact: Talisman of Blinding Light

Kraggi (20)

UNITS

Kurnoth Hunters x 3 (180)

- Scythes

Kurnoth Hunters x 3 (180)

- Scythes

Kurnoth Hunters x 3 (180)

- Greatbows

Kurnoth Hunters x 3 (180)

- Greatbows

Skinks x 10 (80)

Skinks x 10 (80)

Total: 1000

Kurnoth Hunters and Skinks running down to take my objective.

The battleplan for this one was Take and Hold. I tried to run my faster units down the flank to get him off his objectives, but didn't get past the Kurnoth Hunters! He ran one unit of Kurnoths down to my objective to kick off the defending Freeguild Guard, and ran a unit of Skinks down to claim it. I managed to kill the skinks with my other Guard unit, and thought I'd managed to get a draw (or at least on to kill points). 

My attempt at taking Jon's objective!

Last turn of the game Jon ran down his second Skink unit trying to get onto my objective. I charged in my Witch Hunter hoping to hold them up, but due to the Skinks run from combat ability, they managed to get onto my objective to get a major win for Jon! 

My last game was against Nigel Chorlton, probably the number one army I wished not to face! Ha.

Nigel Chorlton

Death

LEADERS

Vampire Lord (140)

- General

- command trait: Ruler of the Night

- Artefact: Ring of Immortality

UNITS

20 x Skeleton Warriors (160)

10 x Zombies (60)

2 x Morghast Archai (240)

BEHEMOTHS

Mourngul (400)Total: 1000 points

Oh Dear

The mission was Gift from the Heavens. Nigel had me go first, I put Mystic Shield on the Hurricanum for my turn. In hindsight I probably should have at least started to move up the board! But I was hoping to weaken either the Morghasts or Mourngul with the Hurricanum first. His turn he ran everything forwards apart from a unit of Zombies to hold his objective when it came down. Not sure who got the double turn but my objective came down on my right near my Demis, who ran onto it, his came down on his right next to his zombies. Unfortunately for me his Mourngul was very close to my objective at this point! It took a couple of turns but it eventually killed my Demis to claim my objective. 

More Oh Dear!

I pushed what I could up the left flank, Greatswords, General and Witch Hunter. The greatswords came up against his Vampire Lord, who quickly killed them all! My Witch Hunter shot his pistol at the Vamp Lord, doing 3 damage! Then I chardged in the Witch Hunter and my General. The Vamp killed the Witch Hunter to avoid his extra damage to wizards attack, then my general eventually managed to kill the Vampire Lord! The Vamp had the Ring of Immortality so came back with d3 wounds, and promptly charged back in to try finish off my General. In the moment of the tournament for me, my general fluffed all of his Damage 3 attacks, but his horse finished off the Vampire Lord! Major win to Nigel!

Cheers to all my opponents, had a great day and managed to get my first tournament win! Sorry to the guy I was meant to have in the last round, hope you didn't get too badly trounced by the ringer!

The Order - New Army Thoughts!

I've wanted to start a new army for a while, having done most of the things I wanted to do with the Nurgle army (although there is of course always more to do!). I decided to begin a Devoted of Sigmar army, as I liked the idea of Flagellants being buffed by a load of Warrior Priests! In typical fashion, I have so far painted exactly one Devoted model, my Excelsior Warpriest. I've instead focused on AoS-ing some spare Bretonnians. I felt these would fit the aesthetic of the Devoted more than the traditional Empire equivalents. I also had a spare Island of Blood elf on griffon I was dying to convert into a Freeguild Lord on Griffon, as well as needing to fill out the army until more Devoted of Sigmar stuff is released for AoS.

I'm beginning to stockpile stuff for the Devoted lot, but for now am building up my Path to Glory warband for Hobbyhammer's Realm Hoppers event. On the workbench currently are 3 Demigryphs and 10 Greatswords, which will act as the hard units for the force (if I ever get a game in!).

As I said before, up next on the blog should be a unit of Demigryph Knights, which I've come up with a pretty interesting backstory for!

Interspersed with the photos below are pieces of fluff written for the Realm Hoppers campaign for each unit.

Blub was even more tired than usual. His regiment had been on the move for as long as he could remember. Even through absolute fatigue however, he knew each and every man would follow the Order to Aqshy and back to achieve their goal, even though it seemed unfathomable to these common men.With their lives on their backs, Blub's men were scouts of the assembled Freeguilds of Azyrheim, part of which had been attached to The Order long ago. Moving through the Realm of Beasts at the forefront of The Orders forces, they were tasked with tracking any signs of Chaos they could find, with particular importance given to that of the servants of the pus god Nurgle...

