Citadel Miniatures – When Cannons Fade…

Bandai Space Marine! Games Workshop finally makes TOYS!

Many of us in the gaming world are also collectors of toys (myself included). For many years a large majority of us were scratching our heads as to why GeeDub hadn’t jumped on the action figure train. Well, as many of you know, last year saw the unveiling of a collaboration between Japanese toy giant Bandai and Games Workshop to unleash a Space Marine action figure, followed shortly thereafter by McFarlane Toys who would bring it to store shelves.

Our intrepid reporter, Matt Crump, took one for the team and wrote up a review for your reading pleasure. So get some Marmite and toast together and a cuppa and lets get started. Matt, over to you sir.

More Kraith!! Also WCF on Instagram.

Look at me! I made a banner that incorporates both aspects of this post! 🙂

Yes, WCF is finally starting to branch out, and now has an Instagram account. The account name is in the bottom left corner of the banner. I don’t want to type it in here in case bots are crawling the interwebs. The mechanicus needs to get on that sh*t and lock it down.

Score! Some retro GW figures – Cheap!

A chance visit to my local Half Price Books yielded an awesome result a week or so ago. Sitting out in the open was this little beauty:

Of course I swooped on it, especially for a mere $10! I wanted a set of these to paint up and possibly use in Judge Dredd as Juvies or something. It was a complete set too! I love finding some of the older stuff out in the wild still. The thrill of the hunt! (Even though I wasn’t on ‘the hunt’ that day).

So I’m considering picking up the new Necromunda, I really like the new Escher minis and I’m really liking the small scale skirmish games GW is finally embracing (again. It took how long for them to realize?). What’s everyone’s thoughts on it? Should I get it, or would I be better off picking up Kill Team?

Cheers!

Its official – Plastic Sisters of Battle drop in 2019!

I almost made a tit out of myself on the train ride into work this morning by (almost) shouting out “HELL YESSSS!”. I saw an email from GW with news from Adepticon that’s happening this weekend, so I took a look. Some relatively interesting stuff, but as I read on and on, I thought there maybe a chance that some Sisters news might be incoming, and in my head, I thought ‘maybe they’ve saved the best till last’.

They did not disappoint:

and here is what they said:

“Yup, plastic Sisters of Battle are on their way. For reals.

We know many of you have been waiting patiently (and impatiently…) for a long time for the Adepta Sororitas, and that for many of you this is more than ‘just’ a new army. So, we’re going to do something we’ve never done before – right up until the release, we’ll be bringing you updates on the Sisters of Battle, sharing images and snippets of info and a whole ton of behind the scenes goodness.

Emperor willing, the Battle Sisters of the Adepta Sororitas will be ready to take the fight to the renegade, the heretic and the unbeliever in 2019.”

So it looks like GW will finally get me back again in some form. Going by the recent Necromunda, Daughters of Khaine, Inquisitor Greyfax, Celestine etc etc, these new sisters plastics are going to be absolutely beautiful, and I for one, cannot wait.

Bravo, Games Workshop, bravo…

Wibbly wobbly timey wimey… stuff. 2015 already!

Happy New Year to everyone! I hope everyone had safe and happy holidays, and that everyone got plenty of minis to keep them going in 2015!

Indeed I feel as though the TARDIS has dropped me off not knowing where the hell the last 12 months have gone. Mind you, if I had a time machine, it would be irrelevant. Heck, even WordPress has changed it’s interface since I last posted… zoinks! Anyway, I digress.

I haven’t been following up too much on what’s been going on in the world of gaming. 2014 saw me drifting further away from Games Workshop releases and focusing more on historical, and tinkering with Judge Dredd miniatures. The latter did in fact reignite a passion for the 2000AD comics and I started picking up trade paperbacks etc of Mega City One’s most famous lawman. Great stuff!!!

Whenever I go into my FLGS I always drift around the GW area, probably more now out of habit than anything. Seeing that 2014 saw (yet another) release of Warhammer 40K (along with the new Space Wolves codex), I finally threw my hands up resignation. I hadn’t even had chance to test out my Wolves with 6th ed rules yet, and here we were, only 2 years later, with 7th edition. I frankly couldn’t be arsed to fork out another $75 (or however much it is now) for the rules and another $50 for the Wolves ‘dex. So I stand at this point now: I’ll play with my forces if it’s 5th or 6th edition, and won’t even entertain the idea of buying any more rule sets until my beloved Sisters get a proper codex release and accompanying figures. Get to it, GW!