The first unit I did for the army, old metal Bret Squires (hence the varnish)

Lord Constantine was inducted into the Order after being gifted with armour plate and parchment from the Holy Stormcast after serving them in Azyrheim in his early years. Constantine brought his Freeguild detachment with him on his Pilgrimage with The Order. Only he of all the Freeguild is fully briefed in The Order's purpose.

Constantine rides his griffon Dimfeather into battle, raised by Constantine himself from an egg gifted to him by the griffon handlers of Azyrheim.

This is the dude I converted from the Island of Blood griffon. I heavily underestimated the green stuff work needed after chopping off the elf rider! Doesn't look too bad from a safe distance though. I'm really happy with the rider however. I wanted to convey a more priestly look to the model, rather than the standard guy charging with lance and shield with a helmet on. I feel I achieved this with the less aggressive left hand and lowered lance, plus the bare face, which incidentally covers the eyes, something which I intend to do with all the priest type characters in the force as a narrative element.

Many priests of The Order give up their names and titles upon entry. They each adopt hoods to cover their eyes, needing only the light of Sigmar to guide them...

The hooded head came about as I wanted to really differentiate between this model and the stock Warpriest from the Silver Tower set. I also changed his weapon into something other than a hammer, to link him to the units in the army.

Many Freeguild Guard followed Constantine and The Order out of Azyrheim, none understood the hardship they would face out in the Realms. Constant travel, war and fatigue soon took it's toll, only the hardiest of men still survive.

These guys are standard Bret Peasants, now used as freeguild guard. Tried to do something different with their shields, as I felt such a large surface area of the model deserved something other than blank colour.

The colour scheme for the army is;

Reds: Mephiston Red, Agrax Earthshade, Wazdakka Red

Greys: Eshin Grey, Skavenblight Dinge, Adminstratum Grey

Bones: Bleached Bone, Agrax Earthshade, Bleached Bone + Skull White

Skin: Kislev Flesh, Agrax Earthshade, Kislev Flesh + Skull White

Metals: Leadbelcher, Agrax Earthshade, Mithril Silver 

Rust: Typhus Corrosion, REyza Rust, Mithril Silver

Weathering/Bases: Doombull Brown, Light brown (can't remember which!), Typhus Corrosion, Doombull Brown, Light Brown.

Cholothrax the Ascended + Future plans!

Hey guys, real late to be posting this, but been a busy summer! Here's my complete Daemon Prince / GUO based on the Glottkin kit! Unlike my other daemons, I used a base of Ogryn Camo for the skin, as I liked the official paint scheme for once! This was followed by Biel Tan Green wash, then 5050 mix of bleached bone and ogryn camo for the highlight! Purple was Screamer Pink washed with Druchii Violet, followed by pure red for some highlights! The horn areas were the most time consuming by far, I tried to blend from Doombull Brown to Bleached Bone! Quite hard but think I did an OK job... this was washed with Agrax to further try to blend the two colours!

Here's the fluff for him -

Thanks to Cholothrax's successful alliance with the Skaven of Clan Festerscar, the Rotbringers were experiencing success after success in the Realm of Beasts. Cholophract remembered his time serving under Cholothrax before his disappearance. He often wondered what had happened to his brother after he followed the Prophet through the Rot Tree and if he'd live long enough to see him again... 

Cholophract and the other leaders of the Rotbringers were close to figuring out the correct ritual to traversing the Rot Tree, being able to use it in the manner of a regular realm gate, and when the moment came, he would mount an expedition into the other realms to find Cholothrax...

I'm now focused on the next Rise of Empires narrative campaign, and will be rolling up a Free Peoples army using the Path to Glory tables beginning in September! I'll also try to post up about my Renegade Guard progress at some point!

May's Complete Hobby Projects

Hi guys, busy hobby time in May for me, aimed to get three warscrolls done for Rise of Empires' May challange. Got a fluff post over there too continuing mine and Patrick's joint Rotbringer / Skaven story.

First of the three warscrolls is Damphead, my herald of Nurgle. I used one of the guys from the Glottkin set for this guy, deciding to swap his head for a Plaguebearer one. I feel that, between the head swap and posing of the head, it changes him into a completely different model! I tried to ref. the Glottkin's tentacle on the Nurgling on the base there.

I'm particularly proud of the rust work on this guy, I think I've pretty much perfected this now, with the addition of a final step of drybrushed Mythril Silver on top of the Ryza Rust in various places.