This decision did help with my ability to not worry too much about getting 40K figures painted. I think I’m the only one in our group now who’s even mildly interested in it at this point anyway, so I turned my attentions elsewhere.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, me and my friend Colin decided that we wanted to venture further into the past (we’d already been playing Flames of War) and thought we’d have a go at getting some dark age armies together, with him fielding Saxons and me leading the Vikings. We’re going to be using the Hail Caesar rules from Warlord Games for this. My 300 pt Viking force comprises an army general, and 3 commanders each leading a division of 4 units of 24 men, for a grand total of 288 foot sloggers… bugger!!! Work is underway on these forces with Colin leaving me standing somewhat in a cloud of dust! anyway, here is a peek at some Viking goodness:

These have been fun paint but holy heck, I have a ton more to do! I love how they look altogether though, and the payoff and satisfaction is quicker than say painting a squad of Space Marines. I can’t wait to roll the whole army out on the table!

As mentioned, Judge Dredd has been getting some paint table time as well. This time I was focusing on his deadliest of enemies… the four Dark Judges! Dodgy scale/size issues aside (see my review on the Judge Dredd Miniatures game), I had a blast painting these little blighters. It also offered me the ‘mid army burnout’ break I needed away from my Norsemen.

Then, tinkering on my phone, I made this:

Also, other mid-army burnout distractions I painted did actually include some GW miniatures. An Adepta Sororitas Sister and a Space Wolf who I don’t even think is table legal (can anyone clarify that for me?). I mainly painted this guy up because I wanted to see how the Max Mini jet packs would look, and they look GOOD!!

Very pleased how they both turned out!

Nine days into the new year, and it looks like my year is already filling up with plenty of projects. A multi-state project will be going on between me and some friends down in Florida. We all picked the Nurgle lord mini as our paint challenge, and we’re going to follow each others progression through out the whole project, an article will be posted here at some point soon. Additionally, a multi-country project will be also taking place with my buddy Matt over in the Motherland and myself spearheading “Project Death Korps”. Again, watch this space. This is all in addition to getting my dark ages forces prepped and ready for battle as well. Some of you may think I have bitten off more than I can chew. I say BRING IT! 🙂 Never a dull moment at the WCF HQ!

On that note, I shall leave you for now, dear readers. Thank you for all your support, your emails and your comments, it really does mean a lot to this old wolf! Stay tuned for lots more to come!!!

32nd Inquisitorial Guard – I salute you!

With the advent of no inducted Imperial Guard in the new Sisters of Battle ‘Codex’ (Codex being used in the loosest sense of the term) I have decided to part ways with my IG, painted to represent the 32nd Inquisitorial Guard (I wanted to distinguish them from the ‘regular’ IG troops.

I took them to my FLGS last night and put them up for sale in their cabinet for a modest $65 (only $5 more than buying a Chimera and a box of guard). I’ll leave them there for a month, and if they don’t sell, it’ll be off to Ebay with them. Is it sad that I got a little sentimental when I walked out of the store last night? I guess when you invest time, money and passion in something, you put a bit of yourself in what you produce, but it did feel like I was saying goodbye, lol!

Hopefully someone will be able to use them and give them a good home. Here are some pics I took last night before I took them to the game store:

Give ’em hell, boys!

Space Wolves – B&C paint challenge completed!

I just recently (by the skin of my teeth) completed my painting vow for the Bolter and Chainsword painting challenge. Here are my Grey Hunters!

I’m very pleased with how they turned out! let me know what you think!

Sisters of Battle… What is happening?

Hmmm. Suffice to say, I was deleriously excited when I saw the inside back cover of last months ~~Games Workshop Monthly Release Catalogue~~ White Dwarf and I noticed the little box that declared ‘Next month – Part 1 of the Sisters of Battle Codex!’. While I was disappointed initially by the fact that my girls only seemed to warrant a Chapter Approved WD codex, I got over it and moved on. I rushed up to my FLGS on Wednesday to purchase the latest issue (even after reading all the venom online about the codex) to see wtf all the fuss was about. I was pretty disappointed that a vast majority of the issue was devoted to Vampire Counts. The Sisters debut of the ‘new’ rules were stuffed at the back of the magazine almost like an embarrassing afterthought. A whopping 14 pages out of 120… I can only hope that next month will see the Sisters maybe even gracing the cover and taking center stage, although with the preview of next month being focused on Ogre Kingdoms, i’m not too sure. We are promised at batrep of the Sisters Vs. Orks, although elsewhere they said it was against Tyranid Hive Fleet Leviathan, so either they will publish more than one batrep, or they just did a shit job proofreading before going to press.

Now i’m not about to launch into whether this new set of rules is going to make them more competitive etc etc, as there are a deluge of blogs out there who are already doing that (and very well, I may add). I’m just trying to get my head around what exactly GW are doing with this army. A cursory glance at the first part of the ~~glorified pamphlet~~ Codex shows us a little bit in the way of the origins and key conflicts, then jumps straight into the Army Special Rules. I wonder if newcomers to the game will look at this and think ‘holy shit! this looks awesome! sod the other armies out there with their shiny books packed with background fluff, i’m rolling with these ladies!’. I guess I have to ask, has this been put together with current non-sisters players in mind, or are they simply appeasing an older crowd who play them? If it is the latter, then I’d be suprised, as i’m sure GW will want to milk as much moolah out of it as they can, so if it’s the former, it’s not particularly impressive. Shit, they’re even regurgitating old artwork for filler.

I’m not sure how I feel about the new Faith Points system. At the start of the Sisters player’s turn, a D6 is rolled, and this is the amount of Faith Points available for that turn. As mentioned on many other blogs, it makes little sense to have this the same for forces of any size. A 3000 point Sisters army would have a max of 6 Faith Points available? Seems a little goofy, considering the religious fervor these ladies are supposed to have…

Gone are Inquisitiors and their retinues, as well as allied forces of Imperial Guard or Space Marines. We do get Priests, with ‘Ecclesiarchy Battle Conclaves’ which is where Crusaders, Arco Flagellants and Death Cult Assassins have now been lumped. If I remember correctly, weren’t the arco’s weapons in the previous Codex classed as power weapons? They have added Feel No Pain, which I guess is pretty cool, and gone is that bloody horrible ‘stim injector death’ rule.

We don’t see an entry for the Repressor in this list. This was one of the things that was getting me excited about the new lists, was the posssibility of plastic sisters, and a plastic Repressor (any one who has attempted a FW one will know how much of a pain in the arse it is to put together). In fact, the only minatures in the book are old ones, so are they saving that up for the next issue? will they get new minis or will it be the old range redone in Finecast? No fire points on an Immolator now? No 12 inch ride-and-fire either? wtf?

Gone is Lord Karamazov on his ~~toilet~~ Throne of Judgement, and back is Arch-Confessor Kyrinov and Uriah Jacobus, who have returned from a well earned break between Codexes.

There are some interesting little tweaks here and there, but the army seems to be lacking the somewhat ‘medieval’ feel they had to them before.

On the whole, it seemed pretty anti-climatic. I can only hope that GW redeem themselves by releasing new minis, vehicles etc in the next issue, and while i’m not going to be sending my army off to Ebay just yet, their days may well be numbered.

Preparing for war!

By the gods! where has the time gone? it seems like only yesterday that I was at AdeptiCon hanging out with Dethtron and Evan… Well, I guess a new position at work, my computer at home taking a shit and generally being bloody knackered are the reasons that I haven’t posted in a while…anyway, enough of the excuses!

AdeptiCon was great fun, and a great chance to catch up with some people from the blogging universe. I met Tasty Taste, Brent, Sandwyrm and a couple of others from the HOP network (sorry, names are escaping me right now!). I also met Papa JJ from Dicerolla who is a gentleman! he approached me and Dethtron at the convention and asked if one or either of us were with Crusader, and thus, the ice was broken! Unfortunately we didn’t get to really hang out much, what with the tourneys going on, and our impending show that night at a venue that was only marginally bigger than my 3-year old’s bedroom. But, friendships were forged and i’m sure that we’ll be seeing Papa JJ again soon for more fermented grain beverages.

My one down point from the con was Forge World. I won’t go on about it, but this is definitely their second strike in my book. They had sod all I wanted at Games Day a couple of years back, and the same thing happened at AdeptiCon. I wanted the ‘event exclusive’ mini, a rather sweet ‘boarding marine’ in pre-heresy armor, but they had sold out. Way to go Forge World. They were painfully trying to get rid of some Eldar Titan that they didn’t want to have to cart home, and from what I understand they did end up taking it home. Well thought out lads…

Forge world: see all this really cool shit here?
me: sweet! hell yeah!
Forge world: well, you can’t buy any of it.
me: >sad face<

If any of you are familiar with the ‘Cheese Shop’ Monty Python sketch, it’s pretty spot on with my FW experience.