Next up is the Prophet of Nurgle, counts as a Rotbringer Sorceror in game. Tried something really different with the skin on this guy. Pallid Wytch Flesh with a Druchii Violet wash. Really happy with that, but am wanting to use this skin on other things, but struggling to think of anything, any ideas anyone?

Love how the green contrasts with the purple on him.

Finally I did another unit of Chaos Warriors. Kind of slept through these guys, left on a couple fo Khorne symbols by accident... Pretty much the same process as my last batch of warriors, but with the added Mythril Silver step on the rust.

This month I'll be working on a unit of Minotaurs, a couple of Clanrats... and possibly building the Glottkin/GUO! If I can pluck up the courage to do it that is...

The Prophet of Nurgle - Complete!

The Proph glanced around the Rotbringers camp lazily. Is this really what Nurgle evicted him from his putrescent pasture in the Ninth Realm for? What had he done to deserve this? It didn't matter anyway, The Proph would follow Nurgle unquestioningly. He was tasked with guiding the Rotbringers to victory in the Realm of Beasts, and if that meant granting that buffoon Cholothrax daemonhood to achieve this goal, then so be it...

Had a lot of fun painting this guy, starting with a grey undercoat was a good choice, as it meant the robes which form a large part of the model just needed highlighting. The other main area of the model. the skin, was really fun to do. I used a new combo (for me) of pallid witch flesh over kislev flesh, followed by a druchii violet wash. I thought I'd try something different with the flames, warboss green, biel tan green wash, followed by  warboss green again and a yellow glaze!

Up next is another unit of converted Bloodreavers and a Herald of Nurgle to round out my Nurgle Host daemon battalion...

April's Hobby Recap

Hi guys, here's what I've been up to this month!

Started with this unit of Bestigor.

I added bellies to most of them, plus rather badly done masks to make them resemble the old pestigor (I'm hoping to redo these soon). The champion got a rather more in depth conversion than first thought to be able to use that Blight King Scythe, but I think it came out ok in the end!

I'm rather more proud of this next unit, 10 chaos warriors converted from Bloodbound Bloodreavers! I shaved off all of the Khorne Iconography and replaced some with my custom Nurgle symbol. I'm particularly proud of the rust effects on these guys.

I think this guy in particular has the best rust effects, you can really tell the difference that using Typhus Corrosion has under the rust paint!

Here's the (out of focus) champion for the unit, you can see the various effects paints used; Blood for the Blood God, Nurgle's Rot and the rust paints. Also on his forehead is an example of the shaved off Khorne symbol followed by a sculpted custom Nurgle symbol.

Finally here's the banner bearer for the unit. He had a massive Khorne symbol on the banner so I had to put greenstuff over it - I tried to make it so it look like a flag, but carved the Nurgle symbol into it as well. 

This month I'm going to be working on another Rotbringer Sorceror, this time taken from the Glottkin kit... Hopefully going to try my hand at scratchbuilding a sign on his base, using plasticard for the first time... 

April Challenge Complete!

Hey guys, managed to get through the April challenge of Rise of Empires by the skin of my teeth...

First up we have the Beastlord Gygax -

Really happy with this guy, aside from the terrible attempted fire on his base! Any tips on improving that? This is the first time I'd used the combo of Typhus Corrosion and Ryza Rust, I may have gone a little overboard on it... Also happy with the green gauntlet, heavily washed so as to hint at magical properties.

Next up we have Gygax's retinue of Best/Pestigor -

Not exactly happy with the green stuffed masks or paint job on these, they coincided with the birth of my baby so wasn't exactly in the right frame of mind. I intend to redo the masks as well as green stuff a little detail onto the banner, similar to how I've done in the next unit...

Finally we have a unit of Chaos Warriors. These guys are obviously converted from the Khorne Bloodreavers. Great models, I particularly like the helmets and weapons on them, and how they visually tie in with my Chaos Lord (pictured below for reference).

I removed any Khorne symbols, replacing some with my Nurgle symbol. Then when painting, I added more Nurgle elements, including green clothes, Rust, Nurgle's Rot and some blood for good measure. I've got another ten of these guys that I'll hopefully convert a little more thoroughly, maybe even using them as chosen?

Here's the price breakdown for the monthly challenge -

Beastlord - £9.50
Bestigor - £25.50
10 Blood Reavers - £17.50 (Half of the 20)

Total -52.50

My next post will be a narrative post on Cholothrax's very own Path to Glory...