So, new Tomb Kings are imminent, and I am super excited. It’s put me into gear full throttle with painting my WFB army, which is also another reason I haven’t posted for a while.

I saw the leaked pictures and pretty much had a nerdgasm. I’ve heard on the interwebs a lot of hate toward the Sepulchral Stalkers/Necropolis Knights, but I think they’re really cool looking, and somewhat over-the-top, which I’ve been coming to expect from Fantasy Battle, considering recent releases. I actually also really like the thought of skeleton troops harnessing them and riding them, it’s just so ‘out there’ and quite refreshing to have this unusual take on what I believe will be a heavy cavalry class for this army. (about bloody time too!). The Sphinx is great too, and the model options just look incredible! I’m super excited about the Tomb Guard though. I actually held a box in my hand at my FLGS the other day, but alas it was still shrik wrapped, but it was on the ‘coming soon’ display. The down side to these guys is that they will be retailing for $41, the same price as a Stegadon… yowch! The one thing that I did find odd about them is the choice of head dress they are wearing, which looks distinctly more Mayan than Egyptian, in my opinion:

A small thing, which I don’t really care about, I just thought it odd… I also managed to thumb through the new army book too, which is gorgeous and lavishly illustrated in full color (yes, it will cost more too). Although we haven’t seen them yet, there will be another wave of TK stuff, as we have seen with other lines, GW will do an initial release, then a second wave. The second wave will consist of what look like plastic Ushabti (3 in a box for about $40 i’m guessing) and some new character figures, including some TK that looks like he’s appearing from a mound of scarabs. I’m hoping that new Liche Priests will be on the cards. Looks like we TK players are stuck with the gods-awful Screaming Skull catapult model, and I didn’t see anything about a new Bone Giant (I HATE that mini!) Having said that, I was in a bit of a rush, and didn’t get to look as deep into the book as I’d liked.

I was also half hoping that we would get new skeleton infantry minis, but alas it was not to be. The cavalry models seem to be out of scale with current horse models they make for other cavalry, which kinda sucks. I would’ve liked to have seen TK dedicated skellie minis, instead of the VCs ones with a couple of egyptian style upgrade sprues in there. There’s a lot I don’t use from those regular sprues, and won’t be using on anything else. Oh well, the pro’s defintely outweigh the cons for the imminent Tomb Kings, and I for one am a happy camper…

The release date of May 7th has totally put the firecrackers up my arse that I needed, and as I wanted to take a much needed break away from painting the Emperor’s finest, this has been perfect! I’ll be posting up some pictures of my progress in the next few days, so stay tuned.

Cheers for now

Crusader, Adepticon, oh, and some Sisters of Battle news…

Ultra quick post today my lovlies…

After what we thought was going to be a big shit dump of a mess, no thanks at all to Brauerhouse in Lombard, We’ve actually managed to secure a spot on a show for this saturday night for all those people at Adepticon who want to listen to some heavy metal. So, Brad, our He-Man-esque guitar player, whose pastimes include playing guitar for us, and wrestling dragons, managed to get us on the bill with She Likes Todd and Situation red. The best bit is it’s f*cking FREE to get in, and only a 10 minute ride from the Adepticon venue. For more in depth details on how to get to the show from Adepticon, be sure to swing by Dethtron’s blog, Dick Move, to get the information. So, come along, hang out, have fun, drink some beer, and pick up our brand new release EP – ‘Rise of the Templars’ for a mere $5 🙂

In other news, I found out yesterday, with thanks to the Blood Of Kittens network, that we have a little taster of what is to come for Sisters of Battle! HELL YEAH!! It appears to be a page from the upcoming new codex… Looks like Sisters will be ‘losing’ acts of faith as an ‘extra’ , but gaining some of them as standard special rules. I’m wondering if different slots will have access to different AoF? AND we see that Repressors are included as vehicle options. Could this possibly mean a plastic kit??? and WTF is an ‘arcaballista’? Anyway, i’m very excited, and you will be too, when you see the image by clicking here!

If you haven’t already, I urge you to join up with BoK, it’s a great network for fellow 40k bloggers.

Thanks for listening, and see you Saturday night!

Paul